Death in Breslau

by Marek Krajewski

  Anwaldt bid his fellow passengers goodbye, slipped Sophocles into his pocket and jumped down to the platform. He left the station and stood beside a few well-tended flower beds. He opened his notebook and read: Ulica Rynkowa, 3. At that moment, a droschka drew up. Anwaldt, pleased, showed the cabman the paper with the name of the street on it.

  Rawicz was a pretty, neat little town, full of flowers and dominated by red-brick prison watch towers. The falling dusk was inviting people out into the street so there were groups of noisy, teenage boys hanging around and proudly accosting strolling girls, women on little stools sitting in the entrances of white-washed houses, whiskered men in tight waistcoats, treating themselves to frothy tankards and discussing Polish foreign politics as they stood outside restaurants.

  The cab stopped near one such gathering. Anwaldt threw the cabby a handful of fenigs and glanced up at the number of the house. Rynkowa 3.

  He entered the doorway and looked around, searching for a caretaker. Instead there appeared two men in hats. Both had very determined expressions. They asked Anwaldt something. He spread his arms and – in German – presented his reason for being there. He mentioned the name of Hanne Schlossarczyk, of course. The men’s reaction was simply peculiar. Without a word, they cut off his way out and shepherded him upstairs. Anwaldt climbed the solid, wooden stairs tentatively and found himself on the first floor where there were two small apartments. One was open, lit and crowded with a number of men whose expressions betrayed self-assurance. Anwaldt’s instinct did not fail him: that is what the police look like all over the world.

  One of the guardians urged Anwaldt delicately towards the lit apartment. Once inside, he indicated the long kitchen with his hand. Anwaldt sat on a wooden stool and lit a cigarette. He had not even managed to look around when an elegant man entered the kitchen in the company of another with a walrus-like moustache, who wielded a broom in his hand. The moustached man looked at Anwaldt, then at the dandy, shook his head and left. The dandy approached the stool and spoke in correct German:

  “Documents. Name, surname. Purpose of visit.”

  Anwaldt handed the man his passport and replied:

  “Criminal Assistant Herbert Anwaldt from the Police Praesidium in Breslau …”

  “Do you have relatives in Poznań?”

  “No.”

  “Purpose of visit?”

  “I’m pursuing two murder suspects. I know they intended to visit Hanne Schlossarczyk. Now I would like to know who is questioning me.”

  “Police Officer Ferdynand Banaszak from the Poznań police. Your official identification, please.”

  “Here,” Anwaldt tried to give his voice a hard edge. “And besides, what kind of interrogation is this? Am I accused of something? I would like to see Hanne Schlossarczyk on a private matter.”

  Banaszak laughed out loud.

  “Say what you wanted to see her about or we’ll invite you to a building which has made our town famous throughout Poland.” And in so saying, he did not stop smiling.

  Anwaldt realized that if a policeman from west Poland’s main city had appeared in this small town, then the affair in which Schlossarczyk was mixed up must be serious. Without unnecessary introduction, he told Banaszak everything, keeping secret only the reason why Erkin and Maass were searching for Schlossarczyk’s illegitimate son. The police officer looked at Anwaldt and sighed with relief.

  “You asked whether you could speak to Hanna Ślusarczyk.† My answer is: no, you can’t speak to Hanna Ślusarczyk. She was chopped up with an axe this morning by a man whom the caretaker described as being a German-speaking Georgian.”

  POZNAŃ, TUESDAY, JULY 17TH, 1934

  THREE O’CLOCK IN THE MORNING

  Anwaldt stretched his numb limbs. He breathed with relief in the cool interrogation room at the Poznań Police Praesidium on ulica 3 Maja. Banaszak had almost finished a German translation of the report of Hanna Ślusarczyk’s case and was getting ready to leave. After returning to Poznań from Rawicz, it had taken them half the night to prepare official reports by which the investigation into the woman’s murder was to be shared between the Police Praesidium in Breslau, represented by Criminal Assistant Herbert Anwaldt, and the State Police Praesidium in Poznań in whose name acted Ferdynand Banaszak. The reasoning was long and intricate, and based on Anwaldt’s statements.

  This record, together with Banaszak’s German translation – signed by both men – was to wait until morning to be signed by the President of the Poznań Police. Banaszak reassured Anwaldt that this was a mere formality and offered him a small, beefy hand. He was clearly pleased with the turn of events.

  “I’m not even going to pretend that I would be only too glad to throw this whole stinking case on to your shoulders, Anwaldt. But I don’t have to. It’s your case anyway, a German-Turkish case. And, you’re the one who is mainly going to lead the investigation. Goodbye. Do you really intend to sit up all night over this? I’ve still got half a page left to translate. I’ll translate it for you tomorrow. I’m very sleepy now. You’ve all the time in the world to relish the case!”

