Children of Wrath (32 page)

“Yes. How could I not know the Herr Sergeant-Detektiv.” Von Hessler reached out a hand while adjusting his eye patch. “The sergeant’s on more magazine covers than Marlene Dietrich. Besides, we’ve met on several occasions. Congratulations on your success, Kraus. The whole city breathes a sigh of relief.”

“Thanks. Now we’ve got to try and untangle some of the knotted strands in a very mixed-up mind.”

“A futile endeavor.” The doctor guffawed as if Willi’d just said the most preposterous thing ever. “You’ll never understand such a mind. Or any mind for that matter. That’s what I’ve been trying to get across to your cousin all this while. And what my experiments once and for all will prove to the world. Exploring the past is pointless. Reformation of the human mind is possible only through reconditioning. We must discuss it further, gentlemen, but in the meantime, please enjoy this beautiful afternoon.”

As they watched von Hessler leap into his sleek, black SSK and race off, Kurt said, “Sometimes I think he’s the maddest one of all. How do you know him, Willi?”

“He’s a childhood friend of my old war buddy Fritz. You?”

“We went to medical school together. He was studying to be a psychoanalyst—until he jumped ship. Just happened to be driving past when he saw me out here so he stopped to try and convert me to his new religion.” Kunt took off his glasses and wiped them clean. “Remember that Yiddish word Nana used whenever we bothered her?”

“Nudnik,”
Willi replied.

Kurt returned the glasses to his nose. “That’s him. A Behaviorist
nudnik.
”

They’d opted for a walk through the park, so Willi could explain details of the
Kinderfresser
case left out by the newspapers, as well as his experience up close in the jail cell. He wanted Kurt to be as well armed as possible for his interview with Magda. Entering the enormous old Tiergarten, though, his cousin kept frowning and scratching his head, as if he found what he was hearing too crazy even for a psychiatrist to believe.

They’d strolled the famous Siegesallee toward the Victory Column in the Platz der Republik. This leafy walk was lined on both sides with a historical chronology of Prussian royalty—nearly one hundred towering figures in Carrara marble commissioned by Kaiser Wilhelm II in the late 1890s to celebrate his thirty-sixth birthday. A grand pedestrian boulevard; nowadays it was fashionable for Berliners to lampoon it as the Avenue of Puppets, symbol in stone of the grandiose delusions that had tripped Germany into the trenches of apocalypse. But for Willi its very monumentalism rekindled memories of something else too that had reigned before the Great War—the rock-hard optimism. How firmly in those days everyone believed humanity was on a march of progress, that tomorrow would always be better than today. Like the very solidness of the ground they stood on, no one conceived otherwise. Until 1914.

Then how hollow, how distant such faith felt.

Proceeding down this timeline of overthrown hegemony, his cousin began to speculate on the disorders of the mind.

“When I was in medical school,” Kurt said as they passed the statue of Albert the Bear, who died in 1170, “they were still calling everyone
minderwertig
—mentally deficient. Now, slowly,” he added as they approached the dingy white figures of Dukes Otto I and II, “we’re better able to distinguish characteristics of what we call psychopathic personalities. Depressive. Fanatic. Explosive. Compassionless.” Beyond the two shining-faced Johannes, they moved toward Waldemar the Great. “Some believe these pathologies are wholly environmental in origin. Others that they’re hereditary. Or like myself, probably a combination of environment entwined with inborn personality.”

Nearing the multiple pairs of Ludwigs, Kurt said that, even without meeting her, Magda appeared to display a schizoid personality cluster that included a number of paranoid and psychopathic types. Detachment. Alienation. Defensive episodes of suspicion. Rage. “When she feels herself breaking into fragmented pieces, she switches into a dissociated state, trying to put herself back together, so to speak.”

Past all the Friedrichs and the Joachims, the Wilhelms and the Friedrich Wilhelms, they reached the sprawling Plaza of the Republic. Ahead, the giant Victory Column, celebrating Prussia’s conquest over France in 1871, and ornate memorials to the men who made it possible: Bismarck and Moltke. Off to the right, the mammoth granite Reichstag, the red, black, and gold flag of the republic flapping over its great glass dome.

Kurt stopped and turned to Willi. “But Lord Almighty, Willi”—he shook his head and took off his glasses, wiping them incredulously—“all psychoanalysis aside—these girls sound like witches from a medieval fairy tale, roaming the forest in search of children to eat. Locking them in an underground lair, savoring them one at a time.”

