‘You knew him Lothar. You fucking knew him,’ Peters said. ‘That’s why you are shitting yourself. Who is he?’
Blucher raised his head up. The Russian hat had collapsed over his eyes.
‘All I know is that he came into the shop. Quite a few times. He and the other one.’
To ward off the cold Peters was jogging on the spot, trying to keep warm.
‘The first one. That’s what you mean, isn’t it Lothar? You knew the first one as well. I would call that obstructing a police inquiry.’
He could see the panic taking hold on Blucher’s face, the sweat re-appearing on his forehead. Peters put his hand on his informer’s right shoulder.
‘Don’t worry Lothar; I’m not going to charge you with anything. All you have to do is tell me about them.’
‘What is there to tell? They both came into the shop. They liked the section with the younger boys. The first one I had to ask to leave eventually. He was pestering one of my staff.’
‘Pestering? Who?’
‘That doesn’t matter. He was pestering him for videos, of younger guys, the younger the better. I thought it was best we bar him from the shop. I didn’t want a reputation.’
Peters burst out laughing.
‘A reputation? That preceded you a long time ago Lothar.’
He kept jogging on the same spot watching the magpie get closer to them, its pecking growing louder.
‘I have a request Herr Peters. I want to call in a favour too. I don’t feel safe anymore.’
‘No you are right. We’ll have to close down the shop, move you out of your house,’ Peters glanced towards the car park. A column of smoke wafted from a rolled down window of Blucher’s VW Beetle.
‘And your Thai friend too of course.’
‘Absolutely not. The shop can’t close. No way. I’ll barricade myself in if necessary. “Boyz R Us” will never close.’ The thought of lower profit margins seemed to be dispelling Blucher’s fear.
‘Ok, Lothar, ok,’ Peters said reassuringly. ‘We will book you into a guest house for a few days. Get you out of Charlottenberg, you and your young friend.’
For the first time since they sat down at Teufelsberg, Blucher was smiling.
‘A guest house for Detective Inspector Martin Peters’ greatest source! Absolutely not. I want the executive suite at the Marriott on Potsdamer Platz if it’s available. Apparently the architect modelled the interior on Notre Dame in Paris. A cathedral for good taste and modern art. Anika and I will be very happy there.’
Good taste! Blucher’s tastes were anything but.
Yet he had to keep his source sweet not only because of the link to the two men on film but also what he knew about the headless horsemen and a possible Russian connection.
‘And what of the Russian, Lothar? ‘
‘Ah, the Russian. For that alone you will put me in front of a Russkie firing squad. I’ll tell you more about him over a Marguerite in the Marriott bar.’
‘But you have heard something haven’t you?’
‘I have my sources and my contacts in that particular community that go back to when the Wall was still up but you will have to see me in the hotel before I talk about that ,” Blucher replied.
Peters wanted to go back to Kottbusser Strasse; he was desperate to share what he learned about the men on camera from Blucher with Angelika.
‘You go off now and play with your Thai friend. I’ll make the arrangements and call you. ‘
Blucher got up, took Peters hand and shook it vigorously. Then he clicked his heels, the clocking noise of two shoes together an echo of his Junker roots and then bowed before waddling off towards the car park. When he had driven off Peters noticed that the magpie had flown off in the same direction as Blucher, eastwards towards the sun.
Six
Mannfred Stannheim always preferred to sit right at the back of the morning conference, pulling on his first cigarette of the morning, playing the disruptive schoolboy at the rear end of the bus. And he waited until near the conclusion, when his English protégé was wrapping up, to toss the awkward question into the middle, to launch the verbal grenade with the pin pulled out.
They had gathered in the incident room to discuss the two killings captured on film and posted on the Internet. Two gay men with a taste for younger men killed brutally, their deaths shown for a reason. A gay basher taking things to the extreme terminus of homophobia? A religious fanatic obsessed with Sodom and in search of smiting Gomorrah? The grim visages of the two men were blown up and pinned to a white board. In front of it Peters held court, Angelika by his side and Riedel looking on enviously from a knot of plain clothes officers seated in front.
‘The only thing we know about these two men were that they both frequented a gay sex shop not far from Sauvigny Platz. That they liked very young men and that they were deliberately exposed for the benefit of the camera. Whoever killed them wanted us to see them.
‘I want all reports of missing persons, of missing middle aged men from 45 to 60 specifically. I want details of any psychos, any with a history of attacking gay men, who have recently been released from jail. And I want a complete black-out on this until we have established who these men were and who we are now dealing with. So if there are no further questions I suggest we get on with it.’
Stannheim shot his hand up.
‘Just one question Detective Inspector,’ the head of the Kotbusser Strasse murder squad was evidently enjoying himself.
Stannheim went on. ‘If the last one is posted on the Internet won’t the press get their hands on this sooner or later?’
Peters smouldered. Stannheim was paying him back for his latest refusal to take over the murder squad.
‘We can’t be certain that he has already sent this to someone in the media.’
