Matt nodded. "That's exactly what Father Alban said. No money, just food. And probably clothing. Come to think of it, he didn't mention clothing. Just something about charity shops."
"Maybe Salman will prefer your clothes rather than mine," Zoé said with a giggle.
"HAT doesn't only look after men; there's at least one woman there. Her name is Olga and she comes from Slovakia. I'm sure she'd like some of your cast-offs. And I don't think you ought to have any more drink in your condition. "
"And why are you taking all this interest in foreign women?" Zoé demanded, leaving the bottle alone.
"I've always been attracted to foreign women. That's why I fancied you in the bookshop."
"And are you going to talk to Olga?"
"Possibly. Father Alban is going to ask her if she'll translate some Czech websites I keep finding. He reckons Olga can speak Czech."
Zoé looked fascinated, which came as a relief. There might not be a crock of gold at the end of this particular rainbow, but somehow Hana Eisler had become very real. He could picture a young Jewish girl hiding in Prague from the Nazis. He could even see her holding the papers and wondering where to take them for safety. He could almost feel her suffering, and even imagine her horrific death at the Terezín concentration camp.
"What is the matter?" Zoé sounded concerned. "I can see some sadness in your eyes."
"I keep thinking about young Hana."
"She has been dead a long time, Matt. I think perhaps you must forget about her."
"I can't. Ever since I've been trying to track Hana down, it's like she's trying to contact me. It's scary."
"You think you are a medium?"
"Of course not. Funnily enough, we got round to talking about séances with Father Alban in the office, and he's very anti that sort of thing."
"I am not surprised. Most of the mediums are in it for the money." Zoé put down her knife and fork. She didn't seem impressed with the sausage. "I will show you. Do you know anyone whose name begins with the letter A?"
"Are you asking me?"
"It is what the medium asks. Pretend I am the medium."
"If it makes you happy." Matt finished a mouthful of chips. "What's the question again?"
"Do you know anyone whose name begins with the letter A?"
"My grandfather was called Alec." He could see now what the game was. He and Zoé had to pretend to be strangers. "Yes, my grandfather was called Alec. He died two years ago."
"Yes, it is Alec who is coming through. He says he is your grandfather. He wants you to know that he is now at peace. And there is someone with him who wants to talk to you. The name has the letter J at the beginning. Do you know anyone whose name starts with the letter J?"
As Matt started to shake his head, Zoé did the same. "Or it might be the letter G. The person is rather distant and the voice is not very clear."
"I have an Auntie Jane. But she's still alive."
Zoé frowned. "No, it is not a J; it is definitely G. A man I think. Yes, a man."
"My Uncle Graham died when I was a baby. Not that I can remember him."
"Yes, he says his name is Graham. Was he the brother of your father?"
"I think so."
"You are right. He is here in the room. I can hear him clearly now. He says his name is Graham Rider. He can remember you when you were a baby. He was watching over you while you grew up. He always kept you safe on your way to school. He loves you very much."
Matt decided not to pour himself a second glass of wine, or Zoé might follow his example. "He didn't stop me falling off my bike and breaking my collar bone then I was ten."
Zoé sighed. "Do you want to know how I did it?"
"Easy. You know about my family."
"I did not know about your Uncle Graham."
"It was a lucky guess."
Zoé got up from the table and fetched the carton of orange juice from the fridge. "Not lucky. Everyone knows somebody who has died with a name that starts with J or G. Sometimes they need a bit of prompting, but they get there in the end."
"Is that how mediums do it?" Matt helped himself to the juice.
Zoé held out her hands wide. "So I have read. Sometimes they do not even know they are doing a trick. Have you heard about horses that can to the mathematics?"
"Tell me."
"Horses are clever. They can do the easy sums like two times four. You ask the horse the question and it taps the hoof eight times."
"Pull the other one."
"It is true. I have seen it on the television in France. The owner asks the question and waits while the horse taps the hoof. When the horse gets to the answer, the owner looks away or stands back, or raises a hand. All the horse is doing is tapping the hoof until it gets the signal to stop. It does not understand the question. Sometimes the owner is not aware of giving the signal, and really believes the horse can count."
