THE BLACK HAND
Fedor Blaskowitz, the Latin teacher, was summoned by the high-school secretary to the conference room. His last class of the day had just ended. ‘Herr Blaskowitz,’ she said, ‘this gentleman is from the police. He would like to speak with you.’ She left the two men alone. Willi identified himself and they shook hands.
‘I already talked to the police,’ said Fedor. He was small, with thinning hair, thick glasses, and a pencil mustache. Though he had claimed to be with Konrad Milch when he was shot, he was not one of the men Willi had seen in the cafe or in the English Garden. And Willi judged immediately that he was not a man that was likely ever to have associated with Milch.
‘I know I’m not the first,’ said Willi. He tapped the sheaf of papers in his hand. ‘I’ve studied their report. Still, there are just a few things we need to clarify, if you don’t mind.’
‘I told the police everything I know,’ said Fedor. He adjusted his glasses. ‘I don’t think there’s anything I can add to what I already said.’
‘Probably not,’ said Willi, opening the papers and taking a pencil from his pocket. ‘But we’ve got these procedures we have to go through in every case. A pain, but we’ve got to do it or the captain has a fit. You understand, I’m sure,’ said Willi with a friendly wink and a nod of his head in the direction of the principal’s office. Willi touched the pencil to his tongue. ‘So, you were with Konrad Milch when he was attacked and shot?’
‘Yes, I was there.’
‘And there were three of you including Herr Milch?’
‘I told the two detectives already,’ said Fedor.
‘And the third man was?’
‘Dieter Hoffmeister. I’ve already …’
‘And how many attackers were there?’ said Willi.
Fedor sighed in resignation. ‘Two. As I said. Two.’
‘And they attacked you how?’
‘What do you mean, “how”?’ Fedor was becoming impatient.
‘With fists? With clubs? With an iron bar?’
‘One of them shot us, that’s how, for …’
‘They didn’t attack you first with clubs or anything before they shot you?’
‘No. They just shot us.’
‘They didn’t shoot you, or Hoffmeister, did they?’
‘No,’ said Fedor. ‘They didn’t hit me, but they shot and missed.’
This was an embellishment of Fedor’s earlier version, and you could see Fedor wished he hadn’t said it. Willi made a note but didn’t say anything.
‘So, what can you tell me about the two men that attacked you?’
‘They were tall, strong. They wore caps low over their eyes.’
‘Caps … over … their … eyes,’ Willi wrote. ‘Was one of them a woman?’
‘A woman? What do you mean?’
‘It’s a simple question: was one of your attackers a woman?’
‘Of course not.’
‘Are you sure? Because we went over the scene pretty carefully, and one set of footprints definitely belonged to a woman. How do you explain that?’
Fedor had been briefed on what story to tell, and had told it, when prompted, to Detectives Bergemann and Wendt. But he wasn’t prepared to answer questions from a persistent investigator, much less one who had studied the crime scene. ‘I can’t explain it,’ he said. ‘I only know what I saw.’
‘What about the lead pipe that was found at the scene of the crime? And the gun that Konrad Milch was carrying? Did you know there were two guns – the one that shot Milch and the one Milch was carrying?’
‘That’s not possible,’ said Fedor, and regretted saying it in the same moment. ‘I didn’t see any gun, except for the one that shot Konrad Milch.’
‘Not possible? So, you’ve seen the police report?’
‘No, I just meant …’ He didn’t finish the thought.
‘Oh, there was a second gun at the scene, all right, Herr Blaskowitz. It belonged to Konrad Milch. It was in his pocket. And there was also a lead pipe. But you weren’t there, were you?’
‘What do you mean?’ said Blaskowitz.
‘I mean you weren’t there. I know you said you were, but you weren’t. Were you?’
No answer.
‘I see you’re an intelligent and educated man, Herr Blaskowitz. You’ve been to university. You’ve studied the classics. You know what it means to impede a police investigation, don’t you? And you probably have some idea of the penalties for doing so.’
Again Fedor didn’t answer.
