by Anton Gill
He had been able to put Kessler's girlfriend away. Emma. He'd fancied his chances with her once himself, but she'd made it plain, in the way women do, that she wasn't interested.
Stuck-up little bitch. But her arrest had brought a jump in rank, and this lonely, but responsible assignment - all from Big Cheese Müller himself. Schiffer smiled. His star was on the ascendant. If only it wasn't rising too late. If only Kessler would make a slip, give himself away. That would be the coup for me, Schiffer thought, allowing his fantasy to get the better of him. He was in so far now there was no going back. No retreat. He had to cling to the ship he'd joined, and even if a part of his mind refused to let him forget that it was sinking, he suppressed the thought. he couldn't afford to admit to himself fully that all he was clinging to was wreckage, for if he did, what would there be left for him.
Of course he found nothing in the room, and spending the night there did no more than spook him.
He wondered if he dared fabricate something - some evidence that he could make to look as if it had been overlooked by Kessler. No. Too risky. But if he couldn't bring Hoffmann down, he'd make sure that Kessler fell. And then it struck him. If Kessler found out what had happened to Emma, wouldn't that be enough to dislodge him? Wouldn't that put him off his stroke? Wouldn't that make him desperate to find her, to save her if he could?
Schiffer smiled again. It was perfect. He sat down at the little desk in the hotel room, and started to write a short letter. It didn't take long. When he'd finished it, he sealed it in an envelope and put it in his pocket. Then, to put icing on the cake, he went down to the reception desk and wrote a coded telegram to send to Müller's office in Berlin. In it he said that he was by now convinced that Kessler was deliberately stalling his investigation, but for proof he'd have to keep him under further observation. These days, he knew, the suggestion would be enough to keep them salivating, provided nobody questioned it, and he knew how unlikely it was that anyone would.
He waited for his delivery boy.
79
Kessler walked back to the temporary office which had been set up for them at Police HQ, Kleinschmidt having gone off on his last errand, which Kessler suspected was simply an excuse to sneak in another couple of beers. He himself was convinced they had reached the end of the line, here.
Kessler had drunk his wine and a cognac, but he'd eaten nothing. The alcohol had relaxed him enough for him to feel more relieved than worried. After all, if he'd lost Hoffmann, he'd lost him. He'd done what he could, and by the grace of God it hadn't been necessary to try to obscure any evidence they might have turned up. And what could they do to him? Demote him? Sack him? In fact, they'd probably just tell him to keep looking because no-one would want to have to tell the Führer that the little cat-and-mouse diversion he'd set up had come to naught. Far better to delay until something else came up to distract him, or they could throw him a bigger fish, though everyone knew that Hitler never forgot and never forgave anyone who crossed him, and the waiting game might therefore be a long one.
He might even be able to use this to his advantage. They'd be bound to recall him, and once in Berlin he'd try to find out what had happened to Emma. She must have gone by now. He thought of her with desperation. Would he ever find her again? Where the hell would he look? But at least if he knew that she'd left his parents' place, there was half a chance that she'd be safe somewhere. She was resourceful, he told himself.
He'd barely entered the building before the duty officer picked up the internal telephone. He walked over to the desk as the man hung up.
'Glad you're back. They've sent people out everywhere to look for you.'
'I left word where I'd be.'
'Yes, but this only reached us ten minutes ago. When our man got to Auerbach's they told him he'd just missed you.'
As he spoke, a detective hurried down the stairs which descended to the grey reception hall and came over to him.
'We've got something for you.' He rushed Kessler across the hall and through an entrance which led to a corridor whose grubby cream walls were studded at regular intervals with mud-coloured doors. He pushed Kessler through one of them into a modest office. Going round the desk he picked up the one file on it, which Kessler noticed was sealed, and handed it across.
'This might have something to do with your man.'
'Where?' Kessler's heart sank.
'Name's in the file. I guess. Some village in the middle of nowhere, south-west of Freyburg. The SS took it over a couple of weeks ago, some hush-hush business, but it's on the line where you'd expect the enemy to advance - not that they'll ever get that far, of course.'
Kessler ignored that. 'What happened to the people?'
'What people?'
'The villagers.'
'Oh – relocated.' The cop looked away briefly. 'Anyway, it's in the file.' The detective was a weather-beaten man of perhaps fifty who wouldn't look out of place in a village himself. He indicated a chair, a battered carver which was surprisingly comfortable, and lowered his own bulk into the swivel-chair on his side of the desk. He took out a pack of Roth-Händle and waved it at Kessler, who leaned over and took one, but refused a nip from the bottle of Korn which was also produced and brandished. 'Some kind of fight down there,' the Leipzig cop continued, lighting their cigarettes. 'This kid in a kind-of SS uniform turns up at a little local cop shop down in Memmelstein at about four in the morning, one arm smashed to pieces, state of collapse, been walking for hours. One guy on duty down there, old man, half asleep, sort of hears the story but then can't rouse anyone by telephone for two more hours. Finally they send a squad from Weimar - locate this sodding village, find a massacre down there: three soldiers - some kind of SS – all dead, and a burnt-out motorbike.'
'Where's the survivor?'
