Ruins of War (19 page)

Mason walked off without a response. He headed for the exit and
called out, “Herr Oberinspektor Becker, if you’d come with me, please.” Then, “Wolski!”

Mason stopped on the cathedral steps. A large crowd had gathered and was still growing. The word had spread. MPs and German police kept them back fifty feet from the steps, but they didn’t need to see inside to know what had happened. He was sure the group of women who’d discovered the body had told anyone who’d listen about what they’d found lashed to the column.

Just as Becker and Wolski joined Mason, a woman yelled out, “The Amis care nothing for dead Germans! We are not safe in our streets!” Another cried out, “The German police are American puppets. We want justice!”

“We want justice!” A man repeated the shout.

In no time, the crowd took up the chant, the cries combining in a unified roar.

“They now have reality to add to the rumors,” Becker said. “I cannot blame them for their fears.”

Mason descended the steps, and Wolski and Becker followed him into the crowd. The spectators moved away to let them pass, while some deep in the crowd continued to yell:

“The murderer is an Ami soldier.”

“The Amis care nothing about us.”

A woman grabbed Becker’s arm. “Please, Herr Oberinspektor, we walk the streets in terror.”

Becker patted her hand as he continued walking. “We are doing everything we can.”

The three finally emerged from the crowd and walked in silence the two long blocks past piles of rubble and the skeletal shapes of buildings to Saint Michael’s Church. Remarkably, the church’s high, sturdy walls remained standing despite direct bomb hits on the roof. Inside, the immense barrel-vaulted ceiling was completely gone. An intricate web of scaffolding kept the walls from collapsing, though the
ornate Baroque altar still stood at the far end. A priest led a handful of worshippers in an afternoon service.

“Many of the statues and artwork, and the pulpit, were removed once they realized that Munich would inevitably be bombed,” Becker said.

“And the two saints’ skulls?”

“The reliquary and its contents are also in safekeeping. They were displayed in one of the side chapels. The first one on the right.”

“You seem to know this place,” Mason said.

“I should. I come here for mass every Sunday. This is my church, you see.”

Mason moved forward along the west wall to get a better look at the worshippers. Workmen stopped briefly to look at them before going back to the task of shoring up the walls.

“I don’t see much of a reason for the killer to come here,” Wolski said. “It’s not higher up the scale than a cathedral.” He looked around. “Plus, it’s too open. Too public.”

“The killer has managed to get around that problem so far,” Mason said. “This is as likely a place as any for his next display.”

The three reached a point where they could survey the twenty-plus worshippers. Except for a scattering of elderly men, they were all women.

“We’ll set up rotating teams to keep an eye on this place,” Mason said. “Maybe have routine checks at the other main Catholic churches, at least in the center of town.”

“And what are they going to be looking for?” Wolski said. “All we have is the vague description.”

“It’ll have to do for now.”

“So, we’re back to square one,” Wolski said.

Mason suddenly felt the weight of the case bearing down on him. He squatted and shifted chunks of stucco as he thought. “Albrecht seemed so perfect: the description, his concentration camp history, a thoracic surgeon, to boot. . . .”

“Yeah, except that he only ran from us because he didn’t want to be arrested as a war criminal.”

“Okay. But we’re not back to square one. We’ve learned a lot about the killer, and we’ve developed lines of investigation we can still pursue.” Mason juggled a piece of stucco as he thought. “What do we know about the killer?”

“He’s tall and broad shouldered, strong, smart, and a religious fanatic,” Wolski said.

“He’s surgically skilled,” Becker said. “He’s able to move around at night and more than likely uses a wagon to transport the bodies.”

“And he chooses doctors or nurses,” Mason said, then paused. “There must be thousands of doctors and nurses in this city, German and American. Why those four victims? What made him pick them?”

Wolski sighed to express his frustration. “There’s nothing physically that links them: hair color, eyes, ages, sex were all different. Could be that each one just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

Becker shook his head. “I concur with Investigator Collins. There is some attribute that we are overlooking.”

Mason stood and surveyed the church. Near the worshippers, an elderly woman helped a much older man approach the pews. The man struggled to walk, his body bent with age, and he leaned heavily on his cane. “We didn’t overlook one element; we just shelved it when we went after Albrecht: Dr. Hieber and the German nurse, Agneth, both limped.” He turned to Becker.

“Yes, of course,” Becker said. “Dr. Reinhardt’s widow—”

“The victim we found in the sewer?” Wolski asked.

Becker nodded. “She said that he limped due to a gunshot wound he’d received during the war.”

“Do you really think that’s it?” Wolski asked.

Mason dropped the piece of stucco and brushed the dust from his hands. “I’ve got an idea.” He headed for the exit. “Let’s finish up at the cathedral, and then we’re going back to headquarters.”

M
ason, Wolski, and Becker entered the main entrance to headquarters. The entire department seemed to be on high alert. A watch commander yelled out assignments to a squad of MPs. Multiple phones rang.

“That pack of brass by the stairs is here for my hide,” Mason said, pointing to a group of frowning high-ranking Third Army officers and military government officials who stood at the base of the stairs.

They watched a corporal descend the stairs and summon the officers to come up to one of the upper floors.

