A Man Without Breath (Bernie Gunther Mystery 9) (56 page)

I sat down and waited patiently for someone to come and say what was to become of me. But it wasn’t any use. Nobody came.

Monday, May 3rd 1943

They released me a couple of hours before the court proceedings, so I might wash and eat something and put on my uniform and consult with Judge Johannes Conrad, who had kindly agreed to defend me. We met in an office at the army Kommandatura, where Conrad informed me that I was charged with the attempted murder of Alok Dyakov, who was also the principal witness; that von Schlabrendorff was to prosecute; and that Field Marshal von Kluge was presiding over the court by himself.

‘Can he do that?’ I asked Conrad. ‘He’s hardly impartial.’

‘He’s a field marshal,’ said Conrad. ‘He can pretty much do whatever the hell he wants in this theatre. The Kaiser had rather less power than Von Kluge commands in the Smolensk Oblast.’

‘Doesn’t he need two other judges?’

‘Not really,’ said Conrad. ‘There’s no legal requirement that there should be two other judges. And even if there were they’d only do what he told them anyway.’ He shook his head. ‘It doesn’t look good, you know. I think he really means to
hang you. In fact he almost seems to be in an indecent hurry to do so.’

‘I’m not really worried about that,’ I said. ‘There’s too much evidence against his
Putzer
, Dyakov. As soon as that comes out this whole thing will collapse like a paper house.’

I told Conrad what I’d learned about who Dyakov really was and that Colonel von Gersdorff and the NKVD file on Major Krivyenko he had spent all of Saturday translating would prove everything I said.

‘The colonel and I have been working pretty closely on this one,’ I said. ‘He’s just as keen to prove Dyakov is really Major Krivyenko as I am. There’s no love lost between those two.’

Conrad looked pained. ‘That’s all very well,’ he said, ‘but Colonel von Gersdorff hasn’t been seen since the commandant’s dinner in the officers’ mess at the department store on Saturday evening. And no one seems to know where he is.’

‘What?’

‘He received a message while he was at the dinner, got up and left and hasn’t been seen since. His car is gone, too.’

I swallowed uncomfortably. Was it possible that Krivyenko had already murdered the colonel when he’d tried to shoot me? That would certainly have explained why he was so confident of remaining at liberty.

‘See if you can find out an exact time that the colonel left the department store dinner,’ I said.

Johannes Conrad nodded.

‘Then I need you to send an urgent message to the ministry of propaganda.’

‘I already did that,’ explained Conrad. ‘Dr Goebbels is in Dortmund right now. Unfortunately communications and rail links there have been disrupted because of an RAF bombing raid the other night. The heaviest since Cologne, apparently.
And our own local communications have been disrupted by a new Russian offensive, in the Kuban and Novorossisk sectors.’

‘I’m beginning to understand Von Kluge’s indecent haste,’ I said. ‘What about the War Crimes Bureau? What about Judge Goldsche? Did you manage to contact him?’

‘Yes. But there’s not much consolation there, either.’

‘Oh?’

‘I’m afraid Judge Goldsche’s hands are tied,’ said Conrad. ‘As you know the bureau is just a section within the legal department of the military High Command. He takes his orders from the international law section of the OKW and Maximilian Wagner; and Wagner – who’s been ill anyway – well, he takes his orders from Dr Rudolf Lehmann. And I’m sorry to tell you this, but Lehmann is unlikely to do anything at all. The politics are delicate here, I’m afraid, Gunther.’

‘So’s my neck.’

‘You see, recently Lehmann wrote a memo to the Foreign Office arguing that the perpetrators of French war crimes against German soldiers should be a matter left to the French courts. He also ordered a stay of all executions in France, in order to improve relations with the French government. Neither of these went down very well with some of our more senior generals in Berlin, who felt that Lehmann had overstepped himself and that these were matters for local army commanders, most of whom dislike lawyers at the best of times. And that’s not all. Rudolf Lehmann’s from Posen, just like Von Kluge; he’s an East Prussian who’s a close friend of the field marshal and owes his advancement as colonel general of the armed forces legal department to none other than Günther von Kluge. There’s no way on earth Dr Lehmann’s going to try to interfere with the way Von Kluge runs things
at Army Group Centre. Not without losing his power base and main patron.’ Conrad sighed. ‘I’m sorry, Gunther, but that’s just how it is.’

