The Fatherland Files

63

Black-and-white flags were everywhere, even on the coffin, which, amidst all the rest, seemed strangely incidental. Never had there been so many flags at a police funeral, colleagues said, although, since it was her first time, Charly was no judge. She just knew she hated it. The pomp, the ironed uniforms, the bombastic speeches – if this was what it meant to pay your last respects she wanted no part.

The church was nigh-on empty, with rows of pews unoccupied. These days in Berlin a dead policeman was nothing out of the ordinary; more and more officers were being caught in the fire between Communists and Nazis. Others were killed in cold blood, like Officers Anlauf and Lenk the previous year.

There were few mourners, but the coffin positively drowned in wreaths. Custom dictated that both Police Commissioner Grzesinski and Uniform Commander Heimannsberg should lay one, though neither had appeared in person. Grzesinski’s deputy, Bernhard Weiss, gave the eulogy, an honour usually bestowed upon police officers killed by Communists or Nazis, but the dead man had, like them, died in the line of duty.

Given the treasury’s long-standing money problems, it was no surprise that the floral tributes had nothing to do with the Free State of Prussia. The dead policeman’s brother had ensured events could proceed with the kind of ceremony normally reserved for dead ministers or members of the Hohenzollern dynasty. Most of the wreaths could be ascribed to his financial clout and influence. The Marggrabowa Homeland Service had gifted one, as had the Treuburg Citizenry, but the most impressive came from Gustav Wengler himself: a sumptuous arrangement of white and dark-violet, almost black, asters. In Everlasting Memory, the ribbon read, Your Brother, Gustav.

Charly tried to listen to Weiss’s speech but couldn’t. No matter, she was here to keep an eye on Wengler, who sat diagonally in front of her in the first row with his head bowed. She had encountered him once already, when he’d presented himself at headquarters and answered the questions the Vaterland team had in connection with his brother’s death, and the events of 1924. Afterwards it became clear that Charly wasn’t alone in thinking he might be holding something back.

It would have been useful to consult Gereon, but no one had heard from him in days.

Though still registered at his Treuburg hotel, he had failed to return calls from headquarters. ‘Gereon Rath missing in action’ was by now an all too familiar trope, and Böhm was beside himself.

Even more vexing was his failure to contact her. If he had done so, she might have covered for him. She’d have given him a piece of her mind, of course, but never in a million years would she have shopped him to Böhm. Didn’t he trust her, or was he simply trying to avoid the inevitable quarrel?

In the meantime she had relieved Erika Voss of her canine duties and moved into Carmerstrasse with Kirie, in the hope that he might call there, but the line was so dead she wondered if it was even connected.

One evening she decided she’d had enough and telephoned his hotel. Inspector Rath was currently unavailable, said a voice on the line, and it wasn’t certain when he would be back. The porter noted her request, but Gereon’s call never came. She hardly dared try again, to suffer the staff skating politely around his absence. Having called at all times of day and night, she asked herself if he was sleeping there at all. But then… where was he sleeping…? The bastard!

Nor could she reach him through the Treuburg Police, since he hadn’t shared the details of his investigation with his Masurian colleagues. The local chief constable was decidedly miffed. She could just imagine Gereon treating him with the arrogance of a big-city cop investigating a small-town crime – seasoned with a good dose of Rath-ian pig-headedness. Gereon Rath, one-man investigation machine. God, she hated it. If he would just give them something, or was he planning to arrest Artur Radlewski on his own?

The Treuburg Police seemed not to trust him, and the same was true in Berlin, with the exception of Gräf, perhaps, and a few others.

She focused on the job in hand. She couldn’t work this Gustav Wengler out. How he listened to Weiss in a spirit of reverence, when she knew that he harboured Nazi sympathies, and would not be pleased that a Jew was delivering his brother’s final address. Slippery: the word could have been coined for the man.

Maybe they’d crack him without Gereon’s help. They had cited him to appear at Alex again before leaving town, and this time they had a surprise in store.

64

The clock tower on the administration building showed twenty past nine. Bright neon lit the grounds and was reflected in the water of the harbour basin.

Reinhold Gräf looked down from high above the quay, in the cabin of a loading crane belonging to the Berlin Harbour and Warehouse Company, through a set of field glasses taken from police stocks. A lone ship was being discharged, otherwise all was quiet. Most harbour workers were gone, with only a couple of dozen still on their feet – as well as a platoon of anti-riot officers currently hidden from view.

Until last year Warehouse 2 had been where the Ford company assembled its cars for the German market, before shifting production to a factory in Cologne, contributing at once to Berlin’s growing unemployment and the vacancy rate of its warehouses. It was the ideal hideout for a hundred or more waiting officers. The Chief Customs Office had suggested it, and Berlin CID had put in its men as discreetly as possible, with civilian coats thrown over their uniforms, their weapons and shakos stowed in crates. They looked like a company of workers charged with restoring the warehouse to life. Detective Chief Inspector Böhm and a senior customs official were last to enter. Böhm issued the men with their instructions, and distributed their shakos and carbines.

Gräf gazed at the telephone beside the levers and buttons, fearing the slightest touch might set the crane in motion. The phones were used by crane drivers to co-ordinate with the foremen at ground level, but Gräf’s was connected directly with Warehouse 2. He knew this, but still gave a start when it rang.

‘Yes?’

‘Anything doing?’

‘Nothing.’

Nine o’clock, Lamkau’s notebook had said. Nine o’clock, Tuesday night. Five hundred crates, each containing twenty-four bottles. Stacks of paper – and even more schnapps. Enough to bring serious charges, but they didn’t know which boat, only which harbour, and here in the northern basin as many as five vessels were moored.

He was wondering whether someone had smelled a rat when there was movement on Westhafenstrasse. They were coming. One vehicle after another rolled onto the site via the eastern gate, five lily-white delivery vans bearing slogans for Mathée Luisenbrand and Treuburger Bärenfang. Gräf hadn’t expected the Lamkau firm to transport such a delicate load so openly. Perhaps they were wrong, and the contents was the legitimate, taxed product of the Luisenhöhe distillery? But then why would Lamkau have entered the delivery date in a notebook otherwise recording illegal income that had no place in official company documents?

The vans pulled up at the loading bay next to the warehouse and Gräf used his field glasses to check the name of the ship they had stopped beside. MS Erika.

A few men appeared on deck and opened the loading hatches. Others emerged from the vans. Each vehicle held two men, clad in the uniform of the Lamkau firm. He was surprised at first, but anything else would have been more conspicuous. The men weren’t doing anything illegal, just loading a cargo ship with crates of schnapps, identical to those Gräf had seen in the lift at Haus Vaterland, next to Lamkau’s dead body.

The difference was that these crates held illegally distilled rotgut rather than brand product. No doubt it was for the American market, where it would be shipped with the aid of the Concordia Ringverein.

At least, that’s what he hoped. If not, they could be made to look very foolish.

A gangway slid out from the ship, and the men formed a chain from the first truck. It wasn’t long before they were loading at breakneck pace, like a bucket brigade – only with crates. He reached for the telephone and waited for Böhm to pick up. ‘Now,’ he said. ‘Warehouse 2, westside, the MS Erika. Five trucks, all told about a dozen men. None armed so far as I can see, but possible some are carrying – above all, those on board.’

A few seconds later a large sliding door opened and the customs inspector stepped onto the loading ramp, behind him Wilhelm Böhm, megaphone in hand. Lamkau’s men didn’t notice until the uniform cops took up position on the ramp, carbines at the ready. ‘Your attention, please,’ Böhm’s voice echoed. ‘This is the police!’

A lone crate crashed to the floor.

‘That’s right,’ Böhm continued. ‘Drop the crates, and place your hands in the air. You’re surrounded and under arrest. As of this moment these goods are the property of the Berlin Chief Customs Office.’

A driver climbed into his van and stepped on the gas. The engine roared as the vehicle raced across the quay, perilously close to the harbour edge. Two men jumped aside to avoid being knocked down. The driver was headed for Westhafenstrasse, but the eastern gate was locked, guarded by armed uniform cops. The van screeched into a turn, but no one gave chase. Heedless flight only confirmed that an illegal operation had been blown. Encountering more armed officers, the driver gave up and exited the truck with hands in the air. Gräf stowed his field glasses and began the descent.

Arriving below, he heard diesel engines and saw the police vehicles stationed behind the admin building move in. The smugglers had their hands in the air, and made no move to resist arrest.

The cops who weren’t busy with handcuffs began loading the crates, not just from the Lamkau vans, but also from the quay and cargo ship. Böhm already had a crate open, and fished out a bottle. He took a sniff, made a disgusted face, and passed the bottle to Gräf.

It looked like the Luisenbrand served all over Berlin, but smelled more like methylated spirit than high-end Korn. They’d need to undertake a chemical analysis for the courts, but there was no doubt about it. This was rotgut of the cheapest order. Could they really be palming it off as a German speciality to the Yanks? Gräf wondered how much money was to be made smuggling alcohol into the US given the current dollar exchange rate. Evidently enough to justify doing so on a large scale.

He looked at the men. On board were a few villains whose mugs no doubt already graced the rogues’ gallery, but the men from the delivery vans were just normal Lamkau firm employees. He thought he recognised one or two from the company offices at Tempelhof.

The men took their places on the vehicle platform next to their smuggled goods, and suddenly there was a loud crash of metal. Gräf looked round to see a Lamkau van door fly open and a cop hitting the ground. A white overall flitted through the night like a ghost. Goddamn it!

They must have overlooked someone hidden in the front van, and he had slammed the heavy rear door against the unsuspecting cop’s head. Now he fled across the quay, overalls flapping.

‘Halt!’ Böhm cried into the megaphone. ‘Stay where you are! Or we’ll be forced to shoot!’

The man turned and, in the pale neon light, Gräf thought he recognised Dietrich Assmann, the East Prussian heading up the Lamkau operation to support the grieving widow. But the man kept running, and Gräf could no longer be sure.

‘Stay where you are,’ the megaphone sounded again. ‘Or we’ll shoot.’

A warning shot was fired in line with police protocol. When most crooks would have given up, this one just ran faster.

A second shot ripped through the night, and Gräf was afraid the operation would claim its first fatality when the white overalls appeared to take off, and seemed, for a moment, to be flying, before dropping like a lead weight and disappearing behind the wall of the landing stage. He chased after a couple of cops as they ran towards the harbour edge, and shone his torch on the water below, still foaming from the body’s impact.

‘There!’ The torch beam caught something white rising slowly to the surface, the overalls borne upwards by air bubbles. The fugitive had disappeared.

65

It was late, the office dark and deserted. Gräf had gone out to the Westhafen with Böhm, and Erika Voss had finished for the day. Charly switched on the light and hung her coat on the stand. Surveillance work wasn’t popular, which was why it was usually left to the cadets. She had been shadowing Gustav Wengler since early morning. For most of the time he had been with relations from Danzig, who had stayed on after the funeral. Now they were back in their hotel. It didn’t look as if he would make for the harbour anytime soon, but they would stay on him all the same.

Lange had relieved her about an hour ago, and while he sat in the green Opel outside the Eden Hotel, awaiting their target’s next move, she headed back to police headquarters. She didn’t know where else she could go.

Despite taking mental leave of the flat in Spenerstrasse, she hadn’t found the courage to tell Greta about the changes in her life and, even after spending the last few nights, she still felt like a stranger in Charlottenburg. The flat was too big, especially when she was alone. Perhaps if she’d been able to keep Kirie… but the surveillance operation had meant handing canine duties back to Erika Voss. She fetched the Vaterland case from the shelf.

Herbert Lamkau. Three crimes converged in the person of the deceased spirits merchant: murder, blackmail and bootlegging. How were they linked?

By now, blackmail was beyond doubt. Riedel and Unger sat in custody awaiting trial, each blaming the other, which only made things easier. Skimming Nebe’s interrogation transcripts, she couldn’t help but smile. The way he had duped the pair was a thing of beauty. A throwaway remark had led Unger to believe Riedel had dropped him in it, which resulted in the head chef doing the dirty on his partner. The back-and-forth had continued between interview rooms, culminating in two written confessions waiting to be signed.

By accusing Lamkau of selling cheap rotgut, Unger and Riedel had unwittingly touched a nerve. The Lamkau firm was indeed pedalling moonshine, the proceeds of which were painstakingly recorded in the notebook Gräf had recovered from Siegbert Wengler’s flat. It had taken some time for police to decipher the columns of numbers, but it had been worth it. Though still unsure how and when Wengler might have stolen the notebook, they were no longer in any doubt that he had.

Even so, Wengler hadn’t been able to protect Lamkau from his blackmailers. That task had fallen to others. Charly had recognised one of the men she’d seen in Linkstrasse in the rogues’ gallery: Rudolf Haas, aka Lovely Rudi, the right hand man of Concordia chief Paul Marczewski, also known as Polish-Paule. Though still unidentified, there was every reason to assume Haas’s accomplice was, likewise, a fully paid-up member of the Concordia Ringverein. Charly wondered if the pair hadn’t been involved in Lamkau’s death, or whether it was a vendetta, as Gereon suspected, pursued by a man whose mother had fallen foul of the company’s rotgut. What Gereon didn’t know, because no one could possibly have told him, was that Lamkau was still at it eight years on. Which meant there could be countless additional victims, and therefore, countless additional people with grounds for revenge.

Gereon. Goddamn it! She was thinking about him again. She looked out of the window, but dusk had already turned to darkness, and all she could see was her yawning reflection. She was tired. If only she knew where he was, the swine!

She was starting to worry. Had something happened to him? No, the Treuburg authorities would have been in touch – or that colleague from Königsberg he’d mentioned on the telephone.

She decided to try his hotel again, no matter how ridiculous it might feel. At least in Carmerstrasse she could use the telephone without colleagues listening. To say nothing of Greta. Her friend would have killed herself laughing if she’d known Charly was worried about a man. The truth was she wasn’t sure if it was worry; it could just be anger at the bastard’s stubborn refusal to get in touch.

66

Strange smells. Animal sweat and herbs. Camomile and vinegar. Light behind the darkness. A gleam behind the eyes.

Dream scraps. Memories.

The moon.

Charly’s smile.

Slipping out of reach.

Eyes open. Stinging light.

A wooden spoon. Steaming fluid. Disgusting smell. Animal sweat. Herbs. Camomile and vinegar.

Drink, drink!

A gnarled voice.

Turn away. Close eyes.

Charly’s smile.

A jolt towards the light.

Infernal grin, black beast, teeth bared; red, panting tongue. Above, a blonde beard.

No strength, no fight.

Drink!

Gnarled voice. Behind the beard.

The spoon again. Disgusting taste, bitter and oily and hot. Involuntary swallow. Camomile and vinegar and honey and herbs.

A sudden shiver. Enveloping warmth. Great fatigue.

Fatigue that excludes all else.

Falling back.

Eyelids.

Heavy.

Closed.

Darkness, sleep, death.

Peace, at last.

Peace, leave me in peace.

Dark, deadly sleep.

Charly’s smile.

Peace.

At last.

67

Dietrich Assmann sat at the table in Interview Room B and shrugged his shoulders. Just as he had done umpteen times already. Böhm might have kept score.

The Lamkau firm meant to offload a large shipment last night at the Westhafen.

Shrug.

The MS Erika, port of destination Hamburg.

Shrug.

The consignment wasn’t accounted for in the freight documents.

Shrug.

The crates contained illegally distilled schnapps, in original Luisenbrand bottles.

Shrug.

Some twelve thousand bottles, the majority already on board, the rest stowed in five delivery vans, property of the Lamkau firm, Berlin-Tempelhof, parked at the Westhafen northern quay. Seized in their entirety by the Chief Customs Office, Berlin.

Shrug.

According to the freight documents, the consignment contained three hundred tons of rapeseed oil, to be offloaded onto the high-sea freighter MS Tsingtao at Hamburg. Its destination: Hoboken, New Jersey.

Shrug.

Böhm stood, arms folded, listening, as Chief Customs Inspector Bruno Kressin continued his fruitless questioning. With every shrug of Assmann’s shoulders, he felt his blood pressure rise. Staying patient during a lengthy interrogation had never been one of his strengths, which was why he had given Kressin, under whose jurisdiction the Lamkau firm’s illegal activities fell, the floor.

For a full quarter of an hour he gritted his teeth and listened. For a full quarter of an hour he displayed the patience of a saint – but no more. ‘Don’t just sit there playing the innocent!’ he yelled without warning, and Dietrich Assmann instinctively recoiled. Böhm beat his fist against the table. ‘They were Lamkau trucks, Herr Assmann.’

For once Assmann offered more than a shrug. ‘Could be,’ he said. ‘But I didn’t send ’em.’

‘No?’

‘No. How many times? Do you think asking the same questions as your colleague will get you a different answer? Change the goddamn record. I can’t tell you a thing.’

‘Can’t, or don’t want to?’ Böhm fixed Assmann with his bulldog-gaze. ‘We’ll question you for as long as it takes to get a sensible answer. Why would almost the entire fleet of Lamkau firm vehicles head out to the Westhafen if the managing director hadn’t given the instruction?’

‘Acting managing director.’

‘And why should your employees, Lamkau firm drivers and warehousers, meet with men who are part of the Concordia Ringverein to load moonshine onto a cargo boat?’

‘What do I know? Perhaps they did so on the instruction of their former managing director. Or, it was someone acting under their own steam who roped the others in.’

‘You had nothing to do with it, then?’

‘That’s what I’ve been saying this whole time.’

‘Then why were you there?’

‘Pardon me?’

‘You were at the Westhafen last night.’

‘Rubbish!’

‘So tell me where you were around half past nine…’

‘I was eating my dinner.’

‘Cut the crap. You were at the Westhafen! A CID officer recognised you.’

‘This officer of yours, got issues with his eyes, has he?’

‘Word is you’re quite the swimmer. Where did you dispose of your wet things? When my colleagues met you at half past twelve in your hotel, you were in evening dress.’

‘I don’t know what you’re driving at.’

‘I just hope you didn’t catch cold in the harbour basin.’

‘What are you talking about? That your officer too? I think you’d better send him to an optician.’

‘In the eyes of the court, police testimony carries serious weight, Herr Assmann.’

‘I wasn’t at the Westhafen, goddamn it, I was in the Rheingold!’

‘And I’ve no doubt you can prove it. So what did you eat, in the Rheingold?’

‘Venison loin.’

Böhm made a note. ‘We’ll check the menu.’

‘Please do.’

‘But that won’t be enough to prove you were there.’

‘How about the bill? Would that suffice?’

‘Better than nothing. Do you have it there?’

‘I didn’t pay.’

‘Then who was kind enough to pick up the tab?’

‘My boss.’ Assmann grinned. ‘Gustav Wengler. Director of the Luisenhöhe distillery.’

Böhm rose to his feet. ‘Kressin, carry on without me for now.’

Charly could tell the man didn’t take her seriously. He seemed to think she was a secretary or second stenographer, even though Hilda Steffens was the only one with a pad in her hand. She had clearly introduced herself and stated her function, but Gustav Wengler was stumped by the very idea of a female CID officer. Or perhaps he had a problem with women in general.

Apparently he thought the uniform cop by the door of Interview Room A was more important than the woman sitting across from him. ‘How long do you propose to keep me here?’ Wengler asked the man. ‘I have appointments to attend.’

The cop gazed sternly, impassive as a castle guard.

‘Appointments can be postponed, Herr Wengler,’ Charly replied. ‘You received our summons four days ago, leaving you more than enough time to rearrange your diary.’

Wengler looked at her in indignation and confusion. ‘I was summoned to an interview. And what happens? I’m here in good time, and the Herr Inspector is nowhere to be seen.’

‘That’s because there is no Herr Inspector. I’ll be the one asking the questions.’ She smiled politely, savouring the look on Wengler’s face. ‘I’m sure it’s in your interests to have the matter of your brother’s death resolved.’

‘I’m just surprised your colleagues didn’t ask these questions when I was here last Friday.’

‘An investigation like this yields new information all the time.’

‘New information? How exciting.’

Hilda Steffens sat at the ready, and Charly began. ‘Dietrich Assmann is the operations manager of the Luisenhöhe distillery in Treuburg?’

‘You call that new information?’

‘Why did you send your operations manager to Berlin? Herr Assmann has been here more than a week.’

‘Edith Lamkau requested my help.’

‘So you send your most vital employee?’

‘My best employee. The Lamkau firm plays a decisive role in distributing our product through Central Germany. It’s in my own interests for business in Berlin to get back on its feet.’

‘How well do you know Herr Assmann?’

‘What kind of question is that?’

‘One I’d like you to answer. Is it a purely business relationship, or are you also personally acquainted?’

‘The former.’

‘How well did you know your brother?’

‘You do ask strange questions.’

‘Just concentrate on answering them.’

‘Eight hundred kilometres makes it hard to stay in touch. I wasn’t aware of his last address, if that’s what you’re alluding to, nor the danger he was in.’

‘And Herbert Lamkau?’

‘What the hell do you want from me? Tell me what you’re driving at.’

‘Let me see. Tainted schnapps containing dangerously high levels of methanol, marketed in Luisenbrand bottles…’

‘Isn’t it about time you stopped digging up these old stories?’

‘The question is: what you know about them? Now, as well as back then.’

‘I’ve explained all this to your esteemed colleague in Treuburg. Doesn’t he pass information like this on?’

Sadly, not always, Charly thought. ‘Herr Wengler,’ she said. ‘I’m afraid these stories aren’t quite as old as you think. Yesterday evening, working with the Chief Customs Office, the Berlin Police seized a large consignment of lethal rotgut stowed in Mathée Luisenbrand original bottles.’

‘Pardon me?’ Wengler’s surprise appeared genuine, but what did genuine mean with a man like this?

‘The goods were to be loaded onto a cargo boat at the Westhafen by Lamkau employees, whose vans were stationed alongside the quay.’

‘You seriously think I’m involved? Who do you think a scheme like this hurts most? The Luisenbrand name! The good reputation of our company, and the Mathée brand!’

‘I don’t think anything, Herr Wengler. I’m just trying to establish the facts. Do you know how the Berlin Police were aware of the operation? It was thanks to a black book found in your dead brother’s apartment. A book from Herbert Lamkau’s private desk that was seized with other company papers, that your brother must have stolen from headquarters.’

She didn’t mention the Nordpiraten informant who had revealed important information about the Concordia Ringverein’s illegal dealings with Lamkau and the Americans.

Wengler shook his head. ‘To think, back then I believed Siegbert when he told me he wasn’t involved.’

‘He doesn’t appear to have been the driving force.’

‘Lamkau?’ Wengler asked. ‘The rat. He swore to me never again. Dragging my company’s good name through the mire!’

‘I’d be surprised if Herbert Lamkau was behind it. Given that the deal passed off yesterday, almost three weeks after his death.’

‘What surprises me is that such large quantities were contained in original Luisenbrand bottles. Someone from the distillery must have been helping him. One of his old accomplices, perhaps…’

Charly tried to read Wengler’s thoughts, in vain.

The door opened and Detective Chief Inspector Böhm burst into the room. ‘Excuse the interruption, Charly,’ he said. ‘Can I speak with you a moment?’

Wenger gazed at her curiously as she re-entered the room. She took her time, sat down, and opened her notepad. She had no need to take down what Böhm had told her outside – nor did she want to mitigate the effect an open notebook could have on a potential suspect. After a moment she lit a Juno, before striking like a snake. ‘Herr Wengler, where were you yesterday evening between nine and ten o’clock?’

‘I was having dinner. In the Rheingold. Why do you ask?’

‘The Rheingold. The food’s good there. What did you have?’

‘Venison loin.’

Charly nodded and made a note. The response had come without hesitation. As if the answer had been agreed in advance. ‘Can anyone confirm that? You must surely have kept the receipt.’

‘I’m not sure what I’m being accused of here. I thought this was about my brother’s death?’

‘I want to know who you had dinner with yesterday.’

‘Relatives. Uncle Leopold and his family. They were here for the funeral, and returned to Danzig this morning.’

Now Charly was surprised. She had been expecting a different answer. Perhaps Wengler was keeping Assmann’s name back for the end, so that it sounded more credible when he finally remembered him? He said nothing more.

‘No one else?’

‘No.’

Charly looked at her notebook. ‘Your operations manager Dietrich Assmann claims you had dinner with him yesterday in the Rheingold.’

‘He must have the date wrong. We met for dinner on Sunday evening, but at Kempinski’s, not in the Rheingold.’

Gustav Wengler smiled, but Charly could hardly imagine he was unaware of what he was doing. Did he really think he could save his own neck so easily? That his old comrade Assmann would give it up just like that?

68

They were obliged to let Gustav Wengler go, but Lange continued to dog his heels. Dietrich Assmann, on the other hand, was afforded the privilege of lunch in his private cell.

Charly wondered if inmates were served the same muck as staff in the canteen. The mashed potatoes could have served as paste in another life, while the pork was stringy and lukewarm. She took a serviette and stowed the meat carefully inside, for Kirie. The rest she could just about stomach. The sauerkraut even bordered on edible.

Wilhelm Böhm’s plate was clean. The man had a horse’s appetite, with taste buds to shame a garbage truck. ‘When should we bring Assmann back in?’ she asked, lighting a cigarette.

‘We’ll let him stew another hour or so.’

‘I wonder what he’ll do when he realises his alibi’s fallen through?’

‘Let’s hope he implicates Gustav Wengler.’

‘We shouldn’t forget this is a murder inquiry. Bootlegging is a matter for Customs.’

‘Of course. Only, it looks like there’s a link between our murders and the illegal distilling of Luisenbrand. Remember that four of those involved are dead, making anyone else who’s mixed up a potential victim, Assmann and Wengler included.’

‘I can’t shake the feeling this investigation’s jinxed.’ Charly shook her head. ‘We keep finding more and more crimes, yet we’re still no closer to catching the killer.’

Böhm agreed. ‘It’d be good to know what Inspector Rath has turned up in East Prussia. I’d be a lot happier if we could bring this Indian in. Apparently Rath’s sent his colleague back to Königsberg. To me that sounds like he’s concluded his investigation. So, why hasn’t he come back?’ He leaned across the table and lowered his voice. ‘You’re on good terms with the man. Can you explain why he hasn’t made contact in over a week? Just between ourselves, Charly.’

She almost choked on her Sinalco. She had any number of explanations, the majority of which she had no desire to share with Wilhelm Böhm. She had already cursed Gereon a thousand times inside. With a more reliable person you could feel your anxiety was justified, but with Gereon you never knew whether to feel anxious or simply annoyed.

She shrugged her shoulders and stubbed out her cigarette. ‘Time for work. Inspector Rath will be in touch. If not, we’ll soon find him back at his desk as if nothing’s happened.’

‘Now that I can believe,’ Böhm said, and stood up. ‘But you’re right: to work!’

A strange commotion disturbed police corridors, distinct from the usual midday ruckus. Officers stood in small groups speaking quietly, watching the passage leading to the police commissioner’s office.

Charly and Böhm pushed to the front to see the unfamiliar grey of the Reichswehr. A captain escorted a police colonel and a civilian to the police commissioner’s office.

‘The uniform cop is Colonel Poten,’ Böhm said. ‘He used to be in charge of the police academy at Eiche.’

