The Man from Berlin (13 page)

He trailed off, staring at his cigarette, then sniffed and took a deep draw on it. ‘Italy, for a bit, earlier this year,' Jelić continued, ‘filming the training of this new Croat division that the Italians are putting together. The Legion, they call it. We got back here about three months
ago.'

‘Did anything like this story you told happen in Russia? Or anywhere else?' asked Reinhardt.

‘Not that I know,' replied Jelić. He seemed subdued now, turned in on himself. He lifted his cup to his mouth, then paused. ‘There were three guys I know of who she was seeing in Russia. One of those affairs was just crazy. But that was pretty much straight-up sex, if what I heard was right.'

‘And here?' demanded Padelin. Jelić shook his head. ‘And you? Did you… ?' Padelin trailed off. Reinhardt looked at the table, trying to work out what was bothering him. Why was he thinking of mirrors?

Jelić shook his head. ‘Not that I didn't want
to.'

‘What were the names of the men she was seeing in Russia?' asked Padelin.

‘One was an SS general, but he was killed. The other two…' He sighed. ‘I can't remember. There was one of them, though. Christ, half the division could hear them having sex. That one ended badly, apparently. That's all she'd say about it, but I wouldn't be surprised to hear they'd picked up where they left
off.'

Reinhardt and Padelin sat up, Jelić cowering back from the big detective. ‘What do you mean?' demanded Reinhardt. Mirrors. Why was he thinking of
mirrors
? Vukić in front of mirrors. At the club. Here. Her bedroom.

‘Yeah, yeah. One of those guys she was seeing in Russia. I heard he was here. Heard his name, something like that, don't know, about a month ago, and asked her wasn't that one of her… one of her men.' His eyes glazed over a bit, as he focused inward, then back out at them. ‘You know, she had the strangest look when I mentioned it. She said she knew he was coming. She knew he was coming, and she had it all planned
out.

‘Something happened between them, in Russia. I don't know what it was, she never talked about it. I'm pretty sure it was some kind of argument. Maybe a lovers' quarrel. Maybe he'd had enough of her, told her to get lost. That was something no man did to Marija. She'd never let them get away with it.' He looked between them. ‘Hey, I mean, emotionally. Never let them get away with it
emotionally
. She'd find some way to get back at them.'

‘Mr Jelić, do you think you'd be able to identify this general if I found a picture of him?' said Reinhardt.

The man pursed his lips. ‘Look,' he hesitated, ‘I don't
know
he was a general…'

‘There's a good chance, correct? From what you've told us about her, and about what she liked?' said Reinhardt. Jelić shrugged, and nodded. ‘We'll arrange it, then.' He pulled out a notebook. ‘Give me the dates you were in Russia, please, when Vukić was seeing this
man.'

Jelić swallowed and squirmed on his stool. ‘Look. Sir. I really don't want anything to do with this. I mean, come on. Look at me. I don't want to get mixed up in stories like this. I wouldn't last a second.'

Reinhardt said nothing, just held his gaze as Padelin glowered next to him. Jelić's eyes narrowed and twitched, and he sighed out. ‘Errr… it was last year. Hang on. I think I've got the dates somewhere.' He went over to a desk and, opening a drawer, pulled out what looked like a journal. Reaching out for it, Reinhardt was disappointed to see it was some kind of ledger, not one of the missing diaries.

Padelin peered over his shoulder, and turned a few pages with a thick finger. ‘It's… how do you say?' He looked at Jelić.

‘Accounts,' said Jelić. ‘It's an accounts book. A ledger.'

Reinhardt flipped it around and handed it back to Jelić. ‘The dates, please.'

Jelić lit another cigarette as he leaned over the book. ‘Russia, ­Russia…' he muttered as he turned pages. ‘Here. We arrived 4th August, 1942. Left…' He turned a page, then another. ‘Left on 6th November.'

Reinhardt jotted it down. ‘You have locations in there?'

