The Sleepwalkers Read Free Page B

both cases the fibula, the bone that runs from knee to ankle, had been surgically removed and replanted in the opposite direction, grafted in place with some highly advanced techniques I am wholly unfamiliar with. For years doctors have been hypothesizing about the possibility of bone transplants, but as far as I know, none has ever been successfully performed. Until now.”
    “Bone transplant?” Willi, who thought he’d heard it all, was dumbfounded. “But—why?”
    “I don’t know. To see if it could be done, I suppose. I only report what I saw.”
    “How long ago might this transplant have occurred?”
    “Six months, at most. The grafts were completely healed. The legs completely healthy—except of course that she never could have walked on them. Hobbled, perhaps. With crutches.”
    “Hobbled.” Willi was trying to grasp this. “You mean the surgery crippled her?”
    “Yes.” The doctor lowered his eyes. “That’s precisely what I mean.”
    Willi felt his throat tighten. “The girl had been healthy? Her legs were healthy? And she was . . . experimented on? Deliberately disabled?”
    Hoffnung stared out the window. “Almost beyond belief, I know. We all assume doctors are guardians of life. Implicitly trustworthy. Even ancient civilizations revered their medicine men. But here, today, in Berlin in 1932, we have a surgeon who appears to have had no qualms about using a human as a guinea pig.”
    He turned to Willi with pained dismay. “Inspektor, whoeverdid this was a genius. A madman. But with exceptional talent. Surely one of the top orthopedic surgeons alive.”
    Closing the door to Pathology, Willi ran straight into Gunther. At least a foot taller, though probably half Willi’s weight, this towering beanpole with a long Prussian nose and virulently infectious smile had come to Willi straight from the top tiers of the Police Academy in Charlottenburg. A country bumpkin from up north, all Berlin to him seemed a fairy tale. Oh, he stuck his foot in his mouth on occasion, no easy task considering he wore a 14 shoe. But he was smart. Efficient. Tenacious as a battering ram. And totally in awe of Willi. They got along supremely. Willi’d been planning to take the boy out to Spandau. But the autopsy report changed that.
    “Gunther—”
    “Yes! Good morning, sir!”
    “Regarding the case from yesterday . . . I need some information.”
    “Jawohl.”
Gunther smiled, instantly ready with a notebook.
    “I want the name of every top orthopedic surgeon in Germany, in the Berlin area especially.”
    “Orthopedic surgeons. Got it.”
    “The name of every American and Canadian female missing in Berlin over the past year.”
    “Okay.”
    “I want you to check with every Prussian state mental asylum if any female patients between the ages of twenty-three to twenty-six have gone missing in the past year. And find out which of those institutions shave their patients’ heads.”
    “Shave heads. Okay. What else, sir?”
    “I need you to dig up whatever you can about bone transplants. See which doctors have written about it, lectured on it, whatever.”
    “Bone transplants. Yes, sir. What else, sir?”
    “That’s all. No. Wait. Better go to Hoffnung’s office. Tell him I want you to see the girl.”
    “Go to Hoffnung. See girl.” Gunther kept writing.
    “Look at her closely, lad. Listen to what the doctor tells you. And ask yourself, Gunther, ask yourself, what kind of world is this we live in?”
    Willi drove alone in an unmarked police car back to where the Mermaid had surfaced. First stop: Kroneberg Strasse 17. The Institute for Modern Living. Stepping through a medieval-looking iron gate, he approached the large, white stucco house and pressed the front bell. Eventually slow, heavy footsteps approached. When the dark oak door finally opened, he was relieved not to have brought along Gunther.
    Before him stood a naked woman, at least seventy, suntanned head to toe like burned toast, breasts