Zoo Stationee

by David Downing

  Russell said he hoped she was right.

  “The police were back yesterday,” she went on. “Herr McKinley’s sister will be here on Wednesday or Thursday to collect his things.”

  “I know,” Russell told her. “They want me to interpret for them.”

  “That’s nice,” Frau Heidegger said.

  Once upstairs, Russell bathed, changed, and worked for a couple of hours planning his transport piece for Pravda. Autobahns and the peoples’ car, streamlined trains and new U-bahn lines, the latest Dornier flying boats. Perhaps a hint of regret for the passing of the Zeppelins, he thought, but absolutely no mention of the Hindenburg.

  He fried up a potato omelette for lunch, found a dusty bottle of beer to accompany it, and reluctantly considered the prospect of interviewing Hitler’s armament workers for Stalin. It could be done, he supposed, but he’d have to be damn careful. Start off by talking to the Party people in the factory, the managers and Labor Front officials. Only move out onto the metaphorical lake if the ice feels really solid. Don’t do a McKinley.

  He thought about the missing letter. If he was going to take a look around the American’s room it had to be today.

  He walked down to the ground floor, and tapped on Frau Heidegger’s open door. “Have you still got a spare key for Tyler’s room?” he asked. “I loaned him some books, and it would be awkward searching for them when his sister’s here, so I thought I could slip in and get them today. You don’t need to come up,” he added quickly, hoping that Frau Heidegger’s bad knees would triumph over her curiosity.

  They did. “Make sure you bring it back,” she told him.

  McKinley’s room was still suffused with the faint odor of his Balkan tobacco. As Frau Heidegger had intimated, the room was almost preternaturally tidy, and now he knew why the Kripo had refrained from leaving their usual mess. A senator’s nephew! No wonder they were on their best behavior.

  The clothes were neatly put away: shirts, jacket and suit in the wardrobe, socks and underwear in drawers. There was a small pile of papers on the desk—left for show, Russell guessed. He remembered two great towers of paper on his last visit. The desk, too, had been mostly emptied. One drawer contained a single eraser, another, three pencils. It was as if the Kripo had decided to spread things out.

  There was no obvious reduction in the number of books, but the lines on the shelves seemed anything but neat. Each had been taken out and checked for insertions, Russell assumed. Well, at least that meant he didn’t have to.

  The same applied to the floorboards. The Kripo weren’t amateurs. Far from it.

  He sat on McKinley’s bed, wondering why he’d imagined he could find something which they couldn’t. The shelf above the headboard was full of crime novels, all in English. More than fifty, Russell guessed: Dashiell Hammett, Edgar Wallace, Dorothy L. Sayers, several authors he hadn’t heard of. There were around a dozen Agatha Christies, and a similar number of Saint books. Russell’s earlier notion that McKinley had stolen an idea from one of these stories still seemed a good one, but the only way of finding out for certain was to go through them all, and that would take forever.

  And what would he do with the letter if he found it? He had no proof of its authenticity, and without such proof there was little chance of anonymously arranging its publication outside Germany. He would have to guarantee it with what was left of his own reputation, either risking arrest by doing so inside Germany or forfeiting his residence by doing so from the safety of England. Neither course appealed to him. “And their secret will stay secret,” he murmured to himself. He took one last look around the room and took the key back to Frau Heidegger.

  EARLY THAT EVENING HE telephoned Paul. The conversation seemed unusually awkward at first. His son seemed happy to talk, but there was something in his voice which worried Russell, some faint edge of resentment that was quite possibly unconscious. His Jungvolk group had spent much of Saturday making model gliders out of balsa wood and glue, something which Paul had obviously enjoyed, and on the coming Saturday they were visiting an airfield to examine the real thing. At school a new music teacher had given them a talk on the different types of music, and how some of them—jazz for example—were fatally tainted by their racial origins. He had even played several pieces on the school gramophone, pointing out what he called “animal rhythms.” “I suppose he’s right,” Paul said. “I mean, jazz was invented by negroes, wasn’t it? But most of my friends thought the records he played were really good,” he admitted.

  Russell searched in vain for an adequate response.

  “What are you doing?” Paul asked, somewhat unusually.

  “This and that,” Russell said. Paul was probably too old to have nightmares about falling under trains, but it wasn’t worth the risk. “Actually I’m looking for something that someone hid,” he said. “If the Saint wants to hide something, how does he do it?” he asked, not really expecting an answer.

  “What sort of thing?”

  “Oh, money, a letter. . . .”

  “That’s easy. He sends it to himself. At a—what do you call it?”

  “Poste restante.”

  “That’s it. He sends diamonds to himself in Getaway and The High Fence. And he does it in another story, I think. I can’t remember which, though. . . .”

  Russell was no longer listening. Of course. If McKinley had forgotten the Saint’s trick, then Theresa’s use of the poste restante would have reminded him. His heart sank. There was no way of collecting anything from a poste restante without identification. McKinley’s sister could probably get access, but only by asking permission from the police.

