‘Move to the side!’ the brownshirts cried, all the time chanting: ‘Jew filth! Jew filth!’
A uniformed cop raised his arm and shouted something. Not the command to attack, as she’d initially thought, quite the opposite: the police cordon dispersed, and the SA men stormed inside. By the time she finally made it through, Steinplatz was as good as deserted. Only a few brownshirts remained along with the cops, who suddenly looked strangely out-of-place.
She didn’t like to think what the brown mob might do with Bernhard Weiss and his family. ‘How can you just stand there?’ she asked.
‘Did you see how many there were? How can two dozen cops face down a hundred or more SA officers? It was only reasonable to withdraw. We couldn’t have held position another five minutes. People would have died.’
‘And now?’ Charly almost screamed. ‘What do you think’s going to happen when they get their hands on Dr Weiss?’
‘He should have gone before.’
She was about to head inside when she felt an authoritative hand on her shoulder. ‘I can’t let you go in there, Fräulein.’
‘You let that lot in, but not me?’
‘Too dangerous for a woman.’
‘Then you go in before it’s too late.’
‘I have my orders.’
‘What orders? To guard the lawn or the lives of those inside?’
Charly looked at the cop, who avoided her eyes, then towards the elegant front door she was forbidden from entering, and inside to the brightly lit stairwell. The first brown uniforms appeared by the windows on the second floor. What would happen? Would they start throwing out furniture, then people?
34
It started at a quarter past six, when Berthold Weinert took the first call from the municipal district of Brieg. Either it was a tiny ward or they were speedy counters up in Silesia. The phone hadn’t stopped ringing since.
He telephoned and jotted down election results as if he were working on a factory line. In fact, he was sitting in a well-heated editorial office high above Kochstrasse, savouring the warmth and view of the winter street below. Finally he could trade his freezing garret for the bustle of activity Voting Sunday had triggered in news desks across the land.
The election dictated editorial proceedings, everything else was secondary. Proofs for the morning edition were postponed until the small hours. It would be a long night for everyone, not that Berthold Weinert minded. After more than three years he was glad to experience the chaos of day-to-day news production again.
His Reichstag fire story had returned him to the fold, though he’d been careful to omit his encounter with Göring. The last thing he needed was for the fat minister to link him with the journalist from the burning Reichstag, and place him in the dock with van der Lubbe and the rest.
He had to go carefully. The Berliner Tageblatt, for which he had written before being shown the door in the bitter cold of January 1930, was Jewish-owned and regarded as left-wing by the Nazis. In Theodor Wolff it had a Jewish editor-in-chief, or used to have. After writing an article that was critical of the Nazis in the days following the fire, Wolff had fled abroad, and been summarily dismissed by his – also Jewish – publisher on Friday. With him, more than a quarter of a century of experience had vanished overnight.
Weinert knew from experience how swiftly the Mosse-Verlag could wield the axe. He hadn’t criticised anyone in his story, nor had he written up the rumours that the Nazis themselves were responsible for the fire. Clearly he wasn’t alone in finding it odd that the brownshirts should be so up in arms about the blaze when they’d spent years referring to the building as a talking shop. Knowing the Scherl-Verlag would remove such things from his copy, he had concentrated on making his story as exciting as possible, and his vivid, sensationalist portrayal had drawn praise from all sides.
And resulted in his own desk.
It had been a holiday cover at first, but now that he had his foot in the door, he had a chance to show what he could do, and there was no point grumbling about gathering election results. He had been assigned Electoral District 7, which roughly corresponded to the administrative region of Breslau. The Scherl-Verlag had people everywhere to carry the preliminary results back to the editorial office in Berlin. Meanwhile the office was staffed with people like Weinert, who noted everything that came over the wires and used it to compile a series of tables, which were then made available to political editors.
It was vital he didn’t get above his station. He had already shown that he could not only write stories, but break them himself. The business with the dead homeless man and the pigeons had caused quite a stir. A number of papers, some of them more respectable than Der Tag, had picked up the scoop.
