The Lady from Zagreb (9 page)

“Evil doesn’t come wearing evening dress and speaking with a foreign accent. It doesn’t have a scar on its face and a sinister smile. It rarely ever owns a castle with a laboratory in the attic, and it doesn’t have joined-up eyebrows and gap teeth. The fact is, it’s easy to recognize an evil man when you see him: he looks just like you or me. Killers are never monsters, seldom inhuman, and, in my own experience, nearly always commonplace, dull, boring, banal. It’s the human factor that’s important here. As Adolf Hitler has himself pointed out, we should recognize that Man is as cruel as Nature itself. And so perhaps it’s the Man next door who is the beast of whom we had better beware. For that reason it is perhaps also the Man next door who is best equipped to catch him. A very ordinary man like me. Thank you and Heil Hitler.”

The men seated in front of me started to clap; they were probably relieved that they could get out of that stifling, smoke-filled room and have a coffee on the terrace. Some of the other speakers who were yet to follow—Albert Widmann, Paul Werner, and Friedrich Panzinger—eyed me with a mixture of envy and contempt. The contempt I was used to, of course. As Nebe had reminded me, my own career was stalled, permanently; I was just air and a threat to no one; but they still had their own speaking ordeals ahead of them, and it wasn’t long before I learned that I’d managed to set the bar quite high. As I sat down, Nebe made some long-winded appreciative noises at the lectern and told everyone how I’d modestly neglected to mention the police decoration I’d received for apprehending Gormann and what an asset I was to everyone in Kripo at Werderscher Markt. This was news to me as I hadn’t ever been through the door of the smart, new police building on Werderscher Markt and, other than Nebe himself, knew hardly anyone who worked there. It sounded a lot like praise but he might as well have been giving Ebert’s eulogy on the steps of the Reichstag. Still, it was nice of him to bother; after all, there were some, like Panzinger and Widmann, who would happily have seen me on my way to Buchenwald concentration camp.

G
eneral Schellenberg presents his compliments and asks if you might join him outside on the terrace. There’s someone very keen to meet you.”

I was lurking in the conservatory by the marble fountain, enjoying a quiet cigarette away from all the cauliflower outside; the man who addressed me now was a major, but the majors working for Walter Schellenberg were usually destined for higher things, and I didn’t doubt that some cauliflower of his own would soon replace the four pips that were on his gray tunic’s collar tabs. He was about thirty and—I later learned—an ex-lawyer from somewhere near Hannover. His name was Hans Wilhelm Eggen and he was the officer I’d seen coming out of the Stiftung Nordhav office on the first floor.

I glanced at the cigarette smoking in my hand. A Manoli, it tasted even better than the ones I’d stolen before. Doubtless someone had thought it important to make a good impression on all our foreign guests and, in my experience, there is no more effective way of doing this in wartime than providing good smokes for the cigarette boxes. My own cigarette case was full again. Things were looking up. At this rate I was going to get my smoker’s cough back in no time at all. I took another puff and crushed the end onto a slab of crystal that passed for an ashtray.

“Of course, sir,” I lied. “I’d be delighted.”

As I followed Major Eggen onto the villa terrace I prayed I wasn’t about to be introduced to one of what were jokingly known as the big three: Himmler, Kaltenbrunner, and Müller. I didn’t think my nerves were up to the task of a conversation with any of them, not without a silver crucifix in my pocket. But I needn’t have worried. When I got outside I saw that Schellenberg was with the same Swiss army officer I’d seen coming out of the Nordhav office with Major Eggen. I’d met Schellenberg before at Prinz Albrechtstrasse when he’d been working closely with Heydrich. He was good-looking and as smooth as an English butler’s silk underwear and, since Heydrich’s demise, in charge of the SD’s Foreign Intelligence department. Most people had believed Schellenberg would take over from Heydrich when he was assassinated, including Schellenberg himself. He was able enough. But the splash in the RSHA’s men’s room was that Himmler thought Schellenberg was too smart for Heydrich’s job; and if the Reichsführer had preferred Kaltenbrunner it was only because he wanted someone who was easier to control, especially with good brandy in such short supply.

