Philip Kerr - Prague Fatale

‘To some coppers that might seem like a crushing blow, sir, but I’m sure I’ll get over it, with a drink or two.’

‘I don’t mind if I do.’

Frank glanced at Kahlo, who went over to the drinks tray.

‘Yes sir? What’ll it be?’

‘Brandy.’

‘Me, too,’ I said. ‘And have one yourself, why don’t you?’

I waited until we were all holding a glass and then toasted the General.

‘Here’s to getting over our superiors not thinking as highly of us as we’d like.’

Frank knew that was meant for him — that of course he might have been the new Reichsprotector of Bohemia and not Heydrich if the Leader had thought more of him. To his credit Frank took the jab on his chin without blinking, but he took the drink even better, like he was swallowing a baby’s cordial. I’d seen men drink like that before and it helped explain how we were both the same sort of age but with different maps on our faces. Mine was all right, I guess, but his looked like the Ganges Delta.

‘I think we’d better have the decanter over here, Kurt,’ I said.

‘Good idea,’ said Frank.

When there was a fresh glassful in his fingers Frank studied it carefully for a moment and said, ‘Usually there’s a payoff for a good informer, isn’t there?’

‘Sometimes,’ I said. ‘But with all due respect, you don’t look like a man who’s going to be happy with five marks and a cigarette.’

‘A favour, Commissar. More than one favour perhaps.’

‘What kind of favour?’

‘Information. You see, since being passed over for the top job here in Bohemia — as you were kind enough to remind me — I don’t hear as well as I used to.’

‘And you’d like us to be your ear-trumpet, is that it?’

Frank looked critically at Kahlo. ‘I don’t know about him. But you’ll do for now.’

‘I see.’

‘I just want to be kept in the loop, that’s all. Right now I’m the last to know everything. It’s Heydrich’s little way of reminding me he’s in charge. You saw the way he dealt with von Neurath the other evening. Well, I get the same treatment.’ He shrugged. ‘It’s not like I’m asking very much, Commissar. After all-’ He poured the second brandy on top of the first and then licked his lips loudly. ‘It’s not like I’m a spy or anything.’

Kahlo and I exchanged a swift look.

Smiling, I poured myself another drink. ‘Are you sure about that, sir?’ I kept on smiling, to make him think I might be joking and to keep him listening without taking offence. ‘Let’s look at it logically. A man with an axe to grind like you. I think you’d make a pretty good spy.’

Frank ignored me. ‘Don’t change the subject. Not now when we’re making progress. Just tell me this: do we have a deal?’

‘To trade information now and in the future? Yes, I think so. I could use a few friends in Prague. Right now I don’t have any. Come to that, I don’t have any at home either.’

Frank nodded, his eyes glistening.

‘All right,’ he said. ‘You first. Some information. A sign of good faith.’

‘Yes. If you like.’

‘What’s the name of this bit of mouse that Henlein has got stashed in the Imperial Hotel? I hear you know all about her.’

‘Her name is Betty Kipsdorf.’

‘Is it now?’

‘Now tell me why you want to know.’

‘Maybe I just wanted to see if you were prepared to keep your end of the bargain before I told you about Lieutenant Colonel Jacobi’s interesting past.’

‘What, more interesting than fighting a duel with my murder victim? And threatening to shoot him?’

‘Oh this is very much more interesting than that, Commissar. That was merely an appetizer. Here is the main dish.

‘Jacobi joined the SA in 1930, while he was still a law student in Tubingen. Nothing unusual about that, of course, but I would suggest that there are not many law students who get themselves arrested for murder in the same week that they graduate.

‘Yes, I thought that would catch your breath. In 1932, Jacobi murdered someone in Stuttgart, which is only twenty kilometres from Tubingen. The victim was a KPD cadre, although it seems that might not be the real reason the boy was killed. There was it seems some suspicion he was queer and that this was the real motive for the murder. Now I don’t have to tell you of all people what things were like in 1932. In some ways von Papen’s government was every bit as right-wing as Hitler’s. The Stuttgart prosecutor’s office was rather slow in putting together a case against Walter Jacobi. So slow, in fact, that the case was never actually brought because, of course, in January 1933 the Nazis were elected and nobody was interested in bringing a case against a loyal Party member like Jacobi any more. All the same it’s no wonder he joined the SS and then the SD soon afterward; it was probably the best way of staying out of jail. And of course one of the very first things he did when he achieved a certain position of authority within the SS was to have the papers in the case destroyed. That almost got him kicked out of the SD, in 1937; but Himmler stepped in and pulled his nuts out of the nosebag.’

‘And you were thinking that a good detective might have found that out for himself, sir?’

‘Something like that.’

‘You overestimate me, General. Then again there’s only so much I can find out in less than twelve hours. That’s how long I’ve been on this case. And of course there’s a limit to how much I can ask my superior officers without bringing down a charge of gross insubordination on my head.’

Frank laughed. ‘We both know that’s not true.’

He laughed again in a way that made me think that there were probably a lot of things he found funny that I would have felt very differently about.

‘We both know that it suits General Heydrich to have you humiliate us all. Especially at this particular moment as he becomes Reichsprotector of Bohemia. It becomes an object lesson in power for us all. Perhaps to test our loyalty. Hitler admires Heydrich because he suspects everyone of everything. Me included. Me especially.’

‘And why would he suspect you, General?’

Frank looked at Kahlo almost as if he knew it had been Kahlo who told me about the VXG.

‘Don’t pretend to be naive. I’m married to a Czech woman, Commissar. Karola. My first wife, Anna, hates my guts and is married to a man who affects to look like the Leader and now makes it his business to tell lies about me and my new wife. Just because she’s German Czech. Between them they have already turned my two sons against me. And now they’re doing their best to allege that the only reason my wife married me was because she is a Czech spy and that when I go home at night she persuades me to part with state secrets. Well, it’s simply not true. And it’s why I didn’t think your joke was funny. I’m loyal to Germany and the Party, and one day I hope that I will have the opportunity to demonstrate to the whole world just how devoted to the Leader and the cause of National Socialism I really am. Until then I hope I can count on your help — yes, both of you — to put paid to this baseless innuendo.’

He stood up and I shook hands with him and, in my defence, so did Kurt Kahlo. It was Frank’s idea that we should, not mine, and at the time I thought nothing of it — a handshake seemed like a small price to pay for some important information about a potential new suspect. It was another eight or nine months before I realized I’d shaken hands with the man who had ordered the destruction of the small town of Lidice and the murder of everyone in it, in reprisal for the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich.

I glanced at my watch. It was seven o’clock.

‘If I wasn’t confused before,’ admitted Kurt Kahlo, ‘I’m certainly confused now. Every time we speak to someone we find out a little bit more. The only trouble is that it leaves me a little bit less enlightened. It’s curious, really. You might even call it a paradox. Even as I think I’m getting a proper grip on this case I find there’s something interrupting my thoughts, as though someone had built a wall between the two halves of my brain. Just as I find a big enough chair to stand on and look over at the other side, I forget what I’m supposed to be looking for anyway. And then, before you know it, I’ve even forgotten why I’m standing on the chair in the first place.’