Marek Krajewski: Death in Breslau

Mock bowed once again in his thoughts to his old chief. Criminal Director Muhlhaus was right — Piontek was a man who had to be stunned and made breathless. Mock knew that any attack against Piontek would involve great risk, which is why he still hesitated.

“Did your chief not ask you to help us?”

“He did not even suggest it,” Piontek’s lips were stretched into a smile.

Mock took a few deep breaths and felt the sweet sense of power gather within him.

“You will help us, Piontek, with all the strength at your command. You’ll set every last grey cell to work. If needs be, you’ll study in the library … And do you know why? Because it is not your chief who’s asking for this, or Criminal Director Muhlhaus, or even I myself … You are being implored by the delightful eleven-year-old hussy, Ilsa Doblin, whom you raped in your car, paying her drunken mother generously; you are being asked by Agnes Harting, that chatterbox with bunches whom you embraced in Madame le Goef’s boudoirs. You even came out quite well on the photographs then.”

Piontek’s broad grin never wavered.

“Give me a few days,” he said.

“Of course. Please contact no-one but me. It is, after all, Counsellor Mock in charge of the investigation.”

BRESLAU, SUNDAY, MAY 14TH, 1933

TEN O’CLOCK IN THE MORNING

Baron Wilhelm von Kopperlingk occupied the two top floors of the beautiful, art-nouveau, corner building on Uferzeile 9, not far from the Engineering College. In the doorway stood a young butler with gentle eyes and studied manners.

“The Baron is awaiting you in the games room. Please follow me.”

Mock introduced himself and his assistant. The Baron was a slender and very tall man of about forty, with the slim, long fingers of a pianist. The hairdresser and the female manicurist had only just taken their leave. The Baron tried to draw the Counsellor’s attention to the results of their labours by performing numerous gestures with his hands — but in vain. Because Mock was not watching the Baron’s hands. He was looking around with interest at the enormous room. His attention was drawn to various details of the decor in which he could not make out any sense, detect any central idea, any predominant feature, not to mention style. Nearly every piece of furniture contradicted the purpose of its existence: the wobbly gold chair, the armchair from which grew a huge steel fist, the table with embossed Arabian ornaments rendering it impossible to stand even a glass on it. The Counsellor did not know much about art, but he was sure that the enormous paintings depicting the Lord’s Passion, the danse macabre and orgiastic cavortings were not the work of a person in their right mind.

Forstner’s attention, on the other hand, was drawn to three terrariums full of spiders and myriapods. They stood on metre-high legs by the French windows leading to a balcony. A fourth terrarium next to the blue-tiled stove was empty. It was home, usually, to a young python.

The Baron finally managed to attract the policemen’s attention to his manicured hands. They noticed, with surprise, that he was using them to lovingly caress that very python, which was now wrapped around his shoulder. The servant with beautiful eyes set out the tea and shortbread on an art-nouveau plate with a stand in the shape of a ram’s horns. Von Kopperlingk indicated some soft, Moorish cushions scattered on the floor to the policemen. They sat down, cross-legged. Forstner and the servant exchanged quick glances, which did not escape either Mock’s or the Baron’s attention.

“You have an interesting collection in the terrariums, dear Baron,” Mock panted as he got up again from the floor to inspect the specimens. “I never thought myriapods could be so large.”

“That’s a Scolopendra gigantea ,” the Baron said with a smile. “My Sarah is thirty centimetres long and comes from Jamaica.”

“It’s the first time I’ve seen a scolopendra .” With relish, Mock inhaled the Egyptian cigarette handed to him by the butler. “How did you bring this specimen in?”

“There’s a middle-man in Breslau who — to order — imports various, all sorts of …”

“Vermin,” Mock cut in. “Who is it?”

On a sheet of letter-paper decorated with his family crest, von Kopperlingk wrote a name and address: Isidor Friedlander, Wallstrasse 27.

“Do you also rear scorpions, Baron?” Mock did not stop watching the scolopendra harmoniously shift the segments of its torso.

“I used to have several at one time.”

“Who imported them for you?”

“This same Friedlander.”

“Why haven’t you got them any more?”

“They died of homesickness for the Negev desert.”

Mock suddenly rubbed his eyes in amazement. He had just noticed a porcelain pissoir secured to the wall with a gleaming metal ice-pick in the shape of a sharpened, narrow pyramid lying in it.

“Don’t worry, Counsellor. That piece is only an ornament in the spirit of Duchamp; nobody uses it. Nor the ice-pick.” The Baron smoothed the velvet collar of his smoking-jacket.

Mock sat down heavily on the cushions and, without looking at his host, asked:

“What made you take up Oriental Studies?”

“Melancholy, probably …”

“And what did you do, Baron, between eleven and one o’clock on the night before yesterday, on Friday, May 12th?” The second question was asked in the same tone.

“Am I a suspect?” Baron von Kopperlingk half-closed his eyes and got up from the cushions.

“Please answer the question!”

“Counsellor, be so good as to contact my lawyer, Doctor Lachmann.” The Baron put the python back in its terrarium and stretched two long fingers which held a white visiting card towards Mock. “I’ll answer all your questions in his presence.”

“I assure you, Baron, I’m going to ask you that question irrespective of whether you’re in the company of Doctor Lachmann or Chancellor von Hindenburg. If you have an alibi, we will save Doctor Lachmann the trouble.”

The Baron mused for perhaps fifteen seconds: “I do have an alibi. I was at home. My servant, Hans, will confirm it.”

“Forgive me, please, but that is no alibi. I do not trust your servant, nor any servant for that matter.”

“And your assistant?”

Before he realized, the Counsellor automatically wanted to reply “not him either”. He glanced at Forstner’s burning cheeks and shook his head: “I don’t understand. What connection do you have with my assistant?”

“Oh, we’ve known each other a long time …”

“Interesting … But today, by some strange coincidence, you have been hiding your acquaintanceship. I even introduced you. Why did you not want to disclose your friendship?”

“It’s not a friendship. We simply know each other …”

Mock turned to Forstner and looked at him expectantly. Forstner’s gaze was fixed intently on the carpet pattern.

“What are you trying to convince me of, Baron?” Mock was triumphant on seeing the embarrassment of both men. “That an ordinary acquaintance allows Forstner to be here with you from eleven to one at night? Ah, no doubt you’re going to tell me that you were ‘playing cards’ or ‘looking at albums’ …”

“No, Forstner was here, at a reception …”

“But it must have been a singular reception, eh, Forstner? Why, it looks as if you’re both embarassed by this acquaintance … But maybe something shameful took place at this reception?”

Mock stopped tormenting Forstner. He now knew what, until then, he had only suspected. He congratulated himself for asking the Baron about an alibi. He had no grounds for doing so at all. Marietta von der Malten and Francoise Debroux had been raped and Baron Wilhelm von Kopperlingk was a declared homosexual.