The Swiss was taller by a head than the shortish Schellenberg and as handsome as he was self-assured. From his manner I thought maybe he owned a small bank but, as things transpired, it was just a large castle. Generally speaking, something like that produces the same overprivileged, nothing-can-touch-me effect. The boots he was wearing looked as if they’d been polished by Carl Zeiss, while the thighs of his pegged riding breeches were so flared he might have got clearance for a takeoff from Tempelhof. His hand was inside his gray tunic, Napoleon-style, although it might just have been holding the broom handle that was doubling as a backbone. But his smile was genuine enough; he was pleased to see me, I guess.

“This is Captain Paul Meyer-Schwertenbach,” said Schellenberg. “From the Swiss military police.”

The Swiss bowed stiffly. “Captain Gunther,” he said. “It’s an honor, sir.”

“Captain Meyer is a famous Swiss novelist,” explained Schellenberg. “He writes adventure and detective stories under his pen name, Wolf Schwertenbach.”

“I don’t read many detective stories,” I admitted. “Or anything else very much. It’s my eyes, you understand. They don’t see as well as they used to. But I knew a Swiss detective once. At least, I spoke to him several times on the telephone. Fellow called Heinrich Rothmund.”

“Rothmund’s now the head of the Swiss Federal Police,” said Meyer.

“Then I wonder why he’s not here,” I said, glancing around.

“He was going to come,” said Schellenberg. “But I’m afraid his visa didn’t arrive in time.”

“That would explain it,” I said, although it hardly explained why a mere captain had been granted a visa to visit Germany ahead of a detective of the caliber of Heinrich Rothmund. “Pity. I should like to have talked to him again.”

“I must confess that I’m a great admirer of yours,” said Meyer.

“That’s quite a confession these days.”

“Both as an author of detective fiction and as a criminologist. Before I was a writer I was a lawyer. Every lawyer in Zurich remembers reading about the famous Gormann case.”

“Like I said, I was lucky. Well, almost. You know, it might just be that I’m the only Fritz here who was never a lawyer.” I glanced at Schellenberg. “How about it, General?”

“Yes, I studied law.”

“Major Eggen?”

Eggen nodded. “Guilty as charged,” he said.

“I enjoyed your talk,” said Meyer. “While I am in Berlin I should like very much to speak with you in private, Captain Gunther. Perhaps you would indulge the questions of an enthusiastic amateur. For the purposes of my research, you understand.”

“You’re writing another novel?”

“I’m always writing another novel,” he said.

“That’s good. In Germany there’s always room for another novel, so long as we keep burning them.”

Schellenberg smiled. “Captain Gunther is that rare thing in the Reich Security Office. A man who is a very poor Nazi. Which sometimes makes him quite entertaining to the rest of us.”

“Does that include you, General?” I had long suspected that, like Arthur Nebe, Walter Schellenberg was a lukewarm Nazi and more interested in his own profit and advancement than anything.

“It might do. But it’s not my entertainment with which we’re concerned right now. It’s Captain Meyer’s.”

“He’s quite right,” Meyer told me. “As an author it’s not very often that I get the chance to find out where a real detective’s inspiration starts and stops.”

I was thinking of a few questions I might have for the captain myself; questions about Stiftung Nordhav, perhaps, or Export Drives GMBH.

“I don’t know much about inspiration, Captain Meyer. But I’d be glad to help you in any way I can. Are you staying here at the Villa Minoux?”

“No, at the Adlon Hotel.”

“Then you’re in very good hands.”

“Why don’t you meet there for drinks?” suggested Schellenberg. “This evening? I’m sure you can spare some time for the captain, Gunther.”

“Actually I have tickets for the German Opera,” said Meyer. “Weber’s
The Marksman
. But before might be possible. Or after.”

“There is no after in German opera,” I said. “There’s only the eternal present. Besides, the opera’s a little too far from the Adlon to be comfortable for the curtain-up. Perhaps we’d better meet at the Grand Hotel on the Knie.”

“Gunther’s right,” agreed Schellenberg. “The Grand would be more convenient for you, Paul.”

“Shall we say six p.m.?” asked Captain Meyer.

I nodded; men were drifting back into the villa for the next lecture, but before that happened, Major Eggen took me aside.

“The general would like you to take special care of Captain Meyer and Lieutenant Leuthard.”

“Is he Swiss, too?”