"It makes sense. I heard about a dog that barked the answers, but I didn't know how it worked."
"And you think you are the clever detective. A medium would find you very gullible."
"If Mrs. Smith asked if I knew someone whose name began with H, I'd want to know a lot more before I gave Hana's name away."
"Did Hana Eisler speak English?"
"That's exactly what Father Alban wanted to know. It's not a problem. Mrs. Smith came from Prague originally, so she'll know what Hana's saying."
Zoé looked aghast. "Oh no, Matt, you are not going to try to contact Hana Eisler. It is dangerous."
"Father Alban said that too. Come on, it's only a bit of fun. You were full of the idea earlier. Even Blake thought a séance might be worth a try."
"Then Monsieur Blake can go to Madame Smith himself, and ask her to contact Hana."
"He can't. Blake doesn't want Smith to know about Hana Eisler and the music manuscripts. Anyway, I've never been to a séance. It will be an experience."
"No, Matt."
"We can go when Martin Smith is teaching at the Academy. His mother needn't know we're doing it for Blake. I could say we want to contact a girl who died in the war. In Prague."
"You would have to tell Mrs. Smith the name. There must be millions of dead people from Prague. How will she know who to contact?"
"Okay, I'll show her a Habgood Securities card and say we're doing it for a Jewish client who wants to trace his roots. I can say the dead relative is called Hana Eisler, but I won't say when she died or how old she was. If Mrs. Smith says she's managed to contact Hana Eisler who died in 1942, I'll get her to ask Hana to tell me the names of Hana's parents, grandparents and great-grandparents. Mrs. Smith wouldn't be able to guess that lot -- not even if she's a horse. Come on, let's go back to the Academy and see if Shelley Carpenter's at home."
*
THE ACADEMY gates were open as usual, the lights on in several windows in the residential block. Matt parked in the middle of a row of cars, most of which were old, though none was as old as his Mini. Did Ken really have a replacement car lined up? He'd not say anything to Zoé yet. It would only raise her hopes.
"We've got to think about this carefully," he explained. "If Edward Blake opens the door we have to tell him ... "
Zoé caught hold of his sleeve. "We will not be telling anyone anything, I think."
"Why not?"
"Because apartment eight is empty. Look, there are no lights on. I would make a better detective than you."
He wasn't going to be outsmarted. "Maybe Shelley Carpenter is round the back."
"And maybe she has gone out. Are you going to ring the bell?"
He shrugged, and was just reaching for the bell push when a young voice called out from behind.
"Are you trying to find Miss Carpenter?" asked a girl who looked to be about fifteen. She seemed surprisingly smart for a student, wearing a long black skirt, and a black jacket over a white blouse.
Matt smiled at her, trying to look relaxed. "We came to see Miss Carpenter. Or Mr. Blake." He wasn't sure why it bothered hi
m that one of the students might find him visiting Shelley Carpenter, but instinct told him to keep this job to himself.
"Mr. Blake doesn't live here," the girl said with a laugh. "Whatever would the principal say if she thought Mr. Blake and Miss Carpenter were living together?"
Obviously the students didn't know. Well, he wasn't going to be the one to start the gossip going around the Academy. "Do you know where Miss Carpenter is?"
The girl came closer, looking at Zoé warily. "Are you friends of hers?"
Zoé nodded.
The girl shook her head. "She's gone."
"Gone?" Matt asked.
"Back to America, and taken her violin with her. Los Angeles I think. There's been a terrible fuss."
Matt kept quiet. The girl was trying to tell them something, but might stop if he interrupted her.
The girl's eyes opened wide. "Haven't you heard? Our principal arranged an Academy concert in London next month. It's already been advertised, complete with a solo by Miss Carpenter on her violin. I think the principal's more worried about the violin not appearing than about Miss Carpenter."
"It is a special violin?" Zoé asked.
Matt guessed it was special. Blake had already told him about a violin owned by Vasek Tesar.
