Thankfully, Father Lardy had left the door unlocked. Bill made his way to the back room of the church. Was it a vestry? Bill wondered. Churches and their geography were never his strong point. He made it a rule to spend as little time as humanly possible asking anyone, invisible or otherwise, for forgiveness. Whatever it was called, it was where he was headed. Bill had no idea what he might find, but whatever it was, he was confident that’s where it would be.
Making his way through the open stone archway, he found himself in an untidy, makeshift bedroom-cum-kitchen. A filthy sunken mattress sprawled across the floor to the right, below a solid oak table covered in crumbs, had deep knife cut marks all over it. On one end was a pile of empty paper bags, the same as the one Bill had taken his sausage away from Mrs Krause’s store, neatly pressed flat and stacked.
Bill noted that there was only enough space for one to sleep as he rechecked the mattress.
He stopped in his tracks as his mind flashed back to Bergen-Belsen. On the day of liberation, the overcrowding had seen dozens of emaciated spectres crammed onto tiny shelves to try to get some rest after the forced death marches from other camps to the east. Filth and disease were rife, and there was no food and very little water. From the very outset, the Nazis had designed suffering into the very fabric of these ghastly places. The meticulous records they had kept there showed the deaths in March 1945 alone had been over eighteen thousand.
He shook the memory and noticed the knuckles of his right hand were white due to his tightly clenched fist. He carried on his search. He had no idea how long he had left in here. Lardy and the man with the Hindenburg moustache and maroon scarf had left together. Lardy had gone, as usual, to the shop, the other man down the hill and away, out of sight.
Looking to the far side of the cold room, Bill spotted a small wood-veneered writing desk, the kind he could imagine Jane Austen or Charles Dickens sitting to write. It might have once been quite in-keeping with the interior of a church, but now it found itself entirely out of place among the squalor of this dishevelled room and under the command of an imposter. Bill was quite sure the man masquerading as the priest was anything but.
The lid of the writing desk yawned open in despair at its current situation, and Bill made his way towards it. He didn’t have much time.
There was a small glass ink well with a well-worn pen poking up like a flag pole, a small, blank notepad with about half the pages torn out, a folded paper bag like the ones on the large table, and a little card shoebox.
Opening the shoebox first, Bill found four brand new Berlin ID cards with all the fields left blank. Worth a small fortune on the black market, but only if you could somehow fake the required rubber stamps, photo style and signatures of the genuinely completed document. There was no sign of a printing press or stamps, so they were either better hidden, or Lardy was outsourcing.
There was also yet another paper bag folded up, which upon inspection contained a wad of paper money. There were French francs, US dollars, marks, and even a few British notes. Closing it back up, Bill spotted the letters EW scrawled on the outside. Ernst Witzer, Bill thought. It had to be. Why would a wanted war criminal like Misselwitz risk getting caught over a few dollars for spinning fake IDs in Berlin?
There was some other loose money, but not much, a few odd crumpled travel tickets to various locations, and an Adox branded folding camera. Bill quickly checked for a film. It was empty. Bill flicked through the tickets. U-Bahn, S-Bahn and trams to places all around the city, but quite a few into the American sector. Particularly Wannsee, in the far southwest.
He replaced the box’s contents and quickly peeked into the other, loose package. There were no markings on this one. Inside he found a brand-new ID card. There was no photograph, no stamp and no other details.
Placing everything back in its place, Bill tore off the top page of the notepad and pocketed it.
“What do you reckon then? The fat man is clearly running a fake ID business, but there isn’t much peculiar about that. This is the city of split personalities.” Jack spoke with his mouth half full of chewed-up bratwurst.
“We could have him arrested on that, alone, but it doesn’t get us any closer to flushing out Misselwitz or finding why he’s even in Berlin at all.” Bill sighed.
Jack poured a small cup of, now cold, coffee from the flask, swirled it a little and threw it down his throat. “That reminds me, did you hear they awarded Violette a posthumous George Cross?”
“Yes, I read it in The Times. A surprisingly honest account, considering what we do is meant to be secret. You don’t hear about many members of the Nursing Yeomanry getting parachuted into hostile territory and holding off a German onslaught with a submachine gun.”
“Her little girl, Tania, collected it from the king. She must be, what? About five now? Poor kid. Never met her father, killed at El-Alamein, and now no mum.”
“I’m sure the king’s trinket will bring her comfort. Maybe she’ll prop it up and ask it to read her a bedtime story?”
“Come on, you and I both know that a GC is a hell of a thing, Bill.”
“Agreed. I’m just pretty sure she’d rather have a mother.”
