by Philip Kerr
Scheuer grinned at me. 'He doesn't like you,' he said.
'That's okay,' I said. 'I feel the same way about him.'
On Rathenower we drove past a large, grim, star-shaped building on our left.
'What's that?' he asked.
'Moabit Prison,' I said.
'And the other building?'
He meant the great, semi-ruined building just north of the prison, a huge fortress of an edifice that ran west along Turm Strasse for almost a hundred metres.
'That?' I smiled. "That is where this whole lousy story began. It's the Central Criminal Court. Back in May 1931 there were police cars parked the length of the street. And cops everywhere, inside and outside the building. But mostly outside, because that was where most of the Nazi storm troopers were gathered. A couple of thousand of them. Maybe more. And newspapermen crowded around the big doors of the entrance.'
'An important trial was in progress, huh?'
'The Eden Dance Palace Trial,' I said. 'Actually, it was a routine sort of case. Four Nazis had tried to murder some communists in a dance hall. Back in 1931 that was almost an everyday occurrence. No, it was the witness for the prosecution that made the case so noteworthy, and why there were so many cops and Nazis on the scene. The witness was Adolf Hitler and the prosecution lawyer wanted to show that Hitler was the malign force behind this kind of Nazi-on-Communist violence. Hitler was always publicly affirming his commitment to law and order and the prosecution wanted to show this up for a lie. So Hitler was summoned to testify.'
'You were there?'
'Yes. But I was more interested in the four defendants and what they might have to say about another murder that I was investigating. But I saw him, yes. Who knew it would be the only occasion on which Hitler would have to answer for his crimes before a court of law? He arrived in court wearing a blue suit, and for several minutes he played the good, law- abiding citizen. But gradually, as the questioning continued, he began to contradict himself and then to lose his temper. The SA, he claimed, was forbidden to commit or to provoke any violence. Many of his answers even provoked laughter in the spectators' gallery. And finally, after giving evidence for almost four hours, Hitler lost all composure and started to rant at the lawyer questioning him. Who happened to be a Jew.
'Now, under German law, the oath is given after testimony, not before. And when Hitler swore to the truth of his evidence - that he was pursuing legal, democratic methods to gain political power - there were very few who believed him. I know I didn't. It was plain to anyone who was there that Hitler was absolutely complicit in SA violence, and I suppose you could say that this was the minute when I realised for sure that I could never be a Nazi and follow an obvious liar like Hitler.'
'So what did you mean when you said that this was where the story began?'
'Mielke's story. Or rather my Mielke story. If I hadn't been to the Central Criminal Court that day I might not have thought it worth while to go to Tegel Prison a couple of weeks later to question one of the four SA defendants. And if I hadn't gone to Tegel that day I might never have seen some SA men piling out of a bar in Charlottenburg and followed them. In which case I'd never have seen Erich Mielke or saved his life. That's what I mean.'
'Given everything that happened afterwards,' said Hamer, 'we'd all have been a lot better off if you'd just let him get killed.'
'But that would mean I'd never have had the pleasure of your acquaintance, Agent Hamer,' I said.
'Less of the "Agent", Gunther,' said Scheuer. 'From now on we're all of us just gentlemen, okay?'
'Does that include Herr Hamer?'
'Keep riding me, Gunther, you arrogant German bastard,' said Hamer, 'and see where it gets you. I almost hope Erich Mielke doesn't come. Just to bring you down a size or two. Not to mention the pleasure of seeing you come up short on twenty- five thousand bucks.'
'He'll come,' I said.
'How do you really know that?' said Hamer.
'Because he loves his father, of course. I wouldn't expect you to understand something like that, Hamer. You'd have to know who your father is to love him.'
'Hamer,' said Scheuer. 'I'm ordering you not to answer that. And Gunther? That's enough.' He pointed at the road ahead. 'Where now?'
'Left on Quitzow Strasse, and then right onto Putlitz Strasse.'
We drove west with the Ringbahn on our right, keeping pace with the little red and yellow train that clattered toward Putlitzstrasse station, moving along the green verge and overgrown track like two snooker balls. The red brick station with its tall arched window and tower was more medieval abby than rail terminus.