"It was once played by Dvorak," the girl told them, confirming Matt's assumption. She turned as another girl called from the doorway of the main building, and then waved before looking at Zoé. "Have to go. We've just got back from a concert. Sorry about Miss Carpenter."
As the student ran off, Matt took Zoé by the hand. "See, I was right. Blake and Shelley Carpenter weren't even lovers, let alone partners. That man's been lying."
"You were right," Zoé agreed, "but too late."
"I could ask Blake for Shelley Carpenter's new address, but I don't trust the man any more. Maybe I can get ... No, it would be better if you did it. Someone in the office will give you Shelley's address in LA if you ring in the morning and say you're a friend. I'll give you the Academy phone number when we get back."
Half an hour later they parked outside their house. They didn't notice her at first, but she must have been sitting in her car, waiting for them to come home. It was only when Matt put the key in the door that he heard Shelley Carpenter call his name.
Chapter Twelve
SHELLY CARPENTER sat forward in the armchair. "I can't stay long. I don't want my dog barking and whining, upsetting the other guests in the hotel."
Matt looked her straight in the eye. "Should we call you Shelley Carpenter or Shelley Tesar?"
That got a reaction. Their visitor sat up quickly. "Just call me Shelley."
Matt had expected her to deny having the name Tesar. He'd come back to it later. "Okay, Shelley, if you're returning to the States, what are you going to do with your dog?" He wished the American woman had arrived wearing something more substantial in the way of clothing. Her sweatshirt clung to her body, revealing every outline.
Shelley Carpenter sighed loudly. "I wanted to go back to America this week, but I can't take him with me. So I'm trapped. I guess I'll have to stay in town until I've sorted things out."
Matt was afraid Zoé was going to invite Shelley Carpenter to move in with them for a few days. It would be a disaster. For one thing he didn't know if he could believe anything this woman had to say, and for another he didn't want her delinquent dog wrecking the place. And he was aware that Zoé was giving Shelley a look that said: be careful, this man's mine.
"How did you know about my family name being Tesar?" Shelley asked with a hint of annoyance when the room went silent.
"It was just the guess," Matt told her. "I was looking at some Czech names and noticed that Tesar means a carpenter. I know you've got a famous violin, and I'm guessing it's the one that Vasek Tesar leant to Dvorak for his trip to America. Am I right?"
Shelley Carpenter shook her head in disbelief. "For a PI you've got one helluva a long nose. And I thought all you did was spy on people with a camera."
He could see if he wasn't careful the woman would storm out, as she'd done in Ken's office. "How did you get the violin?" he asked.
"I suppose it doesn't matter. After all, it's not exactly a secret. Vasek Tesar was my great, great great-grandfather. Vasek married a woman called Anna Král in 1859. We don't know if Anna was Jewish, but their daughter Pavla married a Jew, so we assume the family had Jewish sympathies. Pavla Tesar married Erich Eisler in ... I think it was 1889. One of their children was my great-grandfather Otik. Otik Eisler."
Matt started to count on his fingers, going back through the generations. "You'll have to wait a moment," he said.
"Matt," Zoé interrupted, "Shelley cannot spend all the night here."
He got there in the end. Otik Eisler could be a brother to Hana Eisler's father. "Did Otik have any brothers or sisters?"
"Just one brother. His name was Jakob. Jakob was older than Otik. Jakob had two girls, Hana and Rosa, but he insisted on staying in Prague. The Nazis killed the whole family in 1942. My great-grandfather got his family out of Czechoslovakia just in time, and emigrated to California. My own father was only six. Is it important?"
Matt noticed Zoé giving him a strange look. If only he'd had a chance to talk this through with Zoé first. "I'm just interested, that's all."
"Would you like a tea or a coffee?" Zoé asked, standing up.
"Coffee would be fine," their visitor said. "Plenty of milk."
"Matt." Zoé gave him a look that said listen carefully. "You will have to give me a hand to get the jug down. I am not able to reach it by myself."
He was about to protest that there was no jug to reach, when he guessed that Zoé wanted to say something in private. As soon as they got the kitchen her eyes flashed. "I have seen you looking at that woman," she admonished him.
"I have to look at her when I'm talking."
