United States Embassy.”
How did they know that?
“Absurd.”
“Do you deny you were in the Platz?”
“No. Of course not.”
“Then why were you there?”
“I was following the American woman.” Krebs was making notes. “Why?”
“She was the person who discovered the body of Party Comrade Stuckart. I was also naturally suspicious of her, in her role as an agent of the bourgeois democratic press.”
“Don’t piss me about, March.”
“All right. I had insinuated myself into her company. I thought: if she can stumble across the corpse of one retired state secretary, she might stumble across another.”
“A fair point.” Krebs rubbed his chin and thought for a moment, then opened a fresh pack of cigarettes and gave one to March, lighting it for him from an unused box of matches. March filled his lungs with smoke. Krebs had not taken one for himself, he noticed — they were merely a part of his act, an interrogator’s props.
The Gestapo man was leafing through his notes again, frowning. “We believe that the traitor Luther was planning to disclose certain information to the journalist Maguire. What was the nature of this information?”
“I have no idea. The art fraud, perhaps?”
“On Thursday, you visited Zurich. Why?”
“It was the place Luther went before he vanished. I wanted to see if there was any clue there which might explain why he disappeared.”
“And was there?”
“No, But my visit was authorised. I submitted a full report to Oberstgruppenfuhrer Nebe. Have you not seen it?”
“Of course not.” Krebs made a note. “The Oberstgruppenfuhrer shows his hand to no one, not even us. Where is Maguire?”
“How should I know?”
“You should know because you picked her up from Adolf Hitler Platz after the shooting yesterday.”
“Not me, Krebs.”
“Yes you, March. Afterwards, you went to the morgue and searched through the traitor Luther’s personal effects -this we know absolutely from Doctor Eisler.”
“I was not aware that the effects were Luther’s,” said March. “I understood they belonged to a man named Stark who was three metres away from Maguire when he was shot. Naturally, I was interested to see what he was carrying, because I was interested in Maguire. Besides, if you recall, you showed me what you said was Luther’s body on Friday night. Who did shoot Luther, as a matter of interest?”
“Never mind that. What did you expect to pick up at the morgue?”
“Plenty.”
“What? Be exact!”
“Fleas. Lice. A skin rash from his shitty clothes.” Krebs threw down his pencil. He folded his arms. “You’re a brainy fellow, March. Take comfort from the fact we credit you with that, at least. Do you think we’d give a shit if you were just some dumb fat fuck, like your friend Max Jaeger? I bet you could keep this up for hours. But we don’t have hours, and we’re less stupid than you think.” He shuffled through his papers, smirked, and then he played his ace.
“What was in the suitcase you took from the airport?” March looked straight back at him. They had known all along. “What suitcase?”
“The suitcase that looks like a doctor’s bag. The suitcase that doesn’t weigh very much, but might contain paper. The suitcase Friedman gave you thirty minutes before he called us. He got back to find a telex, you see, March, from Prinz-Albrecht Strasse — an alert to stop you leaving the country. When he saw that, he decided — as a patriotic citizen — he’d better inform us of your visit.”
“Friedman!” said March. “A ‘patriotic citizen’? He’s fooling you, Krebs. He’s hiding some scheme of his own.” Krebs sighed. He got to his feet and came round to stand behind March, his hands resting on the back of March’s chair. “When this is over, I’d like to get to know you. Really. Assuming there’s anything left of you to get to know. Why did someone like you go bad? I’m interested. From a technical point of view. To try to stop it happening in the future.”
“Your passion for self-improvement is laudable.” There you go again, you see? A problem of attitude. Things are changing in Germany, March — from within -and you could have been a part of it. The Reichsfuhrer himself takes a personal interest in the new generation -listens to us, promotes us. He believes in restructuring, greater openness, talking to the Americans. The day of men like Odilo Globocnik is passing.” He stooped and whispered in March’s ear: “Do you know why Globus doesn’t like you?”
“Enlighten me.”
“Because you make him feel stupid. In Globus’s book, that’s a capital offence. Help me, and I can shield you from him.” Krebs straightened and resumed, in his normal voice: “Where is the woman? What was the information Luther wanted to give her? Where is Luther’s suitcase?”
Those three questions, again and again.
Interrogations have this irony, at least: they can enlighten those being questioned as much — or more- than those who are doing the questioning.
From what Krebs asked, March could measure the extent of his knowledge. This was, on certain matters, very good: he knew March had visited the morgue, for example, and that he had retrieved the suitcase from the airport. But there was a significant gap. Unless Krebs was playing a fiendishly devious game, it seemed he had no idea of the nature of the information Luther was promising the Americans. Upon this one, narrow ground rested March’s only hope.
After an inconclusive half-hour, the door opened and Globus appeared, swinging a long truncheon of polished wood. Behind him stood two thick-set men in black uniforms.
Krebs leapt to attention.
Globus said: “Has he made a full confession?”
“No, Herr Obergruppenfuhrer.”
“What a surprise. My turn then, I think.”
“Of course/ Krebs stooped and collected his papers.
Was it March’s imagination, or did he see on that long, impassive face a flicker of regret, even of distaste?
After Krebs had gone, Globus prowled around, humming an old Party marching song, dragging the length of wood over the stone floor.
“Do you know what this is, March?” He waited. “No? No answer? It’s an American invention. A baseball bat. A pal of mine at the Washington Embassy brought it back for me.” He swung it around his head a couple of times. “I’m thinking of raising an SS team. We could play the US Army. What do you think? Goebbels is keen. He thinks the American masses would respond well to the pictures.”
He leant the bat against the heavy wooden table and began unbuttoning his tunic.
“If you want my opinion, the original mistake was in “thirty-six, when Himmler said every Kripo flat-foot in the Reich had to wear SS uniform. That’s when we were landed with scum like you, and shrivelled-up old cunts like Artur Nebe.”
He handed his jacket to one of the two guards and began rolling up his sleeves. Suddenly he was shouting.
“My God, we used to know how to deal with people like you. But we’ve gone soft. It’s not ‘Has he got guts?’ any more, it’s ‘Has he got a doctorate?’ We didn’t need doctorates in the East, in “forty-one, when there was fifty degrees of frost and your piss froze in mid-air. You should have heard Krebs, March. You’d’ve loved it. Fuck it, I think he’s one of your lot.” He adopted a mincing voice. “ ‘With permission, Herr Obergruppenfuhrer, I would like to question the suspect first. I feel he may respond to a more subtle approach.’ Subtle, my arse. What’s the point of you? If you were my dog, I’d feed you poison.”
“If I were your dog, I’d eat it.”