'They had to take the arm off. Died under anaesthetic. They managed to get a description of the man who did it out of him before he died, but it's more or less useless, and of course if it was your man he's long gone.' He scratched his head, took a pull from his bottle, lit another cigarette. 'Big cover-up, of course. Gestapo around like flies on meat; but then we get this report cleared for you by Berlin – Prinz-Albrecht-Strasse, no less.'
'Who else has looked at it?'
The cop grinned. 'Oh, no-one, of course. For your eyes only. All I just told you is hearsay I got over the phone from the boys in Weimar.'
'And what's your clearance?'
The cop kept grinning. 'I'm a section chief here. Don't look so surprised, Inspector Kessler, it hurts my feelings.'
When he got back to his own office, Kessler found Kleinschmidt already there, told him the news, and got him to arrange for their things to be brought round from their hotel. 'Get the car round too – full tank, we'll need it.'
'And where am I supposed to get the petrol?'
'Get them to organise some from here, man. You think anyone's going to make difficulties on a thing like this?'
'If they've got any,' grumbled Kleinschmidt, getting up. 'When did all this happen anyway?'
'Two nights ago.'
'And it'll take us –'
'We should be there by this evening. Get them to give you a large-scale road map too.'
'And where do we stay? Want me to organise a tent, as well?'
'Get on with it. I want to be out of here in an hour.'
Kleinschmidt made his way to the door. 'By the way,' he said as he left, 'There's a letter for you. I picked it up from the duty officer.' He jerked his head at an envelope on the desk.
'Did he say when it arrived?'
'No – when you were in your meeting, I guess.'
'All right.'
As Kleinschmidt closed the door behind him, Kessler opened the letter. His name on the envelope was written in neat capitals, as were the contents, which were unsigned. Both envelope and paper were otherwise plain.
YOU WILL BE INTERESTED TO KNOW THAT EMMA HOFFMANN WAS ARRESTED NEAR BERLIN LAST MONDAY AND TAKEN INTO CUSTODY. HER PRESENT WHEREAB
OUTS ARE UNKNOWN TO US BUT SHE HAS BEEN TAKEN AWAY FROM THE CAPITAL.
THAT WE KNOW YOUR PRESENT WHEREABOUTS SHOULD CONFIRM THE LEGITIMACY OF THIS COMMUNICATION, WHICH YOU SHOULD DESTROY IMMEDIATELY ONCE READ.
Kessler reread the note twice. Then he did as he was told, using his lighter to burn the letter and the envelope, crushing the blackened remains to nothing in the ashtray, all the time glancing towards the door. He lit a cigarette and smoked it hard, so that its smell would cover any that lingered of burned paper. Finally he mixed all the ashes, poured them into a fresh envelope from the desk drawer, crumpled it, and threw it into the wastepaper basket.
80
There was only one way in which they could have got to her so fast: Schiffer had been detailed to make the arrest, and Schiffer must have been thinking more quickly than usual. But Kessler knew that Schiffer had been put on the case. He should have realised that Schiffer would have put two-and-two together.
He should have taken Emma somewhere else, somewhere anonymous. But there hadn't been time. He hadn't had time to think. But he should have thought of that at least... Should have...
Too late! He rubbed his forehead. Three and a half days ago. Oh, Christ! And there was nothing he could do, unless he threw everything up, went on the run himself, but what good would that do her, and without any authority at all, and people almost certainly after him, he'd be as powerless as Hoffmann was now.
He forced himself to breathe evenly. He lit another cigarette, almost the last in the packet, coughing slightly because he was not a heavy smoker. He pushed his glasses up to the bridge of his nose. Where the hell might she be, if she wasn't dead already? But he refused to believe that. He couldn't bring himself to believe that, and in a curious way he knew it wasn't true. Not just because he didn't want it to be true, but because it didn't add up. They'd have shot her there and then, if they'd thought for a minute that she'd been directly involved with the attempt on Hitler's life.
And who were his informants? Was there anyone left in the Resistance organised enough to be able to contact him in this way? He couldn't think straight. For a moment the wild notion crossed his mind that the letter was from Hoffmann himself. Then another thought struck him. It was obvious. He smiled bitterly.
He stubbed the cigarette out and sat upright in his chair, the file about the killings in the village still unopened on his lap. Of course it might be nothing to do with Hoffmann, but if the village was south-west of Freyburg it would be on a route Hoffmann might easily have chosen –country roads. If it was Hoffmann, the trail was hot again. If he got on with it, if he could nail Hoffmann, there'd be nothing they wouldn't let him do, he'd have such cachet. And he'd be free to find Emma. They might even let her go, if she was a prisoner. If –
He stood up, putting the file on the desk. As he did so, he decided to break the seal. Kleinschmidt wouldn't take that long to get things organised, and anyway anyone might come in at any moment. The country cop who'd given him the file, for example. If he had that kind of clearance, who was he really working for? He certainly wasn't a typical Kripo man.
Before he broke the seal, he examined it. He wasn't surprised to see that someone else had in fact opened it already and skilfully – but not quite skilfully enough – re-closed it.
