Entwined

by La Plante, Lynda

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  They were both sitting in the lounge when Anne Marie came out of her room, with case packed and coat over her arm. Her face was tight with anger. “Thank you for your generosity, Baron. Perhaps when you return to Paris, you would be kind enough to give me a letter of recommendation.”

  The baron threw the straitjacket at her feet.

  “There will be no letter of recommendation.”

  Anne Marie stepped over the straitjacket, and crossed to the suite’s double doors. She opened the righthand side, about to walk out without a word, but then she turned back.

  “I would be most grateful for a letter, I will require one for future employment!”

  Helen put her hand out to restrain Louis. Anne Marie looked at them both with disdain.

  “I would be only too pleased to give you a letter of recommendation to have the baroness certified! She should have been, years ago! Dr. Franks is just another quack, another fool who’ll take your money like the rest of them. There is no cure, it is a fantasy…your wife, Baron, is insane! She has been since I have been in your employment. She will kill someone, and that will be entirely your fault!”

  Helen’s restraining hand was pushed aside as the baron strode across the room. “You had better leave before I throw you out. Get out!”

  “As you wish, Baron! I will collect my personal belongings from the villa.”

  He pushed her out and slammed the door shut. “I should have done this months ago.”

  At his feet was the straitjacket. He picked it up and stared at it. He seemed totally defeated.

  “Don’t give up, Louis, it isn’t true. I believe in Franks.”

  He sighed, placing the jacket down on a chair. He kept his back to Helen. “Maybe she is right, maybe this is all a waste of time. I am so tired of it all, Helen.”

  His whole body tensed, his hands were clenched to his side. “I wish to God she were dead.”

  “That’s not true!”

  He turned to face her. “Isn’t it? I was sitting by her bedside, earlier today, thinking if I had the guts I would put a pillow over her face and end it, for her, for me, then…”

  “Then?”

  He sighed, slumping into a chair. “She was lucid, understood that I cannot allow her to be with Sasha, and she called Franks, it was her decision.”

  Helen picked up her purse and took out her notebook. “I am sure he will help her, but I think we should at least talk to this woman. The more we know of Vebekka’s background the better! Franks will need as much information as possible…Louis?”

  He cocked his head and gave a rueful smile.

  “Fine, whatever you say.”

  Helen picked up her coat, heading for her suite. “I’ll have a bath and change. We can leave when Hilda returns to the hotel. I’ll order some coffee.”

  Louis nodded, and then smiled. “Yes, I think some coffee would be an excellent idea.”

  The coffee arrived moments later, and Louis downed two cups before he felt sober. He carefully checked the time, first on his wristwatch, and then looked at the clock on the mantel. It was five-thirty.

  He put in a call to this sons, and then spoke to Sasha for a while.

  He said they missed her, and that he would tell her mama that she was being a good girl. The high-pitched voice hesitated before asking if her mama was being a good girl. He told her that everything was fine, and her mama would talk to her very soon. He managed to keep his voice calm and relaxed, but he was crying.

  “Will she be coming home better, Papa?”

  Louis pinched his nose between thumb and forefinger. “I hope so. She hasn’t been very well for a day or so, which means we may be here longer than we anticipated.” Sasha sighed with disappointment, but then changed the subject, talking about school and her new pony and telling him that she was practicing dressage, and entering a gymkhana—she was sure she would win a rosette this time. Angel—her pony—was living up to his name.

  “Papa, we jumped a two-foot fence! He is wonderful!”

  Louis congratulated his daughter, and then said he had to go, there was another call on the line. Sasha made kissing sounds, and he waited for her to replace the receiver before he put his down. He heard the click, then another click. He frowned; then replaced the receiver and walked into Vebekka’s bedroom. She was propped up on her pillows, very pale, deep circles beneath her eyes.

