March Violets

by Philip Kerr

  ‘I’ll do it right now,’ I said.

  Rienacker sounded tired and irritable when I called him.

  ‘I hope you’ve got something, pushbelly,’ he said, ‘because Fat Hermann’s patience is worn thinner than the jam in a Jewish baker’s sponge-cake. So if this is just a social call then I’m liable to come and visit you with some dog-shit on my shoes.’

  ‘What’s the matter with you, Rienacker?’ I said. ‘You having to share a slab in the morgue or something?’

  ‘Cut the cabbage, Gunther, and get on with it.’

  ‘All right, keep your ears stiff. I just found your boy, and he’s squeezed his last orange.’

  ‘Dead?’

  ‘Like Atlantis. You’ll find him piloting a service-lift in a deserted hotel on Chamissoplatz. Just follow your nose.’

  ‘And the papers?’

  ‘There’s a lot of burnt ash in the incinerator, but that’s about all.’

  ‘Any ideas on who killed him?’

  ‘Sorry,’ I said, ‘but that’s your job. All I had to do was find our aristocratic friend, and that’s as far as it goes. Tell your boss he’ll be receiving my account in the post.’

  ‘Thanks a lot, Gunther,’ said Rienacker, sounding less than pleased. ‘You’ve got -’ I cut across him with a curt goodbye, and hung up.

  I left Inge the keys to the car, telling her to meet me in the street outside Haupthändler’s beach house at 4.30 that afternoon. I was intending to take the special S-Bahn to the Reich Sports Field via the Zoo Station; but first, and so that I could be sure of not being followed, I chose a particularly circuitous route to get to the station. I walked quickly up Königstrasse and caught a number two tram to Spittel Market where I strolled twice around the Spindler Brunnen Fountain before getting onto the U-Bahn. I rode one stop to Friedrichstrasse, where I left the U-Bahn and returned once more to street level. During business hours Friedrichstrasse has the densest traffic in Berlin, when the air tastes like pencil shavings. Dodging umbrellas and Americans standing huddled over their Baedekers, and narrowly missing being run over by a Rudesdorfer Peppermint van, I crossed Tauberstrasse and Jagerstrasse, passing the Kaiser Hotel and the head office of the Six Steel Works. Then, continuing up towards Unter den Linden, I squeezed between some traffic on Französische Strasse and, on the corner of Behrenstrasse, ducked into the Kaiser Gallery. This is an arcade of expensive shops of the sort that are much patronized by tourists and it leads onto Unter den Linden at a spot next to the Hotel Westminster, where many of them stay. If you are on foot it has always been a good place to shake a tail for good. Emerging on to Unter den Linden, I crossed over the road and rode a cab to the Zoo Station, where I caught the special train to the Reich Sports Field.

  The two-storey-high stadium looked smaller than I had expected, and I wondered how all the people milling around its perimeter would ever fit in. It was only after I had gone in that I realized that it was actually bigger on the inside than on the outside, and this by virtue of an arena that was several metres below ground level.

  I took my seat, which was close to the edge of the cinder track and next to a matronly woman who smiled and nodded politely as I sat down. The seat to my right, which I imagined was to be occupied by Marlene Sahm, was for the moment empty, although it was already past two o’clock. Just as I was looking at my watch the sky released the heaviest shower of the day, and I was only too glad to share the matron’s umbrella. It was to be her good deed of the day. She pointed to the west side of the stadium and handed me a small pair of binoculars.

  ‘That is where the Fuhrer will be sitting,’ she said. I thanked her, and although I wasn’t in the least bit interested, I scanned a dais that was populated with several men in frock-coats, and the ubiquitous complement of S S officers, all of them getting as wet as I was. Inge would be pleased, I thought. Of the Führer himself, there was no sign.

  ‘Yesterday he didn’t come until almost five o’clock,’ explained the matron. ‘Although with weather as atrocious as this, he could be forgiven for not coming at all.’ She nodded down at my empty lap. ‘You don’t have a programme. Would you care to know the order of events?’ I said that I would, but found to my embarrassment that she intended not to lend me her programme but to read it aloud.

