Death’s Head

by Campbell Armstrong

  ‘Just forget I ever let you see it,’ he said.

  The woman said, ‘All right. I’ve forgotten. But tell me one thing – why do you want it back?’

  ‘Mind your own bloody business.’

  He began to button his overcoat. Outside, it was beginning to get light. He looked at the woman and for some reason felt a touch of pity for her. He allowed the feeling to pass. He was becoming soft, that was the trouble. He was losing his edge. Once, he had been as hard as a razor, a fact he remembered with a mixture of shame and pleasure.

  ‘Are you going?’ she asked.

  He left some money on the table and went out without saying another word to her. In the street it was bitterly cold: an empty wind drifted up through the barren buildings. He thought of the Jew but that hardly mattered now. Berlin was a large, broken city. He was hardly likely to see the Jew again.

  Until midday he saw a whole sequence of people in his surgery and he listened to their complaints. There were cases of dysentery, malnutrition, bronchitis, venereal disease, gangrene – the last being the complaint of an old soldier who had sustained a serious wound during the defence of Berlin. He treated his patients as well as he could, but it was hard without the proper supplies of medicine. Ultimately he didn’t care; he regarded death as a fact of nature and any attempt he made professionally to prevent it from occurring was bound to be feeble. The best he could do was simply to alter the calendar of dying; to push the date back as far as he possibly could. Besides, he sometimes wondered if any of his patients were worth the trouble of saving. They came to him – thin people with faces he failed to recognize and names he barely remembered – and he asked himself how many of them had been responsible for Germany’s defeat. Even the old Berlin soldier, whom he regarded with a grudging respect, must carry some of the blame for failing to protect the last stronghold of the Reich. And when he realized how little he genuinely cared for his patients, he knew it was because the things he had believed in, the themes and concepts in dreams that had sustained him, lay somewhere about him in ruins.

  This sense of wreckage had changed him. Even his appearance, over which he had once spent so much time, had become shabby now. When he looked at his face in the reflection of a mirror he was invariably touched by a moment of pain. And when he examined his reflection closely he experienced the odd sensation that somehow he no longer existed. His name, for example – what was his name? The letters that came to him were addressed to Gerhardt Lutzke, Doctor of Medicine. And his patients called him Doctor Lutzke, and when they did, sometimes when they did, he had difficulty in remembering that they were addressing him.

  At first, at the very beginning, he used to imagine foolishly that they were talking to someone else, another person who had silently entered the room behind his back. Although this feeling passed, it seemed to him that he had assumed more than a new name, he had taken on a new life – easily, calmly, as one puts on a new overcoat. He was a different person. The mirror reflected a different face. And all that remained of the past – apart from his memories – was the photograph. When he had looked at it earlier it even seemed that the person who had been snapped against the Schöner Brunnen was a child, a boy dressing up for the day in the ancient militaristic cast-offs of his father. It was nonsense of course. The ideas that went through his mind and sometimes seemed to burn there were often nonsense. He hadn’t lost either his identity or his beliefs. It was called a period of transition. The old world – his world – had ceased to exist, but he felt, along with so many others, that it was merely a temporary cessation. A day was coming; a better day was coming, and when it came everyone would see that nothing had really changed.

  When he had finished his surgery period he went into the kitchen and scrubbed his hands under water that he had previously boiled. There were tiny sores along the backs of his fingers. He couldn’t remember where they had come from. At one time they would have worried him greatly, more so than they did now. He spread some ointment over them: in a day or two they would heal. He poured a small glass of cognac, noticing that the bottle was almost empty. He realized he would have to negotiate with a black marketeer for a new bottle and he hated the thought. It seemed to him criminal that Germans had been reduced to such activities – some, he had heard, were even making a fortune in scarce commodities. But this was perhaps symptomatic of a new period of cynicism. There had been cynical periods before, certainly, but Germany had always risen to transcend them. Some people he had spoken to recently were even starting to talk of a rebirth and there were rumours, probably entirely untrue, that a former Wehrmacht General – whom the rumours failed to name – was secretly reforming an army in Southern Bavaria. He liked to hear such rumours, becuase they demonstrated that some people still cared, but he could not bring himself to believe in them.

