‘Ironic?’
‘An Orthodox priest trying to get a Serb Communist out of an Ustaše prison, helped by a Muslim and a Catholic? But that’s this city for you. There is the world, and there is Sarajevo. A world of itself. Rules you never understand. A community you will never be part of.’
Reinhardt thought of the way the city’s people would often come together, the way he would skirt the edge of that community, and the pressure of eyes that watched him and pushed him away. ‘Dare I ask what killed Topalović?’
If Padelin caught the sarcasm he made no sign of it. ‘The doctor thinks it was an overdose of morphine.’
Reinhardt’s frown deepened. ‘Not accidental?’
‘No.’
‘What is Dr Begović saying happened?’
Padelin looked blankly at Reinhardt. ‘I did not say it was Begović who made that determination. Do you know where he went last night?’
Reinhardt’s mouth opened, then closed. ‘Dr Begović?’ he repeated.
‘You left together last night.’
‘That’s correct,’ said Reinhardt.
‘Did he say anything to you? Perhaps something out of the ordinary?’
‘No,’ said Reinhardt, perhaps a little too quickly.
‘Captain,’ said Padelin. Had he heard it, thought Reinhardt? He felt a moment of panic. The detective took a step closer. Just a small step, but all of a sudden he was there, that bit closer, that bit bigger. Reinhardt’s skin crawled. He resisted the urge to take a step back and hated that he had to lift his eyes, not so much, but enough, to look Padelin in his. ‘You came on foot. You left on foot. That is unusual for a German to do in this town. Your behaviour last night was, apparently, also unusual.’
Reinhardt swallowed in a throat gone dry. He had to try to regain some control over this. ‘Padelin,’ he said, quietly. ‘Are you accusing me of something?’
Padelin blinked, that slow, feline blink, then shook his head. ‘No. I am not.’ Reinhardt did not miss the emphasis on I. Others, apparently, were.
‘I did come here last night, looking for you. I was upset, shall we say, over the revelation that you had your culprit for Vukić’s murder. I left with the doctor, who said he was going in my direction, and that a German should not walk unescorted at night.’
‘He said nothing?’
Reinhardt shook his head, all the while running the doctor’s words over and over in his mind. He would not suffer long, he had said. ‘Nothing,’ he replied. ‘He said nothing to me last night that would indicate to me now he had a part in this.’ But Begović not only knew, he had done it, Reinhardt realised. ‘Why can’t you ask him?’
‘Because he has vanished,’ said Padelin. ‘Why were you upset with me last night?’ he asked.
‘Why?’ repeated Reinhardt. He blinked once or twice. ‘Because…’ He paused. What was the point of trying to explain? He had tried before and not made any impression he could tell. ‘Because I was unhappy with the way events were playing out,’ was all he said.
‘Well, perhaps you will be happy with something I have to show you. Please wait here. I must speak with someone, but I will be back.’ With that, he was gone, leaving Reinhardt alone in the conference room.
Almost alone. He heard a faint scuff and turned. Again, perhaps a little too quickly. Last night’s scare, too little sleep, and too much self-reflection had left him very jumpy.
‘So?’ said Becker. ‘That’s it, then?’ Becker was standing behind him, slightly turned away, with his head tilted up. He held his glasses in his hands in front of him.
Reinhardt leaned back and sat on the edge of the table and shook a cigarette out. ‘I don’t know. Why don’t you ask them whether they’ll go out and try to find some other poor bastard to pin this on?’
Becker snorted. ‘Come now, Gregor,’ he teased, knowing how much Reinhardt hated it when Becker called him by his given name. ‘Don’t be so uncharitable.’ He smiled and cocked his head, the light catching the rims of his little steel glasses where he held them in his fingers.
Reinhardt lit his cigarette, drew on it, and exhaled, giving himself time. He hated arguing with Becker. It made him feel weak. It reminded him too much of the past, of railing pointlessly against things that could not be fought against. He looked at the Feldgendarme past the stream of smoke, considering. ‘You know, I ought to congratulate you. That little scene at your headquarters, yesterday. “I’m a policeman.” “Nothing good ever came of bending the rules.” You almost had me believing it.’
