She gave me an incredulous look. ‘I thought you’d have arranged a prison break by now – that’s what Secretary Plico’s been worried about.’
‘Oh, for Juno’s sake!’
‘Now you’re becoming the perfect little inmate.’
‘And you’re forgetting who you’re talking to,’ I retorted.
We both smouldered for a few moments. Galba coughed and pushed a punched and bound folder across the table.
‘This is the prosecutor’s office disclosure document. It lists all the evidence against you, including the interviews, even the one with Caius Tellus. You’re quite right, he’s a smarmy bastard. He pretends to be reluctant and super virtuous. He regrets you are so desperate that you must be trying to frame him for Grosschenk’s murder. Grosschenk’s man, Fischer, has nothing good to say about you, except he finally admitted that Grosschenk ordered him to take you and Prisca Monticola for a ride to “scare you”. Huber’s interview is factual and describes your role in the undercover operation – a little more positive than the other two. I’ve had Monticola’s statement in – she’s wonderful – and Plico has sent in a good report.’
‘But?’
‘The court will probably discount the last two on the grounds of “they would say that, wouldn’t they?”’ She gave me a long, strong look. ‘We’ve tied up all the timings except the thirty-six hours you went off on your private visit. Are you protecting him because he’s married or some prominent person?’
I glanced at her, then shook my head once.
‘So who is he? Gods, he’s not some criminal on the run, is he?’
‘No.’
She said nothing more for a minute.
‘Look, unless we tie the timings up with fully corroborated evidence, they’ll convict you. You’ll forgive the crudity, but is a good shag worth fifteen to twenty years of your life wasted in a foreign prison?’
I smacked my palm down on the table and jumped up out of my chair. I leant over the table.
‘Enough! We are going round and round this point. You go and insist they pinpoint Grosschenk’s time of death. Get Plico to dig out a forensics expert from the Central University at home and fly them to Berlin to help these idiots. It’s ridiculous in this day and age they can’t get a closer time just because it was cold in that forest hut. If they don’t cooperate, get Plico to ask the imperatrix to issue a writ of false imprisonment in the League of Nations Court. For Juno’s sake, do something instead of bleating about a completely irrelevant event.’
She stared at me with an open mouth. Her face started to pucker into a withdrawn expression, then she stared down at the table and hunched over. I was surprised by her defeated posture.
‘I apologise for shouting at you, Galba, but it’s so frustrating. None of this is your fault. It’s these damned Prussians refusing to consider any other possibility. They’ve fingered me, solved their case, so they don’t care.’
Her head was still bowed, but she spoke with a low intense voice.
‘No, I apologise, domina, I… I trespassed on personal concerns. And I forgot who I was dealing with.’ She looked up at last and waved her hand in a vague circular motion. ‘I’m not a criminal lawyer. This place gives me the creeps. When I walk in here, I see all the inmates as either pitiful or dangerous, threatening normal people’s lives. They slouch along the corridor or track you with eyes looking as if they want to eat you. People here are failures or cheats and deserve little respect. And I lumped you in with them.’
‘Well, never mind that now.’ I patted her shoulder. ‘The important thing is to go on the offensive and stop taking what other people are dishing out.’
*
Two days later, I was summoned to the social worker’s office. Unlike the rest of the prison, it was painted in a pastel yellow with walls covered in over-jolly posters with optimistic images about resettlement, social help in the community and medical services outside. But instead of the equally pastel Charlotte, I found a middle-aged man with brown and grey hair, blue eyes and a cheerful smile sitting in her place.
‘Please, sit.’ His voice was as pleasant as a sunny Sunday afternoon. ‘I’m Dr Lenz from the Friedrich-Wilhelms-Institute at the university. Frau Halversen has explained why this assessment is being carried out, I think?’
I opened my mouth to say she hadn’t explained anything, but decided not to land her in trouble. If I didn’t cooperate it would be another black mark against me. And perhaps something positive would emerge from it. So I smiled back as if I didn’t have a care in the world and waited.