  When he heard a sound coming from his surgery, he thought for a moment that perhaps it was yet another patient visiting him after hours. He went towards the door and hesitated. Whoever was in the surgery was walking very slowly up and down the room. He put his hand against the door and pushed it open. The man in the surgery was wearing the uniform of a captain in the United States Army. He was standing by the window, looking out into the street. In one hand he held a briefcase; and for a moment Schwarzenbach imagined that the captain had come in connection with the dead girl in the Augsburgerstrasse, yet that, he realized immediately afterwards, was most unlikely. What connection could there be between a US captain and a dead German girl? He felt uneasy and he thought of the photograph in the pocket of his overcoat: he should have destroyed it, he knew he should have taken it and burned it. But why was he reacting like this? He was behaving like a guilty man who has something dark to hide.

  ‘Dr Lutzke?’ The American was a man of about forty. He had an easy manner, a natural charm, that Schwarzenbach immediately suspected.

  ‘Yes,’ Schwarzenbach said. ‘Can I help you?’

  The American said, ‘May I sit down?’ He moved towards a chair and laid the briefcase on his knees. ‘Do you mind if I smoke?’

  ‘Please do,’ Schwarzenbach said. He stood behind his desk and absently touched the paperknife that lay across the blotter. ‘I’m not sure how I can help you. If you’ve come for my professional assistance –’

  ‘Nothing like that, Dr Lutzke,’ the American said. ‘I ought to introduce myself. Captain Eberhard.’

  ‘Captain Eberhard,’ Schwarzenbach said. He sat down and stared at the American. A man of forty, but still apparently youthful; a facile charm that came from confidence, and a confidence that came from a good education and upbringing. Schwarzenbach could imagine him being adept at athletic pursuits – tennis, basketball, swimming. And he probably danced well, talked well, and in his own territory was known as a good mixer. These thoughts went quickly through Schwarzenbach’s mind. He had known Americans like Eberhard before. Once, as a medical student, he had gone to the United States. A dismal place, he thought: but that had been in 1924 and perhaps it had changed since then. His only memory now was of warm nights filled with banal talk and young girls whose mothers had educated them to think in terms of making a good marriage. There had been stiff, polite young men from private schools who made conversation as if they were playing a game of poker.

  ‘What can I do for you, Captain?’ Schwarzenbach asked.

  ‘I’m not sure yet,’ the American said. He was smiling. He had been wearing the smile for some minutes now as though it were fixed to his face permanently; an affliction of some kind, Schwarzenbach thought. And yet he still felt uneasy. He thought of the photograph again and wondered if he was worrying needlessly. A photograph proved nothing. You could not say that a photograph was evidence of anything.

  ‘There must be some reason for your visit,’ Schwarzenbach said.

  ‘Yes. There is.’ Eberhard seemed in no hurry to express his purpose. He continued to smoke his cigarette and, to Schwarzenbach’s vague annoyance, flick his ash on the floor. The conquerors could do as they pl
eased, he supposed, even in the most inconsequential of ways.

  ‘Perhaps you would be kind enough to tell me,’ Schwarzenbach said.

  ‘Of course. You must be a fairly busy man. There’s a lot of sickness around these days.’ Eberhard smiled but still did not seem in a rush to explain. He finished his cigarette and crushed it in the ashtray on the desk. ‘I like your country, I must say. I only wish I’d seen it before the war.’

  ‘It was different then, of course.’ Again the sense of unease touched Schwarzenbach. If only the man would come to the point; instead, he seemed content to wander in pointless circles around whatever it was he really wanted to say.

  ‘I can easily imagine that, Dr Lutzke.’

  Was Schwarzenbach mistaken? Or had Eberhard said the word ‘Lutzke’ with an undertone of mockery? Of disbelief and doubt? He played with the paperknife. Otherwise he knew that his hands would begin to tremble. He felt suddenly sick: it was as if a deepening shadow had fallen across his mind, obscuring everything around him.

  ‘How can I help you, Captain?’

  ‘Oh – did I say you could help me?’ Eberhard was grinning stupidly.