‘Well, then, let me remind you. Obstructing justice – preventing the police from doing their job – is a very serious crime. The minimum penalty for obstruction of justice is five years in prison.’
Fedor tried one more time. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’
Willi gave him a long, appraising look, then finally nodded his head. ‘I see,’ he said. ‘Have it your way.’ He took handcuffs from his coat pocket. ‘Please turn around, Herr Blaskowitz.’
Fedor suddenly had tears in his eyes. ‘Please,’ he said.
‘Who told you to say what you have said?’
‘Please,’ he said again.
‘I see you’re in a bind, Herr Blaskowitz. I’d like to help you, I really would. But I can’t unless you’re willing to help yourself by telling me the truth.’ He let the cuffs dangle from his hand. ‘Who told you to give false testimony? The police – Wendt and Bergemann?’
‘Yes … No … I’ll lose my job … I’ll …’
‘Someone else then.’
There was a perfunctory knock at the door, which opened. Willi slid the cuffs into his pocket. ‘Everything all right in here, Blaskowitz?’ A pale, squat man with a shaved head came into the room. ‘I’m Dr Bruck, the school principal, Detective. The secretary told me you were here. Is everything all right?’
‘Of course,’ said Willi. ‘I’m just confirming Mr Blaskowitz’s earlier witness statement. Everything checks out.’
‘I’m not surprised,’ said Dr Bruck. ‘Blaskowitz is an excellent fellow, good character, honest, all that. Right, Blaskowitz?’
‘Yes, sir,’ said Willi. ‘I see that.’
Fedor said nothing.
‘Well, Detective, I’ll leave you to it then,’ said Dr Bruck. He turned slightly and extended his left hand toward Willi instead of his right, which hung uselessly at his side, encased in a black glove.
Once Dr Bruck had left, Willi lay the handcuffs on the table. He motioned for Fedor to have a seat. He sat down across the table and for a long time seemed to study his notes. ‘How long have you been here at the Herder Gymnasium, Herr Blaskowitz?’
Fedor had been gazing at the handcuffs, and the sound of Willi’s voice startled him. ‘How long?’
Willi waited.
‘Three years,’ said Fedor.
‘And was it Dr Bruck who hired you?’
‘Yes,’ said Fedor.
‘And what do you know about him?’
‘Know about him? Dr Bruck?’ Fedor appeared not to like the turn their conversation had taken.
Fedor was a timid soul, in love with the Greek and Latin classics. But he was awkward and inept and unable to impart that love to the young men in his charge. From his first day there three years earlier he had been the almost constant victim of student pranks. Every school seems to have one such unfortunate teacher who, through no fault of his own, becomes the designated target, the butt of student abuse. Fedor had been tormented cruelly. Eventually he stopped responding to their torture and went through the day like a man in a trance. One day, for no apparent reason, the students decided that torturing him was no longer as amusing as it had been, and that Fedor should be gotten rid of. The ringleader of the students, a boy named Schneidermann, told Dr Bruck that Fedor had made sexual overtures toward him. Dr Bruck knew the boy was lying, but also recognized the opportunity it presented.
‘These things can happen, Blaskowitz,’ said Dr Bruck. ‘Schneidermann is a handsom
e young fellow. We’ll say no more about it.’ Fedor now owed Dr Bruck everything, and that would, Bruck was certain, be useful to him. When Captain Reineke told Bruck he was looking for a ‘witness’, Dr Bruck said, ‘I’ve got just the man.’
‘Is he reliable?’ Reineke wondered. ‘What are his politics?’
‘His politics don’t matter,’ said Dr Bruck. ‘And he’s completely reliable.’
‘I did nothing with Schneidermann, or any other student,’ Fedor told Willi now. ‘But I am … I am not inclined toward women. So …’
‘So he had you.’
‘Yes,’ said Fedor. ‘He had me. He told me police were coming to interview me, and he told me what to say.’
‘Had you been given their questions in advance?’
‘No. Just the story to tell.’
‘Did you have the sense that the police had been given their questions in advance?’
‘I don’t know. I don’t think so.’
‘Did they read them or improvise them?’