The telephone rang for a fourth time. His pre-printed form was gradually filling with numbers. No sooner had he hung up than it rang again. ‘Ward name?’ he said. Four down, twenty to go; it would be a long night. Perhaps when it was over he’d have a drink with colleagues. It couldn’t hurt. ‘Weinert here, ward name please,’ he repeated.
‘Berlin Alexanderplatz,’ said the man on the other end.
‘Gereon!’ Weinert said, barely concealing his astonishment. ‘How did you get this number?’
‘I’m a police officer.’
‘We’ll have to chat another time. Right now, counting is in full swing and . . .’
‘I didn’t realise you had a permanent position again.’
‘An editor went to take the waters in Karlsbad.’
‘Some people are better off abroad.’
‘It’s good of you to call, but the timing’s all wrong. We’re blocking a line here.’
‘Speaking of right and wrong. How about using someone as an informant without their prior knowledge?’
‘You mean her prior knowledge.’
‘Then you know what I’m talking about.’
‘We ran into one another at the Reichstag and went on to a bar in Friedrichstrasse. We hadn’t seen each other in a long time. It’s normal to say what you’re up to.’
‘Is it normal to do the dirty afterwards?’
‘I didn’t do the dirty on Charly, just on Böhm. I thought you couldn’t stand the man.’
‘He’s a demigod as far as Charly’s concerned. She’s inconsolable and blames herself for everything.’
‘For what?’
‘Böhm was transferred.’
‘You’re not serious.’
‘The investigation you made fun of was shelved by the powers-that-be. Thing is, it was my investigation too.’
‘What can I say? The power of the press. Sometimes it surprises even me.’
‘You could have told Charly you were going to write about the dead tramp.’
‘I didn’t know I was. It wasn’t until I mentioned Böhm’s name that my boss’s ears pricked up. Gereon, I was forced to write that article!’ That was a slight exaggeration, but Weinert didn’t want to risk losing Gereon Rath as a contact. ‘Besides, I couldn’t have been that far off, or the other papers wouldn’t have followed suit.’
‘Well, they all had a great time. You know the canvasses were partly Charly’s idea?’
‘The pigeon business?’
‘It might sound stupid, but in the end it worked.’
‘I’m sorry, Gereon. I really didn’t mean . . .’
‘You should be sorry. You owe me one.’
‘Any time. Give me the information and I’ll write your story, just like old times . . .’
Weinert heard someone clearing their throat and turned around. Harald Hefner, the tall senior duty editor, stood behind him with furrowed brow. ‘Are you engaging in private conversations?’
‘An informant.’ Weinert placed his hand over the mouthpiece.
‘Put them off. You’re here for the election results. Don’t get above yourself!’
‘Of course not.’ Weinert hung up. He was about to say something else, when the telephone rang again, announcing the results from the rural district of
Strehlen. He sighed and reached for his pencil.
35
‘Shhh,’ Charly hissed, as Gereon entered the living room. She waved her arms, hoping he’d understand, and he did. Or rather, he grinned, placed his fingers to his lips and tiptoed exaggeratedly towards his armchair. Couldn’t he take her seriously, just this once? The ten o’clock news was being broadcast on the Berliner Funkstunde, and Charly’s ears were glued to the radiogramophone. Kirie sat beside her, tilting her head as if interested in what the loudspeaker had to say, but now Gereon arrived she pitter-pattered over to greet him.
Charly seldom listened to the radio, though more often than Gereon, who only used it to play his records. Switching it on, she had pushed the transmit button until the rustling and buzzing became a voice holding forth on the subject of Academics and Unemployment. After that it had been music, famous operetta melodies. No word on the election until the news, but they were making up for it now. Typical Gereon, to burst in at precisely the wrong moment.
Voting in Berlin had gone off peacefully for the most part, the speaker announced, something Charly had difficulty believing – unless they meant the kind of deathly peacefulness associated with a graveyard. Then came the preliminary results.