  ‘I can’t remember. But I imagine that you’re here because you think I can help you in some way.’

  ‘How do you imagine you could help me?’

  Schwarzenbach felt a growing sense of despair. It was impossible not to think that the man was trying in some devious way to trap him. But why? What did he suspect? Did he suspect anything?

  ‘Until you tell me why you’re here, I don’t know how I can help you,’ he said.

  Eberhard made as if to open his briefcase and then apparently changed his mind. He drummed his fingers upon the metal clasp. ‘You don’t enjoy having us in your country, do you?’ he asked.

  Schwarzenbach shrugged. ‘We lost the war. You won. The spoils of victory.’

  ‘But you don’t like it, do you?’

  ‘It hardly matters what I like, does it? My opinion is totally irrelevant.’

  Eberhard opened the briefcase this time, glanced inside, and then closed it again. ‘Would you say you were a patriotic German, Dr Lutzke?’

  Schwarzenbach stared at him. What was the point of the game with the briefcase? What did it contain? Incriminating documents? A weapon? A warrant for his arrest? He tried to relax, to restrain his imagination.

  ‘I love my country,’ he said.

  ‘Good. I like to hear that. Why shouldn’t you love your country? Some people think patriotism’s a little old-fashioned, you know. But you have every right to love it. I love the United States of America. So I guess we’re both patriots, eh?’

  ‘I imagine so,’ Schwarzenbach said. He was aware of a slight finger of sweat touching his spine, running down to the base of his back. What did the man want? What was he here for?

  ‘Then maybe you don’t agree with the thing that’s going to happen at Nuremberg,’ Eberhard said. ‘We’ve got Goering, Hess, Keitel, Rosenberg, Streicher, von Schirach, Kaltenbrunner.’ Eberhard paused and Schwarzenbach noticed that he was counting on his fingers as he rattled off the names. ‘And there’s Neurath, Funk, Schacht, von Papen, Seyss-Inquart, Jodl, Raeder, Doenitz, Hans Frank, Speer, Frick, and Fritzsche. Have I missed anyone out? That’s quite a line-up. All the top brass except for a few. Do you agree with that? Do you agree they should be tried?’

  Schwarzenbach looked down at his desk. For a moment he said nothing. His mind had become a petrifying blank. And then; ‘They’re your prisoners. You can do what you like with them.’

  Eberhard was drumming on his briefcase again. ‘I don’t know what to make of that answer, Dr Lutzke.’

  ‘Did you come here just to ask me that?’

  Eberhard shook his head. ‘I’m from Military Intelligence. I should have mentioned that fact. I’m sorry I didn’t.’

  ‘What difference does it make?’

  ‘Perhaps quite a lot.’ Eberhard put the briefcase on the floor where it fell over face down. ‘I want to see your identity papers, Dr Lutzke.’

  Schwarzenbach tightened his grip on the paperknife. ‘I have no objection to your seeing them. Can I ask why?’

  Eberhard searched for his cigarettes. When he found them he lit one and tossed the match to the floor. ‘A routine check. That’s all.’

  Schwarzenbach took the papers from his jacket and passed them to the American. Eberhard didn’t study them. He flicked through them quickly as if they weren’t of any real interest to him. And then he handed them back.

  ‘Nuremberg is only the start, Dr Lutzke,’ he said. ‘We have a list of names that is a mile long.’

  ‘Why should that be of interest to me?’ Schwarzenbach asked.

  Eberhard didn’t answer. He got to his feet and picked up the briefcase. Smiling, he turned to Schwarzenbach. ‘I’m sorry to have taken up so much of your time, Dr Lutzke.’

  Schwarzenbach walked with him to the door. As he was leaving, he turned to Schwarzenbach and asked, ‘Do you intend to stay in Berlin long?’

  Schwarzenbach said, ‘I’m needed here.’

  ‘Yes,’ Eberhard said. ‘Yes, you are.’

  And then the captain was gone.

