Collision of Evil (4 page)

“Why don’t you think he got that far?”

The official ran a hand through the patch of hair above his broad forehead. “I don’t think he reached the summit because it’s a rough go once you clear the woods. He had no climbing equipment, just hiking gear. There are places where you can make it to the top without ropes, but I don’t believe your brother would have known where. And the soles of his shoes were covered with mud and pine needles, not traces of stone. He also had no minor leg abrasions, which we would expect to see if he had made a strenuous climb without mountain gear. So, he never got where he intended to go.”

“Which means he was killed before then,” Robert concluded.

“No,” came the unexpected reply.

“I’m sorry, Kommissar, I don’t follow you,” Robert said, a trace of stiffness in his voice.

The detective shook his head knowingly and clasped his hands under his chin. “Your brother, I am certain, on his ascent went safely past the place where he was later killed. He went higher, into the woods. He probably meant to get to the mountaintop initially, but gave up on this when the weather turned bad. There was a fierce thunderstorm that afternoon, bad enough in the valley, but it would have been especially forceful up high. He would have left the open meadow and headed for cover. Not always the wisest thing to do with lightning strikes, but he probably figured he’d find someplace reasonably safe in the forest. I think your brother was killed after the storm subsided. He left the woods behind and was on his
return
to the hotel when he was attacked.” Waldbaer waited for a reaction.

Robert was trying to envision the scene, but knew that a central question was not being addressed. “I’m sure you know what you’re talking about. But nothing I’ve heard so far tells me why Charles was killed or who could have done it. I’m glad you’re telling me what probably happened beforehand, but why did he die in that meadow?”

Waldbaer regarded him steadily. “I don’t know why; not yet. But
we can rule some things out. There haven’t been other attacks like this in the area, so it’s not a serial killer or similar. There’s nothing to suggest that drugs were involved; your brother’s system was clean. There’s nothing to suggest that your brother irritated anyone at the hotel, had a fight over a girl, or anything like that. All of which leads me to believe that your brother was, as the saying goes, in absolutely the wrong place at exactly the wrong time. I’m not trying to be flippant, but I think your brother would be alive now if he had taken a different path that day. Something he saw up there, something he stumbled upon caused him to be killed.”

“That doesn’t take us very far,” Robert said, aware that his tone was curt, but not really caring. It was apparent to him that the police did not have a lead and he knew that the longer it took to develop a lead, the greater the likelihood that a killer would never be found.

“I understand your disappointment. But something like this can be very complicated. There are no witnesses, none. The place where the murder took place is entirely unpopulated. No weapon has been recovered. We have no motive. But I think we’ll get somewhere. I have a feeling that we will get someone for this. I’ve been around crime a while and I give these feelings their due.”

Robert nodded without actually agreeing. He had a heavy feeling in his stomach that he might end up flying home with his brother’s cold remains in the cargo hold of a United Airlines flight and without any answers. He pushed the thought away. “How did he die? I want to know whatever you can tell me, and please don’t pretty it up for me.”

Waldbaer looked up at the ceiling and pursed his lips. “Fair enough. I will tell you as accurately as I can,
Ja?
First, we did have a bit of luck, insofar as the body was discovered within twenty-four hours of death. The crime scene is remote and it could have easily been a week or more before someone happened upon your brother. There was no attempt to conceal the body. I find that interesting.”

Waldbaer ran a hand slowly over the back of his neck before continuing. “A number of possible reasons come to mind. Perhaps the
attacker was scared and wanted to get out of the area quickly after the crime. That would suggest the killer is not a professional. It could also be that it was getting dark and the killer didn’t have the visibility to find a place to put the body and needed to concentrate on getting away. Or maybe the killer didn’t have the strength to move the body, although the force of the blows he—or she—delivered would seem to indicate otherwise. But who knows, weak heart, asthma? Just as possible, the killer could have left the body where it fell because he was sure that the crime could never be traced to him. Why go through the effort of moving a body if its discovery won’t reveal anything?”

Waldbaer paused, but his visitor interjected neither comment nor question.

“When we arrived at the scene, the body was still wet from the thunderstorm the previous afternoon. There was no water collected in the nostrils or oral cavity, which suggests that your brother was killed after the storm had abated. That means early evening sometime, around dusk, at the latest. Your brother was struck from behind, three times. Two of the three blows were to the head and either one alone would have been fatal. One blow was delivered between the shoulder blades and taken by itself might not have been killing, but I personally believe that the loss of blood and damage to the spinal column from even this wound would have made it impossible for your brother to have gotten out of that meadow. Even with that one blow, I think he would have died up there, just more slowly. The killer was leaving nothing to chance however.”

The Kommissar paused. The American’s breathing had become audible.

“Do you want some water? Or should we stop for today?”

“No, it’s okay,” Robert replied. “Keep going.”

Waldbaer nodded and resumed his narrative. “All right. We don’t have a murder weapon, and we aren’t certain exactly what it is. An axe or hatchet or something similar. The weapon was swung with significant force. This is surely not pleasant for you, but it needs to be said: Your brother’s head was cleaved open to and through the
brain by one of the blows, probably the last one. The other head blow was severe too, but the one that penetrated the cerebral cavity was devastating. It would have been apparent to the killer that this blow had been fatal. This was not a struggle in which your brother happened to be killed. There was no struggle. Your brother was very deliberately murdered.”

The detective must have noticed a slight tic in Hirter’s cheek, and decided that the man was fighting to control his emotions. “I think that suffices for today. We can meet tomorrow.”

