The March Fallen

by volker Kutscher

  More noise in the room.

  ‘Did you know about this?’ Weinert whispered. Rath nodded. ‘My offer of a beer is still valid.’

  Again, Rath nodded, realising that he couldn’t say anything without incriminating himself. He started slowly towards the exit, looking at Roddeck as he went. The man was ill at ease, that much was plain, having lied in the morgue on two separate occasions. Somewhere in those eyes was fear, but of what? Discovery? Benjamin Engel? Apparently Roddeck suspected, perhaps even knew, that his former captain had survived the war. What he couldn’t know was that the man he called Todesengel had succumbed to his injuries five years ago, and now, realising this latest corpse spelled the end of his police protection, he was scared. Of the ghosts he himself had invoked.

  A smile formed on Rath’s face. It was time he was on his way. The journalists grew restless as the police commissioner rose again to speak. ‘I would like to offer my express thanks to Detective Gräf and Cadet Steinke. Gentlemen, we need men like you in the new Germany!’

  Without quite knowing why, Rath felt relieved it wasn’t him being thanked on the podium.

  95

  Porcelain tinkled as coffee was stirred, otherwise the only sound was the rustling of newspapers. Charly peered at Fritze, bowed over the Vossische Zeitung funny papers as he scoffed his final bread roll. Gereon was hidden behind the World News section.

  ‘The first of May is to be a national holiday,’ she said, over the top of her paper.

  Gereon nodded mechanically. ‘They’re allowed to drink again in New York.’

  ‘They’re calling it German Labour Day. The Communists will be pleased the Nazis are stealing their day of action along with everything else. They’ve already commandeered the Liebknechthaus.’

  ‘Just beer for the time being, they’re starting off slow.’

  A loud snort made Charly look up. Fritze looked at them both and said: ‘You’re talking at cross purposes!’

  Charly looked at Gereon, who lowered his paper and smiled.

  ‘I’m taking the dog out,’ the boy said, sticking the last piece of bread between his teeth. Kirie followed him eagerly into the hallway and moments later they heard the front door click shut.

  ‘I think Fritze wants us to have a little time to ourselves,’ Charly said.

  ‘He could tell we were beating about the bush,’ Gereon muttered.

  ‘Did you know?’

  She didn’t have to explain which article she was referring to. It was the one they had scrupulously avoided discussing all morning.

  ‘You were asleep when I got home yesterday, otherwise I’d have mentioned it.’

  ‘They find the corpse and mistake Wosniak for Engel? Really?’

  ‘They’re so fixated on Engel that I’m not surprised,’ said Rath. ‘I think Gennat’s the only one who has doubts.’

  ‘I thought as soon as Reinhold saw the Krumbiegel photos he’d realise Wosniak’s the killer.’

  ‘He doesn’t know what we know. We have Hannah, he doesn’t.’

  ‘We’re not dragging her into this, Gereon! I thought we’d agreed on that. Hannah Singer on the stand probably wouldn’t get a word out, and fugitives from the asylum don’t tend to make credible witnesses.’

  ‘I’m not planning anything of the sort. I only gave Reinhold the photos, nothing else.’ He tapped the Vossische Zeitung, which had devoted two columns and a large headline to the death of the murderer Benjamin Engel. ‘You see the result.’

  ‘Has Fritze seen it?’

  ‘He only reads the funnies. Besides, he doesn’t know anything. Not really. The name Engel means nothing to him. He wouldn’t guess it’s the man he stabbed to death.’

  ‘Let’s hope so. The last thing we need is for him to get nervous and start talking.’

  ‘Nothing can happen to him,’ Gereon said. ‘Not when the commissioner himself’s promised immunity from prosecution.’

  ‘Cut the jokes. They aren’t funny.’

  ‘Levetzow’s performance yesterday was a farce, but they all bought it. Weinert was the only one who tried to dig.’

  Charly fell silent. Ever since the night of the fire when he had exploited her indiscretion, Weinert’s was a name she could do without. ‘Why Weinert of all people?’ she asked.

  ‘There was someone next to him at the press conference, sowing the seeds of doubt.’

  ‘You were at the press conference? Are you mad? What did you say?’

