Mystery Man (34 page)

• A lot of girlie-male dancers start screaming.

• Mark Mayerova aka the Mechanic of Auschwitz sits placidly throughout.

• Max Mayerova pulls a gun.

• He is wrestled to the ground by undercover cops, but not before:

• He fires one shot, which goes through the ceiling;

• Drilling a neat hole through a copy of
Weep for Me
by John D. MacDonald, though I won't discover this for six months.

• The girlie-male dancers rush the door but are repelled by more undercover cops.

• My laptop is irretrievably damaged in the melee, forcing the abandonment of further revelations by PowerPoint demonstration.

• I suffer an asthma attack.

• The Mayerova brothers are handcuffed and held face down on the floor.

• The smoke alarm goes off, not because of the bullet, but because someone has taken advantage of the chaotic scenes to light up in the toilet.

• CCTV footage will reveal that the culprit is Brendan Coyle.

• Alison takes advantage of Max Mayerova being on the ground to kick him in the ribs.

Pandemonium is a word I like. I have a collection of words I like. Not many people know where it comes from. It is the name the poet John Milton gave to the capital of Hell in
Paradise Lost.
Pandemonium might be overstating things for what went on in No Alibis during those twenty seconds, but it certainly fits the source of all that trouble – what happened at Auschwitz, which
was
very much the capital of Hell. Like all cities, it needed someone to ensure that it ran smoothly. Much publicity has been given to the architects of the concentration camps and to the demon doctors who carried out experiments there, but very little to those who made sure the machinery kept working, who mended the fuses, who oiled the nuts and bolts, who ensured the gas pipes didn't rust. People like the Mechanic. A man who thought there was no contradiction between sharing his sandwich with a starving prisoner, and maintaining the ovens in which he or she would shortly perish. A man who could continue to sit impervious while everything erupted around him, a superior, supercilious and defiant smile on his white face.

When order was restored, one of DI Robinson's colleagues sought permission to lead all three Mayerovas away for questioning. The detective looked towards me, kneeling on the floor over my broken laptop. I looked back and shook my head.

'No,' he told his colleague, 'Mastermind has started, let's hear him finish.'

'But sir . . .'

The truth is that part of my agreement with DI Robinson was that I would be allowed to present my evidence in total before I handed it over to him. If he tried to stop me, I promised him that I would eat it. I was quite serious. Yes, I was keen to have the Mayerovas locked away, but I'd done all the donkey work and I was damned if anyone else was going to claim even a smidgen of the triumph. So, as people hesitantly retook their seats after what amounted to a short intermission, I stood before them again to continue my resolution of
The Case of the Dancing Jews.

Of course I had not planned for that sudden explosion of violence, and there was a very real danger of the rest of the proceedings being anticlimactic; Agatha must have known, for there are few scrums in her books, at least before the ultimate denouement. If I wasn't to let it slip away from me I knew that I would have to deliver the rest of my evidence as quickly and economically as possible.

I raised my hands for quiet. I apologised for the disturbance. I told them that the Erich Wiesenthal Centre in Basle had vast quantities of damning testimony from prisoners at Auschwitz about the work SS Sergeant Major Wilhelm Koch had carried out at the camp. With parts in short supply and the number of murders being increased on an almost hourly basis as the war drew to a close, Koch had been instrumental in keeping the ovens and gas chambers functioning at a level of high efficiency. Several statements did refer to the preferential treatment he had given to a 'dancer' he took a shine to, and alluded to a sexual relationship. One claimed to have spotted him dressed in prison clothing immediately after the liberation. It seemed pretty clear to the people at the Erich Wiesenthal Centre that Koch had tattooed himself in a desperate measure to evade justice, and with the connivance of Anne Mayerova, who clearly owed her life to him, managed to escape the authorities. They made it as far as Prague, where he was quite probably recognised and they went on the run, eventually ending up in Belfast. Perhaps with the passing of the years Anne had found it increasingly hard to live with the fact of what her 'husband' had done during the war, and that led to their eventual separation. The fact that they had children, and the damage it would do to them if the secret came out, had undoubtedly led to her agreeing to keep it, and it was only with the onset of Alzheimer's that there was a real danger of it slipping out.

