The Man from Berlin (11 page)

11

TUESDAY

A
s arranged with Padelin, Reinhardt arrived in front of police headquarters at nine o'clock the next morning. For once, he had slept well, and it was only the rumble of heavy convoy traffic down the Appelquai that had finally dragged him from bed. The receptionist at police headquarters called up to Padelin and indicated to Reinhardt that he should wait. Reinhardt pantomimed waiting outside, and the clerk nodded vigorously that he had understood. He bought a couple of newspapers from a kiosk and found a little patch of sunlight and scanned the headlines and some of the text.

Vukić's murder had made the front page of all of them. The
Novi Beher
had a big picture of her meeting Pavelić, the leader of the Croats. He could not make out whether a suspect had been named, although he saw Putković's and Padelin's names. After a while, he folded the papers, lit a cigarette, and waited, thinking back to the morning briefing at HQ. The Feldgendarmerie had reported that the police had been shaking the city down all night, cars showing up here with suspects for interrogation. Reinhardt knew from experience it was hard to find anyone with a dragnet like that, and it was more a case of rounding up the usual suspects and putting on a good show before the senior official that Padelin had mentioned arrived from Zagreb.

The doors to police HQ opened, and a policeman stepped out, holding the door for a woman dressed in black. She came slowly down the steps and fitted a hat to her head, placing it carefully over her ash-blond hair, and he recognised her as Vukić's mother, whom they had interviewed yesterday. Reinhardt straightened as he watched her walk slowly away, something in her bearing, in the way she seemed to be holding herself up and together, demanding that he stand in the best way he could. She did not see him, her eyes somewhere very far ahead. He watched her, her shoulders braced as if she walked into a high wind, one only she could feel, until she turned a corner and was gone, but his eyes stayed fixed on the point where she had been.

When he got home from the hospital the day Carolin died, Friedrich was there. The day had unspooled itself in shreds, the light wavering, people moving like marionettes, as in those old silent films. Somewhere distant he seemed to hear the sound of a piano, like the one they played in the cinema when he was a boy. A scratchy reel of notes just out of rhythm, and that tinny soundtrack to the mess his life had become had eventually led him home.

Reinhardt saw the bags on the floor of the hallway as he opened the door, and the soldier, tall and slim in his grey uniform. His son looked at him, looked him up and down. Reinhardt flushed, twisting his hat in his hands, feeling like a supplicant. In his own home.

‘You've been drinking,' was all Friedrich said.

He had not. Not that day, but Friedrich would not believe that, so he said nothing, only shrugged out of his coat. Another soldier walked out of Friedrich's room, a bag in his hand. Hans Kalter. A year older than Friedrich and the model his son followed. A corporal already, Reinhardt saw. Kalter said nothing, watching with the confident air of a man who knows the outcome of a particular fight. Reinhardt hung up his hat and coat and walked past Friedrich into the kitchen, shying away from that coldness he always seemed to feel around him. He felt Friedrich looking at him as he shifted slowly around the room, lighting the gas for water to boil.

‘Nothing to say, Father? Nothing about the uniform? Didn't you say never to come back here wearing it?' Playing to the gallery, and sure enough, Kalter straightened, seemed to swell with indignation.

‘What are you doing here, Friedrich?' Reinhardt asked, finally.

‘I'm picking up the last of my things. What does it look like?'

‘That's what it looks like,' Reinhardt agreed, quietly. He spooned tea into a small pot. Blue china. The one Carolin always used. He almost never drank tea. He felt Friedrich watching him. He had seen it too. Their eyes met. Something sparked deep behind their flat sheen, behind the blank façade his son seemed to hold up for his father.

‘Where is
she?'

‘She died last night. Early this morning, in fact,' he finished, as the kettle began to whistle. He poured the water slowly, as she used to, hearing it purr softly over the leaves, watching it rise up the inside of the pot, watching the steam curl up and out. ‘Would you like some
tea?'

Friedrich was white. ‘When were you going to tell me? Were you just going to leave me to guess?'

‘When would I have told you, Friedrich?'

‘When you walked
in.'

‘I just
did.'

‘You waited. You did it on purpose.'

‘You're a grown man, now, Friedrich. That's what you keep telling me…'

‘That's what you won't believe!'

‘… and so a man needs to pick and choose his words like he picks and chooses his fights…'

‘Like you? Like you?!'

‘… as otherwise he'll be left looking like a fool.'

‘Are you calling me a fool, Father?'

‘And if you accuse your father of being a drunk…'

‘You are. You are. A bloody drunk.'

‘… don't be surprised if the conversation takes a turn away from where it might have gone.'

There was silence. How fast they had come up against each other. Fallen into the rhythm of their assigned roles. Parry, riposte, words skirling, useless hard scrabbling against each other.

‘A fool?' Friedrich blustered, after a moment. ‘My choices foolish? My choices are Germany's, Father. Are Germany's choices foolish?' He opened his stance, inviting Kalter into the conversation.

Kalter stepped forward. ‘I would have thought a German man, a veteran, would know better than to treat his son in this manner.'

‘When you've got one of these, Corporal,' he said, jerking his thumb at the black dress ribbon of his Iron Cross where it was fixed to his lapel, ‘or better yet, when you've lost a leg or an arm, then come back and lecture me about the duties and responsibilities of a German soldier.' Reinhardt put Carolin's blue cup and saucer on the table and sat there looking at her chair, his mind beginning to skirt around the understanding that she had filled not one space, but many. And he was only beginning to learn just how many, and where.

