Gavin Lyall - The Conduct of Major Maxim

"Really? Can I have the negatives and the certificates now, please?"

"I think you do not see the problem -"

"Just get them, please."

"They are, naturally, in the bank. But -"

"I see." Maxim got up and walked through the inner door.

Beyond, the muttering of a TV set led him to another door. Fraulein Winkelmann wassitting at one end of a small kitchen table, separated from a big colour set at the other end by a cup of coffee and a plate of cream cakes. She snatchedoffapair of gold-rimmed glasses and looked up at Maxim with myopic surprise.

When in doubt, à l'outrance-and a good lie or two, as well."Fraulein, I understand from Bruno that you are prepared to swear to a document that Corporal Blagg brought you some death certificates on the night when Herr Hochhauser -"(thank God he had remembered the name) "- the Standesbeamtefrom Bad Schwarzendorn wasmurdered. I am sorry that I had to deceive you just now; I am from the Military Police Special Investigation Branch." He held out his ID; it showed nothing of what unit or corps he belonged to. "The Staatsen-walt at Paderborn would like to have thosedeath certificates. If I can give them to him, then perhaps he will leave you out of all this. I cannot promise, of course; we are dealing with a murder. And Corporal Blagg is in a lot of trouble. But if he cannot show you have the papers any longer, then he cannot prove he was here on the night of the murder. But I have no authority here; I have to go through the police."

She stood up slowly, taking time to understand – if she ever did understand it, which was more than he did himself. He was just firing a smokescreen of emotive words and phrases. But she was just about to say something when her eyes moved and something touched the middle of his back. It didn't feel particularly like a gun, but with Bruno it would have to be.

Maxim lifted his arms carefully and sighed. "Bruno? " A hand began feeling at him in the places he might carry a gun, so Maxim said to Fraulein Winkelmann:"It would be complicated if he shoots me. I have come from London to see you, a lot of people know that, and I have a taxi waiting outside withm y luggage in it." Bruno had taken his wallet; now he snorted. Maxim went on: "Take a look outside. A grey Mercedes, parked on the pavement about twenty metres up the road. He won't go away until he's been paid. And what are you going to do with my body, Fraulein? Cut it up in thebath – that's the best place – and then what? – eat me? It would take a long -"

She suddenly started screeching at Bruno, so abruptly that Maxim felt a jab in his spine and knew he'd come very close to being shot. But then the pressure from the gun went away, and very carefully he twisted his head around and saw Bruno clutching a worn old Lugerby his waist, shaking it with impatience as he waited for Fraulein Winkelmannto stop yelling.

Maxim couldn't catch half of what she was saying, but it seemed mostly on his side. Bruno turned and stalked out of the room, then came back and pointed the Lugerat Maxim once more and said Yes, there was a taxi waiting. Fraulein Winkelmanntold him for the Good God's sake to get the papersfast, and Bruno went away and came back and pointed the Lugeryet again. It was a farce, a terrible play, but still a real play because these two were acting out a charade of fright and face-saving and if he did anything to break the illusion that they were still taking decisions for themselves then he was going to get himself shot.

But finally he had an envelope of papers in one hand and his wallet in the other and Bruno was clutching a wad of Deutschmarksand challenging Maxim with a twisted leer to say something aboutthat. That was part of the play, too, to give Bruno a final victory but not an easy or total victory because that would be unrealistic. He tried.

"Blagg said he'd promised the Frauleinsome money. But you can't take all of it."

"How much money?"

"He said 300 marks." Blagg had said 250.

"Then I take 400." Maxim knew he'd had about 650 in the wallet. Bruno handed him the difference, note by note, grinning. Then he swatted himself across the nose with the 400, and walked out jauntily. They waited until the front door of the flat slammed.

Fraulein Winkelmannsat down again, staring at the TV. There was a zooming motor race on and Maxim simply hadn't even heard it until then.

"You are not very brave," she said.

"I paid 400 marks not to get shot. It seemed worth it to me. Did he give me all the papers?"

"I expect so. Now he will drink your money and come back and beat me."

"Do you know where he hides the gun? I could… make it so that it will not shoot, but he won't know until he tries."

"I don't care. Now he sniffs cocaine, too. Let him shoot somebody and the police can have him." She started eating a cream cake.

Maxim fingered the envelope of certificates: there seemed to be a lot of them. "Did he do anything with these? Copy them? – anything?"

"I don't know. He could have done anything. "

Maxim put 100 marks on the table; it was all he could afford, with the taxi meter ticking over. "I don't want anybody to get into trouble. So if you remember anything, call me at the Allenby barracks. I shall have some more money when I've changed some travellers' cheques."

"I take them," she said, startling him. But why not? And why not credit cards? – no, he couldn't quite see American Express listing her.

"Major Maxim," he reminded her.

"At the Engineers barracks. " She scooped in the money and he let himself out.

The barracks known as Allenby – though not to the locals -were pre-1939Wehrmachtbuildings, very solid and spacious but a little worn by now. Looking round his room, Maxim realised how spoiled he had become by married quarters and flats. Here there was no soap, no towel, no water-glass or coat-hangers, not even the traditional ashtray made out of a tin lid. Just the plain furniture from Accommodation Stores and a prominent list of what that should comprise. Somebody had pinched the 'Bin, Waste Paper, Metal… i'

He unpacked what little he needed and changed his shirt, then reopened the envelope from the Blumenthalstrasse. It seemed to hold just what Blagg- had described: a wad of old death certificates, or Sterbeurkunden, and two minute strips of colour negative film in a transparent packet. These were really tiny, the special film made for Minox 'spy' cameras, and Maxim was a little surprised that real s'pies actually used it. But the negatives, each no bigger than his little fingernail, were totally meaningless to the naked eye.

Altogether there were thirty-eight certificates, each for somebody who had died in the parish of Bad Schwarzendorn on April 151945. The times of death seemed to span the whole day, but he couldn't be sure the thirty-eight covered everybody who died that day because the numbers of each certificate didn't add up to a complete sequence. Some had been signed as much as three days later. But that was less surprising than that somebody had still been issuing such certificates in the chaos that had been Germany, just three weeks before the final surrender.

The results weren't impressive: Maxim had collected parking fines that looked far grander. Each was on cheap, discolouredas paper, about the size of pages from a novel, theindividual details clumpingly typed into the spaces provided in the print, and attested by the totally illegible signature of the then Standesbeamte.Each hada10-Pfennigstamp cancelled by the eagle-and-swastika symbol, but with the swastika roughly scraped away. Perhaps Bad Schwarzendorn had been in Allied hands by then.

He settled down to sort through them.

Half an hour later, he was back downstairs asking for the duty officer. The mess was almost empty except for an Education Corps captain who was also using the place as an hotel, and three unmarried young officers who'd been playing tennis and shouldn't have been in the ante-room dressed like that. When found, the duty officer obviously knew enough about Maxim's sponsors not to ask for more. He showed him the mess library and the official telephone, then discreetly vanished.