He put a pair of spectacles on and looked at me over the top of the lenses as if he were a professor addressing a student.
‘My evaluation is mainly based on a new psychometric questionnaire designed to measure psychological preferences in how you perceive the world and make decisions,’ he continued. ‘Then we’ll discuss various general topics and how you feel about them.’
‘Very well,’ I replied. I’d faced much worse in our resistance to interrogation training. There, we were taught to stick to the truth as much as possible, which reduced the strain on the mind trying to concentrate on concealing the important things. It also helped you appear to be a more genuine personality to the interrogator.
‘You seem remarkably calm about this,’ he said.
‘I’m not worried, if that’s what you mean. I am what I am and I have no wish to conceal anything from you.’
‘Hm. Everybody has something to hide, so you may be surprised.’
‘I’m sure they have, including you,’ and I smiled knowingly at him and watched a tinge of dark pink appear in his cheeks.
‘However, I’m not the one being assessed,’ he countered. ‘Are you happy to complete it in Germanic or would you prefer Latin, or English?’
‘Germanic will be fine, thank you.’
He drew a multicoloured form with tick boxes out of his file, wrote my name and prisoner number at the top and pushed it across the table. It resembled the standard psychometric test I’d completed in the officer selection process years ago. Unlike the fiendish command test when I’d been selected for promotion to major, which had made me and all the other candidates sweat our brains out, this was fairly basic. But as Charlotte Halversen had said, it never paid to be too cocky, so I focused all my attention on it.
He sat there and read his book, not even glancing once at me. He was an academic, conducting a test in the field in an appropriately neutral way. Perhaps I was being cynical, but I wondered how high the fee was the prison department paid for every prisoner examined.
After twenty-three minutes, I laid down the pen and sat back. He blinked but continued reading, ignoring me. Classic power ploy. I laid my hands in my lap and shut my eyes.
‘Oh, you’ve finished,’ he remarked after a minute. I opened my eyes, looked surprised that he had spoken. Easy game for two to play. He pulled the form towards him and glanced up at me. ‘Please wait outside. I will call you back in when I am ready. And do not discuss the test contents with anyone.’
Nobody was in the corridor. I sat on one of the three plastic chairs and read a magazine from the stack on the floor. Immersed in a piece about intra-Germanic squabbling, I didn’t immediately see Charlotte Halversen until she was within a few metres of me.
‘Hello, Aurelia. How did you get on?’
‘It went smoothly, thank you.’
‘What did he ask?’
Oh, dear.
‘You can do better than that, Charlotte.’
‘What do you mean?’ Her voice pitch was a little higher and her face outraged dignity. I looked ahead and gave a little smile. She flounced off into her office. Five minutes later, she put her head round the corner and asked me to come back in. The psychologist gestured me to sit.
‘I’m not going to tell you anything new when I say you have a very strong, contained personality,’ he started. ‘My initial briefing said you were serving as a diplomat, but I understand you come from a military ba
ckground which puts a completely different light on the results. What was your role?’
‘I’m sorry, but I can’t give you details.’
‘A general idea will be enough – support, nursing, clerical, that sort of thing.’
‘You must have a strange conception of Roma Nova, Doctor, if you think all that female military personnel do is type in offices and apply dressings.’
‘Why, what else can they do?’
I nearly lost control over my rising irritation.
‘We fulfil all combat and support arms roles.’
‘And you did?’
‘Specialist infantry.’
He raised his eyebrows in the way you would when confronted with a direct lie, but he said nothing.
‘Do you have trust issues?’
‘Not for my friends and colleagues. Everybody else, I take them as I find them.’
‘Do you miss your family? Your colleagues?’
‘Yes.’
‘What would be the hardest loss for you if convicted?’
‘Not seeing my daughter grow up.’
‘And would your daughter miss you?’
I took a light breath. ‘I think so, but you would have to ask her that.’
