‘I know where you were sent to serve at the end of the war. You were in a penal battalion, weren’t you? The Dirlewangers.’
Johannes mimed silent applause.
‘They say your unit murdered civilians. Is it true?’
Johannes laughed. ‘Murder? On the eastern front? You might as well ask a man tossed into the sea why he becomes wet. Murder, you say?’ His laughter increased in volume. ‘What was it you people thought your precious little Fuhrer wanted his troops to do in Russia?’
‘What happened to you, Johannes?’
It was the wrong thing to say. His expression, already surly, became angry.
‘What happened? You and your fucking husband happened. You filled my mind with all that Nazi shit. Do you remember? We were to be the first among nations, the chosen people. And little Adolf was to lead us there. I believed you. Do you hear me? I believed every fucking word about destiny and honour and the new order. I believed it all, right up until the war started to go wrong.’
His lip curled. ‘Do you know how many good men I saw chewed up on the Russian front? And while our men froze to death for lack of winter clothes, the newspapers spoke of strategic retreats and well-fed pigs like your dear Rüdiger in his pristine party uniform urged us on to make the supreme sacrifice for the Fatherland. But what happened when the shelling came close? We, the Frontkämpfer in our shabby uniforms, bore the brunt of it, while the party men were running for their miserable lives. And then, when I dared to criticise the way the war was being fought and brought it to the attention of your dear husband, I was sent to a penal battalion.’
‘What do you mean?’
Johannes’s smile was back. ‘It was Rüdiger who had me thrown out of the Totenkopf division. One of his SS chums was friends with my commanding officer. After that visit to the Warthegau, Rüdiger had him watching me. They got me on some trumped-up charge and threw me out. I had two choices: a concentration camp or the Dirlewangers. Do you know, in a funny sort of a way, I felt far more at home with them. At least they dispensed with all the moralistic bullshit, all the pageantry. You and Rüdiger would have loved some of my boys.’
‘I don’t know what you mean.’
‘Don’t you?’ That hint of darkness within her brother flashed across Johannes’s face and the effect was like deepening cloud on a showery day: the chill of it filled the kitchen. ‘Without Nazis like you, Ilse, there would never have been Nazis like me. Remember that.’
‘That’s a lie.’
Johannes was working himself up to a crescendo now. ‘Do you want to see what it was like? What the east was really like?’
He fumbled in his pocket, withdrew a crumpled photo, folded in half. Five soldiers were surrounding an old man, forcing him to kneel while they pinioned his hands behind his back. One of the soldiers had grasped a clump of the man’s hair, pulling it upwards. Two of the others, grinning for the camera, held either end of a woodsman’s saw, the teeth of the blade resting on the old man’s neck.
‘What you can’t see is what the rest of the lads were doing to his wife,’ Johannes said in a low voice. ‘They made a real mess of her.’
Ilse stared at the photo. She began to tremble again. She pushed the photo away.
‘Enough of this, Johannes. Please, I can’t stand anymore.’
Johannes looked at her for a moment and began to laugh, pounding the table with the flat of his hand.
‘Do you know what’s so funny now, my Gräfin,’ he said suddenly, and the humour fell from his face, quick as a slammed door. He stubbed a finger at the photo. ‘That’s exactly what that old bastard was saying when I took that photo.’
That night Johannes found the bottle of whisky. It happened before Ilse realised what was going on. One moment, Johannes was fumbling around in the pantry in search of more food; the next he was swigging from the neck of the bottle. The dark light in his eyes grew as he drank.
When he had finished the whisky, he rummaged in his gunny sack and withdrew a bottle of Korn, which he began swigging like a bottle of beer. Ilse tried to chide him for drinking like a brigand, but when he turned towards her his raw eyes were wet with tears and he did not seem to recognise her. She locked the door when she went to bed. She could hear Johannes fumbling and crashing around downstairs long into the night.