Becker grinned. ‘But it was true, Reinhardt. Nothing good ever did. That was always the point. You never got it, though.’ He shifted, his head tilting down as he altered his stance, turning the other way. It was a habit of his, to never stand facing whomever he was talking to. He faced away to his right with his head down. Away to his left, with his head up. Always fiddling with his glasses. Reinhardt hated it for the ridiculous affectation it was, although he was half sure that Becker did not even realise he did it anymore.
‘More to the point, where does this leave you?’
‘Hmm?’ asked Becker, running his finger along a fold in the baize.
‘You found Krause yet?’
Becker was good, Reinhardt had to give him that. His finger stopped moving for a moment, no longer. He looked up at Reinhardt, shifting stance again. ‘Krause?’
Reinhardt ran his tongue over his teeth and spat a piece of tobacco off his lip. ‘Don’t try to bullshit me, Becker. You know who Krause is. You’ve been after him since Sunday. What game are you playing?’
Becker’s face hardened. ‘Just what are you accusing me of, Reinhardt?’ he said, tightly. ‘And call me “sir”, damn you.’
‘Take your pick. Sir.’ Reinhardt blew smoke at the ceiling. Becker’s face twitched at the insolence, as it always did. He looked back down at the Feldgendarme. ‘Obstructing my investigation. Assault on a woman. Complicity in a blatant cover up. The usual mix of what you’re good at.’
Becker’s face was white now. He stepped closer to Reinhardt. He had none of the physical presence of Padelin, but Reinhardt still tightened in around himself, his hands wanting to tremble. ‘Careful, Gregor. You’re clutching at straws, here.’
‘Spare me your bleating, Becker. I know you.’ He blew smoke in Becker’s face, feeling a sudden edge of recklessness begin to stir inside, just like yesterday in the bar, except he knew he could control this confrontation. ‘Sir.’
‘The hell you do!’ snapped Becker. ‘I’m looking for a deserter. Reported as such. You can’t prove I knew anything about Hendel’s murder before the rest of us did.’
‘That’s interesting. Sir. I never said anything about you knowing Hendel was dead before the police found him and Vukić.’ Becker’s face went blank, but Reinhardt could see the tension in the corner of his eyes, in his neck. He shifted stance again. ‘Who is it that’s called in this favour, Becker? Who has you looking for Krause? Hmm?’ He raised his eyebrows. ‘What’s in it for you? There’s always something, isn’t there? I mean, why should Sarajevo be any different from the way things used to be in Berlin?’
Becker’s mouth tightened, then relaxed. He turned to the left, raising his head, grinning. Reinhardt could see the confidence flowing back, all the cocky catch-me-if-you-can arrogance Reinhardt had hated so much back in their Kripo days. ‘Gregor, Gregor.’ He shook his head. ‘Always so uptight. You need to get laid more. You always did, even back in the old days,’ he smirked.
Reinhardt ignored the jibe at Carolin. It was an old dig. It still hurt, but not nearly as much as it used to. ‘Is it women? Money? A transfer?’ Becker’s grin slipped, just a little. ‘It’s a transfer, isn’t it?’ Becker swallowed, his grin slipping further away. ‘Figures. You always were a cowardly little weasel.’
For a moment Reinhardt wondered whether he had pushed Becker too far, then decided h
e no longer cared. Becker’s grin came back, that shit-eating grin he wore so well. ‘Gregor the crow,’ he said, but his throat was tight and his voice was hoarse. ‘Still cawing and flapping about stuff no one cares about.’
‘What are you scared of, Becker?’ asked Reinhardt. ‘I know you’re scared. You’re shifting left and right again. Playing with your glasses. Not looking at me straight.’ Becker coloured. His hands tightened on his spectacles, his arms half coming up as if he meant to put them on, then stopped, and he smiled, suddenly.
‘Captain Thallberg’s quite something, isn’t he? A real live, poster-grade Aryan superman.’ Reinhardt forced himself to reveal nothing, say nothing. Becker must know Thallberg was GFP, but if Reinhardt was reading Becker’s actions right, he did not know Hendel and Krause were. Becker could only guess what Thallberg could bring to the table. What he might know. ‘What’s all that about? Finally giving up the solitary life?’
‘It’s what you’ve always told me to do, isn’t it?’
