by Colin Forbes
I see.' Tweed tapped his fingers on the table. 'This is going to be difficult – maybe dangerous – for you. I don't like losing one of my finest operatives. I don't like that at all. I thought you would be able to help me by telling me how he spent his last hours on earth. I know he visited you. So you have already lied to me. And you pronounced his name rather well – for an English name you claim not to know. And my friend is Heinz. The trouble with Heinz is he has a short fuse. I'll ask you once more – tell me what you told Fergusson when he came to see you…'
`The name means nothing. I'm a ship's chandler…`And I'm Chancellor of Germany,' Newman interjected. `That's rude…'
Tweed surprised Newman by the swiftness and ruthlessness of his tactics. Normally he showed infinite patience in coaxing information from a suspect. He looked quickly at Newman.
`Heinz, can we turn up Louis Armstrong louder? A wonder with the trumpet, Mr Armstrong.'
Newman, looking very German, trod heavily towards the control panel for the hi-fi. He turned up the volume even louder. The oil lamps flickered, the lamps wobbled with the crescendo of vibration, the dark shadows across the ceiling moved and assumed new shapes. Newman casually extracted the Luger, leaned against a free space of wall and studied the weapon, pointing it at the roof.
'Oh, Christ! You wouldn't…'
Ziggy half-rose from his stool. Tweed slapped the flat of his hand on the bare wooden table top. A sound like a pistol shot.
`Sit down. That's better. We wouldn't what? What time did Ian Fergusson arrive here?'
`About three in the morning. After…' He stopped in mid-sentence.
`After you had completed various illegal transactions,' Tweed said amiably. 'Like a bit of trafficking in drugs. Who told you what to say to Fergusson?' He leaned over the table as he spoke. 'Start talking. Now!'
`The blond giant…' Again Ziggy stopped in-mid-air.
'Oh, I see.' Tweed looked at Newman. 'The blond giant is back in the picture.'
'You know the bastard?' Ziggy asked.
'What name does he use with you?'
'Schmidt.'
Newman laughed unpleasantly. 'Schmidt. Of course.'
'I swear to you he did.' Ziggy was suddenly becoming voluble and the words poured out. 'I had never seen him before. He was a big brute. He threatened me if I didn't tell Fergusson what he told me to say to him…'
'How did he threaten you? Quickly,' Tweed rapped out.
'He was going to burn me.' He pointed to a corner. 'See those two drums of petrol? He brought them here. He said if I didn't do what he said he'd empty them, lock me in and throw a lighted match inside. He knew there was no other way out except for the front door. He must have checked the place out before he came to see me. He left those drums to remind me of what would happen. He said it would look like an accident. These slums burn down all the time, he said. He called my place a slum…'
'I wonder why?' Newman shouted.
The hi-fi sound – rather cracked – filled the place with its crescendo. Tweed looked at the drums. Beyond them an oil lamp shivered as the glass lamp rattled against the brass holder. It was a nightmare Newman had created. The table shook under his hand. Like being aboard a ship in a rough sea.
`Turn it down, for God's sake,' Tweed called out. He waited until he could speak in a normal voice. 'When did this Schmidt call on you?'
`A few hours before Fergusson arrived. He knew he was coming. I had to tell Fergusson – after getting money from him to make it convincing – about Dr Berlin in Lubeck. That he was the man who knew about the East German network in the Federal Republic. That there was a man at the Hotel Jensen in Lubeck who could tell him more. But I didn't know the man's name – only that he is at the Hotel Jensen. That was all.' Some of his normal cockiness came back as Tweed watched him. `How much is that worth? A good few hundred marks, I'd say…'
`He paid you how much?'
`Five hundred.. Ziggy stopped once more in mid-sentence. An ashen colour had replaced his normal pallor. Not a man who took long walks, Newman was thinking, still holding the Luger.
`I see.' Tweed kept his tone judicial. 'For five hundred marks. Less than two hundred pounds. You sold Ian Fergusson's life…'
`I had no idea…'
`Of course you didn't.' Tweed stood up. He leaned over the table close to Ziggy, dressed only in an oil-stained sweater and a pair of stained corduroy slacks. 'You do realize you could be charged by the German police as an accessory to murder?'
