I shook my head with uncomfortable vigor, wondering how it looked at the cross point of the sniper’s reticle and noticing the bandit queen’s perfume now, which was her only concession to femininity. I couldn’t identify it beyond the fact that it was paradoxically vanilla and flowery in its base notes, which seemed like the very opposite of her.
“That’s it. The whole lousy story. For all I know Merten and Brunner aren’t even in Greece anymore. After what I just learned from Meissner, I’m surprised they had the nerve to come back at all.”
“That’s not so surprising, perhaps,” said the bandit queen. “It’s been suggested that there are some in this new Greek government who were informers for the Nazis and who were rewarded with businesses and property confiscated from Thessaloniki’s Jews. That could be why Merten chose to come back now. Perhaps he’s been able to blackmail some of these people.” She shrugged. “On the other hand, it’s not just this government that has failed Salonika’s Jews so dismally. In 1946 the Americans arrested Merten, locked him up in Dachau, and offered him for extradition to Greece. Incredibly, the Tsaldaris government said it had no interest in him. So after ten years of living openly in Munich, Max Merten may have decided that he was perfectly safe here after all. And who could blame him? You Germans have managed to draw a very thick line under the war and to start over again. The Old Man’s miracle, they call it. The Old Man’s whitewash, more like. It makes me sick. There’s no justice. Small wonder we’re forced to take the law into our own hands.”
She sneered and then looked away, as if she didn’t want to get any blood on her jacket after all.
“I certainly didn’t vote for him,” I said. “And please don’t give me a dirty look. I’m liable to get a headache. Speaking for myself, I never disliked Jews as much as I disliked a great many of my fellow Germans.”
“I’ve heard of the unicorn, the griffin, the great auk, the tart with a heart, and little green men from outer space. I’ve even heard of the good German, but I never thought to see one myself. You never voted for the Nazis and you never liked Hitler. I suppose there was even a Jew you helped to survive the war. You hid him in your lavatory for a couple of days. And of course some of your best friends were Jews. It amazes me how so many of us died.”
“I wouldn’t say I did anything to feel proud of, if that’s what you mean. But I’ll live with that.”
She lifted the fist with the red handkerchief and wiggled it meaningfully. “You hope.”
“You seem to have an appetite for revenge that makes me glad I’m not on your menu.”
“A menu? Oh, I see what you mean. Yes, we do have one. You know, getting Max Merten might almost be as good as catching up with Alois Brunner.”
“If I meet him again, I’ll let you know.”
“Again?”
“I knew him slightly before the war, when he was an ambitious young lawyer in Berlin, and then I met him again a couple of months ago. As a matter of fact it was Merten who helped to get me my job at Munich RE.”
“And they talk about Jews sticking together. You Germans could teach us a thing or two about looking after your own.”
“Believe me, if I see him I’m just liable to kill him myself. I had a nice quiet job in a Munich hospital before I thought to try and improve myself by joining the hazardous world of insurance. The people I was working with at Schwabing were as honest as the day is long. Never had any trouble with any of them.” I bit my lip. “But the minute I put a tie on again it’s like I started having to make compromises with myself. So. Can I go now? It’s getting a little chilly up here. But for the waves of hate coming off you I might need a coat. As it is I badly need a change of underwear.”
“Yes, you can go, Herr Ganz. You’re an interesting man. No doubt about it. There’s a lot more to you than meets the eye. You’re staying at the Grande Bretagne, right? Perhaps you have Hermann Göring’s bedroom. Or Himmler’s. That should make you feel at home. You’ll find the car is still waiting. My men will give you a ride.”
“No thanks. I’d prefer to walk if you don’t mind. It will give me a chance to clear my head of the idea that it’s about to receive an unwelcome visitor.” I stood up, carefully, with one eye on the red handkerchief in her hand. “Wasn’t it Sophocles who said that the end justifies any evil? I read that on a souvenir tea towel. Well, take it from one who knows. It doesn’t. It never does. Germany learned this the hard way. I sincerely hope you don’t have to learn the same lesson we did.”
The bandit queen shot me a sarcastic smile. “Go on. Get out of here. Take care of yourself, okay?”
“I’m German. That’s what we’re good at.”
THIRTY-NINE
–
I took a cab back to the office but there was no sign of Garlopis, so I found some cigarettes and a bottle in his drawer, typed a two-page report for Lieutenant Leventis on Telesilla’s English machine concerning my visit to see Arthur Meissner, and then, on my way back to the hotel, handed it in at the Megaron