“Yes. That’s him over there.” Eggen nodded at a tall young man with a hard, unsmiling face that could easily have found a home in the Gestapo. “Go to the general’s office on Berkaerstrasse and borrow a car. I’ll telephone ahead so they’ll be expecting you. Come back here. Drive them to the Grand Hotel for drinks, to the opera, and then wherever they want to go. Show them a good time.”

“At the German Opera?” I smiled. “I’m not sure something like that’s even possible.”

“Before. During the interval. After. Then take them back to the Adlon. Just make sure they’re happy, all right?”

“That’s asking rather a lot, don’t you think? They’re Swiss. Especially that young one. He looks very Swiss indeed. I could make a wristwatch happier than him.”

“Maybe so. But right now, you’re Captain Meyer’s enthusiasm, and whatever Captain Meyer wants, Captain Meyer gets. Understood?”

He handed me a fistful of banknotes and some food and drink coupons.

“I’ll bet you’re the man who made sure the cigarette boxes were full today,” I said.

“I beg your pardon?”

“You’ll forgive me for asking, sir, but who the hell are you? I’m not under your command. Exactly who do you work for? Foreign Intelligence? Stiftung Nordhav? With that manicure I know you’re not police. It was General Nebe who asked me to be here today. I’m sure he wouldn’t like it very much if I went off the farm before we’ve finished making hay here and slipped away into town like you’re asking. It’s not good manners to make a speech and then quit before some of my colleagues have had a turn at the lectern.”

“I work for the Reich Ministry of Economic Affairs,” he explained. “And if I square it with Nebe, will you do as General Schellenberg asks?”

“Well, I hate to drag myself away from this crime conference. Usually I’m very good at concealing my boredom. But if it’s all right with Nebe, it’s all right with me. Frankly I’ve already heard enough billy goat shit for one day. I know. I could take him to a couple of shops to see if we can find some of his books. Marga Schoeller’s Bookshop, perhaps. I expect he’d like it there, being an author.”

Marga Schoeller’s, on the Ku’damm, was the only bookshop in Berlin that still refused to sell Nazi literature.

“I don’t care where you take him, as long as he has a good time. Understood?”

Half an hour later I was walking down Am Grosser Wannsee again, only this time with a bit of a spring in my step. Frankly I was glad to be away from the Villa Minoux, even though it meant missing out on a lunch of mustard eggs and a pig knuckle with pea puree, not to mention more free cigarettes. The thought of meeting Himmler a second time was much too daunting; my shins couldn’t have taken it. The smile on my face lasted for precisely a hundred meters, at least until I came past the SS Horticultural School, where three undernourished young men were toiling in the sun with rakes and hoes. I walked up to the wrought-iron gate and watched them work. I’m good at that, too. But I never did like gardening very much, not even when there was a well-stocked window box on the sarcophagus-sized balcony outside my living room. I have green fingers only when I dip them in a Berliner Weisse with woodruff syrup—the champagne of the North. The three didn’t look up. Not even to wipe their brows, and the blue sky might as well have been gray for all the interest they had in looking at it.

There didn’t seem to be anyone in a uniform keeping guard so I whistled to one of the men and, seeing my uniform, he came running over to the gate, snatched off his cap, and then bowed his head, like someone in the SS had taught him that little show of respect with the toe of a boot and the end of a quirt. Now that he was near I could see that he wasn’t much more than a boy; perhaps fifteen or sixteen years old.

“Jewish?”

“Yes, sir.”

“From Berlin?”

“Yes, sir.”

“What were you, son? I mean, before they got you doing such vital war work for your country?”

“I was studying for my Abitur,” he said.

“Which school?”

“The Jewish School, on Kaiser-Strasse.”

“I know it. I used to know it well.” I swallowed uncomfortably, and removing a fist from my breeches pocket, I pushed it through the bars of the wrought-iron gate. “Take it quickly,” I said. “Before someone sees you.”

He looked at the banknotes and the cigarettes I’d dropped into his hand with astonishment and then pocketed them swiftly. Too surprised to say thank you, he just stood there with his cap in his bony hand, sweating uncomfortably, with eyes that were as hollow as a half-empty catacomb.

“An Abitur isn’t much good these days if you end up wearing a uniform like this one. Take my word for it, my boy. At least you have the scent of those nice flowers in your nostrils. Not like me. I get to smell shit all day long. And sometimes I even have to eat it, too.”

