This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Text copyright © 2016 by Frank Goldammer & dtv Verlagsgesellschaft mbH & Co. KG, Munich
Translation copyright © 2018 by Steve Anderson
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
Previously published as Der Angstmann by dtv Verlagsgesellschaft mbH & Co. KG, Munich in Germany in 2016. Translated from German by Steve Anderson. First published in English by AmazonCrossing in 2018.
Published by AmazonCrossing, Seattle
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ISBN-13: 9781503900578 (hardcover)
ISBN-10: 1503900576 (hardcover)
ISBN-13: 9781503900653 (paperback)
ISBN-10: 1503900657 (paperback)
Cover design by Damon Freeman
First edition
CONTENTS
TRANSLATOR’S NOTE
PART ONE
November 30, 1944: Afternoon
November 30, 1944: Evening
December 1, 1944: Early Morning
December 1, 1944: Midday
December 18, 1944: Morning
December 18, 1944: Midday
December 18, 1944: Night
December 19, 1944: Early Morning
December 19, 1944: Afternoon
December 23, 1944: Early Morning
December 24, 1944: Early Morning
December 24, 1944: Evening
January 1, 1945: Just After Midnight
January 1, 1945: Midday
January 6, 1945: Night
January 7, 1945: Early Morning
January 16, 1945: Late Afternoon
February 13, 1945: Night
PART TWO
May 16, 1945: Early Morning
May 16, 1945: Afternoon
May 17, 1945: Seven in the Morning
May 17, 1945: Shortly before Noon
May 17, 1945: Evening
May 18, 1945: Morning
May 18, 1945: About Noon
May 18, 1945: Early Afternoon
May 18, 1945: Late Afternoon
May 18, 1945: Just before Midnight
May 19, 1945: After Midnight
May 25, 1945: Midmorning
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
ABOUT THE TRANSLATOR
TRANSLATOR’S NOTE
As the winter of 1944–45 set in, the German city of Dresden suffered mounting stress and strain. Masses of desperate refugees from the east overwhelmed local authorities, rations grew scarcer, and the mighty and vengeful Soviet Red Army advanced ever closer. As 1945 began, many still clung to the hope that the grand old city would be spared the worst. After all, Dresden was a baroque and rococo wonder with a long cultural and artistic history representing all that had once been admired in Germany. The city remained largely undefended, its military significance questionable. Many air raid warnings had sounded, to be sure, yet no serious Allied bombings had ever come.
That would all change in February, when over 1,200 British and American bombers dropped more than 3,900 tons of high explosives and incendiary bombs on the city, unleashing a vicious and unrelenting firestorm that obliterated much of the historic city center and killed an estimated 22,000 to 25,000 men, women, and children in macabre fashion over four raids between February 13 and 15.
In the weeks leading up to this fateful and tragic event, as February grew nearer and the despairing people huddled in cellar shelters at night when the air raid warnings sounded, a deranged evildoer could have wreaked havoc on those darkened and abandoned streets of Dresden’s blacked-out neighborhoods. Such an ominous specter would be fueled by increasingly frantic rumors, fears, and delusions. So would arise the one they called the “Fright Man” . . .
PART ONE
November 30, 1944: Afternoon
Max Heller had trouble pulling himself up. His six-foot frame barely fit in the BMW sidecar, but a military motorcycle was the only vehicle available. He winced as he freed his right leg and planted both feet on the cobblestones. A freezing drizzle had set in on the ride over, and he wiped his face, then shook his head in disapproval. Instead of driving him all the way up to the building, Strampe had dropped him off at the gate. Heller took this as a show of contempt. The young SS sergeant clearly didn’t like him.
Heller stood facing the Dresden Rowing Club building. He turned up the collar of his long overcoat and buried his fists deep in the pockets. And there he stood. The moisture collected in his short, gradually graying hair since he’d forgotten his leather flat cap, and he drew his shoulders up against the cold. He wasn’t sure where he was supposed to go.
The Elbe River was a dreary sight, all gray and faded on this last afternoon of November. A few trees stood along the bank, leafless and darkened from the damp. Upstream, Heller could see the barrels of dummy flak guns. The clouds hung low, shrouding the slopes of the opposite bank in a foggy haze. Soon it would be dark. He sniffled. Then a figure emerged from the shadowy backdrop of damp plaster walls.
“Herr Detective Inspector?” asked the uniformed cop, walking toward Heller. He thrust his right arm into the air. “Heil Hitler!”
Heller was forced to wrench his hand from his pocket. He returned the salute without a word.
The cop stepped to the side and bowed, letting Heller go first. “It’s in the old boathouse,” he said.
It was less than fifty yards away, yet the cold had crept into Heller’s bones, and he struggled on his right foot. He took every step with caution, feeling the cop growing impatient.
Once at the boathouse, Heller halted to let the cop go first.
The cop didn’t move. “You go ahead. She’s in the far back of the workshop.”
Heller stared at the man, then entered the structure. It was little more than a shed attached to the large garage where the boats were kept along with long oars and other equipment. He smelled brackish water, oil, and worn metal.
“Right through there,” the cop told him.