  ‘Queried a few minor details . . . The identity of the corpse for example. Weinert wanted to go for a beer but I didn’t let things get that far.’

  ‘It’s enough to be hanging around a press conference without an invite.’

  ‘It was my case.’

  ‘Did Levetzow see you?’

  ‘What if he did?’

  ‘Reinhold?’

  ‘The only person I’m certain saw me is Achim von Roddeck, and that’s a good thing!’

  ‘I can’t think why.’

  ‘Don’t you see? Now he realises I know more than the others, but he can’t say anything to Levetzow, because it would make him a suspect. If he hadn’t identified his faithful Heinrich as Benjamin Engel, Homicide would have asked why Heinrich Wosniak killed all these men. All you’d need then is a single witness who’d seen Wosniak and Roddeck together and it would be over.’

  Charly took a sip of coffee.

  Gereon continued: ‘Roddeck suspects that I know the Spree corpse is Wosniak, and the fact that I haven’t shared this information with the Alberich team is making him nervous. The death of the Alberich-killer means his police protection being stood down. In Roddeck’s mind, he’s now in real danger. Because he believes Benjamin Engel is still alive. And because he must think his novel stands a decent chance of flushing him out.’

  ‘You mean that pack of lies was intended to lure Engel out of hiding?’

  ‘Yes, because Roddeck believes – rightly as it happens – that Engel took the French gold.’

  ‘He meant to corner Engel, so that he could get his hands on it himself?’

  ‘I don’t know about that, but he certainly can’t have expected his faithful Heinrich to be murdered. That must have spiked his guns, especially since he’ll be wondering who on earth stabbed the man.’

  ‘Well, so long as you’re happy.’

  ‘If we can’t get him, then the least we can do is put the fear in him, don’t you think? Perhaps if he’s frightened enough he’ll give himself away.’

  ‘I don’t understand you. Why do you still care? You were taken off the case weeks ago.’

  ‘You’re a fine one to talk. You were pretty involved yourself a few days back.’

  ‘That’s right. Because I wanted to protect the children, but now Wosniak is dead.’

  ‘You really want Roddeck to get away with this? He’s had three people murdered. As well as robbing another man of his reputation with character assassination dressed as literature.’

  ‘I don’t know, Gereon. Fundamentally, you’re right, but how are you going to prove any of it? Do you really think anyone in the new Germany cares about justice?’

  ‘I do.’

  She stopped short when he said it, suddenly realising how cowardly she had been, and how pitiful it was to sit back and do nothing. It was time to follow through on the decision she had been mulling over for weeks and translate her thoughts into action.

  Still, she struggled to get the words out. ‘After Easter I’m going to speak with Wieking again, I’m going to . . . resign.’ There, she’d said it at last.

  ‘So soon before the inspector’s exam?’ He looked at her wide-eyed. ‘Is it . . . are you pregnant?’

  ‘No!’ She had to laugh seeing him there, completely beside himself. She became serious again. ‘We’ve talked about it often enough . . . Wieking, the Communist witch-hunt, everything the WKP stands for.’

  ‘That’s no reason to throw in the towel.’

  ‘I can’t work there anymore, not for this police forc
e in this state.’

  ‘You can’t just go chucking it in. When I think of how long you’ve been striving for this. Things change.’

  ‘You really think so?’

  ‘Nothing stays the same. Things always change.’

  ‘The question is when.’

  ‘I certainly wouldn’t tell Wieking what you’ve just told me. The new government is sensitive about that sort of thing; the Nazis want to be loved.’

  ‘And if you aren’t prepared to court them, they break your skull.’

  ‘Something like that.’ He needed time to digest the news. ‘Have you really thought about this? You haven’t completed your probationary period, you’ll have nothing if you quit now.’

  ‘I’ll have my state examination.’

  ‘What are you going to do with that? Go back to Professor Heymann? He’s Jewish in case you’d forgotten, hardly the best reference in the new Germany.’

  She could have slapped him. Did he even realise that Heymann was one of those who had been forced out of office despite the new law supposedly not applying to veterans? Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service they’d termed it, cynically, when in reality it got rid of thousands of decorated officials. She was about to give Gereon a piece of her mind when the telephone rang. Answering, she was surprised to hear a familiar voice.

