Joseph Kanon - A Good German

“Gunther, you old sod,” Danny said, standing up, a show of respect. “Take a pew.” He pulled out a chair. Gunther sat down and poured a drink.

“Meet the general?” Jake said, nodding in Sikorsky’s direction.

“I know the general. Sometimes a useful source.”

“But not this time,” Jake said, reading his face.

“Not yet.” He downed the glass and sat back. “So. You’ve had a good talk?”

“Danny’s been telling me about his real estate. He’s a landlord.”

“Yes. A kino for parachute silk,” Gunther said, shaking his head, amused.

“Steady,” Danny said. “No tales out of school now.”

Gunther, ignoring him, raised his glass. “You will dress half the women in Berlin. I salute you. Parachutes.”

“You can’t beat it for quality,” Danny said.

But silk hadn’t reached the dance floor yet, just the cheap cotton prints from the last wartime ration. Lena’s dress was gone from the floor, hidden somewhere among the crowded tables. The band had started a jazzy version of “Chicago.”

“You have the actual report?” Gunther said.

Jake pulled the flimsy from his breast pocket and watched Gunther look it over, sipping as he read.

“A Colt pistol,” he said, nodding, a western fan. “M-1911.”

“Is that special?”

“No, very common. Forty-five-caliber. Very common.” He handed the paper back.

“So now what?” Jake said.

“Now we look for an American bullet. That changes everything.”

“Why?”

“Not why, Herr Geismar. Where. Potsdam. All along, it’s a problem. The Russians closed down the market. But there are two things in Potsdam. The market, but also the conference. With many Americans.”

“He wasn’t at the conference.”

“But perhaps at the compound in Babelsberg. Invited there. What could be more likely? All the Americans are there, even Truman. Just down the road from the conference site. On the same lake, in fact.” He looked pointedly at Jake. “He was found at the Cecilienhof, but was he shot there? The night before the conference? No one there, guards only?” He shook his head. “Bodies drift. An obvious point.”

“Frigging Scotland Yard, isn’t it?” Danny said, frankly admiring. “You’re a caution, Gunther. No mistake.”

“But what isn’t obvious is the money,” Jake said.

“Always with you the money,” Gunther said.

“Because it was there. Let’s say he did have a pass to the compound, that he saw an American. He still picked up ten thousand dollars. You only make that kind of money in the market. So, all right, an American in the market. Who’s also at the conference? Most of those guys were just flown in. They’re not allowed out. You don’t see any of them here.” He waved his hand toward the noisy room.

“That is to their credit,” Gunther said dryly. “Nevertheless, he was in Potsdam. And so was an American bullet.”

“Yes,” Jake said.

“And who is at the conference? We can except Herr Truman.”

“Washington people. State Department. Aides,” Jake said, ticking them off.

“Not at the meeting. In Babelsberg.”

“Everybody,” Jake said, thinking of Brian’s requisition list. The last blowout of the war. “Cooks. Bartenders. Guards. They’ve even got somebody to mow the lawn. Everybody except press.”

“A wide net,” Gunther said glumly. “So we eliminate. Not everybody can authorize. First you will find out who issued his papers. Then after—” He drifted off, back to his own list.

“That still doesn’t tell me what he was selling.”

“Or buying,” Danny said casually.

“What did you say?” Gunther said, wide awake, putting his hand on Danny’s arm.

“Well, any transaction, there’s two sides, isn’t there?”

Gunther said nothing for a second, then patted his arm. “Thank you, my friend. A simple point. Yes, two sides.”

“I mean,” Danny said, encouraged, “he’d have dollars, wouldn’t he? An American. What—”

“It wasn’t dollars,” Jake said. “Marks. Occupation marks.”

“Oh. You might have said. Russian or American?”

“I thought they were the same.” Engraving plates, handed over.

“They’re worth the same, of course, but now the look- Here.” Danny picked up one of Sikorsky’s dropped notes. “Now, this is Russian. See the little dash before the serial number? You won’t see that on the American ones.” Somebody in the Treasury Department, careful after all. Jake wondered if Muller knew.

“You sure?”

“Things like that, you notice,” Danny said. “I thought it was fake, see, so I asked. Doesn’t make any difference, really, just something to keep track, I reckon.”

“Who has the money?” Gunther asked Jake.

“I’ve got one of the bills. Not on me.” Back in the drawer of the frilly pink vanity, next to the still of Viktor Staal.

“Then look,” Gunther said.

“But they circulate back and forth, don’t they?”

Gunther nodded. “It might be suggestive, however.” He turned to Danny, raising his glass. “Well, my friend. To your good eye. Most helpful.”

“On the house, Gunther, on the house,” Danny said, clinking glasses, pleased with himself.

“But if he was buying, what was he buying?” Jake said insistently.

“That’s an interesting question,” Gunther said as Danny poured another drink. “More difficult.”

“Why?”

“Because whatever it was, he never got it. He still had the money,” Gunther said, repeating an earlier point to a slow pupil.

Jake felt a door close. How could you trace what was never exchanged? “Now what?”

“Now we find out who he was. What would he buy? Has Teitel spoken to Frankfurt?”

“I don’t know.”

“Then we wait,” Gunther said, sitting back, his eyes drooping. “A little patience.”

“So we do nothing.”

Gunther opened one eye. “No. You will play the policeman. Find out who authorized his pass. I’m retired. I’m going to have a brandy.”

Jake put his drink down, ready to leave. The room was even more crowded, the bar almost invisible behind a wall of people, and the noise was rising now with the smoke, covering the band. “Sleepy Time Down South,” the clarinet again, peppier, straining to be heard. A girl squealed somewhere, then laughed. He took a breath, claustrophobic. But no one else seemed to mind. They were all young, some as young as Danny, who was tapping the table in time to the music. He’d never taken Lena dancing in her blue dress. The clubs by then had become shadowy, dimmed by the Nazis, taking notes in the audience during the comedy sketches. No longer fun, just something to show the tourists, who wanted to see the Femina with the telephones on the tables. Nobody had been young then, not like this, and it only came once.

“Back in a sec,” Danny said, standing up. “Goes through you, don’t it? Keep an eye on Gunther-he goes right out when he naps.”

Jake watched the slick head move through the crowd. How many nights did Gunther sit here, finally oblivious even to the smell? The couples on the floor had taken on a kind of blur. This is probably what he saw, people bouncing through a haze, the music almost an echo. It occurred to Jake that he was probably a little drunk himself. Another dream song, “I’ll Get By.” There was the dress again, leaning against the soldier. The overweight blonde.

He narrowed his eyes. If you blocked out the rest, the dress would come into focus as it had been, without the bulges and damp spots, moving with her. He remembered the Press Club party when he’d sat watching across a different room, the dress finally turning, her eyes laughing at him in secret, a quick flash like the sequins.