A Visible Darkness Part 33

'I do not think you have, Herr Procurator.' The words thundered from his lips. 'That note says you can come in here and ask me about the prisoners. My prisoners, I repeat. Now, I've told you what you want to know, and there's an end of it. You'll not speak to any man. Not while I'm in charge of them. They're my responsibility while they stay on Prussian soil. I won't have riots. I won't have Spain breaking out in the port of Konigsberg. Not if I can help it.'

His words were wild, but what came next was wilder. He was on his feet in an instant, lantern in hand, rushing to the barred gate in a fury, calling for me to follow, shouting at his lads to bring me if they had to.

I did not linger, feeling their hot breath on my collar.

'Just look at them!' Berodstein exploded, wiggling his finger angrily, inviting me to step up to the gate and see what he was looking at, holding up his light to aid me.

I heard the sharp intake of the twins' breath.

Wounded prisoners were stretched out on the floor. Those crushing close to the door pulled back like a widening ripple where a stone has landed in a still lake. I searched the frightened faces for a glimpse of Adam Ansbach, but I did not see him.

The stench which entered my mouth and nostrils was like a physical blow.

Berodstein dropped his lantern closer to the ground, pointing. 'There, sir,' he said. 'Look at that one! That's a Prussian rebel, that is.'

I squatted down, the better to see the man that he was indicating.

His face was deathly pale above bruised eyes. His cheeks and chin were stained dark red with coagulating gore. Where blood still flowed, it gleamed more brightly. He had been severely beaten. The tip of his nose was hanging on by a strip of skin, nothing more. His lips were blackcrushed, torn and mangled. Streams of froth dribbled from the corners of his mouth and flowed down his jaw. Each time he breathed, red bubbles blew out of his mouth. His head lolled, and I glimpsed a hole in his cheek. The edges were serrated, ragged, the teeth showing through.

'Pretty, ain't he?' Berodstein sneered.

Suddenly, the man collapsed. His face fell with a sharp crack into a large metal bowl. His hands were tied to the wall. If he was going to fall, that was where he would land. Over a bowl of dirty water.

'He's in the s.h.i.t, so to speak.' Berodstein laughed.

The animals behind me began to howl.

As the man gasped for air, I saw the horrid traces of brown slime on his skin.

'That's where they p.i.s.s and s.h.i.t,' said Berodstein.

Suddenly, he was shouting at the other prisoners. 'If I catch you doing it anywhere else, you b.a.s.t.a.r.ds, you'll get the same treatment!'

'What crime has he committed?' I asked.

'He was talking,' Berodstein snarled, as if it were obvious. 'Talking to the other prisoners. I will not have it! I set my boys on him, I did. They've got their mother's teeth. Most terrible weapons, that's what they are.'

As he spoke, he patted one of the twins affectionately on the shoulder. Like a jealous hound, the other one pushed his brother aside, seeking equal favour from their master.

'They smell rebellion, sir. Don't like it any more than I do. I had to drag them off. They'd have killed him otherwise. There's always one or two that won't be told. Born rebellious, they are. I spot them, and I set my boys on them. It keeps the others in their place. By the time the ship comes in, these Prussian scabs will be glad to get away from here, wherever they're sent.'

It came to me in a flash.

I slid my hand inside my bag, grasped the rolled-up bundle of papers lying at the bottom. I pulled them out, and waved them in his face.

'Your secret's out, I'm afraid,' I said.

Berodstein's eyes flashed wide with alarm.

'What are they, sir?'

They were the seditious handbills Gurten had brought from Lotingen, the ones naming me as a collaborator of the French, d.a.m.ning me as a traitor. I did not tell him the contents, obviously.

'General Malaport must be warned of the danger,' I lied. 'He must read for himself what is written here. Your beasts have attracted attention. Our nationalists have got it in for you. You're on their target-list, I'm afraid, Herr Berodstein. I'd look about most carefully when you leave this place to night.'

'Me, sir?'

'They say they'll do to you what you have done to them!' I said, pointing in the direction of the prisoners with the scroll of papers.

'Where did you find those sheets, sir?'