‘She died in her sleep, Friedrich. They say she felt no pain.' ­Reinhardt looked at him but felt nothing anymore. No connection across to the boy he had been, and still was, in so many ways.

Friedrich swallowed hard, his jaw tendon tight. ‘You just want to make me feel guilty. You always…'

‘Get out, Friedrich. Do as you said. Don't come back.'

He
sat
there,
the
blue
china
pot
and
the
blue
cup
and
saucer
in front
of
him,
watching
the
steam
writhe
in
the
air
as
the
door
slammed
at
the
end
of
the
hall
and
an
emptiness
suddenly
gaped
underneath
him,
within
him.
He
sat
there
until
the
tea
went
cold,
and
the
night
came
down
on
that
day,
which
had
unspooled
itself
like
a
film.
And
as
with
a
film,
it
always
ended
the
same
way,
each
of
them
playing
out
a
role,
even
if
one
of
the
actors
was
missing
now.

Reinhardt sat in his little patch of sun, his mind far away, until Padelin showed up about ten minutes later, coming heavily down the stairs with his jacket under his arm, rolling his shirtsleeves down. Reinhardt could see that he looked exhausted. His eyes were dark, his hair lank, and he had not changed his clothes. They shook hands, and Reinhardt noted the swelling and bruising across the knuckles. ‘Busy night?'

Padelin looked down. There were flecks of blood on the cuffs of his shirt. He turned those heavy eyes on Reinhardt and nodded. ‘You could say that.'

‘Anyone confessed?'

‘Not
yet.'

‘Right.'

‘You have had breakfast yet?' asked Padelin. ‘No? Then let us have something.'

Padelin took them to a place on Zrinjskoga Street, around the ­corner from headquarters. It was obviously a policemen's haunt. Heads came up and greetings were offered to Padelin. From the tone of voice and the laughter and shoving that ensued, not a few of the comments were on what he had been doing to get in the state he was in. To a chorus of cheers, a policeman even bigger than Putković raised Padelin's arms over his head like a prizefighter. It made Reinhardt nostalgic and uncomfortable in equal measure. He remembered the party they had thrown for him and Brauer when they finally caught Dresner, the Postman. The big officer grinned, brought his head close to Padelin's, and said something, one hand patting the back of his neck. Padelin turned and indicated Reinhardt. The huge policeman looked him up and down, then nodded and left with a final ruffle of Padelin's hair.

‘Who is that?' asked Reinhardt. ‘Your fan club?'

Padelin shrugged as they sat at an empty table. ‘That's Bunda.' He said it like that was all that needed to be said.

‘Looks like a man you wouldn't ever want to have angry at
you.'

Padelin allowed a small smile to flicker across his mouth. ‘No. You would not. Like I said, Vukić was popular. People want her killer found. I must wash. I will order something,' he said, and left.

The atmosphere of the place was thick with smoke. Despite the warmth of the morning, no windows were opened. That, the low hum of conversation, and the glances at him over hunched shoulders and crossed arms, and Reinhardt began to feel uncomfortable. Bunda appraised him openly, staring at him through eyes sunk deep under heavy brows, a cigarette like a toothpick where it poked out between his thick fingers. It was with a surprising degree of relief that he saw Padelin coming back. He had combed his hair and found a fresh shirt somewhere. Coffee and rolls arrived as he sat down, and Padelin began to eat with that methodical, head-down attitude he had shown yesterday. Reinhardt sipped his coffee and winced, forgetting that Croats often served their coffee already sweetened, and there was too much sugar in
it.

Padelin finished his breakfast and ordered a second cup of coffee. ‘I talked with our traffic police, but they have nothing for the times we're interested in. Here.'

Reinhardt took a couple of sheets of paper, with handwritten entries between ruled columns. He flipped between the two. There were only a few entries on each page. He noticed the word for
fire
and pointed to it, his eyebrows raised.

Padelin leaned over, and nodded. ‘Yes, there was quite a big fire on Sunday night, in Ilijaš. I heard about it.' He scanned the entry. ‘Looks like they had to call in one of the fire engines from here to help put it
out.'

‘Forensics?'

‘Still being worked
on.'

‘Pathologist?'

Padelin reached into his coat and pulled out some papers and handed them over. There were two pages, folded lengthways down the middle, and then in half, in the manner they used in Yugoslavia. It was the little differences in things that always struck Reinhardt. ‘There's the report. Nothing we don't already know. Severely beaten. Stabbed to death. Any of three wounds in particular would have killed her. One to the heart, and two to her lungs. There were signs of sex. The pathologist does not think it was rape. Hendel, well, we know what happened to him. But the pathologist said that, given the entry and exit wounds he suffered, it was not a nine-millimetre round that killed him. Something smaller.'

‘Probably 7.62 millimetre, then,' said Reinhardt. ‘Can't say it narrows it down that much, but it's something. I talked with some of our people yesterday. It seems there was a planning meeting in Ilidža over the weekend. There were a lot of senior officers in the Hotel Austria, not far from Vukić's house.'

Padelin looked at him. ‘Your point being?'

Confronted with such apparent lack of interest, Reinhardt was at a loss. ‘Maybe something. Maybe nothing. You saw the collection of photographs at Vukić's house? You remember what her mother said, about her being attracted to men of power and authority? It's something to consider.
No?'

‘I suppose so,' said Padelin, his eyes looking out the window.

Reinhardt felt a flush of annoyance. ‘What about your side of things?' Padelin raised an eyebrow. ‘Has anyone had a look at the darkroom? Been able to catalogue what might be missing? What about Vukić's movements? When she was last seen. Where she was last seen.'