Dusk was fast approaching, and under the weak, greenish gaze on the praying-mantis street lamps of the Föherer Brüche we drove into Wedding. With its textile works, breweries and massive electronics factories. Wedding had once been I he industrial heart of Berlin and a communist stronghold. Back in 1930, forty-three per cent of Wedding voters, many of them soon to be made unemployed by the Great Depression, had voted for the KPD. Once it had been one of the most overcrowded bezirks in Berlin; now, with long winter nights fast approaching and no sign of the economic revival that had come to the American sector, Wedding looked almost deserted, as if all had been taken away to the ships of the conquerors. In truth, Berlin had always gone to bed early, especially in winter, but never in the late afternoon.
Scheuer hammered the steering wheel with excitement as he turned us onto Trift Strasse. 'I can't believe we're really gonna get this guy,' he said. 'We're gonna get Mielke.'
'Fuck, yeah,' said Frei and whooped loudly.
The three of them sounded like a basketball team trying to rouse themselves for an important game.
'If only you knew, Gunther,' said Scheuer, 'what this guy is capable of. He likes to torture people himself. Did you know that?'
I shook my head.
'Les Bauer,' continued Scheuer, 'a Party member since 1932, he was arrested in 1950 and Mielke beat him like a dog. The Russians sentenced Bauer to death, and the only reason he's still alive is because Stalin is dead. And Kurt Muller, head of the KPD in Lower Saxony: the Stasi lured him to East Berlin for a Party meeting and then accused him of being a Trotskyite. Mielke tortured him, too. Poor Muller has spent the last four years in solitary confinement in the Stasi's own prison at Halle. The Red Ox they call it. And you don't want to know what Mielke's done to the CIA agents they've caught. Mielke's a real Gestapo type. They say he has a bust of Felix Dzerzhinsky in his office. You know? The first Bolshevik secret police chief. Believe me, this guy Mielke makes your friend Heydrich look like an amateur. If we get Mielke we can cripple the whole Stasi.'
I'd heard it - or something like it - before and I hardly cared. This was their war, not mine. Probably the Stasi thought the CIA 'fascists' were just as bad.
As we neared the end of Trift Strasse I told Scheuer to turn right onto Miiller Strasse.
'That's Wedding Platz, just ahead,' I said.
Approaching the apartment building on the corner of Schulzenstrasse, Hamer, kneeling behind us, said, 'What a dump. I can't imagine why anyone would want to swap a cottage in Schonwalde to live here.'
Scheuer, who had been to the apartment himself, said, 'Really it's not so bad inside.'
'Well, I don't get it.'
I shrugged. 'That's because you're not a Berliner, Hamer. Erich Mielke's father has lived in and around this area all his life. It's in the bone. Like the allegiance to a tribe or a gang. For an old Berlin communist like Stallmacher this is the centre of German communism. Not police headquarters in East Berlin. And I wouldn't be at all surprised if he has some old friends who live in these very streets. That's a big thing for Berliners. Community. I don't expect you get that much where you come from. You have to trust your neighbours in order to be neighbourly.'
Scheuer stopped the van and turned in his seat. A few metres away, the ambulance containing our security came to a halt.
'All right, listen up,' said Scheuer. 'This is a stake-out. An
d we could be here for a while until Erich junior shows up. No one mentions the Company. Once again, there's to be no Company names and no Company language. And nobody uses profanity. From now on we're members of an American bible school. And the first thing we take out of this van is a box of bibles. Okay. Let's go and get this bastard.'
