Widow Killer

by Pavel Kohout

  After Malina returned from his neighbor's, he had forced the terrified runt to bind his own legs at gunpoint with the straps. The poor half-pint still believed that his disobedience had aroused the parachutist's suspicions, and swore up and down that he was a true patriot. Obediently he put his hands behind his back, so he could be more easily tied up, and even nodded appreciatively when told that the Resistance hero would have to secure him temporarily; of course, he would release his host with honor as soon as it was possible.

  When it came down to it, this motor mouth posed a real danger to him. Now that he'd resolved to take revenge on the Krauts he had the RIGHT TO A TACTICAL DECEPTION.

  He explained his reasoning to the half-pint quite convincingly. After a while Malina stopped squirming and resigned himself to his unpleasant fate, lying bound and gagged in the bathtub bed he had made for himself the day before. During the day the bathroom door was unlocked, and he was allowed to signal with a muffled knock that he needed facilities or food. Eventually the half-pint's hunger passed. At least we'll save on food, his captor thought; for the moment there was nowhere else to go and supplies were running low. At night he locked the bathroom so he could sleep in safety. If you even think about knocking on the wall to your neighbor... He had left the sentence unfinished and put his long, slender knife up to the guy's throat.

  It was strange that now, when the only thing keeping him safe was the thin wooden panel of the door, his heart wasn't even racing or his knees knocking! In the space of a few dozen hours, something had happened to him in that apartment, and it was evidently connected with his new mission. But there was something else, something he had automatically grabbed at home and hidden to use later as bait, and now, as he felt it, it brought back the best moments of his life.

  The pistol.

  He could still remember the marvelous happiness he'd felt on the Brno shooting range. In 1919 he had joined a regiment of fresh recruits for the brand-new Czechoslovak Army. She tried to derail his application, but failed: he was absolutely healthy, and greenhorns were just cannon fodder anyway.

  Seasoned legionnaires from France led the exercises; they worked the recruits so mercilessly that he had no time for homesickness during the day, and evenings he simply collapsed from exhaustion. The Hungarian invasion of Slovakia made time of the essence. On the seventh day they marched over to sharpshooting, and that was where it happened. He was the only one in his unit to hit all the targets and was singled out in the orders for his unforeseen talent. He had never been the center of attention before. It was no surprise that he now set his sights on the army.

  I'll be a soldier!

  The soldiers at the front sensed it. He was the only rookie they didn't mess with; on the contrary, a week later when he repeated his achievement in a mock battle, the feared Sergeant Kralik invited him to the canteen for a beer. He should sign up for Slovakia, the sergeant urged him; it would undoubtedly be the last war for a long time and that was when military careers were made. He'd return as a noncommissioned officer and would be set for life.

  After all those years with HER he was so utterly unprepared for this opportunity that he hesitated. No need to worry, Kralik said; he sensed something in the boy that makes a soldier a soldier. What? Well, what else: A taste for killing!

  He froze. He did not understand where he, a fragile and unsure loner nicknamed "mama's boy," could have gotten it from, but at that moment he knew for sure that Kralik was right.

  I HAVE IT!

  And i want to be myself!

  He rushed into battle like it was a hunt; he literally shook with longing to score a hit. The Hungarians abandoned Komarno, on the Slovak side of the river, of their own accord; the battle in the streets was almost over. The rest of the day they spent huddled on the banks of the Danube in grenade-launcher fire, pulling the wounded out. When they were just about to storm the Hungarians, the last grenade landed and it was all over.

  He had had no place to go from the hospital except back to her.

  That taste suddenly resurfaced after almost twenty years, but by then he was guided by the picture. It had captivated him so completely in the country church that he had remained there largely for its sake.

  When he left, he had to take it with him, since he knew it was the

  PROTOTYPE.

  He had that taste, that old taste for shooting, again today, as beyond the doors the trap closed around him. He listened to the Czech-German conversation outside: Someone had seen him with that guy. With his pistol in hand he felt confident. If that whore had the keys, or if they broke through the door, half a round would take all of them out, and no one else would stand in his way.

  Then he heard the neighbor's oath, and even though it was the result of his own cleverness, he was still a bit disappointed. Still, there was no need to stir up extra difficulties for himself. Not when the hunt for Germans was just beginning!

  SO NEXT TIME!

  Once the woman had returned to the apartment and he heard the men's footsteps on the staircase, he went quietly through the kitchen and bedroom into the bathroom to see if the guy had wet his pants in disappointment.

  “My love," Grete welcomed him home as he opened the apartment door, "they want to evacuate all of us."

