Chapter Three ... at last!

Chapter Three

Officer Jurgen Keifer was a tall man, and he towered over the bed. He stood stiffly, legs snapped together, helmet locked under one arm. He had painfully short black hair, making him look thuggish, with dark eyes that peered down at Karl, waiting for a response. His partner stood by the door, watching. He was much younger, and compared to Keifer’s air of relaxed authority, gave the impression he was not long out the academy.

Karl glanced over at Eckhardt, who was looking away, sheepishly. He wondered if the good doctor had held them off whilst he regained his strength, or if he’d been the one to contact them in the first place.

Clearing his throat, Karl tried to sound indifferent. “You can ask, officer.”

Keifer reached into his pocket and pulled out a notepad. Flicking it open, he moved through it until he found a specific page, then glanced back at the door.

“That’s my partner, ­­­Henrik Faust. We're with the Munich police. We’d like to ask you about your whereabouts the past few months.”

Karl harrumphed. “Well that makes two of us, officer.”

“Yes,” he said, simultaneously scribbling something in his notepad and nodding towards Eckhardt, “we’ve been informed of your condition.”

There was something in the way he said it.

Karl narrowed his eyes. “Are you in the habit of asking questions to which you already know the answers, Officer Keifer?”

He looked taken aback, clearly not used to being spoken to in such a manner. His partner at the door looked uncomfortable, and shifted his weight.

“Am I under arrest?” Karl continued.

“Not at present, no,” Keifer replied, quickly regaining his composure.

“Then what exactly is it you want?”

There was a pause, and a sense of foreboding filled the air.

“When was the last time you spoke with your family, Mr Gabriel?”

Karl was caught off-guard, and frowned. “My family? How the hell should I know? You know I can’t remember anything.”

“What is the last thing you do remember?”

“Oh no,” Karl said angrily, suddenly worried. “I want to know what the hell has my family got to do with this.”

“Sir, it’s important we establish a timeline –”

“Goddammit!” Karl roared, reaching out and grabbing hold of Keifer’s uniform and yanking him forward. There was a clatter as his notepad and pen fell to the floor, and Eckhardt made a yelping noise. “What the fuck is going on here!”

A moment later Faust was at the bedside, pulling his partner away. Karl glared at them both, his face red with anger and his breathing heavy. Keifer looked shocked for a beat, before his nose flared and his eyes darkened further. “How dare you...” he stammered, breathless with fury.

“Three days!” Karl bellowed, “three days I’ve been stuck here! With no clue about what is happening! My stomach in pieces, my fucking eye missing! Now you get to the business of spilling your story or you get out of my way!”

He swung his legs out the bed, and heard Eckhardt yelling something in the background. Karl’s feet connected with the floor, and a moment later his legs buckled from underneath him. To his chagrin, Keifer and Faust grabbed him as he fell.

“Get your hands off me!” he roared as they lifted him back into bed.

“Calm down!” Keifer shouted, anything but calm himself.

“My family –”

“Your family is dead!”

There was a sudden, horrible silence.

Karl looked up at him blankly, Keifer’s words flowing through him but not making any sense. He blinked, feeling a heavy weight settle behind his eye. His empty socket ached. Keifer was panting, either from the tussle or his burden of the message.

He shook his head. “No, I ... I don’t understand what’s ...”

“I’m sorry, Karl,” Keifer said. He seemed to have suffered an slight change of heart, and he looked a little ashamed of their earlier argument. For Karl, the quarrel was forgotten, insignificant. His mind was still too busy trying to understand what Keifer could possibly be talking about.

He opened his mouth, but realised he didn’t know what to say. That Keifer must be mistaken? That his family – his entire family – couldn’t be dead? Or should he ask how it happened? Did he even want to know?

Luckily, Faust chose this moment to finally speak up. “If you want, we can come back later,” he said. He looked shaken and upset. Was this his first time breaking news like this to someone?

Karl blinked, and realised that he didn’t feel that bad, come to think of it. He closed his eye and took a deep breath, and felt the heaviness slink back.  

“When?” he asked eventually.

“About a year ago.”

“How?”

Keifer and Faust exchanged glances. “They were murdered,” Keifer said.

That hit harder. Karl fought to regain his composure. His head began to throb, and his vision – shaky at best to begin with – threatened to pack it in. The pressure behind his eye returned, and he felt his stomach shrink in on itself.

He had assumed that it had been a fire, or some other accident...murder had never even entered his mind. His entire family, wiped out in such a brutal and sickening manner... And almost as soon as he thought it, something twigged.

His eye shot up and he looked at the officers with disbelief. “You think I did it.”

Keifer didn’t miss a beat. “We’re just following up every lead.”

“Don’t you lie to me,” Karl snarled, but Keifer just looked at him coolly.

“Can you explain your whereabouts over the last six months?”

Karl looked at him incredulously. “What possible reason could I have for murdering my entire family?”

“Who knows? It’s not like you’d remember it now.”

“I’m no murderer!” Karl flared up, his temper back in full swing. “I know I don’t have it in me to kill someone!”

“You were in the war,” Keifer reminded him.

“That was different and you know it,” Karl said angrily. “I could never harm my wife, my daughter. I’m no monster!”

Karl was shaking, whether from rage or from shock he didn’t know. Keifer nodded, and reached into his pocket to pull out a card.

“I think it’s best we call it a day, Mr Gabriel,” he said.

“Smartest thing I’ve heard you say yet,” Karl said.

Keifer ignored it. “No doubt we’ll want to talk to you again further. At a more, convenient time,” he said. “Give us a visit when you’re feeling better.” He motioned towards the card, which he placed on the bedside table.

Karl grunted.

“Try not to worry about it just now,” Faust added. “These six person murders won’t solve themselves overnight.”

Keifer shot a glance at his partner, and Faust instantly realised what he’d said.

“If I heard your boy correctly there,” Karl said, “I believe he referred to it as a six person murder.” He pulled himself up straight. “Mind telling me exactly who it is been murdered?”

“I was hoping to save this for the station–”

“And I reckon a man who just lost his family got a right to hear the whole story.”

Keifer was perhaps more reasonable than Karl had given him credit, for he nodded again, and flicked open his notebook.

“I got Andreas and Cazilia Gruber,” he read, “and Viktoria and Cazilia Gabriel.”

At the mention of their names, Karl felt the pressure build slightly, but he forced it away. Keifer continued.

“And finally there’s Maria Baumgartner, who I believe was the newly appointed maid, and I have a Josef Gabriel.” He paused, and glanced up at Karl. “As I’m to understand it, he was Viktoria’s, uh, second child.”

Karl closed his eye.

“Out,” he growled at them. “Get out of here, now.”

“As I said, when you’re feeling better–”

“Out!” Karl roared. “Leave me the fuck alone!”

Officers Keifer and Faust stood up straight and put their helmets back on smartly, pulling them tight. They marched for the door, and when they got there, Keifer turned round and looked Karl dead on.

“Don’t leave Munich,” he said, and then they left.