Werewolf

by Matthew Pritchard

  He went back to the front of the house and saw the RAMC ambulance had arrived. Payne put on his gloves and went downstairs to collect the surgical tools and vials as evidence. Then he took a camera from his utility and photographed the dead bodies.

  ‘All set, Inspector?’ Sergeant Beagley said when he’d finished.

  ‘Just a few more questions before I go, if I may. How would I find out which unit requisitioned this building? And whether anyone is billeted here now?’

  Beagley shrugged. ‘The first units through here, back in May, requisitioned practically every building that was standing. Normal procedure was to give the German owners a chit and eight hours to sling their hooks. But a lot of those troops have gone back home, now. I suppose you could try Housing Branch, see if they’ve got records, though I doubt it. They were drowning in requisition chits and receipts last time I went there.’

  Payne nodded, made a note of it. Then he looked Beagley full in the face.

  ‘Do you know where the victims’ clothes are, Sergeant?’

  ‘Clothes?’

  ‘Both bodies are naked. I presume they were clothed when they came here.’

  Beagley’s frown returned. ‘They might have been killed somewhere else and brought here.’

  ‘Not according to the marks left by livor mortis. You see, when the heart stops pumping, the blood sinks in a downward direction. In this case, the blood has pooled in the back, buttocks and calves, which means they died in a horizontal position, lying face upwards – most likely right where they are now. So, tell me, Sergeant, did your men find any clothing inside the house?’

  Beagley’s big face had become hard and aggressive. Payne thought he was seeing the real man for the first time.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Are you sure? Because I fancied that young private out by the road had a white jumper shoved down his battle blouse. And that kitchen door has been recently kicked in, which means your men were likely hoping to find more than a cup of tea inside. So, I’ll ask one last time: Did your men –’

  ‘Questions, questions,’ Beagley said, dropping his voice. ‘It’s always the same with coppers, isn’t it? Well, I’ve got news for you. Whether that door was kicked in or not ain’t your concern, and I’ll tell you why: me and my lads were out here spilling our blood and guts while you were back home checking blackout curtains. So you can take your questions and shove ’em where the sun don’t shine. If I’m going to be questioned by anyone, it’ll be the redcaps. Clear?’

  Payne held Beagley’s eyes. Then he turned and walked back to his utility.

  ‘You’re way off your turf, copper,’ Beagley called, as Payne drove away. The other soldiers laughed.

  Payne thought about what Beagley had said as he headed back to town. He’d been chancing his arm, trying to strong arm a man like Beagley. After all, Payne had no jurisdiction over army personnel out here. Truth be told, he wasn’t sure he had jurisdiction over anyone.

  But he was damn sure about one thing: Sergeant Beagley was hiding something.

  3

  THE NEXT DAY dawned, overcast and grey. As was his habit, Captain James Booth rose early and took a walk through the streets of Eichenrode.

  The fighting in this part of town had been especially fierce and hardly anything man-made was left standing: the odd chimney stack, a brick facade. They reminded Booth of the monastery ruins in the dell beyond his old school’s rugby field. Perhaps this is how history’s footfalls always look, he decided, scraps of architecture rising from mounds of pulverized stone.

  The Germans queuing beside the standpipe at the end of the road looked as bleak and broken as their town. Opposite the standpipe, the trunk of a huge oak formed an unofficial notice-board for the German populace. Hundreds of papers fluttered from the tree’s bullet-scarred bark, and all began with the same words, Ich suche, and then the name of the missing family member that was sought.

  Booth paused in his customary spot opposite the oak and lit a cigarette. Six months ago, the thought of standing on German soil and looking out over biblical desolation would have thrilled him, but now that victory had arrived it didn’t seem quite as pristine as he’d always imagined it. One of Booth’s friends in Bomber Command had assured him that by the end of the war the RAF could deliver more tonnage of bombs in a single weekend than the Germans dropped on London during the whole of the Blitz. Booth had assumed the man was exaggerating. Now he wasn’t so sure. The bombed areas of London were mere purgatories compared to the hell of some of Germany’s urban areas. The scale of the destruction was beyond imagining.

