Pierre Frei - Berlin - A Novel

The door of the Konigs' room was open. 'Come on in, Frau Weber, sit down, this is just getting interesting,' cried Herr Konig, in high spirits. He poured out some potato schnapps. 'From my brother's secret still. He has an allotment garden in Steglitz. Like a little drink?'

'No, thank you, Herr Konig.'

'Well, where were we, captain?'

Brandenburg's dark glasses for the blind reflected the candlelight. Hands tilted at an angle, he was demonstrating one of his countless fights in the air. 'So the Englishman comes down from the clouds. A two-engine Mosquito. Dangerous craft, that, with three guns on board. I swerve aside. He dives down past me, it takes him a moment to regain height. I wait for him to climb past me. then I rake his underside. Ratatatat — boing — bull'seye! He's flying round me in a thousand pieces. My twenty-fifth victory in the air. I got the Knight's Cross for it — presented by him personally.'

'Bravo!' Herr Konig was beside himself. 'The Knight's Cross. Think of that, Frau Weber.'

Jutta's reaction was icy. 'I'd rather think about how it's all over now, and he is frying in hell instead of handing out gongs. Haven't you men had enough of this rot, with your murderous games of cowboys and Indians?'

Brandenburg leaped to his feet. 'I'm not taking that about rot!'

'Then don't talk it, OK? Goodnight, everyone.' In her room she lit a candle and took it into the bathroom to clean her teeth. The strong-tasting American dentifrice concealed the horrible chlorine flavour of the tapwater. As she fell asleep she pictured Jochen in her mind's eye. He had been killed at the very beginning of the war. The men's voices next door rose in excitement. She wondered, bitterly, Will it never end?

The motorcyclist was disappointed and angry. He had watched his victim for days before deciding she was worthy. Carefully, lovingly, he had chosen her from among a number of blonde, blue-eyed candidates. Not everyone passed the test.

He had been so close to her, and then the jeep ruined everything. Who knew how long he'd have to wait for another opportunity?

He took every precaution, but he had nothing to fear at this time of night. Unseen, he put the bike back in its hiding place, where he also kept the goggles, gauntlets and leather helmet. The rest of his route was hidden in darkness. It was not far to his home.

He went straight to bed, put out the light and waited patiently for the dream. It was always the same: he sank deep into the chosen one's blue eyes, stroked her long blonde hair, kissed her beautiful full lips as she opened them to him. She sighed as he penetrated her. He was a wonderful lover, with strength and stamina. But when he woke up he was an awkward fool again, a clown who had no idea how to approach a girl.

It had been like that with Annie. Annie, blonde and blue-eyed, who worked in Brumm's Bakery and Cake Shop opposite the U-Bahn station. He spent endless Sunday afternoons sitting in the front garden of the cafe, ordering countless cups of coffee and pieces of cake, following every move she made with his eyes. He financed his generous tips from the till of the family business. She said, 'Thank you very much, sir,' nicely, and bobbed a little curtsey. He didn't realize that she was laughing at him.

He gave her flowers and chocolate and a pair of silk stockings, but she just laughed. 'You're out of your league, kid!' His pink, youthful face belied his age: he was twenty-five. But the diamond ring from his mother's jewel box made a difference. She put it on her finger and said, 'Come up and see me tomorrow evening.' She had an attic room above the cake shop.

He arrived from work on his motorbike late that Monday. still dressed in his butcher's overall. She was ready, waiting for him. Her naked body shone pale in the light of the big candle beside the bed. He stood there with arms dangling, not daring to touch her: not knowing where to look. She helped him out of his overall. Something clinked. 'What's that, then?' Embarrassed, he showed her the cattle chain he'd left in his pocket by mistake.

Quick-fingered, she undressed him. When she saw his tiny prick she spluttered with laughter. All the same, she tried hard. But it was no good, he was too tense. Shrugging her shoulders, she gave up. 'Come back when you've grown up, little sissy!' she mocked him as she dressed.

He didn't want to hurt her. He only wanted her to be his. That was the deal. He grabbed hold of her. She resisted and kicked out at him, like a calf resisting slaughter. He reached for the chain that had tamed so many recalcitrant animals. She soon stopped resisting. He pulled her panties down and took her by force, using the candle in its holder as a substitute for his manhood, imaging her stertorous breathing to be the sound of orgasm. An overwhelming climax shook him as he rooted about in her, letting her go only when she stopped moving.

No one saw him carry her out into the front garden in the dark and sit her at one of the tables, her dress pulled up to show her bloodstained sex. He wanted people to know he had possessed her. He removed the ring from her finger.

It had been like that the first time, and it was the same whenever his craving grew too strong and there was only one way to satisfy it: with a young, blonde, blue-eyed woman and a cattle chain.

It was three in the morning. The basement smelled of formalin and decomposition. Gratefully, Klaus Dietrich allowed the nurse to put a mask over his mouth and nose. The body lay on the marble slab, a well-grown young woman with slender limbs.

Walter Mobius had been a medical officer with the Afrika Corps. 'We had refrigeration problems there too. Your Karin must be buried as soon as possible.'

'My Karin! Heavens, what do you think that sounds like? I never knew her. But I'd like to know how and when she died.'

'Last night, around eleven o'clock. Strangled with a chain about the thickness of your finger. Here, you can see the indentations its links left in her neck. But that's not all.' The doctor pointed to the young woman's vagina. Her blonde pubic hair was clotted with blood. He picked up a speculum and gently opened the dead woman's thighs. The inspector turned away. 'The monster,' said Mi bius, after a brief examination. 'Some sharp object. Forcibly inserted and then moved back and forth.'

A chain with a toggle to lock it in place,' said the inspector, thinking out loud. 'Using a chain like that, he could throttle her with one hand while he used the other to. ' He stopped. Around eleven at night? Probably just before the last train left at 22.48. The platform was almost empty and half the lights weren't working. The murderer would have been waiting in the shadows. The chain would have stifled her screams. And when he'd finished with her he pushed the body down on the tracks, jumped after it, hauled the corpse out of sight into the bay under the edge of the platform, clambered up again and waited for the last train, cool as a cucumber. It could have been like that.'

The doctor put the speculum in a dish. 'Nurse Dagmar undressed the body. She wasn't wearing any panties. Does anyone know anything about her?'

'Sergeant Franke thinks he might have seen her before, but he can't remember where.'

'I'm going to open up the body now. Want to stay and watch?'

'No thanks. I can't promise not to keel over. One of our men will come and collect your autopsy report later.'

Dr Mi bius looked at the beautiful corpse with pity. 'I wonder who this Karin Rembach was?' He picked up his scalpel.

SUMMER SUNDAYS WERE the best thing about Weissroda. The entire village drowsed off after lunch, and you could make off down the path through the fields and walk through the tall rye. If you parted the blades very carefully as you went in, they closed behind you, forming an impenetrable curtain. The wind had made a little clearing in the middle of the rye field. You could undo your plaits there, shake your long hair loose over your shoulders, lie down and daydream, looking up at the sky, and sometimes your hand found its way between your legs, giving you a tingling feeling which was simply unbearable, and felt so nice that you couldn't stop.