Another hour had passed as they sat, chatted, and waited. Lardy was back in his holy pied-à-terre, and there had been no further developments. The warm car made the outside appear to be all the colder. A northerly wind whipped between the few standing buildings and made the air vents wheeze like a sleeping old asthmatic bloodhound.
“Lena is in Berlin. Calling herself Irene now.” Secrecy or not, Jack was his partner and had a right to know.
“Really? Well, that’s a turn-up. One of us?”
“Yes. Probably technically our superior, based on my new wheels.”
“I take it you have, er, reconnected then?”
“Who do you think prepared us the flask this morning?”
Bill saw Jack shift in his seat and instinctively scratch the scars on his chest through his jacket. Just then, a tall, thin gentleman in a long pale overcoat strode confidently up the hill and entered the church.
“Probably just another church-goer,” Jack said.
“You don’t honestly still think any of these people believe this is actually still a church, do you?”
“Why not? Perfect cover. Anyway, it’s no more ludicrous than them still thinking God has any sway over the goings-on in Germany,” Jack bluntly pointed out as he gestured around at the devastation caused by the Russians.
“Well, if he is up there; the more I see of Germany and hear about what they got up to in the east, I think he must be long past giving a shit.”
“If Misselwitz is collecting payments, presumably he is running this tin-pot setup?” Jack asked, with as much incredulity as Bill.
“I guess. He’s too clever to turn up here to pick up the money. He’ll be using a drop somewhere, or Lardy is delivering.” Bill brushed breadcrumbs from his makeshift snack off his front and onto the floor of the car, then continued, “He hasn’t been in his apartment for weeks. The concierge didn’t even fit in his uniform. He’s obviously a plant. If he does have contact with him, he’ll already know that someone, who left him nothing but an empty envelope, was sniffing around.”
“And the real concierge?”
“Sacked? Dead? Who knows?”
The tall man appeared from behind the solid door of the church and shiftily looked around. He spotted their two almost matching vehicles and then walked quickly, head down, back towards where he had first emerged.
Bill tutted, “So I guess Lardy knows we are here too.”
“Not very good at this spying lark, are we, mate?” Jack put on his leather gloves, picked up the P38, which had still been between his knees, and placed it carefully back into his inside coat pocket. “So, which one of us is following the tall man?”
“What? Why?”
“He has a small, folded paper bag in his hand.”
Jack cracked his knuckles, rotated his neck around and removed his hat.
“What the hell are you doing?” asked Bill as he put his empty pipe back in his pocket.
They were in the more up-market part of the French sector now. They had carefully followed the tall, thin man down the hill, away from the church. He hadn’t looked back or looked particularly suspicious or cautious, but Bill had a feeling he may well have known he’d been followed.
“I’m just preparing. That bloke might have a billy club in his hand by now.”
“Hardly likely. Did you see him? He looked like he could play hide and seek behind a flagpole.”
“Well, you never know.”
The area was full of tailors, shoe shops and leather goods, all trading from smart-looking storefronts. It was apparent where most of the French money had gone for the rebuilding. Vast swathes of the sector were still rubble and desolation, and yet, here, the shops looked to be lifted straight from Saville Row in London.
Bill checked the street. All clear. He then pushed open the glass door, one hand gripping the revolver inside his right coat pocket.
A little brass bell rang as they entered, and Bill removed his hat and placed it down on the back of a chair near the door. The bookshop opened up into a double-floored atrium. A dead fire sat in the open fireplace to their right, but its warmth remained in the room. The wooden shelves were neatly packed with row upon row of leather-bound books, all carefully colour-coded. The upper floor was accessible by a small iron spiral staircase, and the open side was lined with a brass railing, meticulously polished to a high shine.
This place reminded Bill of the library from his time at Cambridge. There wasn’t much he enjoyed about university, but the library was one of them. He’d spend hour after hour in there, reading as much as possible. Some days it would be Voltaire and Satre, in French, of course. Other days it might be Shakespeare, Twain or Poe. Bill had loved to read once upon a time. He had even set up a proper library in the house, although, he admitted to himself, it had been mainly to sit among the great works and enjoy a whisky and his pipe.
When the war began, there had been no time for such distractions. Since it ended, he didn’t ever find enough downtime to enjoy a book properly. Perhaps he’d never find the time again. He’d even forgotten most of what he’d read. Seeing piles of decaying bodies and innocent people executed will do that to you.
He had brought one of his Arthur Conan Doyle books with him to Berlin but had ended up using it to prop up a broken chair. At that moment, he resolved to find the time to read more often.
The room had the glorious smell of the rich must of old literature and very faintly of wood and tobacco. Passing a little seating area with worn chairs and a smoking stand, they made their way towards the counter at the back, where a large cash register sat among a messy sprawl of books and loose papers.