I nodded and lit one of Conrad’s cigarettes. Outside it was the warmest day of the year; everyone – even the Russians – had a smile on his face as if summer was truly here at last. Everyone except me that is.

‘General von Tresckow,’ I said. ‘Speak to him, will you, please? He owes me a favour. A big Magnetophon-sized favour. You might remind him of that. And you might use those exact words. He’ll know what it means.’

‘The general is out of town since yesterday,’ said Conrad. ‘As you might know there’s a major offensive being planned north of here at a place called Kursk, and as chief operations officer of AGC he’s up there discussing logistical support with Field Marshal von Manstein and General Model. He won’t be back in Smolensk until Thursday.’

‘By which time I will have been hanged.’ I grinned. ‘Yes, I do begin to see the full extent of my predicament.’

‘I also spoke to Lieutenant Voss,’ said Conrad. ‘He is prepared to testify on your behalf.’

‘Well, that’s a relief.’

‘Reluctantly.’

‘He’s afraid of angering the field marshal.’

‘Of course. The field marshal has been very supportive of the field police in this theatre. It was the field marshal who gave Voss his infantry assault badge. And who made sure that the field police were given what is considered to be a very comfortable billet at Grushtshenki.’ He shrugged. ‘Under the circumstances he’s not likely to make a very convincing witness.’

‘I don’t seem to have many friends, do I?’

‘There’s another thing,’ said Conrad.

‘Yes?’

‘Professor Buhtz – who also owes his current position to Field Marshal von Kluge, one might even go so far as to say his rehabilitation – has carried out some forensic tests on your personal Walther PPK. He’s not absolutely certain – due to a lack of proper equipment here in Smolensk, the tests have been inconclusive – but it seems there’s a possibility that your gun was used to murder Signals Corporal Quidde. It’s been suggested – by Professor Buhtz – that you might have shot Quidde.’

I shrugged. ‘Well, I don’t see that the fact that it was my gun proves anything,’ I said. ‘Von Gersdorff’s broom-handle Mauser was used to murder Dr Berruguete. Very likely Krivyenko is trying to frame me for Berruguete, in the same way that he tried to frame Colonel von Gersdorff.’

‘Yes, I do see that, captain,’ said Conrad. ‘Unfortunately Krivyenko is not the one who is on trial here. You are. And you might like to consider this as well. That Mauser was found in your hut, not Dyakov’s. Sorry, I mean Krivyenko.’

I smiled. ‘You have to admire someone’s housekeeping,’ I said. ‘Hanging me is an excellent way of sweeping a lot of our unsolved crime into the nearest mousehole.’

‘Frankly I think your only real chance is to admit that you made an error of judgement,’ said Conrad. ‘To throw yourself on the mercy of the court and admit that while you did indeed shoot Alok Dyakov, you did not mean to kill him. I don’t see any other alternative.’

‘That’s my best defence?’

‘I think so.’ He shrugged. ‘Then we’ll see about getting you off the other charges. Perhaps by then the colonel will have turned up back in Smolensk.’

‘Yes, perhaps.’

‘Look, I believe what you say. But without any evidence to support your story, proving it to the satisfaction of this court as it is convened is going to be almost impossible. It can’t be denied that there’s an element of bad timing in all of this.’

‘Not just an element.’ I let out a breath. ‘It’s the whole periodic table.’

I rubbed my neck nervously. ‘They say that the prospect of being hanged concentrates a man’s mind wonderfully. I’m not sure I’d have used the word wonderfully. But there’s certainly no doubt about the concentration. Especially when you’ve seen a few hangings yourself.’

‘You’re talking about Hermichen and Kuhr.’

‘Who else?’ I pulled my tunic collar away from my neck – it was tight – and took a long steady breath. ‘You might as well tell me. That window-frame gallows in the prison yard at Kiewerstrasse. Have they erected it again?’

‘I really don’t know,’ said Conrad.

Since he’d just come from interviewing a potential Katyn witness at the prison at Kiewerstrasse, I knew he was lying.

For a moment I had a nightmare vision of myself strangling on the gallows at Kiewerstrasse, my feet swinging loose like a flap, one shoulder reaching for the sky, my tongue hanging out of my mouth like a mollusc leaving its shell. And my heart missed a beat, and then another.

‘Do me a favour,’ I told Conrad. ‘I’m going to write a letter for Dr Kramsta. If I really do swing for this, will you see that she gets it?’