But as we entered the building and trooped up the stone stairs I almost hoped that Erich Mielke wouldn't come at all and that everything might stay the same as before. My heart was beating loudly now. Was it just the effort of climbing two flights of stairs with a box of bibles in my arms, or something else? In my imagination I already saw the scene that lay ahead of us and felt a twinge of regret. I told myself that if only I'd remained in Cuba I would never have landed in the hands of the CIA and all of this might have been avoided. That even now I might have been reading a book in my apartment on Malecon, or enjoying the pleasures that were to be had in Omara's body at the Casa Marina. Was Mister Greene still there, juggling breasts? Sometimes we just don't know when we're well off. And, for the first time in a long time I wondered about poor Melba Marron, the little rebel chica who'd shot the sailor on my boat. Was she in an American prison? For her sake I hoped so. Or was she back in Havana and at the mercy of the corrupt local police, as she had feared? In which case she might very likely be dead.
What was I doing here?
'Why did you have to suggest bibles?' Hamer grunted loudly as he put the box he'd been carrying down on the landing outside the first-floor apartment's door. He looked at the door with obvious displeasure. 'You sure about this place, Gunther? I've seen better-looking slums than this place.'
'Actually,' I said, 'there's a very nice view of the gasworks from the sitting room window.'
But in my imagination I saw only the CIA surrounding Mielke as he arrived to visit his father and I heard only their snarling pleasure as they bundled him into the apartment, snapped handcuffs on his wrists, hauled a canvas bag over his head and tripped him onto the floor. Maybe they would kick and abuse him the same way I had been kicked and abused until something in me had broken, the way they had wanted it broken. And I realised that I had at last become the thing that I abhorred; that I had crossed an invisible line of decency and honour: I was about to become the fascist I'd always detested.
'Stop complaining,' said Scheuer, glancing anxiously up the stairs at the landing above where he believed Erich Stallmacher's apartment was located.
I found the set of keys given to me by the landlord, and slid one into the strong Dom lock. The key turned and I pushed at the heavy grey door. A strong smell of floor polish greeted our nostrils as we entered our apartment. I waited in the largish hallway until the last of the Amis was inside and then closed the door. Then I locked it, carefully.
'What the fuck?' Agent Hamer's voice contained a tremor.
Agent Scheuer turned back to the locked door and was felled by a blow from a Makarov pistol to the back of the head.
Agent Frei was already in handcuffs. His face was pale and worried-looking.
There were six of them waiting for us in the apartment. They wore cheap grey suits and dark shirts and ties. All of them were armed with pistols - Soviet automatics with cheap plastic handles, but no less deadly for that. Their faces were impassive, as if they too were made of cheap Russian plastic, manufactured in quantity by some factory stolen from Germany and then reassembled on an eastern shore of the Volga. Just as cold as that river were their grey-blue eyes, and for a moment I saw myself in them: policemen doing their duty; taking no pleasure in these arrests but handling them quickly and with the efficiency of well-trained professionals.
The three Americans might have said something but their mouths were already stuffed with cloth and taped tight so that I only had their watery eyes to reproach me, although these were no less bitter for that.
I might have said something, too, but for the fact that the handcuffed men were already being marched downstairs - each between two Stasi men, as if they were being led to a firing squad. If I had spoken to them I might have adduced the months of ill-treatment I had endured at their hands, not to mention my desire to be away from their control and influence, but it hardly seemed appropriate, or for that matter proportionate to what I'd now inflicted on them. I might even have mentioned something about the unquestioning assumption of all Americans that they had right on their side - even when they were doing wrong - and the irritation that the rest of the world felt at being judged by them; but that would have been to overstate the matter on my part. It wasn't so much that I did not care to be judged - for a German in the Fifties that was, perhaps, unavoidable. It was simply that I did not care to be grateful for whatever it was the Amis were supposed to have done for us, when it was abundantly clear to me and many other Germans that really they had done it for themselves. And hadn't they intended some rather similar treatment for Mielke himself?
'Where is he?' I asked one of the Stasi men.
'If you mean the Comrade General,' said the man, 'he is waiting outside.'
I followed them out of the apartment and downstairs, wondering how they were going to deal with the security men in the CIA ambulance; or had they already dealt with them? But before we reached the ground floor, we went through a door that led out of the back of the building and down a fire escape to a courtyard that was about the size of a tennis court and enclosed on all four sides by tall black tenements, most of them derelict.