‘The National Socialists,’ the announcer said, ‘seventeen point two million votes. Two hundred-and-eighty-eight seats.’
Charly started at the figure, though she felt relieved at the same time. ‘At least it’s not an absolute majority,’ she said. ‘Hitler still needs Papen and company to govern.’ Despite everything, Hitler’s coalition partners from the Kampfbund Schwarz-Weiss-Rot hadn’t achieved more than three million votes.
Even so, the Nazi defeat that many had hoped for failed to materialise. On the contrary, they had gained almost six million votes. The Social Democrats remained on seven point something million, while the Centre Party had also improved slightly, their share now standing at almost four and a half. As for the Communists, though their newspapers were banned and they had been forbidden from holding campaign rallies, they’d still collected almost five million votes.
That was something. When she thought of all the threats outside polling stations, the Communists who had been arrested in the preceding weeks . . . The news moved onto the weather, and she rose from in front of the radiogramophone.
‘Aren’t you going to say hello to the birthday boy?’ Gereon grinned from his armchair. He had fetched a glass and poured from the bottle Charly had opened.
‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘I had to listen to that.’
It was polling day in the Prussian state parliament too. The results followed the Reichstag vote, but they didn’t interest her as much. The only thing she cared about was whether the Hitler government would have parliamentary support in future, and it would.
‘At least the Nazis can’t just do whatever they want,’ Gereon said. ‘They have to govern with Papen.’
‘Papen does whatever they want.’
‘To think the man used to be a Centrist. In the same party as my father and Adenauer!’
‘At some point Papen and his gang are going to have to wake up. Or Hindenburg, at least. It’s about time he put a stop to this madness.’
‘He will, for sure.’ Gereon glanced at the wristwatch Charly had gifted him that morning. ‘Let’s say in . . . four hundred and thirty-seven hours and five minutes. Starting . . . now!’
He smiled at her. He was such a child, but at least he liked his new watch. She had saved half a year for it. ‘No offence, Gereon, but right now I don’t feel much like joking.’ Even so, she couldn’t help but smile as he danced towards her like a gigolo manqué. In the meantime the radio was playing music again, dance music from the Femina-Bar.
He took her by the hand and led her in a dance across the carpet while Kirie looked on curiously. ‘Life goes on! At some point the Nazi government will collapse, and a new one will take its place.’
‘If there’s anyone in the country still worth voting for.’
‘Personally I can do without the Communists. Moscow’s welcome to them. Do you really want to be governed by that lot? They’d have our likes up against a wall.’
‘The Nazis aren’t just striking at the Communists. Do you have even the faintest notion of what is happening in this city?’
Their little dance was over. ‘More than the faintest notion, and I’m telling you all this will blow over.’
Not for the first time she was bewildered by his naiveté. She told him what had happened little more than four hours ago, hoping it might open his eyes. He listened in silence, until the part where the uniformed cop lifted the police cordon.
‘The SA stormed Dr Weiss’s apartment?’ he asked in disbelief.
‘Yes and, God knows, he’s no Communist.’
‘What happened?’
‘Thank God they didn’t get him. They had to vent their anger on the furniture.’
‘How do you know? Were you inside?’
She shook her head and told him how she had paced up and down Uhlandstrasse with Kirie because she couldn’t go home or face spending another minute with her idle colleagues. How suddenly she’d seen a familiar face emerge from a doorway. The relief she had felt on seeing him there, unharmed and with his wife. Bernhard Weiss gestured discreetly for her to keep walking. There were still SA officers a few metres away on Steinplatz. Only when they reached Pension Teske did the Weisses finally stop. ‘Fräulein Ritter,’ Charly’s one-time boss had said, ‘tell my brother that we are safe for the time being.’
‘What about your daughter?’
‘Hilde too. Tell my brother not to worry.’
