Phantoms of Breslau (18 page)

Ilssheimer fixed his black eyes on Mock. In the past, his eyes had burned holes in the petrified consciences of bandits. Mock’s faintly ironic expression told him that those times had long passed.

Mock stood up and allowed the wave of anger that gathered within him to settle. For the first time in many years he felt he had an advantage over Ilssheimer; one word from him could destroy the chief of the Vice Department. Mock clasped his hands behind his back and walked over to the window. “It’s not going to work, it’s not going to come off,” he thought, adopting an attitude of defensive pessimism. He went to the
hat-stand, took the chief’s bowler and turned it around in his hands. Brand new, made by Hitz, as the inner ribbon informed him.

“You’ve bought yourself a new bowler,” he said, purposely omitting Ilssheimer’s title. “Where’s the old one?”

“What’s it to you, Mock? Are you mad? Stop trying to change the subject!” Ilssheimer did not move a muscle.

“I’ve got your old hat,” Mock said, gloating over his advantage. “I found it in August’s room at the South Park Hotel.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Ilssheimer’s eyes grew pensive and distant. “As a police officer from the Vice Department I questioned August Strehl, a male prostitute… It’s true … I must have left my hat there …”

“Not only your hat. You also left indelible memories in August’s heart. Indelible to such a degree,” Mock said, without believing that his bluff would work, “that August wrote them down. Very interesting reminiscences …” Mock rested his hands on Ilssheimer’s desk and said very slowly: “Don’t you think, Councillor sir, that Doctor Kaznicz is going to be a little short of time over the next few days? And besides, did you know, Councillor sir, that I’m not particularly susceptible to hypnosis?”

Ilssheimer glanced at the clerk who, having failed to pull out the right pencil this time, saw his mistake and threw a file at the wall in fury.

“Indeed,” Ilssheimer said, without changing his expression one iota. “Doctor Kaznicz has been very busy of late …”

BRESLAU, THAT SAME SEPTEMBER 5TH, 1919
NOON

Wirth and Zupitza parked their Horch near a meringue shop not far from the university. They got out and set off towards the eighteenth-century Police Praesidium building, stopping on the way at the Opiela Inn so that
Zupitza could buy some Silano cigarettes. In the vestibule of the Praesidium, a solid barrier prevented anyone from climbing the stairs. Appended to it was an arrow which very clearly directed any visitors straight to the duty room, where the two caretakers, Handke and Bender, sat with grim expressions and bristly moustaches. One of them would telephone to announce any arrivals he was not personally familiar with, while the other would bore into visitors with suspicious eyes, as if X-rays radiated from his pupils. They did not stop Wirth and Zupitza, nor pierce them with X-ray eyes. They never did so when the arrival of an outsider had been announced by a high-ranking police official. Looking at the short dandy and the tall, gloomy bruiser, Bender and Handke ascertained that the descriptions Councillor Ilssheimer had give them an hour earlier were very fitting.

“I know those mugs from somewhere,” Handke muttered, observing the duo as they disappeared behind the glazed doors of the main lobby.

“We know a lot of criminal mugs,” Bender replied. “Goes with the job …”

Wirth and Zupitza crossed the courtyard and went through the gate, to where a police van had just arrived from Ursulinenstrasse. The guard opening the gate eyed them suspiciously. They climbed the winding stairs to the second floor and stood outside a heavy door with a plate that read:

DEPARTMENT IIIB
DIRECTOR: CRIMINAL COUNCILLOR DR JOSEPH ILSSHEIMER
POLICE OFFICERS: CRIMINAL ASSISTANT EBERHARD MOCK
CRIMINAL SECRETARIES: HERBERT DOMAGALLA AND HANS MARAUN
CRIMINAL SERGEANTS: FRANZ LEMBCKE AND KURT SMOLORZ

Zupitza knocked hard. A few seconds later the door was opened by a thirty-year-old with thinning hair who, without asking any questions, led
them down a narrow corridor. Before long they found themselves in a large office with three desks. A sleepy Mock sprawled at one of them, another stood empty, and the man who had shown them in sat down at the third next to a door with the nameplate dr joseph ilssheimer, and carried on with his interrupted telephone conversation.

Mock indicated two heavy chairs to the newcomers. They sat down in silence.

“Hot, isn’t it?” Mock managed the unoriginal greeting. “I’ve a favour to ask, Domagalla,” he then said to the balding man on the telephone. “Could you bring my guests some soda water?”

