Philip Kerr - Prague Fatale

‘And Ferdinand? Her husband?’

‘Oh, I’ve no idea what happened to him. And I don’t much care, quite frankly. He sounds like your typical grasping Jewish merchant and he quite wisely cleared off the minute we walked into the Sudetenland. But I do know that the artist — another Austrian named Gustav Klimt — died at the beginning of the influenza epidemic in 1918, poor fellow. But he was a frequent guest here, I believe. Adele was rather fond of old Klimt, by all accounts. Perhaps a bit too fond. Funny to think of them all here, isn’t it? Especially now that General Heydrich owns the house. O quam cito transit gloria mundi.’

I nodded but said nothing. While the eccentric young adjutant seemed to be a cut above the average SD automaton, I wasn’t in the mood to mention the loss of my own wife to the influenza epidemic: if Klimt had been an early victim, my wife had been one of the very last to die of flu, in December 1920. Besides, there was something just a bit unpredictable about Captain Kuttner that made me wonder how someone like Heydrich could tolerate him. Then again, the General also managed, somehow, to tolerate me, and that spoke either of his enormous toleration — which seemed improbable — or his enormous cynicism.

Kuttner tried and failed to stifle a yawn.

‘The General working you late, is he?’

‘Sorry. No, actually I’m just not sleeping very well. Hardly at all, if I’m honest.’

‘He has the same effect on me. I’ve hardly slept a wink since I received his kind invitation to Prague. And it’s not from excitement, either.’

‘Really?’ Kuttner sounded surprised.

‘Really.’

‘You surprise me. Actually he’s been very understanding of my situation. Very understanding. He even referred me to his own doctor. He gave me something called Veronal, which is quite effective. For sleeping. Although you have to be careful not to mix it with alcohol.’

‘Then I’d better make sure I never take any.’ I grinned. ‘I’m usually very careful never to let anything stand in the way of my drinking. But what I meant was that the General’s reputation goes before him. He’s not exactly Mohandas K. Gandhi, is he? And I might sleep a little better knowing exactly why the hell I’m here. I don’t suppose you can shed any light on that, can you? In the same thoughtful and well-informed way that you have illuminated this picture for me.’

Kuttner scratched the duelling scar on his cheek. He seemed to do it when he was nervous, which was often.

‘It was my understanding that you and the General were friends.’

‘If you mean like a friend in need is a friend to be avoided, then yes we’re friends. But I guess the friends we have are probably the friends we deserve.’

‘You do surprise me, Commissar Gunther.’

‘Well, maybe you’ve put your finger on it, Captain. Maybe I’m supposed to be the licensed jester here, to make everyone else but the General feel uncomfortable. Knowing Heydrich as I do, I can easily see how that might amuse him.’

‘I can assure you that what you say simply cannot be the case. Most of the people here this weekend are the General’s most intimate friends. And he’s gone to considerable trouble to make sure that everyone enjoys themselves. Good food, excellent wine, fine brandies, the best cigars. Perhaps it’s just you who is supposed to feel uncomfortable, Commissar.’

‘That is always possible. The General always did like what the English call a Roman holiday. Where one man suffers for the pleasure of others.’

Kuttner was shaking his head. ‘Please let me reassure you, Gunther. I was joking, just now. Your fears are entirely without foundation. The General was most anxious that you should be comfortable. He chose your quarters himself. He chose everyone’s quarters. Including my own. I’ve known the General for quite a while now, off and on, and I can attest to his generosity and thoughtfulness. He’s not at all the capricious cruel man that you seem to know. Really.’

‘Yes, I’m sure you’re right, captain.’ I nodded at the femme fatale in gold. ‘All the same, I wonder if the unfortunate sugar merchant’s wife would agree with you.’

It was one of those early October afternoons that made you think winter was just a word and that there was no earthly reason why the sun should ever stop shining. The flowers in the Lower Castle’s well-tended beds were mostly pink dahlias, white asters and red marigolds, providing a riot of autumn colour — which was the only kind of riot that the SS was likely to tolerate. The lawn was as green and smooth as a python’s eyeball. Crystal glasses clinked, heels clicked, and somewhere someone was playing a piano. A soft breeze in the trees sounded like an enormous silk dress. They had turned off the sprinklers but there was strawberry cup with real strawberries and delicious Sekt so I managed to get nicely wet all the same.

About eighteen of us went in for lunch. With only another four we could have tossed a coin for kick-off. The white tablecloth was as stiff as a sail on a frozen schooner and there was enough silver on it for an army of conquistadores. Otherwise things were informal, as Captain Kuttner had promised, and I was glad we had abandoned crossbelts as the food was as spectacular as it was plentiful: pea soup with real peas and bacon, liver dumplings with real liver and real onions, Holstein Schnitzel with real veal, a real egg and real anchovies served with a real Leipziger Everything. I hardly had room for the real strudel and the real cheese that followed. The wines were equally impressive. There was a box on the table for food coupons, but no one was paying any attention to that and I figured it was just for show. I looked at it and wondered about the two Fridmann sisters in the apartment beneath mine back in Berlin and how they were getting on with the canned food I’d given them, but mostly I just kept on filling the hole in my face with food and wine and cigarette smoke. I didn’t say much. There wasn’t much need to say anything very much. Everyone paid close attention to Heydrich’s table talk, which was the usual Nazi twaddle, and it was only when he started talking about the stupidity of trying to turn Czechs into Germans that I gave my jaws a rest and let my ears take over:

‘People of good race and good intentions, they will be Germanized. Those we can’t Germanize and educate to think differently from the way they think now, we’ll have to put up against the wall. The rest — that’s potentially at least half the population of Bohemia and Moravia — they will have to be moved out and resettled in the East where they can live out their miserable days in Arctic labour camps. However, whenever we can we must act with fairness. When all is said and done, the Czechs should be made to see the advantages of cooperation over opposition. And when the current state of emergency has ended, I will increase the local food ration and do everything in my power to hunt down black-market profiteers.’

There was a lot more of this guff, and I looked at the fat faces of my fellow officers to see if anyone felt the same way about it that I did, but I saw only consent and agreement. Probably they looked at me and thought the same thing.

Among these faces there was only one, apart from Heydrich’s long, thin witch-doctor’s mask, that I recognized and this was the former Foreign Minister and ex-Reichsprotector, Konstantin von Neurath. At almost seventy, he was the oldest person at the table and easily the most deserving of respect. Not that his ambitious young successor, Heydrich, accorded him much of this. From time to time he would pat the old man on the hand like a pet dog and speak to him in a louder voice, as if the Baron were deaf, although it was quite plain to anyone who had talked to him that there was nothing at all wrong with his hearing. I suspected that von Neurath was only present to make the new Reichsprotector’s triumph complete.