The Constant Man

by Peter Steiner

  Well, it didn’t matter; the man was a pest. But then the thought occurred to him: why would a German citizen be receiving regular mail from abroad? Most likely it was completely innocent. But what if it wasn’t? That was how you had to think nowadays – suspect the worst. What if this person really was engaged in some treachery, and it was found out, as it certainly would be, given the thoroughness of the SS and the Gestapo? Gerhard would then be seen to have ignored repeated reports of treachery from one of his underlings. And in that case even Gudrun’s Uncle Himmler wouldn’t be able to save him. Mecklinger wrote the name ‘Karl Juncker’ on a note pad. He would call the information in to headquarters tomorrow.

  Frau Schimmel

  Willi had been staying with Lola during the months since the Nürnberg rally. The day he came back to Tullemannstraße, Frau Schimmel knocked at his door. ‘May I come in, Herr Juncker?’ she said.

  Willi still only knew Frau Schimmel from passing her in the hall. They said hello to one another and occasionally exchanged a few pleasantries. She was, he could tell, watchful and observant. She had a way of being there when something happened. ‘Come in,’ he said. She used a cane with a silver head, but moved briskly and with a sense of purpose. She waited until Willi had closed the door and was facing her.

  ‘I’ll get right to it,’ she said. ‘While you were gone, you had visitors.’ Willi said nothing. ‘There were two of them,’ she said. ‘It was the afternoon of December nineteenth, around noon. They stayed about thirty minutes.’

  ‘In my apartment?’ he said.

  ‘In your apartment,’ she said. ‘Herr Schleiffer let them in. I waited until they were leaving, then I came out and met them in the hall.’

  ‘Frau Schimmel, you …’

  ‘I had my shopping cart; I was on my way to get groceries. They said they were friends of yours. I nodded and said hello. They gave me names.’ She opened her purse and drew out a slip of paper. ‘Herr Weber and Herr Meier.’ She laughed. ‘Weber and Meier? Really?’

  ‘Frau Schimmel, you astonish me,’ said Willi. ‘Won’t you sit down?’

  ‘A cup of tea would be nice,’ she said, as though Willi had already offered one. She gave you the sense that she knew what you were going to say before you said it.

  Willi brought the tea and cups on a tray along with a few cookies on a plate. Frau Schimmel was standing by the small dining table. ‘Please,’ said Willi, motioning toward a chair.

  ‘You don’t have any pictures,’ said Frau Schimmel.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Pictures.’ She motioned around the room. ‘You don’t have any pictures on the wall.’

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘Frau Schimmel, would you …’

  ‘They were in plain clothes, Herr Juncker. They wore hats; their hair was short on the sides. If I had to guess, I’d say your Herr Weber and Herr Meier were Gestapo.’

  ‘Frau Schimmel …’

  ‘You need some pictures on the wall, Herr Juncker. A few knickknacks too. A vase maybe. Your apartment looks like nobody lives here.’

  ‘Who are you, Frau Schimmel?’

  ‘Who am I? I’m the old lady who lives across the hall, Herr Juncker. Who are you?’ She smiled. ‘No, Herr Juncker, I’m not really asking. I just thought you’d want to know about your visitors. Your tea is very good, by the way.’

  ‘It’s from England,’ said Willi.

  ‘I know,’ she said.

  They sipped for a while in silence.

  ‘Frau Schimmel, may I ask you a question?’ said Willi. ‘Several questions, actually?’

  ‘Of course,’ she said, but did not pause to hear his questions. ‘I don’t get around as well as I used to,’ she said, ‘but as you’re certainly already aware, I make it my business to know as much as I can about what goes on in the building. And elsewhere too, if I can. True, I know almost nothing about you, Herr Juncker, but that is as you want it, isn’t it?

  ‘I know a bit about Schleiffer, though, the little storm trooper and his Nazi nonsense. He visits me, you know, for information. I give him gossip and he spills the beans.’ She laughed. ‘He’s quite a competent plumber, by the way, and he likes to talk as he works.

  ‘But he doesn’t like or trust you, Herr Juncker. That won’t be news to you. He has reported you at least once to his Obergruppennazi. He more or less told me so, when he was asking me about you and your foreign mail. I think he has reported me as well, although for invented and inconsequential stuff.

