The Sleepwalkers (4 page)

“
Jawohl, mein
President.”

“My adjutant will give you all the relevant information. You will find the missing Bulgarian princess, and you will make certain she is safely returned to the arms of her waiting papa.”

Willi clicked his heels and retired to the adjutant’s office.

“Princess Magdelena Eugenia.” He found himself in an antechamber with a rheumatic, pink-eyed man every bit as old as his boss. “Her photo.”

Willi was not happy about this. Not happy at all. Why now of all times was he being asked to play Emil and the Detectives, with the most heinous of murderers loose? The doctor in the Mermaid case seemed to him more evil even than the Child Eater, who was a psychopath. A disease of the sort infecting a doctor who would intentionally cripple a healthy girl was something of an entirely new order. Something Willi could barely even conceive, much less be sure how to subdue.

The missing Bulgarian princess, however, caught his eye. The
photo was taken at a beach, and Magdelena Eugenia, a slim, athletic young woman of twenty-three or -four was showing off her legs in a bathing suit. She was not a great beauty but vivacious with dark eyes and a broad, gleaming smile. The legs were worthy of the reverence feigned by the young man in the photo pretending to bow before them.

“That is her husband, Konstantin Kaparov,” the adjutant said through the phlegm in his chest. “It was he who reported the princess missing, yesterday morning.”

“And this Herr Kaparov I might find where? At the Adlon still?”

“
Nein,
I believe you will find him today at the Six-Day Bicycle Race.”

Willi looked at him. “His wife is missing and he’s at the bike race?”

“Nein,”
the old man gurgled as if drowning. “He is not
at
the race. He’s
in
it.”

Since it was practically around the corner, Willi decided to drop by the Adlon first, the city’s most illustrious hotel on its most regal boulevard, Unter den Linden. Everyone from Charlie Chaplin to the Rothschilds were regulars. And Hans, the head concierge, was an old pal.

The red-carpeted lobby sparkled under the chandeliers.

“Yes, yes, a great misfortune.” Hans shook his head over the missing princess. “The entire staff is most upset. But you know of course she did not disappear from her room, Willi. She walked out herself. Just after midnight.”

“Anyone speak to her?”

“Yes, I believe so. Rudy. The night doorman. Unfortunately he’s off duty. I could get him here, maybe in two hours. He lives all the way in Berlin-North.”

“Make it three hours.” Willi slapped Hans’s shoulder. “I’m off to the Six-Day Race.”

“Ach so.”
Hans instantly understood.

The fastest way to the Sportpalast was by streetcar. Willi took the crowded No. 12. Over the swaying sea of padded shoulders and big felt hats, he could hardly avoid the afternoon headlines:
Who Will Lead?

Hanging on to a leather strap, he gazed at
Berlin am Mittag
over someone’s shoulder. Bad enough half of what the papers printed was pure garbage, he knew from experience. But the press had positively addicted Germans to living in perpetual crisis. In Berlin, which had more daily papers than any other city on earth, half the population lived off the adrenaline fix provided by the morning, late-morning, early-afternoon, late-afternoon, early-evening, and late-evening horror headlines.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing, Jew?” Every head in the streetcar turned. He looked to see whom the sharp-faced man in a black derby in front of him was accusing, then got it. “Get your dirty Jew nose out of my newspaper!”

Willi was stunned. He barely even thought of his Jewishness, except on High Holidays. But his dark eyes and curly, dark hair advertised it as clearly as any flashing sign on the Ku-damm. Germans were becoming more brazen by the hour in their anti-Semitic outbursts. The next thing you know they’d want to put Jews back into yellow dunce caps, like in the Dark Ages. All this nut had to do was accuse him of trying to pick his pocket and there’d be real trouble. If he wasn’t who he was. He pulled out his Kripo badge. The change on the guy’s face was almost worth the insult.

“Oh, pardon me, Herr Inspektor-Detektiv.” The man removed his derby and held it trembling. “I had no idea to whom I was speaking. I meant nothing by it. Forgive my stupidity. We’ve all heard of the great Inspektor Kraus, the
Kinderfresser
catcher!”