  “Dad, are you listening?”

  “Yes, sorry—I think you’ve solved it for me.”

  “Oh.”

  “And I’m reading the book you loaned me,” he added, eager to please his son.

  “Isn’t it great?”

  “It’s pretty good,” Russell agreed, though he’d only read thirty pages. “I haven’t got far,” he admitted, hoping to ward off a cross-examination. “I’ll talk to you about it on Saturday.”

  “Okay. On Sunday are we getting the train from Anhalter Bahnhof?”

  “I expect so. I’ll let you know.” Actually, a different means of transport was suggesting itself.

  THE FIRST DAY OF FEBRUARY was as gray as nature intended. His Wednesday morning lesson with Ruth and Marthe was enjoyable as ever, but there was no sign of their brother or parents. Arriving back at Alexanderplatz with twenty minutes to spare he stopped for a coffee in Wertheim and ran into Doug Conway. They chatted for a few minutes, until Russell realized he was late for his appointment. The search for Oehm’s office made him even later, and McKinley’s sister was looking none-too-happy when he finally arrived.

  “We were talking about Fraulein McKinley’s flying boat,” Oehm said, which further explained her look of irritation.

  She was almost as tall as her brother—about five-foot-eleven, he guessed—and even thinner. Severely cut brunette hair framed a face that might have been pretty if the already-thin lips had not been half-pursed in disapproval, but Russell sensed that her current expression was the one she most usually presented to the world. She was wearing a cream blouse and smart, deep blue suit. There was no hint of black and no obvious sign of grief in her face. He told himself that she’d had several days to take it all in.

  He introduced himself and offered his condolences.

  “Eleanor McKinley,” she responded. “Tyler never mentioned you.”

  “We weren’t close friends, just neighbors. I’m here because the police thought an interpreter would make things easier for everyone. Have they told you what happened?”

  “Oh, we got all the details from the Germany Embassy in Washington. A man came out to the house and explained everything.”

  Russell wondered what to say next. He found it hard to credit that the family believed Tyler had committed suicide, but it was hardly his place to question it, particularly with Oehm trying to follow their conversation.

  The German interrupted. “There are papers to sign.” He passed them to
Russell. “If you could. . . .”

  Russell looked through them, and then explained the gist to Eleanor McKinley. “There are two things here. One is an account of the investigation, complete with witness statements and the police conclusion that Tyler committed suicide. They need your signature to sign off on the case. The other form waives your family’s right to an inquest. This is because you’re taking him home with you.”

  “I understand,” she said.

  “I’ll read it through, then.”

  “No, no, don’t bother,” she said, extracting a pack of Chesterfields from her handbag. “You won’t mind if I smoke?” she asked Oehm, holding up a cigarette in explanation.

  Russell was taken aback. “You understand that you’re accepting their version of events, that this exempts them from any further investigation?” he asked.

  “Are there any other versions?” she asked.

  “No. I just wanted to be sure you knew that this puts an end to any. . . .”

  “Good,” she interrupted. She made a writing mime at Oehm, who handed her his pen.

  “Here and here,” Russell said, placing the papers in front of her. She signed both, writing Eleanor V. McKinley in a large looping hand.

  “Is that it?” she asked.

  “That’s it.”

  “What about Tyler’s . . . what about the body?”

  Russell asked Oehm. It was still in the morgue, he thought, reaching for the phone.

  It was. “They need her for a formal identification before they can release it,” Oehm told Russell in German. “But not now—they’re still trying to repair his face. If she comes at eleven in the morning they’ll have plenty of time to seal it for transport and get it across to Lehrter.”

  Russell relayed the salient points.

  “Can’t we do it now?” she asked.

  “No, I’m afraid not.”

  She made a face, but didn’t press the issue. “All right. Well, let’s get out of this dreadful place.” She offered Oehm her hand and the briefest of smiles, and headed for the door. “I suppose I can get the apartment over with instead,” she said as they walked back to the entrance. “You’ll come with me,” she added. It was more of an assumption than a question.

  They took a taxi. She said nothing as they drove through the old city, just stared out of the window. As they swung through Spittelmarkt toward Dönhoffplatz and the bottom of Lindenstrasse she murmured something to herself, then turned to Russell and said: “I’ve never seen such a gray city.”

  “The weather doesn’t help,” he said.

  She was even less impressed with Neuenburgerstrasse. Frau Heidegger climbed the stairs to let them in, and insisted that Russell pass on her deepest condolences. “And tell Fraulein McKinley how much I liked her brother,” she added. “How much we all did.”

  Russell did as he was bid, and McKinley’s sister flashed another of her brief smiles in Frau Heidegger’s direction. “Tell her we’d like to be alone,” she said in English.

  Russell passed on the message. Frau Heidegger looked slightly hurt, but disappeared down the stairs.

  Eleanor sat down on the bed looking, for the first time, as if her brother’s death meant something to her.