Jelić puffed his cheeks and breathed out heavily, and coughed. ‘Some. Hotels usually. Let's see. We flew in to Kharkov from Stokerau, stayed there a few days. Hotel Chichikov. Christ, what a dump that place was. Then out to the front, to join up with the 369th Division around… Selivanova. Back to Kharkov… then Glazkov with the division. The boys were refitting. Ah, yeah,' he said, looking up. ‘Pavelić made a trip out to visit the troops.' He grinned. ‘Yeah, that was a good evening. Medal parade in the afternoon, then dinner with the officers. That German general, what's his name? The one in Stalingrad… Paulus?' Reinhardt nodded, transfixed. ‘Paulus. He joined us. First good food we'd had in a while, but Christ, you should have seen the way they were all over Marija. She had 'em wrapped around her finger. Pavelić, he was…' He looked up, as a man might look up expecting clear skies and instead the horizon was draped in thunderclouds. Jelić took a look at Padelin's face and went back to the book.

‘That was the 24th September, and the end of the good times. The 369th went into Stalingrad a few days later. We hung around. Marija wanted to get into the city to do some filming, but the closest we got was the airfield at Pitomnik, and that was close enough.' He looked up at Reinhardt. ‘We could hear the guns during the day, and during the night it burned. You could see it from miles away. You've got to feel sorry for the poor bastards who were in there. You know they say all the Croat boys are dead.'

Padelin snarled something at Jelić in Serbo-Croat, and Jelić snapped back, the detective's earlier violence towards him forgotten. Whatever it was he said, Padelin folded his hands on the table and just stared at him with those heavy eyes. ‘I know what I saw,' Jelić said, quietly, staring back, and switching back to German. ‘And I know what I've heard. None of them are coming back,' he finished, looking back down at the book. Reinhardt looked at him and swallowed in a dry throat, thinking of Jelić's description of the city where his son had vanished.

‘Listen,' said Jelić, turning pages and then looking up. ‘Do you need anything else from
me?'

Reinhardt nodded. ‘Do you know when Vukić met up with this officer in Russia?'

‘Yeah, sometime in late August, early September. We left the 369th in Glazkov, and joined up with some Germans as they advanced towards Stalingrad. We were in Voroshilovgrad on 28th August. The Hotel Donbass. I'm pretty sure that she had met up with him by then, but I can't be sure. Rostov in early September. Then back to Glazkov, like I said.'

‘When did they break up, Vukić and this officer, you remember that?'

Jelić shook his head. ‘I really don't.' He stared at the pages. ‘It was after we spent the first couple of weeks with the 369th. After Rostov, but before Pitomnik. So, sometime in September. Mid-September. She actually took off with him and his men for a few days while Branko and I stayed in the hotel. But the actual dates… I'm sorry, I really can't remember. Branko will probably remember better than me. He's usually good at dates. I'm hopeless.'

‘Very well,' said Reinhardt, tapping his notebook with his pencil. ‘Padelin? You have anything else?'

‘Yes,' he nodded. ‘Jelić, you can come down to headquarters. We have some suspects in custody you can look at. Let us know if you ever saw them together with Miss Vukić.' Jelić nodded again, although it looked like the last thing he wanted to do. ‘And I want an address for Branko…
?'

‘Branko Tomić,' finished Jelić. He scribbled a name and a Zagreb address on a piece of paper. ‘I've no idea if he knows what's happened. Poor guy. He's been with her for years.'

‘You've been most helpful, Mr Jelić,' said Padelin, with ponderous finality. ‘I will be in touch to arrange a time to come to headquarters. No, don't get up.' He raised a hand. ‘We'll see ourselves out. And put some ice on that jaw, or it will swell
up.'

They left him in his studio, hunched over, watching them with feverish little eyes through a cloud of cigarette smoke. Downstairs, Padelin turned to Reinhardt. ‘Did you get anything useful out of that?' His tone made it clear he had
not.

Reinhardt drummed his fingers on the
kübelwagen
's windshield and nodded. ‘I did,' he said, distantly. ‘Look, something he said is gnawing at me. Going around and around in my head,' he explained, seeing Padelin's look of incomprehension. ‘Something about mirrors.'

‘Mirrors?' grunted Padelin. He looked at Reinhardt, then away.

‘I want to go back to the house in Ilidža for another look. Do you want to come?'

‘You don't know what you're looking for?' demanded Padelin.

‘Maybe nothing. Maybe something. But I need to
see.'

‘Very well,' he replied. ‘I will come. It will be better if I do, in any case. We're supposed to be working together,
yes?'