‘So what’s he doing turning up here with a Reichswehr captain?’

‘Rumour has it that Poten’s to replace Heimannsberg,’ another officer whispered. ‘They say the man in plain clothes is the new commissioner.’

‘Pardon me?’

‘Apparently the entire police executive is to be replaced.’ The officer handed her the morning paper. Dangerous Plans, ran the headline in the Berliner Tageblatt. Papen as Reich Commissioner?

She glanced at the headline. What was now happening had been in the air since Sunday, when bloody exchanges between Communists and Nazis claimed sixteen lives. Gunfire had erupted on the streets of Altona, a provincial town in far away Holstein, after an SA troop in full regalia had marched through a Communist district. The Prussian Police had called for assistance from neighbouring Hamburg, and the national press had questioned whether the Prussian state government and police force still had the ball at their feet. There were calls for a Reich commissioner to be appointed so that the Social Democrat minority government led by that stubborn East Prussian Otto Braun might be deposed. In short: Prussia was to be co-governed by the Reich.

It was nothing less than a call to arms.

Reich Chancellor Franz von Papen, whose major political contribution to date had been the lifting of the SA ban, without which the exchanges in Altona would never have occurred, had travelled to Hindenburg’s East Prussian estate at Neudeck to persuade the aged president of the necessity of such a measure. Papen, who had no Reichstag majority and had been appointed chancellor by the grace of Hindenburg himself, had his heart set on becoming Reich commissioner for Prussia.

The move would signal the end of Prussian democracy, one of the few remaining bastions of democracy in Germany, which was precisely what this reactionary Franz von Papen, dreaming of the Kaiser’s return or a military dictatorship – no one was quite sure which – had in mind.

Böhm and Charly watched in silence as the captain and his men halted outside Grzesinski’s door and knocked, to be admitted by the commissioner’s secretary as if they were expected.

They made their way back to A Division in silence. At length, Böhm spoke. ‘So, Papen and his barons have been so bold.’

Charly was surprised. It was rare for the Bulldog to express his political views in police circles, but a line had been crossed. Suddenly politics were an indelible part of Castle life, and Böhm was deeply unhappy. ‘Do you think Prime Minister Braun’s already been deposed?’ she asked.

‘Otto Braun won’t go without a fight.’ Böhm opened the glass door to Homicide like a gentleman of the old school. ‘I can’t imagine that Grzesinski’s about to clear his desk either. As for Dr Weiss…’ Seeing a few colleagues standing in the corridor, he started whispering again. ‘With any luck, this farce will go the same way as the Kapp Putsch.’

Charly had run into Albert Grzesinski in the stairwell only this morning. Dressed in cutaway coat and top hat, he was scheduled to attend Superintendent Mercier’s funeral at three. Now, in his mourning dress, he was obliged to receive a Reichswehr captain. She’d have given anything to know what was playing out behind those doors.

There was still no news half an hour later when they took Dietrich Assmann back to the interview room. It looked as if Grzesinski was still in office. No doubt Böhm was right, and the whole thing would just fizzle out. There was no way the police commissioner and his deputy would relinquish their roles without a fight. She looked at the man sitting opposite.

‘This is Officer Ritter,’ Böhm said, and Assmann gazed curiously. ‘It was she who spoke with Director Wengler this morning. Your boss – and alibi.’

Assmann furrowed his brow. ‘And?’

‘To cut a long story short,’ Charly said, ‘Herr Wengler denies being with you yesterday evening. He claims to have last seen you on Sunday night.’

Dietrich Assmann was temporarily lost for words. ‘It’s a trick,’ he said finally. ‘You’re trying to pull the wool over my eyes.’

‘I’d be happy to provide a copy of his written statement.’ Böhm didn’t move as he spoke. It was as if a marble statue were moving its lips. ‘If you like, I can arrange a sit-down with Herr Wengler.’

‘I want a lawyer,’ Assmann said at length.

‘Should I have someone call Dr Schröder?’ Böhm asked. ‘I understand you’re one of his clients?’

‘Not any more.’

No wonder the man wanted to switch lawyers, Charly thought. Helmut Schröder was the Berlin solicitor representing Gustav Wengler.

69

Rath opened his eyes and stared into a set of fanged jaws. An animal skull. His mind whirred, but he couldn’t remember where he was. The skull, which might have been from a fox, lay on a rack beside his bed. He looked around the inside of a wooden hut, crudely assembled. Its walls were tree trunks grouted with loam and mostly covered in animal hides, which also served as bedside rugs.

He felt cold sweat on his skin but, now that his initial confusion was past, he realised he felt as rested as he had in a long time. It was as if, after months of wakefulness, he had finally been granted a decent night’s sleep.

Where the hell are you, Gereon Rath? And how did you get here?

He searched his memory but found only fragments of dark dreams.

The man with the beard; the hellhound; the elk.

What had happened to him?

Daylight filtered in through two small windows. Sunshine. He heard birds chirping outside, saw green branches. The hut contained a small table and lone chair. In a corner of the room was a hearth, its joists capped with a thick, sooty layer of loam. An opening had been left in the roof, through which the sun now shone. On a kind of grating metal pots and pans stood covered in soot.

Already he could guess who the cabin’s architect was, and looking at the wall opposite he felt his hunch confirmed. Though likewise crudely assembled, there was something here that didn’t quite match its surroundings. Rath was gazing at a bookshelf.

He had gained the Kaubuk’s hut.

His hand reached to the side where his holster normally lay. Gone. His Walther PP was gone too, along with his jacket, trousers, shoes and socks. He lay in his underwear, covered in a heavy, red-brown pelt that hadn’t lost its animal smell. The bed was lower than most. He pulled back the pelt and tried to stand, but his legs wouldn’t obey and he collapsed in a heap.

His circulation seemed back to normal, but his legs felt like rubber hoses when he tried to stand. He summoned his strength and tried again, gripping a beam. All of a sudden he felt hunger, and an insatiable thirst. Would there be anything to eat or drink here?

Like a cripple he moved through the room hand over hand, finding water in a wooden pitcher, which he smelled and found to be good. He savoured the feeling of it running down his throat. His muscles grew accustomed to carrying him once more, but movement took more out of him than anticipated. He sat on a stool next to the window and looked at the shelf.

Many of the spines were familiar: novels by Karl May and a few volumes of Leatherstocking, perhaps the same editions he’d read as a child. But here they lined the shelves of a grown man, worn and thumbed. Alongside were a few new editions: Fritz Steuben’s Der fliegende Pfeil, Gabriel Ferry’s Waldläufer, a German translation of Mayne Reid’s The Scalp Hunters, as well as a range of non-fiction books with titles such as The Indians of North America and Life on the Prairie.

He stood and tried holding his weight without the support of his hands and, to some extent, it worked. There was no immediate danger of falling over. On a tin plate near the hearth was a small, bandy leg. Meat of some kind, but it was fried to a crisp, and he was hungry.

He reached for the haunch, or whatever it might be, and bit into it, tearing away as much as he could, and nibbling at it, teeth bared, until it was gone. His craving for meat made him feel like a predator. The taste was familiar, rabbit perhaps. Although, it hadn’t looked like rabbit – nor did the gnawed bone. He replaced it on the tin plate, which reminded him of the plates they had used during the war. Carefully, he moved to the door, taking a stick as a precaution.

The sun was high in the sky. How long had he been asleep? There were midges everywhere, but he batted them away. Next to the entrance was an almost full rain barrel. He drank with both hands, shovelling water on his face to waken himself. The hut was perfectly camouflaged by trees and bushes but, a few steps to either side, and the scrub was so thick as to make it invisible.

The landscape wasn’t nearly as bleak as that which Adamek had shown him. He groped his way forward with the stick, but soon found himself in a deepish water hole. He circled the hut and realised it was situated on a kind of island, surrounded by moorland on all sides. It was a mystery how Radlewski came and went here. He’d have to know the moors like the back of his hand, or at least better than old Adamek.

The chances of escape were slim. He knew now why he hadn’t been tied, but Radlewski hadn’t killed him either. Perhaps that was still to come?

Inside again, he scoured every receptacle until he located his suit in a large chest. It was a little damp, and unbelievably dirty, especially the trousers, but it was better than traipsing around in his underwear. He dressed, donning socks and Herr Damerau’s sturdy boots, which seemed to have survived the episode intact.

He felt his inside jacket pocket. His cigarette case was still there, though it was empty, of course. He snapped it shut. The little magnifying glass was there too. He’d have preferred the cigarettes.

He returned to the stool and examined the books. At length he removed one from the shelf, opened it, and a sheaf of papers sailed to the ground. He crouched to retrieve it. Not bookmarks, as he’d thought initially, but letters, written in an elegant, curved hand.

He didn’t have to read to the end to know that Maria Cofalka had written these lines, and that they marked the start of their correspondence. Rath had already guessed it was the librarian who’d initiated the exchange. Using the books she laid out for Radlewski as a kind of mailbox seemed like a natural solution.

She’d written to her childhood crush again and again and, at some point, Artur Radlewski, who was sensible to the written word, had responded. He had christened her Winchinchala, whatever that meant. With the exception of Nscho-tschi Rath didn’t know any Indian names.

He gathered up the letters and placed them back inside the book before returning it to the shelf.

His curiosity was further roused by an item of furniture that stood next to the window. A table with a slanting top, a kind of desk or bureau, adorned, incredibly, by an inkwell and ink. Where in the hell… The paraffin lamp that stood on the table was most likely stolen too, along with a few other implements Rath now recognised: tools, metal pots and pans, a washboard.

So this was where Artur Radlewski sat to write his strange, indecipherable letters to Treuburg’s librarian. The letters that Hella Rickert had stolen from his drawer!

More and more memories surfaced. The day in Treuburg. The missing letters. The expedition to the Markowsken forest. The little lake. Old Adamek, who set a ferocious pace before suddenly vanishing with Kowalski. The moonlit night. The moor. How he’d given up the ghost. When Radlewski had appeared, the Kaubuk…

He couldn’t remember anything after that. He felt his head for a bump, his neck for a puncture site, but there was nothing.

What would the Kaubuk do when he realised his unwanted guest was awake? He must know by now that Rath was a police officer: badge and identification were gone, along with his service pistol.

At least he wouldn’t kill him; if he wanted him dead he’d have killed him long ago.

Rath opened a drawer in the desk and was astonished to find piles of virgin white paper. Standing side by side were various leather-bound notebooks, some good as new, others well worn.

He snapped open his pocket magnifying glass and attempted to decipher a few lines of Radlewski’s tiny handwriting. Diaries, no doubt about it. In order to preserve his sanity out here in the wilds, Artur Radlewski had kept a diary.

The notebooks were from a stationer. The inkwell and letter paper too, no doubt. Rath sat down and opened the book that looked the oldest and most worn. Radlewski had filled the pages with the same tiny script he had used to write his letters to Maria Cofalka.

70

Dietrich Assmann didn’t trust them. His alibi had collapsed, but still he was cautious. Playing the blackmailers Unger and Riedel off against each other had been a doddle in comparison, but Assmann smelled a trap and, for the time being, refused to say anything against his alleged accomplice. It didn’t matter whether it was the customs man, Kressin, asking the questions, or CID Officers Ritter and Böhm. Even Charly made him wary; he wouldn’t fall for her kindness.

After three and a half hours of more or less fruitless questioning, Böhm had Assmann escorted back to his cell. They had already requested an arrest warrant from the magistrate. Time was on their side. Sooner or later, Dietrich Assmann would be in absolutely no doubt that his boss had left him in the lurch and would make his statement, whereupon they could, likewise, issue a warrant for Wengler’s arrest – or so they hoped. They just had to make sure he didn’t give them the slip in the meantime. Fortunately Gräf, who had taken the day shift, was a dab hand at surveillance. They had chosen to deploy a new officer with each shift, alternating between CID and Customs so that Wengler didn’t smell a rat.

‘What do you think? Will Assmann make a statement today?’ Bruno Kressin asked. The man was dry as a bone.

Böhm shook his head. ‘Let him sleep on it, I say, and speak to his lawyer. Tomorrow he’ll be ripe.’

‘Why would Assmann choose an alibi like that if he couldn’t be sure Wengler would cover him?’ Charly asked.

‘Maybe,’ Böhm said, ‘he was sure.’

The customs man nodded, and it seemed plausible to Charly too.

Suddenly there was a commotion outside, loud voices, cries. The officers looked at one another. Charly exited the interview room and stepped into the corridor, crossing to the stairwell where various colleagues had gathered. She heard Böhm and Kressin follow, but didn’t turn around, the action before her was too compelling.

She didn’t know what had happened in the hours they had spent interrogating Dietrich Assmann, or what had taken place in the police commissioner’s office. She only knew that Albert Grzesinski hadn’t found the time to change his clothes. Flanked by two soldiers, he still wore his mourning suit. The Reichswehr had arrested the Berlin police commissioner and were relieving him of office.

Behind Grzesinski followed Deputy Police Commissioner Bernhard Weiss, uniform immaculate as always, and Uniform Commander Magnus Heimannsberg, each man escorted, in turn, by two Reichswehr officers. Though the eyes under the steel helmets stared straight ahead, the young men were clearly afraid that the members of the Berlin police force, hundreds of whom were employed here at Alex alone, might foil the arrest. Yet not a hand stirred; officers whispered and murmured, grew indignant, but none intervened.

The customs officer mumbled an apology along the lines of ‘best not to interfere in police matters’, and took his leave.

Charly couldn’t believe it. They had actually been so bold. Papen and his reactionary ministers didn’t just want to take the Free State of Prussia, the only province that had been continuously governed by the Social Democrats since the war, they wanted its police force too. It wasn’t enough to exile the interior minister, they had to replace the entire Berlin Police executive: the Social Democrat Grzesinski, the Liberal Weiss and the Catholic Centrist Heimannsberg.

‘They can’t get away with this,’ Charly said to Böhm. ‘We have to do something!’

‘The commissioner need only say the word, and thousands of men will stand behind him.’

‘Then let him, goddamn it. He’s going without a fight, like a lamb to the slaughter.’

‘He knows what he’s doing. Armed resistance could provoke a civil war between the police and Reichswehr. The bloodshed would be worse than 1919.’

‘Papen can’t want civil war. No one can. Isn’t there enough violence on our streets as it is?’

‘What Papen wants certainly isn’t democracy.’

The black cutaway and top hat was a fitting outfit, even if Grzesinski had been prevented from attending Superintendent Mercier’s funeral. A fitting outfit with which to mourn the death of Prussian democracy.

More and more office doors opened, and more and more officers stepped into the corridor to look, pushing towards the stairwell to watch the soldiers in field grey leading away their superiors. A few colleagues, above all those in uniform, showed their respect to the police chiefs by performing a military salute.

‘Long live the Republic!’ someone cried suddenly, and the faces under the steel helmets looked about nervously.

‘Long live the Republic!’ More and more officers joined the cry, and now Charly, too, cried at the top of her voice, and even Böhm, whom she’d not have thought capable of such a thing, stood by her side and chanted. ‘Long live the Republic. Long live our chiefs!’

The cry echoed through the corridors and stairwell, growing ever louder. ‘Long live the Republic. Long live our chiefs!’

With increasing nervousness, the youthful soldiers gazed left and right, hands on their weapons, ready to fire. At any moment a CID officer could draw his service pistol and shoot. The Prussian Police could put an end to this nonsense.

No one did, of course. The officers assembled were far too Prussian. In the absence of an explicit command, no one would reach for a weapon, but the disregard in which these insurrectionists were held was plain to see.

Amidst the chants of her colleagues, every so often an isolated cry of ‘Freedom!’ rang out, and Charly felt a hitherto unknown sense of pride in the Berlin Police and her Prussian homeland. Notwithstanding men like Dettmann, she felt inordinately proud to be a part of this police body which, despite the Reich government’s display of force, stood in democratic solidarity with its executive officers.

The officers followed the cortège through the stairwell down to the ground floor, and Charly stood with them. Right now she didn’t care about Gustav Wengler, Dietrich Assmann and the rest, she was simply glad to be a part of the Prussian police force, protesting against its most senior officers being led away like criminals.

Below on Alexanderstrasse was a Mercedes with a Reichswehr number plate, into which Grzesinski now climbed with the Reichswehr captain. Heimannsberg and Weiss followed in a second and third car. Where they were headed, no one could say, only that it was somewhere out west.

Once the cars had disappeared around a corner, Charly looked up at the brick façade of police headquarters. Almost all Castle windows were open, everywhere officers stood following the unworthy spectacle, and the cries that moments before had filled the stairwell resounded still from open windows and the mouths of colleagues: ‘Long live the Republic! Long live our chiefs!’

But Charly no longer felt any desire to join them. Suddenly she recognised the futility of their actions. Her pride and euphoria evaporated, and she felt only impotence. She sensed, no, she knew, that, in the face of the Reich government’s staggering effrontery, words could never be enough. She looked across for Wilhelm Böhm but couldn’t find him among her fellow officers, and with only unfamiliar faces for company she felt utterly alone.

It was Wednesday evening, shortly after half past five, and the death knell for Prussian democracy had just sounded.

71

Rath didn’t know how many pages he’d read. They were confused and not necessarily in chronological order, but made for fascinating reading all the same. The style was similar to the letters, only here Radlewski seemed to reveal more of himself. Sometimes relating details from his everyday life, sometimes dim memories from childhood, they were filled even now with hatred for his father and love for his mother. But there was one event he kept coming back to, the same event he’d described to Maria Cofalka: the murder of Anna von Mathée in the shallows of the little lake.

Radlewski had seen a man rape Anna, and failed to intervene. Returning to the same spot, full of remorse, he had found her dead.

How many times had he recounted the scene? The young woman’s corpse floating on the water as, still stunned, he registered the fact of her death. A young man discovering her body. The killer returning to the scene of the crime in the company of a uniformed police officer. The same officer striking the grieving young man with the butt of his revolver as he knelt by the corpse. Even the perpetrators’ exchange was recorded.

There was no mention of the name Polakowski, but perhaps Radlewski hadn’t known the young registrar. Who else could it be?

Should we drown the dirty Polack?

Rath thought back to the furniture dealer on the aeroplane. He, too, had spoken of dirty Polacks. In jest, perhaps, but the sentiment was real. In the meantime, far too many Germans spoke of their Polish neighbours in a hate-filled and contemptuous manner. Not that the Poles were any less guilty, the feelings cut both ways.

He spun around as, suddenly, the door flew open. He felt as if he had been caught out. Whatever form these notebooks might take, they were still a man’s private diaries. The book was snatched from him, and he was pushed from the chair with no more than a twist of the hand.

Landing on the floor he gazed at the force of nature that stood above him. Artur Radlewski was bareheaded, his hair plaited in two braids and complemented by an Indian-style headband. With his full beard and leather garb the man only partially resembled the vision of his dreams.

Seeing the Kaubuk in person, fever now dissipated, Rath knew that, with his long hair and beard, there was no way this man could have wandered the streets of Dortmund, Wittenberge and Berlin avenging his mother’s death. He’d have been spotted immediately. Even in Berlin, where events that might elsewhere trigger a popular uprising were greeted with a shrug, someone would have seen him. As for the enormous black dog that stood guarding the door, tongue hanging out of its mouth…

‘Herr Radlewski!’ Rath chose to be friendly, knowing the man understood High German. He smiled. ‘Good to meet you after all this time.’ Radlewski silently removed the notebooks from the table, and stowed them back inside whatever this strange item of furniture might be. ‘You rescued me from the moor. Many thanks.’

Radlewski threw him a suspicious glance as he placed the diaries alongside the letter paper, muttering sullenly.

‘I came to, not knowing where I was. When I saw your books, I thought I might find some clue there.’

Radlewski’s gaze flitted between Rath and the desk. Though no less suspicious, his expression was at least a little friendlier. Or rather, a little less unfriendly.

‘My apologies. I had just opened the book when you came in,’ Rath lied.

Radlewski mumbled something and went to the hearth, finding the tin plate with the gnawed-off bone. On top of everything else, it looked as if Rath had bolted his lunch. He took the plate and looked at his guest.

‘That was me. Apologies.’ Rath wondered if the apologies would ever stop. ‘But… I was ravenous. I’ll pay for it if you like. As well as any other inconvenience you’ve suffered on my behalf. If you just tell me where my wallet is.’

‘You’ll pay for nothing. You’re my guest.’ The blonde beard could speak, and the voice wasn’t nearly as dry as Rath had imagined. No doubt he spoke regularly with his dog. The beast, at any rate, wasn’t surprised to hear its master, but remained in the door, watching Rath. ‘I’ve made another catch.’

‘Catch?’

‘Just needs to be skinned and gutted, then we can roast it.’

With that he disappeared outside. The dog remained in the door. Rath didn’t move.

Soon Radlewski returned, holding a metal skewer on which three scrawny, suspiciously small-looking rodents with long tails were impaled one on top of the other.

‘Are those… rats?’ Rath asked.

‘Rats?’ Radlewski laughed. ‘Yes, rats.’ Giggling, he reached into a small bag and rubbed the bloody, skinned animals with salt. Rath’s stomach briefly threatened to rebel, but soon settled. ‘Special rats,’ Radlewski continued, stoking a small fire. His cackling was starting to grate. ‘Tree rats!’

‘Tree rats?’

‘Squirrels,’ Radlewski said, hanging the skewer with the three animals over the hearth. He was still shaking his head and grinning in amusement.

Rath breathed a sigh of relief, though he didn’t especially feel like eating another squirrel.

Radlewski set the meat on the tin plate and handed it to him. ‘Eat,’ he said, taking a second animal from the skewer and biting. ‘You need to eat. You were sick.’

Rath examined the skinned, roasted thing on his plate, so stringy it really was more reminiscent of rat than squirrel, closed his eyes and bit inside. His stomach didn’t protest.

The two men ate in silence for a time until, when Radlewski offered some of the third squirrel, Rath gratefully declined. Radlewski shared it with the dog. ‘What are you doing here?’ he asked suddenly. ‘What are you doing in my forest?’

Your forest, Rath almost asked, thinking the possessive pronoun incongruous. ‘I’m a police officer,’ he said. ‘I catch killers.’

‘I’m aware you’re a police officer, but you’re not from here.’

‘No.’ Rath debated whether he should tell Radlewski the truth, but it was so clear the man had nothing to do with the curare murders that he preferred to keep it to himself.

‘Why are you here?’

‘I wanted to meet you.’ At least it wasn’t a lie; it sounded almost friendly.

‘You won’t bring me in. I’m no killer. I just wanted justice.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘My father. I assume that’s why you’re here?’ The fourteen-year-old boy who had scalped his father.

‘No,’ Rath said. ‘You witnessed the murder of Anna von Mathée,’ he said at length. Radlewski looked at him. Surprised, perhaps even a little upset. ‘You need to testify in court. You saw the man who killed Anna. An innocent man went to jail.’

He had said too much, he could see straightaway from Radlewski’s reaction. The man was thinking. ‘You read them,’ the Kaubuk said at last, the old suspicion returning to his voice. ‘You read my notebooks.’

‘No more than a glance, but Maria Cofalka…’

‘I’m not leaving the forest,’ Radlewski said. ‘I’ll never return to the world of men! Did Maria send you?’

‘Yes and no, it’s…’

‘I’m not leaving my forest,’ Radlewski interrupted. ‘Neither you nor anyone else can persuade me.’

‘I just want…’

Radlewski stood up. Seeing his size Rath started. No wonder everyone here spoke of the Kaubuk. He was really not the kind of man you’d want to run into alone in the forest. ‘You’re fit and healthy again,’ Radlewski said. ‘You don’t need nursing any more. Time for you to leave.’

‘You nursed me?’

‘You had a bad fever, but now you need to return to your people, and never enter my forest again!’ As he spoke, Radlewski fetched a canteen from a windowsill next to the hearth. Seizing Rath so suddenly that there was no chance for him to react, he forced his jaw open and held the bottle to his mouth. ‘Drink,’ he said over and over. ‘Drink!’

Rath had no choice, so firmly were the Kaubuk’s thumb and index finger wedged between his jaw, as if he were a horse being bridled.

The broth tasted better than the Kaubuk’s dirty fingers, and soon Rath realised he was dozing off.

What the hell had the bastard given him? Was he trying to poison him? Why…? Wh…y?

The only response came in the form of darkness, enveloping him once more.

72

At eight the lights went out, and it grew colder. Dietrich Assmann wrapped himself in his blanket and shivered on the plank bed.

So, he’d have to spend a night here, but the lawyer would get him out soon after. Hopefully the man was good. He’d have preferred Dr Schröder, but Schröder ate out of Gustav Wengler’s hand and, as matters stood, wouldn’t be much use – if, that is, Gustav really was trying to do the dirty on him.

He still couldn’t believe it. Why would Gustav Wengler collapse his alibi? Everything had been agreed. True, the shipment at the Westhafen had gone belly up, but that was hardly his fault! He’d bust a gut to ensure they kept to the delivery date, despite the problems created by Lamkau’s death. It wasn’t his fault they’d been grassed up. Some arsehole from Concordia, no doubt. Unlike Gustav Wengler, he’d never entirely trusted its members.

The truth was, he was proud of how he’d dodged the cops, how he’d obtained a set of dry clothes and returned to the hotel. He’d have thought Gustav might reward such commitment. After all, he could have died.

He still wasn’t sure the cops hadn’t simply laid a trap. Every fibre of his being resisted believing that Gustav Wengler had dropped him just like that. Gustav must understand that a man like Dietrich Assmann wouldn’t go down without a fight. Or perhaps it was all part of the plan? Just like in ’24 when Lamkau and his gang were sacrificed to save the firm. Even Siegbert Wengler had left Masuria back then, though not before ensuring it was worth his while.

Wengler might have something similar in mind now. Perhaps Schröder would pay him a visit tomorrow with an offer. Time would tell, but the figure would need to be substantial. Assmann knew the locations of all the moonshine stills, knew the men who worked in them, the transport routes and more. More than Lamkau had ever known, and information like that had to be worth something.

Requesting his own lawyer couldn’t hurt. He might even get more out of it. Since ’24 business had grown exponentially. He wouldn’t let himself be fobbed off like those two stiffs. He’d ask for more than Lamkau, and could do so with a clear conscience.

He couldn’t help remembering the last thing the brawny inspector had said before returning him to his stinking cell. ‘You should be mindful, Herr Assmann, that the murders of your former colleagues are linked to moonshining. If you’re in any way involved, it’s best you let us know. That way we can protect you. You could be next.’

The man had no idea. He’d washed his hands of old lady Radlewski’s death back in ’24, just like Gustav Wengler, which was how he’d been able to take on the role of manager. He was in about as much danger as Wengler himself.

Despite the darkness sleep refused to come. Perhaps that was part of prison life. You had all the time in the world, you just couldn’t use it, not even for sleeping.

In the pitch black everything seemed impossibly loud; every door that slammed, every squeak, cough, slurp, sob, whine and snore. The jerky melody of church bells penetrated the gloom of his cell.

Üb immer Treue und Redlichkeit. Always practise Truth and Honesty.

Despite his infinite fatigue, sleep continued to elude him, and darkness deadened his sense of time. Suddenly, there was movement and a light came on in the corridor outside.

