Фолькер Кучер - Babylon Berlin

Of course it hadn’t occurred to him. Still, after a moment’s thought Schäffner had at least mentioned that Röllecke probably came from Steglitz, even if he couldn’t say for sure.

It was a start, Rath thought, as he requested the address shortly afterwards in the passports office. This time he didn’t run into the old grouch but rather a helpful, young woman who brought him the card files he required with a smile. There weren’t too many Rölleckes registered in Steglitz; one spelt their name with a ‘k’ only, while two others were under thirty. Rath set them aside for the time being. That left Heinrich Röllecke, resident in Ahornstrasse. Forty-one years old, and therefore probably an ex-serviceman. That was how Rath pictured an SA Sturmhauptführer : as a man who couldn’t help himself and had to continue playing soldiers. He noted down the address and proceeded to the records office.

He was looking for the old Selenskij/Fallin file that Böhm had gone through the week before when he had had the two Russians sitting in the interrogation room. Their previous convictions obviously hadn’t been enough for the bulldog to detain them any longer.

Now Selenskij was dead and Fallin had disappeared.

‘Sorry, Inspector!’ The records office worker returned. Not as young as the woman in passports but just as friendly. ‘The file isn’t there.’

‘Does Böhm still have it?’

The woman looked through the index files she had brought back with her. ‘No, it was requested again yesterday evening. My colleague must’ve given it out.’

The file was with Gennat.

He would have to speak to Buddha, even if he felt more like hiding away in his office and raking through files. It couldn’t hurt to feign a little interest in the work of others; at least then he wouldn’t appear like such a lone wolf.

‘Good morning, Inspector,’ Buddha greeted him. ‘Been at Yorckstrasse I understand?’

So Plisch and Plum had snitched on him.

Rath nodded. ‘Wanted to check on Fallin, but the flat is already under surveillance.’

‘You should have told me yesterday that we’d already interrogated Selenskij’s friend as part of the Kardakov case,’ Gennat said. ‘I only found out belatedly from DCI Böhm.’

‘Sorry, Superintendent, I didn’t think of it right away either,’ Rath lied. ‘It was DCI Böhm who questioned them, not me.’

‘Stop taking cheap shots at Böhm. He’s going about his duties at least as conscientiously as you! It was your mistake that cost us valuable time in the search for Fallin!’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Good, then I hope you take it to heart. Now get on with your work. Briefing in one hour in my office.’

Rath cleared his throat.

‘What now?’

‘Could I ask you for the Selenskij/Fallin file, Superintendent?’

12. February 1926.

Rath read the file in his office completely undisturbed. The two Russians had got into a fight with communists on the day in question and really filled their boots. One of the Reds had been in a wheelchair ever since, the other had needed his arm amputated. Selenskij and Fallin had admitted their involvement in the fight but denied responsibility for the injuries sustained by the victims, thereby escaping with a mild sentence. No wonder Böhm had shelved the file. Ex-Tsarist secret police who beat up Reds were the last people you’d suspect of belonging to a communist splinter group.

Whether you’d suspect them of abducting, torturing and killing their fellow countrymen in the name of the Black Hundred was an entirely different matter, however.

Rath leafed through all the police reports on the case, all of which seemed to support the judge’s sentence. It wasn’t until he saw the signature beneath the interrogation records that he began to wonder. They were written in a hand he recognised.

Shortly afterwards Rath was sitting in the briefing like a cat on hot bricks. As expected, there were no new findings. Although Selenskij was a strong suspect following the witness statement made by the schoolboy, he was also sadly dead. The search for Fallin hadn’t yielded anything, nor had the combing of the pine forests, which was still taking place at great expense. That left their inquiries into the activities of Berolina. Red Hugo’s people, otherwise good for a tip-off, tended to keep mum as soon as they became the subject of an investigation. Rath was finding it hard to listen properly and present his findings on his fruitless search of the Delphi. At least Gennat praised him for getting hold of the decisive witnesses. But none of that mattered to Rath now; even Charly’s presence left him cold. The thing he most wanted was to storm into Bruno Wolter’s office, grab him by the throat and shake him until the bastard finally came out with the truth.

Instead he intercepted Gennat straight after the briefing.

‘If you’re here to complain about your assignment today, you can forget it,’ Buddha said. ‘Nothing like a bit of discipline.’

‘No, sir, it’s something else. DCI Wolter. Did he ever work for A Division?’

‘I see you’ve been reading the file.’ Gennat nodded and seemed to think. ‘Must’ve been one of his final cases for us. Before the accident.’

The accident! Rath’s ears pricked up. Scheer had also spoken of an accident.

‘They were colleagues. Has he never told you about it? Come to think of it, I’m not surprised. A nasty thing, it was.’ Gennat took him to one side. ‘Bruno Wolter is one of the best shots on the force. He used to train people on the firing range.’

‘I know. Was he still working for A Division at the time?’

‘Of course. He’s always been a CID officer, just one with a specific set of skills. Whenever things threatened to get a little dicey and we needed someone who could shoot, Wolter was brought in. He was a marksman during the war, belonged to a special unit by the end of it.’

‘Shouldn’t a police officer avoid using his service weapon whenever possible? There are procedures for that sort of thing, aren’t there?’

‘I don’t need procedures, young Rath. There’s nothing I hate more than bullets spraying everywhere. Which is precisely why it’s important to have someone who knows what they’re doing.’

‘That someone was Bruno Wolter?’

‘Yes. He was calm, didn’t matter if chaos was raging all around him. Sometimes a single shot was enough for it all to be over.’

‘And for the perpetrator to be dead…’

‘Wolter never killed a single person in the line of duty. He neutralised the bastards who insisted on waving weapons around. Very precisely. It was more like a surgical incision than a simple shot. Once you’ve got a hole in your hand, you can’t shoot anymore, it’s as simple as that. After that my men could pick up the gun-toting wailers.’

‘What about the accident?’

‘That’s the tragic thing. It didn’t even happen during an operation. Everyone would’ve been sympathetic if something had gone wrong there. But no, it was on the range. A young officer caught a bullet, Thies his name was, if memory serves. The best shot in his year. It was clear he ought to be working with Wolter together on the range.’

‘And then?’

‘The circumstances were never entirely clear. It was probably Thies’s fault. He was already helping out on the range, taking care of some of the smaller maintenance jobs. One day a troop of young officers were practising with their rifles, and suddenly there was a body twitching behind the target, streaming with blood.’

‘Thies.’

‘Somehow he must’ve got into the line of fire. By the time the doctor arrived he was already dead. Killed by his own colleagues. They removed five bullets from his body.’ Gennat paused, as if the memory still made him shudder. ‘As I said, it was probably the boy’s fault. But Wolter took responsibility and arranged for his own transfer to Vice. That’s where he was least likely to have to shoot. No-one’s seen him on the range since.’