*

My court martial began in the army Kommandatura at ten a.m., in the very same room where Hermichen and Kuhr had been tried back in March before being hanged, of course.
After my conversation with Field Marshal von Kluge, that had seemed a foregone conclusion – to me and to him. No doubt he was feeling the same way about these latest proceedings. I was sure of that as he entered the room with a scowl and avoided my eye altogether. I’ve sat through enough criminal trials to know that’s not a good sign. He looked at his wristwatch. That wasn’t a good sign either. Presumably he was hoping to find me guilty so that I could be hanged before lunch.

Of course I could perhaps have said one thing to disrupt my trial, although I thought it would actually do very little to save my life. My unsubstantiated allegation – the tape was now destroyed, of course – that Adolf Hitler had paid a substantial bribe in return for Von Kluge’s loyalty was hardly likely to endear me to my judge, and the chances were very strong that he would have ordered my immediate execution anyway; especially as there also remained his probable involvement in the murders of the two signalsmen from the castle who might have overheard his conversation with the leader. Surely this was the very thing he was in a hurry to cover up. Would my mentioning any of this in court actually change anything? Who among the Prussian knights and barons of the Wehrmacht would believe a peasant like me, instead of a fellow aristocrat?

No, Judge Conrad was right. My only real chance was to admit a terrible mistake – to throw myself on the mercy of the military court and to confess that while I had indeed shot Alok Dyakov, twice, I had not actually meant to kill him. That much was true, at least. And surely even a field marshal could not order the execution of a German officer for merely wounding a Russian
Putzer
. Rape and murder was one thing; a simple case of bodily harm on an Ivan was another.

But it was soon clear that I was wrong. In spite of my plea, Von Kluge still intended to hear all of the evidence, which could only mean one thing: that he meant to hang me anyway, but needed to justify it with his
Putzer
’s evidence – the Russian’s story that I had actually meant to kill him.

Krivyenko, his left arm heavily bandaged and in a sling, but otherwise looking none the worse for wear, was, I have to say, a very convincing witness – as you might have expected of a man who was a major in the NKVD. From the way he talked, I had the strong impression that mine wasn’t the first show trial he had attended or given evidence in: he spoke with a show of probity that would have convinced the Inquisition. He even managed to look like he regretted having to tell the court how I had threatened and tortured him with one gunshot and then another. At one stage real tears rolled down his face as he told the court how he had genuinely feared for his life. Even I was convinced of my own guilt.

The Russian had almost finished giving his evidence when to my everlasting relief, the door at the back of the courtroom opened and Colonel von Gersdorff walked in. His entrance caused quite a stir, not because he was late but because he was accompanied by a small man in the uniform of a German admiral. Admirals were hardly common in that landlocked part of Russia. The man had white hair, a sailor’s ruddy complexion, bushy eyebrows and round shoulders. The only decoration on his rather shabby tunic was a first-class Iron Cross – as if that was really all that was needed. I guessed at once who it was, even if I didn’t recognize him myself. Von Kluge had no such problem, and he and the rest of the court stood up immediately, for the man was the head of the Abwehr after all – none other than Admiral Wilhelm Canaris. He himself was accompanied by two wire-haired
dachshunds that stayed loyally at the heels of shoes that had seen better days.

‘Gentlemen, please, forgive this interruption,’ Canaris said quietly. He glanced around the room, which was now, to a man, standing at attention, and smiled gently. ‘Easy gentlemen, easy.’

The court relaxed. Everyone except Field Marshal von Kluge that is, who looked thoroughly bewildered by the arrival of Germany’s spymaster.

‘Wilhelm,’ stammered Von Kluge. ‘What a surprise. I wasn’t informed. No one – I had no idea that you were coming to Smolensk.’

‘Nor had I,’ said Canaris. ‘And to be quite frank with you, I nearly didn’t get here. My plane had to turn back to Minsk with engine trouble, and Colonel von Gersdorff here was obliged to come and fetch me in his car, which is a six-hundredkilometre round trip. But we made it, somehow. I can’t answer for the poor baron but I’m very pleased to be here.’

‘I’m fine, sir,’ said Von Gersdorff, and winked at me. ‘And after all, it’s a beautiful day.’

‘Yes, now that I’m here I’m very glad I came,’ continued Canaris. ‘For I can see that I’m not too late to play a useful part in these proceedings.’