He heard steps, then saw two men halt outside his cell, a uniformed guard and a plain-clothes officer in a rumpled suit. The guard jangled a set of keys. ‘Here’s your man,’ he said, pointing to the cell.

A loud echo came back from the bare walls as the key rattled in the lock. ‘You’ve got company,’ the guard said.

Assmann sat up. ‘I thought it was lights out.’

‘Take it up with reception in the morning. If CID want to see you, it’s lights on.’

‘CID?’

‘I’m sorry to disturb your sleep, Herr Assmann, but there are a few things I’d like to get straight,’ the plain-clothes man said, stepping inside. Assmann sat up when he showed his badge, suddenly wide awake, and nervous. What did they want from him now?

The guard locked the cell door from the outside. ‘Inspector, Sir!’

‘I’ll call when I’m done.’ The inspector sat next to Assmann on the plank bed.

‘What do you want from me? Don’t you think your colleagues upstairs have done enough?’

‘That was the day shift,’ the man said. ‘I’m nights.’

So they were working him over in shifts now? Fucking cops. ‘Can I smoke?’

‘Feel free.’ The cop made an inviting gesture with his hand. Assmann fingered the last cigarette out of his case, the one he had been saving for the morning. The inspector said nothing.

Night shift! They could question him until they were blue in the face. Dietrich Assmann wouldn’t say a thing until he knew where he stood. Once he’d spoken with his lawyer, and Gustav Wengler.

All of a sudden it was pitch black as before. The embers of the cigarette shone like a glow-worm and threw reddish light on this strange inspector who still hadn’t asked a question. Was he trying to intimidate him with silence? Assmann shook his head and took a long drag, knowing it was his one cigarette for the night. Looking to the side, he was surprised to see that the face of the man, who moments before had sat beside him on the plank bed, was gone.

73

It smelled of damp grass. A chill on the skin.

Letters carved in stone.

In the wan light a snail that appeared almost black.

Rath looked up at a gravestone.

For a moment he thought he was in a nightmare, but the ache in his neck told him it was real.

The gravestone bore a different name than his own.

Gefr. Szudarsky, Res. Inf. R 49.

He was familiar with such abbreviations. The 49th Reserve Infantry Regiment. A dead private who had fought for Kaiser and Fatherland in ’14.

He looked around. More graves, arranged in file. Even in death the Prussians kept to march formation. Moonlight shone on the stones.

Suddenly, he knew where he was: the military cemetery near Markowsken.

He read more names. All had died in the same year, 1914. Many sounded Polish, but it wasn’t just Prussian war graves, Russian soldiers were buried here too – some of whom also had Polish-sounding names.

The Masurians had given their lives for Prussia and the Kaiser; the Masovians for Russian-Poland and the Tsar.

What a difference a simple border made, but then again perhaps not. Everyone here was dead, irrespective of which side they had fought on.

Standing up he was obliged to support himself on Prussian Private Szudarsky’s grave. Radlewski must have doped him. He could vaguely remember stumbling through the forest, more or less out of his mind, urged on by the Kaubuk and his dog. After a while he felt the strength in his legs begin to return.

He looked down at himself. His grey suit was for the garbage. He felt his left side, detecting his shoulder holster and service pistol. Even his wallet was there. He looked inside: not a penny missing, identification present and correct. Artur Radlewski and his accursed moor had spat him out just as they had found him. The only thing he didn’t have was cigarettes.

He made for the road. It was seven or eight kilometres to Treuburg if he went right via Krupinnen, but he had a different destination in mind, and bore left instead. The moon lit the way. Gazing above him he knew he must have been gone longer than a night or two, much longer in fact. The crescent moon that had looked on as he lay dying was already on the wane.

The spire of the village church rose dark and forbidding in the night sky. He walked the final metres to the main road, hoping not to meet anyone, his suit utterly soiled, his hair matted and, feeling his chin and cheeks, he knew that a shave was long overdue. A light was on in the schoolhouse. He knocked and, at length, Karl Rammoser opened the door.

The teacher’s eyes opened wide at the sight of him. Perhaps he took him for the Kaubuk. ‘Inspector,’ he said. ‘What are you doing here so late? I thought you’d returned to Berlin long ago.’

‘Can I come in? I’ll tell you everything.’

‘Of course.’

On the dining table in the teacher’s apartment stood a bottle of homebrew and a glass, alongside an open book. Rammoser fetched a second glass from the cupboard. ‘Drink? You look as if you could use one.’

‘Do you think I could have a cigarette too? I need the nicotine more.’ Rath looked around. ‘Where’s your housekeeper?’

‘Erna? Finished for the night.’

The wall clock showed just before midnight.

‘What day is it today?’

‘Wednesday.’

‘I mean, what’s the date?’

‘20th July. Do you need the year too?’ Rath shook his head. He had been missing for over a week. Why hadn’t anyone come looking for him? Rammoser gave him a cigarette and a light. ‘Don’t take this the wrong way, Inspector, but you look appalling.’

‘Thank you very much.’ Rath took a deep drag and felt the nicotine course through his veins. At last. ‘How about you? Where have you been?’ He gestured towards the teacher’s black suit. Rammoser had loosened his tie.

‘You really don’t know?’ Rammoser furrowed his brow.

‘These past few days I’ve been a world away, quite literally.’

‘Maria Cofalka is dead.’

Rath had to sit down. ‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ he said. ‘You were good friends, weren’t you?’

‘Very good.’ Rammoser poured schnapps into the two glasses and sat beside him. ‘Maria was probably the best friend you could have in this town.’ The teacher raised his glass, and the men toasted and drank.

‘How did she die?’ Rath asked.

‘Drowned, in the Treuburg Lake. They found her body near the public baths. People are talking of suicide, but I think it was an accident. Maria would never have killed herself. She must have slipped on the landing stage, banged her head against something and lost consciousness.’

Rath couldn’t bring himself to mention the letters Maria Cofalka had entrusted to him before her death. The letters that had been stolen from his hotel room.

‘But we were talking about you,’ said Rammoser. ‘Everyone thought you’d gone back to Berlin.’

‘Who’s been saying that?’

‘That’s the word in Pritzkus’s. I don’t know who started the rumour.’

‘Old Adamek perhaps?’ Rath asked. ‘It’s him I’ve to thank for all this. I almost died because of it.’

‘Go on.’ Rath told the schoolmaster the tale of his moorland odyssey, and his rescue by the Kaubuk. ‘Artur Radlewski? So he’s still alive.’

‘He saved my life,’ said Rath.

‘Is that why you didn’t arrest him? Or did he convince you of his innocence?’

‘Most of the time I lay unconscious, running a fever. When we finally had the chance to talk he wasn’t exactly friendly. I fear I may have outstayed my welcome.’ He lit another cigarette. ‘He doped me. It was like I blacked out. I have a dim memory of walking with him through the night, before I came to in the military cemetery by Markowsken.’

‘So now you’re summoning all police reserves in the Oletzko district to fetch him from his murky lair?’

Rath shook his head. ‘No need to worry about that. Firstly, I don’t bear grudges. Secondly, far as I’m concerned Radlewski still has a little credit in the bank. And thirdly, I’m certain he isn’t behind the series of murders I came here to solve.’

Rammoser gave a satisfied nod, as if his favourite student had just given the correct answer. ‘You think old Adamek purposefully lured you onto the moor?’

‘Yes, otherwise he’d have come looking for me. Instead of spinning some yarn about my having gone back to Berlin.’

‘We don’t know if the rumours stem from him.’

‘We know he’s done nothing to dispel them.’

‘Adamek doesn’t say much when he drinks at Pritzkus’s. You should know that,’ said Rammoser. ‘Why would he do it?’

‘If only I knew…’ Rath said. ‘Perhaps he has a score to settle with me.’

‘I think you’re misjudging the old boy.’

‘We’ll see. Either way, I’d like to hear what he has to say.’

74

A Division briefing felt more like a memorial service. Rumour had it that all division and squad team leaders had reported to the new command earlier that morning. Everywhere Charly looked were embarrassed faces. Ernst Gennat appeared later than usual, as usual giving nothing away. He stepped onto the platform and all conversation ceased.

‘We are all aware that decisive changes were made to our institution yesterday,’ he began. ‘Nevertheless, in the coming days I expect you to fulfil your duties just as scrupulously as you would otherwise. Obey the commands of your superiors as ever, and go about your work.’

‘With respect, Sir,’ Wilhelm Böhm cut in, ‘that’s just it. We don’t know who our superiors are.’

‘Until further notice, Dr Melcher will be in charge.’

‘What do you mean, “until further notice”?’

‘Until the matter has been subjected to a judicial inquiry. In the meantime these issues mustn’t prevent us from carrying on with our work. God knows, we have enough cases awaiting resolution.’ The officers weren’t happy. ‘Now don’t be looking like that. Kurt Melcher is by no means the worst commissioner, if his reputation in Essen is anything to go by.’

‘That might be true, Sir.’ Wilhelm Böhm wouldn’t let go. ‘But for myself and many colleagues, it’s the manner of his appointment that jars.’

Gennat nodded. ‘We don’t know if the change in personnel was right, or rather, rightful, but we live in a constitutional state, and these are matters for the courts to decide. Meanwhile, all we can do is carry on.’

‘I’m not so sure about that,’ Charly said, surprised she’d found the courage to speak in a room full of men, but she couldn’t hold back any longer. ‘What I mean is that I’m no longer sure we do live in a constitutional state.’ She lifted a copy of Berliner Tageblatt. ‘If what the paper says is true, then what we witnessed yesterday was a cold-blooded putsch, and Papen has thwarted Prussian democracy in one fell swoop. And whatever our new commissioner’s reputation, he’s hardly known as a democrat.’ She looked around. Not all colleagues were nodding.

‘Surely it’s more important that he’s a good chief.’ The calm voice belonged to Arthur Nebe. He gave Charly a friendly smile. ‘Sadly, this institution has had its share of democrats who’ve turned out to be poor criminal investigators.’

Böhm beat Charly to it. ‘I hope that number doesn’t include Grzesinski and Dr Weiss,’ he said.

‘I’m just saying that professional competence is more important than political persuasion.’

‘I’d have expected a little more loyalty to our old chiefs, especially from you,’ Böhm argued. ‘The support you’ve received from Dr Weiss, you ought to be grateful to him for the rest of your life.’

‘That kind of patronage, Detective Chief Inspector, goes hand in hand with performance!’

‘Gentlemen, please,’ Gennat intervened. ‘Let’s put these squabbles to one side. Everyone is entitled to their own political views, but they should not be a point of discussion here. Dr Melcher’s professional competence is undisputed. He has led Essen Police Headquarters with distinction since the war.’ He looked sternly at Böhm and Charly. ‘And the democratic credentials of a man who belonged to Stresemann’s party are beyond question.’

Charly wasn’t so sure. Kurt Melcher’s move was self-seeking, the very fact that he’d been present at the putsch spoke against him, but she said nothing more and Böhm, too, fell silent. Gennat was right; they shouldn’t discuss these matters here. It sowed discord, and wouldn’t solve any of the issues raised by yesterday’s events.

‘I expect…’ Buddha continued, but then the door flew open, and those assembled remained none the wiser as to his expectations.

Cadet Steinke stood in the door looking agitated. ‘Please excuse the interruption, Sir,’ he said. The man was out of breath, as if he had sprinted the distance from Homicide to the small meeting room. ‘But something terrible has happened.’

‘Come on then, man. Out with it,’ Gennat said, as Steinke paused for breath.

‘It’s… Prisoner Assmann… here in police custody…’

‘Assmann? He’s my prisoner,’ Böhm said. ‘Don’t tell me the man has escaped, or that some shyster has got him off?’

‘Worse. I’m afraid Prisoner Assmann is dead.’

75

In the Salzburger Hof the breakfast tables were already being cleared. Hella Rickert gazed at Rath wide-eyed, but said nothing, simply turned towards the kitchen door with her tray of dirty crockery, offering him a perfect view of her rear.

Forbearance is not acquittance, he thought, and crossed to reception. No one there. He slammed the bell so hard it might have been a high striker.

He felt ready to take on the entire Rickert family if necessary. Rammoser had let him sleep, waking him around nine. After a bath, a decent shave, and a proper breakfast with coffee – sans leg of squirrel – he felt almost human again. Rammoser had offered a replacement suit from his wardrobe. The trousers were a little short and the jacket had patches on its elbows, but otherwise it was a perfect fit, even if it made him look like a village teacher. A village teacher returning from a school trip, for Rath still wore Herr Damerau’s mud-encrusted hiking boots.

He had caught the ten o’clock from Wielitzken. Rammoser had recommended that he find a doctor, but upon reaching Treuburg station the first thing he did was buy three ten-packs of Overstolz. After that he made for the telephone booths and requested a long-distance call to Berlin, lighting the first cigarette as he waited to be connected. He asked for Charly’s extension, but got Böhm instead, and hung up without a word. He had no desire to be recalled while there was still business to attend to here. In the Salzburger Hof, for example.

He slammed the bell again and Hermann Rickert appeared straightaway, looking him up and down, as if to make sure it really was his sometime guest. ‘Inspector, what a surprise!’

‘Isn’t it just?’

‘You left without notifying us. We were somewhat taken aback.’

‘Old Adamek could have told you where I was.’

The hotelier looked at him blankly. ‘I asked Chief Constable Grigat, but apparently you kept him in the dark.’

‘He said that?’

‘I had to have your room cleared, as we had a number of guests over the weekend. You’re welcome to have it back.’

‘How kind.’ Rath wasn’t sure Hermann Rickert noted his sarcasm.

‘You ought to have told us you were staying out of town. We’d have kept your case here for you.’

‘I’m afraid that wasn’t possible.’

‘Well, I don’t mean to be awkward. How about we just charge you for the case? A week in left luggage.’ Rickert smiled his politest hotelier’s smile.

‘Most obliging. Then I’d like to have my old room back.’

‘Of course.’ Rickert fetched the key from the board. ‘I’ll have your case brought up immediately.’

‘Thank you.’ Rath nodded. ‘And… you’ll remember I’d lost something before my… departure? Did you manage to…?’

‘But of course! My apologies, how could I forget?’ Rickert stooped to retrieve a black folder from behind the counter.

‘Where did you find it?’

‘It was my daughter, actually. She found it while clearing your room for our weekend guests, on Sonnabend. It must have slipped behind the bed.’

‘I see.’ Rath took the folder and key, and headed up to his room.

On entering, the first thing he did was check that the letters were all there. At least one was missing, the lines he’d been reading prior to the theft. As for the rest, he couldn’t be sure – and the only person who knew for certain was dead. The news about Maria Cofalka had shaken him. Her death was neither accident nor suicide, nor was it a coincidence.

There was a knock: not Hella, but Reimund, the Rickert’s factotum. In one hand he held a suitcase, in the other a pair of brogues. Rath put on the shoes, but hung his brown suit in the wardrobe, the only one left for the journey back to Berlin. He locked the folder in the desk, pocketed the key and exited the hotel. First stop was Goldaper Strasse, where he called at the shoemaker’s workshop. Friedrich Kowalski wore a leather apron and held a small hammer in his hand. He looked surprised.

‘I wanted to return these,’ Rath said, dropping the muddy boots on the floor so that the crusts flaked off. ‘Please send my regards to Herr Damerau and tell him many thanks. They were a great help.’

‘Inspector!’ The shoemaker looked at the shoes, then at Rath. ‘I thought you weren’t coming back.’

‘I nearly didn’t.’ Rath peered inside the hall. ‘Where’s your esteemed nephew?’

‘In Königsberg.’

‘In Königsberg. I see. What’s he doing there?’

‘Working, what else? He was recalled, about a week ago now.’

‘And the fact that he abandoned me in the forest? That didn’t bother anyone here?’

‘I’m sorry?’

‘That’s right, your nephew abandoned me. He and old Adamek. I almost died out there on the moors.’

‘Come inside, Inspector.’ A short time later Rath sat with a cup of tea at Kowalski’s kitchen table. ‘I’m afraid I don’t quite understand,’ the cobbler said. ‘You sent him back yourself, didn’t you? With a message for Grigat.’

‘The last thing I told your nephew was to keep watch by some clearing on the border. By the time I returned he and Adamek were both gone.’

Kowalski shook his head. ‘That’s not like Anton. He never lets anyone down.’

‘What’s this about a message for Grigat?’

‘He didn’t tell me. He had to set off pretty much right away after returning from the district office. Königsberg needed him urgently, him and the car.’

‘No one thought to ask about me?’

‘Anton was rather vague, but somehow we all assumed you no longer needed his help.’

Rath nodded pensively. Someone here was playing him false, and there were no prizes for guessing who.

Wilhelm Adamek sat outside his shanty whittling an enormous stick. He registered Rath’s appearance with a twitch of his eyebrows and returned to his work. If he was surprised at seeing the missing inspector he gave no sign. He examined his stick, stuck out his lower lip and continued carving. Rath wondered if he should be wary of the knife. His Walther might not be loaded, but it should serve for intimidation purposes.

‘Hello to you, too,’ he said. ‘Safely returned from the forest, I see?’

Adamek threw him a brief glance and carried on with his whittling. Rath tried to assess the old-timer’s strength. Even under normal circumstances a man like Wilhelm Adamek might have the better of him. After a week in bed with fever, and still wobbly on his legs, there was no question. Diplomacy, then. He couldn’t just yank the man up by the collar.

‘I was looking for you, recently. Why didn’t you come back for me?’

‘I’d brought you to your destination.’ Adamek didn’t even look up.

‘You left me in the lurch.’

‘I had to escort your colleague back.’

‘Don’t talk nonsense. What did you say to Kowalski to make him go with you? That I was sending him back with a message for Chief Constable Grigat? What kind of message? That I’d manage just fine on my own in the wilds, and didn’t need his help?’ Rath was shouting, but didn’t care. The composure with which this outlaw sat whittling made him incandescent. ‘I would have died on the moors, if someone hadn’t pulled me out!’

Adamek looked up and raised his eyebrows. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I didn’t want that.’

It sounded genuine. Rath was surprised. ‘Then you shouldn’t have abandoned me in the forest.’

‘Like I said, I’m sorry.’

The old-timer’s face was hard to read. ‘It wasn’t your idea, then?’ Adamek said nothing. ‘Who put you up to it?’ More and more splints rained down in front of the bench. ‘Who?’

‘I can’t say!’

‘So, someone did put you up to it!’ Adamek looked at Rath with a mixture of anger and contempt. ‘Tell me who it was. Did they blackmail you?’ Adamek’s knife carved ever larger splints, this was wood-chopping now. ‘Your poaching, was it? Did someone threaten to turn you in?’

All of a sudden the old man sprang to his feet and hurled the knife into the bench where it quivered for some time. ‘Listen to me,’ he said. ‘There’s only one thing I want from life, and that is to be left in peace!’

‘I don’t like being abandoned.’

‘I never abandoned anyone!’

‘There’s someone else who won’t leave you in peace, isn’t there? Someone who urged you to teach that puffed-up inspector a lesson. See that he’s had his fill of Masuria, and on the first train back to that hotbed of vice he calls home! So that life here can carry on as normal. Is that it?’ Adamek was silent. ‘Well, let me tell you and your fellow Treuburgers something. You won’t get rid of me so easily! There are far too many secrets in this town, and it’s time someone lifted the lid. Now, kindly tell your mystery employer that’s precisely what I intend to do!’

Was that a grin on his face? Adamek seemed to have enjoyed Rath’s outburst. ‘Why don’t you tell him yourself?’ he said.

76

For as long as she had worked at the Castle, Charly had given the holding cells a wide berth. Now the smell and crude remarks that greeted her arrival appeared to justify her decision. At least the man in here would be keeping his comments to himself. Dietrich Assmann lay on the plank bed, covered by a thin woollen blanket. His eyes were closed, at first glance he looked as if he were sleeping.

‘We didn’t realise until reveille,’ the guard told Ernst Gennat. ‘When we saw he wasn’t moving, we went in. The rest you know.’

‘The rest we know,’ Gennat gave the guard a hostile look. ‘This man was an important witness and he was was killed on your watch! For God’s sake, are people no longer safe in jail?’

‘I wasn’t on duty last night,’ the guard said.

‘You’re in charge here, man!’

‘Yes, Sir.’

‘I demand to know how it could have happened.’

‘In theory, Sir, no one can get in or out of here without our say-so.’

‘In theory,’ Gennat repeated. ‘Yet somehow a killer got in and out. You can’t tell me this was suicide.’ He shook his head. ‘It’s a disgrace! Murder in a police cell! If the press gets wind of this… I want this resolved. I need whatever logs are kept here on my desk. Now. And round up everyone who was on duty last night.’

‘This moment?’ the guard asked, kneading his cap in his hands.

‘Yesterday.’

‘Yes, Sir!’

For some years Gennat had preferred to pull the strings from the comfort of his office, but now the bodies were coming to him. He didn’t even have to leave headquarters to reach Dietrich Assmann’s corpse, just cross to the holding cells in the southern wing and head upstairs to Solitary on the second floor.

Böhm was there too, alongside Lange, and Cadet Steinke, who had called it in. All stood outside the narrow cell watching the forensic technicians go about their business.

Gennat approached the corpse, whose neck Dr Karthaus was examining.

Meanwhile all we can do is carry on. Well, here was Buddha showing the way. Charly didn’t know if it was right, but perhaps there really was no other choice. Did it really matter if their commissioner’s name was Grzesinski or Melcher, if he was a Social Democrat or National Liberal?

Whatever, it looked as if their killer had struck again. Dietrich Assmann lay dead on his plank bed. The mattress and upper portion of the woollen blanket were wet, and on the bedpost hung a red cloth still damp with water. She went over and examined it, sniffing at the red fabric. ‘It smells like camphor,’ she said.

Lange finished photographing the corpse and steered the camera towards the cloth. ‘She’s right. Pitralon, I’d say.’

‘Pitralon?’ Gennat said curiously, joining them. ‘Aftershave?’

‘Seems our man applied it before his death,’ Dr Karthaus said. ‘The corpse smells as if it’s been freshly shaved. Although the chin is quite stubbly.’

‘Am I right in thinking these cloths are placed over the victim’s nose and mouth, and then drenched in water?’ Gennat asked.

‘You’re saying the smell transferred onto the cloth from Assmann’s face?’

‘Precisely.’

‘Isn’t it too intense for that?’ Charly asked. ‘Seems more likely the cloth was dipped in aftershave.’

‘Take a photo of the cloth, Lange, then Kronberg can bag it for examination.’

‘Yes, Sir.’

Gennat turned towards Kronberg, who was speaking with Böhm. ‘Well?’

The ED man shrugged. ‘We don’t know how the perpetrator got in and out. There are no signs of forced entry. Nothing to indicate the use of a picklock.’

‘He must have got in somehow.’

‘Perhaps he had a key.’

‘You’re saying it was one of the guards?’

‘We shouldn’t rule anything out, but actually what I meant is perhaps someone had a key cut. Or got hold of one somehow. Wouldn’t be the first time a key had fallen into the wrong hands.’

‘We’ll ask around the relevant people.’

Gennat was famous for his contacts in the Ringvereine, as well as for his network of informants. If anyone could discover who had keys to the holding cells at Alex, it was him. ‘When you examine that cloth,’ he said to Kronberg, ‘I’d like to know why it smells like that, and if it’s a match for the others.’

While Gennat was speaking, Charly looked round the cell and found a cigarette stub under the plank bed. She knelt beside Dr Karthaus and lifted it with a pair of tweezers. It had only been half-smoked. ‘Take a look at this,’ she said. Gennat and Böhm turned towards her. ‘Strange, don’t you think?’

‘Why?’ Böhm asked. ‘You’re permitted to smoke in police custody.’

‘That’s true,’ Gennat said, ‘but in here you smoke each cigarette as if it’s your last. What you don’t do is smoke half and stub the rest out. I think that’s what you’re getting at, am I right, Fräulein Ritter?’

Charly nodded, but she was embarrassed. She felt like an insufferable know-it-all. Luckily Böhm didn’t hold it against her.

Dr Karthaus joined them. ‘Did I hear you right? You’re permitted to smoke in here?’ He fetched his cigarette case from his overalls and lit up.

‘So long as you don’t stub it out on the floor.’

‘No problem.’ Karthaus removed a tin case from his overalls. A pocket ashtray. ‘I know my place where Forensics are concerned.’

‘Have you anything for us?’ Böhm asked. ‘Death by drowning? The usual?’

‘Depends on how you look at it. If by usual you mean that the man is dead, then yes.’ The pathologist inhaled deeply. ‘If, on the other hand, you are asking whether we are dealing with the same sequence of events as in previous cases, then I’m afraid I must disappoint.’ Böhm looked surprised, and the doctor seemed to enjoy it. He gestured towards the corpse with the cigarette. ‘I’ve searched his neck for a puncture site. There’s nothing.’

‘Perhaps the killer injected a different part of his body?’

‘We’ll have to wait for the autopsy. However, while examining his neck I made another discovery.’ Karthaus took another long drag and pointed at the corpse a second time. ‘Unless I’m very much mistaken, the man has a broken neck.’

77

Erich Grigat was adjusting his shako before the wall mirror when Rath barged through the door. ‘How the hell did you get in here?’ he asked.

‘My apologies, Sir,’ his secretary replied. ‘This gentleman completely ignored me. He didn’t even knock, just came…’

‘It’s fine, Fräulein Bikowski. Let me see to the inspector. Why not go for your lunch? If you need anything, I’ll be in the Salzburger Hof.’

The secretary nodded and left, but not before throwing Rath a hostile glance. ‘I think it’s in your interests that this conversation remain confidential,’ he said, closing the door.

‘I can’t see what there is to discuss, Inspector. You’ve told me nothing of your movements so far, and your Berlin colleagues clearly likewise. Your superior was in touch on several occasions. Unfortunately there was nothing I could say to him.’

‘No?’ Rath looked at Grigat’s twitching moustache. ‘You couldn’t have let Berlin know where I’ve spent the last few days?’

‘I’m sorry?’

‘What did you say to old Adamek? Did you threaten him? Say you’d no longer turn a blind eye to his poaching? What about your beloved venison loin?’

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

‘We ran into you on our way to Adamek’s. You’d just come from there, hadn’t you?’

‘Stop speaking in riddles.’

‘Granted, you didn’t mean to kill me. You probably just wanted to run me out of your pretty little town. Well, too bad!’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘Or were you acting on someone else’s behalf, instructing old Adamek to abandon me in the forest like that?’

‘Are you implying the Treuburg Police can be bought?’

‘Depends what you mean by “bought”? Perhaps you were just doing someone a favour. In Cologne we call it Klüngel. Cabal.’

‘And here we call it calumny. I’m warning you, stop making baseless accusations!’ It felt as if Grigat might challenge him to a duel.

‘Need I remind you…’ Rath placed the letter from Bernhard Weiss on the desk. ‘That the deputy commissioner of the Berlin Police has expressly requested that you provide me with support. Therefore, I advise you to lay your cards on the table. Tell me who wanted rid of me and I won’t lodge a complaint. Otherwise, your conduct could be interpreted as insubordination. No doubt you’re aware of Dr Weiss’s connections in the Interior Ministry?’

Grigat lifted the official letter. ‘As far as I’m concerned the only thing that paper’s good for is wiping your arse.’

‘Pardon me?’

‘You heard me!’