  He had been expecting this pronouncement for almost a week now as various institutions vanished from Prague on a daily basis, but had not dared to think it through. Even if Grete had a definite destination, the likelihood of their meeting again was minimal. Once the fiery column had rolled past, telephones and post offices would no longer exist, and millions of homeless would wander across a devastated Germany like nomads. And as for himself, he knew he'd already decided inside; it was the only way to avoid complete disgrace in his own and her eyes as well. If that was his path, then his fate lay with the stars.

  "Where to?" he asked, just to say something, and tried not to show how upset he was.

  "Somewhere in Tyrolia."

  "And there?"

  "All troupes of the German Theater are to be housed there temporarily until we can return here."

  "They said that!"

  "Yes," she sneered. "Theater Director Kuhnke appeared personally to assure us that starting next season we'll be playing in Prague as usual."

  "And what does it really mean?"

  "He wants to cut and run, but can't do it without us, so he'll pretend it's to protect the flower of imperial art for better days. He'll shove us into some flea-ridden barracks and get his own fat ass over to Switzerland; his brother works at the embassy there."

  "You think."

  "Everyone thinks."

  "And what do the others want to do?"

  "Go, of course! Who wants to wait till it breaks? Come on, love, we talked this through two days ago. From there it'll be clear what to do next."

  He could see in the distance that bridge blown off its foundations, hanging deceptively in the air.

  "Yes. It's coming soon. The only question is who'll start it."

  "Exactly."

  She fell silent and looked inquisitively and inquiringly at him. He gathered his strength.

  "I hope you'll go," he said.

  "You want me to?"

  "Yes."

  "Ah ... that's interesting."

  "Why so?"

  "You mentioned something a while back about loving me."

  "Yes!"

  "So that's no longer the case?"

  He could not let her get away with that.

  "If I love you, how can I want you to stay? I want you to live, I want to have a reason to survive this. Once the battle starts, I could probably find you a hiding place, but I could hardly stay with you."

  "I know," she said.

  "Well, then."

  He felt the emptiness begin to open inside him, but kept his face and voice expressionless, so as not to evoke her sympathy. But why? Why not admit that without her he would be alone with the war, and his life would lose all meaning? Or should he give up this messianic complex of p
ersonal guilt and go with her? She was right: he was alone at work; he could issue his own marching orders.

  "So you love me," she said before he could speak again.

  "Yes."

  "And you'll let me leave."

  He steeled himself.

  "Yes."

  "Well, that's good."

  "What?"

  "That you love me so much."

  He did not know what to say to this. He felt like he was slowly losing her; every word he said sounded weak or false. This was to be his punishment; could there be a worse one? His nation had visited immeasurable sorrows on the world, and he was sacrificing his personal happiness to redeem them. He wanted to know everything, quickly.

  "When will it be?"

  "This evening at six, suitcases packed, at the theater. Departure is precisely at seven."

  He looked perplexedly at his watch.

  "But it's eight...."

  "I know," she said. "You see, I love you too. So why should you die here alone?"

  Jitka's funeral took place the morning of Saturday, May fifth. Jan Morava had barely left the dormitory on Konviktska Street when he sensed a new mood in the air. Once again the city's temper had completely changed. An almost awkward enthusiasm replaced the fear that had gripped it since the February air raids. Most of the German signs had disappeared. The stragglers removing the remaining few did not worry about appearances; they simply crossed out the German words with two strokes of a brush dipped in lime or paint.

  This time it was the Czech police closing off the entrance to Bartolomejska Street. They looked quite exotic. For the first time in years, they wore their black helmets and officers' belts with pistols and carried rifles. These men were clearly from another district, but they amiably waved him through without checking his documents; they must have known him from occasional contact with his office. Morava had only come in to announce that he intended to continue his search after the funeral, and was surprised when Beran told him that they would go to the cemetery together.

  "I've made the arrangements," he said. "I'll just change quickly, and you should put on a uniform too; it's important we all be seen today. And Morava," he called after him, "pick up a pistol as well."

  For the first time in two years, since his promotion to assistant detective, he pulled his uniform down from the top shelf of the office wardrobe. The years of disuse showed. When he met the superintendent again they couldn't help smiling. With training, Morava's shoulders had grown, and his sleeves barely fit. Beran had lost weight in the bustle of the last few months and his shirt swam on him. Their holsters weighed them down; they kept wanting to cinch them up. The high cap with its badge crimped Morava's head and settled on Beran's ears. On top of this they smelled of naphthalene.

  "Well, how-dee-doo!" a similarly dressed Litera summed them up. "One look at us and the Germans will pee in their pants and lay down their arms!"

  That was his first and last joke for the day. They rode silently through Prague, watching the city painstakingly transform itself from a German metropolis into a Czech one, and trying not to dwell on the reason for their trip. This hysterical rush, Morava mused, was like trying to erase the traces of your own deeds, as if overnight the city could expunge— or at least will itself to forget—six years of meek acceptance too often verging on active collaboration.

