`Odd that – for a recluse.'
`Not really,' Newman explained. 'They have common roots – so far as they have roots at all. The old days in Kenya. Berlin himself told me that.'
`What does he do for money? How does he live?'
`Well. In a word. Rumour hath it that certain American foundations support his refugee work.'
`I'd like you to check on this Dr Berlin, Bob. Gives you a good reason for what your role is…'
`That means going to Lubeck.'
`Which is my next port of call. Literally.' The phone rang. `Who can that be?' Tweed wondered. 'And at this hour?'
`Ziggy here, Mr Tweed. I'll prove I am trying to help. While you're in Hamburg you should contact Martin Vollmer. He has an apartment in Altona. Here is the address…'
Tweed scribbled the instructions on a pad. As he finished he heard a click. Ziggy had gone off the line. 'And that was Ziggy Palewska,' he told Newman. 'I was just going to ask him how he knew I was at the Four Seasons.' He flung down the pencil. `I find it uncanny. Everyone seems to know where I am, where I'm going to before I get there. Gives me an eerie feeling.'
`Get some sleep,' Newman advised, standing up. `I'm bushed. In the morning everything will seem different:'
In the morning as they sat at breakfast Hugh Grey walked into the dining-room.
`I didn't ask you to contact me,' Tweed said quietly as Grey sat facing them.
`I came in on the late flight last night. Howard asked me to look you up, see how you were coming along and all that… `I'm not an invalid,' Tweed said coldly.
`Oh, you know what I mean.' Grey was full of bounce, his pink face flushed with good health. 'After all, this is my territory, so it's the least service I can render, to do the honours and all that. I say, any chance of a pot of coffee? Steaming hot is how I like it. First thing in the morning, need something to get the old motor humming…'
`The old motor appears to be humming only too well.. Tweed reluctantly summoned a waiter, gave the order. 'And the coffee is always steaming hot here. This is the Four Seasons…'
`Not a bad doss-house, I agree…'
Oh, Jesus, Tweed muttered under his breath. He forced a trace of a smile. 'You know Robert Newman?'
`I'll say. Old drinking buddies…'
`Once,' Newman replied. 'At a bar in Frankfurt. You spilt a double Scotch over my best suit…'
`Must have been half-smashed…'
`You were all of that.'
`We'd had a long meeting.' Grey turned to Tweed. 'Remember? Eight hours non-stop. Crisis time.'
'I do recall it, yes,' said Tweed and continued eating.
`That was the night that attractive blonde girl was raped and murdered,' Newman remarked. 'They found her floating in the Main the following day. A horrific one, that.'
`Which caused the hold-up when we were leaving Frankfurt Airport,' Tweed said. 'The most thorough interrogation I've ever been subjected to. Made me realize what it's like to be in the other chair. Hugh, talking of Frankfurt, you'll be on your way back there today, I take it?'
`Trying to get rid of me?' Grey smiled broadly. 'You're saying you can cope on your own?'
`I might just manage.'
`Found out anything about Fergusson? Can I be of assistance?'
`No to both questions.'
`Dead end?' Grey poured himself coffee.
`It was for Fergusson…'
`You do sound grim this morning. Not at all chipper…'
`Under the circumstances, I'm hardly likely to feel chipper, as you put it. And I did ask you about your future movements.'
`Sorry. Wrong mood. Under the circumstances. Frankfurt here I come. This afternoon. I get the feeling I'm de trop – as the French so delightfully put it.'
He paused, stared at Tweed expectantly, as though waiting for contradiction. None came.
`Ziggy Palewska was cremated at four this morning.'
Kuhlmann made his announcement standing in Tweed's bedroom, hands clasped behind his back, cigar in the corner of his mouth as he watched both Tweed and Newman who were sitting in arm chairs. The man from Wiesbaden had appeared as soon as Hugh Grey left the dining-room.
He had asked for a quiet word and they had taken him up to the bedroom. Tweed stared back at the German whose expression was bleak. Newman kept his own expression blank and left Tweed to do the talking.
`What the devil does that mean?'
`His place of business – if you can call it that – went up in flames. That heavy wooden door you pushed to get inside to see the Pole last night jams. Palewska was trapped inside. Burnt to one black cinder. An accident, the state police are saying…'
`But how could it happen?'
`You tell me. You were there a few hours earlier. Notice anything especially inflammable?'
`There were two drums of petrol in one corner,' Tweed said slowly. 'The room was full of stuff which could catch light – once a fire started. But how would it start?'
`I thought you might tell me. People who live in that stinking alley say he used to turn up the hi-fi full blast. Had a passion for Louis Armstrong, they say. The eye-witness descriptions make a good horror story…'
`What kind of a horror story?' Newman asked, feeling he should say something.
`Imagine a fiery inferno. Flames shooting sky-high. And that bloody hi-fi still blasting out Louis on his trumpet. Turned as high as it would go, they said. Any comment?'
`I don't think so,' Tweed replied. 'You tell us…'
`Place was lit by oil lamps. So, the vibrations topple one of those oil lamps by the petrol drums. There was a big explosion which was probably one – maybe both – of the petrol drums. People who work nearby told me the oil- lamps alone worried them. When he had that hi-fi going they'd sit talking with Ziggy, watching the damned lamps shivering on top of whatever he'd perched them on. The thing which puzzles me is those petrol drums – a neighbour saw them earlier that evening. Never seen petrol in there before.'
Kuhlmann sat down and waited. He expected a reaction – and he had seen both of them leaving Ziggy's place the same night. Tweed grunted, cleared his throat.
`What are you saying was the cause of this new tragedy?'
`State police call it an accident – subject to the report from the arson brigade. That's the second so-called accident involving you in less than twenty-four hours. First Fergusson, now Mr Ziggy Palewska. Maybe we have a specialist in town.'
`A specialist in what?' Tweed asked.
`Murder made to look like accident. I've already put that modus operandi through the computer. I'm waiting for the result.'
`We were there, as you say, earlier in the evening. And I did notice the petrol drums…'
Tweed gave Kuhlmann a brief outline of their visit, omitting a great deal. No reference to Lubeck or Dr Berlin. Kuhlmann never took his eyes off him as Tweed spoke in a matter-of-fact tone.
`So,' the German said, `there was a definite link between Fergusson and Palewska? Why would Fergusson fly to Hamburg to see a man like that?'
`Because he has been one of my contacts over the years. You realize there is a limit as to how much I can tell you?'
`No limit on murder.' Kuhlmann pointed his cigar at Tweed. Fergusson was murdered – that I know. Fergusson had visited Palewska an hour or two before he's found floating. Now Ziggy goes up in smoke. That's a direct link if ever I met one. Who was that man who joined you for breakfast'?' he asked suddenly.
`Hugh Grey. I neither expected or wanted to see him. He's a nuisance…'
`His face is familiar. Care to enlighten me a little more on Mr Hugh Grey?'
`Not really.' Which was a pointless answer. Tweed was aware that Kuhlmann would also put Hugh Grey