  ‘The first events on the track this afternoon are the heats of the 400-metre hurdles. Then we have the semi-finals and final of the 100-metres. If you’ll allow me to say so, I don’t think the German has a chance against the American negro, Owens. I saw him running yesterday and he was like a gazelle.’ I was just about to start out on some unpatriotic remark about the so-called Master Race when Marlene Sahm sat down next to me, so probably saving me from my own potentially treasonable mouth.

  ‘Thank you for coming, Herr Gunther. And I’m sorry about yesterday. It was rude of me. You were only trying to help, were you not?’

  ‘Certainly.’

  ‘Last night I couldn’t sleep for thinking about what you said about — ’ and here she hesitated for a moment. ‘About Eva.’

  ‘Paul Pfarr’s mistress?’ She nodded. ‘Is she a friend of yours?’

  ‘Not close friends, you understand, but friends, yes. And so early this morning I decided to put my trust in you. I asked you to meet me here because I’m sure I’m being watched. That’s why I’m late too. I had to make sure I gave them the slip.’

  ‘The Gestapo?’

  ‘Well, I certainly don’t mean the International Olympic Committee, Herr Gunther.’ I smiled at that, and so did she.

  ‘No, of course not,’ I said, quietly appreciating the way in which modesty giving way to impatience made her the more attractive. Beneath the terracotta-coloured raincoat she was unbuttoning at the neck, she wore a dress of dark blue cotton, with a neckline that allowed me a view of the first few centimetres of a deep and well-sunburnt cleavage. She started to fumble inside her capacious brown-leather handbag.

  ‘So then,’ she said nervously. ‘About Paul. After his death I had to answer a great many questions, you know.’

  ‘What about?’ It was a stupid question, but she didn’t say so.

  ‘Everything. I think that at one stage they even got round to suggesting that I might be his mistress.’ From out of the bag she produced a dark-green desk diary and handed it to me. ‘But this I kept back. It’s Paul’s desk diary, or, rather, the one he kept himself, his private one, and not the official one that I kept for him: the one that I gave to the Gestapo.’ I turned the diary over in my hands, not presuming to open it. Six, and now Marlene, it was odd the way people held things back from the police. Or maybe it wasn’t. It all depended on how well you knew the police.

  ‘Why?’ I said.

  ‘To protect Eva.’

  ‘Then why didn’t you simply destroy it? Safer for her and for you too I would have thought.’

  She frowned as she struggled to explain something she perhaps only half understood herself. ‘I suppose I thought that in the proper hands, there might be something in it that would identify the murderer.’

  ‘And what if it should turn out that your friend Eva had something to do with it?’

  Her eyes flashed and she spoke angrily. ‘I don’t believe it for a second,’ she said. ‘She wasn’t capable of harming anyone.’

  Pursing my lips, I nodded circumspectly. ‘Tell me about her.’

  ‘All in good time, Herr Gunther,’ she said, her mouth becoming compressed. I didn’t think Marlene Sahm was the type ever to be carried away by her passion or her tastes, and I wondered whether the Gestapo preferred to recruit this kind of woman, or simply affected them that way.

  ‘First of all, I’d like to make something clear to you.’

  ‘Be my guest.’

  ‘After Paul’s death I myself made a few discreet inquiries as to Eva’s whereabouts, but without success. But I shall come to that too. Before I tell you anything I want your word that if you manage to find her you will try to persuade her to give herself up. If she is arrested by
the Gestapo it will go very badly for her. This isn’t a favour I’m asking, you understand. This is my price for providing you with the information to help your own investigation.’

  ‘You have my word. I’ll give her every chance I can. But I have to tell you: right now it looks as though she is in it up to her hatband. I believe that she’s planning to go abroad tonight, so you’d better start talking. There’s not much time.’

  For a moment Marlene chewed her lip thoughtfully, her eyes gazing emptily at the hurdlers as they came up to the starting line. She remained oblivious of the buzz of excitement in the crowd that gave way to silence as the starter raised his pistol. As he fired she began to tell me what she knew.

