Филип Керр - Metropolis

‘Yes, that’s true,’ admitted Weiss. ‘I never thought of that.’

‘In every other respect he sounds exactly like a Nazi,’ added Gennat.

‘Or someone who wants to sound like a Nazi,’ I said. ‘But I agree with Ernst. It’s curious that a Nazi of all people should miss out on a good opportunity to libel you, sir. They’re not normally so careless about such things.’

‘Especially that bastard Goebbels,’ agreed Trettin. ‘Hey, wouldn’t it be great if a Nazi really had killed these men? Hitler loves to pose as the veterans’ friend. Something like this would truly embarrass him.’

Weiss said nothing but I could tell he was thinking the same thing.

‘You know, boss,’ added Trettin, ‘listening to that letter reminded me of how you described those two doctors at the Oskar-Helene Home in Zehlendorf. You said they were eugenicists. Only more so. That they believe in the extermination of those who serve no useful purpose in society.’

‘Sadly, this kind of perverted science is a commonly held view today,’ said Weiss. ‘Especially in Germany. And among some quite respectable people, too. Until his death a few years ago, Karl Binding was a leading exponent of “mercy” killing, as he called it. And psychiatrist Alfred Hoche has been advocating euthanasia for the disabled and mentally ill for many years.’

‘Nevertheless,’ said Trettin, ‘maybe there’s some useful purpose in seeing if Doctors Biesalski and Wurtz are somehow involved in these killings.’

‘You mean, in seeing if they’re murderers?’

‘I’m not sure I would go that far. No, in seeing if perhaps they counselled others at the home to carry out the murders.’

Weiss frowned. ‘I think it’s highly unlikely. I didn’t like them. I didn’t like them at all. But I don’t think there’s any German doctor who would put a gun to a man’s head and pull the trigger in the name of so-called racial hygiene, or ask someone else to do so. Things are morally bad in Germany, yes, but they’re not that bad. But by all means pursue it as a possible lead if you think it’s worth it, Otto. It’s not as if we have a lot of other theories to work with right now. Only do it discreetly. I don’t want them complaining to the Ministry.’

Gennat came back to the meeting table and clasped his pink hands in front of his belly, like an innocent choirboy. He didn’t sit down. Looking as if he wished to make a point, he addressed the table with the air of an angry chairman berating a board of directors.

‘If you ask me, it’s teenagers who are behind these killings,’ he said. Gennat seemed a little more red-faced and pop-eyed than usual, and his voice could have blunted the edge of a sabre. ‘That’s right. Our delightful, all-important, patriotic German youth who don’t know anything and want to know even less. Lazy little bastards. Most of them regard cops as figures of comedy.’ He stared up at the ceiling with a look of sarcastic innocence and tried to speak like an adolescent. ‘ “What, me, Officer? I really don’t know what you’re talking about, Officer. No sir, I can’t remember where I was last night. And I wouldn’t dream of doing what you suggest. As a matter of fact, I’ve just come from church, where I was praying for my grandmother”.’

‘They make me puke.’ Gennat caught the smile on the face of Bernhard Weiss and pointed his cigar holder the boss’s way. ‘And why not them? You know what I’m talking about, boss. A gang of juveniles looking for amusement. And what could be more amusing than murder for the hell of it, especially when you’re just killing off a few old men who’ve outlived their usefulness? That’s just Darwinism, according to some lawyers I’ve spoken to.’

‘You’re exaggerating a bit, Ernst,’ said Weiss. ‘Young people are really not as bad as that, are they?’

‘No, they’re far worse than that. You don’t believe me, then go down to the Juvenile Court and take a good look for yourself, Bernhard. They have no souls, half of them. But why should that be a surprise to anyone? Many of them have grown up without any kind of discipline in their lives because their fathers were killed in the trenches.’

‘What about the letter? Are you seriously saying a juvenile could have written that?’

‘Excuse me, chief, but why not?’

With a magnanimous gesture of his hand, Weiss encouraged Gennat to continue.

‘They can write. They’ve been educated. Some of these teenage swine are a lot cleverer than you think, chief. Paul Krantz, for example. Remember him? He was attending a good school, a gymnasium, and would have got his Abitur but for the small matter of a murder trial.’

Paul Krantz was a juvenile whose case had recently come before the Berlin courts; he’d been accused of murdering two of his teenage friends, youngsters from a nice, middle-class home in Berlin-Steglitz, along with another boy who was his rival for the affections of a local girl. The murders had been a source of enormous fascination in the Berlin newspapers.

‘But Paul Krantz was acquitted of murder,’ protested Weiss.

‘All the worse. But everyone in Berlin knows he did it. Three murders and all he gets is a rap over the knuckles; three weeks in the cement for the illegal possession of a .25-calibre pistol. That’s what I call clever. You think I’m exaggerating? Well, I’m not. I seem to recall the trial judge in his case referring to dangerous tendencies that are present in the German youth of today. Frankly a lot of German teenagers are communists or Nazis and don’t even know it yet. Maybe Dr Gnadenschuss is just one of those: young Pifke s the Nazis are working hard to recruit because none of them possesses so much as a vestigial conscience. The ideal Nazi.

‘And by the way, you notice I made mention of Paul Krantz owning a .25-calibre pistol. That’s because lots of kids in juvenile gangs have them. Forget about knives and saps; a lot of these wild boys own small automatics. It’s a status symbol. Like an earring, a good pair of leather shorts or an old tuxedo. They’re a lawless breed bent only on their own lawless pleasure.’

‘So what are you suggesting?’ asked Weiss, fiddling with his immaculate shirt cuffs. He seemed like a study in patience — the very opposite of his more passionate deputy.

‘Let’s have Schupo round them all up for questioning early one morning. See what we can shake out of their lederhosen pockets. If nothing else it will look to the minister like we’re doing something. Who knows? Maybe we’ll get lucky. It’s about time we did. We find one kid in possession of a typewriter that has a misaligned G and we’re laughing all the way to the falling axe.’

‘But where are they? These gangs of teenagers?’

‘They’re easy enough to find. They hang out in encampments in park sites, abandoned warehouses, and old beach huts on the outskirts of Berlin, mostly to the west. Did you know that some of these gangs even call themselves after names in Karl May’s novels?’

‘How do you know all this, Ernst?’ asked Weiss.

‘Because there’s a fourteen-year-old runaway in a cell over in Charlottenburg who stabbed another gang member in a knife fight. A vicious little queer who thought he was playing bare-arsed Boy Scouts. He just happens to be my brother-in-law’s cousin. My sister telephoned to see if I could help him and I told her she could forget it. Help was something he needed a year ago in the shape of a thick ear; now he needs a good lawyer. Besides, I’m a detective, not a damn psychiatrist.’

‘We had noticed,’ said Heller.

‘So what do you say, boss? Shall we round them up for questioning?’

‘I don’t like the idea of mass arrests,’ said Weiss. ‘It smacks of the Freikorps and the right wing. But if you think it’s worth a shot, then let’s do it. I’ll speak to Magnus Heimannsberg and see when we can arrange it.’