*
Three days later, Galba turned up with a face like funeral ash.
‘They’ve set a date for an interim hearing with the intention of committing you for trial. Seeing your test report, I’m not surprised.’
‘Why?’ Dread crept over me. Despite letting the psychologist know I’d seen through his little games, I’d been completely honest.
‘Here, see for yourself.’ She slid a Public Prosecutor Office folder over marked ‘Supplementary Evidence’. Three pages into the file was the report summary.
Subject is highly rational, quick-minded and a natural leader. She sees nothing is impossible given enough time and resources. Subject has the confident personality and willpower to pursue and implement her goals, easily bringing others with her. A dominant personality.
Strategic thinker, curious, innovative, able to grasp and deal with problems with determination and precision. Energetic and excellent communication skills, happy to confront and negotiate with others. Intelligent enough to recognise other people’s talents, and work with them. Requires challenges and even failures, or the self-confidence could easily turn into arrogance and condescension.
Personalities of this type cannot tolerate inefficiency or those whom they perceive as lazy or incompetent. They can be chillingly cold and ruthless when the situation arises, operating purely on logic and rationality.
They interact very well with others, often charming them to their cause, and paying attention to other people’s feelings – or at least pretending that they do. Most mature and successful personalities of this type are genuine in this aspect to some extent, even though their sensitivity may hide a cold and calculating mind.
With the proviso that there may be other factors that have not been apparent in such a short time and without a full forensic examination, I would suggest that the subject is psychologically perfectly able to carry out such a criminal act and unlikely to feel much remorse.
I read it again. I hunched over the table as if somebody had punched me in the middle, pushing the breath out of me. Numbness spread out from my face to the rest of my body. Was this a true picture of me? If I was this cold, efficient automaton, then maybe I should be locked up. I stared at the stark words on the page and wanted to attack them, tearing the sheet into pieces smaller than the finest cross-cut shredder could achieve.
Through the angry haze surrounding my brain, I heard Galba saying something, but not her exact words.
‘… as well as the new forensic report we’ve carried out.’
‘Sorry, Galba, I didn’t catch that.’
‘I’m not surprised.’ She handed me a paper cup of water, which I drank in one go. ‘Not very nice to be called a cold-hearted killer.’
‘But that’s what I’m trained for,’ I whispered.
‘Perhaps, but the essential word is “trained”. And you are trained only to do it in extreme circumstances. We can emphasise that point and even bring in a military expert to explain that.’ She glanced at me. ‘Are you okay now?’
‘Yes,’ I lied.
‘Well, you have a second visitor. I have to leave as you can only have one at a time.’
Gods, I hoped it wasn’t Joachim come to gloat. I tucked the heel of my hand under my chin and stared down at the table.
‘Well, sitting there looking as if Nemesis herself has fallen on you isn’t going to get you anywhere.’
I jerked my head up. Plico. My mouth dropped open.
‘Look out, you’ll catch so many flies you won’t need lunch.’ He smirked. Gods, the bastard was smirking at me. I was never happier. I jumped up and flung my arms round his neck.
‘All right, enough of that,’ he said after a moment and disentangled himself. ‘Calm down and gather your brain cells together.’
‘How on earth did they let you in?’ As a spymaster, he wouldn’t have been welcome in Prussia.
‘Oh, I’ve got a couple of Prussian babysitters, “for my security”, their foreign ministry said. Ha! My Praetorians would see them off, but as day visitors we’re playing nice.’ His face became serious. ‘Imperatrix Justina sends her love and asks you be assured every support will be available to you. She doesn’t have much time for the Prussian royals and they couldn’t intervene now anyway. If you want a top criminal lawyer from home or your own family lawyer, she’ll send them.’
‘No, Galba’s doing very well and she knows the local system. She’s called in others as she needs them.’
‘Seems competent enough. She’s been chasing that poor sod from the Central University forensics department round since she arrived here, and harrying the police and the prosecutor to give her full access. She’s got some interim report for you.’
