SS-GB

‘That was only this morning,’ said Douglas, surprised that Huth was so up to date on what was happening.

Huth nodded.

‘So far we’ve found no one who heard the pistol shot but the doctor thinks death occurred about three A.M. The dead man carried papers saying he was Peter Thomas but the papers are probably forgeries. Criminal records have nothing listed under that name. Fingerprints are working on it but it will take a long time before they finish. He had a railway ticket from Bringle Sands. That’s a small coastal holiday resort in Devon.’

Douglas looked at Huth who was still staring out of the window. ‘I know exactly where Bringle Sands is located,’ said Huth. Douglas was surprised. He’d not known where it was himself until consulting an atlas.

‘Go on,’ said Huth without looking at him.

‘There were military stores in the apartment…not much. Typical black-market items: cigarettes, drink, petrol coupons. We have a written statement from the neighbour who insists that a Luftwaffe Feldwebel was there frequently. He gave a description so my Sergeant went to see the Feldgendarmerie this afternoon. I will wait now to see if they want to take over the investigation, or whether I continue.’

‘What about the murder?’

‘It has all the signs of a killer who let himself in, waited for the victim to arrive home…’

‘But you don’t think so?’

Douglas shrugged. There was no way to tell this SS officer of the problems such investigations brought. The penalties for even slight breaches of the regulations were now so severe that ordinarily law-abiding men and women would give false evidence. Douglas Archer understood this, and, in common with all the rest of the police in Britain, he turned a blind eye to many less serious offences. ‘Probably a black-market murder,’ said Douglas, although his instinct told him that there was more to it.

Huth turned and smiled. ‘I think I’m beginning to understand the way you work, Superintendent,’ he said. ‘Probably a black-market killing, you say. And Saturday’s was a gang killing. Tuesday’s was a suicide pact. Is this the way you work at Scotland Yard? You have these convenient pigeon-holes that are a cunning way of classifying cases that would otherwise be put together in a gigantic file marked “unsolvable”. Is that it?’

‘I didn’t use that word, Standartenführer, you did. In my opinion, such cases are perfectly straightforward, except that Wehrmacht personnel are involved. In such cases my hands are tied.’

‘Very plausible,’ said Huth.

Douglas waited, and when he added nothing more said, ‘Would you please elaborate on that, sir?’

‘You don’t for one moment think it’s a “black-market killing”,’ said Huth contemptuously. ‘Because a man like you knows every damned crook in London. If you thought this was anything to do with the black-market you’d have searched out every important black-marketeer in London and told them to hand over the culprit within a couple of hours, or find themselves doing ten years’ preventive detention. Can you tell me why you didn’t?’

‘No,’ said Douglas.

‘What do you mean, no?’

‘I can’t tell you, because I don’t know why I didn’t do that. All the evidence is as I told you…but there’s more to it, I think.’

Huth stared at Douglas and tipped his peaked cap back on his head with the tip of his thumb. He was a handsome man but his face was colourless, his grey drill uniform, and its black and silver SS collar patches, little different from the pale complexion resulting from a life spent in ill-lit offices. Douglas found no way to discover what was going on inside this man’s head, and yet he had the uncomfortable feeling that Huth could see right through him. But Douglas did not avert his eyes. After what seemed an interminable time, Huth said, ‘So what are you doing about it?’

‘If the Feldgendarmerie identify the Feldwebel mentioned in the neighbour’s written statement, it will be up to the Feldgericht der Luftwaffe to decide…’

Huth waved his hand disdainfully. ‘A teleprinter message from Berlin instructed the Luftwaffe to pass all papers back to you.’

Douglas found this truly astonishing. The Wehrmacht jealously guarded the right to handle their own investigations. The SD – the intelligence service of the SS – had achieved the seemingly impossible when it extended its investigative powers to include not only the SS, but also the SA and the Nazi Party. But even they never attempted to bring charges against a member of the armed forces. There was only one level at which the Luftwaffe could be ordered to pass an investigation over to the SIPO – and that was the supreme controller of civil power and supreme commander of the armed forces, Adolf Hitler.

Douglas’s imagination raced ahead, to wonder if the crime might have been committed by some high-ranking Nazi, or a relative, associate or mistress of such a person. ‘Is there a theory about who the killer might be?’

‘You find the killer, that’s all,’ said Huth.

‘But why this particular crime?’ persisted Douglas.

‘Because it’s there,’ said Huth wearily. ‘That should be enough for an Englishman surely.’

