Rosa (37 page)

“Very German, our Herr Mitleid,” said Stankevich with a wry smile as he watched Mitleid go. “Very perfect.” He turned to Hoffner. “Are you also so perfect in your Kripo, Herr Inspector?” His German was flawless, but Hoffner recognized the accent.

“No worries on that front, Herr Colonel,” said Hoffner. “Kiev?” he added.

Stankevich showed a moment’s surprise. He then spoke in Russian. “You know Ukraine?”

“Once, to visit, as a boy,” said Hoffner. His Russian was not quite as fluid as he remembered.

“Odessa, actually. But close enough.”

Hoffner nodded.

“Your mother?”

Another nod.

“Always the mothers who ran off,” said Stankevich. “Find a nice German boy, give him nice German babies.”

Hoffner’s mother’s story was not quite as charming as Stankevich imagined, but Hoffner had no interest in muddying the illusion with mention of Cossacks and rifles and burning villages. Instead, he continued in Russian: “You’re a long way from Odessa, Colonel.”

“Yes.” The word seemed to carry the weight of the man’s history with it. “Someone decided to turn the world on its head, Inspector.”

Hoffner knew it would be a mistake to go down this road. “I’m told you knew Herr Teplitz, the engineer.”

Stankevich looked as if he might answer. Instead he reached across and pulled the cap from its hook. He held it in his hands like a boy caressing a new toy train, a tender blend of pride and reverence. “They let me keep this, you know,” he said as he gazed at the cap, its crimson band all but faded. “Ripped the epaulettes from my shoulders, the citations from my chest, but this—this they thought would be humorous to leave me with.” He paused. “A corporal. A boy in my company. Tired of taking orders.” Stankevich looked up. “Laziness. That’s what made him a revolutionary, Inspector. And here I sit in a shelter in Berlin.” He placed the cap back on its hook. “Yes, I knew Teplitz.”

Hoffner did his best to console. “The world will find its way back, Colonel.”

“Yes, but not while I’m here to see it.” Stankevich stood. He needed to distance himself from the cap. “Always better to walk, Inspector. Frees the mind. Shall we?”

Stankevich strode as if he were on inspection, his left leg hitching every third or fourth step from some hidden ailment. He nodded to the families as he passed by. Everyone knew the Colonel. A moment’s recognition from him was enough to spark some life into the line of tired eyes: his gift to them, Hoffner imagined.

“They have no past,” Stankevich said quietly. “So they have no hope.”

Hoffner nodded even though he had no idea what the Colonel meant.

“You think it’s the other way round, don’t you?” said Stankevich. “No future, no hope. But the future is fable, air. How can you draw faith from that?”

“It’s an interesting way of looking at things, Colonel.”

“It’s a very Russian way of looking at things, Inspector. Only the past gives you something to stand on. Without it, how do you know where your feet are when you’re looking to the heavens?” Stankevich’s leg buckled momentarily. “They are without hope because their past has been taken from them. It’s been rendered meaningless, and so, like me, they have nothing to build their hope on.”

Hoffner waited before answering. “And Herr Teplitz? Was he also without a past?”

Everything about Stankevich moved stiffly, which made the ease of his smile all the more surprising. “I’m passing on great wisdom, and all you want to know about is Teplitz.”

Hoffner smiled with him. “Unfortunately, yes.”

Stankevich let go with a throaty, quiet laugh. “It’s nice to hear Russian again. Yours is quite good, but it’s the eyes that give you away. Too dark. That’s your past, Inspector. Germans don’t have such depth. And how can you trust that?” He waited, then continued. “A war in China, another in Japan, the Great War, and a boy of nineteen tells me that my country is no longer mine. And you want to hear about a little German engineer.” Stankevich shook his head slowly. “Seems a bit frivolous, don’t you think?” They moved through to the next hall. “My corporal had weak eyes. I remember that.”

An attendant was mopping up something in one of the corners. A boy, in stocking feet and short pants, stood staring at the swirling motion of the mop. Hoffner noticed that Stankevich was gazing over, as well. Stankevich showed no pity for the boy, only a stifled despair. This was what his life had come to, thought Hoffner, watching a boy fascinated by a mop.

“So you chose Berlin,” said Hoffner.

