Free Babylon Berlin by Volker Kutscher

there was a cry or an isolated shot as the commando receded into the distance. A gentle wind made the long curtain billow out and blow into the room.
    There were two women lying on the balcony. Peacefully, as though they were sleeping, but they weren’t sleeping. Blood was seeping from their heads and chests. The cry must have come from the man who was hunched over the older of the two, the man who had just opened the door for them. He was no longer crying out, but weeping silently. Having laid the head of the deceased on his lap, he was now stroking her bloody hair.
    ‘Martha,’ he said. ‘Martha!’
     
    The windows were boarded on the outside so there was barely any daylight in the shop. The man behind the counter didn’t look much like a master butcher. Far too thin, pale face, hollow cheeks. Only the blood specks on his white coat gave him away, and his greeting.
    ‘What will it be?’
    ‘Police.’ Rath showed his ID.
    He had been on the move for quarter of an hour. No-one in Hermannstrasse seemed to own a telephone. The only public telephone he found hadn’t worked but he struck lucky with Wilhelm Prokot the butcher. There was a sign on the door with a telephone symbol. Telephone 20 pfennig per conversation , it said below. Twice as expensive as a public telephone.
    ‘There was me surprised that there were still people out shopping with all that racket,’ grumbled the butcher. ‘Do you and your colleagues want to occupy the shop?’
    ‘I just need to use the telephone.’
    ‘Out back,’ the butcher nodded towards a door. ‘It’s not for free though.’
    ‘The state will pay.’
    Rath followed the man to a telephone hanging from the wall and asked to be put through to Hermannstrasse 207. The butcher remained in the doorway, looking on curiously. ‘Do you have nothing else to do?’ Rath barked.
    ‘No,’ said Prokot in his Berlin accent. ‘Your people have scared off all my customers.’ He disappeared back into the shop.
    Rath asked to speak with one of the officers in charge of the operation. He gave a concise report of the fatal incident and received equally concise instructions in return: take down particulars, secure evidence, interview witnesses, have the corpses medically examined and removed, processes with which Rath was familiar from his time in Homicide. It annoyed him that they treated him like a novice here.
    ‘Can you recommend a doctor?’ he asked, as he pressed two 10 pfennig coins into the butcher’s hands.
    ‘What seems to be the matter?’ the butcher asked.
    The Berlin sense of humour did nothing for Rath. He ignored the stupid remark. ‘Well,’ he said simply, doing his best to conceal his displeasure.
    ‘You’re in luck. There’s a doctor in the house above.’
    The practice was directly above the butcher’s shop. Dr Peter Völcker, General Practitioner , read the sign next to the door. The waiting room was empty. The receptionist looked at Rath with surprise. ‘An emergency,’ he said simply, showing his badge. ‘I need a doctor.’ The woman led him into the consulting room where Dr Völcker was sitting at his desk.
    The doctor was even more gaunt than the butcher and gave the impression of being strict and ascetic. He listened attentively as Rath briefly outlined the situation, took his hat and coat, and reached for the bag. Finally he sent the receptionist home.
    ‘We’re closing. There’ll be no-one coming today anyway,’ he said. ‘No-one dares venture outside while the police are doing target practice.’
    The sentence ought to have made Rath suspicious, but he didn’t think anything of it. He didn’t learn the truth about Dr Völcker until they had returned to the flat, Uncle having remained behind to comfort the grieving widower. Wolter was sitting beside the man, who appeared to have composed himself in the meantime, at the living room table.
    ‘Where did you dredge him up?’ Wolter asked.
    The doctor greeted the widower briefly, offered his