Alphabet House

by Adler-Olsen, Jussi

  Welles had been enlisted in Dempsey’s 2nd British Army when they liberated the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. He had been promoted twice and at the hearings preceding the Nuremberg trials had occasionally testified about the Nazis’ concentration camp medical experiments. Finally he had been assigned the task of inspecting the Nazi hospitals as part of a team of experts set up by British Intelligence.

  There had been hundreds of field hospitals spread all over the country. The great majority were deserted, their purpose no longer relevant. A few had been converted into local hospitals and private clinics. And then there were places like the mental hospital in Hadamar where they’d found patients in mass graves. The disfigured, the crippled, the hideous and insane.

  It had been a harrowing time for the inspection team, even in the case of ordinary patients with body wounds. The consequences of the Nazi view of human nature also applied to their own ranks. During the last months of the war it was not unusual for the food to be so lacking in fat that the patients suffered irreparable damage to their nervous systems. Of the hospitals they visited, only a few in southern Germany and Berlin itself were what could be described as acceptable. Otherwise conditions had been completely miserable.

  After some months on the job Welles felt emotionally drained. In the end he no longer cared where he was, whom he was with or what he drank. He stopped thinking of going home.

  The notion of a mother country no longer held any meaning for him.

  Welles’ final stationing was in connection with the hospital at Bad Kreuznach, where he met a young nurse with an incredible zest for life and a wonderful laugh that made him wake up. Bryan could remember having had a similar experience.

  They’d fallen in love and after a couple of years had moved to Hamburg where his wife’s family lived, and where people didn’t give her quite as strange looks because she’d married someone attached to the occupation forces.

  Welles built up a firm in Hamburg that prospered for a number of years. They now had three children. All in all he was satisfied.

  His account made a great impression on Bryan.

  Later in the evening Fowles gave Bryan a list of the agents he had selected. Welles’ name was not among them. He had been assessed and found wanting. Too old, too jovial, too Canadian, and he snuffled when he spoke.

  Bryan was simply supposed to sign Fowles’ rejection.

  The letter lay on Bryan’s desk all evening and all night. It was also the first thing he saw the following morning.

  Nobody could have detected the slightest disappointment or surprise in Welles’ voice when Bryan phoned him. ‘It’ll all work out, don’t you think, Mr Scott?’ he said. ‘But I’m thankful you found time to tell me yourself.’

  ‘Naturally we’ll refund your travel expenses, Mr Welles, but I may be able to help you just the same. How much longer will you be at your hotel?’

  ‘I’m leaving for the airport in two hours’ time.’

  ‘Can we meet before you leave?’

  The standard of the boarding house in Bayswater was far lower than what Bryan considered suitable for his own employees. Although the fashionable avenue had more hotels than the City had banks, Keith Welles had succeeded in finding the crummiest of them all. The stairs themselves left no doubt that this humble dwelling’s days of glory were ancient history.

  Welles had already poured himself a drink when Bryan arrived. Feeling himself unobserved, disappointment was written all over his face. Not until Bryan spoke did he assume his cheerful mask. Much too relaxed, much too harmonious.

  He was clumsy and unshaven, but Bryan liked him and needed him.

  ‘I’ve found you a job, Mr Welles. In so far as you and your family are still able to move to Bonn, the job is yours from the middle of next month. You are to function as an English-speaking pharmacist in the management of one of our subcontractors’ sub-suppliers. You are precisely the man the company has been looking for. The job includes a staff house near the Rhine, a couple of miles out of town. Suitable salary and pension. Doesn’t that sound tempting?’

  Welles knew the company. He was clearly confused and astonished, without realising he’d dropped his mask. He wasn’t used to coming by things so easily.

  ‘You can do something for me in return, Mr Welles.’

  ‘As long as it isn’t illegal or involve my having to sing,’ he said, attempting to sound cheerful as he knitted his brow.

  ‘When you were talking about your inspection of the German hospitals after the war you mentioned you’d been visiting mental hospitals, and that you’d also been on a tour of inspection in southern Germany. Isn’t that so?’