The thin, tall man appeared from behind the bookshelves like a stick insect.
“Please. Don’t hurt me!”
“Why would we hurt you?” Jack asked.
“You are cops, aren’t you? I’ve not seen you two before, but I have paid Müller this month already. I already apologised for last time. So, there was no need to follow me.”
Bill and Jack waited for more. They had practised the silent-pressure technique.
The thin man continued, “I’m only doing what I have told you about, no extra jobs off the record, I swear. I only sell my books and do the special custom printing work.”
Bill glanced over at Jack. His partner looked as perplexed as Bill was.
“Well, the price just went up. It gets expensive keeping the prying eyes out.” Bill tried his luck.
The Berlin Police were under the control of the Russians. They operated as a supposedly independent force throughout all the sectors, but in reality, all that meant was the crooks, whores and forgers across Berlin all paid the communists to be allowed to operate. It also meant they were not only in their pocket, but any intelligence of interest filtered back, through the police, to Moscow. It was the perfect protection racket and a genius move by the Ivans.
“I can’t afford any more!”
“Well, we’ll have to take some of these books then. There must be some value in them, as fuel at least,” Bill replied.
“No! Please. This is my livelihood. You’re new up here, right? Look, maybe if you come around the back, I can show you the setup, and we can find something that you may be interested in.”
“Sure. We are not unreasonable men. We have been relocated from the American sector, so I am curious to see your setup in person.”
The thin man led the way around the bookshelf, and Bill and Jack followed close behind. Bill kept his gun aimed from within his jacket pocket.
The back of the store was a whole other world. It was a workshop. There were a few different printing presses and two large wooden workbenches. On top of one was what appeared to be a giant’s wooden thumbscrew, surrounded by all kinds of peculiar hand tools scattered carelessly around. A giant ball of string sat on the other bench, which had a large vice attached. At the rear of the workshop was a door with a light above it and yet another bookshelf, curiously out of place and only half-filled with books. Carefully packed down and leaning against it was a camera tripod.
“I have some photographs I have developed, which you may be interested in.”
The man picked up a wooden box and pulled out some photographs, all of the same woman in various states of undress. Each image was more graphic than the last. Her dead-eyed stare at the camera made Bill feel deeply troubled. She had dirty blonde hair and large breasts, and Bill knew he had seen her somewhere before.
“What is this? Is this what all those books are filled with?” Jack demanded.
“No, no.” The man cowered away from Jack. “It’s only a hobby. Please, I just bind books.”
“You don’t pay us protection to bind books. You pay us to look away while you print the fake IDs,” Jack said menacingly.
“Well, not quite. Look, I don’t expect a simple policeman to understand what I do here. I simply fill out the papers they provide me and sort out the photos. Like I say, it’s a hobby of mine. I bet you got your job using false papers, like most of the rest. You’re a big fellow. What were you, SS, Gestapo? If you know anyone that needs papers, send them to me, won’t you?”
“Is that what you are doing for the priest?” Bill asked.
“Of course. What else?”
“Why don’t you print the ID cards here?”
“I do. I mean, I did. But, I mean, I still do, just not for him.”
“What are you babbling about, you lanky streak of piss?” interrupted Jack.
“The priest, he gives me the cards. Only one at a time, but they are the best forgeries I’ve ever seen, totally indistinguishable from the real thing.”
You bet they are indistinguishable, Bill thought.
“I take their photographs, complete the details here, sort out the rubber stamps, then deliver the cards back to him.”
“The latest order is for a man with a moustache like Hindenburg’s?”
“Yes, that’s him. A lovely man.”
“Where is he now?”
“I don’t know. I took his photograph about an hour ago before I headed to the church to collect the card. He really wasn’t here long. I don’t know their names, you know. Always quite hush-hush, as you can imagine. I only get the details required for the card. Some of the customers are downright scary, like your mate here,” he said, gesturing towards Jack.
“I suppose if you had to, you could get me a copy of the photographs of the customers?” said Jack, his arm hanging down by his side. His hand had his gun in it.
“Please, there is no need for this. If you are working on a case and need my help, I will help. I owe the priest nothing. Part of our deal is that I return the card and the negatives. Photographic film, chemicals and paper are not easy to come by or cheap, so I don’t make additional copies. Why would I need them?” Then, suddenly remembering, he added, “I have one of the last chap. You could take that one?”
“Yes, and we’re taking this garbage too. Say anything to Müller or the others, and we’ll be back, and it won’t be pretty,” Jack said as he gathered up the smut from the table and rolled it up into his pocket.