Prussian Blue

by Philip Kerr

  The refectory table-desk was home to an equestrian bronze, a small swing-arm lamp, a thick leather blotter, and another photograph of Hitler. But the room was dominated not by the hive-like ceramic stove, nor by a statue of Adolf Hitler, nor even by a suit of armor, but by a piece of electrical equipment from Telefunken the likes of which I’d never seen before. The center of the machine was dominated by a piece of curved gray glass about the size of a dinner plate. And I was still looking at it, and trying to work out what it was, when Bormann bustled into the room. He was wearing a brown Party tunic and this helped me to form an impression of what a clean-shaven Hitler might look like if he’d not been a vegetarian. Bormann halted in the doorway for a moment, and shouted back over his shoulder: “And tell the crown prince to get on with his homework.”

  I smiled, assuming “the crown prince” was what Martin Bormann called his eldest son; it’s what anyone would have called his eldest son if he was a man as important as the Lord of Obersalzberg. I don’t know why I smiled because this gave me a good idea of just how long the Nazis planned on remaining in power. Clearly the crown prince was destined for higher things in the new Germany.

  “Well, hurry up,” said Bormann. “I haven’t got all night. I have to read an important speech the Leader’s planning to make to the Reichstag. It’s his response to Roosevelt’s Jew-inspired demand for assurances that Germany has no intention of invading a whole shopping list of other countries, including America.”

  I nodded as if taking this seriously, although everyone in Germany knew that following a fire at the real Reichstag in 1933, the Nazis had disposed of its powers, and moved all so-called parliamentary sessions to Berlin’s Kroll Opera House. Parliamentary consent was not required for anything the Nazis did. Which must have been convenient when you were preparing such an important speech.

  Bormann sat down on an inadequate-looking chair and, as he leaned back, he smiled a grotesque, gap-toothed smile as if he’d had a recent sight of his Swiss bankbook. He reminded me of Lon Chaney in London After Midnight. This wasn’t so surprising, perhaps; all the top Nazis reminded me of someone in a horror movie.

  “What happened to your face?” he asked. “I don’t remember you being quite so ugly before, Gunther.” He laughed out loud at his own good humor, which prompted Rattenhuber and Högl to laugh as well.

  “I slipped and fell down a flight of stairs,” I said, staring hard at Högl. “Hurt my jaw. Maybe it’s broken, I don’t know. It’s less painful if I keep my jaw tied up.”

  Bormann nodded. “I get that. But still, I prefer the people who come and see me to be smart, to wear a tie. That’s just good manners, see? Respect.” He opened his desk drawer and took out a mud-brown NSDAP tie. “Here. You can wear this one.”

  I put on the tie and adjusted my shirt collar.

  “Actually, now I come to think of it, the last person to wear that tie was Adolf Hitler. He wore that tie when Chamberlain came to visit him. So actually you’re very honored, Gunther. He gave it to me, personally, but I can always get another.”

  “Thank you, sir.” I tried a smile, not that anyone would have recognized it as one. The idea of wearing Hitler’s own Nazi Party necktie was grotesque to me. A noose would have been more comfortable and, knowing Bormann, that could probably have been arranged just as readily.

  “You should really see a doctor. I’ll tell Brandt to come and have a look at you.”

  “I don’t have time to see a doctor, sir. Not while I’m still actively looking for the man who shot Karl Flex.”

  The grin vanished and Martin Bormann stared at Högl with narrowing eyes. “Damn it, Högl, I thought you said you had some good news about that.”

  “I do, sir,” said Högl. “The fact is that we have a man in custody at the Türken Inn who has confessed to the murder of Karl Flex and signed a witnessed statement to that effect.”

  “That is good news.”

  “Yes, it might be but for the fact that the commissar here is too clever for something as simple as this. He seems to disagree with the colonel and me that the man we have in custody is the assassin. He believes that his collection of carefully gathered clues trump this man’s admission of guilt.”

  “Who is this man you have now?” said Bormann. He helped himself from a cigarette box on the table, lit one quickly, and dragged a large brass ashtray toward him. “Tell me more about him.”