  “I will go to see the doctor tomorrow, Louis, even if you have to carry me there!” She sipped a glass of water, then replaced the glass on her bedside table. It took all her willpower to be calm, she needed something to help her, something to make her sleep, but she asked for nothing. She wasn’t going to drug herself, not this time; she was determined she would see it through.

  “I’ve dismissed Anne Marie. Hilda will be here shortly.”

  She leaned back, closing her eyes. “I never liked Anne Marie. Will you hold my hand?”

  He sat on the edge of the bed, lifted her hand to his lips, and kissed her fingers; they were so thin, so weak.

  “Will you promise me something, Louis?”

  “Depends on what it is!”

  She didn’t open her eyes. “I understand what trouble I cause, and I know I am always asking you to forgive me, but I always mean it. If this doctor thinks I will get worse, that these good moments will get fewer, and you are right, that I shouldn’t be with Sasha, I understand that, but you must understand, I never…I never intend to hurt anyone, I don’t know what takes me over, but it unleashes such terrible…”

  “I know…I know, but you must rest now, regain your strength.”

  She withdrew her hand, turning away from him. “Louis, if nothing can be done, you know, if after the hypnosis you find out things, I want no lies, no cover-ups, no new tests, because I don’t think I can stand it anymore. I’m getting worse, I know that, hours go by and I don’t know what I have done, who I’ve hurt, so promise me.”

  He knew what she was going to ask of him and he leaned over the bed to kiss her cheek.

  “Sleep now.”

  She opened her eyes, they pleaded, they begged him. “Don’t put me away, Louis, help me to end it—promise me?”

  He kissed her again, tilted her chin in his hands, looked deep into her eyes. He didn’t answer, and her eyelids drooped as she fell asleep, her chin still cupped in his hands.

  They were still together like a loving couple when Hilda slipped quietly into the bedroom. Gently the baron drew the covers to Vebekka’s chin, and Hilda saw the way he brushed her cheek with the edge of his index finger.

  “She was so frightened, sir, of the dark. Frightened someone was out there.”

  The baron patted Hilda’s shoulder. “Hilda, my poor darling is frightened of her own shadow. Thank you for your care and attention, good evening.”

  Hilda whispered “Good evening” as he quietly closed the door. She began to knit, then looked to the closed shutter and remembered the woman, the one she had seen outside that afternoon; she had been like a shadow, waiting, watching. The click click of her own knitting needles soothed and calmed Hilda.

  Vebekka did not seem even to be awake, but her hand moved closer to Hilda, and she said very softly: “Ma…angel.”

  While Helen was getting ready, the baron lit a cigarette, pacing the room, tormented by his wife’s request. He picked up the late afternoon paper in the room, and a front-page article caught his attention: murdered man identified. He started to read the column. The man was called Tommy Kellerman, a dwarf, a circus performer, who had recently arrived in East Berlin from Paris. The Polizei requested anyone seeing Kellerman on or during the night of his murder to come forward.

  Helen walked in refreshed and changed. Louis lowered the paper and smiled. “You look lovely!” He was about to toss the paper aside when he passed it to Helen. “Did you read this? A circus performer was murdered.”

  Helen glanced at the article.

  “Yes, I
was talking to one of the doormen, the hotel is only a few streets away from here. Apparently they have no clues, it happened late the same night we arrived. He was horribly beaten—the doorman was very keen to pass on all the gory details.”

  The baron put on his coat and said he would call down for a taxi. Helen opened the shutters to look at the weather, then felt a sense of déjà vu so strong she had to step back from the window…Helen saw Vebekka curled by the window. Helen recalled her exact words: “We have done something terrible”…and Helen remembered thinking she was referring to Louis. But now she recalled something else; she had seen a man, a tall man, passing in the street below. She was sure of it. “Good heavens, Louis, is there a description of the man they are looking for?”

  Helen picked up the newspaper again, rereading the article. Something else jarred her memory, the word Paris leaped at her, and she turned to Louis.

  “When we were at Dr. Franks’s you said you remembered an incident with Vebekka and Sasha…something about a circus.”