Becker chuckled. ‘You’ve got to be careful with those supermen, Gregor. You remember Berlin, back in the old days. People like him stomping around in brown shirts, smashing glass and breaking bones. Beating their breasts over how German they were. They’re nuts.’
‘This is you telling me this?’
‘I’m garden-variety nuts, Gregor. People like Thallberg are something else. They move and think and see the world in different ways.’
Much as it pained him, there was something in what he said, and Reinhardt had felt it himself, but he just held Becker’s eyes as Padelin opened the door, looking between the two of them, frowning at the tension that must have been evident between the two Germans.
Reinhardt stubbed his cigarette out. ‘You’re looking well, Becker,’ he said, no pretence anymore that he was a captain and Becker a major, but then, it always ended this way between them. ‘I wish you a very pleasant day, and happy hunting.’ He walked out after Padelin, not looking back.
Becker still managed to have the last word, though. ‘My best to Major Freilinger,’ he called. ‘And to Captain Thallberg.’
Padelin glanced in at Becker as he closed the door after Reinhardt. ‘Old history,’ said Reinhardt, shortly, willing himself to unwind. ‘Forget about it.’
Padelin shrugged. ‘This way,’ he said. He led him through the building to an office. It was a dark, dingy affair, overlooking what must have been the building’s internal courtyard. There was a desk, obviously shared by two people, covered in files and bits of paper, a ragged bit of carpet. Shelves held more files, books, folders, and assorted bits of junk. Several chunks of blackened metal sat on the desk, and Padelin picked one of them up and handed it to Reinhardt. It was warped, blackened, and twisted by what must have been considerable heat, but it still retained a roundish shape, as did the other pieces.
‘You remember that fire, in Ilijaš, on Sunday?’ Padelin asked. ‘You saw the entry of the fire engines in the traffic records I showed you yesterday morning. These are from that fire. They are film cases.’
Reinhardt’s eyes widened. ‘You’re sure?’
Padelin shrugged. ‘Sure as we can be. The fire brigade found them at the fire. It was a big fire. Very hard to control. I am told film burns very intensely.’
‘I think I remember hearing about that,’ Reinhardt said, quietly. He put the piece of metal back on the desk, thinking. ‘Where was the fire?’
‘In the forest, near an abandoned farm.’
Reinhardt pursed his lips. ‘Last night,’ he said, after a moment, ‘I talked with one of our doctors. He said he treated a couple of soldiers for burns…’ He trailed off, glancing at Padelin. ‘What do you think?’
‘I think these are the films from Vukić’s house. Whoever took them destroyed them.’
Reinhardt nodded again. ‘Becker. The Feldgendarme I was just talking to? He is looking for a reported deserter, called Peter Krause. A lieutenant. I think he thinks Krause has a film. The one’ – he gestured at the metal pieces – ‘these people are looking for, and perhaps thought they had. Almost certainly the one from that camera we found.’
‘Why would he think this Krause has this film?’
Reinhardt hesitated. There was only so much he could tell Padelin about the GFP. ‘It’s complicated,’ he said, finally. ‘Hendel was Abwehr. Apparently, he worked with Krause from time to time.’ It sounded weak to Reinhardt, but Padelin seemed to accept it. ‘So, where does this leave you?’
‘Leave me?’ repeated Padelin, frowning at Reinhardt.
‘Your culprit is dead. Where does that leave your investigation?’
‘Oh,’ said Padelin. He began stacking the pieces of metal. ‘Well, he confessed before dying. We’ll see if that’s enough for Zagreb. I think it will be.’
‘Padelin,’ insisted Reinhardt. ‘You know, you must, that that man did not have anything to do with Vukić’s death.’
Padelin paused in what he was doing and straightened up. Again, Reinhardt felt that sensation of something heavy bearing down on him, and again felt that irrational twitch that he had to look up into Padelin’s eyes. ‘I don’t know why this is so hard for you to understand, Reinhardt,’ said Padelin. ‘You were a policeman once, under the Nazis. You should know, better than me.’ He went back to what he was doing. ‘The man was a Serb. A Communist. People like him will commit crimes, just like Gypsies and Jews. Frau Hofler identified him from photos we showed her. If he did not kill her, he did something else. Besides,’ he continued, ‘we know he was a senior Partisan. So, at a… how do you say… at a minimum? We have given the Partisans a loss. Who knows? Maybe he was Senka. The Shadow.’
