Philip Kerr - Berlin Noir

‘Slow down, shorty,’ I said, looming over his diminutive figure like a frigate coming alongside of a fishing boat. ‘Or I’ll decorate your lip and it won’t be with a Knight’s Cross and oak leaves.’ I pulled a crumpled five-mark note from out of a pocket and dropped it onto the tabletop.

‘I didn’t think you were the jealous type,’ she said, as I moved her towards the door.

‘Get into the lift and go straight down,’ I told her. ‘When you get outside, go to the car and wait for me. There’s a gun under the seat. Better keep it handy, just in case.’ I glanced over at the bar where the man was paying for his drink. ‘Look, I haven’t got time to explain now, but it’s got nothing to do with our dashing little friend back there.’

‘And where will you be?’ she said. I handed her my car keys.

‘I’m going out the other way. There’s a big man in a brown suit who’s trying to kill me. If you see him coming towards the car, go home and phone Kriminalinspektor Bruno Stahlecker at the Alex. Got that?’ She nodded.

For a moment I pretended to follow her, and then turned abruptly away, walking quickly through the kitchens and out of the fire door.

Three flights down I heard footsteps behind me in the almost pitch dark of the stairwell. As I scampered blindly down I wondered if I could take him; but then I wasn’t armed and he was. What was more, he was a professional. I tripped and fell, scrambling up again even as I hit the landing, reaching out for the banister and wrenching myself down another flight, ignoring the pain in my elbows and forearms, with which I had broken my fall. At the top of the last flight I saw a light underneath a door and jumped. It was further than I thought but I landed well, on all fours. I hit the bar on the door and crashed out into the alley.

There were several cars, all of them parked in a neat row, but it wasn’t difficult to spot Red Dieter’s grey Bugatti Royale. I unlocked the door and opened the glove-box. Inside there were several small paper twists of white powder and a big revolver with a long barrel, the sort that puts a window in an eight-centimetre-thick mahogany door. I didn’t have time to check whether it was loaded, but I didn’t think that Red was the sort who kept a gun because he liked playing Cowboys and Indians.

I dropped to the ground and rolled under the running-board of the car parked next to the Bugatti, a big Mercedes convertible. At that moment my pursuer came through the fire door, hugging the well-shadowed wall for cover. I lay completely still, waiting for him to step into the moonlit centre of the alley. Minutes passed, with no sound or movement in the shadows, and after a while I guessed that he had edged along the wall in the cover of the shadow, until he was far enough away from the cars to cross the alley in safety before doubling back. A heel scraped on a cobblestone behind me, and I held my breath. There was only my thumb which moved, slowly and steadily pulling back the revolver’s hammer with a scarcely audible click, and then releasing the safety. Slowly I turned and looked down the length of my body. I saw a pair of shoes standing squarely behind where I was lying, framed neatly by the two rear wheels of the car. The man’s feet took him away to my right, behind the Bugatti, and, realizing that he was on to its half-open door, I slid in the opposite direction, to my left, and out from underneath the Mercedes. Staying low, beneath the level of the car’s windows, I went to the rear and peered around its enormous trunk. A brown-suited figure crouched beside the rear tyre of the Bugatti in almost exactly the same position as me, but facing in the opposite direction. He was no more than a couple of metres away. I stepped quietly forward, bringing the big revolver up to level it at arm’s length at the back of his hat.

‘Drop it,’ I said. ‘Or I’ll put a tunnel through your goddamned head, so help me God.’ The man froze, but the gun stayed put in his hand.

‘No problem, friend,’ he said, releasing the handle of his automatic, a Mauser, so that it dangled from his forefinger by the trigger guard. Mind if I put the catch on it? This little baby’s got a hair-trigger.‘ The voice was slow and cool.

‘First pull the brim of your hat down over your face,’ I said. ‘Then put the catch on like you had your hand in a bag of sand. Remember, at this range I can hardly miss. And it would be too bad to mess up Red’s nice paintwork with your brains.’ He tugged at his hat until it was well down over his eyes, and after he had seen to the Mauser’s safety catch he let the gun drop to the ground where it clattered harmlessly on the cobbles.

‘Did Red tell you I was following you?’

‘Shut up and turn around,’ I told him. ‘And keep your hands in the air.’ The brown suit turned and then dropped his head back onto his shoulders in an effort to see beyond the brim of his hat.

‘You going to kill me?’ he said.

‘That depends.’

‘On what?’

‘On whether or not you tell me who’s signing your expenses.’

‘Maybe we can make a deal.’

‘I don’t see that you’ve got much to trade,’ I said. ‘Either you talk or I fit you with an extra pair of nostrils. It’s that simple.’

He grinned. ‘You wouldn’t shoot me in cold blood,’ he said.

‘Oh, wouldn’t I?’ I poked the gun hard against his chin, and then dragged the barrel up across the flesh of his face to screw it under his cheekbone. ‘Don’t be so sure. You’ve got me in the mood to use this thing, so you’d better find your tongue now or you’ll never find it again.’

‘But if I sing, then what? Will you let me go?’

‘And have you track me down again? You must think I’m stupid.’

‘What can I do to convince you that I wouldn’t?’

I stepped away from him, and thought for a moment. ‘Swear on your mother’s life.’

‘I swear on my mother’s life,’ he said readily enough.

‘Fine. So who’s your client?’

‘You’ll let me go if I tell you?’

‘Yes.’

‘Swear on your mother’s life.’

‘I swear on my mother’s life.’

‘All right then,’ he said. ‘It was a fellow called Haupthändler.’

‘How much is he paying you?’

‘Three hundred now and -’ He didn’t finish the sentence. Stepping forward I knocked him cold with one blow of the revolver’s butt. It was a cruel blow, delivered with sufficient power to render him insensible for a long time.

‘My mother is dead,’ I said. Then I picked up his weapon and pocketing both guns I ran back to the car. Inge’s eyes widened when she saw the dirt and oil covering my suit. My best suit.

‘The lift’s not good enough for you? What did you do, jump down?’

‘Something like that.’ I felt around under the driver’s seat for the pair of handcuffs I kept next to my gun. Then I drove the seventy or so metres back to the alley.

The brown suit lay unconscious where I had dropped him. I got out of the car and dragged him over to a wall a short way up the alley, where I manacled him to some iron bars protecting a window. He groaned a little as I moved him, so I knew I hadn’t killed him. I went back to the Bugatti and returned Red’s gun to the glove-box. At the same time I helped myself to the small paper twists of white powder. I didn’t figure that Red Dieter was the type to keep cooking-salt in his glove-box, but I sniffed a pinch anyway. Just enough to recognize cocaine. There weren’t many of the twists. Not more than a hundred marks’ worth. And it looked like they were for Red’s personal use.

I locked the car and slid the keys inside the exhaust, like he’d asked. Then I walked back to the brown suit and tucked a couple of the twists into his top pocket.