  ‘Yes, on several occasions.’

  ‘Also in the vicinity of Freiburg?’

  ‘Freiburg im Breisgau? Yes, I was all over Baden Württemberg.’

  ‘I am especially interested in knowing something about a sanatorium – a hospital, rather – near a small town called Herbolzheim, north of Freiburg on the outskirts of Schwarzwald. The hospital was solely for SS soldiers. There was also a psychiatric ward. Does that say anything to you?’

  ‘There are many sanatoriums in Freiburg. There were then, too.’

  ‘Yes, but north of Freiburg. It was a big one. Up in the mountains. A whole hospital with at least ten large buildings.’

  ‘You don’t know what it was called?’

  ‘Some called it the Alphabet House, that’s all I know. Only SS soldiers were admitted.’

  ‘I’m afraid I’ll have to disappoint you, Mr Scott. Scores of reserve hospitals were built during the war. It’s also many years ago. Sometimes I inspected several hospitals and clinics during the course of one day. It’s probably too long ago. I just can’t remember much from that time any more.’

  ‘But you could try just the same, couldn’t you?’ Bryan leaned forward, looking him straight in the eyes. The look that met him was alert and intelligent. ‘You go back to Germany, talk to your family and spend a couple of days sorting out your affairs. Then you go to Freiburg and investigate some things for me for a couple of weeks, if it proves necessary. You’ll have time before you begin your new job. In the meantime I’ll pay all your expenses generously.’ Bryan nodded. ‘That’s how you can repay me.’

  ‘What am I supposed to be looking for? Am I simply to find that hospital you just mentioned?’

  ‘No, the hospital was destroyed in the beginning of 1945. I’m looking for a man I met there.’

  ‘At the hospital?’

  ‘That’s right. The same hospital as I was in, though I managed to escape on 23rd November 1944. I’ll explain the circumstances later. But this man remained at the hospital and I lost track of him. I’d like to know what happened. He was admitted under the name of Gerhart Peuckert. During the next couple of days I’ll supply you with all the information you’ll need, such as rank, appearance and other particulars.’

  ‘Do you know if he’s still alive?’

  ‘I assume he’s dead. He was probably at the hospital when we bombed it.’

  ‘And the usual intelligence sources and archives? Have all the possibilities been investigated?’

  ‘You can be damn sure they have! No stone unturned.’

  Even though Bryan didn’t tell him more than necessary on this occasion, a somewhat puzzled Keith Welles agreed to take on the job. He had the time and could hardly refuse. But despite Bryan’s minute description of the place and the other patients and staff, including names and physical characteristics, Welles’ first report didn’t succeeded in uncovering any clues about Gerhart Peuckert’s fate. Nearly thirty years had elapsed. He complained that the task was almost impossible. The hospital and the man they were looking for had disappeared without a trace. Moreover, any patient lying in a mental hospital during the last days of the Third Reich would in all probability have been liquidated. Mercy killing was the state’s safest form of treatment for that type of patient.

  Bryan was possessed by disappointment. The coincidence during recent
weeks of the meetings with Welles and Wilkens and the invitation to the Olympic Games had instilled in him the hope of resolving the case and finally gaining peace of mind.

  ‘Couldn’t you come over for a couple of days, Mr Scott?’ Welles appealed. ‘I’m sure it would be a great help.’

  On the third day Bryan phoned the National Olympic Committee and explained he had some business to do in southern Germany. If they would place a flat in the Olympic City at his disposal, they could consult him if there were any acute problems. The committee agreed. This time England was going to do better than the five golds, five silvers and three bronzes taken in Mexico.

  Cost what it may.

  Laureen was displeased. Not because Bryan was going to travel, but because she only got to know about it on the eve of his departure.

  ‘Couldn’t you at least have told me yesterday? You realise I can’t possibly go with you now, Bryan. If you’re expecting me to tell my sister-in-law that she can just stay at home in Penarth, I can assure you it’s too late now! Bridget is waiting on the platform in Cardiff at this very moment.’