It took a moment for Reinhardt to realise Padelin had actually tried to be funny. He stared back at the detective, remembering that conversation with Begović outside Vukić’s house. The doctor calmly smoking his cigarette, sitting contentedly on his rock. ‘And the nephew?’
Padelin narrowed his eyes at Reinhardt’s tone, then shrugged. ‘Nothing, I think. He will be set free.’
‘So what becomes of our investigation?’ he asked. He pointed at the film casings. ‘This proves there was more to the murder, no? Someone was trying to cover something up, here.’
Padelin frowned. It seemed to Reinhardt it was the frown of a man trying to be patient with a child, trying to explain something obvious and evident. ‘My part is over, I think,’ he replied. His frown deepened. ‘Yours too. Was that not what you were talking about with Major Becker?’
‘No. Are you telling me Becker has received instructions on this case?’
Padelin shrugged. ‘I don’t know. Putković may have talked with him. I know the police are talking with your army at higher levels.’
Higher levels, thought Reinhardt. That could mean anything, and anyone. He gave a long, slow sigh, then nodded. ‘Very well,’ he said. He offered his hand, which Padelin shook after a moment, his frown deepening even further. Reinhardt turned and left, feeling the air thicken with confusion behind him. He walked back down the corridors, down into the foyer, past the press of men still waiting for answers, and outside. The air was hot already, heavy with a weight of stone and concrete, but it was fresh and clean after the stale atmosphere inside.
20
He slumped into the car, staring down at the pedals, his mind empty. After the momentary high of finding out the police had lost their suspect, he could feel himself sliding back into the depression that had seized him since last night. Padelin’s complacency, Becker’s assurance of knowledge that Reinhardt did not have… He raised his head, tracked his eyes along the spartan lines of the Austrian façades without really seeing them. He had no idea what to do now, so he started the engine and began driving.
On purpose, he swung the car left and right more or less at random, taking streets he rarely, if ever, took. The few shops he passed were mostly shut, and the inhabitants of this city
had long perfected ways of looking at people like him without seeming to, or avoiding him altogether. People stared ahead, bent their heads closer together in conversation, found the most interesting things in half-empty shop windows, hugged walls, pulled children closer. Like last night on Kvaternik, he thought of water. As if he moved through water, a bow wave of apprehension moving ahead of him, altering behaviour and trajectories, all of it swirling and washing back and forth in his wake, emotions and intentions coming back together.
There were noticeably fewer troops in the city. The endless convoys were gone, off down to the east and south, and a large part of the city’s garrison had followed them. Of the soldiers who were left, most were from the Croatian Army, many of them Bosnian Muslim conscripts, incongruous in their German Army pattern uniforms with black fez on their heads. The hats were supposedly a cultural exception. Reinhardt thought they looked like extras in some children’s matinee production.
His feet felt like blocks of lead as he climbed the stairs to his office. The day was barely begun and he wanted it over in a way he had not felt for a long time, but there was a note on his desk requesting him to report to Freilinger soonest. He flipped his cap onto a chair and sat on the edge of the desk. As always, in these moments when his mind seemed to drift, he looked without really seeing at the big map of Sarajevo on his wall. East to west, all the way from Hrasnica, on the long, winding road down through Jablanica to Mostar and on to the sea, to Lapisnica and its old Ottoman footbridge where the mountains pinched off the city. North and south of the city were hills and mountains, where he had rarely been. Green rolling country to the north, hills folded and rucked like a bed that had been slept in, but to the south they bulked high, swelling into the great stone bulwarks of the south and east.
It was down there, hidden in fastnesses of stone and wood, moving freely as they wished, that the Partisans had their bases. And it was down there, clustering along the few roads and around the few towns and villages, that the Germans and their allies had mustered their forces. Almost, Reinhardt wished he were with them. This war had, for him, been one of paper and shadows. The war he had known, the first war, had been one of sludge and clay, a blasted horizon slashed and barbed by wire, and the sky at times so full of iron and steel it seemed there could be room for nothing else. But he had sometimes found an honesty in warfare he had found nowhere else. A comfort in the company of men exposed to the same dangers, running the same risks. It was better, sometimes, to face open danger than skulk through the shadows like this.
The Man from Berlin Page 21