  ‘Speaking of Jews in the new age,’ she said. ‘Dr Schwartz. For you.’

  96

  It was still overcast but the rain had stopped. Rath parked on Robert-Koch-Platz and proceeded on foot. He had a strange premonition, which was why he had asked to meet in the lunch break rather than during office hours.

  Evidently Magnus Schwartz, the pathologist, shared his concern. Following his resignation from all duties (to spare him worse) he had summoned Rath to a cafe just next to the Neues Tor. He hadn’t said what it was about, insisting instead on a face-to-face meeting.

  Schwartz sat alone at a window table reading the newspaper. Seeing Rath, he stood up. ‘Good of you to come, Inspector,’ he said, shaking Rath’s hand. ‘I’d buy you a coffee, but I think it’s better if we take a walk.’ Even in his local cafe a law-abiding citizen such as Magnus Schwartz no longer felt safe from informers. Berliners were becoming more and more suspicious.

  ‘Then let’s go,’ Rath said.

  Outside they faced a chill breeze. The pavement was still wet but the sky was starting to clear. They strolled along Invalidenstrasse, where on the other side of the road the façade of the Natural History Museum rose impressively into the sky. ‘What’s on your mind, Doctor?’

  ‘It’s about the corpse they found yesterday in the Spree. This war-disabled fellow, but I thought I’d rather speak with you in private.’

  Rath said nothing and waited.

  ‘Karthaus sought me out. Karthaus, who a few weeks ago suggested I take early retirement.’ Schwartz shook his head. ‘Did you know he’s a Nazi now too?’

  ‘I can’t say I’m surprised.’

  ‘You need to be, to get on in the new Germany. There are even Jews who want to join the party. They can’t have read the manifesto.’ The doctor waved his hand dismissively. ‘Karthaus is carrying on as if everything is normal between us, as if I took early retirement because of my age. A simple passing on of the baton.’

  After only a few metres they turned onto Hessische Strasse, moving towards the Charité Hospital and the morgue. Rath wondered what the veteran pathologist was getting at, but curbed his impatience and waited for Schwartz to make his point.

  ‘Anyway, Karthaus shows me this corpse, wants confirmation that the puncture channels match those I examined a few weeks back.’

  ‘Do they?’

  ‘Without question, but that isn’t why I wanted to see you.’ He came to a halt and looked Rath in the eye. ‘Inspector, there is no way on earth that corpse belongs to Benjamin Engel, even if a thousand witnesses say otherwise.’

  Rath feigned surprise. ‘What makes you say that?’

  ‘Engel is a baptised Jew, am I right?’ Rath nodded. ‘But Jewish born and bred.’

  ‘Yes. He was baptised Catholic prior to his marriage.’

  ‘The man in there . . .’ Schwartz pointed in the direction of the morgue, ‘ . . . is no Jew.’

  ‘How can you be so sure?’

  ‘He hasn’t been circumcised.’ Dr Schwartz looked at Rath triumphantly. ‘With all the stab wounds and burn scars, no one seemed to notice. He also has two older wounds that haven’t healed, to the buttocks and upper thigh.’

  From Hannah, Rath thought. ‘What does Karthaus say?’

  ‘He was painfully embarrassed, but gave me to understand that none of it could appear in his report.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘He’s afraid it will make the commissioner look foolish. Seems our Levetzow was a little too eager to stick his head above the parapet.’ Schwartz shook his head. ‘Karthaus cried his eyes out over his own helplessness. An affront when you think how brazenly he’s exploited the political situation himself.’

  ‘Some people are oblivious to the damage they cause.’ Rath remembered Böhm’s words. How risky it was to make a fool of the commissioner. ‘Why are you telling me all this?’ he asked. ‘Detective Gräf is leading the investigation.’

  ‘I can’t get involved officially, I’d be stabbing Karthaus in the back.’

  ‘You prefer to do your backstabbing unofficially?’

  ‘I know you’ll keep investigating.’ Schwartz hunched his shoulders. ‘You’ve never worried about being taken off a case. As far as you’re concerned, that’s just the chiefs telling you not to put in for overtime.’