“Worse, Kurt. What they had down there was a death factory. And their victims had to do the dirty work. It was all systematized. Rationalized. Thought they were doing a big favor to the world, ridding it of useless mouths.”

*   *   *

When the Charleston wound down, Willi saw Ava and Gunther collapse back into their chairs, panting. It reminded him of Kurt after he’d finished interviewing Magda that afternoon: stumbling into Willi’s office, white with exhaustion. He’d taken off his glasses and didn’t even bother putting them back on. Having spent over three hours in the cell alone with her, he said Magda seemed to confirm every theory of mental illness there was—simultaneously. Both environmental and biological schools of thought as well as the Adlerian and Freudian approaches to criminal behavior. She had every type of inferiority complex imaginable.

“I’ve never seen a more disjointed personality. You know what she said:

“‘It makes me feel good to hold them when they’re dead. Not so alone. But I’ll let you in on a little secret, mister—just ’cause you’re so nice. That lady under Bone Alley’s not really me. Oh, it’s me, but when I was a teenager. See, I had a baby then, but I lost it for all eternity. Papa wouldn’t let it get baptized before he killed it. And now I have to protect all the dear ones—inside me. ’Cause Daddy didn’t just kill my baby, he cooked it for dinner and made me eat it.’”

What was truth and what was delusion, Kurt said, he had no way of knowing.

Willi didn’t have to wonder. Except the idea that it wasn’t her down there, the rest was probably no delusion.

“What about Ilse?” he asked Kurt anxiously.

His cousin could only shrug. Unfortunately, he said, the interview with Magda ended because she’d suffered a comprehensive break with reality. As if to avoid what she perceived as certain imminent destruction, she’d retreated into a psychotic womb and could now be found cuddled in the corner, sucking her thumb. How long it would last, Kurt said, was impossible to predict. In some cases people never came out.

Willi suppressed the urge to go down there and smack her out of it.

Magda’d given up nothing about her sweet little sister.

The ice-cream lady.

*   *   *

High above Berlin the band played on. As they took another round on the dance floor, Vicki pressed her cheek against Willi’s.

“Forgive me, darling, for not trusting you more,” she whispered in his ear. “And for giving you such a hard time. I’m terribly ashamed. And so proud of you now. We all are. The boys especially.”

Deep within, Willi felt the strangest mixture of pride and guilt.

Kommissar Horthstaler was at the podium suddenly, halting the band, hushing everyone. Saying he had an announcement. It was clear he also had a few glasses under his belt.

“I realize that a lot of what’s been broadcasting from the radio tower over our heads hasn’t been very good news lately.” He chuckled at his own cleverness, having come up with that association. “Especially for those of the Hebraic persuasion.”

Silence deadened the room.

What shockingly poor taste, here of all places, to refer to the outbreak of violence the other day, the likes of which the city had never seen since … well, ever.

It had been a bloody season altogether on the streets of Berlin, but Thursday things had gone from bad to worse. Uniformed gangs of brownshirts descended on busy Leipziger Strasse in the middle of the day and began beating up anyone they thought looked Jewish—even women—painting swastikas and large-nosed caricatures on Jewish-owned shops, breaking windows on Jewish-owned department stores. Nearly fifty people had been injured, one of whom died. Never before had Jews been targeted in the heart of the capital, and it sent shock waves through the whole of Germany’s Jewish population. Now, people could only hope that after tomorrow’s election the simmering cauldron would just settle down. Even the anarchy of 1919 seemed preferable to the brutality of 1930.

“But”—Horthstaler put out his hands to quiet his listeners, although a mouse could have been heard—“tonight we have excellent news. And I am so delighted to be able to welcome the deputy president of the Berlin police to personally convey it.”

Willi’s throat clenched when he saw the kind, dark eyes of Dr. Weiss behind their wire glasses. The deputy president was up to his ears combating not only political mayhem but his personal nemesis. Three times he’d taken Joseph Goebbels to court for slander
,
and three times won against him. But nothing stopped the Nazi propogandist. He’d latched onto Weiss like a dog that wouldn’t let go, continuously ratcheting up his attacks, his newspaper showing cartoons of “Isidore” stuffing his pockets with money, Isidore in cahoots with the Reds, Isidore hanging from a Nazi noose. For Weiss to have taken time out to honor Willi tonight was truly special. But the toll these last months had taken on him was evident. He looked completely haggard.

