nodded, appreciating the interruption: it was Fräulein Tauber’s turn to help me. It wasn’t a good idea to tell Frau Lippert my name. I could see that now. The old woman wasn’t just the house guard dog; she was also the building’s Gestapo bloodhound.
‘Caffeine,’ I said. ‘It causes the blood vessels to constrict. You want to reduce the amount of blood that can reach your eye. The more blood that seeps out of the damaged capillaries on that lovely face of yours, the bluer your eye will get. Here. Let me have a look.’
I took away the cold compress for a moment and then nodded.
‘It’s not so blue,’ I said.
‘Not when I look at you, it’s not.’
‘Mmm-hmm.’
‘You know, you sound just like a doctor, Parsifal.’
‘You can tell that from mm-hmm?’
‘Sure. Doctors say it all the time. To me, anyway.’
Frau Lippert had been out of this conversation since it started and must have felt that it lacked her own imprimatur. ‘She’s right,’ said the old woman. ‘They do.’
I kept on looking at the girl with the cold compress in her hand. ‘You’re mistaken, Fräulein. It’s not mm-hmm yourdoctor is saying. It’s shorter, simpler, more direct than that. It’s just Mmm.’
I drained my tea cup and placed it back on the tray. ‘Mmm, thank you.’
‘I’m glad you liked it,’ said Frau Lippert.
‘Very much.’
I grinned at her and picked my bag of canned food off the floor. It was nice to see her smile back.
‘Well, I’d better be going. I’ll look in again sometime just to see you’re all right.’
‘There’s no need, Parsifal. I’m all right now.’
‘I like to know how all my patients are doing, Fräulein. Especially the ones wearing Guerlain Shalimar.’
CHAPTER 4
The Pathological Institute was at the Charité Hospital just across the canal from Lehrter Station. With its red-brick exterior, its Alpine-style wooden loggias, its clock and distinctive corner tower, the oldest teaching hospital in the city was much the same as it had always been. Inside, however, things were different. Within the main administrative building, the portraits of more than a few of the Charité’s famous physicians and scientists had been removed. The Jews were Germany’s misfortune after all. These were the only spaces available in the hospital and if they could have put some beds on the walls they would have done it. The wards and corridors – even the landings outside the elevators – were full of men who had been maimed or injured on the front.
Meanwhile the morgue in the Institute was full to over-flowing with dead soldiers and the still unidentified civilian victims of RAF bombings and blackout accidents. Not that their problems were over. The Army Information Centre wasn’t always very efficient in notifying the families of those serving men who had died; and in many cases the Army felt that the responsibility fell on the Ministry of Health. But however the deaths were caused, the Ministry of Health believed responsibility for dealing with deaths in Berlin lay properly with the Ministry of the Interior, which, of course, was only toowilling to leave such matters to the city authorities, who themselves were inclined to dump this role on the police. So, you might have said that the crisis at the morgue – and that’s exactly what it smelled like – was all my fault. Me and others like me.
It was, however, with the hope of taking advantage of this bureaucratic incompetence that I went there in search of Geert Vranken’s corpse. And I found what was left of it sharing a drawer in the cold room with a dead prostitute from Lichterfelde and a man from Wedding – most likely a suicide – who had been killed in a gas explosion. I had the mortuary attendant lay out the Dutchman’s remains on a slab that looked and smelt worse than it ought to have done, but with an extreme shortage of cleaners in the
‘Caffeine,’ I said. ‘It causes the blood vessels to constrict. You want to reduce the amount of blood that can reach your eye. The more blood that seeps out of the damaged capillaries on that lovely face of yours, the bluer your eye will get. Here. Let me have a look.’
I took away the cold compress for a moment and then nodded.
‘It’s not so blue,’ I said.
‘Not when I look at you, it’s not.’
‘Mmm-hmm.’
‘You know, you sound just like a doctor, Parsifal.’
‘You can tell that from mm-hmm?’
‘Sure. Doctors say it all the time. To me, anyway.’
Frau Lippert had been out of this conversation since it started and must have felt that it lacked her own imprimatur. ‘She’s right,’ said the old woman. ‘They do.’
I kept on looking at the girl with the cold compress in her hand. ‘You’re mistaken, Fräulein. It’s not mm-hmm yourdoctor is saying. It’s shorter, simpler, more direct than that. It’s just Mmm.’
I drained my tea cup and placed it back on the tray. ‘Mmm, thank you.’
‘I’m glad you liked it,’ said Frau Lippert.
‘Very much.’
I grinned at her and picked my bag of canned food off the floor. It was nice to see her smile back.
‘Well, I’d better be going. I’ll look in again sometime just to see you’re all right.’
‘There’s no need, Parsifal. I’m all right now.’
‘I like to know how all my patients are doing, Fräulein. Especially the ones wearing Guerlain Shalimar.’
CHAPTER 4
The Pathological Institute was at the Charité Hospital just across the canal from Lehrter Station. With its red-brick exterior, its Alpine-style wooden loggias, its clock and distinctive corner tower, the oldest teaching hospital in the city was much the same as it had always been. Inside, however, things were different. Within the main administrative building, the portraits of more than a few of the Charité’s famous physicians and scientists had been removed. The Jews were Germany’s misfortune after all. These were the only spaces available in the hospital and if they could have put some beds on the walls they would have done it. The wards and corridors – even the landings outside the elevators – were full of men who had been maimed or injured on the front.
Meanwhile the morgue in the Institute was full to over-flowing with dead soldiers and the still unidentified civilian victims of RAF bombings and blackout accidents. Not that their problems were over. The Army Information Centre wasn’t always very efficient in notifying the families of those serving men who had died; and in many cases the Army felt that the responsibility fell on the Ministry of Health. But however the deaths were caused, the Ministry of Health believed responsibility for dealing with deaths in Berlin lay properly with the Ministry of the Interior, which, of course, was only toowilling to leave such matters to the city authorities, who themselves were inclined to dump this role on the police. So, you might have said that the crisis at the morgue – and that’s exactly what it smelled like – was all my fault. Me and others like me.
It was, however, with the hope of taking advantage of this bureaucratic incompetence that I went there in search of Geert Vranken’s corpse. And I found what was left of it sharing a drawer in the cold room with a dead prostitute from Lichterfelde and a man from Wedding – most likely a suicide – who had been killed in a gas explosion. I had the mortuary attendant lay out the Dutchman’s remains on a slab that looked and smelt worse than it ought to have done, but with an extreme shortage of cleaners in the
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