  ‘Well, for a start there’s her name: it’s not Eva. That was Paul’s name for her. He was always doing that, giving people new names. He liked Aryan names, like Siegfried, and Brünhilde. Eva’s real name was Hannah, Hannah Roedl, but Paul said that Hannah was a Jewish name, and that he would always call her Eva.’

  The crowd gave a great roar as the American won the first heat of the hurdles.

  ‘Paul was unhappy with his wife, but he never told me why. He and I were good friends, and he confided in me a great deal, but I never heard him speak about his wife. One night he took me to a gaming club, and it was there that I ran across Eva. She was working there as a croupier. I hadn’t seen her in months. We first met working for the Revenue. She was very good with figures. I suppose that’s why she became a croupier in the first place. Twice the pay, and the chance to meet some interesting people.’

  I raised my eyebrows at that one: I, for one, have never found the people who gamble in casinos to be anything less than dull; but I said nothing, not wishing to cut her thread.

  ‘Anyway, I introduced her to Paul, and you could see they were attracted. Paul was a handsome man, and Eva was just as good-looking, a real beauty. A month later I met her again and she told me that she and Paul were having an affair. At first I was shocked; and then I thought it was really none of my business. For a while — maybe as long as six months - they were seeing quite a lot of each other. And then Paul was killed. The diary should provide you with dates and all that sort of thing.’

  I opened the diary and turned to the date of Paul’s murder. I read the entries written on the page.

  ‘According to this he had an appointment with her on the night of his death.’ Marlene said nothing. I started to turn back the pages. ‘And here’s another name I recognize,’ I said. ‘Gerhard Von Greis. What do you know about him?’ I lit a cigarette and added: ‘It’s time you told me all about your little department in the Gestapo, don’t you think?’

  ‘Paul’s department. He was so proud of it, you know.’ She sighed profoundly. ‘A man of great integrity.’

  ‘Sure,’ I said. ‘All the time he was with this other woman, what he really wanted was to be back home with the wife.’

  ‘In a funny way that’s absolutely true, Herr Gunther. That’s exactly what he wanted. I don’t think he ever stopped loving Grete. But for some reason he started hating her as well.’

  I shrugged. ‘Well, it takes all sorts. Maybe he just liked to wag his tail.’ She stayed silent for a few minutes after that one, and they ran the next heat of the hurdles. Much to the delight of the crowd, the German runner, Nottbruch, won the race. The matron got very excited at that, standing up in her seat and waving her programme.

  Marlene rummaged in her bag again, and took out an envelope. ‘This is a copy of a letter originally empowering Paul to set up his department,’ she said, handing it to me. ‘I thought you might like to see it. It helps to put things in perspective, to explain why Paul did what he did.’

  I read the letter. It went as follows:The Reichsführer SS and

  Chief of the German Police in

  the Reich Ministry of the

  Interior

  o-KdS g2(o/RV) No. 22 11/35

  Berlin NW7

  6 November 1935

  Unter den Linden, 74

  Local Tel. 120 034

  Trunk Call 120 037

  Express letter to Hauptsturmführer Doktor Paul Pfarr

  I write to you on a very serious matter. I mean corruption amongst the servants of the Reich. One principle must apply: public servants must be honest, decent, loyal and comradely to members of our own blood. Those individuals who offend against this principle - who take so much as one mark - will be punished without mercy. I shall not stand idly by and watch the rot develop.

  As you know, I have already taken measures to root out corruption within the ranks of the S S, and a number of dishonest men have been eliminated accordingly. It is the will of the Führer that you should be empowered to investigate and root out corruption in the German Labour Front, where fraud is endemic. To this end you are promoted to the rank of Hauptsturmführer, reporting directly to me.

  Wherever corruption forms, we shall burn it out. And at the end of the day, we shall say that we performed this task in love of our people.

  Heil Hitler!

  (signed)

  Heinrich Himmler

  ‘Paul was very diligent,’ Marlene said. ‘Arrests were made and the guilty punished.’

  ‘“Eliminated”,’ I said, quoting the Reichsführer.

  Marlene’s voice hardened. ‘They were enemies of the Reich,’ she said.

