‘You seriously think I’m involved? Who do you think a scheme like this hurts most? The Luisenbrand name! The good reputation of our company, and the Mathée brand!’
‘I don’t think anything, Herr Wengler. I’m just trying to establish the facts. Do you know how the Berlin Police were aware of the operation? It was thanks to a black book found in your dead brother’s apartment. A book from Herbert Lamkau’s private desk that was seized with other company papers, that your brother must have stolen from headquarters.’
She didn’t mention the Nordpiraten informant who had revealed important information about the Concordia Ringverein’s illegal dealings with Lamkau and the Americans.
Wengler shook his head. ‘To think, back then I believed Siegbert when he told me he wasn’t involved.’
‘He doesn’t appear to have been the driving force.’
‘Lamkau?’ Wengler asked. ‘The rat. He swore to me never again. Dragging my company’s good name through the mire!’
‘I’d be surprised if Herbert Lamkau was behind it. Given that the deal passed off yesterday, almost three weeks after his death.’
‘What surprises me is that such large quantities were contained in original Luisenbrand bottles. Someone from the distillery must have been helping him. One of his old accomplices, perhaps . . .’
Charly tried to read Wengler’s thoughts, in vain.
The door opened and Detective Chief Inspector Böhm burst into the room. ‘Excuse the interruption, Charly,’ he said. ‘Can I speak with you a moment?’
Wenger gazed at her curiously as she re-entered the room. She took her time, sat down, and opened her notepad. She had no need to take down what Böhm had told her outside – nor did she want to mitigate the effect an open notebook could have on a potential suspect. After a moment she lit a Juno, before striking like a snake. ‘Herr Wengler, where were you yesterday evening between nine and ten o’clock?’
‘I was having dinner. In the Rheingold. Why do you ask?’
‘The Rheingold. The food’s good there. What did you have?’
‘Venison loin.’
Charly nodded and made a note. The response had come without hesitation. As if the answer had been agreed in advance. ‘Can anyone confirm that? You must surely have kept the receipt.’
‘I’m not sure what I’m being accused of here. I thought this was about my brother’s death?’
‘I want to know who you had dinner with yesterday.’
‘Relatives. Uncle Leopold and his family. They were here for the funeral, and returned to Danzig this morning.’
Now Charly was surprised. She had been expecting a different answer. Perhaps Wengler was keeping Assmann’s name back for the end, so that it sounded more credible when he finally remembered him? He said nothing more.
‘No one else?’
‘No.’
Charly looked at her notebook. ‘Your operations manager Dietrich Assmann claims you had dinner with him yesterday in the Rheingold.’
‘He must have the date wrong. We met for dinner on Sunday evening, but at Kempinski’s, not in the Rheingold.’
Gustav Wengler smiled, but Charly could hardly imagine he was unaware of what he was doing. Did he really think he could save his own neck so easily? That his old comrade Assmann would give it up just like that?
68
They were obliged to let Gustav Wengler go, but Lange continued to dog his heels. Dietrich Assmann, on the other hand, was afforded the privilege of lunch in his private cell.
Charly wondered if inmates were served the same muck as staff in the canteen. The mashed potatoes could have served as paste in another life, while the pork was stringy and lukewarm. She took a serviette and stowed the meat carefully inside, for Kirie. The rest she could just about stomach. The sauerkraut even bordered on edible.
Wilhelm Böhm’s plate was clean. The man had a horse’s appetite, with taste buds to shame a garbage truck. ‘When should we bring Assmann back in?’ she asked, lighting a cigarette.
‘We’ll let him stew another hour or so.’
‘I wonder what he’ll do when he realises his alibi’s fallen through?’
‘Let’s hope he implicates Gustav Wengler.’
‘We shouldn’t forget this is a murder inquiry. Bootlegging is a matter for Customs.’
‘Of course. Only, it looks like there’s a link between our murders and the illegal distilling of Luisenbrand. Remember that four of those involved are dead, making anyone else who’s mixed up a potential victim, Assmann and Wengler included.’