Charly shook him and his wife by the hand. ‘I wish you all the best, Sir. See that you don’t fall into the hands of the brown mob.’
Then she made towards Adolf Weiss’s apartment, a few doors further down, and redeemed her pledge.
‘Weiss only escaped,’ she concluded her report, ‘because the SA were too stupid to station a guard outside the service entrance.’ She nodded towards the radio. ‘Yet the whole hideous episode doesn’t receive so much as a mention. According to the Funkstunde, the vote passed off peacefully.’
‘Well, nothing happened,’ Gereon said, in another clumsy attempt to pacify her.
‘Nothing happened?’ she said, careful not to shout. ‘Only because Weiss escaped in time, or he might be dead by now!’
‘It’s all right,’ he said and took her in his arms. ‘I didn’t mean it like that. You’re right.’
Suddenly she was just glad he was home, and that she wasn’t alone anymore. The radio played jazz music from the Femina-Bar, as if it were an evening like any other.
36
Erwin Zientek was at his desk when Rath arrived on Monday morning.
‘Not exactly quick off the mark, are you?’
‘I had to drop off my dog. In A Division.’
‘Police dog, is it?’
‘My secretary’s looking after her. I thought she’d get in the way here.’ He hung his hat on the hook. ‘So what is it today?’
‘What do you think? We pick up where we left off. Find a free interrogation room and start grilling Communists.’
‘The election’s over,’ Rath said, sitting at the desk Zientek had assigned him. ‘Why carry on?’
‘The election might be over, but the SA are still dredging up Communists – must be a nest somewhere.’ Zientek laughed at his joke. ‘Why do you think Dr Braschwitz requested so many CID officers? Because we love you boys so much? No, it’s because there are so many of you and so few of us.’
The detective’s lack of respect was starting to grate.
‘There are more Reds in this city than you might think,’ Zientek continued. ‘Did you see how many votes they got?’ He inhaled deeply, revealing yellowed teeth as he breathed out. ‘We’re interrogating every Communist going, in the hope of finding something Dr Braschwitz and the public prosecutor can use in court against van der Lubbe, Torgler and their co-conspirators.’
‘So it is a conspiracy?’
‘You think this Dutchman was out to grill a sausage?’
What the hell had he got himself into? He’d been careful not to breathe a word of how he’d spent his Sunday to Charly. Though she moaned about the Communists just as much as she did about the Nazis, there was no way she’d condone what he was doing with Zientek.
Communist threat or not, he was starting to feel uneasy about it himself. In his long years of service he had never been part of an interrogation marathon like this. The SA had actually been fetching people from outside polling stations – before they had a chance to vote. Time and again auxiliary police officers brought in people who weren’t even on Zientek’s list.
Mind you, the Communists had lost a good million votes since November. Within weeks, the new government had gained control of the Commune, nullifying the threat of a Red putsch. Germany was as far from civil war as it had been in a long time, but equally far from a functional democracy.
Rath thought of Charly and her vanishing hopes that the Republic might be saved. She had been in a strange mood this morning as she stepped out of the car and entered headquarters, head awhirl with dark thoughts. If he hadn’t called her back in the stairwell she’d have forgotten to kiss him as they went their separate ways. Which in his case meant the Political Police, Section 1A.
‘Let’s get on,’ he said, making no effort to conceal his temper. ‘Who’s next?’
‘We’re still waiting for the list.’
It wasn’t long before it arrived. To Rath’s surprise he knew the man who brought it in.
‘Lange, what are you doing here?’
Andreas Lange had previously worked as an assistant detective in Homicide before starting his inspector training in the same intake as Charly.
‘Inspector!’ Lange placed the list on Rath’s desk. He, too, seemed pleased to see a familiar face. ‘I’ve been with the Political Police since December. Didn’t you know?’
‘Right. Of course.’ Gennat had almost certainly announced the news while Rath’s mind had been elsewhere. ‘How do you like it on the upstairs floor?’
The March Fallen Page 16