I
caught the S-Bahn north to Grunewald Station and walked southwest, along Fontanestrasse onto Hohenzollerndamm. Department Six of the RSHA was located in a modern, four-story building on Berkaerstrasse that looked more like apartments than the headquarters of the Foreign Intelligence Service, with only a flagpole on the flat roof and a few official cars parked in front of the curving façade to suggest that it was any different from the sleepy residential bricks-and-mortar surrounding it. Short of having the SD’s Foreign Intelligence conducted from a back room in a small suburban theater, number 22 couldn’t have been more anonymous and out of the way, and was quite a contrast to the kinds of grand, intimidating buildings that Schellenberg’s sinister masters preferred. Just looking at it now told me a lot about Schellenberg. A German who cares nothing for show is someone with a lot to hide, and as I approached the modest, unguarded entrance I wondered just how it was that Schellenberg had also avoided service in one of Heydrich’s murderous operation groups. That was clever, too. I had to hand it to Walter Schellenberg; it seemed that he’d made a much better job of pretending to be a Nazi than I had.

An SD captain called Horst Janssen came down to the reception area to hand me a set of keys for one of the cars parked outside.

“Nice place you have here,” I observed as I followed him outside.

“It used to be a Jewish old people’s home,” he said without a trace of embarrassment; then again he was just back from Kiev, where he’d probably done something even more dreadful than kick a few old people onto the streets—you could see it in his blue eyes—the kind of thing that people like me and Schellenberg had so neatly sidestepped. An international crime conference can sharpen up your instincts like that.

“That explains why it’s so quiet around here,” I said.

“It is now they’re all in the Lublin Ghetto,” Janssen said, and tossed me the keys. “That one there,” he said, pointing to a Mercedes 170.

“Has it got petrol?”

“Sure we’ve got petrol. That’s why we invaded the Caucasus.”

“Comedian. What’s he like to work for? Schellenberg.”

“He’s all right.”

“Where does he live? Round here, I suppose. In some fancy big villa. Like Heydrich’s place in Schlachtensee.”

“Not at all. He’s a very modest man, our general. Listen, can you give me a lift as far as the West End?”

“Sure. Where in particular?”

“The military court in Charlottenburg,” he said. “I’m a witness in a trial.”

“Oh?”

“An SS man accused of cowardice.”

“That shouldn’t take long.”

But Janssen wasn’t the talkative type. He said nothing on the way to the court and short of asking him a question directly about Schellenberg and the Stiftung Nordhav, I figured that was it with him.

I dropped Janssen off outside the court on Witzlebenstrasse, just a couple of blocks south of the German Opera House, and spent the rest of the morning and the larger part of the afternoon just driving in Berlin. It had been a while since I’d had a chance to motor around the city with no particular place to go, even though I did have somewhere I was supposed to be; then again that’s the best way to see any city—I mean when you should be doing something else. Stolen pleasure beats anything.

Around five I drove back to the villa. In the main hall they were busy listening to someone else performing a long solo about modern policing and I took advantage of this diversion to go upstairs again to check out the Stiftung Nordhav office. The door was still locked, of course, but a quick glance outside revealed that if I stepped out onto the curving balcony that occupied the space above the Greek Revival entrance I might get in there through the third-floor window. A couple of minutes later I was sitting at a little wooden desk and going through the drawers looking for some useful tasty mouthful concerning the sale of the Villa Minoux I might feed to Dr. Heckholz and his charming client, Frau Minoux.

There were lots of files about the IKPK, which mostly I ignored, except to note that the International Criminal Police Commission
*
was now an active part of the Gestapo. And there was plenty of correspondence between Export Drives GMBH—which turned out to be owned by Major Eggen—and a Zurich-based company called the Swiss Wood Syndicate, some of which had been signed by Paul Meyer. There were also lots of documents about a deal, brokered by the Ministry of Economic Affairs, between a government-owned company called German War and Munitions AG and the Luchsinger Company of Zurich to supply the Swiss with 275 submachine guns and two hundred thousand rounds of ammunition. But there was no sign of any documents regarding the sale of the Villa Minoux to Stiftung Nordhav. Not even a mildewed title deed.

