Berlin: A Novel

by Pierre Frei

  He took her seriously. 'Major Berkov? I'll invite him along if you'd like to meet him.'

  She took his arm. 'Not in the least! It's you I have a date with, remember? I'm ravenously hungry too.'

  'I did some shopping.' John Ashburner was glad to be back in safe waters.

  They passed the sentry on guard and entered the prohibited zone. Jutta pointed to the tall fence. 'It's terrible, that fence. When I think of that poor woman in the barbed wire. . .'

  'It must have been a dreadful shock for you.' She nodded, silently, and he sensed that she would rather not talk about it.

  He had laid the table in his living room that morning, with a vase of roses in the centre. He had bribed the gardener of the Harnack House with a packet of cigarettes to plunder one of the flower beds. 'Oh, how lovely,' she said, delighted. 'I last saw roses at my sister's wedding. After that, no one grew anything but potatoes and vegetables. Even in the public squares.'

  'I'd like you to take them home.'

  'Thank you, John, that's really nice of you.'

  'I thought we might cook together.' He handed her an apron and put one on too. Hers bore a picture of a white rabbit with a chef's hat. His had a caricature of a bulldog with a wooden spoon in its mouth. She thought them both rather silly.

  The US quartermaster had installed refrigerators in the requisitioned apartments. Ashburner took out a bottle of white wine and filled two glasses. 'frost. That's what you say here, isn't it?'

  'frost, John.' She took a sip. It was ages since she'd last drunk wine, though Sergeant Panelli sometimes stood her a beer in Club 48. 'What delicious things are we going to have?'

  'Shrimp salad, steak with sweetcorn, we'll drink red wine with that, Chianti. Ice cream for dessert. OK?'

  'Wonderful. What shall I do?'

  'Open the can of shrimp and the jar of mayonnaise, please.'

  'Oh, never mind that! If you have eggs, oil, lemons and mustard we can make the mayonnaise ourselves.'

  Her own whisk was still hanging in its place in the kitchen cupboard. The ingredients she needed were there too. She put the yolk of an egg into a bowl, mixed it with pepper, salt, a few drops of lemon juice and a little mustard, and added a pinch of sugar. He was watching her attentively; it was an excuse to keep looking at her. She bent over the bowl, and puffed an annoying lock of hair away from her forehead. There was something very touching about the sight. The groove in the nape of her neck, which was bent at a pretty angle, aroused feelings in him that he couldn't really define. Her youthful figure in her light dress made her seem both vulnerable and desirable. At home, Ethel went around in hair curlers and barely visited the kitchen to get herself a Coke from the fridge. The two women were worlds apart.

  Jutta slowly trickled oil into the bowl and worked it loosely with the whisk. 'The oil and egg yolk have to be at room temperature, that's the secret of it,' she explained. Before his eyes, she created a wonderful thick, yellow mayonnaise and mixed the shrimp into it. Then she piled it all on lettuce leaves in two dishes.

  He heated the canned sweetcorn with a little butter and put it aside. He had bought the grooved, cast-iron grill pan in the PX especially for this evening, along with the aprons. 'It has to be very hot, so the steaks don't braise all the way through but grill fast. Here, let's test it.' He splashed a little water in the pan, and it immediately fizzled out. 'Careful now!' The steaks hissed as they went into the pan. He looked very serious and was concentrating hard on what he was doing, like a little boy with his electric train set. She did not try to fight off the tender feelings arising in her. 'Quarter of a minute each side to seal the steaks. Then two to four minutes each side, depending on the thickness. When the juices show like red pearls, they're au point, as the French say.' She could see that he was proud of his expertise.

  'Well done, John. That's amazing.' She had found a tube of anchovy paste and was mixing it with butter. We can put this on the steaks.'

  'We work together pretty well, don't you think?' It was a clumsy declaration of love, and all the better for that. He opened the Chianti and put the bottle on the table.

  She took off her apron, and sensed that he was looking at her figure in the light dress, an admiring rather than offensive look. I hope he doesn't think my hips are too broad, she thought. He held her chair for her. She liked his chivalrous gesture, and thanked him with a small smile.

  'Tell me about your home,' she asked as they ate. '1 know almost nothing about America.'