He tapped the folder Galba had left on the table. ‘This psych report is unfair. I grant the first part is correct, but the conclusion is rubbish. Did you piss him off?’
‘I told him the truth.’
‘So, yes, you pissed him off. They can’t take it here, you know, women carrying out what they think are male roles. Perhaps you should have been more circumspect.’
‘That’s rich from you,’ I snorted.
He looked down at his hands. ‘We won’t let you rot here for the next twenty years, whatever happens.’
‘I didn’t do it, Plico.’
‘So you said before. You wouldn’t make such a mess.’
‘What are the chances?’
‘I’m no expert…’
‘Tell me the truth.’
‘… but at the moment I’d say it was eighty–twenty against you. And the tabloids are having a field day.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You won’t have seen the papers in here, but headlines like “Brutal Roman slayer rampages through business community” and in-depth articles on Arminius slaughtering the Roman legions in the Teutoburg Forest are all over the place.’ He looked away. ‘A load of crap about Germanics uniting to drive the Roma Novans out as they did their ancestors. The Prussian foreign ministry are embarrassed, they say, they don’t wish the cordial relations with Roma Nova to be disrupted, blah, blah.’
He stopped and rubbed his thumb and forefinger together.
‘Oh, don’t stop now, Plico. I’m really enjoying this.’
‘Some rubbish about women, guns and bedrooms. The usual Kinder, Küche, Kirche nonsense.’
Before I could retort, a discreet knock on the door interrupted my misery and his embarrassment. Galba came back in accompanied by two men in tight suits who moved their muscled frames purposefully. The Prussian foreign ministry heavies.
‘I’d better go before they drag me out. When you’re back from this jolly, I’ll have a really tough assignment for you. So sort this out,’ he said gruffly. As he turned, he shot me a glance back
that I could only interpret as deep concern.
‘Well, thanks for dropping in,’ I said. My throat constricted. My next words came out as a croak. ‘I’ll think about it. See yourself out.’
XIX
‘You having a problem, Roman?’
Magda had invited me to drink coffee with her that evening. When Eggers had given me the message at lunchtime along with extra fruit, I’d almost told her to get stuffed. I was too tired and felt sick. But my sense of self-preservation stopped me. You didn’t annoy the power that ran the society I was now living in without a very good reason. And apart from my adoring but inarticulate cellmate, Greta, and the nods and nervous smiles of the others on my landing, I had nobody to talk to.
I’d lain on my bunk the afternoon after Plico’s visit, not in the mood for my usual afternoon keep-fit session. Galba’s optimistic report from our forensic scientist had almost put me out of the time frame, but not quite. Grosschenk had been killed in the forest hut as shown by the quantity of dried blood. His body had been burnt on the floor at the far end, by the primitive hearth, and the remains wrapped in a tarpaulin afterwards – a time-consuming and exhausting thing to do. But excluding air had slowed decomposition significantly in the cold forest hut. Night frosts had further decreased the usual expected level of fly and beetle activity. By the time I’d read the report for the second time, my stomach was queasy and I couldn’t stop scratching myself.
Unfortunately, it was still possible that given the state of the body I could have killed Grosschenk at the beginning of my time out with Miklós. I had no cover for twelve hours. Walking down the corridor to Magda’s cell, it was still swirling round my mind. Halfway along, I stopped. I’d missed something, something significant, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. I reran the whole evening at Grosschenk’s through my mind, from the pickup at the hotel to half falling down the wall into the ditch outside his gate. What was missing? It was hovering at the front of my mind, but pulled itself out of my reach every time I tried to grasp it.
Eggers poured coffee and left. I wondered what Magda wanted. I’d learned by now she was the practical sort. You fell in with her, you survived. You crossed her, you ended up in the infirmary. The prison warders knew what was going on, but as they were equally practical and wanted an easy life, they ignored it. And both those favoured and those punished under Magda’s regime kept to a mutual pact of silence towards the officials.
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