The Odessa File

‘I only want to look at his room.’

‘I’ve re-let it.’

‘What did you do with his stuff?’

‘It’s in the backyard. Nothing else I could do with it.’

The pile of junk was lying in a heap under the thin rain. It still smelt of gas. There was a battered old typewriter, two scuffed pairs of shoes, an assortment of clothes, a pile of books and a fringed white-silk scarf that Miller assumed must be something to do with the Jewish religion. He went through everything in the pile, but there was no indication of an address book and nothing addressed to Marx.

‘Is that the lot?’ he asked.

‘That’s the lot,’ said the man, regarding him sourly from the shelter of the back door.

‘Do you have any tenant by the name of Marx?’

‘Nope.’

‘Do you know of any Marx?’

‘Nope.’

‘Did old Tauber have any friends?’

‘Not that I knew of. Kept himself to himself. Came and went at all hours, shuffling about up there. Barmy if you ask me. But he paid his rent regular. Didn’t cause no trouble.’

‘Ever seen him with anybody? Out in the street I mean.’

‘No, never. Didn’t seem to have any friends. Not surprised, the way he kept mumbling to himself. Barmy.’

Miller left, and started asking up and down the street. Most people remembered seeing the old man, shuffling along, head down, wrapped in an ankle-length greatcoat, head covered by a woollen cap, hands in woollen gloves from which the fingertips protruded.

For three days he quartered the area of streets where Tauber lived, checking through the dairy, the greengrocer, the butcher, the hardware store, the beer-bar, the tobacconist, intercepting the milkman and the postman. It was Wednesday afternoon when he found the group of urchins playing football up against the warehouse wall.

‘What, that old Jew? Mad Solly?’ said the leader of the group in answer to his question. The rest gathered round.

‘That’s the one,’ said Miller. ‘Mad Solly.’

‘He was barmy,’ said one of the crowd. ‘He used to walk like this.’

The boy hunched his head into his shoulders, hands clutching his jacket round him, and shuffled forward a few paces, muttering to himself and casting his eyes about. The others dissolved in laughter, and one gave the impersonator a hefty shove which sent him sprawling.

‘Anyone ever see him with anyone else?’ asked Miller. ‘Talking with anyone else. Another man.’

‘Whatcher want to know for?’ asked the leader, suspiciously. ‘We didn’t do him no harm.’

Miller flicked a five-mark coin idly up and down in one hand. Eight pairs of eyes watched the silver glitter of the spinning coin. Eight heads shook slowly. Miller turned and walked away.

‘Mister.’

He stopped and turned round. The smallest of the group had caught up with him.

‘I seen him once with a man. Talking they was. Sitting and talking.’

‘Where was that?’

‘Down by the river. On the grass bank along the river. There are some benches there. They was sitting on a bench talking.’

‘How old was he, the other one?’