‘I can’t shake the feeling this investigation’s jinxed.’ Charly shook her head. ‘We keep finding more and more crimes, yet we’re still no closer to catching the killer.’
Böhm agreed. ‘It’d be good to know what Inspector Rath has turned up in East Prussia. I’d be a lot happier if we could bring this Indian in. Apparently Rath’s sent his colleague back to Königsberg. To me that sounds like he’s concluded his investigation. So, why hasn’t he come back?’ He leaned across the table and lowered his voice. ‘You’re on good terms with the man. Can you explain why he hasn’t made contact in over a week? Just between ourselves, Charly.’
She almost choked on her Sinalco. She had any number of explanations, the majority of which she had no desire to share with Wilhelm Böhm. She had already cursed Gereon a thousand times inside. With a more reliable person you could feel your anxiety was justified, but with Gereon you never knew whether to feel anxious or simply annoyed.
She shrugged her shoulders and stubbed out her cigarette. ‘Time for work. Inspector Rath will be in touch. If not, we’ll soon find him back at his desk as if nothing’s happened.’
‘Now that I can believe,’ Böhm said, and stood up. ‘But you’re right: to work!’
A strange commotion disturbed police corridors, distinct from the usual midday ruckus. Officers stood in small groups speaking quietly, watching the passage leading to the police commissioner’s office.
Charly and Böhm pushed to the front to see the unfamiliar grey of the Reichswehr. A captain escorted a police colonel and a civilian to the police commissioner’s office.
‘The uniform cop is Colonel Poten,’ Böhm said. ‘He used to be in charge of the police academy at Eiche.’
‘So what’s he doing turning up here with a Reichswehr captain?’
‘Rumour has it that Poten’s to replace Heimannsberg,’ another officer whispered. ‘They say the man in plain clothes is the new commissioner.’
‘Pardon me?’
‘Apparently the entire police executive is to be replaced.’ The officer handed her the morning paper. Dangerous Plans, ran the headline in the Berliner Tageblatt. Papen as Reich Commissioner?
She glanced at the headline. What was now happening had been in the air since Sunday, when bloody exchanges between Communists and Nazis claimed sixteen lives. Gunfire had erupted on the streets of Altona, a provincial town in far away Holstein, after an SA troop in full regalia had marched through a Communist district. The Prussian Police had called for assistance from neighbouring Hamburg, and the national press had questioned whether the Prussian state government and police force still had the ball at their feet. There were calls for a Reich commissioner to be appointed so that the Social Democrat minority government led by that stubborn East Prussian Otto Braun might be deposed. In short: Prussia was to be co-governed by the Reich.
It was nothing less than a call to arms.
Reich Chancellor Franz von Papen, whose major political contribution to date had been the lifting of the SA ban, without which the exchanges in Altona would never have occurred, had travelled to Hindenburg’s East Prussian estate at Neudeck to persuade the aged president of the necessity of such a measure. Papen, who had no Reichstag majority and had been appointed chancellor by the grace of Hindenburg himself, had his heart set on becoming Reich commissioner for Prussia.
The move would signal the end of Prussian democracy, one of the few remaining bastions of democracy
in Germany, which was precisely what this reactionary Franz von Papen, dreaming of the Kaiser’s return or a military dictatorship – no one was quite sure which – had in mind.
Böhm and Charly watched in silence as the captain and his men halted outside Grzesinski’s door and knocked, to be admitted by the commissioner’s secretary as if they were expected.
They made their way back to A Division in silence. At length, Böhm spoke. ‘So, Papen and his barons have been so bold.’
Charly was surprised. It was rare for the Bulldog to express his political views in police circles, but a line had been crossed. Suddenly politics were an indelible part of Castle life, and Böhm was deeply unhappy. ‘Do you think Prime Minister Braun’s already been deposed?’ she asked.
‘Otto Braun won’t go without a fight.’ Böhm opened the glass door to Homicide like a gentleman of the old school. ‘I can’t imagine that Grzesinski’s about to clear his desk either. As for Dr Weiss . . .’ Seeing a few colleagues standing in the corridor, he started whispering again. ‘With any luck, this farce will go the same way as the Kapp Putsch.’