  ‘Yes, of course.’ I waited for her to continue, and seeing her rather unsure of me I added, ‘They had to be punished. I’m not disagreeing with you. Please go on.’

  Marlene nodded. ‘Finally, he turned his attention to the Steel Workers Union, and quite early on he became aware of certain rumours regarding his own father-in-law, Hermann Six. In the beginning he made light of it. And then, almost overnight, he was determined to destroy him. After a while, it was nothing short of an obsession.’

  ‘When was this?’

  ‘I can’t remember the date. But I do remember that it was about the time that he started working late, and not taking telephone calls from his wife. And it wasn’t long after that he started to see Eva.’

  ‘And exactly how was Daddy Six misbehaving?’

  ‘Corrupt DAF officials had deposited the Steel Workers Union and Welfare Fund in Six’s bank — ’

  ‘You mean, he owns a bank as well?’

  ‘A major shareholding, in the Deutsches Kommerz. In return, Six saw to it that these same officials were given cheap personal loans.’

  ‘What did Six get out of it?’

  ‘By paying low interest on the deposit to the detriment of the workers, the bank was able to improve the books.’

  ‘Nice and tidy then,’ I said.

  ‘That’s just the half of it,’ she said with an outraged sort of chuckle. ‘Paul also suspected that his father-in-law was skimming the union’s funds. And that he was churning the union’s investments.’

  ‘Churning,’ I said. ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Repeatedly selling stocks and shares and buying others so that each time you can claim the legal percentages. The commission if you like. That would have been split between the bank and the union officials. But trying to prove it was a different story,’ she said. ‘Paul tried to get a tap on Six’s telephone, but whoever it is that arranges these things refused. Paul said that somebody else was already tapping his phone and that they weren’t about to share. So Paul looked for another way to get to him. He discovered that the Prime Minister had a confidential agent who had certain information that was compromising to Six, and for that matter to many others. His name was Gerhard Von Greis. In Six’s case, Goering was using this information to make him toe the economic line. Anyway, Paul arranged to meet Von Greis and offered him a lot of money to let him take a look at what he had on Six. But Von Greis refused. Paul said he was afraid.’

  She looked around as the crowd, anticipating the semi-final of the 100-metres, grew more excited. With the hurdles cleared off the track, there were now several sprinters warming up, including the man the crowd had come to see: Jes
se Owens. For a moment, her attention was devoted entirely to the negro athlete.

  ‘Isn’t he superb?’ she said. ‘Owens I mean. In a class of his own.’

  ‘But Paul did get hold of the papers, didn’t he?’

  She nodded. ‘Paul was very determined,’ she said, distractedly. ‘At such times, he could be quite ruthless, you know.’

  ‘I don’t doubt it.’

  ‘There is a department in the Gestapo at Prinz Albrecht Strasse, which deals with associations, clubs and the DAF. Paul persuaded them to issue a “red tab” on Von Greis, so that he could be arrested immediately. Not only that, but they saw to it that Von Greis was picked up by Alarm Command, and taken to Gestapo headquarters.’

  ‘What is Alarm Command exactly?’ I said.

  ‘Killers.’ She shook her head. ‘You wouldn’t want to fall into their hands. Their brief was to scare Von Greis: to scare him badly enough to convince him that Himmler was more powerful than Goering, that he should fear the Gestapo before he should fear the Prime Minister. After all, hadn’t Himmler taken control of the Gestapo away from Goering in the first place? And then there was the case of Goering’s former chief of Gestapo, Diels, being sold down the river by his former master. They said all of these things to Von Greis. They told him that the same would happen to him, and that his only chance was to cooperate, otherwise he would find himself facing the displeasure of the Reichsführer S S. That would mean a KZ for sure. Of course, Von Greis was convinced. What man in their hands would not have been? He gave Paul everything he had. Paul took possession of a number of documents which he spent several evenings examining at home. And then he was killed.’

  ‘And the documents were stolen.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Do you know something of what was in these documents?’

  ‘Not in any detail. I never saw them myself. I only know what he told me. He said that they proved beyond all shadow of a doubt, that Six was in bed with organized crime.’