Prague Fatale by Philip Kerr
‘And that the same brazen fellow won a bet that he could cadge a light for his cigarette off Fleischer’s cigar.’
‘There’s always a lot of gossip in a place like this,’ said Sachse.
‘Oh sure. But that’s how cops work, Herr Commissar. A nudge here. A wink there. A whisper in a bar. A fellow tells you that someone else says that his pal heard this or that. Personally I’ve always put a vague rumour ahead of anything as imaginative as three pipes’ worth of deductive reasoning. It’s elementary, my dear Sachse. Oh yes, and didn’t these Three Kings send the Gestapo a complimentary copy of their own underground newspaper? That’s the gossip.’
‘Since you appear to be so well informed—’
I shook my head. ‘It’s common knowledge, here on the Third Floor.’
‘—Then I dare say you will also know that two of the Three Kings – Josef Balaban and Josef Masin – have already been arrested. As have many other of their collaborators. In Prague. And here in Berlin. It’s only a matter of time before we catch Melchior.’
‘I don’t get it,’ I said. ‘You caught Josef A in April; and Josef B in May. Or maybe it was the other way round. But here we are in September and you still haven’t managed to shake the third King out of their sleeves. You boys must be going soft.’
Of course I knew this couldn’t be true. The Gestapo had moved heaven and earth in search of the third man, but mostly they’d employed a more infernal sort of help. Because there was another rumour around the Alex: that the Prague Gestapo had enlisted the services of their most notorious torturer in Bohemia, a sadist called Paul Soppa, who was the commander of Pankrac Prison in Prague, to work on the two Czechs in his custody. I didn’t give much for their chances but, in the light of the continued liberty of Melchior, the certainty that neither man had talked was proof positive of their enormous courage and bravery.
‘There are different ways of approaching every problem,’ said Wandel. ‘And right now we should like you to help us with this problem. Colonel Schellenberg speaks very highly of you.’
Walter Schellenberg was close to General Heydrich, who was Chief of the whole RSHA, of which Kripo was now one part.
‘I know who Schellenberg is,’ I said. ‘At least, I remember meeting him. But I don’t know what he is. Not these days.’
‘He’s the acting chief of foreign intelligence within the RSHA,’ said Sachse.
‘Is this problem a foreign intelligence matter?’
‘It might be. But right now it’s a homicide. Which is where you come in.’
‘Well, anything to help Colonel Schellenberg, of course,’ I said, helpfully.
‘You know the Heinrich von Kleist Park?’
‘Of course. It used to be Berlin’s botanical garden before the Botanical Gardens were built in Steglitz.’
‘A body was found there this morning.’
‘Oh? I wonder why I haven’t heard about it.’
‘You’re hearing about it now. We’d like you to come and take a look at it, Gunther.’
I shrugged. ‘Have you got any petrol?’
Sachse frowned.
‘For your car,’ I added. ‘I wasn’t proposing that we burn the body.’
‘Yes, of course we have petrol.’
‘Then I’d love to go to the Park with you, Commissar Sachse.’
Kleist Park in Schöneberg had something to do with a famous German Romantic writer. He might have been called Kleist. There were lots of trees, a statue of the goddess Diana, and, on the western border of the park, the Court of Appeal. Not that Hitler’s Germany had much use for a Court of Appeal. Those who were convicted and condemned in a Nazi court of first instance usually stayed that way.
On the southern border was a building I had half an idea might once have been the Prussian State Art School, but given that the Gestapo was now headquartered in the old Industrial Art School on Prinz Albrechtstrasse, there seemed to be little or no chance that anyone was being taught how to paint someone’s portrait in the Prussian State Art School; not when they could more usefully be taught how to torture people. It was a fact that the Gestapo had always taken its share of the city’s best public buildings. That was to be expected. But lately they’d started confiscating the premises of shops and businesses that had been abandoned as a result of the shortages. A friend of mine had gone into the Singer Sewing Machine salesroom on Wittenberg Platz looking for a new treadle-belt only to discover that the place was now being used as an arsenal by the SS. Meyer’s Wine Shop, on Olivaer Platz, where once I’d been a regular customer, was now an SS ‘Information Bureau’. Whatever that was.
In the centre of the park was a curving promenade where you could walk, or perhaps sit, but only on the grass, since all of the city’s many wooden park benches had been taken away for the war effort; sometimes I imagined a fat Wehrmacht general conducting the siege of Leningrad while warming his hands over a brazier that was fuelled with one of these. On the eastern edge of this promenade, and bordering Potsdamer Strasse, was an area of shrubs and trees that had been closed off to the public by several uniformed policemen. The dead body of a man lay under a huge rhododendron that was in late flower, but only just, since he was covered with red petals that looked like multiple stab wounds. He was wearing a dark blouson-type jacket, a lighter brown pair of flannel trousers, and a pair of severely down-at-heel brown boots. I couldn’t see his face as one of my new Gestapo friends was blocking the sun, as was their habit, so I asked him to move and, as he stepped out of the way, I squatted down on my haunches to take a closer look.