Charly had run into Albert Grzesinski in the stairwell only this morning. Dressed in cutaway coat and top hat, he was scheduled to attend Superintendent Mercier’s funeral at three. Now, in his mourning dress, he was obliged to receive a Reichswehr captain. She’d have given anything to know what was playing out behind those doors.
There was still no news half an hour later when they took Dietrich Assmann back to the interview room. It looked as if Grzesinski was still in office. No doubt Böhm was right, and the whole thing would just fizzle out. There was no way the police commissioner and his deputy would relinquish their roles without a fight. She looked at the man sitting opposite.
‘This is Officer Ritter,’ Böhm said, and Assmann gazed curiously. ‘It was she who spoke with Director Wengler this morning. Your boss – and alibi.’
Assmann furrowed his brow. ‘And?’
‘To cut a long story short,’ Charly said, ‘Herr Wengler denies being with you yesterday evening. He claims to have last seen you on Sunday night.’
Dietrich Assmann was temporarily lost for words. ‘It’s a trick,’ he said finally. ‘You’re trying to pull the wool over my eyes.’
‘I’d be happy to provide a copy of his written statement.’ Böhm didn’t move as he spoke. It was as if a marble statue were moving its lips. ‘If you like, I can arrange a sit-down with Herr Wengler.’
‘I want a lawyer,’ Assmann said at length.
‘Should I have someone call Dr Schröder?’ Böhm asked. ‘I understand you’re one of his clients?’
‘Not any more.’
No wonder the man wanted to switch lawyers, Charly thought. Helmut Schröder was the Berlin solicitor representing Gustav Wengler.
69
Rath opened his eyes and stared into a set of fanged jaws. An animal skull. His mind whirred, but he couldn’t remember where he was. The skull, which might have been from a fox, lay on a rack beside his bed. He looked around the inside of a wooden hut, crudely assembled. Its walls were tree trunks grouted with loam and mostly covered in animal hides, which also served as bedside rugs.
He felt cold sweat on his skin but, now that his initial confusion was past, he realised he felt as rested as he had in a long time. It was as if, after months of wakefulness, he had finally been granted a decent night’s sleep.
Where the hell are you, Gereon Rath? And how did you get here?
He searched his memory but found only fragments of dark dreams.
The man with the beard; the hellhound; the elk.
What had happened to him?
Daylight filtered in through two small windows. Sunshine. He heard birds chirping outside, saw green branches. The hut contained a small table and lone chair. In a corner of the room was a hearth, its joists capped with a thick, sooty layer of loam. An opening had been left in the roof, through which the sun now shone. On a kind of grating metal pots and pans stood covered in soot.
Already he could guess who the cabin’s architect was, and looking at the wall opposite he felt his hunch confirmed. Though likewise crudely assembled, there was something here that didn’t quite match its surroundings. Rath was gazing at a bookshelf.
He had gained the Kaubuk’s hut.
His hand reached to the side where his holster normally lay. Gone. His Walther PP was gone too, along with his jacket, trousers, shoes and socks. He lay in his underwear, covered in a heavy, red-brown pelt that hadn’t lost its animal smell. The bed was lower than most. He pulled back the pelt and tried to stand, but his legs wouldn’t obey and he collapsed in a heap.
His circulation seemed back to normal, but his legs felt like rubber hoses when he tried to stand. He summoned his strength and tried again, gripping a beam. All of a sudden he felt hunger, and an insatiable thirst. Would there be anything to eat or drink here?
Like a cripple he moved through the room hand over hand, finding water in a wooden pitcher, which he smelled and found to be good. He savoured the feeling of it running down his throat. His muscles grew accustomed to carrying him once more, but movement took more out of him than anticipated. He sat on a stool next to the window and looked at the shelf.
Many of the spines were familiar: novels by Karl May and a few volumes of Leatherstocking, perhaps the same editions he’d read as a child. But here they lined the shelves of a grown man, worn and thumbed. Alongside were a few new editions: Fritz Steuben’s Der fliegende Pfeil, Gabriel Ferry’s Waldläufer, a German translation of Mayne Reid’s The Scalp Hunters, as well as a range of non-fiction books with titles such as The Indians of North America and Life on the Prairie.
