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Rex considered his greatest strength to be his ability to lock away his emotions and get the job done. For that reason, on the night of the stabbing while he awaited news of the boy’s fate, the political serendipity of the incident didn’t pass him by. Not that he wished the boy harm. Rather, Rex’s vanity didn’t allow for him to be painted as the bad guy, and the night’s ills reassured him he acted with good judgement in his plan to close the circus.
He spent the day working on matters of state, with Jessy slumbering by his side, looking at worrying anti-Semitism trends and agreeing to increase police presence at the nation’s synagogues. Corinne brought him up to speed on cyber threats from foreign agents, and he chaired a round-table of key people combatting terrorism. He loved the variety of his job on a daily, even hourly basis; he loved the importance it attached to him. The responsibility might be great, but he’d been born for a role like this. His parents, his teachers, even his wife had told him so, not that he’d needed to hear it. Ambition was threaded through every cell in his body.
In the late afternoon, when the dog grew impatient and needed to empty her bladder, he whistled to her, slipped his jacket on, and said his goodbyes to Corinne.
“Minister, are you sure it’s wise for you to undertake this meeting? Should I not go in your stead?”
Corinne had been with him since the early days of his political ascent, and though her salary paled in comparison to his, there was no one whose judgement he trusted more. Still, he couldn’t send her in his place, not into a possibly volatile situation. He owed her more than that. Besides, controlling all the pieces was his forte. His instincts told him that his political survival depended on how he handled the growing rumbles of xenophobia, and he needed to assess for himself whether each pawn in his plan functioned as it was supposed to.
“It’s a few words, Corinne. If I’m accused of anything untoward, then I’ll say I was walking Jessy. Besides, when do you ever leave here before ten? Go home, for once.”
“In that case, this is where I’ve asked him to meet you,” she pointed to a red x drawn onto a map. “It’s not covered by cameras, and off the usual tourist route. Are you sure you don’t want me to call your driver round?”
The fewer witnesses to this meeting, the better. Corinne’s file had provided him with all the ammunition he needed. “No, you can dismiss him for the day. Best keep this between just the two of us.”
He walked from his office in the Interior Ministry to the hollowed out spot of Tiergarten not far from the Holocaust Memorial. The sky hung in silver threads above them, strewn with puffs of candy-floss. Soon, the sun would set, and the tourists that milled around the tombstones of the memorial would disperse. Beside him, Jessy trotted happily, her long tail wagging as she went. Weimaraners had originally been bred as gun dogs for aristocrats, and even now as Jessy walked beside him, noble in gait, full of purpose, it struck him how suited they were to one another.
Situated a short walk away from the Reichstag and the Brandenburg Gate, the Holocaust Memorial was startlingly visible. Up close, the sheer mass of stone and voids created by the pillared grid stood as a testament to the six million Jews murdered by the Nazis. Ironic then to be on his way to meet a far right extremist, and a Holocaust denier at that.
Rex shook his head. To not use your intellect constituted a high crime. What drove men to refute naked truths, however horrifying or unpalatable they might be? How could they possibly surmise that the Third Reich only sought to deport Jews when a deluge of historical evidence spoke otherwise? How could school children visit the concentration camp at Sachsenhausen and grow up to be men who denied the existence of gas chambers?
Still, the ecosystem of mankind meant that even stupidity had its uses. A bitter taste invaded his mouth. Politics could be a grimy business. So, Rex found himself alone with a neo-Nazi in a corner of Tiergarten not overlooked by cameras, under a cluster of maple trees. Karl Klein, leader of a militant group and publisher of colourful pamphlets fuelling anti-immigrant sentiment, waited under a canopy of leaves, propped up against a tree trunk with gnarled roots. He wore a faded terracotta t-shirt, which exposed his bulging forearms.
“Evening,” said Karl, holding out his hand.
Jessy growled at his sudden movement.
“Ssh, Jessy,” said Rex, shaking Karl’s outstretched hand.
“A nice evening for a walk.” Karl ran square fingers through his lopsided fringe.
Wariness danced underneath Rex’s much prized image of power and overt masculinity. He didn’t consider himself physically at risk. He had Jessy with him, after all, and she could be a ferocious thing when the situation called for it. He valued his own life too much to place himself in danger, but meeting Karl unsettled him.
Corinne’s file included photographs and revealed a man who hid his beliefs beneath a façade of normality. Karl blended into his environment, much like Rex did: hiding his predatory impulses in plain sight. This was no shaven-headed Nazi. His dogged nature, willingness to get his hands dirty, and a talent for recruiting others to his cause had endeared him to those prominent in the far right. He’d risen higher up the ranks than the mere thugs. Neither did he speak like one. Karl’s silver tongue contrasted with the man Rex knew him to be. A man who had once punched a young Afro-German woman in the face, breaking three of her teeth. A man with strong links to the alt-right at home and abroad, and whose social media showed a mastery of the dark web. A man who had riled up his youngest recruits with so much bile and bravado, they had set a Turkish supermarket alight. A man who was even more dangerous because he couldn’t outrun his future. The police case against him had finally reached a tipping point.