His face had drained of colour. His boys began to whimper at the sight of him. I could not see their ears beneath their long black hair, but would have sworn that they were flattened against their skulls, the way dogs do when danger threatens.

'Hanging outside your door,' I said. 'The rebels know what goes on here. They have decided where to start their own guerrilla war in Konigsberg.'

There was no need for me to say more. Berodstein's hand was on his heart. He opened and closed his mouth, but not a word came out. His Siberian 'hounds' stood close together, eyes fixed on the father who had rescued them from the wilds and generously brought them back to civilisation.

'Regarding General Malaport,' I said, 'there's one thing in my power to do.'

'What's that, sir?' Berodstein spluttered.

'I may not tell him,' I said. 'It all depends on you.'

'Me, sir?'

I let him think on it for a moment only. No repressive measures would be taken by the French against him, his boys, or his warehouse. Prussian prisoners would continue to go to the convict ships, and he would still be paid.

'Give me the pa.s.senger-list,' I snapped.

Berodstein swiped up his notebook from the table, his expression as black as coal.

'Here, sir. This is it.'

'Show me the page. Hold it up!'

'It's this one, sir.'

I ran my finger down the list.

'Magda Ansbach,' I read out loud.

'Ca.n.a.l-digging down in Hook of Holland,' he said. 'As I said, she's going out today on La Pleiade . . .'

'Where is the son?' I asked him, speaking between clenched teeth. 'Adam Ansbach. They were supposed to be deported together.'

'Next page. Got another boat due in tomorrow. Le Pet.i.t Caporal out of . . .'

'Where is she bound?' I asked.

'French Indies, sir.'

I handed back the book.

'Cancel out the name of Adam Ansbach,' I said, watching carefully as he sat himself down at his desk, slid upon a drawer, took out a jar of ink and a mangy quill, and began to do so.

'Write Adam's name on the list of La Pleiade.'

Berodstein raised his eyes to mine.

'These are official orders. Changing names on the lists is a punishable crime, sir.'

'Do it.' I waved my papers at him.

He took a deep breath, then he obeyed.

He reached inside the drawer again, took out a pot of sand and sprinkled it over the ink. He wheezed hot breath onto the page, then shook the sand away, and handed me the book.

'They'll go out together, if the wind holds fair,' he said.

I held up the roll of handbills up, grasping them in my fists.

Piece by piece, fragment by fragment, I began to rip them up, cancelling my own name, cancelling out the names of my wife and babies, the threats which had been aimed at us. When not one readable bit remained, I threw the pieces into the air.

They fell to the floor like flakes of dirty snow.

26.

'GO TO KNEIPHOF,' Berodstein had said.

How many times in my life had I heard that phrase?

The very first time, I was still a very young child. No more than five or six years old, playing hide-and-seek with my brother, Stefan, I had taken refuge beneath the table in the kitchen when I overheard a conversation.

'You tell him to go to Kneiphof!' the house maid squealed with laughter.

'That rogue don't know where Kneiphof is!' the chambermaid grumbled.

I asked my father what they meant.

'Kneiphof, Hanno?' he replied brusquely. 'You'll learn soon enough.'

General Wagramberg's wife explained the riddle some weeks later. While taking tea and biscuits with my mother, she chucked me playfully under the chin. 'G.o.d bless me, Hanno,' she said with a smile, 'you are growing. It won't be long before you're charging off to Kneiphof.'

I asked her what she meant.

'It's a popular saying in Konigsberg.' She laughed. 'A man goes to Kneiphof to purchase a pledge for a person that he holds very dear. From the jewellery shops. Which signifies that he is about to be engaged. It means that he intends to marry, and eventually become a father.'

It is an old Prussian tradition. The matrimonial pledge is a setting of fine Baltic amber. My mother had an elaborate complet necklace, pendant, earrings and braceletsthat my father gave her when he proposed. The amber gems were large, translucent, smooth, round. The gift was from a shop in Kneiphof. The tradesman's name was impressed in the blue silk lining of the jewellery-case. But for the life of me, I could not remember it.

