Page 27 of Anatomy of a Killer
‘Is it true?’ Me.
Steinhausen blinks with one eye; I look at him as if he were a work of abstract art. He’s no longer the gaunt man from my vision with straggly longish hair and penetrating black eyes. He looks like he does on Meller’s photos: shockingly normal. A perfectly normal, nondescript man with short blond hair and freckles beneath the swollen eyes that almost make him appear friendly.
‘I’ll try upstairs!’ Eva says, running past us. Now we’re alone, Steinhausen and I.
‘Is it true?’ I repeat, more insistently this time.
He cries, he begs. ‘Please. . . home. . . my wife. . . daughter. . .’
Before I’ve formulated my next thought, my hand shoots forwards and catches him flat on his left ear.
Steinhausen howls.
‘You’re lying even now?’ I hate the way my voice is quavering. How it betrays my uncertainty and my horror that I’ve just slapped a man that someone else has already beaten half to death. My left ear begins burning too, like a phantom pain; it’s probably the shame. I’ve crossed a boundary– I’m no better. Eva is better than me, Eva’s doing the right thing. She’s calling the police, who’ll come and arrest Meller and rescue Steinhausen. The police, who’ll no doubt allow him to roam free while they keep sinking their teeth into my father instead.
Steinhausen mumbles something, but I don’t hear him. I hear my father, who can sense my dilemma and is trying to reassure me.
‘You’re a good person, Beetle.’
Am I, Dad? Am I still a good person if I want a little more time alone with Steinhausen before the police arrive?
‘You can forget that!’ I’m rattled by the thunder of Meller’s voice. When I turn around he’s pushing Eva back into the cellar room. He’s confiscated her mobile and an iron bar is wedged in the crook of his arm. Eva stumbles over to me. ‘Your colleague felt it was her duty to call the cops to– how did she put it?–protect a badly injured, innocent man from rash behaviour on my part.’ He spits out a beastly laugh. ‘And of course to protect me from myself!’ Taking hold of the iron bar, he brandishes it in our direction like a dagger. ‘No effing way!’ His eyes move from me to Eva, they fix on her as he flings the mobile phone to the floor, where it shatters noisily. ‘Did you hear me? It’s neither your duty nor your fucking right! This here is my mission, mine and mine alone!’
Eva raises and lowers her hands gently, as if trying to tame a crazed animal. ‘Herr Meller, the police will be here soon. . .’
‘No,’ the animal growls. ‘I’m not going to let you fuck everything up when I’m so close.’ With the iron bar he forces us into the far corner of the room, while Steinhausen starts yelling for help. Meller drops the bar and lands a punch on his chin. Everything inside me winces– since my car accident a couple of years ago I know what a jaw breaking sounds like. Tiny drops of blood fly as if in slow motion, a fine spray that looks black in the makeshift light of the construction lamp. Steinhausen’s head flops limply on to his left shoulder. An overpowering silence grips the room, the unspoken question being if Steinhausen is unconscious.
He is– in the best-case scenario.
And maybe he is. Meller makes sure by grabbing Steinhausen’s hair, yanking his head back and putting his hand under his nose to check for breathing.
He definitely is, thank God; Meller nods at us.