Looking back on it now it seems incredible that I had so much important information in my hands but that I didn’t think to do anything with it because none of it was about the villa. But that was my brief from Heckholz and Frau Minoux, after all. How was I to know that, much later on, the Swiss Wood Syndicate would turn out to be important? Of course, that’s detective work for you. If I had to give that stupid lecture again I might add that sometimes the work is a bit like dealing with a beautiful woman you’re in love with: you never know what you’ve got until she’s gone.

I went downstairs, helped myself to some more cigarettes and a large schnapps from a bottle on a silver tray in the library—the best kind, made from the best fruit, which in this case was pears, and probably Austrian, as the finest schnapps usually is, and like eating the most delicious pear you’ve ever eaten only to discover that it was a wonderful, magic pear and that the effect extends far beyond the mouth into every corner of the human body like a benign witch’s spell. I quickly poured another and felt a smile spread on my face like a cloud shifting away from the sun. The bottle was too good to leave lying around in a place like that. If ever anything needed rescuing from the Nazis, it was that bottle.

The last lecture of the day was now over and the delegates were starting to drift out of the main hall. I swallowed the schnapps and, after a certain amount of talk was splashed about, I ushered Captain Meyer and his somber companion out to the car.

“I’m afraid it was all downhill after you left,” declared Meyer. “Very dull indeed.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I don’t mind telling you that I’ve been looking forward to meeting you again all day.”

I’d been working on my smile and quickly deployed it as I opened the car door.

“But it’s always nice to be back in Berlin,” he added politely.

“How about you, Lieutenant—?”

“Leuthard,” said the man dully.

“Are you enjoying Berlin?”

“No,” he said. “I never liked it here much before. And I like it even less now.”

Captain Meyer laughed. “Ueli says what’s on his mind, generally.”

“That’s not recommended in Berlin.”

We drove north, straight up the old AVUS speedway and then east onto Bismarckstrasse where, outside the Grand Hotel am Knie, I parked the car and gestured the two Swiss inside.

“Shall we?”

Lieutenant Leuthard stared sourly up at the hotel’s tall façade with its twin bell towers and steep Dutch gable, lit a cigarette, and then checked his watch. I made a mental note of the size of his hands and his shoulders and resolved not to have any kind of disagreement with him. He might have been Swiss but he didn’t look like the kind of man whose neutrality you could depend on.

“Is this a better hotel than the Adlon?” he asked.

“No. Not in my opinion.”

“What makes you say so?”

“Before the war, I worked at the Adlon,” I said.

“My father’s in the hotel business,” he said. “I thought I might go into that myself. After the war.”

“With your skill for diplomacy, it’s a sure thing you’d be successful.”

Leuthard smiled a patient sort of smile.

“If you’ll forgive me,” he said, “I’ve heard enough waffle for one day. I’m going for a walk. To stretch my legs. I’ll see you in the opera house foyer in one hour, Captain. Sir.” Then he fixed his kepi on his head and walked east on Berliner Strasse, in the direction of the Tiergarten.

“Sorry about that,” said Meyer. “Ueli is a difficult character, at the best of times. A bit hotheaded, frankly. But I think he’s a good policeman.”

We sat down outside the hotel entrance under the large awning that covered the open-air bar and ordered some beers, for which I felt obliged to apologize in advance.

“The best beer is in short supply,” I said.

“Believe me, things are just as bad in Switzerland. We’re a landlocked country, as you know, and totally dependent on Germany’s goodwill for our survival. Which isn’t easy to maintain, given certain recent events.”

I shrugged, unaware of what recent events he might have been referring to.

“I’m talking about Maurice Bavaud,” explained Meyer. “The Swiss theology student who tried to shoot Hitler in 1938. He was executed last year.”

I shrugged. “Speaking for myself, I’m not about to hold a little thing like that against you all.”

Meyer chuckled. “Schellenberg was right. You are an excellent detective, but a very poor Nazi. I wonder how you’ve stayed alive for so long.”

“This is Berlin. Most of the time people don’t notice when you call a child nasty names. It’s not just Lieutenant Leuthard who hates us. It’s our masters, too. Been that way since Bismarck’s time. We’re constitutionally ungovernable. A bit like the Paris mob, but with uglier women.”