We crossed the courtyard and, in fading light, went through a low wooden door in the wall of the old Schulzendorfer Brewery. Underfoot the cobbles were loose and in some places there were large potholes filled with water. The moon rippled in one of them like a lost silver coin. The three Americans did not resist and, to my experienced eyes, they already seemed to have acquired the compliant demeanour of POWs, with bowed heads and heavy, stumbling footsteps. A small tributary stream of the River Spree marked the edge of the narrowing courtyard. At its southern end was a building with broken dirty windows and tall weeds growing on the roof; painted on the brickwork was a faded advertisement for Chlorodont Toothpaste. I'd have needed a whole tube of the stuff to get rid of the nasty taste I had in my mouth. Within the word 'Tooth' was a door, which one of the Stasi men opened. We went into a building that smelt of damp and probably something worse. Advancing to one of the filthy windows, the team leader looked carefully out onto a street.
He waited cautiously for almost five minutes, and having checked his watch, produced a torch, which he then aimed at the building opposite. Almost immediately his signal was answered by three short flashes of a small green light, and across the street a door opened. The three American prisoners were hustled across, and it was only when I put my own head out of the door that I realised we were on Liesenstrasse and that the building on the opposite side of the street was in the Russian sector.
As the last of the three Americans was pushed across the road in the all-enveloping darkness and on into the building, I saw a portly figure standing in the doorway. He looked up and down the street and then waved to me.
'Come,' he said. 'Come quickly.'
It was Erich Mielke.
* * *
CHAPTER FORTY: BERLIN, 1954
He was shorter than I remembered and stockier, too; a powerful man who was square on his feet, with the air of a pugilist. His hair was short and thin and so was his mouth, which made an attempt at a smile, only it came off as something sardonic, or whatever it is you call it when a man can laugh at things that other people don't find in the least bit amusing.
'Come,' he repeated. 'It's all right. You're in no danger.'
The voice was deeper and also more gravelly than I remembered. But the accent was much the same as it had always been: an uneducated and truculent Berliner. I didn't give much for the chances of the three Americans when they were interrogated by this man.
I looked both ways on Liesenstrasse. The CIA's security ambulance was nowhere to be seen and it would probably be hours before they worked out th
at the team of agents they were supposed to be guarding had been kidnapped right under their noses. I had to admit, the Stasi operation had been as neat as a freshly laid egg. True, it had been my own plan, but it had been Mielke's idea to supply an actual East German border guard who looked like his own father for the CIA to follow around and lead them to the apartment on Schulzendorfer Strasse where the Stasi kidnap team would be waiting.
The street was clear but, in the darkness, I still hesitated to cross.
A little impatience edged into Mielke's voice. We Berliners could get impatient with a newborn baby. 'Come on, Gunther,' he said. 'If you had anything to fear from me you'd be in handcuffs like these three fascists. Or dead.'
And recognising the truth of this I walked across the street.
Mielke wore a mid-blue suit that appeared to be of much better quality than the suits worn by his men. Certainly his shoes were more expensive. These looked hand-made. A navy knitted tie look neat against a light blue shirt. His raincoat was probably British.
He was standing in the doorway of an old florist's shop. The windows were boarded up, but on a floor strewn with broken glass there was a lantern that gave enough light to see vases filled with petrified flowers or no flowers at all. Through an open door at the back of the shop was a yard, and parked at the end of the yard was a plain grey van which, I imagined, already contained the three American agents. The shop smelt of weeds and cat piss - a bit like the pension we had vacated earlier. Mielke closed the door and put on a leather cap that added a properly proletarian touch to his appearance. Although there was a big heavy padlock, he didn't secure the door, for which I was grateful. He was younger than me and probably armed and I wouldn't have cared to fight my way out of there.
We sat down on a couple of ancient wooden chairs that belonged in an old church hall.
'I like your office,' I said.
'It's very convenient for the French Sector,' he said. 'The security here is almost non-existent and it's the perfect spot to slip back and forth between our sector and theirs without anyone knowing about it. But oddly enough I can remember coming into this florist's shop as a kid.'