‘Do you realise what you’re saying? This is a letter from Berlin Deputy Police Commissioner Bernhard Weiss…’

‘Your Isidore has no authority here! The Berlin Police commissioner’s name is Kurt Melcher, and your Dr Weiss can count himself lucky he hasn’t had his Jewish arse spanked.’ For a moment Rath thought Grigat had gone mad. He fetched a communication from on top of his filing tray. ‘Came over the ticker this morning. Grzesinski, Weiss and Heimannsberg have all been removed from office. About time someone cleaned up this Social Democrat pigsty.’

‘No, Severing would never allow it!’

‘The Interior Minister has also been removed, the entire Prussian government in fact, bunch of red bastards. Hindenburg has appointed the Reich chancellor as Reich commissioner for Prussia.’

‘Show me!’

Grigat handed Rath the teleprinter message informing all Prussian police and gendarmerie stations that the Prussian minority government had been removed from office, along with the Berlin Police executive. Until further notice Prussia would be governed by a Reich commissioner.

‘This… can’t be. It’s a… putsch,’ Rath stammered.

‘I’d choose your words carefully if I were you,’ Grigat said, now holding the upper hand. ‘Otherwise I might find myself compelled to make a complaint against you! My patience with you and your bizarre code of ethics is at an end!’ He grasped the document and waved towards the door. ‘Now, be so kind as to leave my office, otherwise I’ll have you removed by force.’

Rath thought better of answering back. Silently he folded Bernhard Weiss’s letter and stowed it in his pocket, before leaving Grigat and the district administrative office behind. Damn it, he thought, a hell of a lot has happened in the days you’ve been gone.

There was a telephone booth outside the district court. He took out his wallet and counted his change, knowing it was only a matter of time before Treuburg’s chief of police declared him persona non grata.

Robert Naujoks was reliable. The Lyck train got in at half past two. Rath met him on the platform. Naujoks opened his leather bag and removed a thick lever arch file: the Mathée case. ‘Pretty old hat, this,’ he said. ‘You think you can find something in here that implicates Gustav Wengler? The victim was his fiancée.’

‘We’ll see. All I’ll say is things are about to get seriously hot for our distillery-owning friend.’

Naujoks took the file from his bag. ‘The Mathée case was closed when I took up office here, the killer long since in jail. It was still talked about though.’

‘It’s still talked about today. Only thing is, they got the wrong man – and I think lots of people knew it, too. Gustav Wengler included.’

Naujoks looked around as if someone might be listening. ‘We shouldn’t speak so openly.’

Rath gestured towards the station restaurant. ‘Can I buy you a coffee?’

‘That’s kind, but no. Too many people here still know me. It’s better we’re not seen together.’

‘Perhaps you’re right.’

‘Look after yourself. If there’s one thing Treuburgers don’t like it’s nosy police officers.’

‘You can say that again.’

‘I’ll be on the next train back out to Lyck.’ Naujoks looked at his watch. ‘Leaves in half an hour. I’ll take my coffee alone. You should find yourself someplace quiet, too.’

Rath took his leave of the retired constable, thanking him once more. Naujoks waved and vanished inside the restaurant.

Exiting the station building, file tucked under his arm, he wondered where he could go. Nowhere sprang to mind. Even prior to Naujoks’s warning, he felt as if his every move were being monitored, as if the whole town was conspiring against him.

Then, all at once, the solution presented itself. The light railway that ran from Mierunsken to Schwentainen was only a stone’s throw distant. Perfect: the next train departed in ten minutes. Rath purchased his ticket.

The line didn’t just have a narrower gauge than the Reichsbahn, its cars were smaller too. The train to Schwentainen, which called to mind a toy locomotive, stood at the platform, engine steaming away. He found an empty compartment, and bagged a window seat.

According to the timetable the train stopped at every milk churn, but that was just fine. The first station, shortly after Treuburg, was Luisenhöhe, where he could see the brick chimneys of the distillery. A few people got off, no one got on, and the train continued. Now certain that no subsequent passenger would recognise him, he opened the file and began to read.

The train needed a good half-hour to reach Schwentainen. After almost a dozen additional stops, he had acquired a basic working knowledge of the Mathée homicide from July 1920.

He was surprised by how many names he recognised. Sergeant Siegbert Wengler had found Anna von Mathée dead on Sunday, 11th July 1920, at around three thirty, in the shallows of a small, unnamed lake in the forest behind Markowsken. Wengler had apparently discovered a man crouched over the corpse, whom, upon violently resisting arrest, he had neutralised with the butt of his rifle and led away from the forest in handcuffs as a prime suspect in the murder of Anna von Mathée. The man’s name: Jakub Polakowski.

The dead girl’s horse was tied to a tree by a nearby clearing; Polakowski’s bicycle stood next to the shore.

Sergeant Wengler had then pronounced Anna von Mathée dead before taking leave of the crime scene and requesting a doctor. Prior to that, he had pulled her body towards the shore and closed her eyes, exactly the sort of thing Gennat had been trying to prevent simple-minded uniform cops doing for years. Ordering things, then calling for CID, was a habit those first on the scene couldn’t seem to kick.

In Anna von Mathée’s case, no one had been especially worried. CID officers from Lyck reconstructed the chain of events using Wengler’s witness statement, alongside clues found at the site, and the autopsy report. The reconstruction had the suspect follow Anna von Mathée to the lake on his bicycle, perhaps to watch her bathe, only for desire to get the better of him. When she tried to defend herself he drowned her.

There were all sorts of suppositions in the text. According to Wengler, the plebiscite’s bleak prognosis for Poland could have filled Polakowski with hatred against all things German, speculation aided by the fact that the suspect had instigated a quarrel against three members of the Marggrabowa Homeland Service on the morning of the same day. An appendix provided the details. Again, the names of those involved were familiar: Herbert Lamkau, August Simoneit and Hans Wawerka. Wengler had actually placed Polakowski under arrest for a short time.

Around an hour after Polakowski’s release, Anna von Mathée’s fiancé had arrived at the police station to report her missing, Anna having failed to appear for lunch at the Luisenhöhe estate. Witnesses had seen her riding out to the Markowsken forest in the late morning. So, the search began.

It was striking that Sergeant Wengler had only mentioned the name of this fiancé on one occasion, at a point that could be easily overlooked, as if he were somehow embarrassed to have set out in search of the missing girl with a family member. For the man with whom he scoured the forest, before eventually arriving at the little lake, was none other than Anna’s fiancé himself, was none other than his own brother, the superintendent at Luisenhöhe: Gustav Wengler.

The wicked man, as the Kaubuk called him. The man who had returned to the scene of his crime.

78

Dr Karthaus had moved quickly. Dietrich Assmann’s corpse still lay covered by a white cotton sheet as the pathologist met the Vaterland team down in the hallowed halls of the morgue.

Charly felt uneasy entering the autopsy room, which would be one reason why Wilhelm Böhm had brought her along. It was something any CID cadet assigned to Homicide, however temporarily, must experience. In the days she’d worked as a stenographer for A Division, Böhm and Gennat had valued her theories and deductions, but they had never brought her here. The smell, a mix of human blood and disinfectant, took some getting used to, but her curiosity outweighed any sense of disgust.

Most officers had remained in the Castle to assist Gennat in interrogating the squad of guards. It was still unclear how on earth the killer had gained access to the cells.

‘That was quick, Doctor,’ Böhm said, and Karthaus arched an eyebrow in surprise. Praise from the chief inspector was as rare as a snowflake in August.

‘Superintendent Gennat asked me to prioritise this autopsy, and there were several details that struck me as odd during my initial examination.’

‘The broken neck.’

‘Right! At first I thought it could be a result of the water torture. If you tie your victims up and put the fear of death in them, some react so violently that they break their bones.’

‘But our man doesn’t secure his victims, he paralyses them,’ Charly said.

‘Not this time.’ Karthaus had their undivided attention. ‘The blood analysis is still pending, but I’d be willing to bet it shows negative. I couldn’t find a single puncture site.’

‘So, he did tie Assmann up?’ Böhm asked.

‘That’s what I thought, but there are no signs of a struggle, nothing to indicate the man was tied.’

‘What about the water on the plank bed, the wet cloth? That points to water torture.’

‘That’s what it’s supposed to point to, certainly. However, we only found water in the trachea, and it got in post-mortem.’

‘Nothing in the lungs.’

Karthaus shook his head.

‘A copycat,’ Charly suggested.

‘That’s what I suspect too,’ said Karthaus. ‘Nothing points to the victim having been exposed to the tormenta de toca, let alone having died as a result. Which was his great good fortune, if you can speak of fortune when a man has died. Most likely he barely noticed a thing, except, perhaps, for the lights going out. Metaphorically speaking.’ He threw Charly an apologetic glance. ‘To come back to the water: I’ve examined samples from both the plank bed and the victim’s hair, as well as the residue from the red cloth. The strange smell – it is indeed Pitralon. I found traces of camphor in the water, camphor and alcohol. It was mixed with aftershave, albeit heavily diluted.’

‘Could it be from the victim?’ Böhm asked.

‘Unlikely, but I have another explanation.’ Karthaus pointed to the covered corpse. ‘The man’s neck was broken by someone who knew what he was doing, someone trained in close combat, or similar. Everything else is for the purposes of misdirection.’ The pathologist looked at the two CID officers. ‘He didn’t have a lot of time to prepare. He had to improvise. As for the water used to simulate the tormenta de toca… my guess is that the perpetrator brought it into the cell using an empty or almost empty bottle of Pitralon, because he had nothing else to hand.’

79

Rath went for a stroll. He’d have liked to go straight back to Treuburg, but the next train wasn’t for another hour and a half. So he strolled, file under his arm, through the town. Schwentainen was a ribbon settlement on the shore of a lake bearing the same name, with a small church, on whose spire red roof tiles gleamed in the sun. Perhaps being forced to walk like this was good. He needed to think.

Now wasn’t the time to confront Gustav Wengler, whatever his instincts told him. He tried to place what he’d read into some kind of order, comparing it with the lines from Radlewski’s diary.

It was a fix-up, all of it. From Anna’s death right up to Jakub Polakowski’s murder trial.

The Homeland Service boys had deliberately embroiled Polakowski in a fight, so that Gustav Wengler could calmly go about cornering Anna at the lake where she met her paramour in secret. Near the tree in whose bark the young couple had immortalised their love.

Was her murder planned? Her rape? Or was it just meant to be a talk, which had spiralled out of control? A brutal murder for which the Wengler brothers had found the perfect scapegoat in Jakub Polakowski?

Rath left Schwentainen, passing over a narrow headland separating two lakes from one another, and reaching the village on the other shore where a sign read: Suleyken, Oletzko District, Administrative Region of Gumbinnen.

He sat on a jetty and gazed at the roofs of Schwentainen lining the opposite shore, a breathtakingly beautiful scene. Nothing could disturb the idyll here in the Oletzko District, Gumbinnen, and certainly not the truth that Maria Cofalka had closed in on.

They had buried her only yesterday, but already Rath was determined to exhume her body. The librarian might be dead, but her case was far from closed.

80

When Charly returned to the Castle with Böhm, they found Vosskamp, the head guard, sitting in Gennat’s office. Trudchen Steiner, Gennat’s secretary, waved them through. ‘The superintendent has requested your presence,’ she said.

Before Charly could confirm they were both needed, Böhm pushed her through the door. ‘So?’ Gennat said, his coffee poured. ‘What’s the word from Pathology?’

‘It’s a copycat,’ Böhm said. ‘He broke Assmann’s neck, doused him with water and left a red handkerchief to throw us off the scent. Well, we’ve caught it now.’

‘There were traces of aftershave in the water,’ Charly said.

‘Interesting.’ Gennat shovelled three spoonfuls of sugar into his coffee, stirring slowly and deliberately. ‘A copycat, then. That tallies with Forensics’s findings. We still don’t know anything about the others, but the handkerchief from this morning came from the textile section in Tietz, right here on Alexanderplatz.’

‘That was quick.’

‘One of Kronberg’s men recognised it. He bought one himself a few days ago.’

‘Then the man’s a suspect,’ Charly joked.

‘You’re closer to the truth than you might like.’ Buddha looked at the guard on his sofa. ‘In the meantime Herr Vosskamp and I have solved one or two riddles.’

Vosskamp interpreted this as an invitation to make his report. He cleared his throat. ‘Yes,’ he said, placing his cup to one side. ‘We’ve questioned the duty guards on both late and night shifts and pieced together Herr Assmann’s final hours. The prisoner received a visit at twelve minutes past nine, from a detective inspector.’

Charly’s ears pricked up.

‘What inspector?’ Böhm asked. ‘I didn’t send anyone up to him in the middle of the night. Or did Customs…?’

‘No, it was a detective inspector,’ Vosskamp said. ‘At least according to our log.’

‘Based on what we know so far,’ Gennat said, ‘this is the man who has Dietrich Assmann on his conscience.’

‘What do you mean? Did an interrogation spiral out of control?’

‘We don’t know yet.’ Gennat shrugged. ‘The guard swears that everything was as normal when he fetched the officer from the cell. He claims the prisoner was already asleep.’

‘Or dead,’ Charly said, immediately irritated by her lapse in control.

‘Yes, Fräulein Ritter,’ Gennat said. ‘That’s what I think too.’ He glanced at a sheet of paper. ‘It was nine thirty-seven when the officer called for the guard, which was also when he left the cell wing.’

‘After which point there were no other incidents of note,’ Vosskamp said. He clearly thought it significant.

‘If he’s in the log then he must have left a name,’ Böhm said. ‘So why aren’t we grilling him as we speak?’

Gennat opened the log and passed it to Böhm. ‘The entry’s there, at the bottom.’

Böhm took the book and looked inside. Charly squinted at the page. Prisoner name, cell number, visitor name and length of visit were all neatly recorded. The last entry bore yesterday’s date and pertained to Dietrich Assmann. She could see the name and signature. No doubt about it, it looked the same as on all those letters he had sent to Paris: the book was signed: Gereon Rath.

81

There was only one fresh grave at the Catholic cemetery in Treuburg. Already the wreaths and flowers were starting to wilt; it smelled of herbs, topsoil and holy water. Maria Cofalka didn’t have a headstone yet, but Rath knew he was in the right place. He’d purchased flowers en route after depositing the homicide file at the train station, in the same locker he’d left his suitcase prior to meeting Naujoks.

He laid the bouquet beside the wreaths and, before he knew what he was doing, sank to his knees. He wasn’t especially devout, didn’t even know if he still believed – but he felt responsible for the death of this woman whom Wengler had ordered killed. For the distillery owner wasn’t only interested in preserving the legend of Anna von Mathée’s death, but also in concealing a murder he himself had committed, and, with the help of his brother, falsely attributed to another man.

If Rath hadn’t let the papers Maria Cofalka entrusted to him be stolen, then perhaps she would still be alive. He felt an urgent need to ask for her forgiveness, but this was ridiculous, kneeling before a mound of earth, communing with a dead woman.

She can’t hear you, goddamn it, it’s too late!

Still, he spoke with her, apologised that he would soon be disrupting her peace so that the circumstances of her death might come to light, in this town where all else, it seemed, was swept under the carpet at the bidding of just one man.

Wanting to confront this man, Rath had alighted from the train the station before Treuburg and walked up to the estate house, finding only Fischer, the private secretary, according to whom, Wengler was still in Berlin. Having settled his brother’s estate he would now depart on business, and wouldn’t return for at least a week.

Was the nimble-minded Fischer aware what kind of man he worked for, that Gustav Wengler had his own fiancée on his conscience, and more people besides? Perhaps the secretary was in cahoots with him?

Rath stood up and wiped the dirt from his knees. Jakub Polakowski’s grave was close by, and, passing it, he read its inscription once more.

For love is strong as death; jealousy is cruel as the grave. The coals thereof are coals of fire, which hath a most vehement flame.

Love. Rath wondered who was responsible for Polakowski being buried here, and for these verses. Perhaps the same person who was responsible for the murders. Someone who knew who first deprived Jakub Polakowski of the love of his life, then sent him to jail for her murder.

If he hadn’t known better, he’d have suspected Maria Cofalka, who had worked in a hospital during the war and would be familiar with needles. As a woman, she’d have been able to get close to her victims without arousing suspicion, right until the needle entered the jugular. But Maria had been in Treuburg when Siegbert Wengler was killed in Berlin. Rath had questioned her in the library the day before.

Perhaps she’d had an accomplice who would finish the job now that she was dead? He needed to find out who else had been close to Jakub Polakowski.

Or he could keep his findings to himself, and let things slide. He could cross his fingers that this mysterious avenger would catch up with Gustav Wengler and subject him to as torturous a death as Wengler had Anna von Mathée.

He shook his head. He couldn’t. He’d have liked to, but he couldn’t. There was a madman on the loose who had killed four people; not innocents, perhaps, but four people all the same. People who hadn’t deserved to die, just as Gustav Wengler didn’t deserve to die.

No, the only right course of action was bringing Gustav Wengler to trial.

On Bergstrasse, just before the marketplace, he was met by around a dozen SA officers, led by Klaus Fabeck, Hella’s boyfriend. Fabeck glowered at him with the typical SA gaze, a strange mix of hatred and contempt. You could be forgiven for thinking the brownshirts practised it. As if it were a forward march, or a kick to the solar plexus.

He stood in the troop’s way, and Fabeck raised his hand and bade his men halt. At least the idiots were well-trained.

‘Well,’ Rath said. ‘What feats of heroism await?’ Fabeck stared in silence. ‘What’s on today’s agenda? Theft, murder, the usual?’

At last Fabeck found his voice. ‘How about decking the local gobshite?’

‘Bet you feel strong with all these men behind you, but that doesn’t mean you can incite your girlfriend to steal.’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘You know very well.’

‘Get out of my way!’

‘Order your lads about all you like, but I’m a Prussian CID officer.’ Rath pulled out his badge, just in case there was anyone who didn’t know. ‘Didn’t your girl tell you? She had to con her way to the letters.’

‘Con her way to the letters?’ The youth was stupider than he looked. The SA needed people like him. The problem was they were ten a penny.

‘Using her feminine wiles.’

Fabeck turned red. ‘What are you trying to say?

‘Let’s not worry about that now. Ask her yourself. Maybe it wasn’t the letters she was after. Maybe she just wanted…’

‘Shut your mouth!’ Fabeck barked.

‘All right, all right,’ Rath said. ‘Like I say, these letters, they’re evidence. I hope you haven’t destroyed them, otherwise you’re looking at a pretty serious offence. Return them, and I’ll forget the whole thing.’

The SA man spat at his feet. ‘You’re addressing an SA Rottenführer!’

‘I’m addressing a boy. That brownshirt doesn’t make you a man.’

‘Don’t get fresh with me.’

‘Don’t get fresh with me, Inspector. The police might look kindly upon you here, but in Berlin we know you’re little more than a gang of thugs.’

‘Is that so? Then perhaps we should show you just how thuggish we can be.’

‘You’d attack a Prussian officer?’

‘Why? You going to report us? How many witnesses d’you think will testify in your favour? No one can stand you here.’

‘I wasn’t thinking so much of reporting you,’ Rath drew his Walther, ‘as defending myself. So, who’s first?’ The brownshirts took a step back. ‘If I were you, I’d be setting my sights a little lower. Now, let’s talk about Maria Cofalka.’

‘That Papist tramp?’ one of the SA youths said, catching a hostile glance from his Rottenführer.

‘That’s not how I’d describe her. I’m Catholic too, and, as luck would have it, you boys are my number one suspects.’

‘There’s nothing for you here,’ Fabeck said. ‘You’re not authorised, and no one gives a damn what your Isidore in Berlin says. The Prussian Police has been cured of its Jews.’

‘You’ve a real problem with other religions, huh? You boys ought to be more tolerant, especially as Prussians.’ He held them in check with his Walther. ‘Jews or no, a Prussian Police homicide unit will be questioning you soon enough.’

He left the brownshirts where they were and proceeded to the train station. It was a good feeling, knowing he’d made an enemy of Wengler’s thugs at last, and an even better feeling, knowing his bags were already packed.

82

Charly didn’t know what to think any more. Where was Gereon? What was going on? Why hadn’t the bastard been in touch? It looked like his signature, but she couldn’t seriously believe he’d paid a visit to police custody yesterday to kill a prisoner. As for leaving his name behind… Someone must be playing a nasty trick.

Gennat seemed to think so, too. Even so, he had asked to speak to her once he’d dismissed Böhm and Vosskamp.

Buddha knew about their engagement, and hoped, therefore, that she could shed some light on where Gereon was, and what he was doing. But she couldn’t. Gereon Rath was the same unreliable shitbag he’d always been. He went his own way whenever the mood took him, and the rest of the world could go hang. An engagement ring wasn’t about to change that.

She fetched the ring from her purse, where she’d kept it ever since that memorable day two weeks ago. She wasn’t sure whether to put it back on her finger or hurl it at his feet – if, that is, he ever showed his face again.

Where in the hell was he, goddamn it? She slammed her fist against the table. He had left her his car, his dog, the key to his flat and an engagement ring. Only, there had been no word from him in over a week. Should she be worried? Too late, she already was, but admitting it only made her angrier.

She wondered whether to call the hotel and make a fool of herself. Again.

It was time to go home. She was the only one still here wondering about who’d passed themselves off as Gereon. The guard hadn’t asked for an identification, a simple badge had sufficed. Well, any idiot could get hold of a badge, even if it was a punishable offence, and you could always forge a signature. Though in this case the forgery came close to the original, meaning it must be someone who had access to the genuine article. Perhaps she would suggest to Gennat that they looked into it again tomorrow, instead of badgering her with questions she couldn’t answer.

The telephone rang, and she started. Erika Voss’s direct line when she had gone home hours ago, taking Kirie with her.

Charly hesitated a moment, but picked up. ‘Ritter, Inspector Rath’s office.’

‘Apparatebau Rath, Rath am Apparat.’

She was so taken aback that for an instant she said nothing. Several instants, in fact. She felt tears in her eyes, so relieved was she to hear his voice. The bastard! She held the receiver in her hand and let the tears flow. At least he couldn’t see her.

‘Hello, Charly? Are you still there?’

‘You bastard!’ She couldn’t think of anything else to say.

‘Charly, don’t get worked up. I don’t have much change. I’m calling from a telephone booth at the train station…’

‘Which train station?’

‘There aren’t too many in Treuburg.’

‘You’re still in Treuburg?’

‘Where else?’ He ceased playing the comedian. ‘Charly, I’m sorry,’ she heard him say. ‘I know this is late in coming. But… I was out of the picture for a while there.’

‘A while!’ She couldn’t help it, it just came out. ‘I haven’t heard a single fucking word from you in over a week!’

‘I was unconscious with fever most of the time.’

‘My God, Gereon, what happened?’

‘It’s a long story, much too long for a trunk call. I’ll tell you when I’m home. The main thing is I’m OK.’

‘If you’re coming back make sure they don’t arrest you. There’s been a warrant out for the last three hours.’ She told him what had happened.

‘Someone’s played a dirty trick.’

‘That’s what I think, and perhaps if you’d submitted your report from Treuburg more often, Böhm and Gennat would think so too.’

‘They don’t seriously believe I’d kill one of Wengler’s people?’

‘Up until five minutes ago even I wasn’t sure.’

‘A hell of a lot has happened here. That Indian business was a red herring; he isn’t our man.’

‘How do you know?’

‘I was with him. He saved my life.’

‘Pardon me?’

‘I’ll tell you later. Believe me, it couldn’t have been him. Long hair, straggly beard. He’d have been spotted right away.’

‘That won’t please Böhm.’

‘Perhaps he’ll come round once he hears what I have to say about motive. It is a vendetta, we were right, but it isn’t about the moonshining scandal, it’s about murder. A murder Gustav Wengler committed twelve years ago.’

‘Can you prove it?’

‘Not yet, but I know. He even made sure someone else was convicted.’

‘The man who’s out for revenge.’

‘No. He died trying to escape, but someone’s avenging him. Avenging everyone involved. Don’t let Wengler out of your sight; I’m pretty sure he’s next in line.’

‘We’re watching him.’

‘Good.’

‘So, who’s this mysterious avenger?’

‘Some relative, a friend, no idea. I’ll know soon enough.’

‘What do you have in mind?’

‘I need to take care of something here, then I’ll be on my way.’

‘Aren’t you at the train station already?’

‘I have a ticket for the overnighter tomorrow evening. I’ll be at Bahnhof Zoo the day after tomorrow, just after six. It’d mean a lot if you…’

‘The day after tomorrow? What…?’

The line beeped and the connection was interrupted. She rattled the cradle impatiently. Nothing doing.

‘Operator? Why was this call ended?’

‘Sorry,’ came the reply. ‘The caller ran out of money.’

Charly hung up. How was she supposed to get hold of him now? She hesitated before reaching again for the telephone and asking for the Salzburger Hof. ‘Ritter here, good evening. I’m sorry to disturb you again. I heard that Inspector Rath, your guest from Berlin, is back in Treuburg, and wondered if you could pass on a messa…’

‘I’m sorry, Fräulein Ritter,’ the hotelier interrupted. ‘Bad timing. The inspector checked out at lunchtime today.’

‘Oh… I see.’

‘I do apologise.’

She hung up and stared at the black Bakelite. What in the hell was Gereon up to? The telephone gave nothing away, and at length she took her coat and switched off the light.

As she closed the office door a voice behind her asked, ‘All alone?’

It was Harald Dettmann. ‘We meet again,’ he said, grinning his nasty grin. ‘Working late?’

‘Leave me alone, Dettmann!’ She tried to evade him, but he moved with her, and her evasion became a kind of retreat. He pressed her back into the corridor, towards the glass wall and into the corner. ‘Let me go! What is this?’

‘I’d never have thought you were such a snitch.’

‘What do you want?’

Dettmann shook his head. ‘You just had to go to your fancy pants hero, didn’t you, give him a good suck, then bawl your eyes out on his shoulder.’

‘Cut it out! Let me go!’

Dettmann pressed his arms against the wall, trapping her so that she couldn’t move left or right. She smelled the sweat of his armpits, his aftershave, and turned her face away. ‘Listen to me, lady, then I’ll let you go. There’s no one here you can go crying to. They’ve sent your Gereon packing, and everyone else has finished for the night.’

‘I’ll be reporting this to Superintendent Gennat!’

‘What have I ever done to you except voice my opinion? Believe me, there are plenty who think women have no place in Homicide.’ He looked down at her with a mix of disdain, hatred and disgust.

Charly felt impotent, and helpless. She had no desire to sit on the toilet crying her eyes out again. She thought of Gereon, how he had fought her corner. OK, so he had played a little dirty, but at least he had done something.

You have to do something too, she thought, you can’t spend your whole life running from men like this.

Dettmann pushed himself off the wall and stood, wide-legged, observing his victim with a certain satisfaction as he lit a cigarette.

It really was no more than a stupid power game. He had wanted to intimidate her, but was too cowardly to actually do anything. All he was interested in was humiliation.

She looked into his dull eyes, held her ground when he blew cigarette smoke in her face and, without so much as batting an eyelash, aimed a short, sharp kick between his legs.

83

This time Rath dragged Karl Rammoser out of bed. The teacher had thrown on a dressing gown and looked at him bleary-eyed. It wasn’t even that late.