Zoé stamped her foot. "You know very well what I mean. You have already seen enough of that woman to last you a lifetime."
Maybe he'd let his thoughts run away a little, but it was hardly his fault. The woman shouldn't have taken her clothes off at the pool. He helped Zoé prepare the tray rather than risk going back into the living room alone.
"I want you to play along with what I say," he told Zoé quietly when she had calmed down. "If I say I don't know something, please don't contradict me and say I do. I want to see if Shelley is as innocent as she claims."
"Ah, it is Shelley now, is it? To me she is Ms. Carpenter. Right, everything is ready. Please carry the tray."
He went ahead, put the tray on the coffee table, and let Zoé do the pouring.
"You seem surprised that I can trace my family back so far. Thanks." Shelley Carpenter leaned forward to take her mug. Fortunately the neck of her sweatshirt stayed tight and revealed nothing. "We Americans are much keener on tracing our roots than you British are. When I've finished my coffee I really must be going. It's my dog. I don't want him upsetting the other guests in the hotel."
"Is that any chance of seeing the violin?" Matt wanted to delay Shelley until he'd asked a few more questions. "Zoé would like to see it."
Zoé must have caught on. "I would love to see such a famous violin," she said.
Shelley Carpenter smiled. "It's in my room at the hotel. It's a bit of a painful subject right now. The principal wants me to play my violin in the London concert next month, but no way am I doing it now she's fired me. And she sure isn't going to borrow the violin if I'm not there."
The conversation was going the way Matt wanted. "You're right. It belongs to your family's past."
Shelley looked thoughtful and nodded, as though to herself. "There's something you won't know. I was telling the principal about it when I first came to the Academy. The violin really belonged to Otik's brother, Jakob, who was left in Prague at the start of the war. My father always felt guilty about our side of the family having it."
"Yes?"
"Jakob Eisler inherited it because he was older than Otik.
But Jakob gave it to Otik to take to America, but I guess it was only to make sure it was safe during the war."
"So why the guilt?" Matt asked. "Your grandfather couldn't have given it back. You said Jakob and his family died in 1942."
Shelley looked embarrassed. "When my great-grandfather Otik got to America his surname was Eisler, but he changed it to Carpenter."
"He must have been proud of his family tree," Matt prompted. "So why not Tesar?"
"So he couldn't be traced by anyone in Czechoslovakia."
"He probably didn't want an argument about ownership with the family," Matt suggested. He could hardly accuse Shelley Carpenter of having a great-grandfather who was an art thief, but it sounded likely.
"Something terrible happened, and that's all I'm saying." Shelley shrugged. "My grandparents have been dead for ages and my father died three years ago. I guess I'm the only one alive who knows the story." Suddenly she burst into tears.
Matt looked at Zoé in alarm. This wasn't what he wanted.
Zoé knew what to do. Her training is a nurse kicked in and she reached out and took hold of Shelley's hand. She began to smooth it on the back. "Please," she said, "you must not be distressed about something that happened so long ago, before you were even born."
Shelley Carpenter sniffed loudly and wiped her face was a couple of tissues that Zoé passed her "My great-grandfather Otik was a murderer. He got his brother's family killed -- so he could keep the violin for himself."
Matt waited a moment. "I'd be interested to hear how it happened," he said when Shelley seemed to have run out things to say.
"The Nazis were in control of Prague, but in May 1942 a group of Czech resistance fighters decided to kill Reinhard Heydrich."
"Wasn't Heydrich the Nazi commander of the area?" Matt asked.
Shelley nodded. "A brutal and ruthless man. A band of resistance fighters set an ambush and shot his car to bits."
"Shot him as well," Matt added. "I remember seeing a television program about it. He didn't die straight away. I think the stuffing from the car seat got taken into his body by the bullets." He glanced at Zoé. "Blood poisoning."
Shelley looked up. "The assassination made the Nazi leaders mad. They rounded up every possible collaborator they could find and killed them. But they knew they hadn't found everyone involved in the assassination, so they kept looking."
"Was Jakob Eisler one of the resistance fighters?" Matt felt almost proud for the man.
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