“You could just go first,” Heller said, annoyed. There was a light on, though the bulb was weak and dim. It was depressing, like everything these days.
“No one else here?” Heller asked. “No photographer?”
“No one yet, Herr Detective Inspector, but we requested the works.”
Heller nodded. All they could do was try. “Was anyone at the scene? Anyone touch the body?”
“No, Herr—” The cop ran into Heller, who’d stopped abruptly.
The door to the workshop was wide open, and nothing could’ve prepared Heller for what he saw in there.
“Who found her?” Heller asked, his voice straining.
“Two boys. We have them over in the clubhouse.”
“So no one’s entered the room?” Heller made himself stop staring at the corpse and scanned the floor for clues. Something must have been left behind among all this dust and oil. The blood had congealed. A pool of it had formed rifts, like a dried-up mud puddle.
“I’ll need light in here, plenty of it, and the photographer.”
“We’d have to black out the windows.”
“Then get it done.”
The cop nodded
and disappeared. Heller studied the woman. She was sitting, her wrists bound to the workbench with strong rope, her arms spread wide as if nailed to a cross. Her blouse and undershirt had been torn open, her skirt as well. A length of the same rope was used to bind her legs. Her lower areas were fully exposed, her underwear and long stockings pulled down to her ankles. Her head hung forward, down to her chest, and Heller could only see the back of her neck. He wiped at his face again.
The rain was coming down harder, hammering the tin roof and gurgling down the gutters and downspouts. Heller crouched to see if the woman was gagged. He couldn’t tell, not with the room so dim, and he couldn’t risk touching the light switch. He left her face in the dark.
Soon he heard engine noises and male voices. He straightened up and stuffed his hands in his overcoat pockets. Oldenbusch from forensics came in, a wooden tripod under one arm and a large brown case in the opposite hand. No one followed him, so they spared themselves the Hitler salute.
“Give it here, Werner.” Heller went to grab the case, but Oldenbusch shook his head. He was thirty years old, short and sturdy and somewhat pudgy.
“You do your thing, Max, I do mine,” he said. “A horrible sight—I already heard.”
Heller nodded. “Such suffering.”
“Suffering all over these days.”
Heller didn’t comment. It was best to avoid conversations like this.
“Try and capture every detail. All the clothing. But first, scan the floor for any clues. I think I saw a footprint. I’m guessing there might be fingerprints on the workbench, on the light switch as well. Might be someone’s hair on her clothes. Where’d that rope come from? And I’m not sure, but is that a sickle over there?” Heller pointed to a dark crescent underneath the workbench.
Oldenbusch gave him a reassuring nod. “Got it. I know what to do. I need to get a spotlight. Flashes are scarce too. Everything’s scarce. At first, Klepp couldn’t even understand why I needed to be here.”
Heller gave the forensics man a wary look. “Did he say why?”
Oldenbusch grunted, which he seemed to think said it all. He headed back outside. Heller followed him.
“This’ll take me a while,” Oldenbusch said. “Remember Friedrich, that young new forensics man? He also got called up last week.”
Heller hadn’t even met him. “I’m going to go talk to these boys. If you need me, I’ll be over in the clubhouse,” he said, and pointed his chin toward the building.
The two boys sat at a table, looking well behaved. They hadn’t touched their tea. Both were wearing overcoats, under which Heller could make out collar insignia for the Hitler Youth.
As he approached, the boys leaped up and thrust their arms out. “Heil Hitler!”
They couldn’t be more than twelve and had never known any other way. He returned the Hitler salute properly this time. He was always careful with children—they were often the most eager informers.
“Sit down,” Heller said. He sat with them. “What were you two doing in that boathouse?”
“Playing, Herr Chief Inspector,” they said without missing a beat.
“Your names?”
“Merker, Gustav.”
“Trautmann, Alwin.”
“You two broke in.”
“We didn’t, Herr Chief Inspector! The door was open.”
Heller looked at the adjoining table. There lay two wooden dummy rifles.
“It’s Detective Inspector, by the way. Do your parents know where you are?”
Both shook their heads.
“Tell me what you were doing and what you saw. Leave nothing out. You first, Gustav.” Heller noticed movement out the window. Klepp’s car was pulling into the courtyard.
“We were playing. We come here a lot. We live over on Gneisi—on Gneisenaustrasse. The door was open a crack, so we went in because it was cold and there could be a spy hiding in there. We saw the body soon after.” This didn’t seem to bother Gustav, but Alwin winced.
“Did you see anyone running away? Hear screaming?” This part was more routine than anything. The woman had been dead for hours when they found her.
“No one was there.”
“Did you touch anything? The door? The light switch? The body?”
Gustav and Alwin shook their heads. “No, Herr Detective, not a thing!”
“Then how did you open the door?”
“I pushed it open with my weapon,” Gustav said.
Heller nodded. “All right. You two go on home, and take the quickest way. You’re not lying about your names, are you? You know that means prison.”
Both furiously shook their heads.
“Good. Then go!”
Gustav stood up. But Alwin didn’t move. “It was the Fright Man, wasn’t it?” he said.
Heller looked up. “The Fright Man?”