‘My apologies,’ Rath said, ‘but I thought as long as the trains are still running to Wielitzken, it’s OK to knock on people’s doors.’

Rammoser glanced at the time, then at the suitcase by Rath’s feet. ‘That was the last train.’

‘Correct.’ Rath cleared his throat. ‘Seeing as the sofa in your staffroom is so comfortable, and school hasn’t started yet… I wondered if I might ask for your hospitality again.’

Rammoser gestured towards the suitcase. ‘Are you planning on moving in?’

‘One night only. Tomorrow morning I catch the train to Allenstein, and from there it’s on to Berlin. It’s just… I don’t feel safe in the Salzburger Hof any longer. I picked a fight with the SA and it’s better they don’t know where I am.’

‘You did what?’ Rammoser gazed to the left and right, but the streets of Wielitzken were deserted. He pulled Rath into the schoolhouse and closed the door. ‘Did anyone see you?’

‘No one else got off the train.’

‘Let’s hope the SA haven’t got wind of where you’re staying.’

‘They think I’m in Allenstein, at least that’s what I told the hotel. The Rickert family are on good terms with the SA.’

‘The daughter, above all,’ Rammoser said. He led Rath into the lounge and set two glasses on the table. ‘I have to get a fresh bottle from the classroom.’

Rath lit a cigarette. He couldn’t help thinking back to his telephone conversation with Charly. Should he tell Rammoser there was a warrant out for his arrest, and that he was suspected of murder? Best not: this SA business had spooked him enough.

‘I’ve brought your clothes,’ he said when Rammoser returned. ‘Thanks again.’

‘No trouble.’ Rammoser filled their glasses. ‘Now, why would you pick a fight with the SA, in Treuburg of all places? You do know what they’re about here, don’t you?’

‘They’re Wengler’s thugs, you told me yourself. The same thugs who have Maria Cofalka on their conscience.’

‘I’m sorry?’ Rammoser set down his glass without drinking from it. ‘Why would the SA kill Maria? They beat up Communists, sure, but a harmless librarian?’

‘Rottenführer Fabeck didn’t deny it.’

‘Fabeck? Even in school the boy was a horror. King of the playground, maybe, but hardly the sharpest tool.’

‘You know him?’

‘I taught him, and he’s a sorry example of the human species. But a murderer?’

‘Better men than Klaus Fabeck have resorted to murder, believe me. Especially when they can hide behind an organisation.’

‘Why? Maria would never have picked a fight with that lot. She wouldn’t have gone within ten metres of them. She acted like any person in their right mind, whose head wasn’t turned by this Hitler’s recent performance in Lötzen. That is to say, she took no notice of the brownshirts. She treated the little shits as if they were still the same schoolboys borrowing books by Karl May and Mark Twain.’

‘They aren’t schoolboys any more.’

‘No.’ Rammoser drained the contents of his glass and wiped his mouth.

Rath drank a small sip. This bottle seemed even stronger than the last. ‘Maria Cofalka didn’t pick a fight with the SA,’ he said. ‘She became a danger for Gustav Wengler. That’s why she had to die.’

Rammoser suddenly appeared very pensive. He topped up their glasses while Rath told him the story of the letters and their contents, and how they had been stolen from his hotel room (though he no more than sketched Hella Rickert’s role). He told him how the decisive pages were missing when the letters were returned, the pages that suggested Jakub Polakowski was innocent.

‘Damn it,’ Rammoser said, when he finished. ‘I should have known. I should have protected Maria.’

‘How could you have known? I was the first person she told about her correspondence with Radlewski. It’s me who failed. It’s me who should have protected her.’

‘You don’t know the full story. At the plebiscite anniversary two years ago, Maria had a little too much to drink. It didn’t happen often. She almost never drank, but sometimes I had the feeling that alcohol was the only way she could stomach Wengler acting like the Fatherland’s saviour. Anyway – at some point late in the day, when everyone had forgotten Wengler’s speech and just wanted to have a good time, she publicly accused him of murder.’

‘But she was so shy, so delicate.’

‘Maria was stronger than you realise.’

‘How did Wengler react?’

‘He said she was a drunk who didn’t know what she was talking about. Truth be told it was an easy sell. Besides, most people, myself included, thought she was alluding to Martha Radlewski’s death.’

‘Which was old news.’

‘The rumours didn’t stick, even in ’24. Remember, this was just some alcoholic who’d drunk herself to death. No one blamed Wengler.’

‘Which means no one took Maria Cofalka seriously…’

‘No. Myself and a few friends brought her home. We were afraid she might make a fool of herself, perhaps even put her job on the line. She slept it off, and the next day no more was said on the matter. Maybe she didn’t remember, she was pretty drunk.’

‘Maybe she needed some Dutch courage to confront the great Wengler.’

‘Maybe.’

‘It must have taken a little Dutch courage to entrust those letters to me too.’

‘Our courageous girl,’ Rammoser said, and drank. He turned his face away, and Rath said nothing more.

84

You pack what you need, the rest you will throw on the stove. You take the small case, no deadweight, you can buy the tubocurarine over there. Discovered in transit, drugs will only spell trouble.

Sobotka’s wanted poster falls into your hands, and you don’t know if you should pack it, or throw it in the oven. Already it has begun to yellow.

The description that followed was perfectly adequate, but would have no chance of success.

You remember the day you met Sobotka. A man who never lost his vital energy, he managed to awaken new hope even in you.

Though perhaps hope is the wrong word.

Still, with Sobotka you laughed again for the first time in years; laughed, despite thinking you had forgotten how. In him you found something akin to friendship. After all those years spent thinking mankind was doomed to solitude; that anything else was just an illusion.

Perhaps Sobotka’s friendship was an illusion, but still you laughed at his jokes. You were never angry when he teased you, and afterwards flashed his pearly white smile – because you knew he never meant offence. You felt that warmth again, which only friendship can provide, and so what did it matter if it was based on illusion?

Yes, he made your life bearable again, but you never approved of his escape plans, which he harboured and shared with you from the start. You had no desire to escape from these walls, which afforded you a strange security; you wouldn’t have known what to do on the outside, if there was anything you could do at all.

Then came the day in early summer when everything changed. Everything.

It was the first visitor you’d ever received in Wartenburg, notwithstanding your public defender, who didn’t so much defend you during your trial at Lyck District Court as work on you to take a reduced sentence, for the purposes of which he extracted a confession. You let him extract it, of course, through your silence. It was clear the public prosecutor stood in thrall to the Wengler brothers and their corrupt witnesses. They wanted to send you away for murder, make an example of an alleged Polish sympathiser. Even the police officer had given a false statement; said you’d started the fight with the distillery trio, that he’d locked you up for it and released you an hour later.

It wasn’t true; you were in that miserable cell more than two hours before you could head out to the lake, and find her.

You no longer recall what happened next. It was as if your soul had already left your body as it sat breathing and staring blankly at the lake, and made its way in search of her, whose earthly form lay dead and pale in the water.

Only in court did you learn you must have been crouched by the water more than an hour holding vigil at her corpse, when the policeman emerged from the forest and felled you with the butt of his rifle. The same man who prevented you from saving her life.

There was only one question in that courtroom left unresolved: the true identity of Anna’s killer.

You had to wait ten years for an answer.

You couldn’t place her at first, sitting on the visitor’s chair, shy, hands on her lap, gaze lowered. Wartenburg was no place for a woman like her. Only when she lifted her head and looked at you, did you recognise her.

Maria. The librarian.

You could have almost cried, so greatly did it move you, so little had you expected it. Here was someone from your former life.

She lowered her voice and told you an incredible tale, mentioned there was a witness to Anna’s death.

That she knew who Anna’s killer was.

By the time visiting was over, your views on jailbreak had gone full circle.

To Sobotka’s great delight. For you were part of his plan. They always chained you together during the construction work prisoners carried out in the summer of 1930. The steel ankle shackles kept your hands free so that you could work.

Guards with carbines looked on. They relied more on the shackles than their rifles. The chains could only be cut by a blacksmith prepared to involve himself with escaped convicts.

Sobotka knew which guard was the most careless, having spent months planning and observing the routines, waiting for the decisive moment when the midday heat was at its peak, and the man responsible for your sector sat in the shade and dozed, and almost fell asleep.

It worked out better than you could have hoped.

You made it to the forest before he raised the alarm. There you could let go of the chains, the jangling no longer mattered; you just had to reach the lake before the wardens arrived with the dogs. It would take time for the canine unit to be deployed.

There were many lakes in the woods near Wartenburg, and you chose the first you came upon. It had no landing stage, no boat, nothing. You managed to swim across, just, already you could hear the yapping of hounds as you emerged from the water on the other side. Sobotka grinned, because he knew the dogs would lose your scent at the shore.

Even the shackles didn’t concern him; the railway line to Insterburg ran through the middle of the forest.

‘Not dangerous,’ he had explained with a characteristic grin when mentioning it for the first time. ‘Not dangerous.’

You nodded back then, because you didn’t take his crazy ideas seriously. Because for you they were just theories that could never be implemented in practice.

And yet…

The railway line was the only sign of civilisation far and wide.

It was quiet, a few birds chirruping, wind rustling in the treetops. No dogs. They had lost your scent.

Sobotka lay on the track bed and instructed you to follow suit. On the outside. ‘It isn’t so dangerous there,’ he said.

‘I don’t think it’s dangerous at all.’

‘Not for the person on the outside.’

‘But for you.’

‘So long as there’s nothing hanging from the train, it’ll be fine. The cars are high enough. I just have to duck.’ His grin. ‘This is the Prussian Ostbahn. There won’t be anything under their trains. No metal parts, no loose screws. Nothing.’

You remember that you believed him. What else could you do? You lay beside him, likewise on your stomach, just the track between you now, and above the track the chain that held your shackles together.

As you lay down you heard the track vibrating.

Sobotka said nothing, simply covered the back of his head with his hands. You were about to follow suit when you shielded your ears to try and block out the vibrations, which were accompanied now by a rattling sound.

The train was approaching.

85

The longer the conversation went on, the worse Charly felt. As if yesterday’s grilling wasn’t bad enough, there was now the matter of Gereon’s telephone call. She had told Gennat about it straightaway, and there had been no let-up since. ‘You know this means you’re shielding a wanted man.’

‘I’m not shielding anyone. I don’t know where he is. You think he’s any more open with me?’

‘Unless something has changed, you’re engaged so, yes, I’d expect a degree of openness between you. Besides, it was you he called, no one else.’

‘He called headquarters!’ Charly lit a cigarette angrily. ‘I just happened to be there.’

‘But you didn’t tell anyone.’

‘It was around eight, half past. I told you straightaway this morning. It didn’t seem necessary last night.’

She didn’t mention how Dettmann had got in the way. She’d been happy just to leave the station without further indignity.

‘We could have tipped Warrants off,’ Gennat said. ‘You know how important time is in our work.’

‘Tipped them off… how? He didn’t actually tell me where he was.’

‘Is that really true?’

‘As soon as the connection was interrupted, I telephoned his Treuburg hotel. He checked out yesterday at midday. He was calling from a train station.’

‘Then he’s still in East Prussia.’

‘Or in the Corridor. He was planning on coming back, that much he did tell me.’ She didn’t say that Gereon wouldn’t be arriving until early tomorrow morning. Perhaps all this would have blown over by then. ‘At least we know he’s alive,’ she said, stubbing out the cigarette with enough force to burn a hole in the ashtray. Her anger didn’t stem from Gennat’s persistence, more that she felt obliged to lie. To Buddha, whom she worshipped more than any man she’d ever worked for.

He adopted a more conciliatory tone. ‘Wengler’s operations manager is killed, Inspector Rath falls under suspicion, and a day later he gets in touch claiming Gustav Wengler’s a murderer. It can’t be a coincidence, can it?’ Charly was tired, weary of these questions. ‘Do you believe him? That Wengler, is a murderer?’

‘He can’t prove it yet. He said so himself.’ She looked at Gennat. ‘But, yes, I believe him.’

She wondered whether Buddha would buy it. Her tone gave him reason to doubt.

‘So who’s after Wengler, then? Who is this sinister avenging angel?’

‘If Gereon says he’ll find out, then you can be sure he will. He’ll do everything in his power.’

‘That’s precisely what I’m afraid of,’ Gennat said.

His secretary knocked and opened the door. ‘Excuse me, Sir, but Andreas Lange is here to see you. He says it’s urgent.’

‘Send him in,’ Buddha grunted. Moments later, Lange stood in Gennat’s office, hat in hand and a little out of breath.

‘It’s Gustav Wengler,’ he said, without taking a seat. ‘He’s gone.’

‘Gone where?’ Gennat asked.

‘Boarded the train to Danzig at Friedrichstrasse. I could scarcely get on with him.’

‘No problem,’ Gennat said. ‘I’ll inform Officer Muhl in Danzig. They can intercept him at the train station, and assume surveillance duties.’

‘It’s the Free City of Danzig,’ Lange said. ‘The German Police has no authority there.’

‘Perhaps that is why Wengler is headed there, but John Muhl is a Prussian and an old friend. He’ll be glad to help.’

86

The night train through the Corridor didn’t leave for another four and a half hours, so Rath used the time to visit the jail where Jakub Polakowski had been wrongly interned until his fatal escape attempt two years before. The prison director was happy to receive him, so, shortly after arriving at Allenstein train station, he made his way over by taxi.

The smell of prisons was unmistakable, whether you were in Klingelpütz, Plötzensee or Tegel: urine and sweat, mixed with dust and steel and fear. As soon as he passed through the security gates he knew he was in a place of confinement. Wartenburg Jail had originally been conceived as a monastery and, certainly, he knew of no other detention facility with a church steeple as the dominant feature. It was almost idyllically situated on a peninsula, separated from Wartenburg town centre with its brick church by the mill pond.

Rath doubted whether the prisoners would appreciate the view, but…

Imagine Polakowski languishing here, his lover murdered by the man who helped send him to jail.

A guard entered the waiting room. ‘The director will see you now.’ He had been ushered into the estate house at Luisenhöhe to meet Gustav Wengler with similar words. The prison director’s office was on the small side, but looked across the water onto the town. Clearly, East Prussian officials understood the value of a good view.

Prison Director Karl Henning was a thin man with even thinner hair, who greeted Rath kindly and offered him a rickety chair.

‘Beautiful location,’ Rath said, cautiously taking his seat. The chair felt as if it might snap at any moment. ‘May I smoke?’

‘Feel free.’ Henning gestured towards an ashtray on the desk, and Rath took out his case. ‘Are you interested in someone in particular?’

‘Yes, Director. Jakub Polakowski. Sentenced to life imprisonment for murder. Committed on 7th November 1920.’

‘You’re aware the man is dead? He perished during an escape attempt.’

‘Yes, but I’d like to know whether he had any relatives or close friends. Who visited him during his time here?’

‘I can tell you exactly. We keep a book.’ Henning reached for the telephone on his desk. ‘Grundmann? Bring me the Polakowski file, Jakub, prisoner four-six-six-slash-twenty.’

Rath still hadn’t finished his cigarette when a young, overzealous type appeared with a thin file, which he placed on the director’s desk. Henning didn’t need long. ‘Here we are…’ He leafed back and forth, as if the odd page were missing, then continued. ‘If this is correct, then in the ten plus years Jakub Polakowski was here, he received only one visitor.’ He shook his head. ‘I remember thinking the man was very isolated, but I didn’t realise the full extent.’

‘Who visited him, and when? It’s very important. The man could have been a killer, someone taking revenge on Polakowski’s account.’

‘It wasn’t a man,’ Henning said. He passed the file across the desk and pointed to the name entered there, alongside a full address.

Cofalka, Maria, Librarian, Treuburg, Administrative Region of Gumbinnen, Seestrasse 3.

It wasn’t the name he’d been expecting. He’d reckoned with another Polakowski, some distant relative or other, but in spite, or indeed because, of this, he felt the same tingling sensation he always did when potentially decisive developments began to emerge.

‘This was just a matter of days before his escape attempt,’ Henning said, shaking his head. ‘Tragic. When he finally receives a visit, he chooses to break out and forfeit his life.’

‘Perhaps he broke out because he suddenly had a reason to live?’

‘You mean, he fell in love with his visitor?’ Henning shrugged. ‘Perhaps you’re right. It wouldn’t be the first time.’

‘What actually happened? Was he shot?’

‘No.’ Henning didn’t have to consult the file to tell the story. ‘Polakowski was engaged in road construction work with a number of other prisoners. A guard lost concentration and he escaped, together with the prisoner he was chained to. A crafty bank robber named Sobotka.’

‘They were chained together? Wouldn’t that render any escape attempt hopeless?’

‘That’s what we thought,’ Henning said. ‘That only a madman would try it. Or, rather madmen. Whatever, Sobotka managed it – we’re still looking for him today.’ Henning adopted a serious expression. He didn’t enjoy discussing the subject. ‘And Polakowski, the poor fellow, whom Sobotka had incited to flee in the first place, was the one who died.’

‘Go on.’

The director explained how they had found Polakowski’s corpse on the railway line between Allenstein and Insterburg. Of Sobotka there was no trace.

‘Could I take another look at the file?’ Rath asked.

Moments later Rath sat with the Polakowski file in an empty office, whose windows looked onto a prison courtyard. In the watchtower two men stood with loaded carbines. He lit a cigarette and leafed through the file. A serious man gazed out of the photo, a man who had abandoned hope.

He checked the date in the visitor log. Maria Cofalka, Treuburg librarian, residence ibidem, Seestrasse 3 had visited Prisoner Jakub Polakowski on 27th July 1930 at 17h, a Sunday. Exactly a week after the plebiscite anniversary during which she’d accused Gustav Wengler of murder.

Maria Cofalka had let Polakowski in on her secret! Following her visit, prisoner 466/20 had a reason to live again, but not because he had fallen in love with the librarian. Not love, but hatred, had been the driving force behind his escape, which took place one and half weeks later, at one thirty on a Tuesday afternoon. Shortly after five they had recovered his corpse.

The prison file came to a close on that date, 5th August 1930, with the stamped remark: Deceased.

Rath leafed back to the photograph. The sight set something inside him in motion, a vague feeling which he tried, once more, to grasp until, all of a sudden, he realised what it was. He knew this man. His appearance might have changed, but the eyes left him in no doubt. It was a man he had met a short while ago, but not in Treuburg. In Berlin.

87

Charly felt a little queasy inside. It was her first armed operation, and she was still a relative novice with the gun. Gennat had insisted she take it.

Buddha himself held position in the Castle. By his own account, Hartmut Janke lived on the fourth floor, and for the overweight superintendent that was a step too far. He had enough difficulty negotiating the single flight of stairs up to A Division. Perhaps – and it wasn’t just Charly who thought this – it was why he was wont to sleep in his office, where he’d had a small bedroom made up years ago for those nights he was obliged to work late. Such nights were commonplace for Gennat, as they were for any CID officer who took the job seriously. Nights such as tonight.

It was already gone eight when the uniform cops took up position in the stairwell. By now all escape routes were blocked, with additional officers posted in the courtyard and on the street below. The squad leader nodded to Böhm, and he knocked on the wooden door. No response. Böhm knocked a second time.

‘Herr Janke? Are you there? Please excuse the late interruption, but I need to speak with you urgently. CID. We have some questions regarding the Haus Vaterland murder three weeks ago. It won’t take long.’

There was nothing from behind the door.

Charly was wondering if she should volunteer her lock-picking skills, when Böhm wound back and aimed a mighty kick at the door frame, lifting it off its hinges. Wood splintered, and there was a loud crack.

Uniform stormed the apartment.

Charly followed at a respectful distance, weapon drawn for form’s sake. She held it primed, barrel in the air, but only because it looked better, and she didn’t want to embarrass herself in front of colleagues.

She had told Gennat and Böhm about Gereon’s call right away. The first thing Buddha said was: ‘I hope you know where he is this time.’

‘Not right this moment, but I do know he telephoned from a jail.’

‘Pardon me?’

‘From Wartenburg, a jail in East Prussia. He recognised Janke, aka Polakowski, from the files.’

Gennat had acted immediately, enlisting a squad of a hundred officers in case Polakowski should attempt to resist arrest or flee. In the rear courtyard uniform cops stood at every entrance and exit point, stretching all the way to Müllerstrasse. Even in Wedding, such a large police presence didn’t go unnoticed.

No one was home. They swept the flat in less than thirty seconds. The windows were all closed from the inside, meaning Janke hadn’t fled via the fire escape. Böhm made a beeline for the bedroom and wardrobe. The hangers were all empty except for one, which held the uniform of the Berlin Security Corps.

Otherwise the cupboards had been cleared. Even the bed had been stripped. There were no pictures, though the tiny holes in the wallpaper revealed that any number of items must have hung above the desk. Charly found a scrap of newspaper on the floor. It was scarcely yellowed. A black line that might have been part of a border was the only sign of printer’s ink.

It looked like it was the only trace the man had left behind. The squad officers handed over to Forensics, but they found nothing either: no red handkerchiefs, no envelopes, no tubocurarine, not even any fingerprints.

‘It’s as if he wiped everything down before leaving,’ said Charly.

‘What about the uniform?’ Böhm asked.

‘No prints, if that’s what you mean. Looks as if it’s been dry-cleaned.’

‘Take a look at this.’ A second technician had lifted a plank from the wooden floorboard between the hallway and parlour. Right under the door frame. ‘It’s hollow under here.’

‘So?’

Charly and Böhm drew closer. The ED man shrugged in disappointment. ‘Empty.’

Even so, Charly felt sure this was where Janke kept the items that a routine police check would have no business uncovering. ‘See if you can’t find something. After all…’ she said.

‘What do you mean? It’s empty.’

‘I mean, little things. Things you might need a magnifying glass for, and better light. Glass shards, perhaps, or dried liquid residue, anything like that. Then check if the glass might be part of a hypodermic syringe, or if the liquid’s curare.’

In the corner where three rooms abutted one another was a small, pot-bellied stove. Charly took a handkerchief and opened the hatch. ‘There’s ash inside,’ she said, and one of Kronberg’s men rushed over. ‘It’s still warm.’

The technician took the poker and carefully probed the ashes. It was mostly paper. Then he fished something from the black-grey mass which disintegrated upon touch, the only thing to have survived the gorging flames. Just a little edge of paper, but it was clear it was from a death notice. A few of the letters were even legible:

Now Charly was certain. They had found his hideout; it was really him.

Hartmut Janke, the guard who had provided information so willingly in Haus Vaterland, had previously been known as Jakub Polakowski, and he had killed four men.

88

Rath saw them as the train pulled in: a dog and its mistress. Was he imagining things or did Charly look ever so slightly peeved? She certainly wasn’t carrying a bouquet of flowers. Quite the role reversal, he thought. Three weeks ago he and Kirie had waited here, perhaps even on the same platform, although on that occasion her train had arrived from the west.

He waved, but they still hadn’t seen him. Of course, she had every right to be peeved. Even so, he hoped she was a little glad to see him, just as he was glad to see her standing there with Kirie.

He was among the first to alight from the train and, as he did so, a smile appeared on her face after all. There you are, see!

He pushed past the other travellers streaming onto the platform, until, finally, he reached them. Kirie wagged her tail wildly, dancing excitedly back and forth, and Charly gazed at him sternly, smiling all the while. He took her in his arms and held her fast, buried his nose in her hair and breathed in her scent like an addict. ‘I’m sorry,’ he whispered in her ear.

‘About what?’

‘Everything. About being away so long, about your not knowing where I was.’ He looked at her. ‘I was missing in action.’

‘You’re telling me.’

‘Seriously. I got lost in the forest. I would have died on the moors, but for…’ He broke off. ‘I’d rather tell you at home over a cup of coffee.’

‘Coffee’s waiting.’

‘Great – what about Polakowski?’ They descended the steps to the car.

‘Gave notice to his employer and cleared his flat.’

‘Hopefully he didn’t smell a rat. Or perhaps he’s en route to his next vic… Where’s Wengler?’

‘Danzig.’

‘Danzig? His home city.’

‘We suspect he’s visiting family there. Local CID are informed. They met him at the train station, and won’t let him out of their sight.’

‘We should send on a description of Polakowski, ideally with a photo.’

‘What photo?’

‘From his prison file.’

‘You said Gustav Wengler was a killer?’

‘I’d stake my next promotion on it.’

‘Whenever that might be.’ Charly laughed, then grew serious again. ‘You know he’s wriggled his way out of this bootlegging business. He shopped his operations manager, Dietrich Assmann.’

‘The dead man from the cells?’

‘Precisely.’

‘Then Wengler’s behind his murder, too. Perhaps he told this police impersonator to use my name, as a little payback for making his life hell in Treuburg.’ He looked at Charly. ‘Let’s hope he can’t wriggle his way out of a murder rap. He’s already eliminated one potential witness.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Maria Cofalka, the librarian from Treuburg. The trouble is, we can’t prove anything. The only person who saw Gustav Wengler killing his fiancée twelve years ago wouldn’t make much of an impression in court. That’s assuming we can lure him out of his forest in the first place.’

‘Radlewski?’

‘An oddball, for sure, but no killer. If he has any role in this case, it’s as a witness. At least, in theory.’

They reached the Buick, which Charly had parked beneath the railway bridge on Hardenbergstrasse. Rath was so busy stowing his case on the dickey that he failed to notice the three men until it was too late. All carried pistols.

‘I hope you’re not going to make any trouble, Rath,’ said one.

He turned around. Wilhelm Böhm’s service revolver was trained on him.

‘What the hell is this? You’re arresting me? When I’d have come in straight after breakfast!’

‘Better safe than sorry.’ Böhm gestured towards the road where a green Opel had pulled over. Rath started towards it. Kirie didn’t understand what was happening, and ran back and forth between master and Buick. Charly was inconsolable.

‘I’m sorry, Gereon. I had no idea. They must have followed me.’ She threw Böhm a hostile glance, and suddenly Rath knew things weren’t half as bad as they seemed. For the first time they shared a common enemy: Wilhelm Böhm. It was almost enough to draw a smile. Maybe she was starting to realise what a bastard he was.

He sat on the rear seat of the green Opel, and greeted the driver. ‘Mertens. I’m sorry you were awakened so early on my account.’

‘Don’t worry about it, Sir.’

A plain-clothes officer whom Rath didn’t recognise threw his case into the boot, and Böhm heaved his heavy frame onto the rear seat. ‘Looks like you’ll be taking your breakfast at headquarters,’ he said, and signalled for Mertens to start.

In the rear mirror Rath saw Charly and Kirie standing next to the Buick, growing ever smaller until a bus crossed Hardenbergstrasse and they disappeared from view.

89

At least Böhm hadn’t put cuffs on him.

‘Are you actually arresting me?’ Rath asked as the car passed the roundabout by the Gedächtniskirche.

‘I have a warrant, but I’m appealing to your common sense.’

‘Sir, this is ridiculous! Arresting me like a criminal. Somewhere out there, someone is dying with laughter.’

‘The magistrate saw grounds for a murder charge. That isn’t to say I share his opinion.’

‘Then why are you arresting me?’

‘Because I can,’ Böhm growled. The rest of the journey passed in silence, but when Rath saw the cake tray in Gennat’s office he knew everything would be all right, in spite of Buddha’s frosty greeting.