Next morning she found him lying fully clothed in the pantry, surrounded by broken glass. She sighed heavily, hands on hips. The floor was sprayed with vomit.
She sat in the kitchen, staring at the embers of the fire. Then she took out the piece of paper Seiler had given her containing the address. She recognised the name of the street: it was on the other side of the town, one of the country roads lined with farms and summer houses. She picked up the bottle of Korn and realised there was still some left. She went to pour herself a glass but put the bottle down when she noticed the bloodied fingerprints on the label.
God, how could she travel anywhere with her brother? It was like being locked in a cage with a wild animal. But she’d spent so much money, three thousand dollars. She was trapped with him, now. Her mind raced, weighing pros and cons as she played with the piece of paper. She would have to go with him as far as Spain. It was too dangerous to stay in Germany. She’d already been recognised once. It could happen again and perhaps the next time the person would want more than a simple apology. But it would be impossible for her to go to South America with Johannes. She wanted to get away from her brother as quickly as she could.
Groans sounded from the pantry as Johannes emerged, hair unkempt, eyes bloodshot. He walked straight to the table, picked up the bottle of Korn and sucked at it greedily. ‘What’s that?’ he said, nodding towards the paper Ilse held.
She handed it to him as she said, ‘Go outside and wash. You smell like a brewery. There’s soap on the mantelpiece.’
Johannes said nothing. He chewed a piece of stale bread, his expression contemplative as he stared at the address. Then he slid the paper under the bottom of the bottle, took the soap and walked outside.
Ilse went upstairs to pack. From her bedroom window she could see Johannes on the far side of the yard. He pulled off his ragged tunic, revealing his broad chest and pale, grubby skin, but left his trousers and boots on. Thick tendrils of scar tissue ran across one breast; his shoulder bore the signs of old burn-marks.
Ilse watched as he soaped and lathered his upper body beneath the makeshift shower. As he lifted his arms and tilted his head back to let the water fall onto his face, she saw that he was smiling in the same way that he had sometimes smiled as a boy. From this distance it was almost possible to believe he was still the young man she had once known.
That photo of the men with the saw – it must have been a fake. He was kidding her. He’d always been such a liar when he was a boy. Yes, that was it. It was probably just one of his stupid jokes. Surely he couldn’t really have done –
Ilse froze when she saw Johannes spin round and lower his arms slowly. The change in his attitude was so precipitate that it made Ilse catch her breath. Johannes resembled a hound catching scent of prey.
Ilse shivered as she followed his line of sight and saw Piotr standing nearby clutching a bundle of firewood, ready for his day’s work, his mangled mouth trying to smile as he caught Johannes’ eye.
She banged on the window but Johannes was already loping towards the trees, waving for the boy to come closer while the fingers of his other hand sought the handle of his hunting knife, tucked into the back of his trousers.
9
DETECTIVE INSPECTOR PAYNE woke before dawn and put on his CCG uniform.
Booth had sent him a note the previous evening saying he had found where the policeman, Metzger, the man who had investigated the early Flickschuster murders, was being held. It read: Former Eichenrode police chief held at Civilian Internment Camp 42. Inmates not regarded as serious security risk, so do not foresee any
problems about you speaking to him (touch wood). Make sure you don’t go in civvies, though. Colonel Bassett has made it clear he doesn’t want you speaking to Germans, but I think you’ll be OK as long as you flash your CCG papers and get in and out quickly.
Civilian Internment Camp 42 was twenty miles outside the town. It consisted of four block houses made of brick and wood, surrounded by barbed wire. It was here that the men and women from the Eichenrode district who were suspected of being minor Nazis – bureaucrats, Hitler Youth leaders, Gestapo informants – were interned. The fence posts and barbed wire that surrounded the camp were the only items that looked new. Paint was peeling from the wooden walls; the windows of the blockhouses were cracked and dirty.