  But Louis did not hear her, he was on the telephone. “There’s a taxi waiting for us, I must tell Hilda we are leaving.”

  Hilda was told that should Vebekka awaken and need anything, she should call Dr. Franks. The baron thanked her profusely for being such a caring companion, and slipped some folded bills into her hand. She blushed, and replied that she was happy to look after the baroness. She added hesitantly: “I hope she will be helped by this Dr. Franks, that whatever demons torture and frighten her will be driven away.”

  The doorman ushered the baron and Helen into one of the regular hotel taxis: the same one that had just returned from the circus, having driven Ruda Kellerman back to her trailer. The driver kept up a steady flow of conversation about the price of the circus tickets, and said there were already lines of people waiting for them.

  He was about to launch into telling them that an earlier occupant of his taxi was one of the star performers, but Helen and the baron began to speak to each other in French, ignoring him, and as he couldn’t understand a word they said, he concentrated on driving to the address in Charlottenburg. It was a long drive, and he hoped the rain would hold off as they were about to get into the rush hour traffic. Suddenly, remembering that Ruda Kellerman had asked him to drive her the following day, he jotted down her name on his call sheet as he drove. The car swerved, but his passengers paid no attention. It was curious, he thought to himself, Ruda Kellerman had seemed just to want to stand outside the hotel. He’d watched her for a long time, standing almost as if she were listening to be called, a strange fixed expression on her face. She must have been waiting for someone, he thought.

  Chapter 7

  After Ruda Kellerman had identified her ex-husband at the morgue, Inspector Heinz returned to his run-down station in the slum area of East Berlin. He and Rieckert proceeded laboriously to type out all the information about the people they had interviewed.

  Kellerman’s immigration papers had not been found at Customs. All Torsen knew to date was that he had arrived from Paris, booked into the hotel, eaten a hamburger, and got himself murdered. Nobody seemed to have seen him, or seen anyone else enter his room, or leave it! Everyone who had known him from the circus felt his death was deserved. His ex-wife had not seen him since he had left prison, and was unable to describe the tattoo sliced from his left arm.

  Rieckert put his typed report on Torsen’s desk, and since it was almost one-thirty went to collect his raincoat.

  Torsen watched him. “You know, a few nights we may have to work overtime on this…”

  “I have a date tonight! You coming out for a sandwich?”

  “No, but you can have a toasted cheese-and-tomato sent over for me, just one on rye bread—tell her I’ll pay tomorrow.”

  Rieckert shrugged and walked out. Torsen completed his own reports, adding that the janitor from Kellerman’s hotel should be questioned again. His stomach rumbled. He’d eaten nothing since breakfast, and he hoped Rieckert wouldn’t forget his sandwich. He put the kettle on to make himself instant coffee and, waiting for the water to boil, he turned in his reports to the empty Polizei Direktor’s office, and filed a second copy for the Leitender Polizei Direktor, who was away on holiday.

  The coffee jar was virtually empty. He found some sugar, but no milk. He sighed, even thought about joining Rieckert when his cheese on rye was delivered, wrapped in a rather grubby paper napkin, but at least it was what he had ordered. He kept an eye on the delivery boy who hovered by the missing persons photographs, and not until he had left did Torsen return to his desk.

  He chewed thoughtfully as he read the autopsy report. The heaviness of the blows indicated that more than likely they had been inflicted by a man—to have crushed Kellerman’s skull took considerable force. Whoever killed Kellerman had also ground his false teeth into the carpet. A heel imprint, retained in the pile of the carpet, was still being tested at the lab. The print was of a steel-capped boot heel, again probably a man’s because of the size. Samples of mud and sawdust found at the scene of the crime were also still being tested.

  Torsen made a few notes:

  a. Where did Kellerman go for his hamburger?

  b. How many dwarfs performed at the circus?

  c. Were any dwarfs missing from Schmidt’s circus (just in case they lied about him not being employed there)?

  d. Sawdust—was it from the circus?

  e. Get the ex-Mrs. Kellerman to give a written positive ID so that burial may take place—(Rabbi).

  f. Why was Tommy Kellerman in East Berlin?

