Фолькер Кучер - Goldstein

Abraham Goldstein.

He didn’t have time to wonder how Marion Bosetzky had morphed into the Yank. Goldstein was now running downstairs. Struggling to get his breath back, Rath gave pursuit, leaping as Goldstein reached the bottom. The pair crashed onto the stone floor with Goldstein taking the brunt. He was still dazed as Rath knocked him down with a right hook. He got up before toppling backwards into the nave of the church, his hands desperately searching for a hold, but succeeding only in tearing prayer books from a shelf.

Rath jumped after him, to finish him off, as he had stupidly left his handcuffs in the car. As he was about to throw a second punch, Goldstein dodged, recoiled, seized Rath’s arm and rolled over backwards. Rath didn’t understand what was happening until Goldstein pulled him down with his entire body weight. He felt the Yank’s boot against his groin as he slammed against the church pews, Goldstein having now let go of his arm. There was a loud thump as the wood struck his forehead and he saw stars, teetering like a ship on troubled waters.

Then Goldstein was on him again, pulling him up by the collar. Rath dodged the ensuing punch, and essayed a kick to the groin which momentarily gave Goldstein pause for thought. Just when he saw his chance to land the deciding blow and send the Yank into the realm of dreams, he felt a hard thud against the right side of his head and heard a loud, gong-like clang. There was a flash of brightness which seemed to light up the world before everything went black.

Charly paced her flat increasingly nervously. She had already smoked seven cigarettes, one after the other, not knowing whether she should be happy or even more furious with the bastard. He had barely let her get a word in.

‘I’m in a rush’ , she imitated. What was he thinking? Snubbing her like that. At least he had conceded, but what was it he said about those gangsters? That their death had something to do with Kuschke’s? Red Hugo had been found dead at the Mühlendamm, and, as far she knew, he wasn’t Gereon’s case.

For some reason his telephone call had made her even more nervous. Pacing up and down, she felt the need to do something, but hadn’t the slightest idea what. He had told her to wait but her curiosity was greater than her rage. Almost an hour had passed. Where was he, and who was it that had telephoned for him? Did it have to do with his latest discovery?

There, the doorbell!

She checked her watch. Gereon had telephoned forty-seven minutes ago. If he had shaken a leg to get here it was most unlike him.

Her rage subsided, her tension eased. She had wanted to be mad with him but, as was so often the case, when he finally showed up her anger dissolved into thin air. At least she had the self-discipline to wipe the smile off her face as she opened the door.

She froze.

It wasn’t Gereon.

Sebastian Tornow was outside with an older man who looked familiar somehow, even if she couldn’t quite place him. She only knew it was his pistol pointed at her.

His head hurt. In fact, his whole body hurt. It was an unpleasant awakening. He’d sooner have slipped back into unconsciousness. At first he didn’t know where he was; he saw angels and saints in fluttering robes. Then he remembered: Saint Norbert’s. Goldstein!

Carefully, he turned his head. He was still in the church, and on one of the pews sat a mildly overweight priest, holding a battered incense burner, the sort of canister Rath would have swung as a ten-year-old boy. Though not to knock anyone out, which seemed to be what the priest had used it for.

Rath felt his temples. He had a mighty bump above his right eyebrow. ‘Did you do that?’ he asked.

Only now did he see Goldstein lying a few metres away and looking a little worse for wear too, holding the back of his head where the canister must have struck him.

‘I don’t tolerate violence in the house of God,’ the priest said, sounding like a teacher who had caught two young punks fighting in the schoolyard.

‘That man’s a dangerous gangster,’ Rath said, pointing towards Goldstein. ‘He’s armed.’

‘This man,’ said the priest, ‘has sought the sanctuary of the Holy Church, and he has been granted it. Besides, he is unarmed.’

‘What did you say?’ Abraham Goldstein, a Jewish gangster, had found asylum here, in a Catholic church? ‘There’s a warrant issued for his arrest.’

‘This man is enjoying church asylum, and, as long as I’m priest around here, won’t be surrendered to any secular justice system.’

Rath could almost have laughed if the situation wasn’t so serious.

‘Who says?’

‘I do. Johannes Warszawski.’

‘We’re not living in the Middle Ages!’

‘ Ecclesia iure asyli gaudet ita ut rei, qui ad illam confugerint, inde non sint extrahendi, nisi necessitas urgeat, sine assensu Ordinarii, vel saltem rectoris ecclesiae ,’ Priest Warszawski declaimed.

That went beyond Rath’s knowledge of Latin. ‘I’m sorry?’

‘From the Codex Iuris Canonici . It means something like no one who seeks asylum in my church can be made to go with people like you. At least not without picking a fight with me first.’

‘What does church law say about priests striking police officers with incense canisters?’

‘You’re a police officer?’ Warszawski showed no contrition, despite this revelation. ‘You don’t behave like one.’

‘He’s telling the truth,’ Goldstein said, taking up residence on a church pew.

Rath could do without his support. He ignored the Yank.

‘This man is a murderer,’ he said, struggling to his feet. ‘He stabbed someone to death in Humboldthain and is alleged to have shot two criminals.’

‘He’s no murderer,’ the priest said. ‘He’s simply wanted for murder. He’s told me everything. That you and your fellow officers are wrongly pursuing him.’

‘You believe him?’

‘Yes, I believe him.’ Coming from the priest, the words didn’t seem so naive. Perhaps because Rath shared his opinion. All the same, Goldstein was still a contract killer, who killed at the behest of an American criminal organisation. At least that’s what they said over there.

‘Joseph Flegenheimer vouched for this man,’ the priest said. ‘That’s enough for me.’

‘How does a Catholic priest know an orthodox Jew?’

‘I’m an old friend of Joseph’s. You can have a good old-fashioned ding-dong with him about questions of faith.’

‘You can have a good old-fashioned ding-dong with most Jews,’ Goldstein said.

‘You’re one to talk,’ Rath said, holding his head.

‘You weren’t exactly pussy-footing about either, but that bump there,’ Goldstein pointed towards Rath’s head, ‘is from the priest.’

‘You only have yourselves to blame,’ the priest said. ‘There are two things that I won’t tolerate in my church: one, that someone who’s sought the protection of the Holy Church should be surrendered to the state’s henchmen…’ That was directed at Rath. ‘…and, two, that blood should be spilled here.’ That was directed at Goldstein.

The pair nodded like a couple of candidates for confirmation.

‘Where’s Marion, by the way?’ Rath asked.

‘Long gone. There’s a rear exit,’ Goldstein said. ‘You should have come in a different car, Detective. Marion recognised the Buick.’

‘You should have gone with her.’

‘I couldn’t have known you’d sniff around the whole building. Besides, it’s about time we spoke in private, away from the prying eyes of your colleagues.’

Priest Warszawski understood. He got up and took the battered old incense burner back inside the sacristy.