“Mother says the Fright Man roams the streets.”
“Tell me about him.”
“He captures little kids!” Alwin was dead serious, his chin quivering.
Heller stood. “Look. Go home. There’s enough fright to go around as it is—no need to bring the bogeyman into it.”
“You think he’ll go after us now, because we found that woman?”
Heller grabbed Alwin by the shoulder. “Go back to your mother. If this really was the Fright Man, he’s got far more to worry about than a couple of boys like you.”
“Fright Man,” Heller muttered under his breath as he crossed the courtyard back to the crime scene. What was he supposed to make of that? No one was the same during wartime. But who would tie up a woman and do such awful things to her without bothering to conceal the crime? The killer could’ve easily tossed the body into the river, then hosed off the floor. There was even a sink and hose in the boathouse.
SS Obersturmbannführer Rudolf Klepp came up to Heller just as he was heading back into the boathouse. The man was nearly as tall as Heller but weighed a good deal more and was a few years younger. He was Heller’s new superior, but he’d never even been a policeman, having trained to be a butcher before his career in the SS.
“What a mess,” Klepp said. Heller didn’t reply. Men with SS skull badges on their caps should be able to stand a sight like this. “I’m going back to headquarters. Keep tidying things up here. Not much worth keeping, I’m guessing.”
Heller felt the rain soaking into his hair and the shoulders of his overcoat, running down the back of his neck. He hadn’t had to deal with Klepp much until now. Klepp was with the Waffen-SS—the SS’s own armed forces—and had been transferred home from Poland. His position with the Dresden Police was likely a reward. There had been certain rumors about things that happened in Poland. Heller wasn’t sure how much of them to believe, especially with a war on.
“I’d like to have an autopsy done on the body,” he told Klepp.
Klepp waved a hand. “You do what you have to. A final report by tomorrow should work.” He nodded goodbye and rushed over to his car. His driver, who’d been standing still in the rain, flung the door open.
“A final report?” Heller asked, but the driver had already shut the door.
Heller watched the car drive away, then went back into the boathouse.
Oldenbusch looked like he’d been waiting for him. “Come on in.” He pointed to a broom against the wall near Heller. “The killer must have swept the floor. I haven’t been able to detect a single footprint.”
Heller studied the broomstick. Fine streaks of pale dust had settled on it. He reached for it, but Oldenbusch cleared his throat.
“It still needs to be checked for fingerprints,” Oldenbusch said, and got right to the point, just as he’d done for years now. “The killer forced his way in—through that metal door over there that leads out to the Elbe. Simply pried it open. No sign of burglar’s tools. The rain’s already washed away any clues outside. As for the victim, no papers, nothing, not on the clothes either. She’s not wearing a star, looks Aryan. Klepp thinks”—Oldenbusch glanced up with a s
tart, making sure Klepp was no longer present—“he thinks she’s Silesian German, but for me the clothing doesn’t fit someone from southwestern Poland.”
Heller pointed to the dead woman’s feet. “Those are hospital stockings.”
Oldenbusch pursed his lips. “From Gerhard Wagner Hospital?”
“It is in the area.”
“The sickle is clean, by the way. The murder weapon must have been different—a really sharp knife, from the looks of it. I’ve taken dozens of photos, and I’ll get them developed today.”
“Klepp’s talking about a final report already.”
Oldenbusch gave Heller a sympathetic glance. “He told me it was a random act, committed by someone passing through.”
Heller stared at Oldenbusch for a few seconds, then said, “Let’s have her taken over to the medical examiner.”
Oldenbusch shook his head. “They’re all at the front. Dr. Kassner got his marching orders last week.”
Heller snorted. Not even those once declared “indispensable to the home front” were exempt anymore, apparently. At some point, they’d even send him to the front.
“It can’t continue like this,” Heller said. “It’s all going down the drain.” He immediately regretted his emotional outburst. “No killer just passing through would bother covering up his tracks so thoroughly. He must’ve washed up somehow—no one can carry out a crime like this without getting blood on himself. You’re telling me he simply rushed out the door wearing the same clothes?”
Oldenbusch frowned. “It would be easy enough to throw on an overcoat. Or he could’ve washed off in that sink. No fingerprints there, though.”
“All I mean is, he knew what he was doing—had it all planned out. The location, the crime, his exit.”
“Yet he just leaves the body.”
Heller drew a breath between clenched teeth. This part was really bothering him.
“You carry on here,” he said. “I’ll go find out where we can take her.”
November 30, 1944: Evening
Heller was completely soaked from his walk to Gerhard Wagner Hospital. Once inside the doctor’s waiting room, he removed his overcoat to dry it out on the radiator. It had been tough for him to track down any kind of specialist. The hospital was overcrowded, the staff overworked. Severe illnesses were increasing, wounded men from the front came in daily, undernourished refugees had to be treated, and a plague of lice was going around. Eventually Heller was shown into the doctor’s office and left to wait for nearly an hour. It was now dark outside. He pushed up the sleeve of his jacket, checked his watch again. Then the door opened.
The Air Raid Killer (Max Heller, Dresden Detective Book 1) Page 1