Stankevich stayed a moment longer with the boy, then fixed his gaze straight ahead as he walked. “So I became a burden on your city? Is that what you mean? Yes. They don’t employ old men here, Inspector.”

“They’re having trouble with the young ones as well, Colonel.”

“Little consolation.” A pot of something brown was boiling over on a nearby range. No one seemed to be taking any notice. Stankevich stepped over and removed the pot from the burner. “I came to Berlin seven months ago. There was a woman. A friend from before the war. She took me in. Brest-Litovsk. We were no longer enemies, after all.” The water in the pot settled. Someone had been boiling socks. “She died from the influenza a little over three months ago. Herr Mitleid was kind enough to house me without the usual paperwork. A generous man.” Stankevich peered down at the floating wool. “You know, of course, that Teplitz’s real name was Tben.” Hoffner said nothing. “Quite popular, as well. A colleague of yours was here asking for him.”

Hoffner showed no reaction. “Another policeman?”

Stankevich began to walk. “If you try to sound so uninterested, Inspector, it gives the game away.” Stankevich swung his arm as if he were remembering what it was to have a crop in his hand. “This other policeman, this man wasn’t like you.”

“The eyes not as deep?”

Stankevich allowed himself a smile. “That, too, but no. He wasn’t the kind to hunt down little Belgians who kill old women.”

Hoffner was impressed. “So you actually read those newspapers?”

“Nothing to do but read in here, Inspector.”

“The political police?”

Stankevich nodded.

“Herr Mitleid didn’t mention it,” said Hoffner.

Stankevich had anticipated the response. “This man didn’t waste his time with Herr Mitleid, Inspector. He simply appeared at my bed.”

“And you told him what you knew about Herr Tben?”

Again, Stankevich stopped and turned to Hoffner. “Now, why would I have done that?”

S
tankevich liked his Russians, even his half-Russians. The man from the Polpo—
Kommissar
Hermannsohn, from the description—had merited no such consideration. Hoffner and his dark eyes, on the other hand, were another matter entirely.

According to Stankevich, Tben had left the shelter nearly a month ago, alone and with no explanation. His only request had been that Stankevich act as his conduit: Tben had thought it unsafe to address his letters directly to his wife, who had remained behind with the boys. Two letters had arrived prior to the twelfth, both postmarked from Zurich, which Frau Tben had read and then destroyed. Stankevich knew nothing of their contents. A third had come after the twelfth, but by then, the entire family had gone.

Back at his cubicle, Stankevich produced the letter. Hoffner read:

MY DEAREST ONE,

All sinks deeper into despair. Access to the account remains an impossibility if we are to keep our whereabouts a secret from our friends in Munich. I have no concern for my own well-being, but I fear that they would not be satisfied with my life alone. It seems that the monies promised for my designs were never intended as payment, but more as a lure should circumstances require my silencing. I will not play the mouse to their cheese. It is something of a miracle that we have managed to elude them for this long.

You, of course, had the good sense from the start. These were not men to be trusted and, if not for my navet, you should not be in such distress now. I have failed in the most fundamental of my obligations—the security of my family—and have only my constant remorse and loneliness to show for my efforts.

I will wait until the 23rd as agreed, and hope that by some good fortune you are able to accompany me. If not, then I hope you can forgive me for the destruction of our lives. Choose your friends wisely, and may they deliver you to me.

IN CONSTANT ADORATION, P.

Hoffner asked Stankevich for the envelope. The postmark was also from Zurich, dated the fourth of February. Hoffner examined the envelope’s flap, then brought it up to his nose and sniffed. There was no residue of talc, nor were the edges crimped by steam: the letter had not been opened and then resealed. Whatever Hoffner might have thought of the Polpo—and whoever else those “friends” might be in Munich—he could at least rest easy that neither had been so thorough as to intercept the letter before it arrived at the shelter. Hermannsohn might have tracked down Stankevich, but he was not monitoring the Colonel’s mail.

Hoffner continued to scan the letter as he spoke: “How much money did you give her, Colonel?”

Stankevich pretended not to have heard. “Pardon?”

“Frau Tben,” Hoffner said, “or whatever her real name is. My guess would be something a bit more Russian. Where did you send them, Colonel?”

Stankevich did his best to sound convincing. “I don’t know what you mean, Inspector.”