He walked across the room to Stannheim and whispered impatiently into his ear.
‘Sir. Please, if we can have a word in your office in private.’
Stannheim nodded and they walked towards the nerve centre of Kotbusser Strasse. Once inside his boss’ office, Peters shut the door.
‘Well, Martin what is it you couldn’t say to me in front of your fellow officers?’
‘An email was sent to a journalist. The fortunate thing is that I know her.’
‘Another one of your conquests, Martin?’ Stannheim asked acidly. He knew. He must have known about Peters’ private life. Mannfred Stannheim was nothing if not thorough even in the monitoring of his subalterns’ existence far beyond the walls of Kottbusser Strasse.
Peters wondered if Stannheim had been keeping tabs on him even paying one of his old contacts from the Cold War to spy on his English detective. The thought of him being stalked on the orders of his own boss provoked Peters to wound the old man.
‘No sir. But I do trust her. And as you well know I am good at keeping secrets and I certainly don’t gossip.’
Stannheim never dropped his guard even though the vaguest mention of Paul his sons Peters knew would hurt.
‘You mean you traded with her? What did you have to give her?’
‘The headless horsemen sir. I told her about the tattoos. The references to the battles. It was the only thing I had to trade. It bought us a bit of time.’
He sized Peters up and down for a moment and then reached over to his desk fishing out a document buried underneath an untidy mound of papers. Stannheim shoved one under the English detective’s nose.
‘By the way, this is a bit steep Martin, isn’t it? Are you sure he’s worth it?’
Peters felt as though he had spent half his career in the Berlin Polizei defending the fiduciary demands of Lothar Blucher.
‘He’s come up with the goods in the past sir and I’m confident he will again. Not just about the Russian, maybe the recent killings too.’
His boss gave him a world-weary look.
‘What does he know about our friends taken from the Havel?’
‘He knows about a Russian connection even tho
ugh we’ve kept the tattoos under wraps. I’m certain he has more to tell. It’s just his way of working; he likes it teased out of him.’
‘You mean he enjoys the largesse of the Berlin Polizei.’ Stannheim said rifling through one of his drawers and taking out a stamper. As he rolled the department’s seal of approval along the account chit, Stannheim whispered.
‘Make bloody sure you’re right because we have no real leads either on the headless horsemen or our stars on film. Four murders in one month and not a single fucking in-road. If your lady friend at WAMS falls out with us and prints we are all screwed.’
Peters was in a vengeful mood when he left Stannheim’s office, so much so that he made his way directly to where Riedel and his clique were sitting, gossiping by their workstations, sniggering into their plastic cups filled with filtered water and organic juices.
He first addressed Riedel’s number one ally in Kottbusser Strasse, Hermann Bauer, a former Vopo from eastern Berlin whom his former colleagues in Prenzlauer Berg swore rose through the ranks of the old force by beating up dissidents and informing on his colleagues.
‘Herr Bauer,’ said Peters delivering a mate-like slap onto his back. ‘I have a special operation for you. Get yourself a pool car and then take a walk on the wild side.’
Bauer looked bewildered. He could never fathom the Englishman’s oblique sarcasm.
‘I want you to check out every gay bar in a radius starting from Sauvingy Platz. Try the pubs first; the ones were the older men frequent. Our two friends were probably less likely to attend the more extreme clubs. Too much sweat and effort for them I imagine. Angelika will provide you with photographs of the victims.’
He then turned to Riedel himself, the source of so much back biting and barrack room rebellion in Kottbusser Strasse.
‘And I have a special task for you Herr Riedel. Grab your coat we are off to Potsdamer Platz to get you a job.’
Riedel looked back to Bauer who was fuming in his seat. Peters nodded to both of them and then gestured with his head towards the door.
‘Come on gentlemen we have a lunatic to catch.’
As they left the incident room Peters deliberately bumped into Angelika and winked at her.
Seven
The cackling echoed around the foyer of the Marriot Hotel on Potsdamer Platz. Peters heard Anika before he could see him/her.
Blucher’s lover was standing at the bar, one hand on hip, the other balancing a cocktail glass through the fingers, flirting with one of the Filipino waiters. The man who brought Anika to Berlin was sitting in a chair near the entrance, prodding on the key board of his lap-top, one mobile glued to his left ear, the other ringing on the table beside his computer. The two of them were already fitting in.
‘The Executive Suite was already booked. They’ve given us a room on the ninth floor instead. It’s small and the sauna isn’t working today either. The Berlin Polizei has let me down, Herr Peters.’Blucher snorted in protest.
The detective had come to take the keys to ‘Boyz R Us’ off its owner. He calculated that his informer might be in danger; instead he would put Riedel behind the counter, once Peters found him something appropriate to wear.
‘The keys Lothar please. I’ve a detective out there who is just dying to get into those leather shorts you have hanging up in the shop.’
‘I must come over and see him modelling them. Here take the keys and let me work out how much I’ve lost today,’ Blucher continued complaining.
Peters thumbed over his shoulder towards the bar from where the cackling was coming.
