As Juretzka listened, life slowly returned to his face. Rath wouldn’t get another chance to speak to him alone like this. At Alex there would a stenographer, perhaps even a colleague present, and his ‘witness’ needed to be in shape.
‘Got it?’ he asked. ‘Nollendorfplatz, you remember?’
‘Yes.’ Juretzka’s voice was scratchy. He seemed not to have spoken in a long time.
‘Good. Then that’s what you say tomorrow at headquarters.’
‘And then?’
‘Then you’re done being an SA prisoner. We’ll let you go, and the boys in Papestrasse won’t notice a thing. Make sure you hole up somewhere no one knows you and where the SA can’t find you. It…’
They were interrupted by shouting in the corridor. Rath looked out. The SA officer was remonstrating angrily with a gaunt, well-dressed man, Marlow’s lawyer, Dr Kohn. Rath had seen him on one previous occasion, during a memorable appearance in court. One of the finest exponents of his craft, even he was powerless against the SA.
‘Prisoner Juretzka is in protective custody. He cannot be released.’
‘Then show me the arrest warrant!’ Kohn appeared to be sizing the man up for a duel.
‘According to a decree issued by the Reich President on 28th February article one hundred and fourteen is no longer valid…’
‘Stop!’ The lawyer waved dismissively. ‘I’ve heard it all before.’ His belligerence returned. ‘But you must grant me the opportunity to speak with my client.’
‘Out of the question,’ Rath interrupted.
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘CID,’ Rath showed his identification. ‘I’m satisfied that Prisoner Juretzka is currently unresponsive.’
‘Are you qualified to make such a pronouncement?’
‘Come and see Dr Fabritius yourself, if you don’t believe me, but leave Herr Juretzka in peace.’ The SA man broke into a grin. ‘If you wish to speak with your client, then be at police headquarters tomorrow at eleven. A Division. You can provide legal counsel there.’
Kohn appeared to wrestle with himself before nodding his agreement. ‘Where can I find this Dr Fabritius?’
‘I’ll take you to him.’
Before Rath set off with Marlow’s lawyer he threw a glance at the SA man, who responded with a conspiratorial wink. Rath grinned back. It couldn’t hurt to have the SA think he was on their side.
41
He looked at his watch before starting across the bridge. He had arrived at the train station in good time, but was moving less freely than usual and didn’t want to be late. Another ten minutes would surely be enough. He could already see the bare treetops on the other side of the River Havel.
Meifert had appeared relieved when he’d suggested the meeting point. No doubt the idea of receiving an acquaintance from his previous life, a comrade from the war, within his own four walls or even at school, was awkward. He had sounded uncertain on the telephone. The encounter with his past must have rattled him.
Stone statues of soldiers lined the Kaiser-Wilhelm Bridge, with all the uniforms of Prussia’s glorious past represented save the most recent. Their presence was summoned, not in carved stone, but in the flesh and blood of an ex-serviceman who stood by the balustrade on crutches, gaze lowered and hand outstretched. How many veterans were forced to demean themselves and beg? Not every ex-soldier had such a cushy number as Linus Meifert. Minus, as he was known in those days, and did the mathematician’s students call him the same thing?
Even the old city palace made a wretched impression. Once the seat of Prussia’s power and splendour, today it housed the employment exchange and a few offices of Potsdam Municipal Council. These were strange times.
Minus sat reading a newspaper towards the rear of the deserted pleasure garden. A gravel path ran parallel to the railway line that separated the grounds from the river. Meifert had gained weight and his hair was thinner, but there was no mistaking it was him.
Approaching his quarry, he tried to hide the pain that walking caused, but in the end it proved unnecessary. Meifert didn’t look up until he reached the bench. He put his paper to one side. ‘You?’ he said.
‘Who did you expect?’
He knew very well who Minus had been expecting. He took another step closer to the bench, while his left hand felt for the soft, smooth handle. The soldier’s bride. His ‘bride’ was no rifle, but something far more elegant, and equally deadly.
‘I thought you were dead.’ Meifert folded his newspaper precisely.
‘Do I look dead?’
‘I haven’t said a thing, and nor will I, but I can’t vouch for Roddeck.’
‘You don’t have to.’ Before Meifert could say anything else, he grabbed his head in a choke hold and stabbed. Meifert gave a final gasp before his body went limp. The whole thing lasted less than three seconds. He looked around before removing the blade. Still no one.
‘Who’s dead now?’ He let the corpse slump. ‘I’m sorry, Minus, but there’s no other way. For what it’s worth… I hated you even then.’
He resisted the impulse to spit on the corpse. Leave no trace, he thought, wiping down everything he had touched with a white handkerchief. He gazed on his work like a painter admiring his latest portrait. Minus sat on the park bench, looking as if he had nodded off while reading his paper. An idyllic image, when you ignored the blood that trickled from his left nostril and dripped red on the page.
It had taken days for anyone to notice the dead tramp at Nollendorfplatz, but this was Potsdam, not Berlin. Things would move faster here.
From the tower of the garrison church, the bells chimed the first notes of Üb immer Treu und Redlichkeit, before the fast train rattled across the line from Magdeburg and drowned out all other sounds.
42
It had worked. Weinert had delivered a major story in Der Tag, dripping with all kinds of jingoistic hullabaloo. Wosniak, the faithful orderly, killed because his lieutenant was threatening to reveal the truth about an army captain who had murdered two innocent civilians and one of his own soldiers. At first Weinert had refused to mention that this captain was Jewish. ‘What does that have to do with anything?’ he had asked.
‘It increases the chance of the case being reopened. My commissioner is a Nazi and a Jewish villain always plays well.’
So, now the article read:
Jewish Captain Engel, missing since March 1917, was previously thought killed in action. Now a witness present around the time of Heinrich Wosniak’s murder has emerged, who claims to have seen a man matching the dead captain’s description last month at Nollendorfplatz. Is someone out there determined to suppress the truth, if necessary by lethal force?
Weinert must have acquired a galley proof of Märzgefallene, or perhaps an advance copy, and he quoted freely from Roddeck’s miserable effort. Unfortunately it wasn’t just Der Tag that carried a story on the Wosniak case, but the Kreuzzeitung too. Rath found the paper on his desk as he brought Kirie in to Erika Voss.
‘The police commissioner wants to see you,’ she said, gesturing to the page that lay open. ‘And I think I know why.’
POLICE REFUSE TO PROVIDE ENDANGERED AUTHOR PROTECTION
DEATH THREATS WON’T PREVENT WARTIME REVELATIONS FROM COMING TO LIGHT – STAY TUNED FOR MORE
Esteemed readers of the Neue Preussische Zeitung,
The eagerly awaited serialisation of the novel Märzgefallene, which charts Lieutenant Achim von Roddeck’s wartime experiences on the Western Front, will begin, as previously announced, in these pages this Monday 13th March. This is due, in no small part, to the great courage of the author, who, in the face of the gravest of threats, remains steadfast in his desire to reveal uncomfortable truths from the Great War.