  “The assassin’s name is Johann Brandner and we’ve had some trouble from him before. He’s a local man. Knows the area very well. He was sent to Dachau concentration camp after he persisted in writing letters to the Leader when his business here in Obersalzberg was closed down for security reasons.”

  “Yes, that’s right. I remember now. The photographer fellow. We made an example of him to discourage all the others from airing their grievances to the Leader. We even put an announcement in the local newspaper to this effect.”

  “Johann Brandner was also a decorated marksman during the war,” added Högl.

  I’d kept quiet through Högl’s preemptive explanation, hoping he’d trip himself up with a factual error, and now he did.

  “When Brandner was arrested he was also in possession of a rifle with a sniper scope, of the kind that was used to shoot Flex.”

  “I see.” Bormann frowned at me. “So what’s the damn problem, Gunther? You’ve got an excellent motive. A rifle. A confession. What more do you need?”

  “Evidence has been the bedrock of German jurisprudence for longer than I’ve been carrying a warrant disc. And the plain fact of the matter is that there is none here. Johann Brandner confessed only because he was afraid of being tortured. Afraid of being sent back to Dachau. Frankly, the evidence against him is purely circumstantial. Which is to say, the present circumstances seem to dictate that when it comes to arresting someone for Flex’s murder, simply anyone will do.”

  “Explain,” said Bormann.

  “For example, the Mauser rifle he was found with could hardly be the Mannlicher carbine that was used to kill Flex. Sir, you saw me find the murder weapon, in the Villa Bechstein’s chimney. Just because he had a rifle when he was arrested or the fact that he’s a marksman doesn’t mean he shot Flex. There are plenty of other men living in Berchtesgaden who are pretty useful with a rifle. More than likely it was one of them who shot Flex. Moreover, I don’t see how Brandner could have killed Captain Kaspel and the assistant hunter from the Landlerwald, Udo Ambros, when he was three hundred kilometers away from here, in a Nuremberg hospital where he’d been since his release from Dachau.”

  “There’s been another murder?” said Bormann. “Why wasn’t I told?”

  “Because Ambros left a suicide note,” said Högl. “It’s mere conjecture on the part of the commissar that he was actually murdered. And the captain’s death was more likely a simple car accident. Kaspel was addicted to methamphetamine, sir. He lost control of the car he was in because he was driving too fast. He always drove too fast.”

  “His brakes were tampered with,” I said. “Only, for some reason the major here seems to have set his face against any evidence I’ve managed to gather. I really don’t know why. Even a German jury used to be equal to the task of understanding evidence when it’s as clear and simple as this.”

  “What is simple,” insisted Högl, “is that we have a man in custody who’s confessed to the murder of Karl Flex. Which is really all we need to put the Leader’s mind at rest, should he ever need to be told about this unfortunate occurrence.”

  It was only now that I understood that Högl didn’t really care who killed Flex. And nor, it seemed, did Bormann.

  “The major makes a very good point,” Bormann told me. “Whatever happens, we are going to need someone to blame for this before the Leader’s birthday. I should have thought of this before. And not even the Berlin Kripo can argue with a full confession.”

  “On the contrary,
sir. It’s my opinion that it’s always a detective’s job to think the unthinkable, ask the unaskable, and accuse those who are totally above suspicion. The number of innocent people who turn out to be guilty is truly remarkable, even in this day and age. Go to any jail in Germany, sir, and you’ll find that the cells are full of men who tell you they didn’t do it. Conversely, it’s my impression that this man’s confession is wholly unreliable. And that the Leader won’t be safe until the real assassin is in custody.”

  “What do you think, Johann?”

  Colonel Rattenhuber twisted his broad face into a semblance of deep thought. It looked painful, like one of those sixty-four canonical grimaces recorded in marble and bronze by Franz Messerschmidt, and almost as uncomfortable as my own face. But when it finally came, his answer was the most perfect example of Nazi justice that I’d ever heard outside of a novel by Franz Kafka:

  “Back in the day, when I was a young copper in Munich, we used to say you’ll find out that everyone’s guilty if you hit him hard enough. In my book, a confession is never, ever to be doubted. Once you’ve got that, it’s up to the damn lawyers. You let them sort it out. It’s what they’re paid for. Perhaps Brandner didn’t do it. Perhaps what happened to Brandner seems coercive and amoral to someone like the commissar. That’s not our problem here. The point is that he could have shot Flex. He certainly fits the profile that the commissar described himself. And that’s what surely counts. So I say we keep him in the bag for now and let Commissar Gunther carry on his investigation for a while longer. To see if he can’t find someone who’s a better fit, the way he says. And if he doesn’t, well then we can all say we have done our duty and we have someone in custody who deserves to be there. Because make no mistake, this fellow is guilty of something, otherwise we wouldn’t have sent him to Dachau in the first place. Frankly, I think perhaps the commissar is in danger of losing sight of the main picture. In a perfect world it would be nice to catch the culprit and be absolutely one hundred percent sure about that. But as I’m sure he will agree, such a thing rarely ever happens in police work. And in the real world we sometimes have to do what is pragmatic. I believe it’s more important that the Leader is completely reassured than that we are completely satisfied that Brandner is our man.”

  I was beginning to see how Rattenhuber had made colonel. And Bormann seemed to appreciate this argument. He was nodding.

  “I like your thinking, Johann,” he said. “I knew there was a reason why you were in charge of the RSD. Because you think the right way. The practical way. Hitler’s way. So that’s decided. We’ll keep this man Brandner on ice but meanwhile we’ll let the commissar carry on working diligently toward a different outcome, if that’s possible. But given the circumstances we ought to have some sort of time limit on his detective work. Yes, I think that would be best. You have twenty-four hours to find a better candidate than the one we have now. Is that clear, Commissar? After that we’ll have to assume it was Brandner who shot Flex and act accordingly.”

  “Yes, sir. This is your mountain. And I’m under your orders. But back in Berlin? Well, let’s just say I’m not sure what I’ll be able to say if Himmler and Heydrich ever ask me about this particular case. And the fact is that you’re too smart not to know that Karl Flex was shot because he worked for you. I’m sorry to say this to you, sir, but it’s my impression that around these parts you’re hated even more than he was. Which means that next time the assassin—the real assassin—might be more ambitious in his choice of targets. The next time he might take a potshot at you.”

  Bormann stood up slowly and came round the desk to face me and instinctively I stood. His whole head was beginning to turn red with anger, which must have pleased Högl. He was a powerful-looking man with pink hands that were quickly becoming white fists.

  “Will you listen to this bastard?” he asked Rattenhuber and Högl. “Talking to me like I was just some Fritz who’d walked off the street and into the Alex for help. Me. You should have sewed up your fucking mouth, Gunther, when you tied up your jaw like a Christmas pudding.”

  The National leader took hold of my tie—the one around my neck—and pulled me to his level until I was close enough to smell the cigarette on his breath. That would have been bad enough, but he now produced a Mauser automatic from the pocket of his tunic and pressed it hard against my swollen cheek.

  “You’ll say what I fucking well tell you to say, Gunther. Is that clear? I have Adolf Hitler’s ear, which means I own the fucking police in this country. So you’d best forget any noble ideas you might have about German jurisprudence. Adolf Hitler’s the law now; and I’m his judge and jury. You got that? And if I hear you’ve so much as hinted to that slippery Jew bastard Heydrich that things are any different from what I’ve said, then I’ll have you in a fucking concentration camp so quick you’ll think you were the last yid in Berlin. I’ll break your jaw into ten pieces, make you swallow them, and then hang you with that necktie. You take your orders from me, you fucking pig hound.”

  I was alarmed to hear myself answer back. There was just half a chance in a hundred that this wasn’t a mistake. And anyway, I was so tired I’d stopped caring very much about what happened to me. I needed some more magic potion, and fast. But only if I stayed alive.

  “In my experience most people want to know when someone’s out to kill them,” I said, swallowing my fear. “But I guess you’re just braver than most people. Maybe that’s not such a surprise. With the RSD and the SS to protect you, sir, you must be the second-best-protected man in Germany. And the terrace in front of the Berghof must be the most secure place in the whole German Reich. At least it was before Karl Flex was shot dead. They say lightning doesn’t strike the same place twice, but I say, why take a chance?”