‘Inspector Rath,’ he said. ‘Do we really have to arrest you to make you submit your report?’

‘It’s a simple misunderstanding. I…’

Gennat interrupted him. ‘It is anything but a misunderstanding. We had no other way of ending your game of hide-and-seek. Now, will you please tell us what is going on? What have you been doing in East Prussia? Then we might understand why Dietrich Assmann had to die, and the charges against you can be dropped.’

‘With respect, Sir, and as I’ve already said to Böhm here, I’d have come in straight after breakf…’

‘Well,’ Buddha said. ‘What’s wrong with having your breakfast here?’ He poured coffee. ‘I hope you had a good trip.’

Rath sat. ‘Yes, Sir, thank you. At least there was no flying involved.’ He lit an Overstolz and took a sip of coffee. For the moment he ignored the cake Gennat had shovelled on his plate, and focused on telling his story from beginning to end. The only details he omitted were the exact circumstances of Hella Rickert’s theft.

By the time he’d finished, Gennat had demolished three slices of cake. ‘You’re certain about this Anna von Mathée’s death?’

‘Quite certain. Radlewski would have no cause to implicate an innocent man. In fact he blames himself for failing to prevent Anna’s murder. I think these diaries were a way of alleviating his guilty conscience. There’s no reason to doubt them.’

Gennat agreed, and for once even Böhm seemed convinced.

‘So this Radlewski saved your life,’ Gennat said. ‘And you’re certain that Polakowski is the man with four people on his conscience?’

‘Working as a guard in Haus Vaterland he’d have opportunity. There was no need for him to leave the crime scene afterwards, because no one suspected him.’

‘Do you have a photo?’ Böhm asked.

‘In the prison file – in my suitcase.’

Böhm snapped it open and took the photograph from the file. ‘We should show this to Constable Scholz, from the traffic tower. Perhaps he’ll recognise his attacker.’

Gennat nodded, and Böhm disappeared with the photo.

‘Now that we’re alone,’ Buddha said. ‘I’m aware of your issues with Böhm, but the fact that you didn’t even contact your fiancée… I’m afraid that I simply can’t let slide. You need to apologise to Charly, and make sure you never treat her like that again, otherwise you’ll have me to deal with and, believe me, that’s a road you take at your peril.’

Rath felt almost moved that Buddha was so concerned for Charly’s well-being. ‘Beg to report: I have already apologised, and it won’t happen again.’

‘Good. Now eat your nutcake.’ With Gennat, that, too, was an order it paid to obey. ‘What I’m wondering is,’ Buddha continued, ‘if you’re right, and everything up to this point has been a prelude to the killing of Gustav Wengler, then why hasn’t Polakowski done the deed by now? The man was in Berlin for more than a week.’

Rath had his mouth full. He swallowed before answering. ‘Wengler was under surveillance the whole time, wasn’t he?’

‘He still is. Danzig CID Chief Muhl called me last night. Wengler’s staying at the Hotel Eden. Two of Muhl’s men are stationed in a car outside.’

‘They should stay on him. Polakowski might fall into their hands.’

‘Our priority is to warn Wengler about Polakowski.’

‘So that he smells a rat, and discovers we’ve been digging up these old stories? Wengler knows that Polakowski is after him, because that’s how Polakowski wanted it. Think of the death notices, the whole rigmarole. With respect, Sir, if we warn Wengler – about something he’s probably already aware of – then all we’ll be doing is giving him the chance to get rid of incriminating evidence. It’s hard enough to pin Anna von Mathée’s murder on him as it is.’

‘In my view it’s more important to prevent a murder than solve one that’s already occurred,’ Gennat said seriously. ‘Wengler is the victim here, or at least potential victim. It’s Polakowski who’s the suspect.’

‘My fear is that Wengler will stop at nothing to conceal his own guilt. He had the Treuburg librarian killed when he learned she was in contact with Radlewski.’

‘What?’ Gennat raised his eyebrows. ‘You’re certain about that?’

‘More or less. I think he roped in the local SA to do his dirty work. Its members are in thrall to him somehow.’

‘Wengler’s a Nazi?’

‘He doesn’t hawk it about,’ said Rath, ‘but I suspect if he ever officially entered politics, you’d find one of those swastika pins on his lapel.’ He replaced his cake fork on the table, and lit an Overstolz in the hope that Gennat wouldn’t offer him seconds. It seemed to work. ‘I think Wengler has Assmann on his conscience too, and is trying to frame me.’

‘While we’re on the subject.’ Gennat cleared his throat. ‘For my part I don’t believe you’re guilty, but that doesn’t mean we can spare you the routine. Fingerprints, identification parade with the guard personnel. That much at least.’

‘If it’s the only way.’

‘I’m afraid it is,’ Gennat said. ‘We’ve already requested a comparison of signatures. Whoever broke into Dietrich Assmann’s cell made a pretty decent fist of yours.’

Rath wondered who might have provided Wengler with his signature. Hella Rickert? Her father, perhaps? The corrupt small-town policeman, Grigat? There were various possibilities.

The door opened and a black dog entered. A woman stood in the door looking angry.

‘Fräulein Ritter. What are you doing here?’ Gennat asked.

‘I thought I might stop by and see what was happening, after Detective Chief Inspector Böhm snatched my fiancé away without so much as a word. You’re not seriously arresting him as a suspect in the Assmann case? If you even think about putting him in a cell, I tell you this now. I’ll be baking a file in his cake.’

Rath could scarcely conceal his pride.

‘As for you,’ she shouted. ‘Wipe that grin off your face. If you just played things by the book for once, we’d have been spared all this fuss.’

‘I’ve already explained that much, Fräulein Ritter.’ Gennat was amused. ‘I think he’s seen the error of his ways.’

‘I should think so too!’

‘Why don’t you join us?’ Gennat clapped the surface of the green armchair next to his. ‘Coffee?’

‘Thank you.’ She sat down, still hopping mad. Rath would have liked to embrace her, but had to make do with ruffling Kirie’s fur.

Gennat poured coffee, while Charly lit a Juno. She was beginning to calm down. ‘Has Kronberg been in touch?’ she asked.

Buddha looked at his watch. ‘Right now Superintendent Kronberg will be eating his breakfast, if he’s up at all.’

‘I mean ED in general. They were planning to work through the night.’

Rath must have had a big question mark on his face.

‘We found a few items in Janke, aka Polakowski’s, flat yesterday,’ Gennat explained. ‘Kronberg promised us the results today.’

Charly stood up to leave with Gereon, but Gennat held her back. ‘Fräulein Ritter, could you stay a moment, please? I need to speak with you, in private.’

‘Certainly, Sir.’

She shrugged at Gereon as he exited the office, wondering what Gennat wanted that couldn’t have been discussed before. Buddha poured more coffee and she lit another cigarette. ‘Would you like some more cake?’

‘No, thank you, Sir.’

‘I wanted to thank you, Fräulein Ritter, for your contribution here. You’ve provided sterling service.’ It sounded like goodbye. She said nothing. ‘It is not least thanks to your efforts that our investigation here will soon be concluded, give or take the odd warrant.’ He looked her in the eye, and she could see he wasn’t finding this easy. ‘Superintendent Wieking wants you back, and I’m afraid I’m running out of reasons to keep you, Charly. From Monday you’ll report to G Division.’ Buddha proffered a hand. ‘It was a pleasure working with you. Think fondly of us.’

She shook his hand. ‘Perhaps there’ll be other opportunities to collaborate.’

‘Perhaps.’ Gennat didn’t sound as if it were likely.

Charly smiled bravely but, in the corridor outside she could have cried. So, it was back to G Division, back to Karin van Almsick and Wedding youth gangs, to neglected children and fallen girls. She had always known her stint in Homicide could be no more than an interlude; that, for women CID officers, day-to-day policing occupied a different plane.

And now, of all times, here came Dettmann! The inspector eyed her suspiciously, but kept a respectful distance. It didn’t stop her from smelling his aftershave as he passed. Pitralon? Whatever it was, it was overpowering. He must have applied it liberally, as if he had just bought himself a new bottle.

She stopped and turned around. Dettmann had disappeared inside his office. An idea flashed through her mind, something so fantastic she could hardly take it seriously. Yet it wouldn’t let go.

90

Rath had difficulty keeping his eyes open. He was lacking in sleep, and motivation, having too little to do with ongoing investigations in the Castle. Somehow he felt he no longer belonged, and Böhm made little effort to disabuse him of the notion. He was more or less a spare part while others went about their work. At his desk he decided to put a call through to Königsberg. ‘Assistant Detective Kowalski, please,’ he said to the switchboard girl.

Kowalski was delighted to hear from him, but inconsolable nonetheless. ‘My uncle told me what happened, Sir. I’m sorry. I thought I had to report to Grigat, and he sent me back to Königsberg. You know how it is: orders are orders.’

‘What did Adamek tell you to say?’

‘That you’d requested backup, more men to arrest the Kaubuk. I thought Adamek would stay with you. He did go back into the forest. How was I to know Grigat had put him up to it?’

‘Well, anyway, I survived.’

‘And now you’re back in Berlin.’

‘Indeed I am, and I have news.’ He told Kowalski the whole story and, though disappointed the Kaubuk wasn’t their man, Kowalski was flattered that Rath had kept him in the loop. Indeed, that he had telephoned at all. ‘Wengler, a killer? Are you sure?’

‘More or less. Only, I don’t have proof.’

‘There must be something out there.’

‘I wouldn’t bet on it after twelve years. Besides, if you listen to my superiors, Wengler’s a victim who needs protection. For now we have to concentrate on Polakowski. After that, we’ll see.’

Kowalski hesitated. ‘I wanted to tell you, Sir, how much I enjoyed working with you.’ Rath didn’t know how to respond. No one had ever told him that before. He mumbled a hasty goodbye and hung up.

Just as he was contemplating taking Kirie for a stroll, Kronberg appeared in Homicide. Rath joined the others in Böhm’s office so that he could listen to the forensics man. Charly was nowhere to be seen; what on earth could she and Gennat still be discussing?

‘The newspaper scraps from Janke’s,’ Kronberg said, ‘are identical to two death notices found in the Wengler flat. The Lamkau notice, and the Simoneit notice. The Lamkau notice from the Kreuz-Zeitung is a 100 per cent match. Regarding Simoneit, we can, at the very least, confirm that the paper is the same as that used to print the Volkszeitung für die Ost- und Westprignitz. There are more details here.’ He laid the file on the table.

‘Many thanks for your efficiency, Herr Kronberg,’ Böhm said. The forensics man nodded modestly.

Typical, Rath thought: has his people work through the night, then takes all the glory himself. Böhm was already hunched over the report when Kronberg produced a second file from his leather bag.

‘I have something else,’ he said. ‘It looks as though we’ve been able to trace the source of the tubocurarine.’ That, too, was typical of Kronberg. He always saved the most important news for last.

Strangely enough, they had got there by way of the red handkerchiefs. These didn’t, as previously suspected, hail from Berlin, but rather, Königsberg, from a large quantity of fabric and off-the-peg clothing that had been stolen two years before from the Junkerstrasse-based Moser firm. The guilty party was a notorious burglary ring that had somehow managed to evade justice, despite its methods being well known to Königsberg Police.

Which was how colleagues there also knew that the same ring had broken into the University Clinic two nights later and, besides various drugs and narcotic agents, made off with large quantities of an anaesthetic that was the focus of current institute research. A muscle relaxant based on the curare poison of the South American Indians, obtained from the pareira root. Its name: tubocurarine.

Polakowski, it seemed, had obtained the handkerchiefs and narcotics from one and the same source.

Rath took Kirie by the lead and went out. At Alexanderplatz he found a telephone booth and put in another call to Königsberg.

Not even the dog was there. Without Kirie and Gereon, Charly felt that much lonelier at her desk. She was still in the outer office with Erika Voss, but got along decidedly better with her than during her first days in Homicide. No doubt due to the absence of a certain Gereon Rath.

‘The inspector’s taken the dog for a walk,’ the secretary said, and for a moment, Charly was tempted to head to Alexanderplatz in search of them, but just then Böhm bustled through the door to ask that she have copies of Polakowski’s photo made and distributed to all major police stations in Prussia. ‘Plus a dozen to Warrants here at Alex.’

She went upstairs to Photographics, which was housed on the same floor as ED. The lab workers were not known for their efficiency, which was why it was best to wait in person and make a nuisance of yourself, otherwise it could take an age to get your prints.

This, then, would be her final act in A Division: having copies made and sent to all and sundry. Nice. Still, it would be a damn sight more interesting than sharing an office with Karin van Almsick again on Monday.

Then there was this business with Dettmann, the scent of his aftershave, and the thought it had triggered. Perhaps she was going mad, but the idea, or, rather, the images, that had flashed through her mind were so realistic it was as if she had lived through them herself. A police officer breaking a prisoner’s neck.

She had seen these images often enough in the last few days; it was how her mind worked when speculating on the particulars of a crime. Poor Dietrich Assmann had been murdered over and over again in her imagination, always with the same jerking motion, but now, for the first time, the killer had a face.

91

By the time Rath returned, most colleagues had already finished for the weekend, but Charly sat alone at her desk bagging photos. He recognised Jakub Polakowski’s mugshot. ‘Can you send one to police headquarters in Königsberg?’

‘Done!’ She showed him an envelope, addressed to the commissioner.

‘Then send another, care of Assistant Detective Kowalski.’

‘No problem. We have more than enough prints.’ She passed him a photo and an envelope. ‘You can take the address from the previous.’

He added a few lines of thanks on lettered paper to go with the photograph. By the time he was finished Charly had bagged at least another five prints and cover notes, but she seemed strangely brusque.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I didn’t mean to treat you like my secretary…’ He showed her the letter to Kowalski. ‘See. I’m not so useless after all.’

‘It’s fine,’ she said, but her face told a different story.

‘Has Dettmann been bothering you again?’

‘No, no. Don’t worry. He’s been avoiding me actually.’

‘It’s better that way.’ He felt a certain pride. Perhaps his performance in Dettmann’s office had achieved something after all.

Charly forced a smile. ‘Soon there’ll be no chance of Dettmann running into me, apart from in the canteen, perhaps.’ She hesitated a moment. ‘I… On Monday, I’ll be returning to G Division.’

‘Your guest appearance is over?’ he said, trying to sound sympathetic.

In truth he was relieved. He had been unhappy working so closely with her. It felt restrictive somehow, as if his every move were being monitored, when in fact they’d only spent three days together on the Vaterland team. The rest of the time he’d been gadding about in East Prussia. Thinking of her curiosity, and his fondness for secrecy… well, perhaps it was no bad thing she was being reassigned. But seeing her face, he knew he had to comfort her. He took her in his arms, and in the same instant she began sobbing.

This was the second time in a matter of weeks when, normally, she’d have fought back tears at all costs. For a moment he wondered if she might be pregnant…

He held her, and she had a good cry on his shoulder. ‘Sorry, Gereon,’ she said after a while, smiling again amidst the tears. ‘I’m just a silly goose.’

He dabbed at her damp cheeks with his handkerchief. ‘No,’ he said. ‘You’re not a goose.’

It took a moment for the penny to drop, then she started banging her fists against his chest. ‘You cad,’ she said, but she was still smiling. ‘I did know it was only temporary, but somehow it got me when Gennat said I’d be back with Superintendent Wieking from Monday.’ She shrugged. ‘He’s right, though. The investigation’s as good as closed. Finding Jakub Polakowski is a job for Warrants now.’

‘I’m not so sure. We still don’t have anything on Gustav Wengler.’

‘You’ve really got it in for him, haven’t you? Don’t forget, he’s the one in danger.’

‘I won’t, but it doesn’t change the fact that he killed a young girl – and ordered the death of an innocent librarian to cover it up. Then there’s his old mucker, Assmann.’

All of a sudden Charly’s smile evaporated.

She wanted to tell him, but couldn’t. What could she say? Describe the images playing over and over again in her mind, of Harald Dettmann wringing Dietrich Assmann’s neck? How she heard the crack of bones breaking, saw Assmann’s cigarette fall to floor and Dettmann stamp it out?

No, it would only lead to more strife.

She leaned on his shoulder as he steered the Buick west via Tiergartenstrasse. He threw her a quick sideways glance and put his arm around her. She was surprised at herself, at her need for affection, her reluctance to make trouble. For once, all she wanted was a peaceful weekend.

She gazed at the windscreen wipers struggling against the rain, which had set in just as they were leaving the Castle, and savoured his presence beside her. In the drizzle she could just make out the spire of the Gedächtniskirche. She decided she couldn’t hold it in any longer. She had to say something, if only to see how he reacted. ‘This business with Assmann. Do you really think it was a colleague?’

‘More likely the badge was a fake.’

‘Still, I wouldn’t put it past… Dettmann, say.’

‘The man’s an arsehole, but that doesn’t make him a killer. Don’t take things so personally.’

‘I just mean I wouldn’t put it past him.’

‘Anyone’s capable of murder. That’s one of the first things Gennat teaches you.’

‘Anyone? Does that include you?’

He hesitated before continuing. ‘That isn’t funny.’

‘Sorry.’ She sat up and looked at him. ‘I know. That signature business was a dirty trick, but someone like Dettmann is just waiting for a chance like that.’

She could see he was thinking. Even so, she knew what he was about to say. ‘It was Gustav Wengler trying to make trouble for me, just like in East Prussia. I’m starting to become a nuisance and I’m telling you, it feels good. It means I’m on the right track.’

‘You seem to want to pin something on Wengler at all costs.’

‘Pin something?’ Gereon looked at her, outraged. ‘The bastard killed his fiancée! Then cashed in on her death.’

‘You can’t prove it.’

‘Oh, I’ll prove it, don’t you worry. If not that he killed his fiancée, then Maria Cofalka, or Dietrich Assmann.’

‘But he didn’t kill them, you said so yourself.’

‘No.’ Gereon gave a bitter laugh. ‘Gustav Wengler no longer kills for himself. He has people kill for him. What’s the point in being director otherwise?’

‘Gereon, I think you’re getting too wound up. Talk about taking things personally.’

‘Oh, I am, am I? The way I see it, I’m the only one who’s actually interested in this. Everyone else just wants Polakowski.’

‘I hardly think Gennat’s taking a murder in police custody lightly.’

‘No, but he hasn’t questioned Wengler either, has he?’

‘Because it wouldn’t help matters.’

‘Wengler’s behind Assmann’s murder, it’s obvious, so that there’s no one left to testify against him.’

‘You realise if he’d given him an alibi, we’d have had to let both of them go.’

‘Perhaps he wanted rid of him. Perhaps Assmann had become a nuisance.’

‘Perhaps,’ Charly said. ‘Just like the others. I didn’t get the impression he mourned any of them, not even his brother. You could be right: he wanted rid of Assmann.’

They reached Carmerstrasse, parking outside the gate. ‘There’s no way he hired Harald Dettmann to do it. The pair don’t even know each other.’

‘No,’ Charly said. Gereon was right. Dettmann was so busy with his Phantom, he’d barely checked in with the Vaterland team these past weeks. Yet she couldn’t shake the image of him breaking Dietrich Assmann’s neck; dousing a red handkerchief with water from a Pitralon bottle, tying the hanky to the bedpost as he poured the remaining water over Assmann’s face – before covering the dead man’s corpse to make it look as if he were asleep.

92

It is quiet now, everyone is asleep. You, too, could use some rest, but you know you will find no peace until you step off the train at Königsberg. The rattling of steel wheels; once upon a time it soothed you, rocking you gently to sleep, but not now, and never again.

Königsberg. It is two years since you were last here, but still you remember where you must go.

The dive bar in Vogelgasse is so narrow you can scarcely believe it has a back room. A back room where, in exchange for money, anything can be yours: information and weapons, narcotics of all kinds, and a new life.

You remember your first visit.

‘I need a passport.’

‘No problem, but it’ll cost you.’

‘I have money.’

Sobotka’s stash was still hidden in the forest by Allenstein, near a village called Altschönberg, his birthplace. Fifteen thousand marks. Money for Sobotka to start over once he was out; money for you to start over now, yourself.

‘There’s more.’

‘We can get hold of anything.’

‘Even tubocurarine?’

‘What’s that?’

‘An anaesthetic adjuvant. They’re using it for research purposes at the University Clinic, Department of Anaesthetics. Lange Reihe.’

‘We don’t need the address.’ You recall the suspicion in his eyes as he looked you up and down. ‘It won’t come cheap.’

‘I told you: I have money.’ He looked down wide-eyed as you laid a thousand-mark note on the desk. ‘Four more, if you can get hold of everything, and grant me a small favour.’

‘We don’t kill people.’

‘No.’ You showed him the iron shackle under the right trouser leg of your elegant new suit. ‘I need to get rid of this. Today.’ You knew then that you had won his respect. ‘I need some addresses. Four East Prussians, who moved west from Marggrabowa.’

‘It’s called Treuburg now.’

You nodded. You were aware that the world had changed. You passed a note across the desk containing the names, along with your additional requests.

You are rid of the shackles the same day, and, two weeks later, you have everything you need. A new identity, four addresses, and enough tubocurarine to kill an elephant.

The rattle of the train keeps you awake, eating away at your thoughts and rekindling unhappy memories.

The vibration of the tracks.

The railway line in the pine forest near Wartenburg.

Sobotka on the crossties, hands on the back of his neck, the ankle chain that binds you straddling the shiny metal.

You pull your legs outwards so that the chain sits tight as possible on the tracks.

By now the vibrations come paired with other noises. You choose not to protect your neck, covering your ears as the train rushes towards you, growing ever louder. You cover your ears and pull the chain tight, awaiting the inevitable.

Even covering your ears, the train is so loud that you start to shake; beads of sweat run down your skin, making you grow cold, as the wind rages all around.

You close your eyes and wait for it to be over – but it takes an age.

A cacophony sweeps over you, a violent screech, thunder and rumble, and you are shaken by a painful blow to your leg.

You wait for the ear-splitting roar to die, not daring to move. You hear more screeching, further and further away until, at last, it subsides.

You open your eyes. Pain in your right leg. Instinctively you reach for it, but feel no wound. The chain has loosened, it must have struck against your shin, a bruise, nothing more.

You’ll limp, perhaps, but you’ll carry on. Both of you must now make yourselves scarce. The driver has halted the train and will soon sound the alarm. It will take time for them to get out here and pick up your trail, but it won’t take forever.

You sit up. Your triumphant grin fades when you gaze towards the track bed.

Sobotka’s powerful frame looks almost unscathed, but he is now lying on his back. A hand is missing, so too his face.

Something struck his head, or perhaps his head met with the onrushing train. All you know is that his grin, which could banish all dread from this world, has been replaced by a bloody pulp.

You feel sick, but the fear makes you act, the fear of being locked up again.

Someone is thinking in your place as you remove your prison garb and switch it with Sobotka’s. Swap your number 466/20 with his 573/26.

Then you strike out into the forest, moving as fast as you can. Before the driver arrives, before the search party arrives, before the dogs arrive. Before they find the dead man with the prison number 466/20.

You run through the forest and scream; despite everything that has happened, you are overcome by a hitherto unknown sense of exhilaration. It is freedom you feel: a freedom that only death can provide.

93

Rath had no choice but to lie. It was true that he couldn’t meet her for lunch in the police canteen, he just hadn’t been entirely honest as to why.

‘I’m out in the field,’ he had said, and he had indeed canvassed several of the witnesses who claimed to have seen Jakub Polakowski in Berlin over the weekend. Still, he was finished with that long before the lunch break. As predicted, all three visits were in vain. An old lady suspected her neighbour, whose radio was constantly blaring; an unemployed bookkeeper’s report had clearly been driven by boredom; which left only the third witness, a kiosk owner, who claimed to have seen Polakowski at Schlesischer Bahnhof on Friday. When Rath showed him the photo, which was considerably sharper than the copy in the newspapers, he nodded. ‘That’s him, I’d wager. Saw him Friday morning carrying a small case.’

The man couldn’t say where Polakowski was headed, couldn’t even remember the exact time. Rath made a few notes, but held little hope of picking up his trail. You could go almost anywhere from Schlesischer Bahnhof, which had its own S-Bahn platform.

He’d finished his list around twenty past eleven, but chose not to return to Alex. Instead he’d lied to Charly, on the day they’d made their engagement public in the Castle. Gennat had announced it that morning in briefing, and Harald Dettmann gazed stonily in Rath’s direction as others joined the applause.

They could have been in the canteen toasting the fact that everyone knew. Instead, he was moving through Friedrichshain towards the banks of the Spree. Walking down Mühlenstrasse, cigarette dangling and hands in his coat pockets, he proceeded towards the Oberbaum Bridge and the Osthafen where, this time last year, Red Hugo, head of the Berolina Ringverein, had vanished without trace.

The black Adler sedan that rolled past and stopped on the street corner looked out of place in a neighbourhood like this, characterised as it was by industry, poverty and petty crime. Even so, its paintwork didn’t have so much as a scratch. Everyone here knew who the vehicle belonged to, as, of course, did Rath.

The driver’s door opened, and a well-dressed Chinese emerged. The man wore a long, black ponytail under his hat, and nodded briefly at Rath as he opened the rear door.

‘Thank you, Liang,’ Rath said, taking his place on the back seat, next to a powerfully built man who put the papers he’d been reading to one side.

‘Long time, no see, Inspector,’ said Johann Marlow.

‘I’ve been out of town.’

‘Might I invite you for lunch? There’s a Chinese restaurant close by.’

‘Thank you, I already have plans.’

‘Let’s take a little drive.’ Marlow gave Liang a signal and the sedan started rolling. They turned onto Warschauer Strasse.

‘Thank you for meeting me like this,’ Rath said, though it went against the grain to express gratitude to such a man. He needed his help though, so had grasped the nettle once more. As time passed he grew increasingly inured to its sting.

Marlow had always behaved honourably towards him, which was more than could be said for some of his so-called colleagues. Arseholes like Harald Dettmann and Frank Brenner, or traitors like Bruno Wolter and Sebastian Tornow. Even a man like Andreas Lange didn’t always play with an open hand; the same went for Böhm and Gennat, of course, to say nothing of the various police commissioners he had served under.

‘What can I do for you?’

Rath lit a fresh cigarette. ‘Where would I go if I was looking for a contract killer, here in Berlin?’

Marlow laughed. ‘You mean to dispose of your superiors? You won’t get any help from me or Berolina for that kind of service.’

‘What about Concordia?’

‘Same code. Murder is off limits.’

The Ringvereine controlled organised crime in the city, but nearly all of them shied away from murder, at least those who could afford the luxury of a code of honour.

Marlow looked at him sceptically. ‘What would you like to know, Inspector?’

‘A witness was killed in police custody last week. By a professional.’ He didn’t want to reveal any more. Neither that the killer had posed as a police officer, nor, this went without saying, whose name he had used.

‘Do you think Concordia are behind it?’

‘I think a man named Gustav Wengler is behind it. A suspected bootlegger, who does business with Concordia. I believe that, with the help of Concordia, Wengler has neutralised a troublesome witness.’

‘I’m afraid you’re barking up the wrong tree, Inspector!’ Marlow tapped a cigarette against the lid of his case.

‘What do you mean?’

‘Concordia no longer have any dealings with Wengler.’