Douglas’s mind was filled with fears and objections. He didn’t want any part of this very important investigation, with a sinister SS officer looking over his shoulder all the time. But this was obviously not the moment to voice his objections. A little watery sunlight dribbled through the clouds and lit the shiny streets. The driver used the distinctive police siren and sped past the high walls of the Oval cricket ground.

Douglas said, ‘I will collect you at seven-thirty for the reception in your honour at the Savoy Hotel. But, on the way to your accommodation, in Brook Street, Mayfair, General Kellerman thought you might like to see Buckingham Palace and the Houses of Parliament.’

‘General Kellerman is a peasant,’ said Huth affably in German.

‘And does that mean you would like to drive past Buckingham Palace or not?’

‘It means, my dear Superintendent, that I have not the slightest intention of spending the evening watching a roomful of army officers, and their overdressed women, guzzling champagne, and, between mouthfuls of smoked salmon, telling me the best place to buy Staffordshire china.’ He continued to speak German, using the word ‘fressen’, normally used to describe the eating habits of livestock.

‘Take me to my office,’ said Huth. ‘And get the best damned pathologist available to look at Peter Thomas tonight. I want to be there for the postmortem.’ He saw the bewilderment on Douglas’s face. ‘You’ll soon get used to the way I work.’

A man can get used to yellow fever, thought Douglas, but many of them die in the attempt. ‘So I’ll cancel the reception?’

‘And deprive Kellerman and his friends of their party? What sort of fellow are you, Superintendent, a kill-joy?’

He gave a soft laugh. Then he rapped the glass partition again and shouted ‘Scotland Yard!’ to the driver.

Chapter Six (#ulink_963fcba4-dab2-57c2-b785-6338d6367a5c)

And so, at the very time when General Kellerman, HSSPf (Senior SS and Police Leader) Great Britain, was playing host to some of the senior officials in London, their guest of honour was in a mortuary behind Baker Street wearing a white butcher’s apron and watching Peter Thomas’s corpse being slashed open by Sir John Shields, the pathologist.

It was a grim little building, set back from Paddington Street by enough space for the hearses and ambulances to unload behind the oak doors that make the entrance so innocuous to passers-by. The interior of the mortuary building had received so many coats of dark green and brown paint that the brickwork was now smooth and shiny, like its stone stairs and polished wooden floor. The low-power light bulbs provided only small puddles of dull yellow light, except where a green-shaded brass lamp had been pulled down close to Peter Thomas’s pale dead belly.

There were nine people present: Huth, Sir John Shields and his assistant, Douglas Archer, a man from the coroner’s office, a clerk, two mortuary workers in rubber aprons and waterproof boots, and a fussy little German police Major who had also flown in from Hamburg that day. He took notes, and continually asked for translations of bits of Shields’s impassive commentary. There were too many people round the slab, and Douglas readily conceded his place in the front row. He had no taste for these gory excursions, and even with his eyes averted, the sounds of the knife and hacksaw and the gurgling liquids made him want to retch. ‘Haemorrhage, haemorrhage, haemorrhage!’ said Shields, indicating with the knife. They peered closely at the dead man’s insides. ‘I don’t like the look of his liver,’ said Shields, grabbing it, cutting it free and holding it nearer to the light. ‘What do you think, doctor?’ His voice echoed in the dark mortuary.

Shields’s assistant prodded the liver, and looked at it through a magnifying glass for a long time. Shields bent down to sniff at the corpse.

‘Explain to me,’ said Huth impatiently.

‘Diseased,’ said the doctor. ‘Most interesting. I’ve never seen one quite like it. I wonder how the fellow kept going.’

The little German police Major was scribbling in his notebook. Then he, too, wanted to look at the liver through a magnifying glass. ‘How near to death was he due to failure of the liver?’ he asked in German and waited while his query was translated by Huth.

‘I’d not like to answer that,’ said Sir John. ‘A man can go the devil of a time with a bad liver – you should see the chaps at my club!’ He laughed.

‘This is not a joke,’ said Huth. ‘Was the man sick?’

‘He certainly was,’ said Sir John.

‘To death?’

‘I wouldn’t have given him more than a couple of months, would you, doctor?’

Sir John’s assistant demonstrated agreement by means of a noisy intake of breath, and a slight shake of the head.

Huth put his arm round the shoulder of the Major and steered him away, out of earshot, where they stood and whispered together. Sir John clearly thought this a breach of good manners and he did nothing to hide his annoyance.