‘The scalp?’ asked Fabel.
Kristina nodded.
‘Where was it?’ asked Maria.
‘It was pinned out on the bathroom door. It took an age to clean.’
‘Just a moment,’ said Werner. ‘What time did you arrive at Herr Hauser’s apartment?’
‘Eight fifty-seven. Exactly eight fifty-seven a.m.’ As she answered, Kristina rubbed at a point on the surface of the interview table with her fingertip. ‘I’m never, ever late. You can check my appointment book.’
‘So after you found the scalp, you put it in the bin bag and started to clean up the door?’ asked Werner.
‘No. First I went into the bathroom and found Herr Hauser.’
‘Where was he?’
‘Between the toilet and the bath. Half-sitting, sort of…’
‘And you say he was already dead at this point?’ asked Maria.
‘Yes.’ Kristina’s eyes glossed with tears. ‘He was sitting there with the top of his head ripped off… it was horrible.’
‘Okay,’ said Susanne. ‘Just take a moment to calm yourself.’
Kristina sniffed hard and nodded. She absent-mindedly moistened her fingertip with her tongue and rubbed again at the same spot on the table top, as if trying to wipe off some blemish that was totally invisible to the others in the room.
‘It was horrible,’ she continued eventually. ‘Horrible. How could anyone do that to a person? And Herr Hauser seemed so nice. Like I told you, he was almost always at work when I was in to clean, but whenever I did meet him he seemed very friendly and polite. I just don’t know why anyone would do such a thing to him…’
‘What we don’t know or understand,’ said Maria, ‘is why anyone, if they found a murder scene, would choose not to contact the police but instead set about cleaning it up… and in the process destroy essential evidence. If you’re innocent, Kristina, why did you try to hide all traces of the crime?’
Kristina continued to rub at the invisible stain on the veneer surface of the interview table. Then she spoke without looking up.
‘They said I was mentally unsound when I killed Rauhe. That the balance of my mind was disturbed. I don’t know about that. But I do know that in prison, for a while, I was crazy. I nearly lost my mind completely. It was because of what Rauhe did to me. Because of what I did to him.’ She looked up, her face hard, her eyes red-rimmed and moist with tears. ‘I would have panic attacks. Really bad ones. Much worse than the one I had today. I would feel as if I were suffocating, being smothered by the air I was breathing. It was like everything I was afraid of, everything I’d ever been afraid of, and all that terror Rauhe had put me through… all coming together at the one moment. The first time I thought it was a heart attack… and I was glad. I thought I was getting out of this hell. The prison put me on suicide watch and sent me for sessions with the prison psychiatrist. They said I was suffering from extreme post-traumatic stress and obsessive-compulsive disorder.’
‘What form did the OCD take?’ asked Susanne.
‘I developed a severe phobia about contamination… dirt, germs. Especially anything to do with blood. It became so strong that I stopped menstruating. I spent most of my time in prison in and out of the hospital wing. Anything could spark me off. The panic attacks became more and more severe until eventually they put me in the prison hospital wing permanently.’
‘What did they treat you with?’ asked Susanne.
‘Chlordiazepoxide and amitriptyline. They took me off the amitriptyline because it zonked me too much. I also got plenty of therapy and that helped a lot. If you’ve been through my record, you’ll know I was released early.’
‘So the therapy worked?’ asked Werner.
‘Yes and no… I got much better and was able to cope. But it was after I was released that I really started to get better. I was referred to a special clinic here in Hamburg. One that only deals with phobias, anxiety disorders and obsessive-compulsive disorders.’
‘The Fear Clinic run by Dr Minks?’ asked Maria.
‘Yes… that’s the one.’ Kristina sounded surprised.
There was a brief silence as everyone waited for Maria to follow up her question. But she did not, instead holding Kristina in her steady blue-grey gaze.
‘Dr Minks worked wonders,’ Kristina continued. ‘He helped me get my life back. To get myself together again.’
‘It must have been effective.’ Werner leaned back in his chair and smiled. ‘For you to become a cleaner. I mean, does that not mean you face your worst fear each and every day?’
‘But that’s exactly it!’ Kristina suddenly became animated. ‘Dr Minks got me to confront my demons. My fears. It started in small steps, with Dr Minks there to support me. I was exposed more and more to the things that would trigger my panic attacks.’
‘Flooding…’ Susanne nodded. ‘The object of terror becomes an object of familiarity.’
‘That’s right – that’s exactly what Dr Minks called it. He said I could learn to control and channel my phobia, ultimately diminishing and conquering it.’ It was clear from the manner in which Kristina delivered the words that she was using an unaccustomed vocabulary learned from her psychologist. ‘He showed me that I could control chaos and get my life in order. So much so that it ended up that I became a cleaner.’ She paused and the zeal disappeared from her expression. ‘When I walked into Herr Hauser’s apartment… when I saw Herr Hauser and what had been done to him, I thought my world was falling apart. It was like I was right back in my old apartment, when I…’ She let the thought die. ‘But Dr Minks taught me that I have to stay in control. He told me that I shouldn’t allow my past or my fear to define me, to define what I was capable of becoming. Dr Minks explained that I have to contain what I fear and by doing so contain the fear itself. There was blood. So much blood. It was like I was standing on the edge of a cliff or something. I really felt I was one step away from going mad. I had to take control. I had to get hold of the fear before it got hold of me.’
‘So you started to clean? Is that what you’re saying?’ Werner asked.
‘Yes. The blood first. It took so long. Then everything else. I didn’t let it win.’ Kristina rubbed again at the invisible spot on the table top. One last time. Decisively. ‘Don’t you see? The Chaos didn’t win. I stayed in control.’
7.10 p.m.: Police Presidium, Alsterdorf, Hamburg
The team had a brief meeting after the Kristina Dreyer interview. She remained the prime suspect and she was to be held in custody overnight, but it was clear that none of the team was convinced of her guilt.
After Fabel had wound the meeting up, he asked Maria to stay behind.
‘Is everything okay, Maria?’ he asked her when they were alone. Maria’s expression eloquently transmitted impatience and confusion. ‘It’s just that you didn’t say much in there.’
‘I tend to think there wasn’t much to say, to be honest, Chef. I think we’ll have to see what the forensic and pathology exams tell us about exactly what happened. Not that Kristina Dreyer left us much to go on.’
Fabel nodded thoughtfully, then asked: ‘How do you know about this Fear Clinic she was attending?’
‘It got quite a bit of publicity when it opened. There was an article about it in the Abendblatt. It’s unique, and when Kristina Dreyer said she was attending a special clinic it was the only one that would fit.’ If Maria was hiding something, then Fabel could not read it in her face. Fabel found himself, not for the first time, becoming deeply irritated by her closed-off countenance. After what they had been through together, he felt that he deserved her confidence. He felt the urge to confront her; to ask just what the hell her problem was. But, if there was anything Fabel knew about himself, it was that he was a typical male of his age and background: he habitually repressed spontaneous expression of his feelings. It meant that he approached things in a more measured way; it also meant that he often churned deep inside with the turmoil of his feelings. He dropped the subject. He did not mention that he was concerned about Maria’s behaviour. He did not ask her if her life remained shredded by the horror of what had happened to her. Most of all, he did not give name to the monster whose spectre would, at times like these, stand between them: Vasyl Vitrenko.