Philip Kerr - Berlin Noir

‘That’s enough of that,’ her father said firmly, probably not caring to hear much about fathers who were dead. ‘It doesn’t matter what she said. If you know something that will help the Kommissar to find her, then you must tell him. Is that clear?’

Sarah pulled a face. ‘Yes, Daddy,’ she yawned, and threw herself down into an armchair.

‘Sarah, really,’ said her mother. She smiled nervously at me. ‘She’s not normally like this, Kommissar. I must apologize.’

‘That’s all right,’ I smiled, sitting down on the footstool in front of Sarah’s chair.

‘On Friday, when one of my men spoke to you, Sarah, you told him you remembered seeing a man hanging around near your school, perhaps a couple of months ago. Is that right?’ She nodded. ‘Then I’d like you to try and tell me everything that you can remember about him.’

She chewed her fingernail for a moment, and inspected it thoughtfully. ‘Well, it was quite a while ago,’ she said.

‘Anything you might recall could help me. For instance, what time of day was it?’ I took out my notebook and laid it on my thigh.

‘It was going-home time. As usual I was going home by myself.’ She turned her nose up at the memory of it. ‘Anyway, there was this car near the school.’

‘What kind of car?’

She shrugged. ‘I don’t know makes of cars, or anything like that. But it was a big, black one, with a driver in the front.’

‘Was he the one who spoke to you?’

‘No, there was another man in the back seat. I thought they were policemen. The one sitting in the back had the window down and he called to me as I came through the gate. I was by myself. Most of the other girls had gone already. He asked me to come over, and when I did he told me that I was -’ She blushed a little and stopped.

‘Go on,’ I said.

‘- that I was very beautiful, and that he was sure my father and mother were very proud to have a daughter like me.’ She glanced awkwardly at her parents. ‘I’m not making it up,’ she said with something approaching amusement. ‘Honestly, that’s what he said.’

‘I believe you, Sarah,’ I said. ‘What else did he say?’

‘He spoke to his driver and said, wasn’t I a fine example of German maidenhood, or something stupid like that.’ She laughed. ‘It was really funny.’ She caught a look from her father that I didn’t see, and settled down again. ‘Anyway, it was something like that. I can’t remember exactly.’

‘And did the driver say anything back to him?’

‘He suggested to his boss that they could give me a ride home. Then the one in the back asked me if I’d like that. I said that I’d never ridden in one of those big cars before, and that I’d like to-’

Sarah’s father sighed loudly. ‘How many times have we told you, Sarah, not to -’

‘If you don’t mind, sir,’ I said firmly, ‘perhaps that can wait until later.’ I looked back at Sarah. ‘Then what happened?’

‘The man said that if I answered some questions correctly, he’d give me a ride, just like a movie-star. Well, first he asked me my name, and when I told him he just sort of looked at me, as if he were shocked. Of course it was because he realized that I was Jewish, and that was his next question: was I Jewish? I almost told him I wasn’t, just for the fun of it. But I was scared he would find out and that I would get into trouble, and so I told him I was. Then he leant back in his seat, and told the chauffeur to drive on. Not another word. It was very strange. As if I had vanished.’

‘That’s very good, Sarah. Now tell me: you said you thought they were policemen. Were they wearing uniforms?’

She nodded hesitantly.

‘Let’s start with the colour of these uniforms.’

‘Sort of green-coloured, I suppose. You know, like a policeman, only a bit darker.’

‘What were their hats like? Like policemen’s hats?’

‘No, they were peaked hats. More like officers. Daddy was an officer in the navy.’

‘Anything else? Badges, ribbons, collar insignia? Anything like that?’ She kept shaking her head. ‘All right. Now the man who spoke to you. What was he like?’

Sarah pursed her lips and then tugged at a length of her hair. She glanced at her father. ‘Older than the driver,’ she said. ‘About fifty-five, sixty. Quite heavy-looking, not much hair, or maybe it was just closely cropped, and a small moustache.’

‘And the other one?’

She shrugged. ‘Younger. A bit pale-looking. Fair-haired. I can’t remember much about him at all.’

‘Tell me about his voice, this man sitting in the back of the car.’

‘You mean his accent?’

‘Yes, if you can.’

‘I don’t know for sure,’ she said. ‘I find accents quite difficult to place. I can hear that they’re different, but I can’t always say where the person is from.’ She sighed deeply, and frowned as she tried hard to concentrate. ‘It could have been Austrian. But I suppose it could just as easily have been Bavarian. You know, old-fashioned.’

‘Austrian or Bavarian,’ I said, writing in my notebook. I thought about underlining the word ‘Bavarian’ and then thought better of it. There was no point in giving it more emphasis than she had done, even if Bavarian suited me better. Instead I paused, saving my last question until I was sure that she had finished her answer.

‘Now think very clearly, Sarah. You’re standing by the car. The window is down and you’re looking straight into the car. You see the man with the moustache. What else can you see?’

She shut her eyes tight, and licking her lower lip she bent her brain to squeeze out one last detail.

‘Cigarettes,’ she said after a minute. ‘Not like Daddy’s.’ She opened her eyes and looked at me. ‘They had a funny smell. Sweet, and quite strong. Like bay-leaves, or oregano.’

I scanned my notes and when I was sure that she had nothing left to add I stood up.

‘Thank you, Sarah, you’ve been a great help.’

‘Have I?’ she said gleefully. ‘Have I really?’

‘You certainly have.’ We all smiled, and for a moment the four of us forgot who and what we were.

Driving from the Hirsch home, I wondered if any of them realized that for once Sarah’s race had been to her advantage -that being Jewish had probably saved her life.

I was pleased with what I had learned. Her description was the first real piece of information in the case. In the matter of accents her description tallied with that of Tanker, the desk sergeant who had taken the anonymous call. But what was more important it meant that I was going to have to get the dates on which Streicher had been in Berlin from General Martin in Nuremberg, after all.

Monday, 26 September

I looked out of the window of my apartment at the backs of the adjoining buildings, and into several sitting-rooms where each family was already grouped expectantly round the radio. From the window at the front of my apartment I could see that Fasanenstrasse was deserted. I walked into my own sitting-room and poured myself a drink. Through the floor I could hear the sound of classical music coming from the radio in the pension below. A little Beethoven provided a nice top and tail for the radio speeches of the Party leaders. It’s just what I always say: the worse the picture, the more ornate the frame.

Ordinarily I’m no listener to Party broadcasts. I’d sooner listen to my own wind. But tonight’s was no ordinary Party broadcast. The Führer was speaking at the Sportspalast on Potsdamerstrasse, and it was widely held that he would declare the true extent of his intentions towards Czechoslovakia and the Sudetenland.

Personally, I had long ago come to the conclusion that for years Hitler had been deceiving everyone with his speeches about peace. And I’d seen enough westerns at the cinema to know that when the man in the black hat picks on the little fellow standing next to him at the bar, he’s really spoiling for a fight with the sheriff. In this case the sheriff just happened to be French, and it didn’t take much to see that he wasn’t much inclined to do anything but stay indoors and tell himself that the gunshots he could hear across the street were just a few firecrackers.