Dr. Mabuse, master of mystery a novel
where he was staying. At last he had him within reach, in the place
where he desired to accomplish his scheme of revenge and towards which
he had been working, for Mabuse in reality had never left Berlin. In
all the towns to which Wenk had travelled in search of the gambler,
Mabuse had doubles, persons of his own gang, instructed by him. Munich
was too small for the scheme Mabuse had in hand. The abysses of Berlin
would be a safer hunting-ground, and the hunt began on the very next
day.
* * * * *
That day Wenk had been describing to a junior colleague in the Berlin
police his course of action in “the Mabuse case.” They had talked about
it together, discussing a plan of operation, but the only conclusion
they had come to was that the gambler should be allowed to show his own
hand first. To aim at him in the dark would be likely to reveal to him
prematurely the whereabouts of his pursuers.
In the evening, when Wenk had taken a meal in the “Traube” restaurant,
he visited a café, and then, tired out by his long discussion, he
sought his lodgings. There a man accosted him, standing in a doorway
removed from the light.
“If you please, sir ...” said he.
“What do you want?” asked Wenk reluctantly.
“Would some cocaine be useful to you, sir?”
Wenk went on without vouchsafing a reply, and he noticed that the man
followed him, but when he came to the busy Friedrichstrasse he lost
sight of him.
Wenk soon took himself to task for having let the man escape him thus.
He ought to have got into touch with this pedlar of illicit wares, for
he belonged to the same stock as Mabuse. He was half inclined to go
back, but the feeling of weariness was too strong for him and he went
home.
The next night he took the same way home from the restaurant, but
the man was not there. Wenk lingered here and there, and then, as he
approached his lodgings near the Police Market, a man came out of an
entry towards him, saying in a whisper, “Do you want to see some nude
dances?”
Wenk stopped still, saying, “You have come just at the right time. I
don’t belong to Berlin, and I should like to see the real night-life of
this city just for once. Where are your dancers? Go ahead!”
“Follow me, then. I’ll go in front, and when you see me go in
somewhere, you come quick, guv’nor, ’cos of the peelers!”
Wenk promised to follow his lead. The man went round the corner,
listened to see if he were following, and then went on again. Suddenly
he disappeared. Wenk went a few steps straight on. The man must have
gone into one of the entries near, and he walked slowly, expecting to
find him, and looking round about. Suddenly he heard the man’s voice
behind him, speaking low and reproachfully: “I don’t call that quick,
guv’nor. You’ll have the bobbies after you if you can’t be more spry.
Come on here, then!” and the man pulled him into a house standing far
back. The door opened on to a dark corridor, and silently and unawares
it closed behind him, while the corridor was lighted up in the same
instant. This corridor led into a little living-room, and that again
into a hall crowded with people. Two gentlemen sitting near the door
made room for Wenk beside them. His guide had disappeared.
What Wenk saw was a simple performance, deriving its interest only from
the secrecy with which it was performed.
He heard the conversation of the two men at his table. One of them
said, “The only thing that interests me is how this entertainer manages
to get a hundred or more persons here, year in and year out, without
the police finding it out. Now, as an expert, you just tell me that!”
The other answered in German that sounded unfamiliar, “Well, you
can’t really tell whether it is known to the police or not. There
are such places winked at by the police because they are traps for
criminals--yes, really traps set for them. Now in Budapest....”
Wenk listened eagerly. The gentlemen went on talking, drawing him
naturally into their conversation. They disclosed their calling,
and then gave their names. One of the gentlemen was, as Wenk had
conjectured, a highly placed police official. They frequently met
each other. The Hungarian told of various interesting and complicated
cases occurring during the practice of his profession. He described
the Budapest haunts of crime, touched on the many secret gaming-houses
which had sprung up so quickly everywhere since the war, and waxed
eloquent against the ever-increasing boldness displayed by criminals
and the mob generally.
Wenk, with a certain unconfessed distrust, talked very warily, saying
that he was only on leave in Berlin, for the scene of his activities
lay in Munich. But Berlin, as the hotbed of crime, afforded a good
field of study for a Munich criminal prosecutor. He touched lightly on
the existence of Mabuse, though without naming him, and related some of
his bold and shameless crimes.
“Just lately,” said the man from Budapest, interrupting him, “we took
into custody a similar adventurer, and we did it by curious and not
exactly legal methods, but we got no further in any other way. With us
in Hungary, as it is with you here, the assistance of hypnotism in the
detection of crime is forbidden. We had the man of whom we were almost
certain--but, my dear sir, you won’t betray me, I am sure, for the
professional interest you feel in putting an end to such aberrations
is just as strong in me--well, we were practically certain that he was
the leader of a gang which had several murders to their account. He
was in prison, as I have told you. He made himself out a deaf mute, and
we could glean nothing from his papers. No one knew him, yet we felt
almost sure of our man, and that kind of thing is almost unbearable to
an expert, isn’t it?--for when he appeared before their worships, there
was the risk of his being acquitted for lack of sufficient evidence.