  ‘No, Herr Juncker, I don’t tell him anything about you or anyone else. He is simply set off by suspicions that come to him apparently out of thin air. He believes, for instance, that several people in the building are Jews, when I am quite certain that I am the only one.’

  ‘Frau Schimmel, you don’t have to …’

  ‘Herr Juncker, look at me.’ Willi realized he had been avoiding her eyes, looking at the bare wall above and behind her instead. He lowered his gaze. Her eyes were dark and penetrating, and he could sense a fierce intelligence behind them. She had short, stylishly cut white hair, a small nose, a firmly set mouth with brightly painted lips, and a strong, rounded chin which she held high. ‘First of all,’ she said, ‘I was a member of the KPD – the German Communist Party – and the Spartacus League during and after the war, in the teens and twenties. I was friends with Rosa Luxembourg. We were together during the November revolution. I loved her dearly. So you see that, besides being a Jew, well, the Third Reich has many reasons to want me dead.’

  Willi’s discomfort was plain to see.

  ‘I’m eighty-two years old, Herr Juncker. My family is either dead or out of the country. I’ve been operated on three times for cancer, and the prognosis isn’t good. So, you could say, I suppose that by talking to you as I am, I’m placing myself – and possibly you and others – in danger. However, I don’t think that is the case. First of all, I know enough about you and your … circumstances to be reasonably sure that what I have told you about your visitors will be helpful to you. And I think of myself as having nothing to lose and also much to gain by what you probably regard as my “reckless” behavior.’

  ‘Much to gain?’ said Willi.

  ‘Well, your friendship, for one thing. And Lola’s too. She’s lovely. I like her very much.’

  Frau Schimmel stood up with the help of her stick. ‘Herr Juncker, it has been a pleasure. I’m sure we will be in touch again.’ She turned toward the door and then turned back toward Willi. She held out her hand. Willi took it, and she held on for a minute. ‘You know, the Nazis know everything about me. They will have reams of paper with my name on them – not Bertha Schimmel. Still, they’ll find me eventually – they’re not all idiots. But I like the idea of going down fighting.’ She turned again and took Willi’s arm as they walked to the door.

  ‘Hang a few pictures, Herr Juncker,’ she said. ‘Here and maybe over there. A potted plant or two would be good. Make the place a little homier.’

  Willi was unnerved. That evening he stayed with Lola and told her about the visit. ‘I don’t know a thing about her, and she knows a great deal about me.’

  ‘But she told you about the Gestapo visitors. Without her you wouldn’t know that.’

  ‘That’s not reassuring,’ he said. ‘I don’t need more people.’ Having few social connections still seemed like the best thing for him and for others too. Lola looked at him with raised eyebrows. ‘I didn’t mean you,’ he said. ‘But Frau Schimmel was reckless.’

  ‘Was she really?’ said Lola. ‘I mean, she told you what she saw and who she is, knowing that it won’t go any further.’

  ‘Why would she do that?’ said Willi. ‘And how does she know it won’t go further?’

  ‘Because she knows who you are, Willi. She figured out enough about you to know she can trust you.’

  ‘I know. You’re right,’ said Willi. ‘She figured me out.’

  ‘Aha. That’s what bothers you, isn’t it? But she trusts you,’ Lola said again, ‘and I think she
was saying you can trust her. I understand your caution, Willi, and your fear. But you can’t let your situation turn you more suspicious than you have to be. I know, I know; I don’t understand much about these things. But haven’t you said yourself that too much caution can be as dangerous as too little?’

  Willi still wasn’t ready to lay this caution aside. ‘She implicates me, doesn’t she? Now I – we both – have knowledge that we didn’t have before, things that it’s dangerous for any of us to know.’

  ‘Yes, but you also know things that it’s good to know that you didn’t know before. Herr Weber and Herr Meier, for instance. You know you have a friend across the hall. Knowing that could save your life.’

  ‘Yes, but …’

  ‘You like her, don’t you?’ said Lola, finally finding her way to the heart of the matter. ‘Now there’s someone else you care about who you have to worry about.’