Domagalla nodded with no sign of surprise, replaced the receiver and left the room.

“Now listen to me carefully.” Mock got up from his desk and angrily rubbed his poorly shaven cheek. “You’re forming an investigative team with me. Apart from us, there’s Smolorz. As from tomorrow our base will be your office, where you’re holding the whore Kitty and that waiter from the Hungarian King. We’ll meet there for a briefing every day at nine in the morning.” Mock glared at Zupitza. “What are you laughing at? That you’re going to play at being a policeman? Explain it to him, Wirth!”

Wirth made some movements with his hands, and Zupitza turned serious.

“When we’ve finished today’s briefing,” continued Mock, “we’ll go and find Smolorz. When we’ve found him, we’ll separate. Smolorz is going to get on with the tasks I’ve given him. I’m going to go for a stroll and you’re to follow, watching carefully to see if anybody is tailing me. The minute you see someone suspicious, you pull his arse in. Understood?” When Wirth nodded, Mock began to bark instructions. “I’m going to Norbert Risse’s floating brothel. You know the ship I mean? I’ll question the boss there. Then you and your men are not to let him out of your sight. You’re to tail him without fail, and discreetly protect him at the same time.
We’re setting him up as bait. Somebody will want to kill him. You’re to catch that person and then hold him at your place. And then I’m going to want to get to know him. Everything clear?”

Domagalla entered the room with a soda siphon and some glasses. He stood them on the empty desk, then sat down at his own and spread out the
Breslauer Zeitung
in front of him. The headlines on the front page shrieked:
DISTURBANCES AND FIGHTING ON BRESLAU’S RING
. Nobody felt like drinking anything.

“What did you tell your pal a moment ago?” Mock asked abruptly.

“Not to air his fangs needlessly,” Wirth replied.

“And that’s all?”

“No, there was something else …” Wirth hesitated.

“Well, go on!” Mock said impatiently.

“I said policeman, bandit, sometimes it’s all the same.”

“And that’s God’s own truth,” Domagalla added from behind his newspaper.

BRESLAU, THAT SAME SEPTEMBER 5TH, 1919
HALF PAST TWELVE IN THE AFTERNOON

Caretakers Bender and Handke took their time deciding whether or not to allow the latest arrival in. It was not the man himself who made them doubtful – they knew him well – but the state he was in. Criminal Sergeant Kurt Smolorz did not stink of alcohol, but swayed on his legs and smiled like a moron. They detained Smolorz in their duty room, placed a steaming mug of tea in front of him and stood at the barrier deliberating quietly.

“He’s fixed his hangover with a beer,” Handke muttered to Bender. “But why doesn’t he stink of booze?”

“Damned if I know,” Bender replied. “Maybe he’s eaten something. I’ve heard parsley can kill any smell.”

“Yes.” Handke was relieved. “He must have stuffed himself with parsley. Besides, we haven’t disobeyed our instructions prohibiting drunken policemen. This one’s not drunk, only a bit …”

“You’re right,” Bender’s face brightened. “How are we to know whether a policeman’s drunk or just in a good mood? Only by his breath. And his doesn’t smell of booze …”

“Best phone for Mock,” Handke said glumly. “Not Ilssheimer. That pain in the arse can’t stand alcohol. But Mock’s our man. He can decide what to do with his friend.”

As they resolved, so they did. A moment later Mock tore his subordinate away from his mug of tea, discreetly led him by the arm out of the duty room, turning right and down the corridor to the toilets. One of the cubicles was occupied, as indicated by the sign. Mock and Smolorz went into another. They stood in silence, waiting for the neighbouring cubicle to become vacant. After a while they heard the grating of the cistern’s handle and flushing water. The cubicle door clattered, the door to the toilets clattered, Mock’s teeth grated in anger.

“Where were you, you shit?” he growled. “Where did you get so pissed?”

Smolorz sat on the toilet and stared at the brown wainscoting on the walls. He said nothing. Mock grabbed him by the lapels, dragged him to his feet and pinned him to the wall. He saw laughing, bloodshot eyes, damp nostrils and crooked teeth; it was the first time he had noticed that Smolorz was ugly. Very ugly.

“Where were you, you son of a whore?” roared Mock.