  The Czech activity had caught the Germans' attention. Heavily reinforced military patrols were everywhere. Today they walked in threes or fours instead of in twos, and hand grenades with long hafts now jutted from their belts.

  "Hey hey!" Litera pointed at a trio they passed underneath the railroad bridge.

  The German army had always flaunted its orderliness and discipline in the occupied territories, but the cigarettes stuck in the corners of the soldiers' mouths were a far cry from that image. For experienced warriors, apparently, Prague was already on the frontlines.

  They reached the crown of the steep street alongside the Vysehrad ramparts and rumbled across the cobblestones to the church by the cemetery. There Beran surprised Morava for the second time that day.

  "I got one for you, too," he said, while Litera opened the trunk and removed two bouquets and a small wreath.

  FOR JITKA FROM JAN—FOR JITKA FROM V. B.—FOR JITKA FROM EVERYONE said the ribbons. Red, white, and blue, they were the colors of the Czech flag, which until now had been strictly forbidden.

  "Everyone wanted to come," the superintendent explained, "but I'm sure you'll understand I couldn't allow that, so I'm here both in a personal capacity and for them."

  Beran had arranged the simple ceremony after a short conversation with Morava on Wednesday. He had unsentimentally ordered that under no circumstances must it run late or exceed fifteen minutes. The police technician removed the decoy tablet with the name jan morava from the gravesite where the murderer had taken the star-crossed bait, and replaced it with a real one:

  JITKA MODRA

  The sexton and a vicar from the Evangelical Church of the Savior were waiting at the graveside. Next to them was a simple wooden coffin resting on planks. In a few sentences the vicar said a farewell for her parents and relatives, who were cut off from Prague by the front. Then he read the Lord's Prayer, and for the first time Morava neither moved his lips nor even said it to himself.

  Even now he could only think about the man he was after. How to find him now? Prague was coming to a boil, like a cauldron whose lid dances as the water threatens to spill over. The Czech newspapermen, overcome at the eleventh hour by sympathy for the Resistance, kept sanctimoniously refusing to publish the murderer's picture. Morava had made a thousand copies of Rypl's photograph, but only a few policemen in Prague had one, and they were already preoccupied, waiting to see whether the Germans would attack them again, this time more savagely, or whether they themselves would suddenly be forced to attack the Germans. Where could a man hide if he apparently had no relatives or friends here? And who would harbor a strange man at great risk to himself when it could still be a Gestapo trap? Unless ... unless ... unless he thought he was hiding Rypl from the Germans!

  Yes, if people who had called the Germans valued customers yesterday could turn about and publicly erase all the German signs today, wouldn't someone who desperately wanted an alibi be tempted to hide a supposed ... what? Maybe a persecuted patriot? But then it could be a whole family covering for him, or a whole building. Rypl wouldn't even have to set foot outside.

  In that case, the key character was this Malina. The murderer had almost certainly left the train station with him. Why should they accept the neighbor's statement that he went to visit his mother and that there was no one in the apartment? No, he'd have it opened today on orders.... He almost turned to Litera so as to be off without delay, when a movement disrupted his thoughts.

  Four men in well-worn dark clothes skillfully tightened and then loosened the straps. The coffin began to descend into the grave he had designed himself and adorned with his own name, only to place his wife and unborn child into it. Just at that moment Jitka seemed to be physically present by him; he could see the shyness of her brown eyes beneath their lids, smell the country milkiness of her skin, feel her fingers, knuckles, elbows, sides, breasts.

  For a moment that numb silence in his soul threatened to rip wide open; he nearly sank to his knees and wept bitterly, almost jumped into the pit to huddle on the wooden lid. He felt someone's palm clasp his arm. It was Beran, guiding him to the lip of the grave. Together they threw a handful of earth on the coffin. And afterward, as he strode off down the grave-lined path toward the car, he heard a quiet voice behind him.

  "Good work, Morava!"

  Beran continued in the vehicle from the front seat.

  "Today you'll have to interrupt your investigation and be my personal adjutant for a day. I've become a commander in my old age. The Germans were right to hang that bogeyman Buback around our necks, you know."

  "Why didn't you even hint to me that—"

  "You're not ma
de for deception, or so I felt. I wanted you to keep your credibility. Jitka was all I needed."

  "She knew?"

  "Of course. She was my right-hand man. I had to order her not to breathe a word to you until I gave permission."

  Grief wrung Jan Morava's heart again; he'd barely begun to know the girl now buried deep in the stony soil.

  "Live in the future, my good friend," Beran said knowingly. "Your life is only beginning, even though you may think it's already ended. May she have a long life inside you. Do you know how to use it?"

  With no transition he nodded at Morava's holster and pistol.

  "No," the younger man answered, complying with the change of subject. "I started right when Rajner lowered the number of employees approved to carry weapons."