  His laughter boomed in the corridor for a long time. Anwaldt drank his strong coffee, which was now cold, and started to read the case files. He grimaced as he did so, feeling the sour taste in his mouth. Too much coffee and too many cigarettes were taking their toll. Police Officer Banaszak spoke fluent German, but his writing of it was atrocious. He had mastered only professional police terminology and phrasing – he had served in the Prussian Criminal Police in Poznań from 1905 to the outbreak of the war, as he had told Anwaldt – the rest of his vocabulary was very poor, and this together with the numerous grammatical errors, created a comical combination. Anwaldt read the short, clumsy sentences with genuine amusement. He closed his eyes to the stylistics. The most important thing was that the files were comprehensible to him. It appeared that Walenty Mikołajczak, the caretaker of the building where the deceased had lived, had, at about nine o’clock in the morning, July 16th, 1934, been asked in German by a “well-dressed, Georgian-looking” stranger – which, according to the caretaker, meant black hair and an olive complexion – for Hanna Ślusarczyk’s apartment. The caretaker imparted the information and returned to his work. (He was repairing the cages where tenants kept their rabbits.) But the visit of such an unusual guest caused him unease. Ślusarczyk was a loner. Every now and again, he went up to her door and eavesdropped. But he neither heard nor saw anything suspicious. At about ten o’clock, he got thirsty and went into the nearby Ratuszowy bar for a beer. He returned at about eleven-thirty and knocked on Ślusarczyk’s door. Surprised by the sight of her open window – the old spinster, the crank, never opened her windows, fanatically afraid as she was of draughts and murderers; the latter because of the fame she enjoyed as “a rich woman”. According to Mikołajczak, “everybody knew that Miss Ślusarczyk had more den de mayor hisself”. Since no-one answered, the caretaker opened the door with a spare key. He found her quartered remains in the wooden washtub. He closed the door and informed the police. Three hours later, Police Officer Ferdynand Banaszak arrived in Rawicz with five detectives. They pronounced that death had been caused by loss of blood. Nothing was discovered that could point to burglary as being the motive. Nothing, apart from a photographic album, had disappeared from the apartment, which was confirmed by Mrs Amelia Sikorowa, a friend of the deceased. He testified, furthermore, that the deceased had no relatives or, apart from Sikorowa, any friends. She had corresponded with no-one except a merchant in Poznań, but she kept his name a secret. (The neighbour suspected that he was Ślusarczyk’s former loved one.)

  Anwaldt felt immensely tired. In order to banish the tiredness, he shook the last cigarette from his packet. He inhaled and looked anew at Banaszak’s neat annotations. He did not understand anything because this was the page half-covered in Polish writing which Banaszak had not yet translated into German. Anwaldt examined the Polish text with fascination. He had always wondered about the mysterious dia
critical marks: the flourishes beneath the “a” and “e”, the little wave over the “l”, the oblique accents over the “s”, “z” and “o”. Among these letters, he found his name written twice. This did not surprise him in the least, for in the arguments as to why the German police were to take over the investigation, Banaszak had often referred to its assignation. But the error in his name did surprise him. The name was written without a “t”. He leaned over the page so as to add a “t”, but withdrew his hand. A drop of ink flowed from the nib and splattered on the green felt which covered the table. Anwaldt could not pull his eyes away from his surname swimming among Polish squiggles, oblique lines and gentle waves. Only the surname was his. Not the first name: that sounded unfamiliar, foreign, proud: the Polish name “Mieczysław”.

  He got up, opened the door and entered the main part of the station where, behind a wooden barrier, nodded a sleepy duty constable. His assistant, an old policeman just short of retirement, was arguing with some queen of the night in a flowery dress. Anwaldt walked up to him and discovered that the old man spoke German. Mentioning Police Officer Banaszak, he asked him if he would translate the Polish text. They went back to the interrogation room. The old policeman started stammering:

  “According to Walenty Mikołajczak’s testimony … he carried Ślusarczyk’s letters to the post office … He read and contemplated the name of the addressant … no … how do you say it?”

  “Addressee. What does ‘contemplated’ mean?”

  “Yes … addressee. ‘Contemplated’ means that he has it in his brain, he knows.”

  “Addressee: Mieczysław Anwald, Poznań ul. Mickiewicza 2. Walenty Mikołajczak was surprised that she was sending letters addressed to a shop. The name of the establishment announces …”

  “Reads, surely.”

  “Yes. Reads. The name of the establishment reads ‘Mercer’s Goods. Mieczysław Anwald and Company’. Then is goes … well … I know … something about a photographic album … But what’s it to you? He’s asleep … sleeping …”

  The old policeman abandoned his duties as translator with relief, went out of the room and left Anwaldt alone. Closing the door, he cast a concerned eye back at the tired German policeman who had rested his forehead on the coarse, green felt.

  He was wrong. Anwaldt was not asleep at all. It was easier for him to transport himself in time and space with eyes closed. He was now sitting in Franz Huber’s agency with the old detective in his sights. In the agency, its walls covered in wood, floated specks of dust which settled as a powdered carpet on the thick files and glass panes behind which old photographs were turning yellow. Franz Huber was tapping the top of his desk with his engraved cigarette holder and slowly drawling out his words:

  “Schlossarczyk worked for the Baron from 1901–1902. That’s presumably when she got pregnant. Thereafter, Baron Ruppert von der Malten, Olivier’s father, never again employed a woman, not even as cook. So her son must be thirty-one or thirty-two. His name? We don’t know. Certainly not the same as the Baron. His mother got a handsome sum to keep quiet, enough for her to live comfortably to this day. Where does the bastard live now? That we don’t know either. And what do we know? That until he became of age, he lived in an orphanage in Berlin, where he landed up as a baby from his loving mother’s arms.”

