‘This is my dad Joe,’ May said.
The small, hunched man looked to be having trouble with his breathing. The hand he held out had a perceptible tremor, the skin like crêpe paper. He wore glasses with thick lenses and his head was more liver spot than hair. Next to him sat a woman who could almost have been his sister.
‘Helen Carter,’ May said. Then, raising her voice, ‘Helen’s a bit deaf, despite the hearing aid. Aren’t you, Helen?’
The woman clucked and nodded.
Across the table sat a man of similar vintage, taller and thinner than Joe Collins, with angular features and no apparent need of glasses.
‘Stefan Novack,’ May Collins said. ‘Helen and Stefan both live in Tongue. Stefan was kind enough to give her a lift.’
Rebus took Novack’s hand while looking at the figure seated next to him. This young man held up his hands.
‘I know,’ he said.
‘This is Jimmy Hess,’ May Collins was explaining. ‘His grandad’s not great today.’
‘Your grandad being … ?’
‘Frank Hess – Franz, actually, just like Joe is Josef.’ Jimmy gestured towards May Collins’ father. ‘And as I always say, no, we’re not related to Rudolf.’
‘Not that we ever see Frank in here,’ May went on.
‘Not really a drinker,’ Jimmy explained to Rebus. ‘Not these days.’
‘Get yourself seated and I’ll fetch you a drink,’ May Collins told Rebus, giving him a pat on the arm.
‘Just sparkling water,’ he said, settling himself at the head of the table.
‘Very sorry for your loss,’ Jimmy Hess said. He was a large man and ungainly with it. Late thirties maybe, no sign of a wedding ring. Dark hair receding rapidly at the temples.
‘I appreciate you standing in for your grandfather,’ Rebus said. ‘But this is probably a waste of your time.’
Hess held up his hands again. It was something he obviously did a lot, probably without even being conscious of it. ‘Thing is, Grandad used to talk to me all the time about the camp, and I sat in when Keith was asking his questions, so maybe I’m more useful than you think.’
Rebus nodded his understanding. ‘As you all know,’ he began, addressing the table, ‘Keith was my daughter’s partner. Someone killed him at Camp 1033, and it looks like his computer and some of his notes were taken. I’ve been studying what’s left and I know the camp had become an obsession. I’m just wondering what he learned from talking to you.’
‘I didn’t catch all of that,’ Helen Carter said, leaning so close to Rebus they were almost touching. ‘You know I wasn’t a prisoner?’
Rebus smiled. ‘You worked in the dispensary. There’s a bit about it in Keith’s files.’
‘And you did marry one of the internees,’ Hess called across the table. ‘I’ve still got a toy horse Helen’s husband carved when he was inside.’ He looked to Rebus. ‘A lot of internees were let out to work the fields and take exercise.’
May Collins placed Rebus’s drink in front of him.
‘No nodding off now,’ she warned her father, whose eyelids were drooping.
‘Blame the conversation,’ he barked at her, his voice still heavily accented.
‘You were another of the prisoners who was able to leave the camp?’ Rebus asked him.
‘Of course.’
‘And you were a newly promoted officer, I think – meaning a different accommodation block to the lesser ranks?’
‘Correct.’
‘How did you end up in Camp 1033?’
‘My platoon was surrounded. We had no choice but to surrender.’
‘And you, Mr Novack?’
Novack’s right hand moved with slow deliberation towards the glass on the table in front of him. His fingers curled around it without making any attempt to raise it. ‘Before 1033 was a British camp, it belonged to the Poles.’
‘You got on the wrong side of General Sikorski? So you weren’t here at the same time as Mr Collins and Mr Hess?’
‘Not quite, no – though Helen was a constant throughout.’ Novack looked at Helen Carter and gave a slight bow of his head.
‘I only caught a little of that,’ Carter said, fiddling with her hearing aid.
‘Offer her a post-prandial rum, however,’ Novack said quietly, ‘and you will find her hearing miraculously unimpaired.’
The sly glance she gave him confirmed the prognosis.
‘I returned here immediately after the war,’ Novack continued for Rebus’s benefit. ‘I had fond memories of the place and the people – and I’d found that there wasn’t much of a life waiting for me back in Poland. Camp 1033 was still operational then, of course. It only closed in 1947. Internees were used as unpaid labour – no need to send them home, as there had been no official armistice at war’s end. And of course the country needed workers.’
‘Is that when you were released, Mr Collins?’ Rebus asked.
‘Exactly so.’
‘And like Mr Novack, you chose to stick around?’
A further twitch of the shoulders. ‘I had fallen in love.’
Rebus turned to Jimmy Hess. ‘And your grandfather?’
Hess was nodding. ‘Same thing.’
‘Odd, isn’t it?’ Helen Carter broke in. ‘I don’t think many British POWs stayed in Germany after 1945.’
‘You only have yourself to blame for being so accommodating,’ Novack said. ‘I don’t mean you personally, Helen, but Scottish people in general.’
‘So nothing but happy memories of the camp?’ Rebus enquired.
‘There was hardship,’ Novack said. ‘The place was freezing in winter, stifling in summer. Even after British soldiers replaced the Poles, there were incidents. It was thought someone had tried to poison the camp’s delivery of bread – isn’t that correct, Helen?’
‘A lot of the men got food poisoning. Just one of those things.’
Rebus’s eyes were on Novack. ‘You don’t think it was random chance?’
‘People were friendly in the main, but try to imagine it – exotic foreigners arrive in your midst and are free to walk around the community, charming your womenfolk … ’
‘Leading to a certain resentment?’ Rebus guessed.
‘Best if Joseph tells it,’ Novack stated.
‘What is there to tell?’ Collins barked across the table.
‘A fellow internee died, Joseph.’
‘Died how?’ Rebus asked into the uncomfortable silence.
‘Firing squad. He’d shot and killed one of the guards.’
