Lehrter Station (20 page)

Most of the big operators were Germans, the young journalist told Russell, but they all had powerful friends in one or more of the occupation authorities. Rudolf Geruschke was one of the most successful. He used muscle when he had to, but generally preferred a more discreet approach, buying people off rather than burying them. He had businesses in all four sectors, but none of the occupation authorities seemed inclined to interfere with his activities, and neither did the German police.

Russell asked if Luders had heard of Kuzorra.

‘He was an exception, and Geruschke managed to get him arrested. Why? Do you know him?’

‘He’s an old friend,’ Russell admitted. ‘I went to see him on Saturday at the French camp in Wittenau.’ He told Luders what Kuzorra had told him.

‘Off the record?’ Luders asked.

‘On,’ Russell decided. He didn’t think Kuzorra would mind a little publicity. ‘When are you planning to file?’

‘Too soon to say. When I’ve got enough dirt, I guess. Maybe I’ll give Kuzorra a visit myself.’

Russell was reminded of Tyler McKinley, the young American journalist killed by the Gestapo in 1939 for digging up dirt on their political masters. Seeing the eagerness in Luders’ eyes, he worried for the young man. Things had changed since 1939, but not that much.

Delayed by another disabled tram on the way back to Dahlem, he had time to reflect on the paucity of his own journalistic output – personal
matters, an all-too-active espionage career and Berlin’s convalescent public transport were taking up every hour he had. He needed to get something written, but when? He had to complete the interviews for Shchepkin, and he couldn’t just abandon Kuzorra. But then maybe Dallin would have something for him.

When he reached the American’s office he found him about to leave, bound for some formal function in what looked like a borrowed monkey suit. ‘I talked to Crosby,’ Dallin said, hustling Russell towards the stairs. ‘He says they asked the French to pick up Kuzorra after several people denounced him. And that the only reason he hasn’t been interviewed is the backlog of cases they’re having to deal with.’

‘Did you tell him that at least one of the denouncers was an employee of the man Kuzorra was investigating?’

‘I did. He said he’d look into it. When I asked him what he knew about Geruschke, he said he knew the man was a black marketeer, but that Berlin was full of them. Which sounds fair enough. And apparently this one has a habit of helping Jews.’

Russell was sceptical. ‘Do you trust him? Crosby, I mean.’

They had reached the main entrance. ‘No,’ Dallin said eventually, ‘but there’s nothing more I can do. Your friend will have to wait his turn.’

‘That’s not good,’ Russell said, following him out.

‘That’s the way it is.’ Dallin stopped and raised both hands to close the subject. ‘And we have something else to talk about,’ he added, lowering his voice. ‘I have a job for you. There’s a man in the Soviet sector who we need to bring out. Theodor Schreier.’

‘Why can’t he just take a bus?’ was the first question that came to mind.

‘Because he’s being watched by the Russians. And if he tries to come over they’ll probably arrest him, and ship him off to Moscow.’

‘Who is he? What does he do?’

‘He’s a research chemist – something to do with polymers, whatever they are. They’re important apparently, and this man was the best in his field. He worked for I.G. Farben.’

‘So why haven’t they whisked him off already?’

‘We don’t know, which is one good reason for haste. What I need from you – from your man Shchepkin, that is – is whatever he knows about the surveillance operation. We’re going to bring Schreier out, but we’d rather not do it in a hail of bullets.’

‘That’s all you want from me?’

‘We’ll also need you for the actual extraction.’

It sounded like a trip to the dentist’s, and might prove a lot more painful – the ‘hail of bullets’ reference was hardly encouraging. But Dallin was looking steadily at him – this was a test, Russell realised, and one that he had to pass. ‘I’m not seeing Shchepkin until Friday,’ he said, ‘and ‘I’ve no way of contacting him before then.’

‘When on Friday?’

‘In the morning.’

‘That’s okay. We’re looking to bring Schreier out on Saturday evening.’

‘What if Shchepkin doesn’t know anything?’

‘Then you’ll have to wing it.’

Russell smiled. ‘Say I succeed – will you have another go at Crosby for me?’

‘If we succeed,’ Dallin said slowly, ‘then I’ll be able to argue the case for taking on more locals, whatever their crimes in the past.’