  Willi did not answer, but he looked up and met Lola’s eyes. She saw she was right.

  Detective Sergeant Hermann Gruber

  Detective Sergeant Hermann and Mitzi Gruber had recently celebrated their wedding anniversary with an excellent dinner in a fancy restaurant. The Golden Pheasant was known for its Tafelspitz, and it had a good cellar of German and French wines. It should have been a happy occasion for them both. But Mitzi had become more and more anxious as the evening went on, as uniformed SS officers and their wives or girlfriends filled nearby tables. Hermann should have expected her reaction, given that the Golden Pheasant was known to be favored by Party members and officials. Maybe it had occurred to him. Maybe it was even part of a subconscious strategy.

  Mitzi doesn’t look Jewish, Hermann thought, so what’s her problem? She’s pretty with her blond hair and upturned nose and high bosom. But the fact remained that her mother, Anna Schwarz, née Flegenheim – who didn’t look Jewish either – was a full-blooded Jew, which made Mitzi half Jewish, and, as Hermann had increasingly come to realize, despite his affection for her, a real liability.

  He should have been a police captain by now; he had been with Hitler since the beginning. He had cracked heads at those early Nazi rallies and had marched in the failed Putsch in 1923. True, he had failed the detective exam several times. But finally, thanks to his mentor, Major Reineke, a Hitler enthusiast and a chief of detectives, he had passed the exam and become a detective.

  Reineke had made it clear early on, though, that as long as Gruber was married to Mitzi, he would remain a sergeant. And being assigned to partner with Willi Geismeier had been another stroke of bad luck. Willi Geismeier … Whenever Hermann thought of the man, he felt bile rise in his throat. Willi had been nothing but trouble, always going his own way, violating every department regulation in the book. He was always investigating matters he wasn’t supposed to investigate, making things difficult for everyone, especially Party members, like Reineke and those higher up too, and thereby making things difficult for Gruber. How much, he wondered, had Geismeier’s bad behavior cost him in terms of advancement and success? No use crying over that spilled milk though. What could he do about it now?

  Anyway, he had invested too many years in his career to let it all go now because of an incorrect marriage. That was something he could do something about. He looked around the Golden Pheasant at the SS in their sharp, black uniforms, true Aryans with their Aryan wives and girlfriends, and decided then and there that he had to divorce Mitzi. What choice did he have? She was a Jew. She hadn’t even produced any children, which he momentarily regretted, until he realized they would have been Jewish too.

  Of course, he would do the right thing by her. He wasn’t a cad. He would provide for her, support her, protect her, when it came down to it. Once he was admitted into the SS and rose through the ranks, he would have influence and be better able to protect her and her whole family. That thought put his mind at ease.

  It was as though Mitzi had read his mind. A few days later she started making preparations for what was coming. ‘I’m going to move in with Mutti and Vati,’ she said.

  ‘What? Why, Mitzi?’ he said, all innocent and surprised.

  ‘Because,’ she said. ‘It’s for the best.’

  Hermann left it at that. He appreciated Mitzi all the more for her willingness to make this sacrifice.

  A judge granted the divorce immediately. Most of Hermann’s police colleagues didn’t react when they heard, although a couple of them solemnly shook his hand, as though he had been freed from a great burden or awarded a prize. Major Reineke said, ‘You did the right thing, Gruber. It’s only too bad it took you so long.’

  Hermann did not get promoted after the divorce. In fact, months and then years passed and he remained a sergeant in charge of a small squad of detectives. Major Reineke, the closest thing Hermann ever had to a mentor, was transferred to Berlin, and Hermann was left on his own.

  Hermann’s new commander, Captain Robert Wendt, who had once been a detective under Hermann’s command – the insult was almost unbearable – sent down the latest case-closure statistics. Hermann found his squad near the bottom of the chart again, his numbers circled in red pencil. With Willi Geismeier’s departure – Willi had closed more cases than the rest of the squad put together – the squad’s numbers had plummeted to the bottom of the chart and for the last few years had stayed there.