He stood and tried holding his weight without the support of his hands and, to some extent, it worked. There was no immediate danger of falling over. On a tin plate near the hearth was a small, bandy leg. Meat of some kind, but it was fried to a crisp, and he was hungry.
He reached for the haunch, or whatever it might be, and bit into it, tearing away as much as he could, and nibbling at it, teeth bared, until it was gone. His craving for meat made him feel like a predator. The taste was familiar, rabbit perhaps. Although, it hadn’t looked like rabbit – nor did the gnawed bone. He replaced it on the tin plate, which reminded him of the plates they had used during the war. Carefully, he moved to the door, taking a stick as a precaution.
The sun was high in the sky. How long had he been asleep? There were midges everywhere, but he batted them away. Next to the entrance was an almost full rain barrel. He drank with both hands, shovelling water on his face to waken himself. The hut was perfectly camouflaged by trees and bushes but, a few steps to either side, and the scrub was so thick as to make it invisible.
The landscape wasn’t nearly as bleak as that which Adamek had shown him. He groped his way forward with the stick, but soon found himself in a deepish water hole. He circled the hut and realised it was situated on a kind of island, surrounded by moorland on all sides. It was a mystery how Radlewski came and went here. He’d have to know the moors like the back of his hand, or at least better than old Adamek.
The chances of escape were slim. He knew now why he hadn’t been tied, but Radlewski hadn’t killed him either. Perhaps that was still to come?
Inside again, he scoured every receptacle until he located his suit in a large chest. It was a little damp, and unbelievably dirty, especially the trousers, but it was better than traipsing around in his underwear. He dressed, donning socks and Herr Damerau’s sturdy boots, which seemed to have survived the episode intact.
He felt his inside jacket pocket. His cigarette case was still there, though it was empty, of course. He snapped it shut. The little magnifying glass was there too. He’d have preferred the cigarettes.
He returned to the stool and examined the books. At length he removed one from the shelf, opened it, and a sheaf of papers sailed to the ground. He crouched to retrieve it. Not bookmarks, as he’d thought initially, but letters, written in an
elegant, curved hand.
Dear Artur,
I know I won’t be able to entice you from the wilderness, and sometimes I understand you only too well. But I cannot choose the same path as you; I couldn’t live like that, I’m not strong enough. That’s why I choose this path, because I know how much you cherish the world of language and the written word. Perhaps in this way we can even establish something akin to a friendship. You don’t have to reply, but if you don’t want me to write, just leave my letter here on your next visit. I’ll place it inside the pages of a book you want to borrow.
He didn’t have to read to the end to know that Maria Cofalka had written these lines, and that they marked the start of their correspondence. Rath had already guessed it was the librarian who’d initiated the exchange. Using the books she laid out for Radlewski as a kind of mailbox seemed like a natural solution.
She’d written to her childhood crush again and again and, at some point, Artur Radlewski, who was sensible to the written word, had responded. He had christened her Winchinchala, whatever that meant. With the exception of Nscho-tschi Rath didn’t know any Indian names.
He gathered up the letters and placed them back inside the book before returning it to the shelf.
His curiosity was further roused by an item of furniture that stood next to the window. A table with a slanting top, a kind of desk or bureau, adorned, incredibly, by an inkwell and ink. Where in the hell . . . The paraffin lamp that stood on the table was most likely stolen too, along with a few other implements Rath now recognised: tools, metal pots and pans, a washboard.
So this was where Artur Radlewski sat to write his strange, indecipherable letters to Treuburg’s librarian. The letters that Hella Rickert had stolen from his drawer!
More and more memories surfaced. The day in Treuburg. The missing letters. The expedition to the Markowsken forest. The little lake. Old Adamek, who set a ferocious pace before suddenly vanishing with Kowalski. The moonlit night. The moor. How he’d given up the ghost. When Radlewski had appeared, the Kaubuk . . .
The Fatherland Files Page 35