‘I’ve put this fucker in hospital twice already,’ he says. ‘And I went down for it. Six months the first time– utter nonsense. The judge realised my head was a fucking mess and so accepted there were extenuating circumstances. But when I got out I saw Steinhausen was behaving as if nothing had happened. He was still living in Lichtenberg, going to work, cutting the hedge, pushing his mother around in a wheelchair.’ I think of the photos on Meller’s pinboard, showing Steinhausen in different everyday situations; they might date from this time. ‘Then little Kati was killed– here!’ Meller opens out his arms. ‘I tried to beat the truth out of him, but the problem was, I was just a touch too keen. A few kicks and the tosser had a fractured fucking skull. Which meant he was back in hospital and I was back in the nick. Five years this time, no more mercy from the judge. So I was inside when Steinhausen came out of rehabilitation. He made use of his chance and did a runner. But not only that!’ I see blobs of spittle fly from his mouth. ‘Or don’t you think it’s strange that no children were kidnapped while this wanker was in hospital, licking his wounds? I read the paper every day when I was banged up– nothing! No children murdered when he was out of action! Am I meant to believe that’s a coincidence?’ He shakes his head and I copy him, as if hypnotised. ‘At any rate, for years after I came out, I couldn’t for the life of me find out where he was. But then, a few weeks ago, his mum died and I knew that now, now he’d come back like the dutiful son he is. . .’ Meller is a wild beast, prowling around this basement room as if he were cooped up in a cage. He moves from left to right and from right to left, menacingly entranced, describing how Steinhausen lurked at the funeral. He photographed that too, I realise. Steinhausen standing beside his mother’s grave. But this time he intended to be smarter, Meller continues. Instead of nabbing Steinhausen at the cemetery, he followed him to his new home. ‘He was awarded compensation for his injuries– a tidy sum. His lawyer was a real crafty bugger. Together with the money he had already put aside, the fucker was now able to afford a fancy bungalow in the leafy suburbs! And there’s me in my shitty little room in Marzahn, agonising over what had happened to Larissa.’ He spent days watching Steinhausen, driven by a vague hunch that something was about to happen, something fateful, something incontrovertible. ‘And it did happen.’ Meller breaks off abruptly and gives us a triumphant look. ‘One morning I followed him to a primary school. It was 22 December, the last day before the Christmas holidays. He was hanging around the playground, ogling a group of little girls while they were having a snowball fight. They were laughing, giggling. Alive.’ His face darkens. ‘For now.’
He doesn’t have to say any more. Both Eva and I know this was the moment when Meller pounced, overwhelmed Steinhausen and dragged him to this basement.
‘Originally I was going to take him to the hut by the Weihenpfuhl, but the terrain there’s so rough that I couldn’t have driven with Steinhausen in the boot. And nobody ever strays out here.’ His gaze sweeps the room, coming to rest on Steinhausen, who’s still unconscious. ‘I would have already finished the job, but it’s Christmas and I’ve got my boys to think of.’
I look to the floor in embarrassment when I grasp another piece of the puzzle that is the Meller family tragedy. A father who, by all appearances, is devoted to solving the death of his stepdaughter, and yet interrupts this– his most important mission– to offer some normality to his sons, at least at Christmastime.
‘What? Why are you gawping like that?’ Meller’s voice thunders like a sudden storm. I frantically wipe my eyes. ‘I’ve treated the tosser far better than he deserves!’ In a flash he’s hurried over to a canister beside the entrance, which I hadn’t noticed before. He’s jittery as he turns the red screw top, and then he empties the contents in Steinhausen’s face. As if on cue, Steinhausen comes to, flouncing and gasping in panic, like a drowning man.
‘It’s true, isn’t it, Marcus?’ Meller says, bending down to Steinhausen. ‘I’ve treated you far better than you deserve during your little stay down here. But now’s the time to put an end to the Christmas charity.’ Dropping the canister, which clunks on the floor, he stands up and takes a mobile out of his jacket coat pocket. This must be why he left the basement earlier: he’d forgotten his mobile. Which he now needs– ‘Showtime, arsehole!’– to record Steinhausen’s confession. ‘And you’re going to tell all, every little detail. About what you did to Larissa and all those other girls. And why. . .’ All of a sudden he starts shaking; first just his shoulders, then his entire body is quivering with pain. ‘Why?’ he repeats. Awhywhich this time seems to be referring only to his stepdaughter and perhaps is questioning more than just the murder itself. Why did it get to that stage? Why didn’t he look after Larissa more when she was still alive?
‘. . . It. . . it. . . wasn’t. . . wasn’t. . . me. . .’ Steinhausen mumbles with his badly swollen lip, then howls. This only gets Meller more worked up. Slipping the mobile back into his coat pocket, he bends down to pick up the metal rod.
Eva takes a pace forwards; I hold her back. Meller isn’t going to kill Steinhausen. He only wants answers. Just like us.
He takes a swing.
No, he’s not going to kill him, absolutely not, no way. Not even here, in this strange space where reality has sprung a leak.
The rod swishes through the air.
Meller’s bluffing. Just before the metal comes into contact with Steinhausen’s skull and shatters it, he’ll stop– I’m sure about that.
And I’m right.