  Torsen wondered why Ruda still used Kellerman’s name and not Grimaldi’s. Then he remembered something that had been nagging at the back of his brain. He scrambled for his notepad and scrawled a memo to himself. “Check unsolved dossier—the wizard.”

  When Torsen’s father had been detective inspector they had often discussed unsolved cases together. It had begun as a sort of test between the old policeman and his eager son, but the two men had eventually grown to enjoy discussing what they thought had happened, and why the case remained unsolved. One case they had nicknamed “The Wizard,” because the murdered man had been an old cabaret performer. He too had been found brutally stabbed.

  The Wizard—he could not even recall the man’s real name—had been found in the Kreuzberg sector; he had been dead for many months, his decomposed body buried under the floorboards…and his left arm had been mutilated. It was suspected the mutilation had taken place because the discovery of a tattoo would have assisted police inquiries, might even have helped them identify him. They would have required a lot of assistance if his body had not been wrapped in a wizard’s cloak. They had been able to trace him, but his killer had never been found.

  It was, Torsen surmised, just a coincidence, but he could hear his father’s voice, see that forefinger wagging in the air. “Never believe in a coincidence when you are investigating a murder, there are no coincidences.”

  Torsen picked up his notepad again.

  1. Discover any persons residing in East Berlin or in the vicinity of the dead man’s hotel recently arrived from Paris.

  2. Call the Hospice Center.

  3. Magician.

  Torsen checked his watch, then demolished the rest of his lunch, carefully wiping the crumbs from his desk with the napkin. He sipped his coffee, draining the cup, and then, unlike anyone else at the station, returned it to the kitchen, rinsed it out, leaving it on the draining board. He had a quick wash and brush-up in the cloakroom before he went back to his office. He sifted through the work requiring immediate attention, and then checked his watch again. He had taken exactly one hour, no more, no less.

  Rieckert was back late by a good fifteen minutes. Torsen could hear him laughing in the corridor. He snatched open the door.

  “You’re supposed to take one hour!”

  Rieckert waved a new jar of coffee as an excuse, asking if Torsen would like a cup. “No, thank you. Now g
et in here!”

  Torsen left his door open and began to gather up all his half-completed vehicle theft reports, at the same time shouting again for Rieckert to join him.

  “I was just going to get some milk!”

  “These are more important. Get them sorted, I want the lot filed and checked.”

  “But I’m off at five-thirty.”

  “You can leave when these are completed and not before. I have to go out later myself, so the faster we get through them, the…”

  “Where are you going?” Rieckert interrupted sullenly.

  “Kellerman’s hotel. I am, in case you are unaware of the fact, heading a homicide investigation. I have to have further discussions with the manager and get hold of the register, find out whether the janitor saw anyone else leaving the hotel around the time of the murder. Perhaps I should have a look at the alleyway, the distance the janitor had been from the man he saw, if that is permissible with you!”

  Torsen began furiously jotting down notes in his thick pad.

  a. How did the killer get to the hotel?

  b. Question taxi drivers.

  c. Question bus drivers.

  d. Question doormen at the Grand: very well-lit reception area outside, within spitting distance of Kellerman’s hotel.

  e. Discuss guests with hotel manager.

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  Ruda had got soaked to the bone standing outside the Grand Hotel, yet nonetheless went to see Mamon before changing. As she turned to head toward her trailer, she saw Mike, and froze. He was still wearing Tommy Kellerman’s black leather trilby. She swore at herself, at her stupidity for not remembering to dump it along with the rest of Kellerman’s belongings. She watched Mike heading toward the meat trailer, but she couldn’t do anything about it. She had to get ready to rehearse the act; she was behind schedule. When she reached the trailer Grimaldi was already there, with an open bottle of brandy.