“I had the privilege of meeting Willi Kraus when he was still fresh out of Police Academy. We worked together on the Rathenau assassination case, and I thought then that he was as smart, as even-tempered, as dogged a detective as I’d ever met. Tonight, I’ve changed my mind. I think he’s even smarter and a more dogged detective than I’ve ever met.” A wave of laughter traveled the room. “And so, on behalf of the Department of Criminal Police, I’m proud to announce his promotion from the position of Sergeant-Detektiv to full Inspektor, with all the accompanying benefits and responsibilities. I have no doubt he will continue to make all Berlin proud.”

Willi was so taken by surprise he had to fight back tears.

Vicki threw her arms around him. The boys ran up and gave him hugs. Then before he knew it, they were rolling out a giant birthday cake ringed with candles. As he stood before it staring at the swaying circles of flame, he couldn’t suppress all the thoughts dancing through his brain.

He’d come a long way since he’d grown up on those streets down there. Lost his father and had to care for his little sister while their mother worked. Was Greta happy in the Holy Land, milking cows? He’d survived three years on the front lines of the largest conflict in human history. Married the most wonderful woman on earth. Had two of the greatest kids in the world. What was turning out to be a stellar career.

There was so much to be grateful for.

And he was.

Yet so many questions still nagged him about this supposedly shut case.

Why had Ilse only gone for boys? Was there something sexual about it? Nothing in the case indicated it. And what the hell was the Tower Labs they’d found reference to when they’d uncovered Axel’s apartment?

Magda certainly wasn’t telling.

She remained in catatonic regression, transferred to the Berlin-Buch Psychiatric Hospital, Ward 6, for the criminally insane—where even if she ever saw trial, she was likely to remain for the rest of her life. Perhaps, he told himself, he’d have to accept never knowing all the answers to his questions.

The crowd gathered near, awaiting him. He saw his wife, his children, all the faces from his past and present, staring together, eyes aglow. It had been a hard-won battle, he had to admit. One of the hardest. He deserved a pat on the back. So filling his lungs until they could take no more, he blew as hard as he could, aiming in circles at each of the thirty-five candles.

He got them all too. Almost.

One wouldn’t go out.

Even as all his well-wishers crowded around shaking his hand, offering congratulations, hugs, kisses, a single question indeed burned brighter than the others.

If Ilse had captured them …

And Magda had turned them into product …

And Axel had sold them …

Who actually killed all those children?

Dr. Hoffnung determined the cause of death was carbon monoxide poisoning. Yet there was no means whatsoever for gassing that many children in the underground lair. They’d checked. Every goddamned inch of the place.

Twenty-seven

The next morning, Sunday, September 14, trucks with loudspeakers rumbled down Beckmann Strasse trumpeting martial music, urging people to vote. Vicki and Willi pulled themselves from bed finally, remembering it was Election Day. Time to get up and dress. When she slipped into her new tweed suit, though, not only her knees but half her calves disappeared. Willi hadn’t seen her in such a long skirt since they’d gotten married.

“You hate it, don’t you?” she asked ruefully.

What could he say? Women hadn’t been allowed to show so much as a shinbone until after the war, when among the most ubiquitous signs of modernity was the hemlines’ rise. Now dress lengths were plummeting again. It seemed not only a contradiction of progress but a damned shame, considering how much he liked legs, Vicki’s especially.

“Well, er—” He took her in his arms and distracted her with a kiss. “I sure don’t hate you in it.”

Having already eaten, Erich and Stefan were downstairs playing with Heinz in the courtyard. Irmgard was on the terrace hanging laundry, no doubt wishing she had Vicki’s electric dryer. “Yes, yes, we voted early,” she said with a shade of disapproval at their tardiness. “Go on. I’ll keep an eye out.” She shooed them with a flicking wrist. Lately she’d been rather dour, they noted.

Stepping from the building, they crossed Beckmann Strasse hand in hand, Vicki’s dark bangs bouncing in the breeze. Willi was so happy being back in her good graces he could have skipped down the block. The sun was shining, clouds sailing across a bright blue sky. A yellow streetcar clanged by, number 89. As he took a deep breath, the world felt in order. He’d grown up less than three blocks from here. His parents used to vote at the same school they were heading for now. Vicki’d grown up only a few blocks farther west. These clean, tree-lined streets were their streets. These stores, small and tidy, the ones they’d always shopped in. These streetcars, lines they’d ridden all their lives. And as uncertain as the times had become, strolling on a Sunday through this handsome neighborhood filled them with pride. Especially on Election Day.