  For a moment I thought Bormann was going to hit me. But then he stepped back, smiled, relaxed his grip on my tie, and even started to straighten it for me, as if he now remembered who the tie had belonged to. I’d seen psychopaths behave in similar fashion and it was plain to see why Hitler kept him around; Bormann was fascism incarnate, carrot and stick on the same black lanyard. He could just as easily have been a crime boss as a senior member of the German government, although, in my estimation, there was little difference between the two. Germany was in the grip of a gang just as ruthless as Al Capone’s Chicago Outfit. Bormann even looked like Capone.

  “I hear what you say,” he said, pocketing the Mauser again. “Maybe the real assassin is still out there. Maybe Flex was shot because he was working for me. Hey, I know I’m not liked up here. These fucking Bavarians are not as smart as us Prussians, Gunther. They have no idea what’s necessary and what isn’t.” He paused. “You know, it took a lot of guts to say that to my face, Gunther. I’m beginning to see why that horse-faced Jew Heydrich keeps you on his key chain. Maybe you’re even as good as he says you are and you really can find the Fritz who shot Karl Flex. But until then we’re keeping Brandner in the cells. For the Leader’s peace of mind, like Colonel Rattenhuber here says. And you know what? If he is innocent, then he’s relying on you every bit as much as the Leader is. Because if you don’t find someone else to put on a charge sheet, I’m going to have him shot. Just like those other two clowns from Linz. And not because Heydrich said so. But because I don’t like anyone who thinks they can come up here to the Leader’s Territory without my permission and arrest people who are working for me. So you can forget that fucking telex you wanted to send to Heydrich, Gunther. There’s to be no mercy for them. They’ll be shot first thing in the morning as soon as I’ve had my breakfast and there’s the end of it. I want you there to see it, too. As for Kaltenbrunner, I can promise you and Heydrich that he will get the sharp edge of my tongue when next I see him. Don’t you worry about that.”

  “I’m sure the general will be very relieved to hear that, sir.”

  What was the point of truth in a world dominated by cruelty and the arbitrary exercise of power? What had b
ecome of me now that I was so reduced? I was nodding away like a googly-eyed doll but all the time I was thinking I was a madman among the very mad, and how hateful I was. Everywhere I looked, I found my own life-preserving compromises staring back at me like friends I’d shamefully betrayed. If only Hitler could have hated himself as much as I now hated my own self. Perhaps nothing in life is more unpleasant to a man than to take the road that leads to himself. Perhaps I would only be free of these monstrous people on the day I went to hell. That’s the trouble with being an eyewitness to history; sometimes history is like an avalanche that sweeps you down off the face of the mountain and into the oblivion of some hidden black crevasse. But for now I was going back to the Berghof, to seek out Gerdy Troost in the hope I might get some answers to the many cryptic mysteries of Flex’s secret ledger.

  FORTY-NINE

  October 1956

  There probably wasn’t a bus for hours but the man in the leather shorts waiting at the stop didn’t mind. He wasn’t waiting for a bus. To reach the bus stop and deal with him, I would have to cross the road, and to cross the road probably meant being seen. The road was about ten meters wide and without any sign of traffic, and so quiet you could have heard a mouse cough. I could have shot him, of course, but the sound would certainly have brought other Stasi men to the scene and I’d have had a gun battle on my hands. One I was certain to lose. It had rained while I was sleeping and the cobbles glistened in the moonlight like the skin of an enormous alligator. There wasn’t a breath of wind and the treetops were as still as if they’d been tied onto the sky. Somewhere in the thick forest behind the bus stop an owl was hooting, like Mother Nature’s own alarm, as though to warn other animals that a man with a gun was close by. Probably I’d seen one too many films from Walt Disney’s Wonderful World of Color. But to me the trees couldn’t have looked more like the real Germany if they’d been painted black, red, and gold. Whatever the French intended for the Saarland, it certainly looked like home to me. To get there, I needed to distract the Stasi man, and I knew I would only get one chance. If there was one thing the East German police were good at, it was guarding borders; since the creation of the GDR in 1949, “flight from the Republic” was a specific and serious crime, and hundreds, perhaps thousands, of people were killed every year by the Grenzpo. Those who were caught were often executed and, at the very least, imprisoned.