Dead Woods (20 page)

Daniel Vogler brought them to the living room. He sat down on the only chair, while Lina and Max took the couch.

“Herr Vogler,” Max began, “We’re investigating a murder case. You might have heard about the dead man in the Niendorfer Gehege. The victim is your former employer, Philip Birkner.”

“Is that so?” Vogler said and lifted an eyebrow. “I haven’t seen him in years, not since the bankruptcy of Inoware, to be exact.” He was leaning back in the chair, had his legs crossed, and jiggled his toes. He wore jeans and a light-colored striped shirt. His ash-blond hair hung into his face. His left sock had a small hole in it. Lina had taken out her notepad and was looking around the room. Other than the leather couch, the chair, a shelf with some books and CDs, and a flatscreen TV, the room was empty. No curtains or venetian blinds. No carpets on the parquet floor. No pillows or blankets on the couch. On one wall there were two photos of a very tan Franziska Leyhausen laughing into the camera. Both pictures were taken outside and Franziska’s long dark brown hair fluttered in the wind.

“How well did you know Herr Birkner?” Max asked.

Vogler shrugged. “He was my boss.”

“Did you see each other outside work? Did you invite each other over, go for drinks after work, or do things like that?” Max pressed.

“No.”

“But you knew each other from school, didn’t you?” Lina asked.

Was she mistaken, or did Vogler hesitate for a tiny moment? “Yes, but we weren’t close.”

“Nevertheless, you applied for a job at his firm?”

“Pure accident. I was looking for a job and was calling several software firms. I only found out that Philip was the owner of Inoware when I came for the job interview.”

“Did you also know the girl who was murdered back then, Julia Munz?” Lina asked, digging deeper.

Daniel Vogler sighed. “Yes, but also only from afar. We were in the same class for a year or two.”

“What about Herr Jensen?” Max asked. “How well do you know him?”

“Not any better. I’m not very sociable. I like to be left alone.”

“No private conversations? Nothing he shared with you one time or another?”

With knit brow Vogler said, “What do you mean by that? Maybe that he messed up the software for Wesseling & Kröger on purpose?” He laughed a hollow laugh. “He was stupid, but not that stupid. If he was involved, he wouldn’t have told me, that’s for sure.”

Lina looked up from her pad. “So you’re saying you consider Herr Jensen capable of such sabotage?”

Daniel Vogler grimaced mockingly. “You don’t have to be especially intelligent to do that. Even he could have done it—or he just messed up and someone else seized the opportunity.” He put both feet on the floor and bent forward, propping his elbows on his knees. “I know that this sounds inconsiderate, but that’s always been my problem. I just tell it like it is. He might not want to hear it, but Frank Jensen is no more than a mediocre programmer. To be honest, I wasn’t surprised that he messed up. The project was way over his head.”

“But it would have been a piece of cake for you?” Max asked.

“Yes,” he replied. There was no doubt, at least not in his mind.

“Do you think your former colleague would have been capable of creating the mistake on purpose?”

“No idea. I never thought about it.”

“How did Birkner and Jensen get along?” Max asked.

“Quite well, I think.”

“When it became known that there was a mistake in the software—what happened then?”

“Philip freaked out. He gave Frank hell in front of the entire team. Frank spent half the day in the john because he couldn’t stop puking. He was whining that it wasn’t him, but Philip didn’t believe him and threw him out—even before he officially went bust.”

Lina pensively fidgeted with her pencil. “Is it true that other than Herr Jensen, Herr Birkner, and you, nobody had access to the source code?”

Daniel Vogler laughed. “Have you ever heard of hackers? A good hacker could have done all kinds of things without anyone being the wiser.”

Lina looked around the spacious room. While the furnishings were not very comfortable, it was obvious that the apartment couldn’t have been cheap.

“How about you? Did anyone ever suspect you of manipulating the code?” Max asked.

“Sure, of course,” Vogler replied with a shrug. “Frank accused me, but Philip didn’t take him seriously. Besides, I wasn’t even at work when it all happened. I was on vacation.”

“So one can determine the exact time when the code was manipulated?” Max asked, surprised.

“Of course,” Vogler declared with a condescending look. “Each access to the data was recorded. And the log showed that it was Frank who messed with the program code.”