  'Neither do I really. I know Venice, Illinois. Five thousand inhabitants, two churches, Bill's Bar on Main Street. And the police station house. Green hills and pasture around the town. I grew up on our farm: my brother Jim runs it now. I'm the local sherriff. A peaceful job: not much happens in the country.'

  'What about your wife?'

  He gave a resigned smile. 'Not much happens with her either. We don't have children. Ethel hated the idea of pregnancy.'

  'Jochen wanted a Volkswagen first, and then a son. He never had either. A Polish marksman shot him. He was on the latrine. He didn't even get to die a hero's death.'

  'I wasn't in the war itself. They sent me over here afterwards, when they needed police to keep order. Once the fighting stops guys can get stupid ideas into their heads.' He poured more wine. 'You know, I've always wanted just to talk like this - never mind what about. The main thing is to have someone listening.'

  'Red check tablecloths and candles in wine bottles, wasn't that how your little German-style restaurant was going to look?'

  'You remembered?'

  'Of course, I like the idea.'

  'Will you have a cognac?' he asked after the meal.

  'No, thank you, John. After all that wine it would knock me right out.' She went close to him and raised her face. He hesitated before taking her in his arms and kissing her. He had almost forgotten what it was like. He felt her warm, soft body and breathed in her perfume. It seemed to him that they stood like that for a delicious eternity. Then she moved gently away from him. 'We have plenty of time, don't we?' she said quietly. It was a promise. Elated, he drove her home in the jeep and waited until she had disappeared into the building.

  The door to the Konigs' room was open. Late as it was, they were drinking schnapps with Brandenburg. Jutta stopped. 'How's your son?' she asked.

  'They're doing the second operation tomorrow to pull the skin over the stump.' Pretty Frau Konig wiped a tear from the corner of her eye.

  'Now, now, Ilse. He'll soon get a brand-new hand with all the latest clever inventions. The surgeon says the Americans have made amazing progress in that area.'

  I do hope he'll make a quick recovery. Goodnight.'

  Brandenburg followed her into the kitchen. He was slightly tipsy. 'Been brought home in the jeep again? What's the going rate - a packet of cigarettes a trick?' She managed to hit his cheek even in the dark. Her hand connected with a loud slap, and his glasses fell to the floor. He bent down and felt about on the rug for them. When she lit the candle he had them on again. 'Well, congratulations, you have a good aim.' She ignored him, and filled a vase with water for the roses.

  In bed, she felt remorse. He hadn't been sober, and he was blind and helpless. She ought not to have hit him. Later, she heard cries of pleasure from his room. Frau Konig's anxiety about her son was obviously kept well within bounds.

  On the way to the bathroom in the morning she met Herr Konig. 'You mustn't upset the captain,' he told her reproachfully. 'Just think of all the poor man's been through.'

  CHAPTER FOUR

  BEN AND RALF kept their heads bent at breakfast, but the doomsday blast they were expecting never materialized. Their father's calm approach hurt far more. All three of you are to blame,' Klaus Dietrich told them in matter-of-fact tones. 'But Hajo is the one who has to pay for it. All his life. When you two have long forgotten about it, he'll still be going around with one hand. Think about that. Now, off you go to school.'

  Relieved, the boys raced off over the veranda. Aren't you c
oming?' Ralf asked. Ben silently shook his head, and went to hide his school bag under the empty potato sacks in the shed. There was time enough for Latin, English and geography tomorrow. The Potsdamer Platz was on his schedule for today.

  'You ought to give Ben a little help with his maths. He's having difficulty with logarithms.' Inge told her husband.

  As soon as I get time,' Klaus Dietrich promised her, and glanced at his father-in-law, who was sitting at the breakfast table looking glum.

  'We'll have this ghastly ersatz coffee coming out of our ears,' Dr Hellbich complained. But the real reason for his gloom was not the coffee but yesterday's meeting of the Berlin Social Democrat party committee. 'They're seriously thinking of letting former Communists join the SPD, on the grounds that they're anti-Fascists too. Murderers, that's what they are: just as bad as the Nazis, I said, and I successfully opposed the motion. Luckily my friends and I are in the majority. But for how much longer, that's the question? You have to look at it pragmatically, some snotty-nosed youngster told us. The fellow knows nothing about Social Democracy before '33, and he wasn't in the underground movement like us either.'

