‘It’s a straightforward question, Gottfried. Is he honest?’
‘As far as it goes these days.’
‘In my book it goes all the way to the altar.’
‘There’s a war on. So maybe not as far as that.’
‘Look, Gottfried. We’re both in the shit-house age-group. And I certainly don’t want to cause any trouble for you and Sergeant Macher. But I need to know if our dead Czecho was carrying more than just the fifty marks we found on him.’
All of the lavatories at the Alex had three numbers on the door, of which two were always ‘00’; and the phrase ‘shit-house age-group’ was used to indicate anyone born before 1900 and therefore over the age of forty.
‘If you say you’re in the shit-house then I believe you,’ said Lehnhoff. ‘But from what I’ve heard around the factory you’re here not because you’re ready for your pension, but because you’ve got vitamin B.’
He meant that I had connections with senior Nazis who would keep me better nourished than other men.
‘With Heydrich,’ he added.
‘Who told you that?’
‘Does it matter? That’s the splash on the men’s porcelain.’
‘The Czecho’s watch was gone. It wasn’t at his apartment when we searched it, and there wasn’t a pawn ticket. But I really don’t care about that. I’m guessing he had at least five Alberts on him when he was first found in the park. There were only fifty on him by the time I made his acquaintance. I need to know if I’m right about that. You don’t have to say anything. Just nod or shake your head and we’ll say no more about it.’
Lehnhoff’s head remained still. Then he grinned. ‘I can’t help you. I just don’t know. But even if I did, what makes you think I’d tell you?’
I stood up and came around the desk. ‘I don’t like threatening other men with my vitamin B. I much prefer it if people pay attention to my natural authority. Me being a Commissar’n all.’
‘That won’t work either. Sir.’
Lehnhoff was still grinning as he left my office.
I picked up my coat and followed him out onto the landing. Cool air was drifting up the enormous stairwell. Down on the ground floor there were raised voices, but that was normal in the Alex. Even at the best of times the place was like a zoo full of all kinds of wild and noisy animals. But up on the third floor things were quieter. The blackout curtains were drawn and most of the lights were off. At the other end of the landing was an abandoned floor polisher. It looked a lot like me. Then the raised voices on the ground floor became a little more urgent and someone cried out with pain. Someone was working overtime and it gave me an idea.
‘Hey Gottfried,’ I said, catching him up. ‘You know what they used to say about this place?’
Lehnhoff stopped at the top of the stairs and looked at me with open contempt. ‘What’s that?’
‘Be careful on the stairs.’
I hit him in the stomach, hard enough to bend him in two and fold him over the balustrade so that he could empty his fat gut into the stairwell. If it was my lucky day some Nazi would slip on Lehnhoff’s soup and break his collarbone. Holding him by the collar, I pushed him down so that his feet tipped off the shiny floor and then slammed my forearm across one of his kidneys. He yelled out with the pain of it but that was fine because nobody ever paid much attention to the sound of pain at the Alex. It was one more background noise, like the sound of a typewriter or a telephone ringing in an empty room. I could have slugged Lehnhoff all night until he was groaning for his pastor and it would have been just another night at police headquarters to anyone’s ears.
‘Now,’ I said, bending close to Lehnhoff’s waxy ear. ‘Do I get an answer to my question or would you like to go downstairs? Three flights at a time?’
‘Yes, yes, yes. Okay. God. Please.’ His subsequent answers sounded exactly like a cry for help. ‘We took a hundred marks off him. Me and Macher. Sixty for me and forty for him. Please.’
‘In twenties?’
‘Yes. Yes. Twenties. Yes. Pull me up, for God’s sake.’
I pulled him back off the balustrade and dumped him on the linoleum, where he lay curled and twitching and whimpering as if his mother had just delivered him onto the Alex floor. He gasped:
‘What the hell—’
‘Hmm? What’s that?’
‘What the hell difference does it make to you, anyway? A hundred fucking marks.’
‘It’s not the money. I don’t care about that. It’s just that I didn’t have the time or even the inclination to wait until you were ready to answer my question. You know something? I think I’ve been affected deeply by working in an environment where, within the context of a police interrogation, violence is now endemic.’
‘I’ll get you for this, Gunther. I’ll make a fucking complaint. Just see if I don’t.’
‘Hmm. I wouldn’t rush into that, if I were you. Remember. I’ve got vitamin B, Gottfried.’ I twisted the hair on his scalp so that I could tap the back of his skull against the balustrade. ‘I can see in the dark. And I can hear everything you say from a hundred miles away.’