That was a most disagreeable idea to me, for I had spent about six
months in tracking him down, and if he were discharged the mistake
would be due to me. I therefore took a very bold step. A friend of mine
had hypnotic powers. He was a barrister, and had often displayed these
gifts of his in private. I wanted him to go to the jail with me, but
he said, ‘I can operate on him from outside,’ and, indeed, a quarter
of an hour later I knew that we had the leader of the gang at last,
and various disclosures were made which shortly after sent him to the
gallows.”
While the Hungarian was telling this story Wenk experienced an aversion
to him. He had a sensation of profound mental resistance to the man,
although he could not explain what had caused such a reversal of
feeling.
“Are you also interested in persons who possess this gift of
suggestion?” asked the police superintendent.
“Uncommonly so!” answered Wenk.
“Perhaps you would like to meet my friend, and see something of his
gifts?”
“Is he in Berlin, then? Yes, that I certainly should!”
“Yes, he’s here now. He has given up practising law, and now exercises
his gifts openly. He has very quickly become celebrated. You must have
heard the name of Weltmann?”
Wenk did not like to say No, so he answered with a subdued “Certainly!”
“Well, he is the celebrated Weltmann. You know he is noticeable
on account of his having only one hand. He lost the other in the
Carpathians in 1915. Well, we’ll arrange a meeting, then. I will see
him in the morning. Are you on the telephone by any chance?”
Wenk mentioned his telephone number. Both the gentlemen then left, to
go to a house where ether, cocaine and opium were procurable, and other
more obvious vices were pandered to.
On the very next day Wenk was summoned to the telephone. “Police
Superintendent Vörös speaking! Things have fallen out most favourably
for you, my dear sir! In the home of one of our countrymen, about whom
I will tell you a few things in confidence, Weltmann is giving an
entertainment this very evening. It is quite enough for you to have
expressed the wish; you may consider yourself invited, without any
further formality. It is a most hospitable house, and you won’t feel
yourself in any way a stranger. There are between sixty and seventy
people invited. I’ll undertake all the arrangements, and if it suits
you I’ll come in a car for you at nine o’clock. The villa is some
distance out behind Nicholas Lake.”
“Thank you very much. Your kindness overwhelms me,” answered Wenk, “and
I do not know how to requite it.”
“Oh, _that’s_ all right,” answered the other heartily. “We Hungarians
are only too pleased to have such a chance. Then we can regard that as
settled?”
“Quite, thank you!”
“How very amiable the Hungarians are,” thought Wenk, as he hung up the
receiver. He felt quite ashamed of himself for having had a doubt of
the police superintendent’s good faith.
He spent the afternoon among the archives of the Criminal Investigation
Department, where he and the colleague with whom he had talked
concerning the Mabuse crimes looked through the collection of
photographs of criminals. Face after face drew his attention. He would
not give up until he had seen them all, and when he came back to his
lodgings, tired out with his protracted labours, he had only just time
to don his evening clothes in readiness for the function he was to
attend.
XX
Police Superintendent Vörös was punctual.
“Now I must tell you something about our host and my fellow-countrymen
out there by the Lake,” he said directly the car started. “He was
formerly Prince of Komor and Komorek, and he married a Viennese dancer.
Of course, his people were furious! They made things so disagreeable
for him that one day he said, ‘All right: you’ve gone too far. You’ve
done with your Prince. From to-day I am plain Komorek,’ and then he
wandered off. He was very rich, anyhow, and not in any way dependent
on his people. The only thing that is still ‘princely’ about him is
his mansion out yonder. You will see it for yourself. He’s been living
there for ten years now. His wife is very smart and exclusive--more
exclusive than a princess. Of course, she is no longer young. Have you
had your evening meal?”
“No, I had no time.”
“Well, that does not matter. At Komorek’s house they are always ready
for guests. You’ll get something good to eat there.”
Wenk asked himself, “Why is the man so talkative?” and once more his
feeling of repulsion for the Hungarian regained its sway. He was
inwardly both excited and uneasy, and in spite of the darkness in the
car his eyes smarted. There seemed to be a constant stabbing sensation
in them, and the thousands of likenesses he had seen that day seemed to
be chasing each other round and round in a never-ending stream. “How
much I should like to be at home and in bed!” he thought to himself.
The car drove through districts which were unknown to him, and this was
peculiar, for he had made the trip to the Nicholas Lake several times
already and thought he knew the district beyond Friedenau. To-day,
however, everything seemed unfamiliar. Was it the thick darkness of the
night and the very sparse illuminations allowed since the war, or was
it his own mood, which was responsible?
“Surely we ought to be at Nicholas Lake by now!” said he.
“I am not familiar with this neighbourhood,” said Vörös.
“I used to have friends out there, and I often drove there by
motor-car, but of course that was before the war.”
“Ah, yes, before the war. Everything was different then,” and they both
became silent.
Wenk looked at his watch, but it was too dark to read the dial, and for
a long time now there had been scarcely any lights.
After a prolonged pause, Wenk said, “Surely the driver has not lost his
way?”
“He is a Berlin taxi-driver. He told me he knew the way quite well.”