  ‘You’ve seen right through me, Doctor!’

  ‘Böhm’s confided in me on more than one occasion how difficult you are to work with.’

  ‘He’s no picnic himself.’

  ‘Yet he has always spoken very highly of you.’

  ‘He has?’ It would be hard to find anyone who made a greater show of disdaining him than Wilhelm Böhm. ‘Böhm’s handed in his notice too,’ Rath said, as casually as possible.

  ‘Sabbatical, early retirement, resignation, that’s the fate of many a public official these days. Funny, Hitler has always spoken about lowering unemployment. I’d question whether ousting civil servants is the way to go about it . . .’

  Reaching the morgue, the pathologist halted as if to enter one last time and show Rath his findings. Instead he sighed. ‘Only a few weeks ago. Göring was telling the world that so long as the Jewish community went about its affairs and proved itself to be loyal, no one had anything to fear. Idiot that I am, I believed him. He just wouldn’t tolerate Jews in positions of government, he said, that’s all.’ Schwartz pointed towards the dirty yellow brick building. ‘Does that look like a position of government? The Berlin morgue? So why, I ask you, am I no longer entitled to work there?’

  Rath didn’t know how to respond and caught himself turning away. Damn it, he thought, horrified at himself, if things carry on like this the Nazis really will turn us into a nation of cynical, good-for-nothing cowards.

  97

  For the first time in weeks, the Alberich investigation played a lead role during A Division morning briefing. Since the discovery of the corpse, Homicide had renewed their interest in the case, and even Forensics had plenty to be getting on with, as Kronberg set out in his own, inimitable way.

  Searching both sides of the Spree, they had struck lucky in an abandoned joinery workshop. The place had been broken into and traces of blood found in the sawdust. The blood group matched that of the deceased. The building had formerly been a cabinetmaker’s works and Kronberg emphasised that Benjamin Engel had been a furniture dealer before the war.

  Rath was careful not to shake his head. CID officers just couldn’t stop looking for connections, even when there were none.

  Kronberg suggested that Gräf investigate whether the bankrupt cabinetmaker had any links with Benjamin Engel’s furniture business, and Gennat nodded his
approval. Could they no longer acknowledge a coincidence, or did it just seem that way to someone who knew the corpse had been falsely identified, but couldn’t say? The dead man’s foreskin proved the commissioner was wrong, and that the Alberich team had got sloppy. Rath was tempted to put the idea in Gräf’s head: Word on the street is your Jew isn’t even circumcised.

  Once upon a time he could have exposed the error with a press release, but there was no way he could involve Weinert. Not only because reporters were no longer free to report, or because he had something to hide. The truth was that he was scared. Gereon Rath was scared of making a fool of the police commissioner.

  As always when leading an investigation Gräf appeared slightly overwhelmed, but Gennat came to his aid. Without undermining his detective, Buddha thanked Kronberg and outlined the next steps. It was a skilful performance which flattered Gräf and made it seem as if the pair had discussed the matter prior to briefing.

  Gennat’s intervention notwithstanding, Gräf cut a dash. The commissioner had praised him publicly, and even the senior officers strove to make a good impression. Promotion was possible again in the new Germany, but then so was being fired. Or, indeed, being fired at.

  While Gräf basked in admiration, Rath returned to his office, consoling himself that the investigation was the biggest farce ever to have spawned overtime. How he longed to stand, like the boy in the Emperor’s New Clothes, and open everyone’s eyes. Instead he found himself responsible for the most feeble-minded task of all.

  ‘You were in Bonn recently, Inspector,’ Gennat had said. ‘See if you can establish what relationship existed between the cabinetmakers in Berlin and Engel’s furniture business in Bonn.’

  Was he being ironic, or was this a serious request? Feeling Gennat return his gaze, he looked down at the piece of paper on which Gräf or Kronberg, or whoever it was, had written the name of the store. Ohligs Cabinetmakers

  In his lonely office, the letters stirred unpleasant memories. He had asked Erika Voss to look into the bankruptcy, saying he would contact Bonn himself. A call he knew he would never make.