Bernie thinks back to the fall of 1941 when he returned to Berlin from Belorussia where he had witnessed the start of the Holocaust and been involved in the horrific acts recounted in Field Gray. He returns to working in the Homicide department of the Berlin police. Bernie contemplates, even prepares to commit suicide, In the end he goes to unsettled sleep night after night.
It is a difficult time to live in Berlin. Rationing has every common citizen on a diet. Beer, when available, is bitter. Cigarettes have little tobacco. Clothing is restricted. Everything is ersatz. Hospitals are filled with wounded soldiers returned from the Eastern Front to recuperate or die in Germany. I had not thought about the economic consequences on the home front in a great war.
Nazi leadership expects the police to focus on enforcing discriminatory laws against Jews including the requiremenet to wear the yellow cloth star. Crimes such as murder and assault are not a priority. Not surprisingly, Bernie will not overlook murder.
The Gestapo draw him into an investigation of murder. The killer had false ID and may be connected to the Three Kings. They were three Czechs, residents of Bohemia and Moravia if you are a Nazi, who were military officers. They have been conducting sabatoge operations against the Nazis in Bohemia and Moravia and now Berlin. Two have been caught. Pressure is immense upon the Gestapo to capture the third who is known as Melchior.
Bernie makes the acquaintance of a bright and lovely woman, Arianne Tauber, who works at the Jockey Bar. She asserts she is not a “joy girl”. She will accept cigarettes, drinks, perfume, tips and “the odd present or two” for being a good companion to the patrons of the bar.
Being on the Eastern Front has left Bernie impatient with those unwilling to answer his questions. He is quick to use violence to get answers. Bernie’s connections with Heydrich quell those in the police department from complaining about his conduct.
Heydrich summons Bernie to Czechoslovkia. Even Bernie is afraid of the blonde general:
That’s the only way I know that you can distinguish being brave from being stupid.
The general, as with other members of the Nazi elite, lives in sumptuous luxury. His residence is the Lower Castle at Jungfern-Breschan, a beautiful country manor, that was confiscated from its Jewish owner. Heydrich is attended by SS officers. The heart of darkness is cold and efficient.
Over a multi-course lunch Heydrich casually discusses his plans for the Czech people:
“People of good race and good intentions, they will be Germanized. Those we can’t Germanize and educate to think differently from the way they think now, we’ll have to put them against the wall. The rest - potentially at least half the population of Bohemia and Moravia - will have to be moved out and resettled in the East, where they can live out their miserable days in Arctic Labour camps.”
Heydrich speaks directly to Bernie after lunch. After a failed poisoning assassination Heydrich wants Bernie as a personal bodyguard. He sees Bernie’s stubborn independence as useful for he can trust Bernie “to tell me those unpleasant truths that others would shrink from”. Bernie’s integrity makes him a fool but “a clever and resourceful fool”.
Danger for Heydrich is not limited to the Czechs. In talking to those around Heydrich, no one is close, who govern the Czechos for him Bernie realizes all are killers:
In a room full of murderers, anything seemed possible.
Heydrich has no inclination to listen to Bernie about his security. His arrogance is immense.
When there is murder at the Lower Castle Heydrich appoints Bernie to investigate with unlimited power to question anyone. Bernie can aggressively question generals to their dismay.
It is a locked room murder with 31 suspects in the Lower Castle and more not far away.
While Bernie is troubled about investigating the death of a Nazi he cannot conduct a perfunctory investigation. It was impressive to read how he finds and extracts information.
Kerr cleverly has Bernie ferret out little facts that would escape the routine investigator.
As always, witnesses attempt to evade questions but Bernie will not be deterred and no one wants Bernie to tell the ruthless Heydrich that a witness, of any rank, was uncooperative.
It was fascinating reading Bernie’s impertinent, often aggravating, questioning of the Nazis who governed Bohemia and Moravia during World War II. It was like reading the cross-examination of Hitler by Hans Litten in the Eden Palace trial of the early 1930’s.
Heydrich occasionally mentions Hercule Poirot. He appears to have enjoyed reading mysteries. Bernie is dismissive of Agatha Christie.
The last quarter of the book sped by as Bernie gradually put together what happened. I spent most of a sunny Sunday afternoon sitting on the deck under our elm tree finishing the book.
As Bernie contemplates his experiences with the Nazis he realizes that while, as a Berlin homicide detective, he considered himself an expert on the science of murder he is actually a “rather quaint and old-fashioned amateur”.
The twists were striking and convincing. The resolution of the investigation was precisely logical.
The solution to the locked room was byond clever. I should have had an inkling but failed yet again. Maybe some reading day I will figure out a locked room mystery before the end.
Kerr was a brilliant writer. His depth of understanding of what happened in Germany during World War II is breathtaking. He has helped me understand the psyche of Germans, especially non-Nazis, during the war better than any work of non-fiction.
****
Kerr, Philip – (2004) - Dark Matter; (2016) - March Violets; (2016) - The Pale Criminal; (2016) - A German Requiem; (2016) - Berlin Police and the Holocaust - Part I and Part II; (2016) - Comparing Serial Killers in Three Totalitarian States; (2023) - The One From the Other; (2023) - A Quiet Flame; (2024) - If the Dead Rise Not; (2026) - Field Gray
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