What was it about hackers? Hadn’t Vogler just said himself that nobody would have noticed if a good hacker had played around with the data? Looking around the room again, Lina focused on the two photos on the wall.

“Herr Vogler, do you by chance know where we could find Franziska Leyhausen?” She looked at him, but he avoided her gaze.

“I assume she’s at work, somewhere around metropolitan Hamburg. Try reaching her on her cell phone.”

Lina pretended to take notes. Why did the question not surprise him? He gave the impression that he had expected it.

“When did you talk with her last?” Max asked.

“Sometime last week, I think. Monday or Tuesday.”

“Wasn’t it Wednesday?” Lina asked. “As far as I know, you were thinking of attending the concert at the Waldschänke with her.”

“True. I completely forgot.” Daniel Vogler looked as if he had trouble suppressing a yawn. “But it didn’t work out. I had to work late,” he explained.

“Where do you work?” Max asked.

“I work at the university, but I’m able to do most of the job from home. On Thursday night I was logged in at the computer center of the university and worked until almost two in the morning.” He shrugged. “At night, there’re fewer annoying students asking dumb questions.”

“Are you employed as a computer scientist?”

Daniel Vogler nodded. “As a computer scientist and mathematician. I’m working on the partial stabilizability of high-dimensional nonergodic Markov network processes which, of course, cannot converge asymptotically to a global equilibrium. What interests me is whether a virtual stationary distribution—marginal, that is, local—exists within the dynamics of space and time; whether these local processes converge to
t
, to infinity, to any measure of probability. This has many connections to output analysis in information technology,” he explained.

“I see.” Lina hadn’t understood one word and suspected this to be true for Max as well. She had tried to take notes, but only a few terms, cryptic ones at that, had found their way to the notepad. “And with such work one makes enough to afford an apartment like this?” she asked, still floored by his job description.

Vogler laughed and Lina felt like a little child. “Of course not. I won some money playing poker.”

Lina frowned. Hearing “playing poker” or “winning money” automatically reminded her of the movie
The Sting
, one of her favorite films. But she didn’t believe Daniel Vogler had sat across from a crime boss in a classy train compartment and outbluffed him. “Where can one win that much money playing poker?”

Daniel Vogler yawned discreetly. “On the Internet.”

“Gambling for money is prohibited in Germany,” Lina replied.

Vogler laughed out loud, and again it sounded mocking rather than jovial. “So? Who cares? Besides, poker isn’t gambling, it’s a game of strategy. You don’t believe me? Why don’t you Google it. It’s become the thing to do. And with some idea of math, the whole thing is child’s play.” He yawned loudly now. “With all the amateurs who are also trying it . . .”

Lina looked at Max and rolled her eyes. Daniel Vogler obviously considered himself invincible. But who knows. Someone who tackles nonergodic distribution and asymptotic networks in his job probably does have plenty of gray matter.

While Lina was doodling on her notepad, Max asked, “Do you happen to know any other friends of Frau Leyhausen?”

“No, it was always just the two of us when we met. Wait a moment,” he added. “There’s Barbara. I’ve met her two or three times, but I don’t know her last name.” He covered his mouth and yawned.

Lina pricked up her ears and leaned back on the couch. “So you aren’t seeing Frau Leyhausen anymore?” she asked, watching Vogler attentively.

The man gave her an annoyed look. “Of course I am. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Because you used the past tense. You said, ‘It was always just the two of us when we met.’”

“Did I?”

“Yes.”

Daniel Vogler shrugged, folded his right leg over his left, and crossed his arms. “That means nothing. I’m rather more talented in math than in language usage.”

On the street again, Lina took a deep breath. “Wow, what kind of guy was that?”

“A nerd,” Max said. Then he grinned. “He’d be at least a fifth
dan
in martial arts.”

Lina laughed. “Tanja Fischer said he’s a catastrophe in social settings. Now I know what she meant.” Then she got serious again. “What’s your impression?”

Max climbed into the passenger seat and put on his seat belt. He waited for Lina to start the car before he said, “Maybe you should tip off White-Collar Crimes. Gambling for money is illegal.”