The soldier on the gate looked at Payne’s ID and wandered away without saying anything. When he returned a few minutes later, accompanied by a rotund army officer, Payne thought the game was up. However, the man introduced himself as the camp commandant. He listened as Payne explained what he wanted, nodding occasionally.
‘That shouldn’t be a problem, Inspector,’ he said, after examining the chit Booth had filled out for him. ‘Step this way, I’ll show you where Herr Metzger is.’
German men in civilian clothing stood in groups outside the block houses. As Payne and the commandant approached, they stopped talking and turned thin, nervous faces towards them.
‘I hate the way they look at me,’ the commandant said. ‘They remind me of stray dogs. I never know whether to make them salute me or not.’
They stepped into the chill, gloomy interior of one of the blockhouses. Men stirred on banks of wooden bunks, then looked away. Some smoked; others merely stared at the roof. There were no bunks at the far end of the blockhouse, where the prisoners slept on straw palliasses.
‘We don’t actually have any facilities for interrogation here, Detective Inspector,’ the commandant said. ‘For all the heavy stuff, the prisoners get taken over to the larger facility.’
‘It doesn’t matter. I only want to speak to him.’
‘He’s down there at the end. I’ll leave you to get on with it. Let me know if you need anything.’
The police chief, Metzger, was in his early fifties. He was sitting on the floor in his shirtsleeves, hair unkempt, pot-belly pressing against the front of his shirt. Payne greeted the man in German. Metzger’s eyes flickered slightly, as if showing interest.
‘What do you want of me?’ he said.
Payne handed him the photos of the two bodies he had found in the cellar. Then he handed the man black and white shots of the body parts taken from the well. He let Metzger examine them. Then he said, ‘Do you remember a killer called the Flickschuster?’
Metzger’s eyes became guarded. He was clearly registering something, but didn’t want to show his hand.
‘I might do.’
‘I need your help.’
Metzger gave a short, bitter laugh.
‘You must think me a fool, Herr Detective Inspector. First, you take my gun and my badge. Then, you take my belt and boots and give me straw to sleep on and just two bowls of soup each day. You do everything you can to take my dignity from me. And yet you come here to ask my help? I suppose you’re going to make me an offer, tell me you can get me released? Or get me reinstated in my job?’
Payne shook his head. ‘No. I don’t think you’ll ever work at that again.’
Metzger was taken aback for a moment. Payne’s honesty had unsettled him. ‘Then why should I help you?’
‘Because you were a policeman once and you helped hunt this man. People are dying. And if you ever took any pride in your uniform, you’ll tell me what I need to know, so that I can catch this monster before he kills again.’
Metzger thought about this. Then he stood up.
‘Let us take the air together, Detective Inspector. Tell me what you know.’
Payne told him everything. Metzger listened in quiet concentration. When Payne had finished, Metzger said, ‘You are right to suspect that the Dutchman they executed had nothing to do with it.
‘As you have seen from the newspapers, the first set of Flickschuster crimes was discovered in the autumn of 1942, in Brunswick. We found bodies in the cellar and more buried in the garden, and a bath tub filled with quicklime. I don’t think they ever found out how many victims there were. Then other houses containing bodies were found. There was one in Regensburg. And another in Berlin.
‘The more victims were discovered, the more the political pressure increased. I knew the arrest of the Dutchman was mistaken. The authorities had a way of rushing things through when they were trying to please their political masters.
‘Anyway, there was a ‘trial’, the Dutchman was found guilty and they guillotined him. Then they found the house in Würtemburg. For the first time, there was no official announcement of the crimes. We heard about them, though, through a Gestapo man who worked from our office. He just couldn’t resist boasting whenever he knew something the rest of us didn’t, especially when he had a few beers inside him.
‘After that, there were more murders at Grafenwöhr, in Bavaria. That was in October ’44. And others were uncovered at Münstereifel in Westphalia last December.’