Mason, Wolski, and Becker waded through the MPs and headed for the stairs. Opposite the stairs, on a wooden bench, Laura sat talking to a flirtatious corporal. She saw Mason and stood as he approached.

Mason said to the corporal, “I bet you have something more important to do.”

The corporal saluted and scurried off. Wolski waved hello to Laura before heading up the stairs. Mason led Becker over and introduced him to Laura. Becker tipped his homburg hat and gave her a slight bow. He then followed Wolski up the stairs, leaving Mason and Laura alone.

“Sniffing for a scoop?” Mason said.

“I don’t need to sniff. The news about the cathedral killing is
already buzzing around town. I don’t see how anyone can keep this out of the press.”

Mason led her to a corner away from the commotion. “What are you doing here?” he asked.

“I’m glad to see you, too.”

“Things went from bad to worse in the last few hours, and there’s a bunch of brass upstairs waiting to rake me over the coals.”

“I heard about Albrecht. I’m really sorry. That must have been a blow. I came by to offer you a shoulder to cry on, but then news about the cathedral came in.”

“Laura, I haven’t got time.”

“I know, but these latest developments
do
deserve a sit-down, don’t you think? Come to the hotel tonight. I’ll have a drink waiting for you.”

“I have no idea when I’ll be able to get out of here.”

“I’ll wait up.” Laura started to leave, then turned. “Do I need to remind you about our deal? Be there.”

Mason felt a warm flush as he watched her go, while a number of the MPs craned their necks at her passing. He mounted the stairs and discovered Wolski and Becker waiting for him at the top.

“It was business,” Mason said.

Wolski gave him a knowing smile. “Sure . . . okay.”

The two detectives followed Mason up to the third floor. When they entered the operations room, Wolski asked, “So, what was the rush getting back here?”

“Give me a moment to check it out, then I want to bounce an idea off you two and see if I’m not out in left field on this.” He turned to Wolski. “In the meantime, I want you to get on the horn and see if you can reach one of Emily O’Brien’s nursing friends. We’ll talk to them at length later, but right now I want to know if Emily had some kind of limp.”

Wolski headed for the bank of phones. Mason immediately went to one particular pile of documents and leafed through them. It took a few minutes for him to find the affidavits and photographs he sought. He then laid them out on the table.

By that time, Wolski had returned from his phone call. “Emily O’Brien was in a skiing accident about two weeks ago and sprained a ligament in her left knee. Her friend said she’d just gotten off the crutches and still had a pretty pronounced limp.”

Mason nodded and referred to the documents laid out on the table. “These are affidavits and photographs from Ravensbrück. They mostly have to do with the experiments with bone transplants and testing sulfanilamide on intentional wounds. Close to a hundred inmates were used in those experiments, and the ones who survived were permanently disabled. Most all of the surgically caused injuries involved the victim’s leg.”

Becker turned to Mason with a look of realization. “The survivors had pronounced limps. So you’re saying that, though Albrecht is not our killer, it’s possible another doctor at Ravensbrück could be?”

“Or a prisoner doctor. When I talked to Marsden at the war crimes depository he mentioned that the camp experience could have driven the killer mad—”

“But Albrecht wasn’t insane,” Wolski said.

“Exactly. Marsden also said that the Nazi doctors were found to be sane, even ordinary. On the other hand, a large portion of the
inmates
displayed a whole variety of psychological problems. Maybe our killer was a prisoner doctor. I know it’s not much to go on. . . .”

Wolski shrugged. “It’s worth looking into.”

“We jump-start the other lines of investigation, while looking into concentration-camp prisoner doctors. We concentrate on Ravensbrück, but also look at Mauthausen and Buchenwald. That German prisoner doctor Herta Oberheuser mentioned—the Healing Angel, who assisted Albrecht—let’s step up inquiries on him.”

“Maybe we should go back at Oberheuser,” Wolski said.

Mason nodded. “You’re the devious one. Figure out a way to convince her to talk to us again.”

“In the meantime, we can look again at the few files we have for U.S. Medical Corps personnel and continue to check on citizen permits and night passes.”

“My men will resume a full search of the hospitals, doctor’s offices, and surgeons in the area, plus the liveries and stables,” Becker said. “Albrecht is probably not the only surgeon who hid his past.”

Wolski retrieved a sheet of paper from another stack of documents and laid it on the table for Mason and Becker to peruse. “While we were still investigating Albrecht, I was running down this list of prisoner doctors and nurses we obtained from the Mauthausen and Ravensbrück camp documents. I was able to track down one lady doctor in Berlin.”

“Then set up an interview.”

“She’s in the Russian zone. The red tape to petition her for an interview is a mile long. The others are scattered everywhere, so it’s going to take more than a few days to arrange interviews. Some are too traumatized to talk, some are still too ill . . . but we were able to contact a Czech prisoner doctor. He was an inmate at Mauthausen. A Dr. Blazek. The problem is, he’s in poor health, and the Czech authorities are balking. Unless it’s for the war crimes trials, they’re not interested in cooperating.”

“I’ll get Colonel Walton on it and see if he can convince JAG to come up with a story to get him up here.”