‘They didn’t read them. Although they seemed very uncurious about my answers and didn’t ask any follow-up questions. I remember thinking that was odd. But I was relieved.’
‘Did anyone tell you anything about the crime being investigated?’
‘Dr Bruck told me a patriot had been shot down in cold blood and the villain was likely to get away with it unless a witness could be found. I was … am that witness. Dr Bruck is an enthusiastic patriot. He lost his hand in the war.’
‘And it didn’t bother you that you were giving false testimony?’
‘Of course it did, but I didn’t see that I had any choice.’
‘And do you see any choice now?’
Tears sprang to Fedor’s eyes again. ‘No, I don’t. I’m finished, washed up.’
‘Listen to me,’ said Willi, picking up the cuffs and sliding them into his pocket. ‘If you cooperate with me, you will have a choice. Dr Bruck will never know from me or anyone else what you’ve told me, and he must never know from you. Neither must Bergemann or Wendt, the two detectives you talked to. Just stick to the testimony you already gave them. It will stand in the official record.’
‘Is someone being framed? I could never live with that.’
‘I can’t tell you any more about this case than I already have,’ said Willi. ‘I suppose Dr Bruck will ask you about our interview.’
‘I’m sure he will. What should I say?’
Willi thought for a moment. ‘Let him know that the police suspect Konrad Milch, the man who was killed, of having been involved in the bombing of a newspaper more than two years back.’
‘Is that true?’ said Blaskowitz, his face going pale.
‘I can’t say anything more about it,’ said Willi. ‘Just let him know you learned from me that Milch is suspected of the bombing of a newspaper.’
‘How do I do that?’
‘Just say, “The detective thinks that Konrad Milch bombed a newspaper.” That’s all.’
‘Will he ask me anything about that?’
‘If he does, just say that’s all I said about it.’
‘I don’t understand any of this,’ said Fedor. ‘One policeman says Milch is a victim and a hero, and another says he’s a killer. How is anyone to make sense of it?’
‘There’s no making sense of it, Herr Blaskowitz. It’s the times we live in. There are two kinds of police now, two kinds of truth, and two kinds of justice. There is true justice and false justice that twists the truth. Nowadays in Munich, more and more often official justice is false; more and more often the law is on the side of false justice. True justice is inconvenient and difficult and dangerous. It’s the kind of justice that gets trampled on, that doesn’t get a hearing, that is often suppressed or withheld. I’m afraid that the law has moved to the dark side, Herr Blaskowitz.’
ROSENCRANTZ AND GUILDENSTERN
Detectives Robert Wendt and Hans Bergemann had not been partners very long. But from the first day of their partnership they had found an almost instant rapport with one another, the ease that usually arrives only after a long friendship. It did not hurt that the two men were in political agreement. Both were attracted to National Socialism, but in a casual way, without having given it much thought. They liked the idea of reviving German traditions, strengthening the family, making Germany great again, feeling good about things again. What could be wrong with that? They were stirred by Hitler’s evocation of a golden future that was much like the golden German past. They loved the folksiness, the Gemütlichkeit: stirring speeches and uniforms and parades, Sunday walks in the country, their wives in dirndl, singing the old songs, a good Jägerschnitzel and a large Hofbräu, a meerschaum pipe by the fire. You might have called them armchair Nazis, and neither man would have objected too strenuously.
Both men thought alike about their work. Willi was right: they were lazy. They pursued evidence in a lackadaisical way, following the easy leads that led where they wanted to go. They interrogated witnesses in a superficial manner so as not to turn up any uncomfortable surprises. Being partnered with someone whose work habits mirror your own only reinforces and confirms you in your ways. Before long, they were finishing one another’s sentences like an old married couple. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, thought Willi. He was still visited by Shakespeare when it was appropriate. ‘I will trust them as I will adders fang’d.’ That was Hamlet.
The case file that had come down from Gruber listed Dieter Hoffmeister and Fedor Blaskowitz as the two principal witnesses.
‘Let’s start with Blaskowitz?’ said Wendt.
‘Yes, by all means,’ said Bergemann.
