‘Is it Klugmann?’

‘Looks like. But we’ll have to wait until Möller turns him over and we can see his face.’

A silent minute passed before Werner and Maria emerged, followed by the body, sheathed in a black body bag and on a wheeled trolley between two pathology technicians.

‘It’s Klugmann all right,’ said Werner, grimly.

Volker stepped forward and stopped the technicians with a gesture of his hand. He sniffed a lungful of air as if preparing himself and then nodded curtly towards the body bag. One of the technicians pulled on a long tab; the zipper peeled open with a resonant rasp to expose the empurpled face of Hans Klugmann. Much of what had been between his teeth and his nose had been blasted into the crater of an exit wound. Volker made a face and nodded again to the technician who re-zipped Klugmann into his vinyl cocoon. He turned to Fabel; the dark eyes glittered with something between pain and anger.

‘He was a brave man. And a good and honest policeman. You can understand that, Fabel.’ Volker paused and watched the body being loaded into the mortuary wagon. ‘I recruited him myself, Fabel. I sent him on this operation and I didn’t insist he came in when the girl was killed. It’s my fault he’s dead.’

‘I rather think it is,’ said Fabel, without a hint of maliciousness.

Monday 16 June, 2.00 p.m. Altona, Hamburg.

Sonja Brun’s pretty face had the sore, inflamed look that only comes with an hour of constant crying. Even now, although the effort had dulled the pain in her red-rimmed eyes, she somehow found the energy to rack her body with intermittent, deep sobs. Fabel had made it clear to a furious Volker that this was now a Mordkommission case and he would treat any intervention by Volker as obstruction. Volker had no choice but to take it on the chin, and had accepted the scrap of being allowed to tag along when Fabel and Werner interviewed Sonja. He had winced when Fabel had revealed to Sonja that Klugmann had been working as an undercover federal agent. She had not been able to accept it and Fabel saw her eyes working through every moment, every word she had shared with Klugmann.

‘But he said we were going to get married … that we would get out of Hamburg and start over somewhere else, once he had this big deal done … was that all a lie?’ Her eyes searched Fabel’s pleadingly.

‘No, Sonja. I honestly don’t believe it was. He cared about you. I’m sure he did …’

They questioned Sonja about the Ukrainians, the big deal Klugmann had talked about, when he had gone out, who she had seen him with. Fabel tried to keep the pace slow and easy, allowing her a moment between each answer. No, she had never seen ‘Vadim’. No, Klugmann had never mentioned him. Yes, he would often go out late when he was off work to meet with people about his ‘big deal’.