The road out to Ilidža was relatively empty of military traffic, and Reinhardt was able to drive fast all the way. Padelin sat quietly next to him, flexing his wrists and fists over and over again. They pulled up outside Vukić's and surprised the police guard who was dozing along the shady side of the house, next to the motorcycle and sidecar. The man blanched at the look on Padelin's face and fumbled the keys to the door, eventually getting it open and almost dropping his rifle as he stood aside and saluted them in. Reinhardt took the stairs quickly up to the second floor, through the living room and into the bedroom.

The curtains had been drawn open, the two lights at the foot of the bed were turned off, and the bed had been stripped. Otherwise nothing had changed. The head of the bed was still covered in blood, and it had soaked into the mattress. Reinhardt walked to the bedside table and looked back. He could see himself standing in the other mirror. A glance up, and he saw that the roof of the four-poster was also a mirror. Padelin watched him from the doorway.

Mirrors. She liked to watch, he thought. She liked to watch others. She liked to watch herself. He looked back and forth between the two mirrors, the one by the door and the one at the headboard. The blood on the light switch at the entrance caught his eye again. The mirrors. It was all a setup, he thought. Set up so that she could see. So that whoever was with her could
see.

But it wasn't enough just to watch. This was elaborate. Why waste it? He turned in the room, looking for he knew not what, and came back to the two mirrors, and the blood on the light switch, and the two lights. This was like a set. A film set. She was a filmmaker. He walked slowly back towards the door and stopped, looking at the light switch. He pushed the top button, and the lights at the foot of the bed came on. He pushed the second, and lights in the roof came on. He frowned, not knowing what he had expected, but not that. Nothing that simple. He stood in front of the mirror, looking past his reflection, trying to look inside it. He took the mirror's frame in his two hands and pulled it. Nothing. He pushed, each side, shook it. Nothing.

He tried harder. The mirror did not move, seemingly bolted to the wall. He stepped back, and knocked the wall, stopped. Stared. He hit the wall again, harder, as he looked at Padelin. The wall boomed hollowly under his hand.

‘There's a room behind here,' Reinhardt said. His eyes ran over the wall, stepped back. There was no entrance he could see, nowhere he could work out where one might be. Back and forth went his eyes, and then he looked down, imagining the space beneath him, and took off back downstairs.

The kitchen was gloomy, cool, like it seemed to be holding its breath. Reinhardt paused again and focused on that cupboard he remembered from his first time. The one with the big double doors, padlocked shut. He took the lock in his hands. It was a big, old-fashioned lock, a round hole in it for a key. He rattled the ring, and the shackle came loose from the lock. He froze, stared at it, then turned the lock in his hands and slipped the shackle through the ring. The padlock sat heavy in his hand, and he realised as he pushed the shackle down into the lock, then pulled it out again, that it would not work without a key. Someone had tried to put it back on the door but without the key it would not lock shut and so they had left it, made it seem nothing had happened. He pulled the doors open, looking into a deep space that was all but empty save for a ladder standing against one wall, an old broom, and a few boxes. Nothing else.

Reinhardt's mouth twisted as he stepped back. He had been so sure… He frowned, looked closer. The ladder was not standing against the wall. It was too upright. It was fixed to the wall. He looked up, seeing where it vanished into the ceiling. He reached up with his fingers and pulled at what looked like a latch, and the ceiling swung down, suddenly, releasing a wash of light that etched out the inside of the cupboard. He ducked, took the weight on his hands, then manoeuvred it past his head, looking up. The ladder continued up into the light. He exchanged a quick glance with Padelin, then began pulling himself
up.

The ladder passed through a flimsy ceiling, into a space braced by a crisscross of beams, then up into a small room, bare of any furnishing, only one thing in it. The floorboards creaked softly under his weight as he crossed over to a tall rectangle of light and looked out into Marija Vukić's bedroom. There was creaking from the ladder as Padelin began to haul himself up. His head poked up, and then his shoulders heaved up and around, and the two of them stood squeezed into the small space, Padelin swearing quietly under his breath.

Reinhardt felt a lurch in his stomach, like one feels at the edge of a great height. A camera stood on a tripod, mounted in front of the mirror, its lens like a wet, black eye. He swallowed in a dry throat and reached out to open the film case, but it was empty.