  'You were never in the underground,' Klaus Dietrich pointed out. 'They made you retire early, that's all, complete with your own home and your rose beds.'

  Inge signalled to her husband not to continue. She was worried about her father's blood pressure. Hellbich did not explode, but mounted a counterattack instead. 'So how's your work going? No progress. eh? Or have you caught that serial killer yet? Well, don't let it bother you. Your predecessor before the war wasn't any more successful.'

  Dietrich pricked up his ears. 'What do you mean? What happened before the war?'

  With an expression of distaste, Hellbich took another sip of the brown brew. 'Oh, it was in '36. The Olympic Games had just begun. I can still see her: Annie, young, pretty, blonde, blue eyes. She was a waitress in Brumm's Bakery and Cake Shop opposite the U-Bahn station. I used to get our breakfast rolls there. Found dead in the front garden one morning. Oddly enough, the newspapers didn't publish the story. It was kept under wraps. I happened to know a police officer, though, and he told me the details. What the murderer did before he strangled her was unspeakable.'

  As if electrified, Klaus Dietrich shot to his feet - and fell to the floor with a cry of pain. 'This damn prosthesis,' he groaned.

  Inge helped him up. 'Lie down for a little. We'll take the thing off.'

  'No time. I must go straight to the station.' But his wife insisted on quarter of an hour's rest for the nerves in his stump to recover a little. Then Dietrich cycled off.

  'Franke, we need details.' Dietrich removed the bicycle clips from his trouser legs and put them in the middle drawer of his desk. 'Did the pre-war murderer ride a motorbike? Exactly how did he torture his victim? What was that girl Annie strangled with?'

  The sergeant shrugged apologetically. 'Sorry, sir, can't help you. I was with the regular police in Schoneberg before the war. Maybe someone at the station there will know.'

  'Then let's go.'

  They heated up the Opel. The gears crunched and the transmission howled, but Franke got the vehicle from the CID office to the police station ten minutes' drive away without mishap. Most of the windows in the police station had cardboard filling the panes, but they were wide open in the summer heat. The paving stones in front of the building had been taken up and the space turned into a small potato patch.

  Two police officers with grey, hungry faces climbed over the potato plants and set out on afternoon patrol. On orders from the city commandant, their green uniforms had been dyed black, with the result that they were now an ugly, dark and dirty hue, particularly the fabric of their caps. They carried wooden truncheons at their belts. They'd been required to hand in their Parabellum 0.8s with the leather holsters.

  'Hey, if it isn't the CID cops,' the man on duty, an old superintendent, greeted the visitors. 'What can we ordinary plods do for you gentlemen?'

  'Tell us where to find the pre-war files. Unless someone's been warming his feet with them,' said Franke, going along with the officer's tone.

  'It's all there, gents. We lose the odd war now and then, we never lose the files. Herr Ewald will take you down.'

  Herr Ewald was a little man with the face of a sparrow, wearing sleeve protectors. 'Got an interesting case?' he asked hopefully as they climbed down the basement steps.

  'Depends how you look at it,' growled Franke, looking with distaste at the flooded basement floor. A couple of dead rats were bobbing about in the stinking water. Planks had been laid on bricks between the shelves of files.

  'The drains are a total mess. A Russian mortar on the last day of the war,' Ewald apologized. 'What are you looking for?'

  'Everything you have on the murder of a woman in 1936. As far as we know, the case was never solved. The victim was found strangled in the front garden of Brumm's Bakery, opposite the Onkel Tom U-Bahn station.' Dietrich told him.

  Ewald disappeared among the shelves of files. The planks creaked. Water slopped back and forth in a blocked drain with an unpleasant slurping sound. After a few minutes he reappeared, looking gloomy. 'No murdered woman, case solved or not. Only a manslaughter. The killer confessed. I looked at 1935 and 1937 too, but I didn't find anything.'

  'It was in August '36, during the Olympic Games. My father-in-law remembers the exact time. He knew the victim slightly, a young waitress.' Dietrich insisted.

  'Could the files have been lost?' asked Franke.