  When Booth returned to the billets of his field intelligence unit, the duty sergeant gestured towards a man in a cheap grey flannel suit standing opposite the door to Booth’s office.

  ‘My name is Detective Inspector Silas Payne,’ the man said, shaking Booth’s hand. ‘I hear you’re the man to speak to about werewolves.’

  Booth closed the door to his office, checking his watch as he did so. ‘So, you’ve been seconded to the Control Council for Germany, Detective Inspector? Should I call you that, by the way, or just Mr Payne? Or should I use your CCG rank?’

  ‘I’d prefer Detective Inspector. But it’s your decision.’

  Yes, you would prefer that, wouldn’t you? Booth thought. You could tell this Silas Payne was a policeman. It was the way he stood, with his hands thrust in his pockets, rocking on the balls of his feet as he took everything in. And that long, bony nose of his, it was just right for sniffing around in other people’s affairs.

  ‘What brings you to our part of Germany, then, Detective Inspector?’ Booth said, inviting Payne to sit.

  ‘I’m to run a training centre for German policemen here in Eichenrode.’

  ‘A training centre? I wasn’t aware there was one.’

  ‘There isn’t. That’s the problem.’

  ‘Oh, dear. Been a bit of a stuff up back in Blighty has there?’

  ‘I’ve got the building. What I don’t have are students. They’ve all been interned.’

  ‘I’m afraid I’m partly to blame for that,’ Booth said, wondering why Payne’s thin, austere face seemed so familiar. ‘The Colonel in charge of this area ordered us to arrest all the German policemen a few weeks back.’

  ‘Was that wise?’

  ‘Colonel Bassett – that’s our commanding officer – is typical of these Blimp types the military government are wrenching out of retirement and turning into ad hoc proconsuls: still wet with the mud of Flanders fields, and with no interest in seeking rapprochement with the ‘damned Jerries’, if you catch my drift. The good colonel has a tendency to conflate all Germans with Nazis, and once he got his hands on a list of names and addresses, he had us round all the local police up. I think he’s convinced they’re all ex-Gestapo agents. But do tell, Detective Inspector, what is your interest in the werewolf insurgency?’

  ‘There was a double murder here yesterday. The dead man was Waffen SS. Major Norris of Public Safety Branch has asked me to look into things. It’s been suggested these Nazi partisans, the werewolves, were involved.’

  ‘I say, this isn’t something to do with that clandestine field hospital they found out by the Brunswick road, is it?’

  Payne frowned. ‘Who told you it was a field hospital?’

  ‘Well, that was the rumour doing the rounds in the officers’ mess last night. I presume the soldiers that found your dead bodies must have reported it that way. But I can see from your face you don’t agree.’

  Payne shrugged. ‘I found surgical tools and vials of medicine there. But I still think it was something else.’

  ‘Something else . . . how?’

  ‘That’s the problem. I don’t know. It’s just a feeling. But I know a murder scene when I see one.’

  Booth sighed. ‘Well, I’m afraid supposition and hunches won’t get you very far with Colonel Bassett. If
it’s been reported to him as a field hospital, that is what it will be in perpetuum, no matter how eloquently you argue the contrary.’

  Payne had a notebook out now. ‘What can you tell me about the werewolves, captain?’

  ‘It seems they were the brainchild of Himmler, back in late ’44, but the whole thing was always very hush-hush, for obvious reasons. The fact that the Nazi hierarchy were preparing partisan-style resistance in areas the Allies were poised to conquer constituted an open admission that the war wasn’t going quite as well as the propaganda ministry would have had people believe.

  ‘The German code name for it was Operation Werwolf. According to a training manual I translated in October, these partisan cells were to have access to arms dumps and explosives and were to “fall upon the Allied lines of communication like werewolves.” That said, we’ve not had many problems with them in this sector: just the odd cut telephone wire, pit traps, that sort of thing. I think the werewolves’ main impact has been psychological, principally due to the name. It’s so terribly evocative, isn’t it?’