How German was it to torment the weaker and grovel before the more powerful.

Willi stared until the man got so uncomfortable he pulled on his derby and fled the tram.

The Berlin Sportpalast, a templelike stadium built 1910, was the city’s largest indoor arena, home of professional boxing matches, major political rallies, and the wildly popular Six-Day Bicycle Race. Begun in 1920, this grueling marathon pit teams of cyclists in a round-the-clock run for high-stakes prizes. Only one rider from each team had to be out on the track, so the second could eat, sleep, or bathe while his partner racked up points by gaining laps on the competition or in ball-busting sprints every third hour.

Willi was admitted through the front doors with the flash of his Kripo badge and hit by a wave of humidity. Inside, cones of brilliant white floodlights transported him into the arena. The whole place shook as if in an earthquake, the air exploding with the roar of thousands, the bleachers thundering with stamping feet. A dozen cyclists bent parallel to the ground insanely pedaled the track of wood that circled the arena floor, trying to pull ahead, an inch, a foot, flying past in a blur of color. “Around and around and around they go!” the loudspeakers were blasting. “How long can they last,
meine Damen und Herren
? How long?”

Willi soon enough learned that Konstantin Kaparov, No. 8, was out there right now. Fortunately though, in just a few minutes, the section would end and Kaparov would retire to let his teammate take over. Willi’d shown up just in time.

Lucky day, he thought.

Until he saw Kaparov stumble off the track after six hours of racing.

Poor guy’s eyes were rolling into the back of his head. A crew wrapped his heaving body into a towel and led him to a rest area. The man looked on the verge of death. Willi gave him a few minutes to at least regain some consciousness before showing him his Kripo badge. Kaparov nodded, taking another glass of juice, then summoned what seemed his last ounce of strength. “Thank God you’re here.”

In between dizzy spells and spasmodic convulsions he told Willi his story.

They’d arrived in the afternoon two days ago by train direct from Sofia, Bulgaria. They’d never been to Berlin before. “Vee came for zee bike races.” His German was heavily accented. “For two years I have trained.”

After settling in at the Adlon, they hadn’t done anything. Only dinner at a nightclub. Where? He couldn’t remember the name; he was too tired to think straight. On the Friedrich Strasse somewhere. How had they found it? No idea. Magdelena must have known about it. No, of course, no one knew she was a princess. They always used his name when making reservations. Dancing? No. Magdelena couldn’t dance that night. She’d twisted her ankle earlier on the train and it was still bothering her. Unusual? No. Nothing. Nothing unusual at all, that he could recall. After dinner? She was totally normal. They went straight back to the hotel. By taxi. He had to race the next morning. He needed his sleep.

“An hour later in bed, I notice Magdelena putting on coat. ‘Where you going?’ I ask her. ‘I vant cigarettes,’ she tell me. ‘Cigarettes? So why going out? Call room service.’ ‘I vant fresh air,’ she say. ‘To stretch a little my legs.’ I think to myself, before ankle killing her, now she wants walk. But half the time Magdelena’s a little how you say, cuckoo? So I am thinking nothing strange. Only all the time about race next day. I’m closing eyes. Maybe I sleep a little, maybe not exactly. Then I see clock. It say three a.m. Magdelena still gone. Now, I say to myself, Konstantin, something not right.”

Willi had a sixth sense about when he was being lied to. Whatever had happened to the missing princess, her husband, he felt certain, had nothing to do with it.

“Find her for me,
bitte,
Herr Inspektor.” Kaparov’s eyes had begun rolling back into his head again. “I don’t care about zees fuckink race. I only want Magdelena back.”

When Willi returned to the Adlon, since Rudy the doorman
had still not arrived, he was treated to a six-course dinner at the lavish Grill Room. “Eat!” Hans insisted, joining him midway through. “God only knows where this town would be without men like you. Hey, you’ll never guess who’s staying with us.”

Willi pondered over a most delicious stuffed grouse. “I don’t know . . . Hitler’s dog?”