‘At least your friend is enjoying it.’
‘It keeps her happy Herr Peters. As long as there’s something left to entertain me I don’t mind the flirting.’
‘Something left in the tank for Lothar’, Peters said with a trace of sarcasm.
The lobby was full of slickly dressed business types carrying wafer thin lap tops under their arms, sitting down to talks with partners under the layered balconies leading up to the roof of the hotel. There was a hum overlaying the hotel atmosphere, the murmur of polite 21st century commerce. Peters admired the women in their dark suits and designer glasses, all poised and elegant and immaculately made-up. Peters felt at home in places like this, inside these post-modern cathedrals of good taste and impeccable manners. It was all a far cry from the odorous back-biting, the bitchiness and the claustrophobia of Kottbusser Strasse.
‘How long have I got here?’ Blucher asked.
‘As long as it takes, Lothar just don’t take the piss and order champagne every night.’
‘I’ll just stick to the Sekt then. Here’s to the Berlin Polizei.’ Blucher lifted up a glass and swigged back the fizzy, golden liquid. It had just turned eleven o’clock in the morning.
Before leaving, Peters grabbed the glass out of Blucher’s hand and slammed it down onto the table, some droplets falling on his keyboard. Peters wanted to remind his informer that there was another reason why they were meeting - the Russians and the headless horsemen from the Havel.
‘Damn you this is my office on the go for as long you keep me out of the shop.’
‘You haven’t mentioned the Russian Lothar. You said you had information about the men in the Havel. I think it’s time you stopped being so obscure. I’ve got a nervous wreck of a commander breaking my balls to get a lead, any lead, into the Havel corpses and you sit there guzzling back the Sekt at our expense telling me nothing.’
Blucher shook his head feigning sadnesss and the look of someone who had just been deeply insulted.
‘If there is anything dodgy going on with a Russian link in Berlin then it all flows back to one Avi Yanaev.’
Peters didn’t recognise the name. His attention was diverted by the cackling from the bar. Anika had snatched the Filipino waiter’s hand and shoved it up her skirt. Blucher ignored the scene and continued texting.
‘Yanaev? Never heard of him. Who is he?’ Peters inquired.
‘What is he - that is the real question here,’ Blucher said while sending a text message on one of his mobiles before continuing.
‘He’s a Jewish émigré from the depths of Siberia. Made his money in property down in the Russian quarter in Kopenick. Lives in a big house there with electronic gates and drives about in a blacked out Mercedes. Rumour has it the houses and flats he owns are just fronts for his other businesses. There’s a knocking shop down in Schoenberg full of Russian and Ukrainian girls. Seven stories high. A different kink on every floor. One of Yanaev’s partners owns the place but he’s just the front man.’
‘Who’s the partner?’
Blucher winked at Peters and sent another text he was clicking out on his dial pad.
‘He’s a friend of mine who’s fond of talking when I’ve plied him too with much vodka.’
‘Then bring him over here and put the Stolychnya on us.’
‘Me and the Russians have form, Herr Peters. I still owe them.’
Peters sensed that Blucher, despite the protests, was also enjoying himself.
‘You and your lost lands in East Prussia. You really ought to get over it.’
‘Never Herr Peters! And you should know.’
Peters left the hotel shuddering at the notion that he and Blucher were alike. They could both trace their roots to lost Germanic lands beyond the Rivers Rhine and Oder. The thought of such a connection, however tentative, repulsed him.
Riedel was fuming in the driver’s seat, already irritated for having to drive around Potsdamer Platz several times while Peters held talks with his prized source. Peters had insisted he did not come inside with him. He was not going to let Riedel find out about Blucher.
‘Head over to the Ku’damm Herr Riedel and I’ll direct you from there.’ he said coldly.
Still a building site! Peters wondered if Berlin was a city that would ever be finished. For the place he had adopted as home was in constant flux, new pieces of architecture being constantly bolted incongruously onto old ones. Thi
s was a hodge-podge of a capital, with rival urban themes either clashing or coalescing. A bastard child of history and post-modernity; a home where everything and everyone was temporary and transient in a departure lounge for plots and dreams.
After the Ku’damm they turned left mid-way down the west end shopping thoroughfare and onto a Wilhemine side street. ‘Boyz R Us’ was situated on a corner, its shiny black sign above the door the only hint of what was on offer inside.
Once he unlocked the door, Peters had to shut down the alarm on the inside wall and illuminate the shop. When the lights came on they revealed a cornucopia of fetish clothing, racks of porn DVDs, gay sex magazines wrapped up in plastic and a terrifying range of sex toys, some of which posed unimaginable anatomical challenges to their future owners. Riedel looked as if he was about to throw up.
‘Come on, Riedel. Don’t be so squeamish. There’s not much difference between what they do and what you get up to at the weekend. Just the portals are not the same.’
When Riedel failed to rise to the bait Peters plucked an enormous double-ended vibrator from one of the shelves and waved it in his face.
The Swinging Detective Page 4