  ‘I’ve heard the British advance guard found bodies strung up from lampposts when they moved into Eichenrode. I’ve been told they were Germans executed by the werewolves.’

  ‘Ah, yes. Didn’t actually see it myself so I can’t say. But it’s more probable that those people were killed by SS or Wehrmacht units engaging in a last minute spasm of hate.’

  ‘Wasn’t there one of those elite Napola boarding schools in this region? The children at those were bred to be fanatics.’

  ‘Agreed. But it’s important to realise that children is what they still are, even now. Or, rather, young adolescents.’

  Payne tapped pencil against notepad for a moment, then took a cardboard file from his satchel. ‘Do you think adolescents did this?’ he said, handing Booth a series of photographs.

  In the first, a naked male body lay on a wooden table. The second showed a woman lying on a dirt floor, her breasts and crotch covered with sackcloth. Thick bruises ringed each of their necks. A third photo showed surgical implements on a table. No, he’s right, Booth thought as he looked at the photos, this was not carried out by a teenager.

  ‘In each case, the victim was strangled,’ Payne said. ‘As you can see in the photos, there is a furrow in the flesh of the neck that indicates a ligature of some sort was used. An army medical officer performed an autopsy last night and he suggested that, given the bruises found on the backs of the necks, some form of tourniquet was applied and used to gradually tighten the ligature until strangulation occurred.’ Payne gestured towards the photos. ‘Have you seen anything like this before, Captain?’

  ‘Well, if it were something to do with the werewolf insurgency, it would suggest a level of organisation we’ve not seen before. But anything’s possible, I suppose. It does look like some type of medical operation was about to be carried out, doesn’t it?’

  ‘What about British soldiers murdering Germans? Have there been many incidents?’

  Booth shifted in his seat. He blew air and gestured towards the photos. ‘Surely you’re not suggesting British soldiers did this?’

  ‘I’m not suggesting anything, Captain. But I can’t discount the possibility at the moment. And it seems to me that blaming it on werewolves could be a convenient smoke screen. Have there been any incidents of British troops committing murder?’

  ‘Murder is such an emotive word, isn’t it? But if you’re talking about summary justice being dispensed, well, yes, I’m afraid there have been some incidents, mainly involving combat troops. Some of the fellows we had here at the beginning of the occupation were real tough old 30 Corps veterans. They’d seen more fighting than you or I could imagine, and they’d all lost someone dear to them. You never know how a chap will react when he’s put under that sort of pressure. Suffice it to say that 99 per cent of those incidents were limited to the weeks directly following the German collapse. It was all a bit chaotic back then. But I really don’t think this’ – he motioned towards the photos of the corpses – ‘could have had anything to do with British soldiers.’

  Payne made notes then said, ‘You mentioned that you used a list to arrest the local Nazis. How come this Waffen SS man hadn’t been caught and interned already?’

  The faint note of reproach made Booth look up from the paperwork he was sorting, but Payne’s expression was neutral. I know who you look like, Booth thought: Old Crippley, a schoolmaster he’d had, a former cleric; Payne had that same air about him, horsehair shirts and self-denial.

  ‘Arresting Nazis is not a clear-cut business, Detective Inspector. Men hide out in the woods. They lie about who they are, mix themselves in with the DPs, the displaced persons. Don’t forget, a lot of these chaps will be facing prosecution for war crimes. The prospect of the hangman’s noose does tend to give a chap pause before handing himself in.’

  If Payne noted the irritation in Booth’s voice, he chose to ignore it, so Booth went over to the attack. ‘Actually, talking of Germans, I suppose you’ll need to interview some sooner or later. I don’t mean to be rude, but do you actually speak any German?’

  Booth repeated the question in German for good measure, but the smile on his lips faltered when Payne replied in rapid and flawless German, saying that, yes, he thought he knew enough to manage.