  Laureen looked at her watch in despair and sighed deeply as her shoulders slumped. Bryan avoided her gaze. He knew what she was thinking. It had been difficult enough arranging her sister-in-law’s visit. To cancel it would be the end of the world.

  But that’s how he had wanted it.

  Chapter 31

  It was a smiling Keith Welles who strode across the road. Traffic had come to a complete standstill. The classic description of German order and efficiency didn’t exactly fit with the sight that met Bryan at Munich’s airport. The heat struck him in the face. Cars were packed so close together that it wasn’t even possible to open the boot.

  ‘Chaos, total chaos,’ grinned Welles, as he tugged him along the traffic lanes. Only the buses were moving. Everyone was out to watch the opening of the Games. Everyone except Bryan.

  The city itself was about to boil over. A magical thrill of colour and festivity. The stronghold of culture. Musicians, artists and dancers were assembled. Every street corner reflected countless days of preparation. It was both big business and no business. And Bryan was feeling extremely strange.

  He felt as if he were in a vacuum in this mixed crowd of Germans and foreigners, all strolling around, safe and smiling. It was possible to banish the ghost of the past for only moments at a time. Then the voices rose again and brought back memories of the tone and aggressiveness of the language that years ago would have made Bryan shudder. Letting Welles guide him forward, he stared at the numerous young people who were enjoying the outdoor pleasures of café life and speaking the native language so naturally, sweetly and melodiously, without the savage, threatening undertones of the past. He also surveyed the stream of old women and men in whose faces he saw the dreadful mark of Cain.

  And then he knew he had returned.

  It took Welles two whole steins of beer to familiarize Bryan with his fruitless reconnoitring. The crowded, easy-going atmosphere of the outdoor cafe couldn’t hide his shame. He raised his hand deprecatingly when the waiter came around a third time. ‘I know that if I kept on forever, sooner or later I’d probably stumble across a clue that could be traced to someone who had been at the sanatorium in Freiburg. But I honestly think it could take years. I’m not a professional, you see. The question is whether I’m the right person to undertake the task.’ Welles pursed his lips. ‘I haven’t sufficient time, we know that. There are far too many treatment centres, far too many archives, far too many case histories and far too great distances. And then there’s the Wall. Who says the decisive clue is to be found in Western Germany? If it’s in Eastern Germany, we’d have visa problems among other things, and that too takes time and still more time.’ He smiled and then frowned. ‘What you really need is a huge system of nosy sleuths and archivists.’

  ‘That’s been tried.’

  ‘Then why do it again now?’

  Bryan regarded Welles at length. Unfortunately he was right. Everything pointed to his being unable to get to the bottom of James’ enigmatic fate. It was also true that he could have entrusted the job to a professional. The fact was that Bryan hadn’t intended to delve further into the past until providence sent him the unshaven man who was sitting in front of him.

  He had always assumed James was dead. And now he had to attempt to find out, once and for all.

  ‘I’m getting the feeling I ought to use the carrot-and-stick method. I’d be terribly sorry if you gave up in advance. So sorry, in fact, that it might affect your new position in Bonn.’

  The reaction in Welles’ eyes said this would be a bad idea. At any rate, fruitless.

  ‘But I’m a man of my word, Mr Welles, and you don’t owe me anything. You can hear that I’m desperate. We’re venturing into an area that should probably never have been investigated. I’m seriously afraid I’m doing myself a disservice with all this. But you see, the man we’re looking for was my best friend. He was English and his real name was James Teasdale. I left him behind at that hospital and I haven’t seen him since. If I never learn more about his fate, the uncertainty will haunt me for the rest of my life because I’ll never find the strength to try again.’

  The adjoining tables were emptying as they were talking. Even the impatient waiters had given up trying to make them order more or leave so new customers could get at the all-too-few tables. The broadcast of the opening of the Games was already in full swing. Welles was studying Bryan with interest. ‘Give me another two weeks, until the Games are over,’ Bryan finally said. ‘Concentrate on the area around Freiburg. If we don’t get a bite, I’ll have to find some other way. I’ll give you an extra £5,000. Will you do that for me?’