‘Why do you think they kept the subsequent killings secret? Was it to avoid embarrassment over the false arrest?’
Metzger drew closer and dropped his voice. ‘Part of it might have been that. But I think it was mainly for a different reason. I think the authorities had realised by then that the killer was an SS man.’
‘An SS man?’
‘Think about it. How was it the killer was able to get access to so many houses? Well, a Kripo man I knew named Gohrum found out the answer. In each case, they were houses the SS authorities had confiscated from Jews. They were supposed to be given to the families of SS men or turned into offices, but someone had fudged the books and so they lay empty. And when the killer began using them, nobody dared ask who he was.
‘But the real proof was when those bastards from the SS special court began sniffing around. That was when we knew it had to be something serious because it took a lot to get them to leave Berlin.’
‘SS court?’
‘It was a special tribunal that looked into crimes committed by SS personnel. Basically they could write their own rules. Dangerous bastards.’
Payne told Metzger about the Red Cross travel documents. ‘Did you see anything like this during the Flickschuster case?’
Metzger smiled. ‘That was the most interesting part. The killer was cunning. Do you know how the Gestapo became involved in this crime? They were investigating something else, what seemed like a totally separate incident at the time, a clandestine organisation that could supposedly help get enemies of the regime out of Europe: deserters, Jews, communists. They had managed to infiltrate this group with a Gestapo man posing as a Jew. But then the Gestapo man disappeared. Do you know where they found his body?’
‘At one of the killer’s houses?’
‘Exactly. He had an unusual birthmark on his chest, so they knew it was him. Plus they found his clothes and wedding ring and ID papers in the attic. And that was when the authorities realised what was really happening. The killer was like a spider and the false escape network was his web. These people went to the killer expecting to escape Germany. Instead they were murdered. And, of course, when they disappeared, no-one was looking for them as they were supposed to disappear. It was a fiendishly inventive plot.’
Metzger had been going to say more when the camp commandant appeared, looking perturbed.
‘I say, Detective Inspector, I’ve just been on the phone to HQ and they don’t know anything about this interrogation of yours. I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you to leave.’
There was no point in arguing. Payne walked back to his car, thinking about the suitcases in the attic, the travel documents. Christ, it had all h
appened before.
He stopped by his car and looked at his notes. Those names, Grafenwöhr and Münstereifel, he’d heard them before, too.
He searched through his notebook. When he came to one particular page, he ran back towards the camp and knocked on the door to the guardhouse.
‘Can I borrow that?’ Payne said, pointing at the telephone. ‘It’s important.’
10
CAPTAIN BOOTH WOKE an hour before dawn and made himself a thermos of hot, strong tea. Then he went to the building where the boxes of documents he had found in the cellar of Wolfflust prison were stored. He pulled a desk and chair close to the stove, sat down and poured himself a cup of tea. Then he opened the first box, withdrew the pile of papers from within it and set to work. Somewhere among the files, documents and transcripts of conversations was the killer’s identity, Booth was sure of it.
He worked for three hours before he realised the task he had set himself was near impossible. Nearly fifty SS men had gone through Doctor Wiegand’s programme between 1941 and the end of the war, and each patient’s case had produced hundreds of pieces of paper.
He looked at the piles of cardboard boxes. He needed to find some way of narrowing the parameters of the search. He and Payne had discussed the possibilities the day before. Because of the dates of the Flickschuster crimes, they could be fairly certain that their man had not entered Wiegand’s programme until mid-1944 at the very earliest. That still didn’t help very much, as some of the patient records were fragmentary and others lacked dates.
Booth spent the morning trying to put some order to the mass of notes. At lunchtime, Payne phoned and told Booth what the German police chief had said.
‘The killer used the lure of a false escape network to reel his victims in. I think he’s doing the same here. And it definitely wasn’t the Dutchman,’ Payne said. ‘There were more Flickschuster crimes committed after the Dutchman was caught and executed.’
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