‘Look at you, starving away. How about I buy you lunch?’
Paul looked up, wide-eyed. ‘You? Forget your toothbrush in the rush?’
‘I guess I owe you an explanation.’
‘An apology will do. There isn’t a lot to explain.’
‘Ha! I thought it was the other way round.’ Paul looked at him angrily. ‘Anyway,’ Rath continued. ‘I thought I’d buy us lunch. My way of putting things right. What do you think, or have I come at a bad time?’
‘You always come at a bad time. It’s never stopped you in the past.’ Paul screwed the lid back on his fountain pen and stood up. ‘Or me, for that matter.’
Weinhaus Brungs was near the town hall, a tavern which had opened in the rooms of a long-established in-house brewery that had recently ceased production. Seats and tables were made from wine cases, which gave an authentic feel.
‘Clients of yours?’ Rath asked once they had taken their seats.
‘Of course. It’s win-win. You buy me lunch, they re-order my stock.’
‘Let’s not go wild. It’s only lunchtime – and it’s Lent.’
‘Fish it is, then,’ Paul said. ‘I hear the trout au bleu is very good.’
The waiter arrived with the menus, and Paul ordered a bottle of Moselle.
‘One of yours?’ Rath asked once the waiter was gone.
‘My best drop,’ said Paul. Rath had an inkling this wouldn’t be cheap. ‘So, you want to straighten things out?’
‘Why do you think I’m here? This wine tastes pretty expensive.’
‘I mean with the girl.’
‘How do you propose I do that?’
‘What about gently informing her that you have no future as a couple.’
‘She’ll have guessed that by now.’
‘Perhaps. But there’s guessing and there’s knowing… It’s time you cleaned up your own mess for a change.’
‘You’re right.’
‘I’m not just talking about poor Hilde.’
‘What do you want me to do? I can hardly tell Charly.’
‘God forbid!’ Paul looked at him with unusual seriousness. ‘Didn’t I say you’d have me to deal with if you ever pull a stunt like this again?’
‘Whose witness are you anyway?’
‘I’m serious, Gereon.’
‘Yeah, yeah, I get it. I’ll just have to forget about Carnival as a married man.’
‘If this is how it ends, maybe you should.’
‘The Nazis will ban it anyway.’
‘Why?’
‘Sense of humour isn’t really their thing.’
‘Adenauer’s hardly Carnival’s greatest fan either. And he collected money so that the parade could take place this year. The powers-that-be know how to make themselves popular…’
‘I wonder if it always works like that…’
‘Not for Adenauer anyway.’
Paul fell silent. The waiter came with their dishes and poured more wine.
‘Has Adenauer been voted out?’ Rath asked once the waiter had disappeared.
Paul looked around. ‘Let’s not discuss it here,’ he said.
They ate in silence, and by the time they were finished they had emptied the bottle. Rath looked out of the window as people filed past, many of them in brown uniforms. ‘What’s this?’ he asked. ‘They’re heading for the town hall, aren’t they?’
Paul placed his napkin to one side. ‘No idea, but let’s go. I need to get back.’
The bill made a dent in Rath’s wallet, but he left a decent tip all the same. Could he put the meal on expenses? He pocketed the receipt.
He hadn’t managed to find a space in the narrow alleyway in front of the restaurant and had parked a few metres down the road by the town hall, where an enormous throng was now gathered. His car was surrounded. ‘What’s going on?’ he asked a passer-by.
‘Haven’t you heard?’ The man had a thick Cologne accent. ‘The party occupied the town hall this morning. Adenauer’s scarpered.’
‘Which party?’ Rath asked. Stupid question.
‘Dr Riesen is mayor now.’
‘The Nazi? That’s why all these people are here?’
‘He’s going to make a speech about what’s going to happen in Cologne, now that Adenauer and his cronies are gone.’
‘I never thought the Nazis would get a majority in Cologne,’ he said to Paul across the roof of the car.
‘They didn’t, not even with the German National People’s Party.’
‘Then how come they get to pick the new mayor?’
Paul waited until they were inside the Buick with both doors closed and Rath had the engine running. ‘The Nazis took the town hall this morning by force. Adenauer did well to stay away. They might just have put him up against a wall, like they were threatening last time you were here.’
Rath rarely discussed politics with Paul, and was relieved his friend couldn’t stand the Nazis either. ‘In Catholic Cologne of all places. I thought they voted Centre here.’
‘Not by a long shot. The police even banned them from holding a rally on Friday. Adenauer’s final campaign speech was cancelled. Even he could no longer do anything about the swastika flags on his town hall. Things have been frantic since the Reichstag vote.’
Rath manoeuvred the Buick out of its space and through the milling mass at a snail’s pace. It took some time before he had a clear run, and people could be seen again on the pavements. People going about their daily business without uniforms or flags. There was still such a thing as normal. The crowds outside the town hall had seemed so unreal it was as if all this were happening in another city – in another world.
At Platz der Republik he stopped to let Paul out. ‘Braunsfeld,’ his friend said, leaning over the window. ‘Blumhoffer Nachfolger. Hildegard Sprenger, Sales.’
Rath gave a wry smile, and saluted. ‘Aye, aye, Sir!’
He drove on, lost in thought, without the slightest idea how he was going to tell this girl, whom he hadn’t seen for two weeks, that she was just a one-night stand. Stopping at a florist, he bought a small bouquet and drove via Aachener Strasse to Braunsfeld. The lemonade factory wasn’t as big as he’d expected. Trucks were being loaded on the yard, but with metal barrels rather than bottle crates. He asked the porter for Fräulein Sprenger from Sales, concealing the flowers behind his back.
‘First floor, second door on the right.’
Hilde Sprenger looked at him wide-eyed as he peered through the door. Annoyingly she wasn’t alone; a female colleague sat at the desk opposite. ‘Now, there’s a surprise,’ she said. ‘Are they for me?’
‘The porter actually, but he didn’t want them.’ She laughed a perfectly nice, normal laugh. ‘I thought I might buy you a coffee, seeing as I was in the area. Do you have time?’
The woman at the other desk pretended not to be interested. Hilde stood up and smoothed down her dress. ‘A quarter of an hour, for sure. I was about to take a break anyway. There’s a cafe on Aachener Strasse.’ He handed her the flowers. ‘Hedwig, could you put these in water for me?’ Her colleague took the bouquet with a grin. ‘Are you in town long?’ she asked, when they were outside.
‘No.’ Rath didn’t know what else to add.
‘Then you’re lucky you found me. I’m on holiday next week.’
‘You are?’ He cleared his throat. ‘Do you mean the cafe up ahead? It looks nice.’
This time they ordered coffee rather than Afri-Cola. Hilde took a cigarette from her handbag and he gave her a light. She smiled nervously and smoked. He flipped open his cigarette case. ‘You’ve already realised I’m not Paul Wittkamp,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry I couldn’t clear that up before, I was called away unexpectedly. I hope it wasn’t too much of a shock.’
‘It’s my own fault, going back like that, but I was curious. I wanted to see you again.’