Hoffner nodded to himself as he continued to look down at the letter. “We both know German isn’t his first language. ‘The destruction of our lives.’ ‘You are able to accompany me.’” He looked up. “He means ‘join me.’ The syntax and language are wrong throughout. It’s also much too formal. He gives himself away, as you knew he would when you let me read it. So now that I’ve passed your test, Colonel, where did you send them?”

Stankevich looked as if he might try another dodge; instead he simply smiled. “They made you out to be quite brilliant in the newspapers,” he said. “I thought it was all something of a joke.”

“It was.”

“No, I think, in spite of themselves, they managed to get that right.”

Hoffner spoke deliberately: “Where is Tben, Herr Colonel?”

Again, Stankevich waited. It was now a matter of trust. “Sazonov,” he said. “His name is Pavel Sazonov. The wife’s maiden name was Tben.”

Hoffner had guessed as much. “So sometimes it was the fathers who ran off and wanted nice German babies?”

“What do you want with them, Inspector?”

“The same as you. To help them.”

Stankevich was not yet convinced. “Your colleague said the same thing.”

“Yes,” said Hoffner more pointedly, “but you didn’t show him the letter, did you?” Hoffner held the single sheet out to Stankevich.

It was an obvious point. Still, Stankevich hesitated. “No,” he said. “I didn’t.” He peered down at the letter. Then, as if a weight had been lifted from his shoulders, he said, “Better for you to keep it, don’t you think?”

Hoffner pocketed the letter.

Stankevich now spoke as if to a longtime confidant. “I don’t think he knew what he was doing, Sazonov. Not that he explained any of it to me. He did mention once that he had been clever, something about hiding in the last place they would look, but more than that he never said.”

Clever until his son had discovered Mary Koop’s body, thought Hoffner. “And his wife?”

“She knew less than I did. She simply wanted a roof over their heads. I don’t think she’d slept in weeks.”

“And he never mentioned his ‘friends’ in Munich?”

Stankevich shook his head. “The letter was the first I heard of them. Or of an account. Or a rendezvous. The man was terrified, Inspector. I did what I could. I had a few marks. It was enough to get him wherever he was going. Evidently that was Zurich. He said he would send more for his wife and the two boys, but the money never came. And then, last week, Frau Sazonov informed me that it was no longer safe for her to stay in Berlin. I don’t know why. I didn’t ask.” Stankevich paused. “I don’t care how long he had been in this country, Inspector, he was still a Russian. This was a good man.”

“And one, no doubt, with a past worth saving?” said Hoffner.

For the first time in minutes, a warmth returned to Stankevich’s eyes. “Yes.”

Hoffner nodded slowly. There was nothing else to be learned here. He stood and pulled his wallet from his jacket pocket.

The Colonel’s reaction was instantaneous. His hand shot up. “Really, Inspector, there’s no need—”

“My card, Colonel,” said Hoffner. He had no intention of embarrassing the man. “Nothing else.” Hoffner held it out. “Over the years, my wife has learned to make a very nice walnut dumpling—Kiev style, I’m sorry to say—but close enough. An expert’s opinion would please her to no end.”

Stankevich cleared his throat; he was not particularly fond of his emotions. He took the card.

T
he stink of ammonia was still with Hoffner as he drew up to the Café Dalles’s front doors: two steps down, and a bit of sawdust to keep the ice at bay.

It was always tough going, getting the weight of a place like Frbelstrasse out of one’s system. Hopelessness, whether informed by a past or a future, was all the more stark when projected against a backdrop of cold white tile and yellow light, more acute when seen through the faded red of an officer’s cap: Hoffner doubted the Colonel would be joining them for dumplings in Kreuzberg any time soon. At least the desperation inside the café had a nice jaunty feel to it, small tables and dim lights, with a prostitute or two catching up with her pimp. These were always pleasant reunions, money handed over, a few drinks into her system as she sat like a queen atop his lap. New stockings invariably demanded attention.

The band—a violin and piano—plunked out something that blended easily into the haphazard spray of conversation, nothing to take focus, though the air would have grown stale without it. Hoffner began to navigate his way across to the far corner and what had become his usual table. Like a distant shore under mist, it was obscured by clouds of smoke. He checked his watch and saw that it was a quarter to ten. The place was just revving up as he passed by a waiter and told the man to bring over a bottle of Mampe’s, no doubt the watered-down stock, but why should tonight be any different, he thought.