“We have no interest in this man,” said the officer.
Hoffner had not expected the response. For a moment he said nothing. Then, with an audible sigh, he turned to Fichte and said, “Why am I down here, Hans?”
Even in the dim light, Hoffner recognized the slight tensing in the younger man’s expression. With a jabbed thumb over his shoulder, Fichte said, “This way.” And without further explanation, he picked up a lamp and started toward the central tunnel. With no other choice, Hoffner did the same.
The air grew still heavier as they made their way deeper into the maze. Fichte stopped at one point to pull a small glass inhaler from his coat pocket, the nebulized liquid making a sharp puffing sound each time Fichte sucked in. Hoffner had learned not to notice these brief episodes; the shame in Fichte’s face was something he didn’t care to see. Hoffner slowed and waited until Fichte had picked up the pace again. Two caverns on, they stopped. A lone patrolman stood at the entrance.
It was the odor that gave it away. Decomposing flesh, when kept moist, takes on a scent not unlike rotting fruit with a bit of sulfur thrown in. Hoffner had actually experimented with various mixtures some years ago. He had kept a number of covered bowls in a remote area of the cellar at police headquarters, all filled with different concoctions. It had taken him nearly two weeks to hit on the right combination. When asked why he was doing this, Hoffner had explained that it could be used to train detectives how to sniff out hidden or buried corpses: take the bowl, place it behind some boards, etc. They had all gotten a good laugh out of it until a young assistant detective by the name of Bauman had cracked the infamous Selazig case of 1911 by nosing around the man’s office. Selazig had been in the pickled-herring business and believed that the smell of his cannery could hide anything he might be keeping behind the walls of his office. Detective Bauman had been doing a routine check of the man-the disappearance of his wife and son, missing money, Herr Selazig distraught beyond all measure-when he happened to detect something of a familiar scent coming from behind a large filing cabinet. So acute was Bauman’s nasal prowess that he had actually distinguished the smell of rancid pears, so he described it, from that of three-day-old fish. The bodies had been found within a small chamber behind the wall, each laid out perfectly on an altar of sorts, bits and pieces of arms and legs having been nibbled away. Selazig had gone to the gallows, Bauman to Kriminal-Bezirkssekretr (detective sergeant), and Hoffner back to his experiments, along with a short article titled “The Odor of Death” published in Die Polizei, August 11 issue, a framed copy of which still hung in his office.
“It’s just here,” said Fichte as he moved through the cavern and knelt down in front of a mound by the far wall. He placed his lamp to the side and waited for Hoffner to draw closer. He then began to pull back the tarp.
Hoffner leaned over. “I’m surprised he didn’t post another moustache back here.”
“He tried,” said Fichte. “I told him that wouldn’t be advised.”
“Good. Who found it?”
“The older boy. He was rummaging.”
Hoffner crouched down and drew his lamp closer in to the corpse. Fichte had learned to take careful note of his partner at these moments. Gone was the waggish smile. In its place, a concentrated gaze lingered over the body and the areas just around it, every inch cataloged for later use. Without warning, the eyes would dart to a wall, or the space by the entrance, hold for a moment, then return for more probing. Fichte knew to say nothing.
Hoffner’s first inclination was to flip her over, check her back, look for the markings that had been so much a part of his life-their lives-since that first grisly discovery in early December. But this woman was too young to have anything to do with that. Strange to feel relief at the side of a murdered woman, he thought. “So,” said Hoffner, his tone matching his focus, “how many have been back here?”
“The boy and the father, and one or two of the patrolmen.”
“One or two?”
“They’re not convinced it’s our case. Keeping their mouths tight. They’re waiting for a Leutnant to arrive. That’s why I was in such a hurry.”
“Right. We’ll need shoe molds from each of them to match against all of this. And photos of everything before the body is moved.” Fichte jotted down a note in his pad as Hoffner continued to speak. “The boy, the father. They’ve seen no one else down here?”
Fichte shook his head. “It turns out there might actually be another three or four ways down into the site. It’s impossible to know how many, or where. According to our ex-engineer, the station promenade was to have extended as far east as Blowplatz.”
“Blowplatz? That’s over half a kilometer. Wonderful.”
The clothes were in surprisingly good shape. In cases like these, they were either missing entirely-the motive for the killing-or had succumbed to the elements-caked-on mud, gnawing rats, etc. Not so here. The woman’s skirt and bodice looked almost new, and she was wearing a pair of intricately woven lace gloves. That seemed odd. “And nothing’s been moved?” said Hoffner.
“As far as I can tell, no. The boy said he saw her, then ran for his father. They brought the moustache. I followed.”
Hoffner nodded slowly. “And how long do we guess she’s been down here?” He took a pen from his coat pocket and brushed the hair back from her face.
“Rate of decay, rats. I’d say about a week, week and a half.”
“Good.” Hoffner liked it when Fichte got something right. He moved farther down the corpse. “But the clothes say otherwise.” Hoffner used his pen to lift the hem of her dress and examine the legs. What he saw momentarily startled him. The flesh on the legs was almost entirely rotted through, with a small puddle of worms and crawling ants camped in between her knees. In an odd way, it looked as if they had been placed there, caged by the legs, and given free rein to go about their business, but only as far as the mid-thigh. There, Hoffner noticed something slick on the flesh, something that was keeping the worms at bay.
Fichte had seen it, as well. It was as if they were looking at two entirely different corpses, one a week postmortem, the other at least six. For several moments Hoffner said nothing as he stared at the strange sheen.
“Someone’s been taking care of her,” he finally said. He let the hem fall back. “Flip her over,” he said as he stood.
Fichte peered up at him. There was a momentary plea in the boy’s eyes, as if to say, They told us we were off this today. Then, with a conscious resolve, Fichte reached under her shoulders and slowly pulled her over.
“Oh God” was all he could get out.
Police headquarters were a disaster.
Hoffner hopped out of the ambulance and motioned for the medic to continue driving through the main gate, or at least what was left of it. For a place he had been coming to six days a week for the past eighteen years, it was almost unrecognizable. The once-imposing line of redbrick archways looked ashamed of itself. Four days removed from the final assault, and the crumbling masonry-chalk-white-was doing little to hide the naked slats of wood that pockmarked the faade. Worse were the iron gates that skulked behind, all at wild angles, bent like spoons for a child’s amusement. And along the lower floors, turreted windows peered out blindly from empty sockets, shards of broken glass still clinging to their disfigured panes. Such was the crowning achievement of Alexanderplatz in the wake of revolution.
A trio of soldiers stood lazily by the gate, guns resting on the ground, their collars pulled up tight to fight back the chill. Each sucked on a cigarette, though the tobacco-where they had managed to scavenge that was anybody’s guess-was clearly too harsh for their young lungs. For a fleeting moment Hoffner thought of his own boys, younger still. He would have to teach them how to smoke properly one of these days. None of the soldiers took even a moment’s notice as the ambulance moved past them.