  “What orphanage?”

  “She doesn’t know herself. Some merchant took her there. An acquaintance of hers.”

  “The merchant’s name?”

  “She didn’t want to give it to us. She said he had nothing to do with it.” (I’m better than Schubert, the detective from Huber’s agency. I know what that merchant was called. The same as me except without a “t”. An orphanage in Berlin and a mercer from Poznań, Mieczysław Anwald. Two cities, two people, one surname, one death sentence.)

  POZNAŃ, THAT SAME JULY 17TH, 1934

  SEVEN O’CLOCK IN THE MORNING

  The establishment of Mieczysław Anwald’s blue textiles on Ulica Północna near the Goods Station was already rumbling with life at this hour. Workers were carrying bales of material, carts and delivery vans were driving up to the ramp, a Jew was pushing a trolley constructed out of planks nailed together, the trade representative of the Bielschowsky establishment was waving his business card in front of the manager’s nose, abacuses were clattering in the counting-room, Police Officer Banaszak was puffing away at a small ivory pipe and Anwaldt was repeating in his mind: “it’s a pure coincidence that Schlossarczyk’s and Baron von der Malten’s son was brought up in a Berlin orphanage as I was, it’s pure coincidence that he was taken there by a man with the same surname as mine, I’m not the Baron’s son, it’s pure coincidence that Schlossarczyk’s and the Baron’s son was brought up …”

  “Can I help you?” the well-built fifty-year-old squeezed a fat cigar between his fingers. “What do our dear police want from me?”

  Banaszak got up and, with reluctance, glanced at the unshaven Anwaldt who was muttering something to himself. He pulled out his identification and, stifling a yawn, said:

  “Police Officer Banaszak, and this is Criminal Assistant Klaus Überweg from the Breslau Police. Did you know Hanna Ślusarczyk of Rawicz?”

  “No … no, I don’t … where …” the merchant glanced at the cashier women who were suddenly counting more slowly. “Let’s go to my apartment. It’s too noisy here.”

  The apartment was large and comfortable. From the agency, the way in was through the kitchen door. Two servants threw a flirtatious eye at the young man for whom the night had been too short; under their employer’s glaring eyes, they immediately reverted to their plucking of a fat duck. The men’s footsteps rang on the sandstone floor. The merchant invited the policemen into the library where the spines of untouched books glittered and the green armchairs standing under a palm spread their soft insides. Through the open window wafted the nauseating, sweetish smell of a slaughterhouse. Mieczysław Anwald did not wait for Banaszak to repeat his question.

  “Yes, I know Hanna Ślusarczyk.”

  “Do you speak German?” the police officer’s pipe was blocked.

  “Yes.”

  “Perhaps we could switch to that language. It will save us time since Assistant Überweg doesn’t speak Polish.”

  “Certainly.”

  Banaszak finally blew his pipe through and the library filled with scented smoke.

  “Let’s be exact, Herr Anwald. You knew her. Yesterday morning your friend was killed.”

  Mieczysław Anwald’s face contorted in pain. There was no verbal reaction. Anwaldt ceased to repeat his mantra and started to ask questions:

  “Herr Anwald, is it you who took Hanne Schlossarczyk’s illegitimate child to the Berlin orphanage?”

  The merchant did not reply. Banaszak moved uneasily and said in Polish:

  “My dear fellow, if you want your family to find out about your romance with a woman of ill repute, if you want to walk out of your establishment led to the police station by two uniformed policemen, then persist in your silence.”

  The host looked at the unshaven man with flaming eyes, and answered in German with a Silesian accent:

  “Yes. It was me who took the child to the orphanage in Berlin.”

  “Why did you do so?”

  “Hanna asked me to. She could not part with the child herself.”

  “So why did she part with it at all?”

  “My dear Assistant,” Banaszak bit his tongue at the last instant so as to not say “my dear Anwaldt”. He was angry at himself for having agreed to Anwaldt’s strange request to introduce him under a fictitious name. “Please forgive me, but this question has nothing to do with the case. Firstly, it should have been addressed to the deceased; secondly, the answer won’t give you what you’re looking for: the son’s address.”

  “I’m not, sir, going to come to Poznań again in order to ask something you’ve not allowed me to ask.”

  Anwaldt examined the books through the yellow glass and admired the la
rge collection of Greek literature in translation. A verse from Oedipus the King roared in his ears: “Terrible though it is, Sir, while the witness/ Does not the truth confess, hold fast still to your hope.”

  “She was young. She still wanted to get married.”

  “Which orphanage did you take the child to?”

  “I don’t know. Definitely a Catholic one.”

  “How’s that, were you in Berlin or not? You went there at random with the child, not knowing where you were going to leave it? How did you know they would take him in anywhere?”