He was just the person required to stir up trouble for the circus.
“We’re not here for small talk, are we?” said Rex. “Let me get to the point. The Treptow Circus is in trouble.”
“And you’ve seen the error of your ways in supporting that rabble?” Karl cocked a half-smile, revealing pearlescent veneers that hid a history of menace.
Rex looked away from the man, and shielded his eyes against the dying sun. Across the vista of Tiergarten, students lounged on the grass and office workers recouped their energy after long days staring at screens. How refreshing to live one day at a time, rather than plan like a chess master. What might his life have been had he taken another path? He sighed, and let Jessy off her lead. She hovered, unwilling to go far with a stranger so close to her master.
Rex turned to Karl. “Tell me, do you ever think about the human impact of your...business?”
Karl laughed, but Rex didn’t reciprocate, and Karl’s sheen of charm evaporated on the wind. “Being soft is a luxury for those who have it all. But people like me, we have something too. We shatter taboos. We have energy and vitality. We are not scared to speak truth to power. We are creative and not trapped by the structures the elite build.”
Rex rolled his eyes and his voice became steel. “Those very structures are closing in on you.”
Karl pushed himself off the tree trunk and drew near. Amber eyes watched from the undergrowth just beyond, ready to pounce. The two men stood face to face, the neo-Nazi a full head shorter than Rex.
“A good lawyer will see me off,” said Karl.
Rex looked down and could see his own eyes reflected in Karl’s sunglasses. He noted, not for the first time, the advantages that came with being a tall man. He could crush this imbecile like a cockroach. He released his words through gritted teeth. “Don’t count on it. You’re scum. You deserve to be locked up.”
“Then why are you here, Herr Minister?” Karl laughed, flashing his perfect teeth.
“I’m nothing like you,” said Rex. Conviction raced through his body, making him stand taller still.
A hint of a raised eyebrow. “You carry on believing that.”
The thin band of civility which held Rex together beneath his air of polish snapped. “Shut up, fool. It’s only a matter of time before you’re in prison again.”
Karl bristled. “You’re lying.”
“The case against you used to be wafer-thin. You were shrewd enough to cover your tracks. But arrogance has a knack of tripping people up. You’re getting sloppy. And your victims aren’t as frightened as they used to be. Funny what the promise of extra protection does.”
“You bastard.” His words whipped through the still air around them.
Jessy came bounding over, and Rex, calm and collected, slipped on her lead. “Remember who you’re speaking to before you say something you regret.”
Karl took off his sunglasses, and Rex’s china blue eyes met his bloodshot ones. “Well, the gloves are off, aren’t they?”
“I suppose they are,” said Rex. “But then, you have so much to lose, Karli. That is what your little sister calls you?”
Karl grew pale, and his eyes became narrow slits in an expressionless face. In the corner of his mouth, a nerve twitched.
Bingo, thought Rex. “She’s only fifteen, right? Your parents are so old now. They won’t be around forever, and your father’s gambling debts are already out of control. What’s Julia going to do without you?”
Karl clenched his fists. “You leave my sister out of this. She’s not me. She’s not in my world.”
Rex continued, unabashed. “She has such talent. It’d be a shame to let that go to waste, to let her despair about you propel her away from the path she’s on.”
Karl winced. “What do you want?”
Beside Rex, Jessy’s body stretched taut like a wire, every nerve ending assessing the threat.
“I need a blunt tool. That’s all.”
“And if I get caught?” Karl’s defiance peeled away. All that remained was pleading.
Rex shook his head, like the executioner’s guillotine. “I’m afraid that ball is already rolling. The choices you made long ago are catching up with you, Herr Klein.”
“You can’t keep me out of prison?”
The wolf had morphed into a lamb. Part of Rex felt sorry for the man. “No, I cannot. But if you help me, I’ll see to it that Julia gets into the best art college and secures an apprenticeship of her choice.”
“No, that’s not enough. An apprenticeship is not enough. What happens when that ends? I need to know she’ll be able to look after herself.”
“Fine. I’ll see to it that there’s a job waiting for her on the other side. I have a wide range of contacts. She can take her pick. You’ll never have to worry about her again.”
Karl held his gaze. “I have your word?”
Rex bowed his head, low and deep. “Of course.”
“Okay, we have a deal,” said Karl.
“One more thing.”
“Yes?”
Rex passed him a slip of paper. “Everything from this point forward goes through my assistant. If we are publicly linked, our deal is off.”
Karl replaced his sunglasses on his nose gave a mock salute. “Yes, Sir.” Then he reached into his pocket for a small flask and took a swig before sauntering off into the park.