  He took the photograph and tore it into tiny pieces which he flushed down the we. He tried not to think of Eberhard’s visit. But it puzzled him. Why had he been part of a routine check? And what exactly was a routine check anyway? And why, when he had produced his identity papers, had Eberhard shown so little interest in them? And for what reason had he wanted to know whether Schwarzenbach intended to remain in Berlin? It puzzled and worried him; it was the feeling that he was being pursued by a shadow, something without physical substance. He tried to put these thoughts out of his mind. He was worrying too much. Eberhard’s visit had been nothing more than a routine check. That was all. He supposed that Eberhard would be calling on a great many people, looking at thousands of identity papers. And he, Dr Lutzke, was just one of that number.

  And then he remembered the Jew. He remembered Grunwald in the house on the Augsburgerstrasse and the coincidence sickened him, the coincidence of the meeting upset him. Had he managed to convince the Jew that he was Lutzke – and not Schwarzenbach? Or had Grunwald remained certain? If so, had he been talking to the authorities? Would that explain Eberhard’s visit? Would that make clear one of the reasons why Eberhard had mentioned Nuremberg and the war trials? Was it to frighten him? Make him feel that he, Eberhard, knew Lutzke’s real identity, and that it was merely a matter of time before the net closed around him?

  These questions circled Schwarzenbach’s consciousness; and at the back of his mind was the odd feeling that he really was afraid, that some new emotion had penetrated him. The Jew – who would have guessed that the Jew could have survived? And that he would turn up in Berlin? That was the frightening thing: it was the feeling that the Jew’s existence plunged him back into the past, to the recent as well as the distant past, into the trap of his own memories. Coincidence – it seemed such a frail thread, a thin chance, a random occurrence completely indifferent to the affairs and destinies of men.

  He felt better after the bits and pieces of the photograph had vanished – and yet, throughout the day, there returned to him curious sensations of uneasiness and anxiety.

  7

  The house that Schwarzenbach visited every Thursday evening was situated in a street near the Kaiser-Allee. Helmut Broszat lived in a tiny apartment on the top floor. Broszat, a man in his early fifties, assembled together secretively a regular gathering of former SS men. When Schwarzenbach arrived that evening and was shown into the front room there were already several men present; apart from Broszat, he recognized Seeler, an ex-Hauptsturmführer in the Wirtschafts und Verwaltungshauptamt, whose responsibility had been for the deportation of Jews from occupied Hungary: Katzmann, who had organized the last stages of the defence of Berlin and who, according to his own testimony, had been close to the Führer himself at the end; Urbach, who had worked in the Central Security Depart
ment of the Reich. They were drinking wine and talking aimlessly. As he entered Schwarzenbach wondered why he continued to come. He supposed it was for a sense of camaraderie because these were men who had lived through the same experiences as himself, belonged to the same organization, and who now – like himself – had reasons of their own for wishing, at least publicly, to disown their pasts. And yet, like himself, whenever they talked it was invariably about the past: the future was too difficult either to comprehend or to anticipate. Some of them were expecting to leave Germany as soon as it could be arranged; others preferred to stay, living assumed lives, hoping that the memories of the conquerors were short and their own disguises infallible. Urbach, for instance, was working as a translator for a firm of lawyers that had dealings with the Americans, and Katzmann had found employment with the city council – a menial position admittedly, but a safe one for that reason. Broszat and Seeler on the other hand were preparing to leave Germany as soon as the chance arose and Broszat, a perpetual optimist, was always talking of his negotiations with this, or that ex-Nazi who could promise him a safe passage out of Europe.

  Schwarzenbach helped himself to a glass of wine. The apartment was comfortably furnished and intact – a rare thing these days – and it was Schwarzenbach’s suspicion that Broszat paid for it out of old SS funds he had somehow managed to expropriate. As he sat drinking his wine, Schwarzenbach listened to the conversation. It followed a regular pattern: Urbach would state the case for remaining in Germany, arguing that the conquerors could not remain forever and envisaging a revival of the SS in a somewhat modified form – and for that reason he was prepared to stay; Broszat would accuse him of a lack of realism – the old days were dead and gone after all and no matter what happened to Germany in the future, the past that they had worked for could never be revived. The Russians and the Americans wanted revenge and when they were satisfied they would go home, leavirfg Germany depleted and disarmed. This was very clear. The only safe course of action was to leave.