'Only Sergeant Major Koch or his sons can say how it developed after that – whether he told them his secret, or whether they discovered it through their mother – but what I do know is that they decided or agreed to protect their father – and through violent means. Perhaps it's in the genes. As for the evidence, that will lead to one or two or all of them being charged with murder – and that's forgetting for the moment the war crimes charges, although not
forgetting
them, obviously. It's not my job to prove any of this; I merely present what I have found and let others take it away and use it as they see fit. But I can give you some examples of the evidence I have found that at least suggests to me that the police will have little difficulty securing convictions. Like – Malcolm Carlyle's body was found hung with Pine Fresh trees to hide the smell. Each Pine Fresh tree happens to have its own serial number. Those on Mr Carlyle were from a batch sold to Smith Motors just over a year ago. Quite a coincidence, I'd say. One of my customers . . .' I nodded across at Garth Corrigan, the FA Cup fan, who quickly sank down in his chair. '. . . is a banker who has gained access to the Smith-Mayerova bank accounts and can prove that Karl Mayerova flew to Frankfurt on the day of Manfredd's murder and returned the following day. That Max Mayerova purchased cigarettes using his cash card at a twenty-four-hour petrol station less than a mile from Daniel Trevor's house at four o'clock on the morning Daniel supposedly drowned. Another of my valued customers . . .' This time I nodded at Jimmy Martin, who smiled proudly. '. . . using his contacts in the painting and decorating industry was able to join a team working on a new showroom at Smith Motors, and gain access after hours to their computers. Now Jimmy won't mind me saying that he wouldn't know a hard drive from an orthopaedic shoe, but he was more than happy to smuggle out Karl and Max's computers overnight so that I could search them for incriminating evidence. And there was no lack of it. Boys, one should always remember that nothing ever truly disappears from a computer. If you know what you're doing, it's not hard to find. A few further tips for future reference – when planning a murder, do not use Google Earth to pinpoint the best access routes to your victim's house . . . that's Daniel I'm talking about . . . do not use e-mail to keep each other posted as to the movements of your intended victims . . . and most certainly do not describe my girlfriend, the girl I'm going to marry, as a sexy little thing you're going to have fun with before you plug her, because that only gets me angry, and you wouldn't like me when I'm angry.'

There was plenty of
stuff,
dozens of other e-mails, bank account details, receipts, invoices, a history of websites visited (including ones for the purchase of weapons), which together amounted, so far as I could see, to a mountain of incriminating evidence. There were also Brian's and Alison's statements about the attempted drugging, and lab reports of her hair sample showing Rohypnol use. Now it was up to someone else to prove it in a court of law. That wasn't my job. There was no reason for me to hog the limelight any further. As far as I was concerned the bad guys were in handcuffs and they were going away for a very long time.

I was satisfied.

I was vindicated.

I was happy.

'Now,' I asked, 'are there any questions?'

I surveyed my frankly
stunned
audience. Towards the back, one young man tentatively raised his hand. I nodded for him to speak.

'Could you tell me how much the books are, and if it's possible to get one signed by the author?'

One must never overestimate the intelligence of one's customers; equally, business is business.

'Fourteen ninety-nine, and no.'

Another hand was raised.

'Are you serious about marrying your girlfriend?'

It was, in fact, my girlfriend.

I forced a smile. It was a rather poor attempt to shift the spotlight to her good self. 'It's not really the time or the place,' I said.

'But you brought it up.'

I shook my head dismissively. I turned to an impatient looking DI Robinson, then nodded down at the still-pinned-to-the-floor Mayerova brothers, and their impassive father.

'Book 'em, Robbo,' I said.

He did not look like he much appreciated it, or even understood.