It was a typical mortuary photograph: the mouth wide open as if awaiting the attentions of a dentist – although the teeth were in remarkably good condition and certainly better than mine – the wide eyes staring straight ahead so that, all things considered, he looked more surprised to see me than I was to see him. He was about twenty-five with a small moustache, and on the front of his left forehead below the line of his dark hair a contusion that was the shape and colour of an outsized amethyst and which more than likely was the cause of death.
‘Who found the body?’ I asked Sachse. ‘And when?’
‘A uniformed cop on patrol. From the Potsdamer Platz station. About six o’clock this morning.’
‘And how is it that you picked up the order?’
‘The duty detective from Kripo telephoned it in. Fellow named Lehnhoff.’
‘That was clever of him. Lehnhoff’s not usually so quick on his toes. And what did this Fritz have in his pocket that marked him out as your meat? A Czech passport?’
‘No. This.’
Sachse dipped into his pocket and then handed me a gun. It was a little Model 9 Walther, a palm-sized .25 calibre automatic. Smaller than the Baby Browning I had at home for when I wasn’t expecting visitors, but quite accurate.
‘A bit more lethal than a set of door keys, wouldn’t you say so?’ said Sachse.
‘That will open a door for you,’ I agreed.
‘Be careful. It’s still loaded.’
I nodded and handed the gun back to him.
‘This makes it a Gestapo matter.’
‘Automatically,’ I said. ‘I can see that. But I still don’t see how this connects him with the Three Kings.’
‘One of our officers from the Documentation Section looked over his papers and found some discrepancies.’
Wandel handed me a yellow card with the dead man’s photograph in the top left-hand corner. It was his Employment Certificate. He said, ‘Notice anything wrong with it?’
I shrugged. ‘The staples in the picture are a bit rusty. Otherwise it looks all right to me. Name of Victor Keil. Doesn’t ring any bells.’
‘The impression of the rubber stamp on the corner of the photograph can hardly be seen,’ said Wandel. ‘No German official would have permitted that.’ Then he handed me the dead man’s identity card. ‘And this? What do you make of this, Herr Commissar?’
I rubbed the document in my fingers, which drew a nod of ap
‘You’re right to check it that way first,’ he said. ‘The forgeries just don’t feel right. Like they’re made of linen. But that’s not what gives this one away as a fake.’
I opened it up and took a closer look at the contents. The photograph on the ID card had two corner stamps, one on the top right-hand corner and the other on the top left, and these both looked clear enough. The two fingerprints were similarly clear, as was the police precinct stamp. I shook my head. ‘Beats me what’s wrong with it. It looks completely right.’
‘The quality is actually quite good,’ admitted Sachse. ‘Except for one thing. Whoever made that can’t spell “forefinger”.’
‘My God, yes, you’re right.’
Sachse was starting to look satisfied with himself once more.
‘All of which prompted us to investigate further,’ he said. ‘It seems that the real Victor Keil was killed during a bombing raid in Hamburg last year. And we now know, or at least we strongly suspect, that this man isn’t a German at all, but a Czech terrorist by the name of Franz Koci. Our sources in Prague tell us that he was one of the last Czech agents operating here in Berlin. And he certainly fits the last description we had of him. Until October 1938 he was a lieutenant in a Czech regiment of artillery that was deployed to the Sudetenland. After the capitulation of the Benes government at Munich, he disappeared, along with many others who subsequently worked for the Three Kings.’
I shrugged. ‘It sounds like you know everything about him,’ I said. ‘I can’t imagine why you need me to look at his fingernails.’
‘We don’t know who killed him,’ said Wandel. ‘Or why. Or even how.’
I nodded. ‘For the how you’ll need a doctor. Preferably a doctor of medicine.’ I smiled at my joke, thinking of the American, Dickson, and his aversion to the doctors of deceit at the Ministry of Propaganda. But it wasn’t a joke for sharing, especially with the Gestapo. ‘As for the who and the why, maybe I could take a closer look.’ I pointed at the body. ‘Do you mind?’
‘Be my guest,’ said Sachse.
I took out my handkerchief and then laid it neatly beside the body. ‘Somewhere to lay any evidence I find. You see I intend going through the dead man’s pockets.’
‘Help yourself. But all of the useful evidence has already been collected.’
‘Oh, I don’t doubt that. If there’s anything of value that the uniforms and Inspector Lehnhoff have left behind, I’ll be pleasantly surprised.’
Sachse frowned. ‘You don’t mean—’
‘Cops in this city are just as crooked as anyone else. Sometimes they’re even as crooked as the crooks. These days most of them only join so they can steal a man’s watch without getting caught.’
I lifted the dead man’s left arm by way of illustration. There was a tan mark on his wrist, only the watch that might have made it wasn’t there.
‘Yes, I see what you mean,’ said Sachse.
‘The body’s a little stiff, which means that rigor is setting in or passing off. It takes about twelve hours to get established, lasts about twelve hours and takes another twelve hours to pass.’ I tugged at the dead man’s cheek. ‘It starts in the face however and this fellow’s face is soft to the touch, which probably means the rigor is passing off. You understand that all of this is very crude but I’d say your man has been dead for at least a day or so. Of course, I might be wrong, but I’ve seen plenty of dead men who would say I’m probably right about that.’