  Booth needed a moment to overcome his surprise.

  ‘Well, I must congratulate you on your German, Detective Inspector. It’s as good as mine, I’d say, and I was top of my class at Oxford.’

  ‘I’ve been told you have access to files on SS men,’ Payne said, ignoring the compliment. The policeman possessed a deep inner calm that was really quite annoying, Booth thought.

  ‘Yes. A unit of our advance guard captured a load of files from RuSha.’

  ‘And what is that?’

  ‘RuSha? The SS Race and Settlement Main Office. It was originally established to safeguard the racial purity of the SS, but it ended up organising most of the mass deportations that occurred in the conquered territories.’

  ‘What do the files consist of?’

  ‘Before joining the SS, a man had to obtain a licence from RuSha to prove the purity of his bloodline – a little like a pedigree for a dog, really. Part of that process involved supplying lots of photographs – something which has proved very useful to chaps like myself who are trying to find former Nazis.’

  Payne nodded towards the photo of the dead man’s face. ‘Is there any way we could use the files to find out who this man was? I can’t really move my investigation forward until I know who the victims were.’

  Booth laughed when he saw that Payne was serious.

  ‘Detective Inspector, there are tens of thousands of files. It would take weeks – months – to check every single photo.’

  ‘We have his blood group, though. I checked with the surgeon, he’s AB negative. Less than one person in a hundred has that type of blood. Surely that should whittle it down?’

  ‘It’s impossible, Detective Inspector. Absolutely impossible,’ Booth said, rising to show Payne the conversation was over. ‘Now, unfortunately, I’ve got to head off somewhere. Call me if you need anything else, though. Always happy to help.’

  And even happier to refuse you, again, Booth thought as he closed the door on the policeman, then wondered why he’d taken against the man so. Must be the resemblance to Old Crippley, he decided.

  4

  THIS REALLY IS too much, Ilse Drechsler thought, as she hovered beside the bed.

  Cousin Ursula’s breathing was deep and regular now and the irritating mucus-rattle barely audible, but it had taken four hours to get her to sleep.

  Four hours.

  Each time Ursula seemed on the verge of drifting off, she had begun to writhe and fight with unseen attackers, gritting her teeth so hard it seemed the tendons in her neck would snap. Part of Ilse had longed to go
downstairs and leave Ursula to it, but she couldn’t risk her cousin crying out and attracting attention.

  No-one must know Ursula was there.

  Ilse took a corner of the bed sheet and lifted the covers to inspect Ursula’s injuries. The whole of her lower half, from the breasts down, was covered in bruises, and the sheets beneath Ursula’s posterior were damp with blood.

  That was the problem: whatever wounds she had were inside. Ilse had tried to examine the damage, but whenever she went to part Ursula’s thighs, the woman became hysterical. Whatever it was, the wound smelt bad now. It smelt of rot. Ilse should call a doctor, but there were so few left in Eichenrode and those that had stayed couldn’t be trusted; they all worked for the Tommies now.

  There was no way round it, she realised, Cousin Ursula must stay hidden until she got better and then she must go somewhere else: there couldn’t be two women called Ursula Drechsler living in Eichenrode . . .

  Ilse’s troubles had begun months earlier, out east in the Warthegau. The Russian breakthrough had come so suddenly. In the morning, the radio had said the front was stable; by lunchtime, the Russians were everywhere, like a ravening swarm of rats, biblical in their savagery. When a friend in the German High Command had phoned to warn Ilse, she had barely had time to bundle together a bag of possessions before the shells began to fall. There’d been no time to warn anyone else. Cousin Ursula had been away shopping in the town at the time. Ilse had taken Ursula’s identity papers, hoping to find her cousin on the road later.

  But when Ilse stopped running that first evening, the horizon in the east was a solid mass of smoke and flame, and the rumble of tanks and artillery was all that could be heard.

  Weeks of hell followed.