Philip Kerr - Prussian Blue

“And are they?”

“A little, perhaps. Berliners have never made good Nazis. It’s a metropolitan thing, I guess. People in big cities don’t care much about race and religion. Most of them don’t even believe in God. Not since that other German madman. They’re a little cynical to be wholly enthusiastic acolytes.”

“I’m beginning to see why you’re expendable.”

“But give me Wasserstein’s last address and I’ll see what I can find out.”

“Thanks. Commissar Gunther, I want you to know that I’m loyal to the Leader.”

“Isn’t everyone?”

“You’re not.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Look, it isn’t him who’s at fault. It’s the people around him. People like Martin Bormann. He’s so corrupt. He runs this whole mountain like it’s his personal fiefdom. And Karl Flex was just one of his more loathsome creatures. Him and Zander, and that awful man Bruno Schenk. Those are the kind of people who give our movement a bad name. But if I’m going to help you I have to do it in my own way.”

“Sure. Whatever you say. And that’s just the way I was going to handle it.”

“I don’t want to hear any lectures about police procedure and withholding evidence.”

“All that stuff means nothing now, anyway.”

“So here’s what I’m offering. I’ve been coming here for almost a decade and I’m often in this house. Sometimes on my own. Sometimes not on my own. I see things. And I hear things. More than I should, perhaps. By the way, there are listening devices all over the Berghof so be very careful what you say and where you say it.”

I nodded, hardly wanting to interrupt Gerdy Troost by telling her I already knew about the listening devices.

“That’s another reason why this terrace — the smoking room — is so popular. It’s safe to talk here.”

“So what have you got to tell me now?”

“Nothing that might reflect badly on Hitler,” she said carefully. “He’s a man of great vision. But if you ask me a question, I’ll do what no one else on this mountain will do, Commissar Gunther, I’ll try to give you a straight answer. You tell me what you think you know and, if I’m able to, I’ll confirm it. Clear?”

“Clear enough. You’re going to be my own oracle at Obersalzberg. And it will be up to me to make sense of what you tell me.”

She nodded. “If you like.”

“How much of what Flex was doing did Bormann know about?”

“Everything that happens on this mountain happens because Martin Bormann wants it that way. Flex was merely carrying out his master’s orders. Sure, he was an engineer with lots of letters after his name, but he was just a button that Bormann could press. Once for this and twice for that. Bormann’s difficulty is that he desperately needs this man caught or the Leader will never come back; but in order for that man to be caught he risks the exposure of all his local rackets. Which means you’re right about that police medal. You solve this case, you might not live to collect it.”

“I figured as much.” I lit another cigarette. “Dr. Brandt. Is he one of Bormann’s buttons, too?”

“Brandt’s in debt,” she said. “A massive amount of debt. Because of his lavish lifestyle. He used to rent part of the Villa Bechstein but now he has a house in Buchenhohe. Not to mention an expensive apartment in Berlin, on Altonaerstrasse. All on a doctor’s salary of three hundred and fifty reichsmarks a month. And because he’s in debt he has to make ends meet by being part of Bormann’s rackets. He might seem honorable. But he’s not. Don’t trust him.”

“Capable of covering up a murder, do you think?”

Gerdy nodded. “Not just of covering one up. Capable of committing one, too. Tell me. You’ve lifted a few rocks already. And seen what slithered out. Why do you think Flex was killed?”

“Because someone bore him a grudge, because of a compulsory purchase — perhaps.”

“Maybe. But that’s just fifty or sixty people. And quite a narrow sample of people on the Berg with a substantial grievance. You’re going to need to cast your net much wider than that to get a proper idea of what’s been going on here. You do that and you’ll have a much better idea of who killed Karl Flex.”

“The P-Barracks. The brothel? Does Bormann get a cut of that as well?”

“Bormann gets a cut of everything. But I’m disappointed. You’re still thinking like a policeman. The money generated by fifteen or twenty girls is tiny. No, there are much bigger rackets than that in Obersalzberg, and at Berchtesgaden. You need to expand your horizons, Commissar, to think on a more grandiose scale, to build your ideas of what one man can achieve if he has the resources of an entire country at his disposal.”

I thought for a moment. “Construction,” I said. “The Obersalzberg Administration. Polensky & Zöllner.”

“Now you’re getting warmer.”

“Is Bormann getting a kickback from OA?”

Gerdy Troost stood a little closer to me and lowered her voice.

“On every contract. Roads, tunnels, the tea house, the Platterhof Hotel, you name it, Martin Bormann is getting a cut. Think of it. All those jobs. All those workers. All that money. More money than you could imagine. There’s nothing that happens around here he doesn’t take his cut from.

“It’s going to take you a while to find out just what he’s been getting away with. You’re going to need to build a case, carefully. And when you do you’re going to need not just my help, but the help of someone close to the Leader who’s as honest as I am.”

“And who might that be?”

“Martin Bormann’s brother, Albert.”

“Where can I find him?”

“At the Reichs Chancellery building, in Berchtesgaden. Up here on the mountain might be Martin Bormann’s territory, but down there, in the town, that definitely belongs to Albert. In case you didn’t know, they hate each other.”

“Why?”

“You’ll have to ask Albert.”

“Maybe I should go and see him.”

“He won’t talk to you. Not yet. But he knows you’re here, of course. And he’ll see you when he’s ready. Or when you’ve got something concrete on his brother. But you haven’t got that yet. Have you?”

“No. Not yet. And I get the feeling I’m crazy even to try.”

“Perhaps.”

“You could speak to Albert Bormann. Tell him to see me now.”

“You’d be fishing. Wasting his time.”

“How will I know when I’m close to the truth? Will you tell me?”

“I probably won’t have to. The closer to the truth you get, the more your own life is going to be in danger.”

“That’s a comforting thought.”

“If you wanted comfort you’d have stayed at home.”

“You haven’t seen my home.” I sighed. “But from what you’ve told me, I’m going to be lucky if I ever see it again.”

Home was beginning to seem tantalizingly close. Germany — what I called Germany, which is to say the Saarland — was less than eighty kilometers away. With any luck I thought I might get there before dark.

There was an almost invisible stream on the edge of the field of stubble where I washed my hands and face and tried to make myself look as respectable as you can be after you’ve spent the night in a haystack. A light drizzle was falling and the sky was gray with the threat of something worse. I ate the rest of my food, mounted the bicycle uncomfortably, and cycled northwest, away from Château-Salins. A few dogs barked as I cycled past farm gates and cottage gardens but I was long gone before any locals could look out of their net-curtained windows and see a suspicious character like me. The road was straight and relatively flat, as if some Roman engineers had not long finished their lapidary endeavors. I was now in Lorraine, which had been annexed by another great empire following the war of 1871 and made a part of the German territory of Alsace-Lorraine. After Versailles, Lorraine had been given back to France, only for it to be annexed by Germany again during the Second World War. But it looked solidly French to me now, with French flags displayed in nearly every wart of a town or village, and it was hard to understand why Germany had ever wanted this dull, featureless region of France. What use was it? What did it matter which country owned one stinking field or another misshapen wood? Was it for this that so many men had died in 1871 and in 1914?