As a lifelong studier of patterns, it is not difficult
at all
to establish the trends and fashions in mystery fiction. They tend to reflect society as a whole. The genre has become more violent, more pornographic, less literate, and there are a lot more serial killers around. One might debate whether mystery fiction influences society, or it is the other way around. Quite possibly there were always a lot of serial killers, they were just less well chronicled. However, one thing that does not change with crime or mystery fiction over the decades is that the public demands that in the next-to-final chapter the murder or crime be solved, leaving the final chapter to tie up the loose ends and to allow for some playful banter between the leading characters, who have probably fallen in love. These are the
conventions.
Occasionally there is a surprise ending, in which one or other of the characters the reader has grown to love turns out to be the killer after all, and has gotten away with murder, or reveals some unsuspected secret that leads one of the lovers to suspect that he or she is now in mortal danger. So it ends with an unresolved cliffhanger. Generally I do not like such books and do not often recommend them to my customers. Life is too short to leave questions unanswered and it often makes me think that it is a case of the author simply not knowing how to finish his story rather than him being particularly clever. For example, Brendan Coyle.

At least here, in real life, there would be no unresolved endings. The SS Sergeant Major was arrested for being complicit in the murders involved in
The Case of the Dancing Jews.
DI Robinson turned up further e-mails showing that Smith/Mayerova/Koch had been the driving force behind the murders – while renewed forensic examination of the various murder scenes, now that he knew who he was trying to implicate, was yielding dividends that would mean he probably wouldn't have to rely in court on the evidence I had amassed through mostly unconventional methods. An extradition warrant had also been received for the former Mark Mayerova, naming him as a war criminal. Smith Motors remained open for a while, but the publicity surrounding the case meant a huge drop in custom. Some unknown (!) graffiti artist painting
These guys are fucking Nazis!
across their showroom windows didn't help business much either. As DI Robinson has hinted to me over a Starbucks coffee – I'm back to the top of the menu once again, and loving it – the Mayerova brothers aren't quite so menacing any more. They're blaming each other. It's all starting to come out, and he's quite hopeful that the location of Rosemary Trevor's body will soon be forthcoming.

As for me, I wasn't in it for the publicity, I was in it for the satisfaction of triumphing over evil and demonstrating that a life in crime fiction has its practical applications. Needless to say, members of the public with a mystery to solve have been making their way to my shop door in increasing numbers. As before, I do not accept all of these cases, preferring to cherry-pick those that are both the most challenging and the least dangerous. I do not intend ever to be involved in murder again, or with Nazis; there are plenty of missing trousers, dogs, lampshades and bicycles to keep a bookselling amateur detective busy for decades to come. As for Alison, after a period of sulking because I did not once refer to her in my performance – and it was a performance, every pause rehearsed, every pithy comment worked over – as my
partner
in crime-solving, or even as my
sidekick,
she has come around a bit. With my encouragement she has now gone part time in the jewellery store in order to devote much more time to her comic-book art. I have even helped her with a few scripts myself. She has not returned to Brendan Coyle's creative writing class, and is all the better for it.

I thought the business about me suggesting that I was going to marry her, which somehow crept out during my public resolution of
The Case of the Dancing Jews,
had slipped from her mind, but I should have known better. Though we resumed our courting and on occasion had the sex, she managed to keep the subject under her hat until some six weeks after the events surrounding the case. On an evening when she had said she wasn't coming out to play because she was working on a comic, she unexpectedly appeared at my front door, despite the fact that I have made it clear to her in the past that I do not welcome such surprises. I do not expect her to make an appointment, but some prior warning always allows me to get the house in order. In fact, the house is always in order, scrupulous order, but that is hardly the point.

Nevertheless, I welcomed her in, and I made her coffee, and I sat her down at the kitchen table.

'You look vexed,' I said.

'Are you ever going to marry me?' she asked.

I said, 'Whoa, hold your horses.'

I offered her a Jacob's Orange Club biscuit. She ignored it.

'Why would you say a thing like that in public and not mean it?'