smuggling, you see. But that, I am afraid, he was loath to do. He wouldn't even entertain the notion, which suggested to me that his concerns did not revolve around smuggling at all."
"Then what did he tell you?"
"He would say only that he had information about a felonious activity that was ongoing, operating out of an address in Wandsbek, although he did not know that it was Wandsbek, of course.
Just that it was in Hamburg."
"Oskarslratte 15?" Barbara guessed.
"You've found the address among his things, I take it. Ja, that was the location. We looked into it, but found nothing at all."
"He was on the wrong track? Did he have the wrong German city?"
"There is no real accurate way to know,"
Kreuzhage replied. "He may well have been correct about the illicit goings on, but OskarstraAe 15 is a large apartment building with some eighty units inside, behind a locked front door. We have no cause to inspect those units and could not do so on the unfounded suspicions of a gentleman phoning from another country."
"Unfounded suspicions?"
"Mr. Querashi had no real evidence to speak of, Sergeant Havers. Or if he had it, he was not willing to share it with me. But on the strength of his passion and sincerity, I did place the building under surveillance for two days. It sits on the edge of Eichtalpark, so it was easy enough to place my men in an area where they could not be seen.
But I have not the manpower to ... how do you call it ... sit out a building?"
"Stake out a building?"
"That American term, ja, this is it. I have not the manpower or the financial resources to stake out a building the size of OskarstraSe 15 for the length of time it would take to ascertain if illegal activity is going on there. Not, I am afraid, with so little to go on."
It was hardly an unreasonable position, Barbara thought. Doubtless, stormtrooping one's way into people's private homes and apartments had gone out of fashion in Germany after the war.
But then she remembered.
"Klaus Reuchlein," she said.
"Ja? He is ... ?" Rreuzhage waited politely.
"He's some bloke living in Hamburg," Barbara said. "I don't have his address, but I have his phone number. I'm wondering if there's any chance that he lives at OskarstraAe 15."
"This," Rreuzhage said, "could indeed be ascertained.
But beyond that . . ."He was good enough to sound regretful. He went on to tell her -- in the sombre tone of a man with a thorough knowledge of the evils that other men do - that there were many arenas of misbehaviour which could possibly span the North Sea and tie England to Germany. Prostitution, counterfeiting, gun running, terrorism, extremism, industrial espionage, bank robbery, art theft . . . The wise policeman did not confine his suspicions to smuggling when two countries were connected in a criminal way. "This I tried to point out to Mr.
Querashi," he said, "so that he might see how difficult was the task he wished me to perform.
But he insisted that an investigation of Oskartrafie would provide us with the information we needed to make an arrest. Alas, Mr. Querashi had never been to OskarstraSe 15." Barbara could hear him sigh. "An investigation? Sometimes people do not understand how the law regulates what we as policemen can and cannot do."
How true. Barbara thought of the police dramas she'd seen on the telly, those programmes in which the rozzers regularly wrestled confessions from suspects who went from defiant to compliant within the convenient space of an hour. She made noises of agreement and asked Kreuzhage if he would check on Klaus Reuchlein's whereabouts.
"I have a phone call into him as well," she explained, "but something tells me he's not going to return it."
Kreuzhage assured her he would do what he could. She rang off. She spent a moment just sitting on the bed, letting its hideous counterpane soak a bit of the sweat from the backs of her legs.
When she felt she had the energy to do so, she went to the shower and stood under it, too hot even to entertain herself with her usual medley of rock 'n' roll oldies.
Chapter 20
After dinner, Barbara ended up on the Pleasure Pier solely because Hadiyyah had extended the invitation. In her usual impulsive and generous manner, the little girl had announced, "You must come with us, Barbara. We're going to the pier, Dad and I, and you must come as well.
She must, Dad,