‘Only last week Concordia men were involved in loading Wengler’s moonshine onto a boat at the Westhafen.’

‘Also the moment that their long-standing arrangement came to an end.’

‘Wait a minute. You’re saying Concordia deal directly with the Luisenhöhe distillery?’

‘Dealt. Like I said. How else do you think they get their hands on so many original bottles? And they’re important; the Yanks pay top dollar for market products, take it from someone who knows.’ Rath thought of the two thousand dollars in his mailbox. ‘What’s actually inside isn’t important. You have to assume our associates over there dilute the product even further. With water and medicinal alcohol, or worse. Poor Yanks.’ Marlow shook his head and laughed.

‘But this arrangement is now over?’

‘The Pirates drove Concordia out of business, if you ask me with the express approval of Gustav Wengler.’ Marlow took a drag on his cigarette. ‘If a witness needed eliminating, it’d be Hermann Lapke who ordered it, the head of the Nordpiraten.’ The gangster grinned. ‘If I were you, Inspector, I’d be asking around at police headquarters. Who knows, perhaps you’ll find your killer there.’

Rath was astonished. He was certain he hadn’t mentioned the police impersonator and his fake badge. Charly’s words flashed through his mind – but surely Dettmann had even less to do with a Ringverein than Gustav Wengler?

‘What do the Pirates have against Concordia? I thought it was Berolina they had it in for?’

‘Lapke’s decided to leave us in peace for the time being.’ Marlow inhaled appreciatively. ‘Though he’s leaning on Concordia pretty hard. Five of their members have now been killed and, according to the papers, you were the investigating officer.’

‘The Phantom.’ Rath nodded thoughtfully. ‘The victims were all linked to Concordia…’

‘No doubt some of them wouldn’t want it inscribed on their gravestones, Riemann, the Charlottenburg lawyer, for instance… but, yes, the Phantom’s victims have all been necessary in some way for Marczewski’s business deals.’

‘Polish-Paule?’

‘I wouldn’t call him that, unless you want to get yourself shot. Though he’s a perfectly charming fellow otherwise.’

‘He’s Masurian?’

‘Prussian, at any rate. Came to Berlin a few years ago from Königsberg.’

‘Then Wengler knows him from the old days.’

‘Possibly, though they’re no longer friends. Marczewski’s afraid he’s next on the Phantom’s list, and went to ground several days ago.’

‘So the Pirates are behind all the Phantom murders?’

‘Lapke’s behind them. Ever since he was released from Tegel a year ago, he seems to be on astonishingly good terms with the police.’

‘What are you saying?’

‘That it’s no coincidence he was spared by the Weisse Hand, unlike his friend Höller.’

‘You’re saying Lapke was in cahoots with the Weisse Hand?’

‘Perhaps he still is.’

‘The Weisse Hand no longer exists. We broke it last year.’

‘The man who kills on Lapke’s behalf is one of your colleagues, Inspector, believe me. Whatever name you give him.’

‘The Phantom’s a sniper; the victim from police custody had his neck broken.’

‘I’d be surprised if Lapke gave the job to someone new.’

‘So who is it?’

‘If I knew that, he’d have been exposed by now. Or killed.’

‘You’re well informed.’

‘In my line, information is the alpha and omega,’ Marlow said, and Rath remembered his father’s saying. Knowledge is power.

He fell silent and stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray. It was about the same size as the Buick’s glove compartment. ‘Do you think that Paul Marczewski would be willing to testify against Gustav Wengler?’

‘You really want to get this Wengler, don’t you?’ Marlow said. ‘If it hurts the Pirates, you have my support. That said, I can’t imagine Marczewski will make the greatest impression in court, and he’ll hardly be crazy on the idea either. But…’ – he threw his cigarette out the window. – ‘…I’ll see what I can do.’

94

Charly hadn’t been at her desk half a day and already felt she was in a rut. At the weekend she had laboured under the illusion that she still worked for Homicide, discussing the dead man in the cells with Gereon and mentioning Dettmann by name on several more occasions. In the meantime her colleagues in G had picked up the girl gang from Wedding. Questioning had taken place while she’d been seconded to the Vaterland team, and now she had to sift through the transcripts with Karin van Almsick, looking for contradictions or inconsistencies.

Somehow she couldn’t help sympathising with these girls who threatened their fellow U-Bahn passengers with switchblades, which they took great pleasure in opening in front of their victims’ faces.

The youngest was fourteen, the oldest seventeen. All were homeless, orphaned girls trying to make ends meet. Charly couldn’t help thinking of Alex, whom she’d met a year ago. Where might she be now? Initially she’d feared she might stumble on the name Alexandra Reinhold in the transcripts, and was glad to be proved wrong. Alex, too, had stolen, and used a knife from time to time, but Charly liked her all the same. Hopefully, one way or another, she’d soon have her life back on track, along with her friend Vicky.

‘Penny for your thoughts.’ Karin van Almsick was a very nosy colleague. ‘Let me guess, you’re thinking about him?’

News of their engagement had been made public that morning in G as well as A Division. She’d received the congratulations of her colleagues, and promised to bring a cake the next day. ‘Actually, no,’ she said. ‘If I’m honest, I don’t think of Gereon much at all.’

She tried to focus on the transcripts, but her colleague wouldn’t allow it. ‘How long have you known one another? Pfeiffer from Juvenile Crime says you worked in Homicide three years ago as a stenographer.’

‘That is indeed where I met Gereon Rath. It’s plain you’re a CID officer.’

Her colleague smiled blissfully, not realising that Charly was being sarcastic. ‘How long have you been together?’

‘We were together and then we weren’t – but we got there in the end.’

Karin van Almsick gazed sympathetically. ‘How awful!’

‘There are other men out there.’

The throwaway remark was astonishing to her colleague. ‘You’re not serious?’

‘Pardon me?’

‘About there being other men. You haven’t actually…’ She seemed fit to burst.

‘Yes, there have been other men in my life. Some serious, some not so. You’ve got to be able to compare. You do it while shopping, so why not when it actually matters?’

Karin van Almsick needed a few moments to close her mouth. She was a country girl, from Wriezen or somewhere, shocked by Berlin morals, or Berlin moral depravity, as she’d no doubt have it. ‘Why don’t I make us a tea,’ she said, and smiled, obviously glad to be escaping temporarily. Charly gazed after her. Better to come out with it now than spend the next God knows how long beating about the bush.

Karin van Almsick returned from the tea-kitchen sooner than expected. The door flew open and she stood in the office, minus the teapot but short of breath and white as a sheet. ‘There’s someone outside,’ she said.

‘So?’

She took a deep breath, looking as though she’d just encountered the Devil himself. ‘A Negro,’ she said at length. ‘Charly… there’s a Negro outside who wants to speak with you.’

95

Rath couldn’t bear the waiting, but what choice did he have? What a crackpot idea, going to Gennat now! Did he really think he’d be waved straight through? But that was just it, he wasn’t thinking, or at least, he wasn’t thinking straight. He had knocked, and Trudchen Steiner had motioned for him to take a seat, and so now here he was, and there was nothing he could do.

The mood he was in, it was torture. There were a thousand things he’d rather be doing than waiting for an audience with Gennat, but perhaps it was better he couldn’t do them now. Better he couldn’t storm into her office and ask who the hell she ate lunch with whenever he turned her down.

Finishing with Marlow, he had wanted a quick snack before returning to the Castle. He’d never have gone near Aschinger if he thought she’d be there. Instinctively he sought cover behind a fat woman in the queue, his guilty conscience at work, as ever, following his latest rendezvous with the gangster.

That was when he saw she wasn’t alone. In Aschinger of all places, where half the station went for their lunch, she sat in full view: Fräulein Charlotte Ritter, newly engaged to Herr Gereon Rath, as most colleagues knew since this morning, eating her lunch without her fiancé. Only, she wasn’t alone.

Alongside at her window table was a black man. A black man who displayed his dazzling white teeth just as Rath looked over. Charly was laughing about whatever it was he’d said, so fixed on her companion that she failed to notice her fiancé in the queue. Rath resisted the temptation to give the man a good smack, choosing, instead, to beat a retreat.

If he hadn’t just come from meeting Johann Marlow he’d have taken her to task, and hounded the black out of the restaurant, but if there was one thing Charly must not know it was Marlow’s excellent relationship with the Berlin Police, viz. Gereon Rath. So, perhaps it was wise that he hadn’t. Even if it’d have made him feel better. Perhaps.

What kind of man was this? Why was she meeting him, and why had she never mentioned a black acquaintance? One thing was for certain: this was no lawyer.

He stared at the Hindenburg portrait in Gennat’s outer office and tried to think of something else, but the same images kept flitting through his mind. Charly, sitting with a black man, laughing. Trudchen Steiner finally stopped the merry-go-round in his head. ‘The superintendent will see you now.’

Ernst Gennat sat at his desk. ‘What is it that’s so important?’ he asked.

My fiancée is having secret meetings with a Negro.

‘How is Officer Dettmann getting on with the Phantom case?’

It wasn’t the most poised opening. Gennat eyed him suspiciously. ‘Do you want your old case back, Inspector?’

Of course he did, and if he could take Gustav Wengler down at the same time, so much the better. ‘Of course not, Sir, it’s…’ He lit a cigarette. Rarely had he felt so nervous in this office. Perhaps it was because his thoughts kept turning to Charly. ‘I might have some fresh insight regarding the case…’

‘I thought the Vaterland team was focusing on the search for Jakub Polakowski?’

‘Precisely how I came upon the information, Sir, or rather, in connection with our investigation into Gustav Wengler.’

‘Your primary concern should be Polakowski,’ Gennat said. ‘He’s our suspect. Wengler is the victim, or potential victim. We are keeping him under surveillance to protect him.’

‘With respect, Sir, Gustav Wengler is a killer, and bootlegger, who had his long-time operations manager murdered to conceal his shady deals.’

‘That’s little more than a theory at this stage.’

‘I have evidence to substantiate it. Wengler has played two Ringvereine against each other, by switching allegiance from Concordia to the Nordpiraten.’

‘What are you driving at?’

‘The murder in police custody could be the work of the Phantom. The man kills on Hermann Lapke’s behalf – who was doing his new business associate Wengler a good turn.’

Gennat’s expression grew serious, even startled, as he reached for the telephone. ‘Fräulein Steiner, under no circumstances am I to be disturbed in the next ten minutes. Not even by you.’ He hung up. ‘Who have you already spoken to about this?’

Charly’s meeting a Negro.

‘Spoken to?’

‘About your suspicion.’

‘No one, Sir. You’re the first.’

‘Then let it stay that way.’ Gennat furrowed his brow. ‘Tell me how your suspicion came about. The Phantom is a sniper, and Assmann had his neck broken.’

‘It had to be done quickly, and police custody is the worst possible place for a sniper.’

‘Where do you have your information?’

‘An informant from the Berolina Ringverein told me the Phantom is Lapke’s personal hit man.’

‘Berolina…’

‘Yes. A Ringverein on good terms with Concordia, in whose orbit most, if not all, of the Phantom’s victims moved.’

‘You think the Pirates are stirring things up again?’

‘Perhaps even Lapke himself.’ Rath lowered his voice. ‘There are whispers that Lapke was in league with the Weisse Hand last year, and that this Phantom is a remnant, so to speak, of that time. Which would mean…’

‘…the Phantom’s a police officer,’ Gennat said.

‘Which also explains how he gained access to the cells. All we have to do now is show the guard from Wednesday evening pictures of all CID offic…’

‘I fear that could be tricky. Herr Studer has been missing for three days.’ Gennat adopted a conspiratorial expression. ‘What I’m about to tell you, Inspector, must stay in this room. Can I rely on you?’

‘Of course, Sir.’

Gennat threw him another searching glance before continuing. ‘The Phantom killings actually began in autumn ’31, shortly after the Weisse Hand was broken. We suspect someone slipped through our fingers at the time, who has since made a career of his hobby. A lucrative one, at that.’

‘Murdering criminals or their accomplices, and earning money on the side.’ Rath stubbed out his cigarette. ‘So it really is a police officer?’

‘Not a word to anyone, do you hear.’ Gennat gave him a piercing look, and Rath nodded as if hypnotised. ‘We are not only certain it’s a police colleague. We know which one.’

96

A further four days passed, and still Jakub Polakowski hadn’t been found. By now all major police stations in Prussia had a photo, and Warrants had scoured the whole of Berlin, along with every town Polakowski had visited during his vendetta.

The Danzig Criminal Police had also been issued with photos, but Polakowski hadn’t appeared outside Wengler’s hotel, the Eden, where the distillery owner occasionally met with lawyers or family members. Clearly he wanted to put his dead brother’s affairs in order, and perhaps do a little bootlegging on the side.

The man had been in his home city for a week now, and Rath wondered when he would return to business in Treuburg, especially since his manager was dead and the distillery was operating without a leader. Perhaps he had already anointed a successor? Whatever, he’d have to return tomorrow at the latest, since there was no way someone as politically-minded as Gustav Wengler would miss the Reichstag elections.

The previous four days had been hard on Rath. Buddha’s secret weighed heavily. He’d have liked to tell Charly, but it was Gennat’s express wish that not even she be admitted. The secrecy was worse than last year, when they had disbanded the Weisse Hand, a clandestine troop of frustrated police officers who had taken it upon themselves to eliminate career criminals using vigilante justice.

Apparently the troop’s last remaining member was still out there killing, only now he did so against a fee. Rath wasn’t entirely surprised when Gennat gave him the name. ‘Detective Inspector Dettmann.’

‘Dettmann, but you gave him his own case? Why, so he can eliminate all evidence?’

‘There is no evidence. I wanted to lull him into a false sense of security.’

‘You’d have been better making an arrest.’

‘Without proof, that’s not possible.’

Gennat was right. They had no proof, only clues that would never stick in court, and would have to be patient.

As luck would have it Rath wasn’t alone in guarding a secret. Charly hadn’t said a word about this black she’d eaten lunch with on Monday. Rath thought he’d heard colleagues gossiping about it in the canteen, but the whispering died as soon as he entered the room. Even so, he was certain he’d caught the word black, and the scorn and pity in the eyes of colleagues. He’d tried not to think about it, remembering Hella Rickert in Masuria. There was no way he’d be telling Charly about Hella, it was none of her business. He wondered if that was why she’d failed to mention…

His jealousy grew by the day. Rarely had he slept with Charly so often as in recent times, and it was starting to feel as if he were doing it to possess her, that she might belong to him and no one else.

Who was this black, and why hadn’t she said anything about him? He’d briefly considered hiring a private detective, only to abandon the idea, since it would mean yielding to his jealousy. Besides, Berlin sleuths were a notoriously shady bunch.

Meanwhile, normal service had resumed in A Division. Charly had been recalled at exactly the right time and didn’t complain, simply got on with it. Clearly she was on good terms with her office colleague, and no one in G seemed to envy her having spent three weeks in Homicide.

Three times this week he had eaten lunch with her in the canteen, introducing her as my fiancée, Fräulein Ritter, and enjoyed being seen together at last.

Perhaps it was jealousy that bound him to her, but he didn’t care. Already they were living a kind of trial marriage, sitting together in the evenings, listening to the radio or records, and talking about work. As well as keeping their own secrets. Perhaps that, too, was part of married life. He tried to make peace with the idea, however difficult he found it.

On Sunday they would cast their vote together, as he’d promised they would. He still didn’t know where to put his cross. The whole thing seemed pretty pointless. At the end of the day, it’d be Hindenburg who had the final say on the identity of his chancellor, and perhaps it was better that way. The Nazis were beneath the old man; there was no way he’d let one of them run the country.

Rath’s sole wish was that Nazi and Communist votes might tumble, reducing the frequency of street battles. Perhaps the new government would ban the SA and SS again, so that life in Berlin and elsewhere in Prussia might return halfway to normal. That way the police wouldn’t have to keep hearing about how they had lost control.

With all these questions running through his mind, one refused to let go: who in the hell was this black man?

Perhaps on polling Sunday he’d casually steer conversation onto the Nazis and their asinine racism. Were there even black Germans? It was a legitimate question, surely?

He put the thought to one side and concentrated on the file in front of him. He’d spent much of the week trying to write down everything that had happened in Masuria. He hated drudge work like this, but at last the report was ready for Böhm. Hopefully it wouldn’t be thrown back in his face.

Perhaps Böhm was no longer here. Most colleagues had finished for the weekend. Charly had said her goodbyes about an hour ago, after arranging to go shopping with Greta. Or was she meeting… Again his thoughts turned to the black man, sitting with her at the window table in Aschinger.

The telephone rang, the call he’d been waiting for all week. ‘Kowalski. I see you’re racking up overtime, just like me.’

‘I’ve been spending a lot of time with my colleagues in Robbery Division.’

‘And?’

‘This university break-in from October ’30…’ He paused, as if to make sure no one was listening. ‘Nothing was ever proved, but my colleagues are certain it was Marczewski’s gang. Their prints are all over it.’

‘Marczewski?’

‘It’s how the gang’s still known, though the boss has been in Berlin a few years now.’

‘Polish-Paule.’

‘Pardon me?’

‘That’s what we call him here. He took over a Ringverein. Clearly a major player where bootlegging’s concerned.’

‘There’s an informant. I showed him the photo you sent, and he recognised the man.’

‘And?’ Rath felt his hunting instinct awaken.

‘He says not only did this man buy the stuff from the clinic, he ordered the theft himself; knew exactly where the drugs could be found.’

‘Interesting.’

‘It wasn’t the only job he gave Marczewski’s men either. He wanted a new passport, as well as the addresses of four Treuburgers who’d moved away.’

‘Let me guess: these four men are no longer with us?’

‘You got it.’

‘Did these gang members know they were handing a killer his victims on a plate?’

‘The informant denies it, but that lot would sell their grandmothers. Polakowski must have laid down thousands of marks – just like that, enough to make any hood go weak at the knees. Only thing I’m wondering is how a fugitive could have so much cash.’

‘His jail-friend was a bank robber, wasn’t he? It’s probably from his stash. Thank you, Kowalski. Excellent work.’

‘Thank you, Sir, anytime, but there’s one more thing. Our informant saved the best until last…’

‘Go on.’

‘He was there again.’

‘Who?’

‘Polakowski paid another visit to Marczewski’s gang last Sunday. He needed more tubocurarine, and he got it.’

Wilhelm Böhm was still at his desk, but dressed in his hat and coat and speaking on the telephone. ‘Keep your eyes open. He’ll be back soon enough.’

‘What’s the matter?’ Rath asked.

‘Our colleagues from Danzig. They’ve lost Gustav Wengler, somewhere in the covered market.’

Rath placed a thick file on Böhm’s desk. ‘Apropos Wengler,’ he said. ‘My Masurian operation. Here’s the report.’

‘Finally.’ Böhm reached across and opened it. ‘About time.’ There was no such thing as a friendly thank you from Wilhelm Böhm.

‘I think you’ll find it’s pretty comprehensive.’ Rath was unsure whether or not he should report Kowalski’s call.

Böhm looked up from skimming the file. ‘Was there something else, Inspector?’

‘Yes and no.’

Böhm furrowed his brow.

‘Polakowski,’ Rath said. ‘I think he’s in Treuburg, waiting for Gustav Wengler.’

‘What makes you say that?’

‘Just a feeling.’

‘Why not check if this feeling has any substance, and get in touch with the local police? A man like Polakowski should stick out like a sore thumb.’

‘With respect, Sir, I don’t trust the police in Treuburg.’ Rath gestured towards his report. ‘As far as I’m concerned, Chief Constable Grigat’s perfectly capable of killing Polakowski himself.’

‘A police officer who kills?’

‘No doubt he’d dress it up as self-defence, or say Polakowski was trying to escape. Grigat and Wengler are in cahoots, and it’s not in Wengler’s interests that Polakowski should fall into police hands, the sole witness in an age-old homicide case.’

‘A mass murderer, besides.’

‘That doesn’t mean vigilante justice should prevail.’

‘Hmm.’ Böhm rubbed his chin.

‘What sort of impression does it make if Berlin asks for assistance on the basis of a feeling?

‘Yet you expect me to green-light an expensive operation on precisely the same grounds?’

‘It’s the weekend,’ Rath said. ‘It could always be an unofficial trip.’

‘Don’t you want to cast your vote tomorrow?’

‘There are more important things.’ Rath started downstairs. On this occasion ‘hmm’ would have to suffice. If he let Böhm say anything else, he’d only end up back in his office.

The Buick had a full tank, and he had over a hundred marks in his wallet. More than enough. He steered onto Kaiserstrasse, then Frankfurter Allee. There was a build-up as far as Lichtenberg, but once he was past the S-Bahn bridge he could step on the gas.

He’d have liked to take Charly with him, but she was with her friend on Tauentzienstrasse, spending her hard-earned cash. Screw it, there was no way of reaching her, but perhaps it was better if she didn’t come, thinking of Hella Rickert, and the prospect of their crossing paths.

He knew what he had to do, and he had to be quick about it. If he made good time, the journey would take around fifteen hours. Gustav Wengler would be back in Treuburg tomorrow at the latest to cast his vote, and he wanted to be there too. He drove as fast as he could, but still took almost five hours to reach the border. In Schneidemühl, the last German town before the Corridor, he found a gas station with a coin telephone. He made his way over while the attendant looked after the Buick. It was almost eight, she’d be long home by now.

The connection wasn’t good; Charly’s voice scratched in the receiver. ‘Gereon, where are you? Overtime again?’

‘No.’ He decided to make it short and sweet, to tell the truth for once, instead of talking all around it. ‘I’m at a gas station,’ he said. ‘In Schneidemühl.’

‘Sorry?’

‘In Schneidemühl, on the Polish border.’

Charly stressed each individual word. ‘What. Are. You. Doing. In. Schneidemühl?’ By the time she finished, she was shouting.

‘Settle down. It’s Polakowski. I know where he is.’

‘Going it alone again. Gereon, didn’t you want to…?’

‘I’m not going it alone. Böhm knows.’ She was speechless. Great. ‘Don’t worry, Charly. I have to say goodbye, I’m out of coins. I love you.’ He hung up.

It wasn’t far to the border, but he wasn’t the only one heading to East Prussia for the weekend. A long queue had formed in front of the checkpoint. Gennat hadn’t been exaggerating. First of all he required a transit visa, which cost him sixty marks and no little patience, before it was finally stamped and signed. It took just as long for the serious-minded Polish border officials to search his car, in the process of which they discovered one of Kirie’s rubber balls, which Rath had misplaced long ago.

Next, his Walther was confiscated. In its place he was issued with a receipt, which entitled him to reclaim the pistol on his return journey. On top of everything else, he then had to pay a toll of five Zloty. The officials refused to take Reichsmark, meaning he had to use the bureau de change, where the commission bordered on daylight robbery. He was beginning to regret taking the car. The train ride had been more pleasant; even the plane had been preferable, despite his fear of flying, but there was no going back now that the paperwork was complete. His transit visa granted him twenty-four hours to clear the Corridor; he did so in two and a half. Bromberg and Thorn were both pretty towns but, fearing the hostility of Polish border officials might be matched inland, he carried on, refusing to stop until he’d reached German Eylau, and with it Prussian territory once more.

Entering East Prussia proved far easier than entering Poland; the border officials requested his visa, his passport and his driving licence. No more than half an hour, and he was back on German soil.

In the meantime it was just after midnight.

97

A pleasant day greeted Charly as she stepped outside with Kirie. She felt the sun on her skin, and a gentle breeze made her forget her fatigue. She was so angry she had barely slept. Gereon bloody Rath, but she wasn’t so much angry at him, as at her own stupidity, at having to stay put while he was gallivanting round the country. This time he hadn’t even left her the car. Couldn’t he have flown again? It seemed highly unlikely that he was hot-footing it back to Masuria with Böhm’s blessing.

To think, she had been looking forward to getting out of town together, and to casting their vote. She couldn’t help thinking back to the last week, during which she had rehearsed eagerly for married life. Was this part of it too? Spending her weekends alone? Not if Charlotte Ritter had anything to do with it! She’d catch up on that Wannsee trip she still owed Greta. Her polling station was in Moabit anyway; she could call by Spenerstrasse at the same time, perhaps even spend the night. Her role in life wasn’t restricted to keeping Gereon’s bed warm!

She pulled hard on the lead as she crossed the street. Kirie, who had been slow to react, looked at her in astonishment, and she immediately regretted venting her anger on the poor beast. Kirie was least of all to blame for her master’s antics.

At Steinplatz she came to a halt in front of an advertising pillar bearing election posters. Down with the system, demanded the Communists. The Workers have awakened, the Nazis proclaimed. Here in Charlottenburg, these slogans would most likely fall on deaf ears, though the German National People’s Party might gain traction with their Power to the Reich President, with Hindenburg at its core. None of the three parties were interested in democracy. As far as these elections went, they were interested in power, and power alone.

She was about to cross to the park when a man emerged from a bright, imposing-looking house on the corner. Donning his hat he looked through thick spectacles as he made his way towards her.

Charly couldn’t contain her surprise. ‘Deputy Commissioner, Sir,’ she cried. ‘ Good morning.’

Bernhard Weiss lifted his hat. ‘Good morning, Fräulein Ritter.’ He hadn’t needed a moment to remember her name, which flattered her more than she cared to admit. ‘I fear you’re one of the few who still recognise that title.’

‘You’re still in charge as far as I’m concerned, Sir.’

‘Strictly speaking, I’m only on leave of absence. I signed a declaration in custody which prevents me from exercising any official powers.’

‘Your removal from office wasn’t legal. As for our government – that was a putsch.’

‘These are matters for the State Court to decide.’

Charly’s next question had been on her mind ever since she had seen Reichswehr soldiers leading away her superiors like criminals. ‘Why didn’t we defend ourselves?’ she asked. ‘Twenty thousand police officers. We could have prevented this putsch.’

‘No doubt Prime Minister Braun and Commissioner Grzesinski didn’t want to risk civil war. Enough blood has been spilled already.’ Weiss gestured towards the advertising pillar. ‘Who knows, perhaps these elections will result in a new government.’

‘You think an election can really change anything?’ Charly asked, smiling as she saw his face. ‘Don’t worry, I haven’t given up hope. Of course I’ll be voting. I’m just sorry I couldn’t do more.’

‘I wouldn’t give our Republic up yet.’ Weiss stroked Kirie, who was sniffing at his shoe. ‘Is this your dog?’

‘I… she belongs to Inspector Rath. I’m looking after her while he’s in East Prussia.’

‘Rath still isn’t back?’

‘He’s gone again. I think he’s on the trail of a murder suspect, but, honestly, I’m not sure any more. I was reassigned from Homicide last week.’

Weiss seemed surprised that she was still looking after Rath’s dog. For a moment she considered mentioning their engagement, but it hardly seemed appropriate.

‘You live here?’ she asked, pointing towards the house from which Weiss had just emerged.

‘Not yet, but this is where my family and I will be moving to. We need to vacate our official apartment in Charlottenburg within the next few weeks.’

Charly felt a great sadness. ‘So it’s permanent, your withdrawal from police office?’

‘I hope to be reclaiming my desk at Alex very soon. Once the State Court has delivered its verdict, or the new Reich government.’

‘If there is a new government, and it isn’t worse than the one we already have.’

