'Maybe he realised how effective a weapon it was and took the rest of it with him. I rather imagine there was an argument. The killer grabbed the trophy, broke it over Gebhardt's skull and found himself holding just a piece of it. A conveniently sharp piece. There are some smaller punctures on Gebhardt's head that are consistent with that possibility. Gebhardt collapsed onto the bed. The killer then went at him with the point. Finished him off. Then he went outside and caught the U-Bahn home. As to who and why, your guess is as good as mine. If this was Berlin I'd be telling the uniforms to look for a man with bloodstains on his jacket, but of course here, that's not so unusual. There are fellows out there who are still wearing uniforms stained with the blood of comrades at Konigsberg. And I expect the killer knows that, too.'
'Is that all you've got?'
'Look, if this was Berlin I could pick up the rugs and beat them, you know? Interview some witnesses, some suspects. Speak to a few informers. There's nothing like an informer in my business. They're the flies who know their shit and that's the detective work that nearly always pays a dividend.'
'So why not speak to Emil Kittel? The other anti-fa agent? It's in his interest to cooperate with your inquiry, wouldn't you say? He might wind up being the killer's next victim, after all;
'That might work. Of course speaking to Kittel means I have to speak to Kittel, and if that happens I don't want anyone in this camp thinking it's because I'm turning Ivan like him.'
'I'll make sure that people know the score.'
'But that's only one objection. You see Kittel's already one of my suspects. He's left-handed. And one of the few things I can tell you about the murderer is that he's probably left- handed.'
'How do you figure that?'
'The stab wounds on Gebhardt's body. They're mostly on his right side. Less than ten per cent of the population is left- handed. So, out of more than a thousand men in this camp, I've got about a hundred suspects. And one of them is Kittel.'
'I see.'
'Somehow I've got to clear ninety-nine of them in less than seventy-two hours with nothing more to go on than the fact they disliked the victim only a little less than the man who actually killed him. All of this would be more than enough to do if there wasn't already a wheelbarrow with my name on it and several tonnes of sand ready for shifting around this canal. That's not a tall order, it's a tall order standing on a box.'
'I'll speak to Major Savostin. See if I can't get you off the work detail until this thing is sorted.'
'You do that, sir. Appeal to his sense of fair play. He probably keeps it in a matchbox alongside his sense of humour. And now I think about it, that's another objection I have to this so-called investigation. I don't like the Ivans knowing anything more about me than they already do. Especially the MVD.'
The SGO smiled.
'Did I say something funny, sir?'
'Before the war I was a doctor,' said the SGO.
'Like your brother.'
He nodded. 'In a mental asylum. We treated a lot of people for something called paranoia.'
'I know what paranoia is, sir.'
'Why are you so paranoid, Gunther?'
'Me, I suppose it's because I have a problem trusting people. I should warn you, Colonel, I'm not the persistent type. Over the years I've learned it's better to be a quitter. I find that knowing when to quit is the best way of staying alive. So don't expect me to be a hero. Not here. Since I put on a German uniform I find that the hero business has been put back thirty years.'
The SGO gave me a disapproving look. 'Perhaps,' he said stiffly, 'if we'd had more heroes we might just have won the war.'
'No, Colonel. If we'd had more heroes the war might never have got started.'
I went back to work, filling my wheelbarrow with sand, pushing it up a gangplank, emptying it, and then pushing it back down again. Endless and unavailing, it was the kind of work that gets your picture on the side of a Greek amphora, or as an illustration in a story that shows the dangers of betraying the secrets of the gods. It wasn't as dangerous as the kind of work the SGO wanted me to do, and but for the vodka inside me and the nicotine in my lungs I might have been feeling a little less than inspired about the prospect of saving twenty-five of my comrades from a little show trial in Stalingrad. I've never been the type to mistake intoxication for heroism. Besides, it's not heroes you need to win a war, it's people who stay alive.
I was still feeling a little intoxicated when the SGO and the MVD major came to fetch me from my Sisyphean labour. And this can be the only explanation for the way I spoke to the Ivan. In Russian. That was a mistake all on its own. The Russians liked it a lot when you spoke Russian. In that respect they're like anyone else. The only difference is that Russians think it means you like them.
The MVD major, Savostin, dismissed the SGO with a wave of his hand as soon as Mrugowski had pointed me out. The Russian beckoned me towards him, impatiently.
'Bistra! Davail'
He was about fifty with reddish hair and a mouth as wide as the Volga which looked as if it had been exaggerated for the purpose of a vindictive caricature. The pale blue eyes in his pale white head had been inherited from the grey she-wolf who'd littered him.
I dropped my shovel and ran eagerly toward him. The Blues liked you to do everything at the double.
'Mrugowski tells me that you were a fascist policeman before the war.'
'No, sir. I was just a policeman. Generally, I left the fascism to the fascists. I had enough to do just being a policeman.'
'Did you ever arrest any communists?'
'I might have done. If they broke the law. But I never arrested anyone for being a communist. I investigated murders.'
'You must have been very busy.'
'Yes, sir, I was.'
'What is your rank?'
'Captain, sir.'
'Then why are you wearing a corporal's jacket?'
'The corporal it belonged to wasn't using it.'
'What function did you have, during the war?'
'I was an intelligence officer, sir.'
'Did you ever fight any partisans?'
'No, sir. Only the Red Army.'
'That is why you lost.'
'Yes, sir, that is certainly why we lost.'
The pale blue wolf eyes stayed on me, unblinking, obliging me to snatch my cap off while I stared back at him.
'You speak excellent Russian,' he said. 'Where did you learn it?'
'From Russians. I told you, Major, I was an intelligence officer. That generally means you have to be something more than just intelligent. With me it was the fact that I'd learned Russian. But it wasn't the same standard of Russian you've described until I came here, your honour. I have the great Stalin to thank for that.'
'You were a spy, Captain. Isn't that right?'
'No, sir. I was always in uniform. Which means if I had been a spy I'd have been a rather stupid one. And as I told you already, sir, I was in intelligence. It was my job to monitor Russian radio broadcasts, read Russian newspapers, speak to Russian prisoners…'
'Did you ever torture a Russian prisoner?'
'No, sir.'
'A Russian would never give information to fascists unless he was tortured.'
'I expect that's why I never got any information from Russian prisoners, sir. Not once. Not ever.'
'So what makes the SGO think that you can get it from German plenis?'
'That's a good question, sir. You would have to ask him that.'
'His brother is a war criminal. Did you know that?'