`Oh, God, no.' The Pole shrank back from Tweed looming above him. 'I've helped you many times. I can help you again…'
`You might just do that. You still have that concealed cine-camera in the back wall inside the cupboard – the one you use to take porno movies? Don't play with me, Ziggy.'
`I do have a camera. Yes.'
`So, if this Schmidt comes back you could arrange with a bit of help to have him photographed?'
'I wouldn't dare.' He cast a sideways glance at the large petrol drums standing against the wall.
`Then you could always stand your trial for complicity in the murder of Ian Fergusson..
`I'll do what I can. Promise. Can I have a bit of money?' `Your thirty pieces of silver?'
Tweed thrust his hands inside the pockets of his lightweight Burberry. Newman had never seen him look so grim. Ziggy's eyes dropped, he threw his pudgy hands out in a gesture of despair.
`What else could I have done…'
`You could have kept your mouth shut about Fergusson coming to see you.'
The blond was going to burn me…'
'And I won't tell you what will happen if you tell anyone I've been here to see you. Now, you can atone a little for what you have done. Describe this blond giant. Nationality?'
'German.' Ziggy hesitated. Tweed continued staring. 'He was a Saxon. Nasty people, the Saxons. I could tell that from the way he spoke German. I think he's from the East. I can't describe him…'
'Why not? He was standing in front of you. There's not all that much space in this den of iniquity.'
'I can't!' Ziggy protested. He glanced at Newman who was still leaning against the wall, still holding the Luger. 'He wore a woolly cap – like sailors wear – pulled down over his head, huge tinted glasses and a silk scarf pulled up over his chin…'
'Yet you say he was blond,' Newman pointed out.
'A tuft of the blond hair protruded from the back of his cap when he was leaving. He was over six feet tall, built like a house.'
'Age?' Tweed demanded.
'Thirty. Thirty-five. I couldn't say. I'm going by how he spoke. He had a big nose. Clean-shaven. A killer. That I'm sure of. Which is why I was so frightened…'
'Stay that way. Stay frightened. Of us,' Tweed advised and turned on his heel without another word.
Eight
At one o'clock in the morning they sat in Tweed's room at the Four Seasons, drinking black coffee ordered from room service. A double room, it had a separate sitting area, divided off from the sleeping area by a graceful arch.
`Did we learn much?' Newman asked. 'And when we came out of that Pole's -slum I noticed Kuhlmann standing in a doorway alcove, cigar unlit…'
'I know. I wonder when he sleeps? Yes, we learnt what poor Ian Fergusson was trying to tell me. Berlin isn't the city at all – he's the mysterious Dr Berlin who, I understand, spends a part of the year in the ancient city of Lubeck on the Baltic. And that links up with Ian's reference to Hans.'
Tweed finished his cup and refilled it. Newman guessed he was being tantalizing. He liked to keep people guessing.
`All right,' he said, 'tell me how it links up. I'm damned if I see any connection..
`Not easy.' Tweed settled himself in his arm chair. 'Ian was trying to say Hansa – maybe Hanseatic. In the twelth century a number of northern ports formed a protective association – they reckoned there was strength in alliance. So they formed the Hanseatic League. Lubeck was a leading member of that League. Hamburg, too, for that matter. Ian was poi
nting the finger at Lubeck, specifically the Hotel Jensen..
`All being information provided via Ziggy by Blondie,' Newman pointed out.
`Yes, but Ian wouldn't have known that. And what do you know about the recluse, Dr Berlin?'
`As much as anyone, I imagine. I once interviewed him – at his house on Priwall Island near Lubeck. As a young man of eighteen he started out in Africa – Kenya, I think. He looked after the natives, a second Dr Schweitzer up to a point. That's over twenty years ago..
`And how did he come to settle in Lubeck?'
`That's a weird story. Berlin didn't want to talk about it too much. I did get out of him that he disappeared from Kenya and the locals thought a wild animal had got him. He made treks into the jungle and had a mission station in a remote spot. Eighteen months went by. Everyone assumed he was dead.'
