‘I’ll tell them who she was. I’ll explain what she did. Surely they’ll understand.’
He slammed down the receiver when he saw Liese reappear and took the sacking she was holding out to him.
‘Thank you for making that call. I’m glad you could see there’s no choice.’
Liese reached for his hand but he shrugged her away.
‘There’s always a choice. I wasn’t calling the police, I was calling Michael. He has a van and we need it.’
Not Michael – not standing witness to this.
Confessing her crime to the police suddenly seemed far less important than not having to confess it to Michael.
‘Andrew, no. Don’t bring him into this, I’m begging you!’
His face changed; his voice switched from fury to what sounded like fear.
‘Don’t do this, Liese. Don’t make yourself into some kind of sacrifice. I can’t live with that. Michael won’t be able to live with that. Please, please, if you have any care for me at all, just do what I say.’
He looked so broken, so desperate. Whatever force had been pushing Liese on since she picked up the scissors drained away. She moved through the next moments doing only what he asked. Helping him roll the body onto the hessian, helping him pile the cleaning cloths on the guard’s chest. But when the doorbell rang, she wouldn’t let Andrew answer it and she gave Michael barely a second to take the scene in. She needed to face him and face her actions before Andrew told a more edited story.
‘It’s the guard who murdered Lottie. I cut her throat.’
Michael stared at her. He opened his arms. All she wanted to do was fall into them, but Andrew grabbed him instead.
‘And if we don’t sort this out, she’s going to give herself up to the police and she’s going to hang. So help me. Are you listening, Michael? Help me, or she’s lost.’
‘Michael, no! Don’t listen to him; listen to me.’
But Michael turned away from her and spoke only to Andrew.
‘I need something heavy. I need to destroy her face and make sure that nobody recognises her.’
He scanned the shop and picked up a sewing machine.
Liese darted forward. ‘That’s wrong! That won’t work!’
She was about to explain, but both men rounded on her.
‘Don’t look if you can’t stand it but let us do what we must.’
She was exhausted, her limbs trembling. Faced with Andrew and Michael, not listening to her, so united and so determined to do what they clearly thought was in her best interests, it was easier to give in, to convince herself she could still somehow make this right later. She stood back. She made herself watch, and not argue .
‘We need to take her to the river.’
Their voices were so low, she wasn’t sure which of them spoke – not that it mattered. Michael and Andrew were focused only on each other and the tightly bound package now balanced between them.
‘You don’t understand—’
‘You need to come with us. You can’t stay here alone.’
Neither of them were listening to her. It was clear they still thought she would call the police. They bundled the body and Liese into the van, intent only on where they were going.
‘At least tell me where we’re going.’
‘There’s a point across from Schloβ Charlottenburg where the river quickens. The current should take the body down from there to the Havel and out to wider waters. It’s better to let the river move her than us.’
Once Michael answered her, without turning round, neither man spoke to her or each other again, except when Andrew told Michael to slow down or risk being stopped by an army patrol. Once the American military jeep passed by, Berlinerstraβe stayed empty. There was no traffic to slow them on the Schloβbrücke or in the maze of broken streets that bordered the river. Liese knew there was no point in speaking, that their actions had taken on their own momentum in the same way that hers had. When they drew close to the tightly packed treeline, Michael pulled the van in.
‘It should be quiet enough here, as long as we move quickly. Anyone hanging round this place will be too drunk to know what they’ve seen, or be believed if they try to describe it.’
He jumped out, followed by Andrew. They wrestled the body out of the back and told Liese to wait. She couldn’t – the light on the water spun too strong a pull. She followed them as they stumbled over the muddy ground, both men struggling to stay upright. It had rained for most of November and the river was full, branches caught in it and tumbling.
She won’t lie as peacefully as Lottie.
‘On my count, and on three.’
Michael’s whisper swelled in the silence.
The bundle rolled towards the water. There wasn’t an arc this time; it was more of a plunge. And there wasn’t a quicksilver splash but a crash as the water opened. A greedy roar that ran through Liese’s bones and ripped away the silence that had been forced on her in the salon.
‘This is all wrong. Why wouldn’t you listen to me?’
She stopped and sucked in a breath that came out in a scream.
‘How can I have been so stupid? All I had to do was lock the door and keep you away. This was my fight, not yours, and now you’re messed up in it.’
Michael and Andrew broke into a run and caught her between them as her legs slipped from under her.
‘It doesn’t matter. No one will find her. Look at the river: it will take her for miles, toss her to bits.’ She pulled and pushed against them, but they wouldn’t let go.
‘No it won’t. She won’t lie peacefully – how can she? This won’t end it. Don’t you see? I’ve killed her and this won’t end it. She had babies. Children of her own – two little girls. One more than what she took from me. She’ll be found. She’ll be identified. And you’ll pay a price that was only ever mine.’
She was long past a whisper. Her voice bounced round the trees like a trumpet calling.
‘Liese, take a breath. I destroyed her face. You know I did. No one will know her.’
Michael’s arm tightened round her shoulders as if his words were reassuring.
‘No. That’s what I was trying to tell you. You got it all wrong. It wasn’t her face that mattered. It was her hand. The scar on her hand. That’s how they’ll know her and track her to Lottie, and to me.’
Michael’s arm fell away.
‘And now you two are in danger. Because of me. What I’ve done makes me as evil as her. It makes me worse.’
She spun round and began stumbling her desperate way towards the water. Michael lunched forward to grab her. Liese felt his hand catch at her sleeve, but she tugged too hard for him to hold her and left him floundering in the mud.
‘Andrew, for the love of God stop her!’
‘Let me go! You have to let me go. You have to let me make it right!’
She was quick, but Andrew was quicker. When he caught her, his grip was so tight she couldn’t pull free.
‘Make it right? Are you crazy? How does you ending up in the water make any of this right?’
He pinned her arms so tight she couldn’t struggle.
‘I won’t let you, Liese. I won’t. I can’t have done all this to watch you die. Neither can Michael.’