Blaskowitz, shy, even timid, seemed to both men an unlikely witness. But his answers to their inquiries, while not exactly compelling – they seemed rehearsed and lacked specificity – confirmed the detective sergeant’s instincts, as he had laid them out. So the detectives were satisfied, for the moment at least.
According to Blaskowitz, he and Hoffmeister and Konrad Milch had been walking in the English Garden, where they were attacked. No, he couldn’t identify either of the attackers; they wore caps pulled low over their faces. No, they hadn’t demanded money. One of them had attacked Konrad Milch verbally, calling him a Nazi asshole, and had then pulled out a gun and shot him. He and Hoffmeister had then run away.
‘Do you have any idea why they attacked Milch? Did they know him?’ Wendt said.
‘I had the feeling they knew him,’ said Blaskowitz. ‘An artist from the Post had a show of his drawings in an art gallery nearby. He had made a drawing of Milch. Milch didn’t like it, and it was in the show. And the artist had published that drawing in the Post. It was like he had it in for Konrad. Maybe he was one of the attackers.’
Wendt asked for the name of the gallery. Bergemann asked for the artist’s name. Fedor recalled both names; neither detective found it odd that he did. Wendt asked whether Milch and the artist had met before that evening? Fedor didn’t know whether they had met before. But they must have, if the artist had been able to draw him.
‘How long have you known the victim?’ said Wendt.
‘Not very long,’ said Blaskowitz.
‘Where did you meet?’ said Bergemann.
‘I don’t remember.’
Wendt and Bergemann decided to interview Hoffmeister next and then find the artist, Maximilian Wolf. Hoffmeister worked at National Socialist headquarters as a custodian and maintenance man. Wendt and Bergemann had never been to the Party headquarters before. The building was heavily guarded. Hoffmeister was small and skinny with a pockmarked face and an Adam’s apple that bobbed up and down as he spoke. But he stood in the hall with his feet spread and his thumbs hooked over his belt as though he owned the place. His answers echoed Blaskowitz’s. ‘A little too much, don’t you think?’ said Wendt.
‘Absolutely,’ said Bergemann. ‘They used almost the same words.’ The detectives were lazy but not stupid.
The artist Maximilian Wolf had his work in the P
ost several times a week, so it was easy enough to look him up.
‘What do you think?’ said Bergemann.
‘I wouldn’t want this guy to draw my picture,’ said Wendt, looking at Maximilian’s latest drawings.
‘I know what you mean,’ said Bergemann. ‘But if he did, so what? Would you be that upset about it? I mean, it’s just a picture.’
‘Let’s go talk to him,’ said Wendt.
They found Maximilian at the Post. ‘We won’t keep you long,’ said Bergemann.
‘How well did you know the deceased?’ said Wendt.
‘I didn’t know him at all,’ said Maximilian.
‘But you drew him,’ said Bergemann. ‘Why?’
‘I was doing drawings at the Nazi march – I’m paid to do drawings of goings-on around the city. He had an interesting face. That’s all.’
‘Interesting?’ said Wendt.
‘What do you mean?’ said Bergemann.
‘It wasn’t just a face. It expressed violent emotions,’ said Maximilian. ‘That was interesting.’
‘He was marching past you that day. It can’t have taken more than a few seconds for him to pass. If you didn’t know him, how could you draw him so quickly?’
‘I draw quickly, because I have to,’ said Maximilian. ‘It’s how I work. I make quick notes. Then, if I need to, I can refine the drawing later.’
‘Show me,’ said Wendt.
Maximilian did a quick drawing of Bergemann. He caught his unruly hair, his large ears, his scowling eyes and downturned mouth in a few lines. He showed the men his drawing. Wendt laughed. Bergemann continued to scowl as he studied the drawing. He could see how being drawn could make you angry. ‘Where were you on the night in question?’ he said.
‘I was at the Appelbaum Gallery until after eleven, then I went home.’
‘Can anyone vouch for you?’ said Bergemann.
‘I was with my partner. Sophie Auerbach.’
They wrote down the name and address.
The Good Cop Page 10