I had bought Helena a diamond ring when I proposed to her, instead. It came from the shop of a noted merchant in the city of Hamburg: three rose-cuts, one quite large, and two flanking smaller brilliants. Helena was overjoyed when I presented her with the box, though surprised when she opened it.

'A clean break with outmoded tradition, Hanno,' she said ironically, smiling as she slipped the ring onto the middle finger of her left hand.

We were married three months later.

I walked across the Kramerbrucke bridge to the leafy isle of Kniephof, which is the oldest part of Konigsberg. The buildings there are made of crumbling wattle and timber for the most part. In that location, Leonard Euler posed his famous puzzle relating to the seven bridges which link the island to the city: could one cross them all in turn without crossing the same bridge twice?

I was thinking of a different problem as I stepped off the bridge.

The puzzle which tormented me was always the same: illegal amber, amber containing insects, the women who died transporting it, the person who had murdered them. Nordcopp, Nordbarn, Konigsberg. How did all the pieces fit together?

I turned left on the cobbled quay, my mother's amber treasure again in my thoughts.

What was the jeweller's name?

The town across the water was a delightful vision, despite the damage to the castle caused the previous year by the French bombardment. And Kneiphof was a tranquil spot-few people about, though it was a warm, balmy evening. The sun was low and slanting, the river-bank was tree-lined, it was cool in the shade. The castle bells struck five, but I was rea.s.sured by that. Our shops rarely close before six or seven in the evening. Long shadows stretched out from the shops by the waterside.

They were jewellers' shops. All of them.

I walked along the row, glancing in at the windows, looking up at the signs.

My thoughts returned to Nordcopp. Much of the amber in these shops had come from that sh.o.r.e. It was stained with the blood of Kati Rodendahl and Ilse Bruen. Tainted with the sights and the smells of the coast where they had worked. Behind each polished cabochon, I saw the mangled face of Hilde Bruckner, labouring over her grindstone. Each flash of light from those glistening amber jewels was like forked lightning striking the sea, reflecting the fear in the eyes of Edviga Lornerssen, who risked her life every time she prodded the pebbles with her stick, or reached too far with her heavy net. And deep inside those stones, at the very heart of them, lay the secret of the man who was butchering the women.

KLAUS FLUGGE & SON.

I halted.

That was the name inside my mother's presentation case.

The shop was small, the window bowed, the mullions sagging out like tired knees. Honeycomb panes of gla.s.s, as round as wine-bottles, were grey with age. Two flickering candlesticks flanked a blue cloth. On this dark field, amber had been laid out on display. A double row of oval beads with a gold clasp, the centre piece carved as a cameo. Little wooden trees held earrings en girandole, dangling amber grapes. Before the war, the style was much in vogue. Helena possessed a beautiful pair made up of cl.u.s.tered amethysts and pearls. We had been obliged to trade them for a sack of flour and some pork chops not long after Jena.

No amethysts or pearls for Flugge & Son.

Every jewel in the window was amber, as if they cared for nothing else. The range of colours was vast: pale yellow, dark red, streaked orange, intense chocolate brown, and every shade in between. I peered more closely at the goods on display, looking for a fern, a leaf, some trace of animal or insect life. There was not one relic of the Garden of Eden in that window.

I pushed the narrow door, and a bell clinked.

Two ruffled heads bobbed behind the counter. One white, the other dark brown. Two men bent over a pewter tray containing beads of amber. They looked up as I closed the door. Left eyes pinched tight closed, their right eyes took stock of me by means of a metal tube like a miniature cannon. A tight metal band held these instruments of torture to their heads.

'Am I disturbing you?' I enquired.

Like a pair of showmen in the theatre, they simultaneously pushed these cannons onto their brows, and smiled in welcome. I might have been viewing two portraits of the same person made at a distance of a generation. Their faces were of a type, but vigour, colour and animation were absent from the face of the younger man. The old man's hair was thick and wiry, dark as teak. Clear grey eyes peered keenly out of deep, dark sockets. Bushy eyebrows, a strong nose and large mouth denoted character, the ability to smile and encourage, or to issue a sharp rebuke. The son's portrait was the pale ghost of his father's, as if the artist had failed to a.s.sert what he intended to show.