  'Nothing gets lost here,' Ewald told him.

  'Just take another look, would you?' asked Dietrich patiently. 'It's important.'

  Herr Ewald dived in among the shelves again. This time they heard him clicking his tongue and talking to himself under his breath. Fifteen minutes went by before his sparrow-like face appeared. 'I was looking in alphabetical order first, no result, like I said. Now I've been through all the files in chronological order for the whole of 1936. They begin with File 36/1/1/111 B, that's year, month, consecutive number, and the Roman three at the end is for theft, and B is for the sub-category pickpocketing.'

  'What indicates murder?' Franke interrupted him.

  'I A. But like I said, all we had in Zehlendorf in 1936 was a manslaughter, that's I B. There's a gap in August, though. The file with consecutive number 122 is missing, which is odd, because if a file's been lent out there's usually a card index entry in its place, giving the name and department of whoever's borrowed it. And there isn't one here.'

  'Can you establish the date of that file?'

  Yet again Ewald did a tightrope act across the planks to the shelves. This time he came straight back. 'The files just before and just afterwards were dated the third and the seventh of August respectively, if that's any help.'

  The inspector and sergeant were glad to get up the stairs and away from the stench below. Dietrich turned to the man on duty. 'Superintendent, how long have you been at this station?'

  'Since '38, inspector. I was in Pankow before that.'

  All the same, it's possible that you can help us. A woman murdered in the Onkel Tom quarter in 1936 - who's likely to have been in charge of the inquiries back then?'

  'Wilhelm Schluter. He was head of the ZehlendorfclD from 1935, ended up as Chief Detective Superintendent. During the war he commanded a Security Police unit in the Ukraine.'

  'You don't by any chance know what became of him?'

  'You bet I do, inspector. He's in Brandenburg penitentiary. Responsible for mass shootings in Kiev. They say the Russians need him as a witness to cases involving other horrors, or it'd have been a bullet in the back of the neck for him long ago.'

  'Brandenburg penitentiary? Franke, we must try to get permission to interview him.'

  'What, from the NKvD?' The sergeant gave his superior a pitying glance. Ben bought a twenty-pfennig ticket at the ticket counter in Onkel Tom. There was nothing on the platform to remind anyone of last week's murder. Passengers were waiting calmly for the tr
ain. Ben got into the end carriage and sat down in the empty conductor's seat next to the driver's cab. On the way back this would be the front of the train, manned by the driver and conductor. The rails gleamed in the afternoon sun. Out here in the suburbs the U-Bahn track was carved out of the sand of the Brandenburg Mark, and still above ground. Ben thought of what his father had said about Hajo and his hand, and swore to himself never to forget it. This good resolution lasted all of two stations, as far as Thielplatz. By the time he reached Dahlem Dorf station the torn-off hand was in one of his mental pigeon-holes. Ben had many such pigeon-holes in his head: for school, which he attended as sporadically as possible: for Gert Schlomm, who had taught him to masturbate before he began taking an interest in Heidi Rodel: for Heidi's breasts, which he dreamed of, waking with a stiff penis: for the new GYA youth club, which must surely prove productive: for the Prince of Wales check suit in which he intended to make a conquest of Heidi.

  That double-breasted suit accompanied Ben into his dreams; smooth, soft fabric, beautifully tailored, with sharp creases down the trouser legs and broad, slightly sloping shoulders. But best of all were the lapels, which he could see in his mind's eye: they rose elegantly, following the curve of the chest in a gentle arc and complementing the collar at a harmonious angle. After careful consideration of the pros and cons he had decided on a button to close the jacket at waist level and four buttons on the sleeves. He had firmly decided on velvety brown suede shoes, too. They were going to have thick crepe soles.

  After Podbielskiallee, the underground railway lived up to its name and thundered through the tunnel. Bored, Ben looked at the ads in the carriage. He had been familiar with them from his early childhood: the liveried men from the House of Lefevre delivering carpets: the huntsman from the Pfalz who took salt because Salz rhymed with Pfalz: the green bottles of Staatlich Fachingen water. Just before Niirnberger Strasse, sunlight suddenly shone into the carriage. A bomb had knocked a hole in the roof of the tunnel.