For a second Jake just stared at Gunther, the sharp eyes no longer cloudy, now cleared by caffeine. “Me?” he said, little more than a surprised intake of air.
“A man who finds a body, who investigates a murder. Do you mean this hasn’t occurred to you? Who else? A soldier, for raiding the Zeiss works? Perhaps. The lady? And it might be, you know-you’re quick to look away from her. The person shot is usually the one intended. But let’s say this time you’re right, a piece of luck. Luck for you.”
Stepping into his bullet, dead because he was lucky.
“I don’t believe it.”
“When did you first see the Horch? On the Avus, you said. Soon after you left Gelferstrasse.”
“That doesn’t mean anything. Try this point. Nobody started shooting until we met Shaeffer.”
“Away from the crowd. And if you had both been shot? An incident. No longer just you.”
“But why—”
“Because you are dangerous to someone, of course. A detective is.”
“I don’t believe it,” Jake said, his voice less sure than before.
Gunther picked up a hairbrush and ran it back over his temples. “Have it your way. But I suggest you move. If they know Gelferstrasse, they may know the other. I take it this is where the lady friend lives, the good Lena? It’s one thing to put yourself in danger—”
Jake cut him off. “Do you really believe this?”
Gunther shrugged. “A precaution.”
“Why should Lena be in any danger?”
“Why was a Russian looking for her? You didn’t find it interesting, that point? The Russian at Professor Brandt’s asks for her, not for the son.”
“To find the son,” Jake said, watching Gunther’s face.
“Then why not ask for him?”
“All right, why not? Another obvious point?”
Gunther shook his head. “More a possibility. But it suggests itself.” He looked up at Jake. “They already know where he is.”
Jake said nothing, waiting for more, but Gunther turned away, taking the coffee cup with him into the other room. “Is it time?” he said to Bernie.
“You sober? Hold out your hands.”
Gunther stretched one arm out-a mild trembling. “So I’m on trial now,” he said.
“We want a credible witness, not a drunk.”
“I’m a policeman. I’ve been in a courtroom before.”
“Not this kind.”
Jake had followed them, brooding. “That doesn’t make sense,” he said to Gunther.
“Not yet. As I say, a possibility.” He put down the cup. “But I would move her. I would hide her.”
Jake glanced at him, disturbed. “I still want to talk to Shaeffer,” he said. “He’s the one they shot. And he couldn’t wait to get out of there. Even wounded, it’s all he cared about.” He paused. “Anyway, where could we go? It’s not easy to move in Berlin.”
“No. Unless you have to. I moved Marthe fourteen times,” Gunther said, looking down at the floor. “Fourteen. I remember every time. You don’t forget. Guntzelstrasse. Blucherstrasse. Every time. Will they ask me about that?” he said to Bernie.
“No,” Bernie said, “just the last time.”
“With the greifer,” he said, nodding. “A coffee. We thought it was safe. She had papers. Safe.”
Jake looked at him, surprised. A U-boat trail, Gunther helping. “I thought you divorced her,” he said.
“She divorced me. It was better.” He looked up. “You think I abandoned her? Marthe? She was my wife. I did what I could. Flats. Papers. For a policeman, not so difficult. But not enough. The greifer saw her. By chance, just like that. So it was all for nothing. Every move.“ He stopped and turned to Bernie. ”Forgive me, I’m not myself.“
“You going to be sick?”
Gunther smiled weakly. “Not sick. A little—” His voice trailed off, suddenly frail. “Perhaps one drink. For the nerves.”
“Nothing doing,” Bernie said.
But Jake glanced at him, his body shrunken in the old suit, eyes uneasy, and walked over to the table and poured out a finger of brandy. Gunther drank it back in one gulp, like medicine, then stood for a second letting it work its way through him.
“Don’t worry,” he said to Bernie. “I won’t forget anything.”
“Let’s hope not.” He reached into his pockets and pulled out a mint. “Here, chew this. The Russians’U smell it on you a mile off.”
“The Russians?” Jake said.
“It’s a Russian trial. To show us they can do it too, not just string people up. Especially when we help catch them. Come on, we’ll be late.”
“Can I get in? I’d like to see this. See Renate.”
“The press slots were gone days ago. Everybody wants to see this one.”
Jake looked at him, feeling like Gunther asking for a drink.
“All right,” Bernie said. “We’ll put you on the prosecution team. You can keep an eye on our friend here. Which is getting to be a job.” He glanced at Gunther. “No more.”
Gunther handed the glass back to Jake. “Thank you.” And then, as a kind of return favor, “I’ll talk to Willi for you.”
“Willi?”
“It’s a type I know well. He’ll talk to me.”
“I mean, why him?” Jake said, intrigued to see Gunther still working, behind everything.
“To keep the figures neat. The little details. What’s the English? Dot the i’s and cross the t’s.”
“Still a cop.”
Gunther shrugged. “It pays to be neat. Not overlook anything.”
“What else did I overlook?”
“Not overlook-ignore, perhaps. Sometimes when it’s not pleasant, we don’t want to see.”
“Such as?” “The car.”
“The Horch again? What’s so important about the Horch?” “No, Herr Brandt’s car. That week-to drive into Berlin, how was it possible? The city was burning, at war. And yet he comes to get his wife. How was that allowed?” “It was an SS car.”
“Yes, his. You think the SS was offering lifts? While the city was falling? Either he was one of them or he was their prisoner. But they stop to collect the father, so not a prisoner. One of them. A mission for the SS-what kind? Even the SS didn’t send cars for relatives those last days.”
“His father said they were picking up files.” “And they risk coming to Berlin. What files, I wonder.” “That’s easy to find out,” Bernie said. “They surrendered in the west. There’ll be a record somewhere. One thing we’ve got plenty of is files.”
“More folders,” Gunther said, looking at the stack Bernie had brought with him for the trial. “For all the bad Germans. Let’s see what they say about Herr Brandt.”
“What makes you think he’s in them?” Jake said. “What do you save when a city’s on fire? You save yourself.” “He was trying to save his wife.”
“But he didn’t,” Gunther said, then looked away, somewhere else. “Of course, sometimes it’s not possible.” He picked up his jacket and put it on, ready to go. “That last week-you weren’t here. Fires. Russians in the streets. We thought it was the end of the world.” He looked back at Jake. “But it wasn’t. Now there’s this. The reckoning.”
The courtroom had an improvised look to it, as if the Russians had set up a stage without knowing where the props went. Their de-Nazification program had run to group executions, not trials, but the greifer was a special case, so they’d taken over a room near the old police headquarters in the Alex, built a raised platform of raw wooden boards for the judges’ bench, and assigned the press haphazard rows of folding chairs that squeaked and