A corporal knocked on the door. “Sir, you’re to report to conference room six on the fourth floor.”

“The brass are done sharpening their knives,” Mason said.

Wolski and Becker wished him luck.

While Mason dreaded the lambasting he was sure to receive at the meeting, he still felt the flush of renewed energy. “Okay, let’s get back at it.”

•   •   •

T
he windowless conference room contained a long table, a handful of folding chairs, and a chalkboard. The ten high-ranking brass formed a horseshoe around one end of the table.

No chair waited for Mason. He snapped to attention, saluted, and took his place at the opposite end of the table. He knew some of the
men from Third Army and OMGB sitting around the table: General West and Major Bolton of OMGB civil affairs from the last meeting, Major Blaine, the commander of the 508th Military Police Battalion, and Laura’s “boyfriend,” General Jenkins, the commanding officer of all CID detachments in the American zone. Then, of course, Colonel Walton standing just behind the others.

Colonel Walton growled out introductions, then got to the point. “In light of the new developments, we’re here to decide whether to pull you off this case and bring in someone with more competence and experience. Someone who can get this case solved.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Is that all you have to say?”

“Permission to speak freely, Colonel?”

Walton’s face reddened. “That’s why we brought you in here!”

“Bringing in someone new is your gentlemen’s prerogative, but it would take time to get him up to speed. We’ve already spent hundreds of hours on this investigation. Someone new could slow things down, making it take longer to apprehend the killer.”

“You requested more manpower, and we gave it to you,” General West said. “You wanted liberty to access military personnel files, and we gave you that, too. We’ve given you what you asked for, and in return we expected results. Do you have any results, Mr. Collins, other than pursuing the wrong suspect?”

“Though it turned out that Dr. Albrecht was not the killer, our investigation has brought to light several promising lines of investigation.” Mason summarized their latest theories, lines of investigation, and findings in short order. “Any of those could lead to more information on the killer’s name and a more complete physical description. With that information in hand, we can orchestrate an all-out manhunt.”

“A full-blown manhunt could chase him out of town,” Jenkins of CID said. “There are also a half million people, with every bombed-out building providing a hole to crawl into. I wonder if you’ve thought all this out well enough to lead to success.”

“Sir, we’re hunting a meticulous killer who leaves no evidence, kills seemingly at random, and is cunning enough to avoid any eyewitnesses. That would challenge the biggest city police department or the FBI. I believe we are conducting as competent an investigation as any skilled police department. Plus, we have the advantage of military control, curfews, random identity checks, travel restrictions for all German citizens, and, in this instance, a cooperative and vigilant population. There is no doubt in my mind that we will find him.”

Mason did have plenty of doubts, but he wanted more than anything to stay on the case, and if it meant lying like the best politician, he was going to do it. He’d worry later about why. A voice within urged him to tell them to find some other poor sap to put up with the heartburn of frustration and crushing self-doubt with each new victim. He knew some chain killers were never caught; he knew some just stopped after the body count reached twenty or thirty. That sometimes the failed hunt resulted, for the detectives, in ruined careers or black marks on their records, not to mention living with remorse and guilt the rest of their lives.

“A convincing speech, Mr. Collins,” General West said. “The main problem is—when? I’m starting to get questions from Eisenhower’s general staff, even the muckety-mucks in Washington, for chrissake. I can keep them at bay in the short term, but meanwhile the locals are already in a frenzy, and it’s about to get worse. This whole situation is going to make governing difficult. Just when we’re trying to form civilian government entities and gain cooperation from the populace, they’re accusing us of injustice and negligence. The word on the street is we’re heartless bastards who don’t care that the German population are getting butchered. They’ll turn more to criminal elements and underground Nazi revivalist groups.”

Major Bolton, the civil affairs director, said, “Maybe the fact that an American nurse was the latest victim will help calm things down.”

“Major Bolton is right,” another uniformed OMGB official said. “This development could help civilian relations. But if we replace Mr.
Collins now, we’ll appear to have suddenly thrown everything we’ve got into this investigation now that an American nurse is the victim. We’ll be proving their point: that we didn’t really care until it was one of our own.”

Mason felt disgusted. These two gutless pricks only saw the dead girl as a political pawn. He felt a renewed respect for Colonel Walton when the colonel said, “This conversation is degrading to the poor woman who suffered and died. I will not stand by and see her corpse used as a public relations tool.”

“Now, see here,” Major Bolton said, “I was simply stating a fact—”

“That’s enough, gentlemen,” General West said. “Everyone here is stunned and saddened by Lieutenant Emily O’Brien’s death, and no one means disrespect to her memory. But perception is important. We can’t ignore that any radical change in this investigation could inflame German misconceptions. If we intend to build a democratic Germany then we need to lead by example.” He signaled for General Jenkins to continue the sentencing.

“Mr. Collins, you are to remain as the lead investigator, but I’m giving you one week to solve this,” Jenkins said. “If you haven’t done so, or damn close to it, I’m pulling you out. Are we clear?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I want daily reports. I want to see forward momentum. If there is anything that you need, within reason, run it through Colonel Walton. He will immediately forward it on to me. Get it done.”