Martin was standing outside the entrance to the ship’s infirmary on deck 3. When he saw the name on the door he couldn’t help thinking of another Elena who also had the title of doctor. The other Elena wasn’t a medic on a ship, but a psychologist in Berlin Mitte, a marriage counsellor in Friedrichstrasse with whom Nadja had once booked an appointment, though they never turned up to it. Partly out of cowardice, and partly from the conviction that they’d get through without outside help.
How naïve.
Crises had often loomed in their relationship. No surprise there. Martin’s job as an undercover investigator meant he’d spend weeks, sometimes even months, away from home at a time, and five years ago the big bust-up had occurred, which had made Martin realise that things couldn’t continue as they were.
He’d come back unexpectedly a day early from a preparatory workshop. The classic scenario. It was eight in the morning, the apartment in Schmargendorf was empty; Nadja and Timmy were at school. The bed he sank into hadn’t been made and it smelled of sweat. Of scent.
And of condom.
He found it on Nadja’s side between the sheets. Empty, but unrolled.
She didn’t deny it and he didn’t blame her. During the long period they’d spent apart because of his work he’d had urges too, but he had drowned them with adrenaline. Nadia’s only option for entertainment was an affair.
Martin had never found out who the guy was, nor did he ever want to know. Two weeks after his discovery of the condom they decided that his next operation would be his last. He’d even offered to quit his job straight away, but Nadja knew how much was at stake. He’d spent a quarter of a year cultivating a new identity as a drug addict and habitual offender. His arm had been dotted with needle marks, some of which were still visible today. The Polish authorities they were working with wanted to plant him in a prison for dangerous criminals in Warsaw, in the cell of a notorious neo-Nazi, the head of a band of traffickers. Martin was to win his confidence so as to obtain information relating to the people-trafficking ring he was running. He was convinced that the heroin he’d had to inject himself with in front of the Nazi was partially responsible for the blackouts he sometimes suffered in moments of extreme physical or emotional stress. At the time it was crucial that his cover wasn’t blown.
If beforehand he’d known what would happen, he’d never have got involved with this supposedly final operation. Nadja and he had agreed that afterwards he should apply for a desk job. He’d given his promise and then treated her and Timmy to a three-week leg of a world cruise. This holiday was to distract her as much as possible from the thought that her husband was risking his life for one last time. And pretending to his son for one last time that he was going abroad to work as a tour guide.
Martin glanced again at the name plate that had set this chain of memories in motion, knocked on the door of the ship’s infirmary and waited until it opened.
‘My, my, it hasn’t taken you long,’ the ship’s doctor smiled, offering her hand. Dr Elena Beck was in her mid thirties with a blond plait that came down to her shoulder blades. The only make-up she wore was a trace of bright-red lipstick and a touch of eyeshadow. Her skin was pretty much the same colour as her snow-white uniform; even in rainy weather it probably needed factor 50 cream. Her eyes offered an interesting counterpoint to her almost boringly symmetrical face. They shone like blue mosaic stones at the bottom of a swimming pool.
‘Feeling sick already? We only left port two hours ago,’ Dr Beck said, following on from the phone call they’d had five minutes ago. In his initial fury Martin had wanted to go straight to confront the captain, that fucking arsehole he partly blamed for the death of his family. But the headache that came over him in Gerlinde’s cabin had forced him out into the fresh air, and when half an hour later he was finally able to think clearly again, he realised that an impetuous visit to the captain would only make him look foolish. Besides, the bridge was secured against unauthorised access.
After what Gerlinde had revealed, however, he couldn’t just do nothing. And as he had no idea where to find the second eyewitness, the chambermaid Shahla Afridi, he’d arranged an appointment with the ship’s doctor.
‘But don’t worry, Herr Schwartz, you’re not the only one with an upset stomach.’
Dr Elena Beck invited him to sit on a swivel chair and opened a glass cupboard. She had to stand on tiptoes to reach a box in the top compartment. ‘It’s better you popped in now. It’s not going to get any calmer out in the Atlantic. I’ll give you an injection of something.’
She took a glass ampoule from the box and turned back to him.
‘Thanks, but I’ve already done that myself,’ Martin said.
It was as if he’d turned down the dimmer on Dr Beck’s smile, which till now had been unchanged. It vanished slowly but completely from her face.
‘You’ve injected something?’
‘Yes, yesterday. HIV antibodies. Since then I’ve been on PEP.’
And from time to time I get razor blades shooting through my head.
‘Why on earth did you do that?’ Elena Beck asked.
She was nervy; her voice was jittering as much as her hand, which was holding the travel sickness medicine.
‘To manipulate an HIV test. It’s a long story,’ he said, flapping his hand dismissively. ‘Almost as long as that of Anouk Lamar.’
After the dimmer he’d now found the rapid-ice switch. Dr Beck’s expression froze.
‘Who are you?’ she asked with a frown.
‘The man who’s telling you that you’re going to pick up the phone and dial the number.’
‘Which number?’
‘The one they give you for when someone asks stupid questions.’
Dr Beck failed in her attempt to laugh. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about!’ she said indignantly.
‘About child abduction, for example. About covering up crimes, aiding and abetting, maybe even complicity. In any case I’m talking about you being struck off if it comes out that, in contravention of every ethical principle of your profession, you kept a young girl in custody against her will.’
It was obvious that each one of his words was like a slap in her face. Elena’s pale cheeks grew redder by the second. By contrast, Martin became ever calmer in the comfortable patients’ chair.
‘Come on,’ he said, crossing his legs. ‘I’ve checked in using my real name. The captain knows me. The alarm bells must have been ringing ever since the booking system spat out my name yesterday evening.’
He pointed to a telephone on an impeccably tidy desk. ‘Call him.’
The doctor fiddled nervously with her earlobe. Twiddled a pearl ear stud as if it were the volume control for her inner voice that ought to be telling her what to do now.
She sighed.
Without taking her eyes off Martin she removed a mobile from the belt pocket of her uniform.
She pressed a button on the keypad and held the phone to her ear. Martin could hear beeping. It was answered after three rings.
Dr Elena Beck said just two words: ‘He’s here.’
Then she handed over the phone.