‘My apologies, Herr General. I was led to believe by Major Ploetz that I should conduct these interviews in strict order of seniority, so as not to keep anyone important – such as yourself – hanging around.’
Hildebrandt shrugged. ‘I see. My apologies, Commissar.’
I shrugged back.
‘However, I still fail to see why senior ranks should be questioned at all. In my opinion my word should be good enough.’
‘And what word is that, sir?’
‘That I had nothing at all to do with this man’s death, of course.’
‘I don’t doubt it, sir. However, it is not the point of this interview to find out if you murdered Captain Kuttner. The immediate purpose of this inquiry is to build a detailed picture of the man’s last few hours. And having done so, to identify some genuine suspects. You do see the difference.’
‘Of course. Do you take me for an idiot?’
I didn’t answer that. ‘You were with us all, in the library, to listen to the Leader’s speech, were you not?’
‘Naturally.’
‘And then to hear Heydrich’s speech.’
Hildebrandt nodded, impatiently. He took a last puff of his cigarette and then extinguished it in a heavy glass ashtray that lay on the table between us.
‘Do you remember Captain Kuttner bringing in some champagne after that?’
‘Yes.’
‘Did you stay celebrating very long?’
‘Yes. I confess I drank rather too much, I think. Like everyone else I have a bit of a headache this morning.’
‘Yes sir. Only I have a bigger one. I have to solve this murder. That won’t be easy. You do see that, don’t you? At some stage it’s possible I’m going to have to accuse a brother officer of killing Kuttner. Perhaps even a senior officer. I think you might try to be a little more understanding of my position, sir.’
‘Don’t tell me my duty, Commissar Gunther.’
‘With the scary badge in your lapel? I wouldn’t dream of it, sir.’
Hildebrandt glanced down at his gold Party badge and smiled. ‘You mean this, don’t you? I’ve heard that’s what some people call it. Although I can’t imagine why anyone would be scared of this.’
‘It means that you joined the Party very early on, doesn’t it?’
‘Yes. In my case it was 1922. The following year I took part in the Munich putsch. I was right behind the Leader as we left the beer hall.’
‘You must have been very young, sir.’
‘I was twenty-six.’
‘If you don’t mind me asking, what happened to you, sir? After the putsch failed.’
His eyes misted over for a moment before he answered.
‘Things were difficult for a while. Very difficult. I don’t mind telling you. Apart from the harassment I received at the hands of the police, I was short of money and I had little choice but to go and work abroad.’
He seemed relieved to be talking about something that was nothing to do with Kuttner; relaxed even, which, momentarily, was my intention.
‘Where did you go?’
‘America. There I tried my hand at farming for a while. But after that failed I became a bookseller, in New York.’
‘That’s quite a switch, sir. Did you fail at being a bookseller, too?’
Hildebrandt frowned.
‘Or did you come back to Germany for another reason, sir?’
‘I came back because of the wonderful things that were happening in Germany. Because of the Leader. That was 1930.’
‘And you joined the SS when, may I ask?’
‘1931. That is when I first met Heydrich. But I don’t see what any of this has to do with the death of Captain Kuttner.’
‘I’m coming to that, if you’ll bear with me. I suppose you must have a high regard for the standards of the SS, having joined as early as 1931.’
‘Yes, I do. Of course I do. What kind of a question is that?’
‘Do you suppose that Captain Kuttner lived up to those standards?’
‘I’m sure he did.’
‘Are you sure he did, or do you suppose he did?’
‘What are you driving at, Gunther?’
‘If I told you that Captain Kuttner was a practising homosexual, what would your reaction be?’
‘Nonsense. General Heydrich would never have tolerated such a thing. I’ve known him long enough to be quite sure of that.’
‘What if General Heydrich didn’t know about it?’
‘There are no secrets from Heydrich,’ said Hildebrandt. ‘You should be aware of that. And if you’re not, you soon will be. What he doesn’t know, probably isn’t worth knowing.’
‘Would it surprise you if I told you that there are some things even Heydrich doesn’t know?’
‘Nonsense,’ he repeated. ‘This whole line of questioning is nonsense, Commissar. Kuttner was artistic, at worst. But we don’t condemn a man for enjoying good music and appreciating good paintings.’
‘With respect, I don’t think it is nonsense, sir. Kuttner was living with a man in Berlin. A man with convictions for male prostitution. A man who used to frequent a notorious homosexual bar called the Burger Casino, dressed in a schoolboy sailor-suit, and who used to take his clients to a nearby pier on the river in order to have sex with them.’
‘Rubbish. I just don’t believe it. And I think it very poor taste on your part to malign a fellow officer who is no longer in a position to defend himself from that kind of defamation.’
‘Let us assume for one minute that I’m right about this.’
‘Why?’
‘Please, sir. Indulge me for a moment.’
‘Very well.’
‘What would your opinion be of a man like that?’
‘My opinion?’
‘Yes, sir. What do you think of an SS captain who shares his bed with a male prostitute?’
Hildebrandt’s smooth face darkened. The lips tightened and the jaw turned pugnacious.
‘I mean, sir, it’s said it was Ernst Röhm’s homosexuality that was one of the reasons the Party turned on him, why he was executed.’
‘That’s probably true,’ admitted Hildebrandt. ‘Röhm was a degenerate. As were some of the others. Edmund Heines. Klausener. Schneidhuber. Schragmüller. They were loathsome specimens and richly deserved their fate.’
‘Of course they did.’
I wasn’t sure they had deserved their fate, not all of them. Erich Klausener had been the leader of the police department at the Prussian interior ministry in Berlin and not a bad fellow at all. But I wasn’t there to debate with Hildebrandt.
‘Do you think that sort of thing should be tolerated in the SS?’
‘Of course it shouldn’t. And it isn’t tolerated. Never has been.’
‘Do you think it brings dishonour to the SS? Is that why?’
‘Certainly it brings dishonour to the SS, Commissar Gunther. What a fucking question. It’s obvious. If the man was, as you say, homosexual – although I still don’t believe Kuttner was – then I’d go further than that. Such a man should be put in front of a firing squad. Like Röhm and those other queers. It’s the pansies and the Jews who almost destroyed Germany during the Weimar Republic.’
‘Oh, surely,’ I said.
‘Who continue to threaten the moral fibre of our country. We are cultivating increasingly healthy blood for Germany and it must be kept pure. As the father of three children myself, two of them boys, I say it quite emphatically. If such a man was under my command I should not hesitate to denounce him to the Gestapo. Not for a minute. No matter how serious the consequences.’
‘Well, of course,’ I said, ‘I know it’s illegal under paragraphs 174 and 175 of the Criminal Code. But I thought that homosexuals could only be sent to prison for up to ten years. So, let me get this straight. There are extra punishments that apply to such people in the SS, is that right? Like being shot, as you say. I assume you would know, sir.’