The One From the Other Read Free

indifferently. Begelmann looked at me with quiet desperation. There was sweat on his forehead and I didn’t think it was only as a result of the unusually warm September weather. “Because, Herr Gunther, your reputation for honesty goes before you.”
    “Not to mention your dedication to making an easy mark,” said Six.
    I looked at Six and nodded. I was through being polite to this legal crook. “What you’re saying, Herr Begelmann, is that you don’t trust this department or the people who work for it.”
    Poor Begelmann looked pained. “No, no, no, no, no,” he said. “That’s not it at all.”
    But I was enjoying myself too much to let go of this bone. “And I can’t say as I blame you. It’s one thing to get robbed. It’s quite another when the robber asks you to help carry the loot to the getaway car.”
    Six bit his lip. I could see he was wishing it was the vein on the side of my neck. The only reason he wasn’t saying anything was because I hadn’t yet said no. Probably he guessed that I wasn’t going to. A thousand pounds is a thousand pounds.
    “Please, Herr Gunther.”
    Six looked quite happy to leave the begging to Begelmann.
    “My whole family would be extremely grateful for your help.”
    “A thousand pounds,” I said. “I already heard that part.”
    “Is there something wrong with the remuneration?” Begelmann was looking at Six for guidance. He wasn’t getting any. Six was a lawyer, not a horse dealer.
    “Hell no, Herr Begelmann,” I said. “It’s generous. No, it’s me, I guess. I start to itch when a certain kind of dog cozies up to me.”
    But Six was refusing to be insulted. So far in this, he was just a typical lawyer. Prepared to put aside all human feelings for the greater good of making money. “I hope you’re not being rude to an official of the German government, Herr Gunther,” he said, chiding me. “Anyone would think you were against National Socialism, the way you talk. Hardly a very healthy attitude these days.”
    I shook my head. “You mistake me,” I said. “I had a client last year. His name was Hermann Six. The industrialist? He was less than honest with me. You’re no relation to him, I trust.”
    “Sadly not,” he said. “I come from a very poor family in Mannheim.”
    I looked at Begelmann. I felt sorry for him. I should have said no. Instead I said yes. “All right, I’ll do it. But you people had better be on the level about all this. I’m not the type who forgives and forgets. And I’ve never turned the other cheek.”
     
     
    It wasn’t long before I regretted becoming involved in Six and Begelmann’s Jewish peddler scheme. I was alone in my office the next day. It was raining outside. My partner, Bruno Stahlecker, was out on a case, so he said, which probably meant he was propping up a bar in Wedding. There was a knock at the door and a man came in. He was wearing a leather coat and a wide-brimmed hat. Call it a keen sense of smell, but I knew he was Gestapo even before he showed me the little warrant disk in the palm of his hand. He was in his mid-twenties, balding, with a small, lopsided mouth and a sharp, delicate-looking jaw that made me suspect he was more used to hitting than being hit. Without saying a word he tossed his wet hat onto my desk blotter, unbuttoned his coat to reveal a neat, navy-blue suit, sat in the chair on the other side of my desk, took out his cigarettes, and lit one—all the while staring at me like an eagle watching a fish.
    “Nice little hat,” I said, after a moment. “Where’d you steal it?” I picked it off my blotter and tossed it onto his lap. “Or did you just want me and my roses to know that it’s raining outside?”
    “They told me you were a tough guy at the Alex,” he said, and flicked his ash on my carpet.
    “I was a tough guy when I was at the Alex,” I said. The Alex was police headquarters, on Berlin’s Alexanderplatz. “They gave me one of those little disks. Anyone can