He laughed. “You’re a most amusing man. I’m sure my wife, Patrizia, would love to meet you. If you’re ever in Switzerland, you must look us up.”

He gave me a stiff little card that had more names and more addresses than a Maltese confidence man.

“Sure. I’m often in your neck of the woods. Actually, my bankers in Zurich think I should move there permanently. But I like it here. There’s our famous air, for one thing. I’d miss that. Not to mention all our hard-won freedoms.”

“Seriously, though,” he said. “There’s an old murder case I’ve long been fascinated with. Happened in a place called Rapperswil. A woman was found dead in a boat. The local detective is a friend of mine. I’m sure he’d love to have the benefit of your insight. We both would.”

“The only insight I can offer you at the present moment is that hosting an international crime conference in Germany is like the Goths and the Vandals offering suggestions on new ways of tackling crimes against property during the sack of Rome. But it would certainly seem like a shame to go to Switzerland just to tell you this.”

The beers came and they were better than I had expected. But very expensive.

“Are you really a writer?” I asked.

“Of course. Why do you ask?”

“I never met a writer before. Especially one who was a policeman.”

Meyer shrugged. “I’m more on the intelligence side of things,” he explained.

“That explains why you know Schellenberg. He’s got a lot of intelligence. Maybe just enough to survive the war. We’ll see.”

“I like him. And he seems to like me.”

“How did you two meet?”

“In Bucharest. At the 1938 IKPK General Assembly, where it was proposed the IKPK headquarters be moved from Vienna to Geneva. Schellenberg was all for it. At least he was until your General Heydrich changed his mind for him.”

“He could be a very persuasive man when he wanted.”

“According to Schellenberg, it was Heydrich who brought you back into Kripo, wasn’t it? After five years in the cold.”

“Yes. But it wasn’t so cold. At least I didn’t think it was.”

“Schelli says there were some more murders he wanted you to solve. In 1938. Of some Jewish girls.”

“A lot of Jews have been murdered in this city.”

“But you know the ones I’m talking about. These were just before the infamous night of broken glass, weren’t they?”

I nodded.

“Would you tell me about them?”

“All right.”

From the pocket of his tunic Meyer now produced a notepad and a pencil. “Do you mind?”

“No, go right ahead. Only, you’d better wait until I’m dead before you write about this. Or better still, you’d better wait until another theology student comes along with a gun in his hand.”

We talked for about forty minutes and then I walked him along Bismarckstrasse to the German Opera House, where Leuthard was already waiting outside, looking more thuggish than before. You wouldn’t have been surprised to have seen him in an opera—Wagner’s, full of thugs with swords and wings on their helmets—but attending one was something else again. There was grass on the back of his tunic, as if he’d been lying in the Tiergarten. He walked toward me with a sort of smile on his face and a program in his hand, but I might just as easily have expected him to have been carrying a gun.

“What did you do?” Meyer asked him.

“Nothing much,” said Leuthard. “Lay in the sun and slept for a little.”

“I’ll meet you back at the hotel after the show,” I said. “And then we can go to dinner. Or I’ll drive you back to the Adlon. Both, if you prefer.”

“I’m sure we could get you a ticket,” said Meyer.

“One thing you can’t knock about the opera is the music; it’s just a pity that they take so long to play it.”

“What will you do?”

“Don’t worry about me. I live not very far from here.”

“You know? I’d like to see the home of a real Berlin detective.”

“No, you wouldn’t. There’s no chemistry set, and no Persian slipper where I keep my tobacco. There’s not even a violin. The ordinariness of it would horrify a writer. You might never write another word again because of the disappointment. Besides, right now we’re not receiving visitors, on account of the fact that we’re waiting for a new guest book from Liebmann’s.”

“Well then. The Alex. I should like to see around the famous Alex.”

“Schellenberg will fix that for you. And now I’m going home. I’ll see you back here at ten o’clock.”

I walked back toward the Grand; but I didn’t go home. I had no intention of going home. Just around the corner was the municipal bathhouse where, two nights a week, Kirsten Handlöser—the schoolteacher I’d met in a boat on the Wannsee—went swimming. At least that was what she had told me. You never know with women. What they tell you and what they don’t tell you is a very long bridge across a very wide river with all kinds of fish.