A woman is stabbed. Inspector Pütter must clarify the case as soon as possible. He has no idea who did it. And certainly not why
Bochum, July 20, 2000, around 1:20 a.m. The woman steps into the night. Up until now she was dancing, and I’m sure she was laughing at the party in the old train station in the east of the city, built of clinker and beams. Hits from the 80s were playing. Now she wants to go home.
The woman gets into her Ford Ka and drives off, her home is across town, about 15 kilometers away. The journey takes about half an hour. The woman is in a good mood, exhilarated, the evening lingers. A car drives behind her. She doesn’t notice.
When she gets home, she parks on the side of the road. The other car pulls up a few yards behind her, headlights on. She gets out, stands in the light, doesn’t recognize anything, doesn’t think anything. She goes to the front door and when she hears footsteps, she turns around – only her neighbor’s boyfriend.
It is a quiet area on a hillside, a cobbled street with low houses, birch trees in front. The woman digs for the key from her handbag, the man comes closer, then stands next to her in front of the door. She looks him in the face.
The woman was wrong; it’s not the neighbor’s boyfriend. She asks the man if he wants to visit anyone so late at night. The man says: Yes, pushes the top button of the bell, and before the woman understands, he pushes her into the hallway.