Tweed sat absorbing the data as Newman refilled his own cup. He drank half the strong black liquid and put down the cup.
`You're intriguing me,' Tweed prodded.
`He turned up in Leipzig – behind the Curtain in East Germany. As you mentioned, he's something of a recluse, a secretive man. I was lucky to get that interview, short though it was. He'd been treated at the School for Tropical Diseases for a rare complaint. Recovered, he crossed over to the West and turned his energies to helping refugees in Schleswig-Holstein. His parents had come from what is now East Germany. After he arrived in the West he said he had slipped across the border. The East German lot said he'd been permitted to go where he liked because of his international reputation. End of story..
`Not entirely satisfactory,' Tweed observed. 'What does he look like?'
`Has a black beard. He first grew that in Kenya. A fanatic for work, he couldn't be bothered wasting time shaving each day. And while I was in the Lubeck area I stumbled over something else you might find intriguing.'
`Try me.'
`In summer – at just this time of year – there's a British colony afloat at Travemunde, the port on the Baltic near Lubeck.'
`Afloat? What does that imply?'
Newman grinned. 'Thought that would get you. They live on a collection of yachts and power cruisers. While at Travemunde they moor at the marinas – for the summer, as I said. And where do you think they hail from? Kenya. They're old hands, relics from the British Empire. Summertime, they sail from the Mediterranean to the Baltic to escape the tourist crowd which infests the Med. Wintertime, they sail up through the Kattegat, down the North Sea, through the straits of Gibraltar and back into the Med for the warmth. Mostly to the Greek islands, some berth in Port Said, others get as far as returning to Mombasa in Kenya through the Suez Canal.'
`They sound a curious crowd…'
`They are! Straight out of Maugham and Noel Coward. The one place they don't like is Britain.' Newman changed his voice, mimicking a plummy falsetto. "My dear, the place has changed so much you'd never recognize it. Simply awful." And they never pay one penny tax.'
`How do they manage that? I think I can see but…'
`They're careful never to be resident in any country for more than a few months. That's why I said afloat. They wander over the oceans – literally ships in the night. Some of them are pally with Dr Berlin…'
`Odd that – for a recluse.'
`Not really,' Newman explained. 'They have common roots – so far as they have roots at all. The old days in Kenya. Berlin himself told me that.'
`What does he do for money? How does he live?'
`Well. In a word. Rumour hath it that certain American foundations support his refugee work.'
`I'd like you to check on this Dr Berlin, Bob. Gives you a good reason for what your role is…'
`That means going to Lubeck.'
`Which is my next port of call. Literally.' The phone rang. `Who can that be?' Tweed wondered. 'And at this hour?'
`Ziggy here, Mr Tweed. I'll prove I am trying to help. While you're in Hamburg you should contact Martin Vollmer. He has an apartment in Altona. Here is the address…'
Tweed scribbled the instructions on a pad. As he finished he heard a click. Ziggy had gone off the line. 'And that was Ziggy Palewska,' he told Newman. 'I was just going to ask him how he knew I was at the Four Seasons.' He flung down the pencil. `I find it uncanny. Everyone seems to know where I am, where I'm going to before I get there. Gives me an eerie feeling.'
`Get some sleep,' Newman advised, standing up. `I'm bushed. In the morning everything will seem different:'
In the morning as they sat at breakfast Hugh Grey walked into the dining-room.
`I didn't ask you to contact me,' Tweed said quietly as Grey sat facing them.
`I came in on the late flight last night. Howard asked me to look you up, see how you were coming along and all that… `I'm not an invalid,' Tweed said coldly.
`Oh, you know what I mean.' Grey was full of bounce, his pink face flushed with good health. 'After all, this is my territory, so it's the least service I can render, to do the honours and all that. I say, any chance of a pot of coffee? Steaming hot is how I like it. First thing in the morning, need something to get the old motor humming…'
`The old motor appears to be humming only too well.. Tweed reluctantly summoned a waiter, gave the order. 'And the coffee is always steaming hot here. This is the Four Seasons…'
`Not a bad doss-house, I agree…'
Oh, Jesus, Tweed muttered under his breath. He forced a trace of a smile. 'You know Robert Newman?'