His guest cut him off. “How painful do you think it was? Did Charles suffer a lot? Would he have lost consciousness from that first blow to the head?”

The Kommissar released a breath slowly, contemplating the top of his scarred desk.

“I can’t answer that,” he said. “I don’t know. When the first blow hit him it was enough to drive him to his knees, we can tell by the way the mud clotted on his trousers. If you want my speculative view, he was conscious after that first blow hit, but probably wasn’t sure what was happening. Remember, he couldn’t see his attacker, who was standing behind him. The second strike propelled him forward into a fence. But I’m certain that all sensation and consciousness stopped the instant that third blow penetrated his skull. My suspicion is that the pain was not overwhelming; I think the body opiates against that. But who knows? You would like to think it was a quick death, Herr Hirter; so would I, but I can’t give you a real answer. Not what you would prefer to hear, I expect, but you asked for a truthful rendition of things.”

“Right,” Robert uttered the word barely audible. “What’s next?”

“Go back to your hotel. Take a walk in this gorgeous weather; not every day here is this desirable. Try to relax. I’ll meet you at the Alpenhof tomorrow morning for coffee, and we can talk about identifying your brother.”

Robert nodded, rose, and shook hands with the tired-looking Bavarian. Moments later he found himself standing by his car and wondering how he had gotten there. The sun was shining with
almost painful intensity against a pale blue sky, but the incontestable beauty of the day failed to rescue him from a feeling of emptiness.

It was to the meadows and woods that he felt inexorably drawn. After an hour in his hotel room and a ham sandwich lunch, Robert knew that he had no choice; he had to see where his brother’s life had come to its unanticipated halt. He donned worn jeans, a thin sweater, and track shoes. Leaving the hotel behind, hearing the creak of the double doors swinging shut, Robert wondered what sense it really made to visit the scene of the crime. The German detective had told him graphically enough what had happened. Still, one foot stepped ahead of the other and Robert knew that he had to make the journey. He had his own map and experienced no difficulty in finding the path his brother had taken.

Robert paused at intervals during his climb, rested his hands on his hips, and surveyed the scenery. He had passed some hikers near the hotel but none up higher; most of the tourists preferred the lighter athletic diversion provided by the valley floor. When he arrived at the high meadows, he quickly found the spot where Charles had been killed. The tall grass bore traces of the disturbance caused by the recent comings and goings there, and orange tape stenciled with the word
Polizei
was strewn haphazardly around the area it had once, briefly, corralled. A small herd of milk cows nearby observed him with bovine indifference. Robert knelt on one knee at the meadow fence and touched it where he imagined his brother’s head had slammed into the rails, but there was no distinguishing sign of this, no trace, no electric current emanating from the weathered wood announcing
it was exactly here.

But he did feel something. A sensation teasing and opaque. He felt with certainty that he was being watched. There was nothing in his field of vision save the cows and it was not their dumb gaze that he felt crawl along his skin. The conviction that some being both sentient and malevolent was studying him would not fade. He rose, slowly, and turned to take in the terrain behind him. Higher still, but close enough to be reached with a ten minutes walk, the dark
line of fir trees that marked the forest’s edge fixed his gaze. There was no hint of motion, no betraying movement of branches or flash of color. But Robert knew that his watcher was there, concealed in the mottled shadows of black and brown.

This feeling of surveillance was unexpected, and he was unprepared for it. He wanted to go to the woods and find whoever it was who was there. But he felt embraced by the cold grip of fear, and began his descent back toward the hotel far below. As he walked with steps careful enough to prevent a stumble, he continued to look back at the brooding dark forest and the secrets locked within.

Kill him too perhaps; it might be the most prudent course, the figure reasoned. As with the first one taken down, there was no other party in the area to interfere. This new intruder could be killed like the other, quickly, efficiently. But this time it would be judicious to move the body into the woods and bury it. He followed the steady retreat of the figure intently from his refuge in the deep and embracing forest shadows. He felt the heft of the edged weapon in his hand and flexed his toned biceps, savoring the feel of rushing adrenaline. If it is to be done, it must be done soon; the target was steadily moving away.

Perhaps it would not be so easy this time. For one thing, the intruder did not take his eyes from the tree line as he headed back toward the valley floor. The man was suspicious, as if he sensed he was being watched. A headlong rush toward him from the woods would be detected and the man would run downhill at top speed, maybe bellowing for help. If the fellow was a good runner, he might be difficult to catch or, infinitely worse, might not be caught at all. There was no darkness to conceal an attack this time. And if the assault succeeded, even if the corpse were buried, the end result might still be a redoubling of police activity.

The matter of what was secreted in the cave was far too important to endanger. It would, in theory, be a fine thing to kill this intruder, but there was considerable risk involved and he dared not wager such enormously high stakes in a game of chance.

He watched the figure recede into the pastoral distance until he
disappeared below the slope of the hill. You will live for now, the watcher thought, but events yet unseen will in the end determine your destiny, and, for that matter, my own.

“
Gruess Gott
” Waldbaer intoned as Robert stepped from the elevator into the deeply veneered comfort of the hotel lobby. After a perfunctory handshake, the detective guided the American to a small corner table in the high-ceilinged breakfast room. A teenage waitress wearing a puffy-shouldered green dirndl served them coffee. With her departure, Robert leaned across the table and half-whispered, “I think someone was watching me yesterday.”

Waldbaer looked steadily at his table partner and waited for more.

“I went up to where my brother was killed. I found the meadow. While I was standing there, I had this feeling that I was being watched.”