98

Rath pulled over just before Allenstein, parking on a forest path, struggling to keep his eyes open. When he awakened it was already dawn. He washed using water from a nearby stream, and drove on, encountering more and more people the closer he came to Treuburg. Again and again he had to brake as a horse and cart straggled along. Occasionally he met a group of pedestrians, who stood gawping at the Buick and took an age to clear the road. It was almost midday when he arrived in Treuburg, suit rumpled and stomach rumbling.

The Masurians were on their way to church and the polls. Almost all the towns and villages he had driven through were decked out for election day, with people hanging flags out of windows to denote their political persuasion. Far too many swastikas, he thought, far too much black-white-and-red, and not nearly enough black-red-and-gold.

Approaching from Lyck he could already make out the Treuburg water tower, but instead of holding course, he bore left and drove up to Luisenhöhe. The staff in the estate house were surprised to see him again. Yes, Herr Wengler had returned, yesterday evening in fact, but unfortunately he wasn’t home. After church he had gone to vote, and he still had business to attend to in town.

When was he expected?

A shrug.

‘I need to find Herr Wengler. It’s a matter of life and death.’

The servant looked at Rath as if he had never heard such nonsense. ‘I see,’ he said. ‘I’ll pass that on.’

‘It might be too late by then. Just tell me where I can find him.’

‘Try the marketplace, that’s where Herr Wengler’s polling station is.’

In Treuburg, too, flags hung from windows. Lots of black-white-and-red, interspersed with swastikas. There was even a little black-red-and-gold on show. Only Communist colours were absent; perhaps the Nazis had burned their flags.

The girls’ school on the marketplace had been transformed into a polling station. Outside the entrance stood a few of Fabeck’s SA boys, brown shirts freshly ironed, hair parted straight as a die. They threw Rath dirty glances but, in the absence of their Rottenführer, seemed unsure whether to take matters further. ‘Berliners aren’t permitted to vote here,’ said one, as Rath pushed past.

‘Who wants to vote with people like your Führer standing?’

Before the youth could respond, he disappeared inside. Dressed in their Sunday best, the Treuburgers were fulfilling their patriotic duty. Gustav Wengler was nowhere to be seen. ‘The Herr Director has voted already,’ one of the polling officers said. No more information was forthcoming.

Outside, he found Klaus Fabeck and troops blocking his path. ‘If it isn’t our busybody friend from Berlin,’ Fabeck said. ‘SA-officer Brandt tells me you’ve been insulting the Führer…’

‘Have I?’ Rath lit a cigarette. ‘Well, he isn’t my Führer. I’m sorry if I hurt your tender feelings for the man. I forgot you lot are all gay.’

‘You’re lucky it’s polling day, Inspector. Once these elections are over, you’d better watch out. People like you will be first for the chop.’

‘People like me?’

‘Those who mock the Führer. Once Adolf Hitler assumes his rightful position as leader of the German Volk, only true Germans…’

‘He didn’t even make it to Reich President,’ Rath interrupted. ‘Perhaps it’s time Herr Hitler headed back to Austria. Half a year ago he didn’t have citizenship, now he’s telling us what it means to be German?’

Fabeck stood poised to attack, but his two companions held him back.

‘Leave it, Klaus,’ said one. ‘He’s a cop. He’s trying to provoke you, so he can lock you up.’

Rath lifted his hat. ‘I bid you good day.’

Without hurrying he made sure to put a little distance between himself and the group. Fists inwardly raised, he readied himself to strike, but the attack never came.

Outside the Kronprinzen he ran into Karl Rammoser, who sat on the terrace in the shade. ‘Inspector, what are you doing back in Masuria?’

‘Try keeping me away.’

‘Isn’t it polling day in Berlin?’

‘I have more important things to do. I’m looking for Gustav Wengler.’

‘I saw him about an hour ago, coming out of the polling station. Exchanged a few words with the SA lads, then got in his car.’

‘Well, he isn’t home. I was up there just now.’

‘Then I assume he’s gone for a drive. He does that sometimes, just hops in his car and drives around, out to some lake, or forest.’

‘It is pretty around here.’

‘You’re telling me. Only, not everyone has a Mercedes to enjoy it.’

‘A Buick will do just fine.’ He gestured towards his car, which was parked down by the roadside. ‘Can I drive you home?’

‘Too early for me, I’m afraid. I’m meeting someone for lunch.’

‘Well, then…’ Rath tipped his hat by way of goodbye.

He wondered how long he could leave the Buick by the marketplace before the SA slashed his tyres. It hardly faded into the background, besides being the only vehicle here with IA plates. It seemed even the Berlin tourist family had returned in time to vote. All other cars bore the East Prussian registration IC.

He got in his car and considered where Polakowski might be hiding. He had no idea. This trip to Treuburg might be a crackpot idea, yet he knew Polakowski was here somewhere, waiting to complete his revenge.

He settled down. If Wengler was in his Mercedes then he was safe, for the time being. Whether that was true at Luisenhöhe was another matter.

At least he had managed to pick up the trail again after Danzig. That ought to pacify Böhm somewhat. He started the engine and set off. Perhaps he should take a leaf out of Wengler’s book and enjoy the scenery, and maybe he’d meet the maroon-coloured Mercedes along the way.

Something on the Lega bridge was flapping in the breeze. He reversed a few metres and looked out the side window. A red handkerchief was tied to the railing. He pulled over and got out of the car. No doubt about it, it was the same as the one they’d recovered from the lift at Haus Vaterland. In the traffic tower at Potsdamer Platz; in Wittenberge and in Dortmund. Fearing the worst he gazed over the railing, scouring the Lega’s shallow waters for a corpse.

He took a deep breath before climbing down to the river to check underneath the bridge. Only when he was certain there was no body did he return to the handkerchief. It was dry.

Suddenly it dawned on him that the red handkerchiefs were a signal to Polakowski’s victims, rather than a simple means of torture. The same signal had lured Anna von Mathée to her death – and Jakub Polakowski to ruin.

Rath got into the Buick and drove to Markowsken without filling up. He’d only have enough for another few kilometres but couldn’t afford to be late. Wengler had almost certainly seen the sign.

Apart from two horse carriages, the road was clear. His instincts hadn’t betrayed him: the red Mercedes was parked by the edge of the forest.

Gustav Wengler wanted rid of this man who threatened his legend, this man who knew his status was founded on lies and hypocrisy. Did he think he had the edge on Polakowski? That was what Herbert Lamkau and Siegbert Wengler had thought, until Polakowski administered his needle and resistance was crushed. Did Wengler realise exactly how his brother had died?

Rath drove into the forest until the road became track, parked and started walking. He didn’t know how far it was, couldn’t be sure he wouldn’t get lost again without Adamek and his local knowledge; but still he continued, until suddenly he saw the water sparkle through the trees.

He considered calling out loud, so that he could bring home the folly of Polakowski’s endeavour, but then the man would be warned, and he would never catch him. And Rath wanted to catch him. Not just because he was a mass murderer, but because he might be a viable witness in the case against Gustav Wengler. He worked his way through the forest until he could see the little lake – but it was too late.

Standing in the shallows over Gustav Wengler’s inert body was Hartmut Janke, aka Jakub Polakowski, the man whose life Wengler had so utterly destroyed. Wengler’s head was submerged, but Polakowski pulled it out. Wengler gasped for air, but not as frantically as someone who fears he will drown. The tubocurarine must be at work. Polakowski apparently spoke with Wengler, who sat listlessly in the water.

Rath imagined Polakowski speaking with his other victims, reminding them of their sins, of the harm they had visited on himself and Anna, even asking about Gustav Wengler, as, slowly, he ended their lives.

Then he realised he wasn’t alone in the forest. A man was crouched behind a thick pine trunk, brown suit scarcely visible against its surroundings. It was Erich Grigat in plain clothes, his weapon drawn and trained on Polakowski. He meant to shoot Polakowski dead first time, and not hit Gustav Wengler by mistake.

Rath could have made short work of things with his service pistol, but it was locked in a Polish border office.

Down by the water Polakowski was still speaking, and Grigat had eyes only for the killer and his next victim. Rath grabbed a stick from the forest floor, and approached the chief constable slowly from behind, making sure he didn’t step on any withered branches that might give him away. It was a trick he had from reading Karl May, although perhaps fortune looked kindly on him. As Gustav Wengler’s head was thrust underwater a second time, he struck, and Grigat slumped to his knees before collapsing sideways on the soft forest floor. His service pistol, a Luger, fell out of his hand. Rath claimed it, walked the final few metres to the shore, and emerged from the shadow of the trees.

Polakowski didn’t see him, hadn’t heard him above the splash. Wengler lay on his back, face submerged in the water. A few bubbles rose to the surface, otherwise all was still. Wengler didn’t so much as twitch.

Rath caught himself taking pleasure in the scene: the great Gustav Wengler drowned by his own wretched victim. Wasn’t that just, and didn’t he deserve to die? Should he, Rath, not simply wait until Polakowski had completed his task before making his arrest? He just needed to stay quiet, to avoid startling Polakowski and preventing him from carrying out the execution, but the other part of Rath’s conscience was already working. His right hand released the safety catch on Grigat’s Luger and held it at the ready, as his feet continued towards the shore. It was time to end this.

‘CID, Berlin,’ he said. ‘I’m armed. Please do as I say.’ Polakowski’s body grew rigid. Though the man’s back was to him, Rath felt certain it was devoid of expression. ‘Remove the man from the water. Slowly and carefully.’

Polakowski lifted Wengler by the shoulders. No sooner did his head surface than he took a deep, heavy breath. The escaped convict, who had spent long years wrongfully languishing in jail, held his victim and tormentor above the water.

‘Bring him ashore.’

Rath didn’t know if that would save Wengler. He had no idea if and when the curare would exert its deadly effect, or if Wengler already had too much water in his lungs. Polakowski seized Wengler’s body under the armpits and dragged him slowly towards the shore.

‘Now lay him down, place your hands in the air and turn around.’

Polakowski obeyed, but turned so quickly that Rath scarcely knew what was happening, knocking the Luger out of his hand in a single motion. The pistol landed in the undergrowth, and Polakowski was on him.

The man was strong and deadly serious. Polakowski took his neck in a chokehold. He couldn’t prise his hands free. He wriggled and thrashed his legs, reared up, but it was no use. Polakowski stayed on top, hands squeezing mercilessly until, suddenly, his grip loosened and he toppled to the side like a felled tree.

Rath gripped his neck and looked up. Gustav Wengler stood over him, holding Grigat’s Luger in his hand, which glistened with Jakub Polakowski’s blood. Rath was confused. It was strange to see a firearm used as a primitive cudgel, but it had worked, Polakowski had been immobilised. Wengler had saved his life.

Rath would never have thought he’d have to feel grateful towards the man, yet here he was. ‘You need a doctor,’ he said. ‘He’s injected you with tubocurarine. Probably in a fatal dose. It’s a miracle you can even stand.’

‘You disappoint me, Inspector!’ said Wengler. ‘I thought you were more intelligent than that, and less scrupulous.’ He grew more serious. ‘I’d hoped you’d shoot the swine. The man was trying to kill me.’

‘He didn’t inject you with paralytic poison?’

‘He injected me with something, and I’m sure he believed it was the Devil’s work.’ Wengler laughed. ‘When really it was saline solution.’ He gestured towards a large tree by the shore. ‘The needle lay hidden there for days. I had a hunch he’d want to finish things here, and asked Erich to keep an eye on the lake. It was no problem to switch the needles.’

‘Then you were playacting? Why?’

Wengler looked at the weapon. ‘Did you get this off Erich? That isn’t nice, you know. It’s his service pistol. Where is he, by the way?’

‘Sleeping the sleep of the just. Now explain: why the dying swan?’

‘Why, indeed? To manufacture a situation where the bastard could be gunned down without Erich being brought to trial.’

‘It was all planned?’

‘Inspector, for more than two years I have known that Polakowski was outside, planning his revenge. He made the mistake of obtaining false papers from Paul Marczewski of all people. In Königsberg. Without realising I do business with the man.’

‘Did business with the man.’

‘I see you’re well informed. Yes, sadly I had to end our business partnership but, back then, it proved very useful. When the Polack started making inquiries about my people, Marczewski naturally informed me right away.’

‘You knew the whole time? Why didn’t you protect your men?’

‘Why should I? They’d become a nuisance. The sins of one’s youth.’ He shook his head. ‘Inspector, I’m trying to legitimise my business operation and these tales of moonshining are damaging.’

‘But… your own brother…’

‘If you must know, Siegbert was a corrupt bastard. Sooner or later he’d have blackmailed me if I’d interrupted my payments. He’d cost me far too much already, and he was a lazy swine.’

‘Then Polakowski acted in your interests.’

‘You know, he thought he was scaring me with those death notices. I was pleased with his work. How much do you think it’d have cost to pay someone for all that?’

‘Well, you ought to know. You paid for Assmann, didn’t you? Or did Lapke go halves with you?’

‘Inspector, if you’re so clever, why is it I have to do your work for you?’

Wengler raised Grigat’s pistol and aimed at the unconscious Polakowski. Rath closed his eyes.

‘Wengler, you can’t! I’ll have you for this.’

‘You think you’re going to survive?’ He aimed the pistol at Rath. ‘First I’m going to shoot the Polack, then I’m going to shoot you. Afterwards we’ll cook up a nice story about how you tried to save me, but died a hero’s death. Poor Grigat sustained a blow to the head during the struggle, of course, but will testify to my version of events. A police witness always looks good.’

‘I’m warning you, Wengler. My colleagues will be here any moment.’

Wengler laughed. ‘Even you don’t believe that. The way Grigat tells it, you’d rather run from your colleagues than keep them informed.’ Suddenly his laughter died, and he gazed over the barrel with an ice-cold expression. ‘Any more and you’ll be first to go.’

‘Wengler, you wretched…’

Creature, Rath was about to say, but he ran out of time. He heard a whirring sound, then a noise that sounded like a fence post being driven into a quagmire. A shot struck his shoulder and threw him backwards looking up. Gustav Wengler stood as before, Luger smoking in his hand. In his neck was a long, thin arrow.

Wengler dropped the pistol and reached with both hands for his throat, gasping for air as he tried to remove the shaft. The next arrow struck him in the left eye and it was as if he had been snap-frozen. He stared rigidly towards the lake, at a thick shrub on the other side of the little bay, before tilting like a tree slowly torn from its roots, falling sideways into the water and landing on his back.

Rath sat up, only now aware of the pain in his shoulder. Wengler’s lifeless body lay in the shallows. Two arrows, one in his throat, one in his left eye, protruded like solitary reeds.

99

Again Rath sat on Ernst Gennat’s green armchair, only this time things were more serious. This was no dirty trick. A man had died during a police operation, and not just any man but a Treuburg luminary, whose obituary served as a moving tribute to national pathos everywhere.

Rath was familiar with this kind of tone. He had endured similar in Cologne, and eventually been forced to leave. He didn’t care what they wrote about him in Treuburg, but Erich Grigat was more than making up for it, despite the counter statement issued to the Treuburger Zeitung by Berlin Police Headquarters, refuting the paper’s more outrageous claims. The police constable was still on sick leave, recovering from a serious head injury with relatives in Elbing, and had already put in for a transfer.

It was probably for the best, even if Editor Ziegler wouldn’t be able to preserve Gustav Wengler’s reputation forever. Maria Cofalka’s death was being investigated. Königsberg CID had a Homicide unit on site, which included Anton Kowalski, and, by their last telephone conversation, it was only a matter of time before the deceased Wengler was implicated by one of Fabeck’s troop. At least here, it seemed time was working in justice’s favour. Each SA man that sat in custody was a victory for public security. Since the vote the brownshirts had stepped up their brutal and often fatal assaults. The surge in Nazi votes promised anything but stability.

Gennat glanced at Rath’s report and shook his head. ‘Well I never.’ The superintendent gestured towards his sling. ‘How’s the shoulder?’

‘Fine, thank you. Bandage comes off next week.’

The blood-soaked bandage and sling that held his arm steady made a wretched impression, but had been a great help in mollifying Charly. Confined to his bed by doctor’s orders, he had been moved by her concern. So much so that he’d almost forgotten about the pain.

‘I still don’t understand why you took Chief Constable Grigat’s service pistol.’

‘To arm myself. Mine was with Polish border officers in Wirsitz. I knew Polakowski couldn’t be far away.’

Gennat raised his eyebrows. ‘Yet it was Gustav Wengler who was shot!’

‘That was self-defence, as I’ve already explained to police in Lyck and Gumbinnen. As well as your good self.’

‘You know how we like to hear things again and again. What I’m interested in, is how this situation came about.’ Gennat leafed through Rath’s report. ‘You went down to the lake alone, leaving the police constable up in the forest, unarmed…’

‘That’s correct, Sir.’

‘There you came upon Jakub Polakowski…’

‘…who was lying in wait for Gustav Wengler. There was a blackmail letter in Wengler’s car.’

That much was true. Perhaps Polakowski had drawn inspiration from Riedel and Unger, of whose endeavours in Haus Vaterland he must surely have been aware. At any rate, he had threatened to expose Gustav Wengler not only as a moonshiner, but a killer to boot. Having tortured every one of Wengler’s trusted allies to death, there was no doubting what he knew. Even so, he didn’t want simply to destroy Wengler’s reputation, built as it was on lies. He wanted to destroy the man entirely.

‘Then,’ Gennat continued. ‘You were about to arrest Polakowski…’

‘Correct. There was a warrant out. An alleged mass murderer…’

‘A warrant that is still current, since apparently you let this alleged mass murderer escape.’

‘I’m sorry, Sir.’ A little contrition couldn’t hurt.

‘Back to the lake: you were keeping Polakowski in check with Grigat’s Luger…’

‘Everything was under control until Gustav Wengler appeared.’

‘It was he who felled Grigat from behind, up in the forest…’

‘That’s what we assume, Sir.’

‘Why? If Wengler had the police in his pocket, as you’ve always maintained?’

‘That was an error. Chief Constable Grigat is a loyal representative of the Prussian police force, a man of integrity.’

‘Wengler threatened you with a pistol?’

‘Yes, Sir. He meant to kill Polakowski. I’d interfered with his trap. I instructed him to lay down his weapon.’

‘An instruction he refused to carry out.’

Rath took a drag on his cigarette. ‘As you can see from the report, he then demanded that I lay aside my weapon. That’s when I informed him that he, too, was under arrest: that he had knowingly sanctioned the death of his former associates, including that of his brother, and was responsible for the deaths of Maria Cofalka and Dietrich Assmann.’

‘Which was enough to make him shoot.’

Rath’s left shoulder hurt. ‘Clearly.’ He stubbed out his cigarette with his right hand. ‘I didn’t think that was in any doubt.’

Gennat again glanced at the file. ‘I can understand your first shot,’ he said. ‘A classic case of self-defence, but why did you shoot Wengler in the eye after you’d immobilised him with a shot to the neck?’

‘I don’t know, Sir. I pulled down on the trigger twice. I realise it was an error, but it happened. Perhaps it was a reflex after Wengler hit me, mortal terror, whatever… in situations like that you don’t always think clearly. You react…’

‘But you should. Think. It’s what police officers are trained to do. Especially before using their weapons; before having recourse to fire!’

‘Yes, Sir.’

‘The weapon used to shoot you… could it have been a Luger too? Our colleagues were unable to trace the bullet.’

‘I don’t know, Sir. It’s possible.’

‘Your wound would suggest as much.’ Gennat sighed. ‘Shame we don’t have it.’

‘Yes, Sir.’ Rath appeared contrite again. ‘I’m sorry I let Polakowski give me the slip, but he threatened me with Wengler’s gun, which he had claimed for himself.’

‘You were armed too. Why didn’t you take up the chase?’

‘I had to see to Gustav Wengler first. He was still alive at that point.’

‘And, of course, Chief Constable Grigat was no longer armed.’ Gennat struck the file with the flat of his hand. ‘Rath, my good man. I’m having trouble believing even half of this outlandish tale.’

‘I can’t help it if the truth is outlandish, Sir.’

Gennat fixed him in the eyes, so deep that Rath grew uneasy. ‘I guess we’ll never know what really happened at this lake in Masuria.’

Let’s hope so, Rath thought. Otherwise they’ll make Artur Radlewski’s life hell, and he deserves it least of all.

‘I’ve told you everything I know, Sir.’

‘Let’s put it this way: you haven’t once contradicted yourself and, as your statement tallies with that of Chief Constable Grigat, there’s an end to it.’

Dealing with Grigat had been easier than Rath anticipated. The fact that Gustav Wengler was dead, and the bullets in his corpse came from the constable’s service Luger, made it a damn sight easier to win the man over, and cook up a halfway credible explanation for the whole shemozzle.

Gennat tapped Rath’s report with the flat of his hand. ‘This won’t be the last time you’re questioned on this. Investigation proceedings aren’t over, not by a long shot.’

‘I’m aware of that, Sir.’ Rath tried not to show discomfort at Buddha’s stern gaze.

‘I hope that killing a man and allowing a mass murderer to escape can be squared with your conscience.’

‘Forgive me, Sir.’

Gennat shook his head. ‘Sometimes, Herr Rath, you’re a little too Catholic for your own good.’

‘What do you mean, Sir?’

‘The fact that you’re constantly seeking forgiveness. How many times is it you’ve sat here now? I’m neither your confessor, nor the dear Lord himself. Go to confession to have your sins absolved, not my office!’

‘I haven’t been to confession in a long time, Sir.’

‘Perhaps you should.’ Buddha snapped the file shut. ‘You’re lucky, Herr Rath, that alongside Chief Constable Grigat and Assistant Detective Kowalski, both Fräulein Ritter and Wilhelm Böhm have put in a good word for you. And that, right now, I need people like you. People who aren’t interested in politics, but in solving crimes.’

Rath stubbed out his cigarette, safe in the knowledge that, whatever investigation proceedings were still to come, he’d survive. As for his conscience and visiting confession, Buddha need have no worries there. He was at peace with himself – for the most part.

He looked at his watch and stood up. ‘Might I remind you, Sir? We have an appointment.’

100

Though it was mid-August, an uncomfortable chill rose from the harbour basin, a biting wind. Rath parked the Buick outside the warehouse and opened the passenger door. Having squeezed himself into the vehicle, Gennat only barely made it out.

Rath turned up his collar and looked around. At the opposite end of the basin a ship was being loaded, otherwise all was quiet. With his arm still in the sling he felt vulnerable. Driving had been a challenge in itself but, having now arrived, he was certain they had nothing to fear. The Westhafen was Concordia territory; no one from the Pirates would show his face here. Even if there was a traitor in Concordia ranks, as Rath suspected, their chief was the only one who knew of this arrangement. That much had been guaranteed by Marlow.

Rath had met Marczewski on one previous occasion, in Marlow’s office at Ostbahnhof, shortly after returning from East Prussia. ‘So, you’re from Königsberg?’ he’d asked, and Paul Marczewski had shaken his head.

‘Rastenburg. Like many Masurians, I moved west for work.’

‘You’re Masurian? Then why is your nickname Polish-Paule?’

‘Your guess is as good as mine. We Masurians are caught between two stools: too German for the Polish, too Polish for the Germans. Believe me, though. The majority of people decried as Polacks here in Berlin or the Westphalian mines have Prussian passports.’

Gustav Wengler had indeed known about Polakowski’s vendetta, and done nothing about it. It seemed that, meaning to go legitimate and make his position unassailable, the time was right to get rid of his former partners in crime. Lamkau, Simoneit, Wawerka, and his own brother, Siegbert.

‘It was the strangest thing,’ Marczewski said. ‘The man appearing like that, and asking about the very people we do business with. Did business with.’ Needless to say the former Königsberg gangster had informed his business associate Gustav Wengler. ‘Had I known the bastard would leave me in the lurch, I’d never have warned him. It’s a good thing you dealt with him.’

Rath didn’t know how to take this compliment, but he did know that he didn’t mourn Gustav Wengler.

Buddha wheezed as he climbed the small staircase to the concrete loading ramp. Rath followed behind. No sooner had they reached it than a door opened and a man stepped out. ‘May I introduce Paul Marczewski, Sir.’

‘Pleased to meet you.’

Rath was surprised at Buddha’s easy manner. The pair shook hands, the chief of the Concordia Ringverein and the head of Berlin Homicide.

‘Come in,’ Marczewski said. ‘It’s warmer inside.’

The warehouse really was just a warehouse, bearing no comparison with Marlow’s office at Ostbahnhof, which called to mind the fireplace room of an English country house. Marczewski was less assuming, contenting himself with a table and a few chairs. They sat down. On the table stood three glasses and a bottle of Mathée Luisenbrand. Marczewski poured. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said, ‘it’s the real thing.’

The Luisenbrand tasted as Rath knew it from Treuburg. This was no rotgut, though nor was it as tasty as Rammoser’s homebrew.

‘It seems,’ Marczewski began, lighting a cigarette, ‘that the Berlin Police and Concordia have a mutual problem…’

‘Indeed,’ Gennat said. ‘Inspector Rath tells me you’d be willing to help bring it to a resolution.’

‘The Phantom, as the papers have dubbed him, has been responsible for the deaths of five of my men. With each killing he has sought to weaken my organisation. From what I understand…’ he drew on his cigarette, ‘…I’m next.’

‘How do you know?’

‘Since the operation at the Westhafen, seven of my men have been detained in custody. If they take me now, Concordia will be finished. Why do you think I’ve gone into hiding?’

Gennat looked at him pensively. ‘You’re saying the Phantom will strike as soon as you show yourself in public?’

‘You can bet on it.’ Marczewski sipped on his Luisenbrand and recharged their glasses. ‘Am I right in thinking the Phantom always takes aim at his victims’ chests?’

‘You are indeed.’

‘What about these bulletproof vests I’ve been reading about in the papers? Do you have something like that?’ Buddha nodded. ‘Our founder’s day celebration is in two weeks, at the Habsburger Hof ballroom on Stresemannstrasse. We’d be delighted to have the pleasure of your company, Superintendent.’

Gennat looked at Marczewski out of narrow eyes. ‘The Habsburger Hof? That’s right opposite Europahaus, isn’t it?’

‘The perfect location for a sniper, but perhaps preparations can be made.’

Gennat nodded pensively. ‘I’m quite certain they can be, Herr Marczewski. And thank you for the invitation.’

‘Then you accept?’

‘I accept.’

Paul Marczewski shook Gennat’s hand and took his leave. Rath noted his laughter lines. Marlow was right, he was a charming fellow, even if Rath was loath to consider how many men’s lives he might have on his conscience, and precisely what Marlow understood by ‘charming fellow’.

Still, that didn’t matter. Marczewski was helping them lay a trap for a dangerous contract killer, the last remaining member of the Weisse Hand.

‘What do you say, Rath,’ Gennat said, when they were back among themselves. ‘Care to join me at Concordia’s celebrations?’

‘Perhaps from across the street. Europahaus is, in fact, the ideal location for a sniper.’ He lit a cigarette. ‘It would be my pleasure, Sir, to arrest Harald Dettmann in person.’

Gennat smiled, and they went silently into the clear night. The stars twinkled bright in the dark water of the harbour basin, above the sickle of a crescent moon. Perhaps everything would turn out just fine.