  Now was the moment, Russell thought. He had to say something. “I find it hard to believe that your brother killed himself,” he said tentatively.

  She sighed. “Well, he did. One way or another.”

  “I’m sorry. . . .”

  She got up and walked to the window. “I don’t know how much you knew about Tyler’s work. . . .”

  “I knew he was working on something important.”

  “Exposing some terrible Nazi plot?” she asked.

  “Maybe.” She was angry, he realized. Furious.

  “Well, that was a pretty effective way of committing suicide, wouldn’t you say?”

  Russell bit back an answer. He’d said much the same thing to McKinley himself.

  “Look at this,” she said, surveying the room. “The life he chose,” she said bitterly.

  That you couldn’t, Russell thought. He silently abandoned the idea of asking for her help in checking out the poste restante.

  She picked up McKinley’s pipe, looked around, and took one of his socks to wrap it in. “I’ll take this,” she said. “Can you get rid of the rest?”

  “Yes, but. . . .”

  “I can’t imagine it would be much use to anyone else.”

  “Okay.”

  He accompanied her downstairs and out to the waiting taxi.

  “Thank you for your help,” she said. “I don’t suppose you’re free tomorrow morning? I could use some help at the morgue. My train leaves at three and I can’t afford any hold-ups. And some moral support would be nice,” she added, as if it had just occurred to her that identifying her brother might involve an emotional toll. “I’ll buy you lunch.”

  Russell felt like refusing, but he had no other appointments. Be generous, he told himself. “It’s a deal,” he said.

  “Pick me up at the Adlon,” she told him. “Around ten-thirty.”

  He watched the cab turn the corner onto Lindenstrasse and disappear. He felt sorry for McKinley, and perhaps even sorrier for his sister.

  HE ARRIVED AT THE ADLON just before 10:00, and found Jack Slaney sitting behind a newspaper in the tea room. “I’ve got something for you,” Russell said, sitting down and counting out the ninety Reichsmarks he owed from their last poker game.

  “A sudden inheritance?” Slaney asked.

  “Something like that.”

  “What are you doing here?” the American asked, as he gestured the waiter over to order coffees.

  Russell told him.

  “He was a nice kid,” Slaney said. “Shame about his family.”

  “The uncle’s not one of your favorite senators?”

  Slaney laughed. “He’s a big friend of the Nazis. Anti-Semitic through and through—the usual broken record. On the one hand, we should be leaving Europe alone, on the other, we should be realizing that Britain and France are on their last legs and Germany’s a progressive power-house, our natural ally. Bottom line—it’s just business as usual. The Senator’s brother—McKinley’s dad—has a lot of money invested here. One plant in Dusseldorf, another in Stuttgart. They’ll do well out of a war, as long as we stay out of it.”

  “The daughter’s not exactly soft and cuddly,” Russell admitted.

  “I know. Hey!” Slaney interrupted himself. “Have you heard the latest? Over the weekend some Swedish member of Parliament nominated Hitler for the Nobel Peace Prize. Wrote a letter of recommendation and everything.” Slaney flipped back the pages of his notebook. “He praised ‘Hitler’s glowing love of peace, heretofore best documented in his famous book Mein Kampf.’”

  “A spoof, right?”

  “Of course. But at least one German paper missed that bit. They printed the whole thing as if it was completely kosher.” He threw back his head and laughed out loud, drawing stares from across the room.

  At 10:30 Russell asked the receptionist to let Eleanor know he was in the lobby. She appeared a couple of minutes later. The suit was a deep crimson this time, and she was wearing a silk scarf that was a shimmering gold. Her heels were higher than on the previous day, the seams of her stockings straight as arrows. The fur coat looked expensive. “It doesn’t look like they’re getting ready for a war,” she said, as their cab motored down Unter den Linden.

  The morgue was ready for them. McKinley’s body was laid out on a stretcher in the middle of the spacious cold storeroom. She marched confidently forward, heels clicking on the polished floor, then suddenly faltered and looked back at Russell. He came forward, took her arm, and together they advanced on the stretcher.

  A white sheet concealed whatever injuries her brother had suffered below the neck. The familiar shock of dark hair had been burned away at the front, and the entire left side of his face looked blackened beneath the mortician’s make-up. The eyes looked as though they’d been re-inserted in their sockets; one was not quite closed, and presumably never would be again. The bottom lip had been sewn back on, probably after McKinley had b
itten clean through it. An angry red-brown wound extended around the American’s neck above the uppermost edge of sheet, causing Russell to wonder whether he had been decapitated.

  “It’s him,” Eleanor said in a voice quivering with control. She signed the necessary documentation on the small table by the door and left the room without a backward glance. During the first part of their ride back to the Adlon she sat in silence, staring out of the window, an angry expression on her face. As they crossed over Friedrichstrasse she asked Russell how long he’d lived in Berlin, but hardly listened to his answer.