them? — and for good measure, Braun, Tamshik, and Hermannsohn; Weigland, he knew, was not clever enough to merit inclusion. At the bottom of the page, he wrote the words “Rosa” and “Wouters.” He also jotted down dates next to each of the men’s names, indicating when they might have become involved, or at least when they had shown some connection to Rosa and Wouters. How far back that went was impossible to say.
The first three had conspired to set Wouters loose on Berlin starting in June of last year, but to what end? To get rid of Rosa without a trace of political involvement, by having it appear that she was just one more victim of Wouters’s madness? Why not simply do the killings themselves, if it was all a ploy? Why dredge up Wouters? If Urlicher, Oster, and Manstein had in fact been working in conjunction with any of the last three on the list, why was the Polpo holding on to her body? Why set up Wouters, unleash him, and then keep Rosa hidden? Jogiches’s “obvious” answer made sense only in hindsight. Worse, Hoffner had nothing to say about the three names in the middle. The design of the Rosenthaler station and the missing engineer-Herr Tben/Sazonov-pointed to the construction company of Ganz-Neurath, but Berlin money linked to a Munich regiment not only seemed a stretch, it was completely out of character: there were no heights steep enough from which a Prussian could look down his nose at a Bavarian. The timing there was also troubling: when had Herr Tben/Sazonov made his alterations so as to give Wouters his ideal surroundings?
The only recourse Hoffner had was to track down Oster and Manstein, which only confirmed everything Jogiches had been saying: Munich.
Hoffner reached over to telephone the duty desk for a train schedule and saw little Franz standing in the doorway. It was unclear how long the boy had been there. “Something I can do for you, Franz?”
The boy was oddly hesitant. “A note’s come in for you, Herr
“Well, give it here.” Franz produced the small, familiar-looking envelope. “Same man with the beard?” Hoffner sliced open the top as Franz nodded.
Odd, thought Hoffner. Jogiches was hardly a man to repeat himself. “Anything on Herr Kvatsch?” He pulled out the card. He had given up hope at this point: Kvatsch was playing it far better than he had anticipated. Still, it was good to ask; keep the boy on his toes.
“A few more times with Herr
Groener, thought Hoffner. More dirty work for Jogiches. He made a mental note to sit down with the detective sergeant. Over a whiskey. It was the only substance he could think of strong enough to counteract the stench.
The card was the same quality as before, except this time Jogiches had chosen a typewriter. There was an address, the word “Urgent,” and the signature “K.”
Hoffner looked up. Franz was peering across at him with surprising interest. “Yes?” said Hoffner.
For just a moment the boy looked as if he had been caught out. “Well. .” he said, “I’ve been following Herr Kvatsch around for you, Herr
Hoffner understood. He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a few pfennigs. He placed the coins on the far side of the desk and said, “Never be afraid to ask for what you’re owed, Franz.”
The boy walked over and took the money. “Yes, Herr
Hoffner knew there was no point in keeping after Kvatsch now. Even so, he said, “Ten pfennigs a week for more information, all right?”
This seemed fair. Franz nodded. He pocketed his wages and headed out the door.
Forty-five minutes later, Hoffner stepped out of a cab and into the overwhelming stench of hacked flesh. Fichte was still nowhere to be found, but the note had been clear: urgent. Hoffner would manage Fichte later.
The address from Jogiches was out in the slaughter-yard district, about as far east as one could go: killing of this kind was too much even for the folks in Prenzlauer Berg; they wanted it out of their backyards, as well. The whole area was little more than a series of slick cobblestone alleys and dirty gray walls topped by barbed wire, although the cows and hogs and whatnot were hardly there long enough to merit the precaution. Someone had once joked that the wires had been set in place to keep the rest of Berlin from sneaking up and stealing a few pieces of meat. Given the state of things now, no one was laughing.