  From inside the restaurant came the sound of fanfares and the roar of thousands of spectators – a round of cheering that echoed simultaneously from all the windows along the street. A beam of light from the beer glass Welles had been constantly fingering caught his serious expression and gave birth to small laughter lines in the corners of his mouth. He quietly extended his hand.

  ‘Then you’re going to have to call me Keith!’

  Despite the heat and the potential danger to health that always arises when thousands of people are crowded together, Bryan didn’t have much to do in the Olympic City. There were no acute gastric cases. The only contact he had had so far with the English group was over the telephone. Upon checking in, he’d received his admittance card to the stadiums and the usual invitations to various receptions and evening parties. But although time seemed to drag along, he never felt the need for company. As in the calm eye of a hurricane, Bryan dozed through events upon which the whole world was focused. ‘I envy you,’ said Keith Welles, when he phoned in his morning report. ‘I don’t envy you,’ Laureen lied, in their daily chat.

  The Olympic City was a seething cauldron. Everyone seemed to be constantly moving from one place to another. No one noticed Bryan. The few hours outside his hotel were spent in town – lunching in department store cafeterias, visiting museums, sitting on benches in green parks that were wilting in an eternal summer that refused to loosen its grip.

  The waiting was unbearable. Even books gave him no relief. The temptation to investigate Munich’s numerous pharmaceutical firms wasn’t strong enough.

  Everything revolved around James.

  ‘It may be that I’m getting too old,’ Bryan reflected, staring at the TV he hadn’t turned on in the far corner of his hotel room. There would be other Olympic Games. If he wanted to attend them in future he’d be glad to pay for it.

  On the tenth day Welles phoned him. He sounded different.

  ‘I may have something for you, Bryan.’ The words almost knocked him over. He held his breath. ‘Don’t expect too much, but I think I’ve found your Calendar Man.’

  ‘Where are you?’

  ‘I’m in Stuttgart, but he’s in Karlsruhe. Can we meet there?’

  ‘I’ll have to rent a car. Can I pick you up on the way?�
�� Bryan didn’t expect an answer as he sat rocking to and fro, legs crossed. It felt as if he were getting diarrhoea. ‘I just have to report that I’m leaving the area. I could meet you in three hours.’

  It was clear that Welles didn’t relish speed. The big car was silent. It wasn’t a love of speed that made Bryan always rent Jaguars – rather a case of national pride. But it could drive fast. Much too fast for Welles’ taste. He leaned in towards the middle of the car and tried to avoid looking at the road. ‘I decided I was looking for a true eccentric whose calling in life was to keep an exact account of the years, months, weeks and days. Then it was just a question of whether this Werner Fricke was still alive. If so, he was bound to turn up if I phoned enough places. It may sound simple, but I’ve been doing nothing else for days. Maybe a professional would have tackled it differently, but I phoned all the hospitals and treatment clinics I could find. At least fifty, before I found him.’

  ‘And Gerhart Peuckert? What about him?’ Bryan fixed his gaze on the road far ahead and clutched the steering wheel.

  ‘I’m sorry, Bryan, but up to now, nobody has known anything about him.’

  ‘Don’t worry, I’m not expecting too much at once. You’ve done a good piece of work, Keith. One step at a time, right?’ Bryan tried to smile. ‘I’m looking forward to seeing him again. So good old Calendar Man is alive…’ Bryan stared into space. ‘If he’s alive there’s hope for James, too.’

  ‘You can ask him questions, if you like, but I can’t promise he’ll answer.’ Like the rest of the clinic, the head doctor’s office was light and painted colourfully. It was an expensive place, not for just anyone. ‘Werner Fricke’s family has already been informed about your visit. They have no objections,’ Dr Würtz continued in her heavy accent, without a smile. ‘Perhaps Mr Welles could be your interpreter, Mr Scott.’