‘Sounds fair,’ Russell said. It wasn’t much, but it was the best he was likely to get.

As he reached home, Effi was seeing off a smiling British sergeant. ‘And what have you been doing in my absence?’ he asked her.

‘Entertaining the British Army,’ she told him, leading the way back in. ‘He brought a letter from Rosa and Zarah,’ she said happily over her shoulder, ‘and I had to give him something in return.’

‘A biscuit, I hope.’

‘Twenty cigarettes, actually.’

‘What’s in the letter?’

‘You can read it,’ she said, passing it over.

Zarah’s handwriting was almost florid, Rosa’s small and fastidious. The latter stressed how hard she was working at school, described London’s recent weather in enormous detail, and listed the meals that Zarah had taught her to cook. A long line of kisses was addressed to them both. Zarah reported that Rosa had cried for two nights following their departure, but seemed much better since, and was still doing well at school. A letter from Berlin would help, she added pointedly. Lothar had come down with a cold, but seemed to be on the mend, and Paul had taken Marisa to the theatre. He was, Zarah thought, very much in love. And he was also taking his ‘man of the house’ responsibilities seriously, constantly asking if there was anything he could do to help.

‘She says nothing about herself,’ Russell noted.

‘I know. It reminded me that I’ve done nothing about Jens.’

Russell grunted his agreement. It all seemed so wonderfully ordinary in London. He wondered if Paul would ever come back to Berlin, because he doubted the Soviets would ever let him leave. He sighed and put the letters put back in their envelope. ‘How was your day?’ he asked Effi.

‘It was good,’ she said, picking up the envelope and holding it across her chest. Hearing from London had clearly made her day. ‘We had another rehearsal this morning, and filming starts next week – Dufring has been cleared by the Americans.’

‘Fantastic.’

‘Isn’t it, especially after last week, when everything seemed against us. Oh, and this afternoon I visited the two synagogues Ellen told me were open. No sign of Miriam, and no more Ottos.’

‘Shanghai Otto and Palestine Otto are probably enough to be getting on with.’

‘Oh, we can’t have too many Ottos.’

‘Maybe not.’

‘And the English Tommy turned up just after I got here. He was a nice boy. What about you?’

Russell detailed his failure to advance Kuzorra’s cause, and the task which Dallin had dumped in his lap. He was well on the way to dampening Effi’s
high spirits when Thomas arrived home, triumphantly bearing a radio. They spent most of the evening listening to the BBC, enjoying the music and reminding themselves of all those nights they’d broken Hitler’s law, with one ear tuned to London, the other cocked for sounds outside. But these days the Gestapo was just a bad memory, and the men in long leather coats wouldn’t be coming to drag them away.

Next morning, Russell was in Thomas’s study trying to get something written when the telephone rang. Out of service for the last two days, the line had apparently been repaired.

It was Miguel Robier. ‘John, I’ve got some bad news. Your friend Kuzorra is dead. He was killed last night.’

‘What?’ Russell said stupidly. ‘Who by?’

‘By another prisoner, or at least that’s what they’re saying. I got the news from my friend at Müllerstrasse, the one who told us where Kuzorra was being held. I’m going up there now – there’s something wrong here, I can smell it. Do you want to come with me?’

Russell was still in shock. ‘Yes,’ he said eventually. ‘Yes, I do.’

‘How long will it take you to reach Stettin Station?’

‘An hour,’ he said optimistically.

‘I’ll be waiting.’

Russell fumbled the earpiece back onto its hook, and stood staring at the floor. The man he owed his life to was dead. And he was terribly afraid that he himself had been the cause.

For once the buses cooperated. Robier was waiting on the concourse of the half-ruined station, a newspaper under his arm. ‘Ah,
bien
,’ he said. ‘There’s a train in a few minutes.’

Soon they were rattling out past the yards, where the remnants of shattered wagons and coaches had been raised into piles, looking like anthills on an African plain.

‘I’m glad I’m with you,’ Russell told Robier. ‘If I turned up on my own they’d just tell me to get lost.’

Robier warned him not to be too optimistic. ‘The people at
Müllerstrasse
are politicians – they like having friends in the press. The Army couldn’t care less.’