Oddly enough, it was the one place in town that reminded Hoffner of his father’s Berlin, where the smell of manure outpaced the stink of automobile petrol, and where the lazy hoof-fall of an overworked nag replaced the coiled snap of a tram wire from above. This was a world of wagons and pushcarts, the red and yellow spokes of the slaughterhouse two-wheelers as common a sight as a Daimler in the Westend. No amount of snow could cover the grit that was here; a constant plume of locomotive smoke rose from the Belt Line Railway yards-livestock rolling in from East Prussia and Pomerania and Brandenburg-soaking the flakes in soot before they had a chance to make it to the ground. It hardly mattered, though: there was nothing to hide out here. It was killing, pure and simple.
Hoffner found the building, a worn sign for MECK UND SONNE above the door. The shortages had forced some of the smaller houses to consolidate, a nice word for shutting down the works and letting go fifty men. The surrounding buildings had fallen victim, as well. Hard to imagine something more depressing than a row of slaughterhouses, but here it was, a row of abandoned ones.
The lock on the door had been jimmied. Hoffner wondered if Jogiches had recognized the irony in his choice of lodging; then again, maybe a man as good as dead could tempt the fates?
Hoffner stepped inside and was struck at once by the taste of raw meat in the air. The building was ice cold, but the chill had done nothing to minimize the rancid remnants of Herr Meck’s once thriving business. Hoffner realized he was standing inside an enormous hall, brick wall rising to a ceiling some twenty meters above. A grim light poured in from a series of windows that stretched around the uppermost reaches of the walls, but it did little more than cast odd shadows: at ground level, the space was a collection of amorphous shapes in black and gray. One of them began to move toward him, and Hoffner stepped over to meet it. “Herr Jogiches,” he said. The next thing he knew, Hoffner was feeling the ripping pain of a well-placed boot to his ribs.
He doubled over instantly, his nausea only slightly more acute than his surprise. Hoffner had no time to react to either as a second blow landed on the back of his neck, a gloved hand from somewhere behind making its presence known. Hoffner’s face slammed to the floor, the echo of his own stifled breath ringing in the hall. He tried to reach for his gun, but he had never been terribly good at any of this. The blows came more rapidly now, fists and boots with excruciating precision. Hoffner was doing all he could to curl into himself, but it was all too vicious and determined to permit any kind of retreat. A first taste of blood dripped to his lips as a thick set of fingers ripped into his hair and jerked his head up. Hoffner choked out a cough, only to smell the breath of an unwashed mouth a few centimeters from him.
“No more questions,” whispered the voice. “No more late-night meetings. No more visits to the file rooms at the GS. You understand? Step off, Herr Inspector.”
Hoffner did everything he could to answer: he twitched his head once.
“Good.” The man held him there for several more seconds before releasing. Hoffner’s head fell to the cobblestone with a compressed smack even as the smell of foul breath continued to linger over him. The man was hovering. Hoffner tried to open his eyes, but there was no point.
“No more,” said the voice.
There was a last kick to his kidneys, but Hoffner was too far gone to feel it. He heard the sound of receding steps, sensed a sudden shock of light, but he was out cold by the time the door slammed shut.
Half an hour later, his eyes opened.
The pain was a constant throbbing, though the stiffness in his chest was far more of a problem. He tried not to breathe too deeply: every intake was like a cracking of bone. Swallowing, too, had become impossible, no saliva to be had. It was several minutes before he found the strength to push himself up to his knees, and, at no better than a crawl, he made his way over to the near wall and began to prop himself up. At least they had left him his legs. Hunched over and holding to the wall, Hoffner forced himself to the door and out into the light.
The sudden brightness brought his hand up to his face, the reflex a mistake, and his entire back arched in pain. Stifling a groan, Hoffner spotted a series of water taps sticking out from the wall of the building, and making his way over, tried his luck with the first in line: miraculously, a stream of cold water began to flow. He gingerly placed his lips under the tap and drank. Almost at once the ache in his head lifted; it was clear that the real