A smile stretched Smolorz’s pink skin and his pale freckles receded. Grains of powder showed white against his moustache and there was a faint smell of a woman’s expensive perfume. Smolorz was repulsive. Mock raised his hand but then lowered it a second later. He left the cubicle, slamming the door with such force that the sign above the door
handle jumped to
OCCUPIED
. Smolorz tried to open the door but the lock was badly buckled and would not move. He hammered. Mock returned to the locked cubicle. His highly polished shoes rang out loudly. Smolorz’s hand emerged from beneath the door and a business card appeared on the floor.

“That’s where I’ve been,” echoed the voice of the imprisoned man, and then he produced another business card. “And this is where the murdered sailors lived.”

Mock gathered up the two cards. Besides the printed text, both bore a handwritten note. On the first, which was decorated with a coat of arms, were the words:
BARONESS MATHILDE VON BROCKENHEIM UND BIELAU, WAGNERSTRASSE 13
, and instructions had been written on the reverse in a woman’s rounded writing: “Please visit me today in my boudoir, otherwise the person delivering this letter will lose his job here.” On the back of the other card, which was printed:
DR NORBERT RISSE, ENTERTAINMENT AND DANCING, THE WöLSUNG
, Mock recognized Smolorz’s uneven hand: “Four sailors, Gartenstrasse 46”. He left the toilets and lit a cigarette. He made off briskly, sensing that his lungs and head were reacting positively to his tenth nicotine hit of the day. As he passed the duty room, he said to the caretakers:

“Smolorz is going to stay in the lav for a while. He’s not feeling too good.”

“Goes with the job …” muttered Bender.

BRESLAU, THAT SAME SEPTEMBER 5TH, 1919
A QUARTER TO ONE IN THE AFTERNOON

Mock stepped into his office waving Norbert Risse’s business card. Wirth and Zupitza were still sitting in their heavy chairs, and Zupitza was wielding the siphon and squirting soda water into the tall glasses. He
handed one to Wirth and another to Mock, who downed the contents in one gulp and threw Risse’s business card on the table.

“That’s where we’re going.” He pointed a stubby finger at the address Smolorz had scribbled down. “You’ll do exactly as I said, except for one thing: you’re not going to tail Risse, you’re going to tail whoever it is I question at this address, understood? The caretaker, for example, or one of the neighbours.”

Angry invectives could be heard issuing from Ilssheimer’s office. Mock approached the door and began to eavesdrop.

“What sort of order is this, damn it!” Ilssheimer’s voice was harsh and swollen with anger. “You’re a police pen-pusher, Domagalla. You ought to keep our archives in order!”

“Councillor sir, that whore could have had the tattoo done recently.” Mock sensed determination in Domagalla’s voice. “Our files are ordered alphabetically by surname, not according to distinguishing marks.”

“You know nothing about our filing!” Ilssheimer yelled. “I drew up various sub-files myself, including one for distinguishing marks. At Mühlhaus’ request. If there was a problem identifying the body of some prostitute we could always refer to the file. And now some whore has committed suicide, so Mühlhaus turns to me and says: ‘Look into your excellent archive and find me a whore with the sun tattooed on her backside.’ And what? I have to tell him: ‘Unfortunately, Councillor sir, I don’t have one like that amongst my files – my archive’s a mess.’”

Domagalla said something so quietly Mock did not hear.

“Damn it!” Ilssheimer shouted. “Don’t tell me the whore came here just to make a guest appearance during the war, and that’s why she’s not in our archive! I worked here in the war and I kept the register in good order!”

Domagalla mumbled something else.

“Domagalla …” Mock glued his ear to the door. Ilssheimer was
hissing, a sign that he was at his wits’ end. “I know for a fact that the prison archives have accurate descriptions of all tattoos …”

Mock heard nothing more. “No, it’s impossible,” he thought, “it definitely isn’t Johanna, Wohsedt’s mistress. She didn’t make any ‘guest appearances’, she was a Penelope waiting for her Odysseus. And it was only when he didn’t return from the war that she took to prostitution. She certainly wasn’t in some prison getting a tattoo done on her backside.”

He decided to adopt the method which had proved so effective during his talk with Ilssheimer that day. “That swine must have got at her,” he thought. “He must have killed her, gouged her eyes out and hung her, gloating at the sight of her suffering; first he would have told her to write a letter to me saying it would save her, and then he would have broken her arms and legs, like he did the sailors’.” Mock was invaded with such evocative images that they horrified him. He shuddered, thinking, “Death has looked me in the eye.”

He knocked, and hearing a loud growl which he interpreted as “Come in”, he entered his chief’s office.