Kessler had to cut a way through the trees. And he'd calmed down enough to know that his momentary impulse was insane. What would Emma think or feel if she found out – as she would – that her freedom had been bought at the cost of her father's betrayal?
He sat down again, took off his glasses, and cleaned them. At last a reasonable and maybe even hopeful possibility occurred to him. He'd heard about an 'Arrest of Kindred' measure that the Gestapo had brought in. The wives, sons and daughters – even the fathers, mothers and cousins – of conspirators against the Party were being jailed, but if there was no immediate need, they were not necessarily also being tortured or killed.
At least that was what he'd heard. There were also rumours that they were being taken to a camp - or more than one - where there were special facilities for them, where they didn't share the same fate as the other prisoners, where they were being kept, as it were, on ice. Quite why, he didn't know, but he had an idea of where: there'd been talk of secret amenities at the concentration camp at Dachau. If they were true, then maybe... But he wasn't sure if he wasn't leaning more on hope than reason.
His shoulders slumped again. She may be alive, even alive and well, but how would he ever find her? And if he found her, how would he reach her? Well, he thought, let's find her first. Dachau was just one possibility. There were plenty of other camps where women were kept, and the one reserved for women was at Ravensbrück – seventy-five kilometres north of Berlin – a world away for Kessler.
His head ached. He lit another cigarette but it didn't make him feel any better. He had to get on. Reluctantly, he opened the file, and began to read. As he did so, his mind gradually but automatically re-engaged with his work, and that was some comfort. But Hoffmann and his daughter would not leave his thoughts, and as he read, planning what he might do when he examined the burnt-out bike, and whatever other evidence he might find that the Gestapo and the local police hadn't already trampled over, he was also thinking, though without much success, about any means by which he might yet be able to snatch at least one of them from the fire.
There was little in the file he hadn't already been told: the description the dying boy had left could have fitted Hoffmann, but it wasn't precise enough. A big man in a leather jacket. And, as the cop who'd given him the file had said, whoever it was would be long gone by now. However, without transport, he couldn't have gone far. But the cop hadn't mentioned the description in detail, he'd just said that it was there.
Was this some kind of test for him – to see if he'd suppress it or act on it? And how the hell could they check? He decided to tell no-one else about what he'd read, and returned the file to the front desk, to be locked in the secure archive.
81
They arrived at the village later than Kessler had hoped, and dirtier, because they'd had a puncture on the way and had to change the tyre, which had plunged Kleinschmidt into a deep gloom - which unfortunately had not resulted in silence, but a long and repetitive diatribe against all things rural. Kleinschmidt, it appeared, would never set foot anywhere again where he could not feel paving stones beneath his feet, and see buildings wherever he looked.
But it was still light when they reached the square. The motorbike rested where it had been left, against the flight of steps which led up to the entrance of the church. The market hall was open and so was the inn next door, both dimly lit, as were the half dozen tents pitched near them. There must have been twenty SS and Gestapo personnel in the village, along with another half dozen regular police, all constables, roped in for auxiliary duties.
They'd barely drawn to a halt when their car was surrounded by a group of men, three of whom carried machine guns at the ready; though it was the other two who stepped forward, one a Hauptsturmführer, the other, taller man in civilian clothes.
'Scholz, Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler,' the uniformed man said.
Kessler introduced himself, thinking, Christ, they are putting weight behind this. A Leibstandarte officer in charge.
'We've been expecting you. They called Memmelstein from Leipzig. They radioed the message through to us from there.' He turned to the other man. 'This is Bauer, RSHA.'
The other man nodded coldly. His patch, thought Kessler. National fucking Security. Doesn't like me muscling in.
They walked over to the market hall, where the ground floor had been converted into an operations room. There was a radio transmitter on a table against the wall near the door, and beyond it boards on trestles, on which an assortment of items had been laid out. Among them Kessler recognised the charred remains of a large leather bag. There were also bloodstained uniform fragments, three old-fashioned rifles, and what looked like the contents of people's pockets, rendered pathetic by the
deaths of their owners: packets of cigarettes, condoms, handkerchiefs, wallets, keys, loose change.
'They'll take your bags next door,' said Scholz. We've got a couple of rooms fixed up for you. And the water's OK. Where do you want to start?'
'Here. I'll take a look at the bike in the morning, when it's light.' Kessler walked over to the neatly-labelled exhibits and glanced at them.
'How many people have touched this stuff?'
'Just my men,' said Bauer in a frozen voice. 'We're used to handling evidence.'
'Shouldn't have been moved at all before I arrived. Didn't they tell you that?'
'No.' Several degrees lower.
'Well, I'll do what I can. I see there's nothing personal here.'
'Like what?'
'Soldiers usually carry photographs of their loved ones, letters, things like that.'
'These men were on a secret mission,' said Scholz. 'Their identities have been confirmed by local SS-command.'
'And what was their mission?'
Scholz smiled thinly. 'I believe your remit is to trace the traitor Hoffmann.'
'I have a Hitler Order to do so.'
'I am aware of that.'
Kessler suddenly felt less sure of his ground. He was after all talking to a captain in the most elite squad of the Waffen-SS, and, for all he knew, Scholz was a member of Hitler's personal bodyguard.