Marek Krajewski - Death in Breslau

Mock was suddenly no longer interested in the martial music transmitted over the radio. He ran his finger along the top of the radio set and muttered: “I’ll be there directly.”

A quarter of an hour later he was on Eichen-Allee. Without a word of greeting, he passed the old butler, who was standing — straight as an arrow — in the doorway, and growled: “I know how to find the Baron’s study!”

His host was in the open door, dressed in a long, pique dressing gown and slippers of pale leather. Beneath the unbuttoned collar of his shirt was a silk neckerchief. He was smiling, but his eyes were extremely mournful. The slim, furrowed face was aflame.

“It’s a great honour for us that your Excellency has deigned to trouble himself to come and see us,” he contorted his face in a joker’s grin. All of a sudden he grew serious. “Come inside, sit down, have a smoke and don’t ask any questions!”

“I’ll ask one.” Mock was clearly angry. “Who were you going to phone?”

“I’ll start with that. If you hadn’t come, I’d have phoned Udo von Woyrsch, Chief of the S.S. in Breslau. He’s a nobleman from an excellent family, somehow even connected to the von der Maltens by marriage. He would most certainly have helped me get through to the new Head of the Gestapo, Erich Kraus. Did you know … von Woyrsch has been in an excellent mood for a week now. He drew his knife during ‘the night of the long knives’ too, and destroyed the despised enemy: Helmuth Bruckner, Hans Paul von Heydenbreck and other S.S.-men. Oh my, and what a terrible thing met our dear rake and conqueror of boys’ hearts, Edmund Heines! The S.S. killed him in beautiful Bavarian Bad Wiessee. They dragged him out of not just anybody’s bed, but that of the Chief of the S.A., Ernst Rohm himself, who not long after, shared his loved one’s fate … And what happened to our beloved, hearty Piontek that he had to go and hang himself in his own garden? Apparently they showed his darling wife a few photographs where old Walter, dressed in a spherical cap, was performing what the ancients used to call lesbian love, with a nine-year-old girl. If he hadn’t done away with himself, our brown-shirt cubs from Neudorfstrasse would have dealt with him.”

The Baron, a dedicated lover of Homer, adored retardation. This time the retardation was actually an introduction.

“I’ll ask you a brief and succinct question: do you want Kraus to see the documents I keep and which prove irrefutably that the Chief of the Criminal Department used to be a Freemason? Answer ‘yes’ or ‘no’. Did you know that the Chief of the Gestapo of barely a few days feverishly wants to prove himself so as to show his principals in Berlin that their decision had been correct. We have in the Gestapo now a man who is more of a Hitlerite than Hitler himself. Do you want the Hitler of Breslau to find out the whole truth about your career?”

Mock began to wriggle in his chair. The choice cigar suddenly took on a sour after-taste. He had known somewhat earlier about the planned attack on Rohm and his Silesian followers, but he had, with particular relish, forbidden his men to intervene in any way. “Let them kill themselves, the swine,” he had told the one and only man in the police whom he trusted. And he, himself, had gladly supplied the S.S. with a number of compromising photographs. He had wanted to greet the fall of Piontek, Heines and Bruckner with champagne, but as he was raising a solitary toast his arm suddenly stiffened. He had realized that the thugs had executed a purge among themselves but that they continued to rule. And that after the few bad specimens, even worse might follow. He had anticipated correctly: Erich Kraus was the worst of all the Hitlerites he had known.

“Don’t answer, you little shoemaker from Waldenburg, you little hustler, you mediocrity! Even your interpretations of Horace had the finesse of a shoemaker’s hoof. Ne ultra crepidam . †You did not heed the warning and lied at our door. For your career. You left the Lodge. You secretly served the Gestapo. Don’t ask how I know all this … Of course, you also did this for your career. But it is my daughter who served your career best. You remember — the same one who, limping, would run to meet you. You remember how much she liked you? ‘Dear Herr Ebi’ … she’d cry when she saw you.”

Mock got up abruptly.

“What do you want? I’ve already handed you the murderer. Speak, as you promised, ‘briefly and succinctly’ and spare yourself this Ciceronian performance!”

Von der Malten did not say a word, but walked up to his desk and took a tin Wiener Chocolate box from a drawer. He opened it and slipped it under Mock’s nose. A scorpion was pinned to the red velvet. Next to it lay a little blue card with the Coptic verses about death which he already knew. Underneath was added in German: ‘Your pain is still too small.’ I found this in my study.”

Mock looked at the geocentric model of Earth and said far more calmly now:

“There is no lack of psychopaths. In our city, too. And most certainly among your servants — who could get into such a well-guarded residence?”

The Baron was toying with a paper-knife. Suddenly, he turned his eyes to the window. “Do you want to see in order to believe? Do you really want to look at my daughter’s dessous ? I’ve put it away. It was in this box next to the scorpion and this letter.”

Mock did, indeed, remember that Marietta’s underwear was missing from the scene of the crime. He had even told one of his men to check on all fetishists on this very account.

Von der Malten put the knife aside and said in a voice trembling with rage:

“I finished off that ‘murderer’ in the cellar, the man you delivered to me … That old, demented Jew … There’s only one man I hate more than you: the real murderer. You’re going to put all that’s within your power, Mock, to work and find that murderer. No … no … not you personally. Somebody else will be heading the new investigation. Someone from the outside, whom no gang from Breslau will ensnare. Besides, you’ve already caught the murderer … How would that be? You looking for him again? You might even lose your position and your medal …”

The Baron leaned across the desk and their faces came within a few centimetres of each other. Stale breath enveloped Mock.

“Are you going to help me or am I to ruin your career? Are you going to do everything I tell you or am I to call von Woyrsch and Kraus?”

“I’ll help you, but I don’t know how. What am I to do?” he replied without hesitation.

“That’s your first intelligent question.” Anger still trembled in the Baron’s voice. “Come into the drawing-room. I’ll introduce you to somebody.”

As the Baron opened the door to the drawing-room, two men sitting at a side table immediately stood up. The not too tall man with curly, dark hair looked like a teenager caught by his parents in the act of looking through pornographic illustrations. The younger, slim, auburn-haired man, had the same expression of weariness and satisfaction in his eyes as Mock saw in his own on Saturday mornings.

“Criminal Director,” the Baron addressed Mock. “Let me introduce Doctor Georg Maass from Konigsberg and Criminal Assistant of the Berlin Police, Herbert Anwaldt. Doctor Maass is a fellow at the University of Konigsberg and an eminent Semitologist and historian; Assistant Anwaldt a specialist in crimes of a sexual nature. Dear gentlemen, this is Chief of the Criminal Department of the Police Praesidium in Breslau, Criminal Director Eberhard Mock.

The men nodded to each other, after which — following the Baron’s example — they sat down. The host continued ceremoniously:

“In keeping with his courteous assurance, the Criminal Director will give you any help you need. Files and libraries stand open to you. The Criminal Director has kindly agreed to employ — as of tomorrow — Assistant Anwaldt in the establishment under his command as Official in Charge of Special Affairs. Am I right, Criminal Director?” — Mock, astounded by his implied “courtesy”, nodded — “Assistant Anwaldt, having access to all files and information, will commence a highly secret investigation into my daughter’s murder. Have I omitted anything, Criminal Director?”