  Hermann suddenly had a thought – an inspiration really. Everyone knew Geismeier was responsible for the death of Otto Bruck, and Bruck had been one of the Führer’s favorites. And yet Geismeier was still at large somewhere, still tempting fate, still waiting to be caught. Many believed Willi had fled the country for England or America, but there was no evidence that this was actually true. What if Geismeier was still here? And what if he, Detective Sergeant Hermann Gruber, could manage to find the son of a bitch and arrest him? Willi Geismeier was a big fish and that would change everything. No one would give a shit about the squad’s closure rates or any of that crap after he arrested Willi. Willi Geismeier would be Hermann Gruber’s path to redemption. Hermann knew as much about Willi as anybody did. After all, they had even once been partners. If anyone could find Willi Geismeier, it was Hermann Gruber.

  Hermann stepped to his office door, full of new exuberance and hope. ‘Bergemann!’ he bellowed. ‘Come in here.’

  Bergemann jumped. ‘What is it, Sergeant?’

  ‘I’d like you to get me whatever we have on former Detective Geismeier.’

  ‘Willi Geismeier? Boy, there’s a name from the past,’ said Bergemann. ‘I doubt we have much in our files, but I can check in Central Records. What are you thinking, Sergeant?’

  ‘How well did you know him, Hans?’

  ‘Not that well, Sergeant. I heard he’s in America.’

  ‘I don’t buy it,’ said Gruber.

  ‘What? You think he’s still in Germany?’

  ‘Not only that. I think he’s still in Munich,’ said Hermann triumphantly.

  ‘Really? That’s interesting,’ said Bergemann. ‘Do you have new information?’

  ‘Gut instinct,’ said Hermann, thumping his ample stomach.

  ‘I see,’ said Bergemann. ‘OK.’

  Gruber was a big believer in his own instincts, despite the fact that they were usually based on a combination of his misreading a situation and wishful thinking. He had always been a terrible detective. He had hardly ever investigated a case on his own, unless it had been in order to impede it. His rare interrogations of perpetrators gave away more information than he ever gleaned. He telegraphed his intentions so that the dimmest of suspects could tell what he was after. And yet once in a while even a terrible instinct could turn out to be correct, and even a terrible detective could catch a break.

  The Steins

  It was time for one of the Horvaths’ Sunday evenings. Benno was polishing champagne glasses in the kitchen. Margarete sliced a cucumber, smeared some paté on each slice, and arranged them prettily on a china platter. They laid out French cheeses on another platter beside a porcelain
bowl with small crisps and thin squares of pumpernickel bread. There was a crystal bowl of pickled herring in thick cream, and various other treats, both savory and sweet.

  For as long they could remember, the Horvaths had been hosting occasional small Sunday evening buffets for a group of their friends where they talked about culture and politics and whatever else came up. Benno and Margarete both wanted to keep the Sunday evenings going, to keep something like normality alive. You really couldn’t tell what was going to happen next. And even Benno Horvath – who was later arrested, tortured, tried, and executed for being part of a plot to assassinate Hitler – still managed to believe, or maybe he just hoped, that Germany could somehow come to its senses. A lot of people thought that way. Somehow we’ll get out of this mess. The champagne was cold, the glasses shone in the candlelight, the hors d’oeuvres were spread on silver trays.

  Recently, however, the gatherings had changed. Gerhardt Riegelmann, for instance, a longtime guest and an acquaintance of Margarete’s from her university days, had always been a true conservative, a royalist even. He brought with him interesting and strong opinions about world politics and the like. He had seemed to be a supporter, with reservations, of the Weimar Republic, but had recently let it be known that he had come to think of Hitler as ‘the right man for the moment, the leader we need,’ to defend the country against the rising tide of Bolshevism. ‘He has the Bolshis on the run. And just look at the economy,’ he said. ‘You can’t argue that we’re not all better off under the Führer.’

  Bad enough, thought Benno, but then one Sunday, Riegelmann was suddenly castigating ‘world Jewry’ for seeking to undermine Germany’s rising well-being. ‘I don’t know why I tolerated his crap for so long,’ said Benno. Riegelmann was no longer invited and soon broke off relations with the Horvaths altogether. Subversives, he called them both, even though Margarete deplored politics of every sort.