“Maybe he got paid for the industrial espionage and he uses poker to cover it up,” Lina suggested. Something, some inconsistency, gnawed at her, but she couldn’t figure out what it was.

“Replacing one illegal gain with another?” Max shook his head. “That would be stupid, wouldn’t it?”

“Or, on the contrary, very clever.” Lina looked into the rearview mirror and signaled. It had stopped raining, but it was still gloomy, gray, and humid. “But our main question is whether or not he had anything to do with Birkner’s murder.”

Max shrugged. “I don’t see why he should have anything against Philip Birkner. And other than referring to his girlfriend in the past tense . . . I have to say, I didn’t even notice that. You’re a keen listener.”

Lina grinned. “Well, I’m rather more talented in language usage than in math.”

When Katja Ansmann opened the door and saw Lina, she pressed her lips together but remained polite otherwise. In a low voice—Leon was asleep—she asked the two detectives to come in and follow her to the living room.

Lina controlled herself at first and just listened. That gave her a chance to calmly observe Katja Ansmann. She was wearing comfortable, wide-leg trousers today and a blouse and sandals. Her makeup was as perfect as last time, but there were dark circles under her eyes which even makeup couldn’t hide. Lina noticed that the quasi widow seemed more agitated than during the previous visits, resembling a grieving spouse more than before. She looked at Lina every now and then as if asking herself what in the world this woman was doing on her sofa.

“Frau Ansmann, we still have a few questions about Herr Birkner, especially about his past,” Max said. “A former girlfriend of his was murdered shortly after he graduated from high school. Do you know anything about that?”

Katja Ansmann was frowning pensively. Though the woman wasn’t much older than she, Lina detected signs of aging for the first time: little, faint wrinkles at the corners of her eyes and a tired expression around the mouth. “No, sorry. He never told me anything about that.”

“He never told you about a girl he was in school with who was murdered?” Max’s voice was as calm as before. “That surprises me.”

“Philip never talked much about his past. He was very much about living in the present.” She shrugged. “Maybe he was suppressing it.”

Lina scrutinized Katja Ansmann suspiciously. He didn’t talk much about the past? That might be true for acquaintances he wouldn’t tell his life story to right away, but his partner, the mother of his son? Lina asked herself how open the relationship between the two had actually been—was it maybe so open that it bordered on indifferent?

“Do you know Daniel Vogler?” Max asked.

Katja Ansmann seemed to be thinking. “Daniel Vogler . . . ,” she said slowly. “I’ve heard the name. Could you refresh my memory?”

“A former employee of your partner, at Inoware.”

“Oh yes, the second software developer of his company. I remember. A very intelligent man, but his social skills were somewhat underdeveloped.”

“Could you explain that?”

“Good communication skills and the ability to work in a team are indispensable if you want to survive in today’s job market. If you’re unable to empathize with others or adjust to a group, you’ll be in trouble. Herr Vogler is what’s usually called a lone wolf. He always came up with solutions, absolutely creative solutions, all by himself, without considering his colleagues at all.” She allowed herself a little smile. “When he was questioned about that once, he declared that he didn’t feel like wasting time explaining the times tables to a bunch of jerks.”

“Did the term
jerks
include Herr Birkner?”

Katja Ansmann’s smile disappeared. “Yes, I would think so.”

“Did you know that Herr Birkner and Herr Vogler attended the same school and graduated the same year?” Max asked.

Katja Ansmann said in a tired voice, “No, I didn’t know that.”

She knows damn little about her dead partner
, Lina thought. Or maybe she knew Daniel Vogler better than she was willing to admit. Maybe the mathematician was behind the data theft and Katja Ansmann had collaborated with him. “Were you in contact with Herr Vogler after the bankruptcy of Inoware?” Lina asked.

“No. I never saw him after I was done with my consulting job for the company, which was about nine months before the insolvency.”

“Is it only a coincidence,” Lina asked, “that Markman Solutions, the company that profited from the mistake in programming made by your partner’s firm, made payments to you after the data theft?” Out of the corner of her eye, Lina saw that Max shot her a warning glance, but she ignored it.

Katja Ansmann looked at her silently for a moment. “I don’t know what you’re trying to insinuate, but if that company employed me as a consultant, we can certainly assume that I received a fee for my services.”