Part 36 (1/2)

I thanked him, and sat down.

I did what I had been meaning to do all day, I wrote a note to Helena.

She was constantly in my thoughts, I said, and the investigation was proceeding speedily. I told her that I was confident of being home before the child was born. Her time would soon be up. If I had not completed my task (that is, if I had still not caught the killer, though I avoided being so unnecessarily explicit), I would request temporary leave from General Malaport, and I had no doubt that he would grant it. I asked her to consign the second note (which would be folded up and sealed inside her letter) to my a.s.sistant, Johannes Gurten. I described him as 'manna from heaven,' noting: I know not where he may be lodging, but Knutzen will know. I count on you, my love, having no other means of contacting Herr Gurten.

Kiss our little ones for me. I miss them all. I cannot express the pleasure that I feel to think of the addition to our house hold, who is, at this very moment, growing inside you. Try to keep him/her quiet until I am able to return to you all.

Yours, etc. Hanno.

The note to Gurten was more prosaic.

Konigsbergtwo unidentified female corpses found here. One was mutilated. The other, too, perhaps. Reports unclear about details. Girls from Nordcopp selling amber in Konigsberg? Most likely. City alive with rebels/nationalists/dissidents of every sort.

I am hunting a ghost named VULPIUS.

I hope that your research is more material than mine.

I will keep you posted regarding developments.

I added Rickert's address, telling Gurten to send his messages there.

All the while, Professor Rickert stood in front of the table, his back towards me, arms folded, feet apart, as if he were on special guard duty. Would he charge me for this service, too, I wondered. If any marauding student from another queue came too close, he stepped forward quickly, waved them off with his fists, ordering them angrily to keep their distance and behave like scholars.

I folded the second letter inside the first, sealed the packet with wax by the candle flame, then I stood up.

'I thank you for your help, Herr Doctor Rickert,' I said.

'It was nothing, sir. Nothing at all,' he replied. 'You have to keep a careful eye on them, you know. Whatever is the university coming to! They're little better than monkeys. Why, they'd be climbing all over the table if you didn't fight them off.'

I knew what was expected of me. I slipped another coin into Rickert's damp palm as I handed him the letter.

'You spoke of two letters, sir.'

'Just one,' I replied. 'Second thoughts, you know.'

Dr Rickert had no such thoughts. He did not offer to refund a farthing of the money that he had already taken from me.

'Your message will be delivered tomorrow morning,' he informed me, glancing at the address that I had written. 'The town is near enough.'

Dr Rickert was correct. Lotingen was close, Nordcopp even closer. They seemed to me like distant planets drawn together by an astral flux that was malign, mysterious. Lotingen with its invasion of flies and foulness, Nordcopp with its mutilated corpses, living cripples and vulnerable women. Konigsberg was part of the same impenetrable labyrinth-strange men and stranger trades in the port, the secretive commissions of its jewellers' shops, the cloisters and the halls of its university ringing with a new scientific language, the old ways all but forgotten. And yet, I thought, there was the secret, hidden underbelly of Konigsberg, too, where amber was smuggled, bought and sold, and where feverish and rebellious ideas of Prussia's spiritual rebirth were never far away.

'A letter to your wife, I see, sir. She'll be pleased to know that you have found the perfect lodging. Until this evening, then, Herr Stiffeniis. Your humble servant, sir.'

The eyelids of Dr Rickert beat as rapidly as any young lover's might, when the moment of separation arrives. By way of contrast, his joyful expression reminded me of the mysterious sentence about blood and how best to extract it, that he had been writing when I arrived. Then, something that Colonel les Halles had said the other night on the coq du mer returned to my thoughts. Nothing is ever as it seems in Prussia, Stiffeniis. What had induced this smiling academic, this thaler-hungry sycophant, to interest himself in blood, and the most efficient ways to extract it from the human body?

The sun was sinking, and it was gloomy out in the quadrangle. I walked through the great entrance-gate, but I did not leave the precincts of the university. I knew where I was going as I turned away from the harbour, and headed into the shambles of the old town.

I knew what I would find there.

28.

THE LIBRARY DOORS were thrown wide open.

A single lantern traced out a cracked mosaic of pummelled, ancient paving stones. A head poked out of a tiny window in the wall, like a guard-dog on a short chain chasing off unwanted callers.

'What can I do for you, sir?'

'I must speak with Herr Ludvigssen,' I answered, recovering from my surprise. Here was a change! The library had been abandoned and forgotten the year before. Now, there was a man to guard the entrance.

'Ludvigssen? D'you know where to find him, sir?'

'If he is still down in the Kantstudiensaal . . .'

'That's right, sir. Been down there before, have you?'

The head ducked out of sight, as if I had just given the correct pa.s.sword.

As I went down the stairs to the bas.e.m.e.nt, as the lanterns grew spa.r.s.er, and the shadows thickened, I recalled my visit to the university library in the company of Serge Lavedrine the year before. On that occasion, thanks to Lavedrine's perseverance, we had found what we were seeking.

Would I be so lucky on my own, I wondered.

The underground corridor ran the length of the building. It was dark and dank, smelling strongly of mould and mice, dusty paper and rank abandonment. My nerves were tingling and a sort of blind panic seized me by the throat. Was it possible that Kant had failed to record our conversation? It had changed the course of my whole life. It had altered the direction of his life, too. I was certain the philosopher had written a note about it, and I did not doubt that his account was hidden somewhere in that archive. All of his extant papers had been deposited there after his death. And Arnold Abel Ludvigssen had been employed as the archivist to catalogue each single ma.n.u.script sheet. My nightmare had long been that the man would find my name and learn what I preferred should be forever lost and forgotten.

My steps echoed on the stone flags. Someone might have been following behind me in the gloom, they sounded so loud. My head was a maelstrom of thoughts that made no sense, as I halted before the door of the Kantstudiensaal.

I raised my fist-it felt as heavy as a cannonball-then let it fall upon the door.

'Come in,' a voice called brightly.

It was not the slurred and slovenly voice that I remembered, though the same man was seated behind a large desk. I recognised the long nose of Arnold Abel Ludvigssen, the straight middle parting, the divided waterfalls of greasy black hair which fell on either side of his long, pale, narrow face. He peered short-sightedly over the top of his pince-nez like a frightened hare.

'Can I help you, sir?'

No light of recognition shone in his eyes, and I was glad of that. Twelve months before, he had been the picture of dest.i.tution. Drunk then, he was sober now. The state of the room had altered, too. It was as if a Baltic gale had blown through the place, sweeping up the mountain of ma.n.u.scripts and books, and depositing them magically in perfect order on the shelves which ran around the walls. He had accomplished a task that would have daunted Hercules. A rubbish tip had been transformed into an archive which was manageable, though vast. The same purifying wind had blown over him. He looked fresh, clean, new, as he came running from behind the desk to meet me.

'I am an investigating magistrate,' I began to say.

'You've come about the stolen papers?' he asked, and his left eyelid began to flicker nervously.

'I am conducting an enquiry on behalf of General Malaport,' I specified.

I could have sworn I heard his heels click together at the mention of the Frenchman's name. He had been standing in front of me, his body rigid, eyes cast down like a junior officer brought up on a charge. Now, his tense face seemed to visibly relax.

'You are working for the French,' he started to say, and a trill of nervous laughter burst out of him. 'That's a great relief, sir. I knew they'd take the matter seriously in the end.'

'The matter?' I echoed.