I undid the buttons on the blouson and then pulled open the shirt to inspect the torso. ‘This man took a hard fall. Or received a substantial impact. There is substantial bruising on the left-hand side of his body.’ I pressed hard directly on the bruise and the lowest part of the ribcage. ‘Feels like one of the ribs has separated from the chest wall. In other words, it’s broken.’
I took out my pocket knife, unfolded it carefully and, starting at the cuff I began to cut up the length of the dead man’s trouser leg, but only because I didn’t want to start unbuttoning his fly buttons. Generally speaking, I prefer to know a man a little better before I will do that. On the left thigh there was another heavy bruise that matched the broken rib and the contusion on the head. I was trying not to appear nervous, but on top of the bad feeling I had most of the time I now had a bad feeling about the dead man, too. The distance between Kleist Park and Nollendorf Platz was about a kilometre, and even a man who had collided with a taxi on the corner of Motz Strasse might have staggered to the park in less than thirty minutes. This wouldn’t have been the only traffic accident in Berlin that night but it was almost certainly the only one likely to have gone unreported.
‘You want to know what I think?’
‘Of course.’
‘This man has been involved in a road traffic accident. Of course that’s hardly uncommon what with the blackout and Berlin drivers.’
I was quite certain I was looking at the man who had attacked Fräulein Tauber and who had collided with the taxi. A hundred different thoughts started to run through my mind. Did the Gestapo know that already? Was that what this was all about? To see how I would react when presented with the dead body, like Hagen’s treachery uncovered when he stands beside Siegfried’s bier? No. How could they know? None of the other parties involved – Fräulein Tauber, Frau Lippert, the taxi driver – even knew I was a cop, let alone my name. But for a moment my hand started to shake. I folded the knife and returned it to my coat pocket.
‘Anything wrong, Gunther?’
‘No, I like working with the dead. On most nights when I’m not contemplating cutting my own throat you can catch me down at the local cemetery with my good friend, Count Orlok.’ Biting my lip I steeled myself to go through the dead man’s pockets.
‘We’ve searched his pockets,’ said Sachse. ‘There’s nothing important left in them.’
From the dead man’s pocket I took out a packet of Haribos and showed them to the two Gestapo officers.
‘I don’t know what that tells us,’ objected Wandel.
‘It tells us that the man had a sweet tooth,’ I said, although it told me a lot more than that. Any doubts that this was the man who had attached Fräulein Tauber were now removed. Hadn’t she mentioned the smell of Haribos on his breath?
‘Apart from the false documentation,’ said Sachse, ‘and the gun, of course, all we found was a money clip, a door key, and a pocket diary.’
‘May I see them?’
I stood up. The money clip was silver and in its fold was about fifty Reichsmarks in twenties and ones, but it was loose on the notes and made me think that it had held more money than was now present; and it was all too easy to suppose that the policemen who had stolen Franz Koci’s watch had also relieved him of at least half of his cash. That would only be typical. The door key was on a steel chain that must have been attached to his belt: it was a key for an old mortise lock made by the Ferdinand Garbe Lock Company of Berlin. The diary was the most interesting item. It was a red-leather Army pocket diary for 1941 that they handed out to German officers: there was a little wallet at the front and at the back there was a useful guide to recognizing German army ranks and insignias. As a boy I’d had a diary with a similar guide for recognizing the footprints of animals – almost invaluable in a big city like Berlin. I turned to the current week and noted the only entry for the last forty-eight hours: ‘N.P. 9.15 p.m.’ It had been nine-thirty when I had interrupted Franz Koci’s attack on Fräulein Tauber, which was time enough for them to meet on Nolli at nine-fifteen.
But why would a Czech terrorist intent on avoiding the attention of the police risk carrying out a sexual assault on someone at an S-Bahn station? Someone he had arranged to meet there. Unless the person he had arranged to meet hadn’t turned up and, in frustration, he had attacked the girl. But that made no sense either.
I handed the diary back to Sachse. ‘These diaries are even more useful to spies than they are for our men, don’t you think? They tell the enemy who’
‘I imagine he must have stolen it,’ said Wandel, redundantly. ‘Our intelligence suggests that some of these Czechos are damn good pickpockets.’
I nodded. That sounded fair enough to me considering that we had just stolen their country.
I had a lot of thinking to do and I decided to do it at the Golden Horseshoe. That was probably against the rules. Anyone with a thought in his head wouldn’t ever have gone to the Golden Horseshoe so I figured a man with my chequered history was worth a discount.
It was a big round room with small round tables around a big round dance floor. The floor was mostly given over to a mechanical horse on which the club hostesses and female customers were invited to take a musical ride and, in the process, flash a stocking-top or something more intimate. If you’d had a lot of beer it was possibly a lot of fun, but in the middle of Berlin’s drought, a quiet game of cribbage had it beat.