“Nein.”
Hans laughed. “But just as big a bitch, I tell you! The great Marlene Dietrich. What a pain in the ass. The trouble with these international stars is, just because they’re special, they think they ought to be treated that way. Complain, complain. Everything’s a hundred times better in America. Well, if you feel like that, why not move to America, is what I say.”

“She may just yet, Hans.” Willi dug into a tureen of asparagus au gratin. “She may just yet.”

He was finishing up a Sacher torte and coffee, more satisfied than he’d been all day, when Hans announced the doorman’s arrival. Willi met him at the entrance to the hotel under the long, striped awning.

“Herr Inspektor-Detektiv.” Rudy was already in uniform. “How was I to know I’d be the last to speak to her?” His servile eyes had a look of real fear, as even the most innocent often had when being interviewed by Kripo. “She was acting strange, it’s true. But is it my place to question our guests?”

“Relax, Rudy. Nobody said you did anything wrong. Now tell me exactly what happened. What do you mean, she was acting strange?”

“It was right after midnight. Our busiest time. The lady came up to me, very exotic looking. Big dark hair. Dark eyes. Wearing a leopard coat, but no hat! Very quietly she inquires about the nearest S-Bahn station. Strange, I think, for an honored guest of ours to take public transportation—much less a lady alone so late at night. But truly odd was her voice . . . and the look in her eyes. I have a boy, you see, ten years old. Quite frequently he gets up in the middle of the night and starts walking around and talking . . . but he’s asleep. Sleepwalking. You’re never supposed to wake
sleepwalkers, just lead them back to bed, which is what I do with Tommy. This lady had the same look . . . like she wasn’t awake. The eyes were open but she wasn’t really there. I had the strongest feeling I ought to lead her back inside. But like I said, is it my place to question our guests? And at just this moment the Italian foreign minister and his wife arrived. I had to attend to them. So I told the lady, the nearest S-Bahn station is at Friedrich Strasse. I asked if she wished me to hail her a taxi. ‘No, no,’ she said. ‘I want to walk.’ And that was the last of it. As I opened the minister’s door, I saw her going down Unter den Linden, alone, in that leopard coat and no hat!”

“Did she tell you where on the S-Bahn she wanted to go?” Willi was astonished by the story. “Think, Rudy. This is important.”

“Why, yes.” His eyes widened as he recalled. “Yes, she did. She said, ‘Where is the nearest S-Bahn that can take me to Spandau?’ ”

“Spandau!” A shiver ran through Willi’s veins. “You’re sure?”

“Yes, quite. I remember asking myself, does the S-Bahn even go to Spandau?”

Willi pictured the station he’d seen there this morning.

For a second he was speechless. Could it possibly be mere coincidence? He looked at his watch. It was nearly nine o’clock. Despite his exhaustion there was only one thing to do, he knew. Back to Spandau, again. By S-Bahn this time.

Even though he was almost thirty-six and had lived here all his life, hurtling across the capital on the elevated train still held the feel of a magic-carpet ride for Willi. The landscape ever mesmerizing. A vast city of brick and limestone, new by continental standards, most of it less than a century old, Berlin was Europe’s Chicago, ambitious, arrogant, driving itself ever onward. Toward what, he and 4 million other Berliners had no idea.

From Friedrich Strasse they flew along the Spree River, passed the great glass dome of the Reichstag. After skirting the edge of the Tiergarten, the city’s great rustic park, the train shuttled into the fashionable West End, running parallel to block after block of handsome apartment buildings, allowing passengers unrivaled access into the lives of all whose shades were not tightly drawn. Scenes of domestic composure flew past Willi’s
eyes. Families listening to radios. Gathered around pianos. Trimming Christmas trees.

The farther north and west they shuttled, the shabbier the buildings grew, and the sadder the pictures they presented. Bony housewives bent over ironing boards. Fathers in undershirts spanking their children. As the train slowed to round a bend beside an enormous warehouse, through its big, cracked windows he saw it had been turned into a dormitory for homeless men, packed with countless hundreds of souls, the stench of hopelessness all but reeking into the train car.