`I'll say. Old drinking buddies…'
`Once,' Newman replied. 'At a bar in Frankfurt. You spilt a double Scotch over my best suit…'
`Must have been half-smashed…'
`You were all of that.'
`We'd had a long meeting.' Grey turned to Tweed. 'Remember? Eight hours non-stop. Crisis time.'
'I do recall it, yes,' said Tweed and continued eating.
`That was the night that attractive blonde girl was raped and murdered,' Newman remarked. 'They found her floating in the Main the following day. A horrific one, that.'
`Which caused the hold-up when we were leaving Frankfurt Airport,' Tweed said. 'The most thorough interrogation I've ever been subjected to. Made me realize what it's like to be in the other chair. Hugh, talking of Frankfurt, you'll be on your way back there today, I take it?'
`Trying to get rid of me?' Grey smiled broadly. 'You're saying you can cope on your own?'
`I might just manage.'
`Found out anything about Fergusson? Can I be of assistance?'
`No to both questions.'
`Dead end?' Grey poured himself coffee.
`It was for Fergusson…'
`You do sound grim this morning. Not at all chipper…'
`Under the circumstances, I'm hardly likely to feel chipper, as you put it. And I did ask you about your future movements.'
`Sorry. Wrong mood. Under the circumstances. Frankfurt here I come. This afternoon. I get the feeling I'm de trop – as the French so delightfully put it.'
He paused, stared at Tweed expectantly, as though waiting for contradiction. None came.
`Ziggy Palewska was cremated at four this morning.'
Kuhlmann made his announcement standing in Tweed's bedroom, hands clasped behind his back, cigar in the corner of his mouth as he watched both Tweed and Newman who were sitting in arm chairs. The man from Wiesbaden had appeared as soon as Hugh Grey left the dining-room.
He had asked for a quiet word and they had taken him up to the bedroom. Tweed stared back at the German whose expression was bleak. Newman kept his own expression blank and left Tweed to do the talking.
`What the devil does that mean?'
`His place of business – if you can call it that – went up in flames. That heavy wooden door you pushed to get inside to see the Pole last night jams. Palewska was trapped inside. Burnt to one black cinder. An accident, the state police are saying…'
`But how could it happen?'
`You tell me. You were there a few hours earlier. Notice anything esp
ecially inflammable?'
`There were two drums of petrol in one corner,' Tweed said slowly. 'The room was full of stuff which could catch light – once a fire started. But how would it start?'
`I thought you might tell me. People who live in that stinking alley say he used to turn up the hi-fi full blast. Had a passion for Louis Armstrong, they say. The eye-witness descriptions make a good horror story…'
`What kind of a horror story?' Newman asked, feeling he should say something.
`Imagine a fiery inferno. Flames shooting sky-high. And that bloody hi-fi still blasting out Louis on his trumpet. Turned as high as it would go, they said. Any comment?'
`I don't think so,' Tweed replied. 'You tell us…'
`Place was lit by oil lamps. So, the vibrations topple one of those oil lamps by the petrol drums. There was a big explosion which was probably one – maybe both – of the petrol drums. People who work nearby told me the oil-lamps alone worried them. When he had that hi-fi going they'd sit talking with Ziggy, watching the damned lamps shivering on top of whatever he'd perched them on. The thing which puzzles me is those petrol drums – a neighbour saw them earlier that evening. Never seen petrol in there before.'
Kuhlmann sat down and waited. He expected a reaction – and he had seen both of them leaving Ziggy's place the same night. Tweed grunted, cleared his throat.
`What are you saying was the cause of this new tragedy?'
`State police call it an accident – subject to the report from the arson brigade. That's the second so-called accident involving you in less than twenty-four hours. First Fergusson, now Mr Ziggy Palewska. Maybe we have a specialist in town.'
`A specialist in what?' Tweed asked.
`Murder made to look like accident. I've already put that modus operandi through the computer. I'm waiting for the result.'
`We were there, as you say, earlier in the evening. And I did notice the petrol drums…'