In the event, the authorities at Camp Cyclop seemed eager to display a reasonable front. The major seemed inclined to ignore Russell’s existence, but answered Robier’s questions readily enough. Kuzorra had been found dead in his room that morning – someone had cut the detective’s throat while he slept.

It would have been mercifully quick, Russell thought – a few split seconds of consciousness at most.

The perpetrator was not known, and, if the major’s demeanour was any guide, never would be. They were interrogating other inmates, of course, but there were no fingerprints on the razor blade.

When Russell asked to see the body the major seemed set to refuse, but nodded his acquiescence when Robier demanded the same. They were taken to what looked like an empty storeroom. Kuzorra’s body was laid out on a table, still dressed in his underwear, still wearing an apron of congealed blood. His eyes, still open, looked surprisingly at peace.

Russell suspected that much of Kuzorra’s will to live had died along with his wife Katrin, back in the early years of the war. His own death would probably have worried the old detective less than the fear that Geruschke might profit from it.

He won’t, Russell silently promised the corpse. He didn’t suppose he would ever connect the nightclub owner to this particular murder, but there had to be some way of bringing the bastard down.

He and Robier thanked the still nervous major and talked things over on the Wittenau platform. The Frenchman said he’d try and dig a little deeper into the circumstances surrounding the original arrest, but warned Russell not to expect too much. ‘I know what the line will be – Kuzorra was about to be handed over when he fell victim to some deranged fellow prisoner. Who could we find to prove otherwise?’

Robier got off at Wedding, leaving Russell to travel the last lap alone. As he walked across the Stettin Station concourse he noticed
two British military policemen – ‘Red Caps’ they were called – striding towards him.

‘John Russell?’ the shorter of the two asked him.

‘Yes.’

‘Come this way please?’ the man said, shepherding Russell with one arm towards a nearby archway. The other man was at his other shoulder, funnelling him towards the same objective.

Russell went where he was told. ‘What’s this about?’

They were through the archway now, in a part of the station that Russell remembered had once been used by taxis. Now it was empty, save for two men in civilian clothes and a scruffy-looking two-seater Mercedes with its trunk wide open.

‘He’s all yours,’ the shorter MP told the two men, one of whom, almost casually, slid a revolver out of his pocket.

Russell realised why the car’s trunk was open.

‘In’ the man said in English, confirming his guess. The MPs had vanished.

‘No,’ Russell said, playing for time. He could hear other people close by – surely someone else would come through the archway. Or were the MPs making sure that they didn’t?

The man brought the muzzle level with Russell’s head and seemed inclined to pull the trigger. One blast of a locomotive whistle would certainly drown out the noise.

‘All right,’ Russell agreed. The man smiled, and gestured him into the trunk. He was about thirty, Russell guessed, with a long scar on the back of his gun hand and what looked like ancient burns down one side of his face. A veteran of something nasty.

Russell took his time getting into the trunk, and was still arranging his body to fit the space when the lid slammed down, plunging him into darkness. A few more seconds and the car lurched into motion, running straight for a while and then taking what seemed a right turn, presumably onto Gartenstrasse. Maybe they’d be stopped at a military checkpoint, Russell thought – there were few enough cars on the road. If so, he’d make a racket that no one could ignore.

‘Johann’s buried there,’ Scarred Man said as they took another turn. They must be on the street which bisected Wedding cemetery.

‘He was an unlucky bastard,’ the other man said. It was the first Russell had heard his voice, which sounded unusually shrill.

He had no trouble hearing their conversation – the trunk’s inner wall was much thinner than the outer. He wondered if they realised he could hear them, and whether they would care.

They’d been silent for several minutes when Shrill Voice came out with a question: ‘When are you going to do it – when we get to the factory?’

Scarred Man’s laugh was derisive. ‘We’d have to carry the body, wouldn’t we? I’ll wait until Kyritz Wood.’

‘I see what you mean.’

So did Russell, who suddenly felt cold all over. And his bowels were feeling loose – it was Ypres all over again.

They were going to kill him. Why? It had to be Rudolf Geruschke, but why? All he’d done was take an interest in an old friend. He hadn’t even kicked up a real fuss. Not yet anyway, and certainly not with Geruschke. So why?