‘Do you know of any cults operating in Hamburg?’

MacSwain rubbed his chin. ‘You suspect Asatru worshippers of these murders? They tend to be harmless New Age types who focus on Balder.’ MacSwain read Fabel’s questioning expression. ‘A Christ-like figure in the Aesir pantheon. A politically correct Viking deity. To answer your question: yes, I do. They call themselves the Temple of Asatru. They meet in an old warehouse in Billstedt, from what I’ve heard.’

‘Thanks for your help, Mr MacSwain,’ Fabel said in English and rose from the couch.

Fabel gazed blankly at the doors of the elevator that took them back down to the lobby of MacSwain’s building.

‘There’s something about that guy that doesn’t smell right. He may not have anything to do with these killings, but he didn’t seem at all surprised to have the Hamburg KriPo knocking at his door.’

‘Sometimes I think half the population of Hamburg has something to hide,’ said Werner.

‘I want MacSwain watched. And I want a full background worked up on him.’

‘Can we justify the manpower to watch him round the clock? All you have is a hunch … Although I agree with it. He was too cool by half.’

‘Just organise it, Werner. I’ll clear it with Van Heiden.’

Friday 13 June, 11.00 p.m. Hamburg-Harburg, Hamburg.

The waterless swimming pool was illuminated by the bright disc of the moon which sat framed in the large roof window; the only window that, because of its inaccessibility, had not been smashed by vandals. The beam of the flashlight swept across the pool’s cracked tiles and along the walls. The swimming pool had not been used for years. What had been intended as a cheery mural, depicting bright blue dolphins and children with water wings splashing together in water, was only just discernible on the walls beneath the built-up grime and graffiti. All the windows along the far poolside had been broken and the basin of the pool itself, long emptied of water, was scattered with litter and filth. There were discarded syringes everywhere. Someone had even defecated in the corner.

‘This used to be a decent working-class neighbourhood.’ It was the man who stood at the far side of the pool, looking out through the broken glazing, who spoke. He shone a flashlight in the direction of a double doorway that now housed only one door. ‘Check there’s no one around …’

The younger man of the two made his way over to the doorway and shone his light into what had once been changing rooms.

‘Nothing here.’

The older man resumed his reverie. ‘I used to go out with a girl who lived just a block away. I even took her swimming here.’ As he spoke, it was as if he were reconstructing the past, trying to see everything as it had been, not how it was now. He pulled himself back into the present. He looked across to the younger man who was now holding the gun to the head, covered in a rough sack, of a figure who knelt at the edge of the pool with his hands bound behind his back. The older man took a deep breath. When he spoke, he did so without anger, without malice, without excitement: ‘Kill him.’