by Rick Blechta
“Why do you say that?” Roderick asked.
“When I woke in the morning, I did not have a complete recollection of what had happened the night before. It was very strange. Normally, I have no problem with drink. Thekla told me that I had passed out. I remember nothing. It has never happened to me before. Never have I felt so sick! There was vomiting and a most terrible aching of the head.”
“So to the best of your knowledge, Thekla was with you the whole night?”
Hauser nodded.
“And she left first thing the next morning?”
Hauser nodded again.
“Are you certain that she could not have hidden something in this apartment? It would not be large. It could have been hidden behind that bookcase, for instance,” I said, pointing to the upended object across the room. Obviously, someone had already had the same idea.
“She could not have done that. One of the first things Thekla noticed when I brought her up here was how clean my wife keeps this apartment. I think she does it to torture me. ‘Don’t put your feet on the furniture, Heinz!’ ‘Take off your shoes by the door!’ ‘Put away those filthy dishes, you schwein!’ My wife cleans everywhere. I told Thekla to be very careful of her things, or my wife would find them. She just laughed at me, the little bitch! Sometimes I wish I could swear off women, but they follow me around for God’s sake!”
I don’t know how Roderick felt, but I’d had enough of Hauser. Clearly, we’d gotten there too late. Or maybe we’d forced someone to move early. Had whoever trashed the place found what they were looking for? My head said probably, but my heart wouldn’t give up hope.
As we were walking through the Schönbrunn grounds on our way to the U-Bahn stop, Roderick said to me with a grin, “You know, I’d love to hear what Hauser tells his wife. I have an idea it will be quite entertaining.”
***
We met up with Elen back at the hotel. Actually, we were in the middle of a second round of scotch (having wisely bought a bottle) when she dragged herself into my room.
“Christ, I feel as if my eyeballs are going to fall out of my head!” she said, flopping down on one of the beds. “I could sleep for a week.”
“What did you come up with?” I asked, fixing her a drink.
She took an appreciative sip. “Oh, that’s good. Let’s see, I’ve got a good handle on Ertmann’s material. Von Heislinger really was a prime bastard. When you write everything out in a list, it is quite awful. What’s interesting is that he most often picked vulnerable women, not the kind who would be happy to exchange sex for something they wanted, but ones he could really debauch, if I can use that old term. This is probably what turned his crank, and that’s why he was so vicious with Tory when she refused him. He probably was happy she felt that way.
“I also decided to take a trip over to the Austrian State Music Library and see what I might find in the way of historical background on how the concerto might have gone missing. There was nothing definite, but I did run across something rather spooky in an old research book that I’ll bet hasn’t been opened in fifty years. There’s also a very brief reference to it in Thayer’s Life of Beethoven.
“Apparently, when Beethoven visited his brother Johann in the fall of 1826, the year before he died, the household had a maid whose name was—believe it or not—Thekla. How’s that for curious? Beethoven brought her back to Vienna as his servant when he returned in December. That’s when he caught the cold which led to his final illness, by the way. She was let go in late January or early February. Guess why?”
“I shudder to think,” Roderick said. “Theft! Beethoven accused her of stealing things from his apartment. It sent a shiver down my spine, I can tell you!”
“Were you able to find out any more about her, this other Thekla?” Roderick asked.
“Not really. We might look in old city records. Also, I’m told the most complete collection of research materials on Beethoven is in Bonn at the Beethovenhaus. We might go there to look. It’s too bad so many of his conversation books were apparently burned after his death. I bet we could have found something in there. Knowing what he could be like, I’m sure Beethoven probably complained about Thekla at tedious length.
“I also got to talking with one of the librarians, and he said that Beethoven also left behind a lot of things called sketch books. Maybe we could find some references to melodic material in the concerto from one of them.”
“That’s a terrific idea,” Roderick said. “You would think that one of the highly educated musicians in the room would have thought of something useful like that!”
The room phone rang, and Roderick answered. He said a few sentences in German then handed the phone to me. “Seidelmann.”
The doctor sounded rather distraught. “I cannot speak long. I thought, though, that you should know what is happening.”
“Has Tory taken a turn for the worse?”
“Nein! They have taken her back to prison! I am on my way to the Haftanstalt now to make certain that she is provided for as best as possible and that they understand the seriousness of her mental state.”
“I’ll meet you there.”
“It will do you no good. To see Fräulein Morgan, you have to now have a signed permission from the examining magistrate. I am only allowed as her physician because of pressure by Schultz.”
“Shit!”
“My sentiments exactly. I must go now.”
“Tell Tory I send my love and that we’re all working hard to get her out. Things are looking up.”
“Your wife will need to know not only that, but she will need your strength, my friend. I must freely admit that I fear for her.”
I rang up Schultz, this time using my cell phone. His secretary put me through immediately.
“Herr Lukesh! So you know what is going on?”
“Yes, I just got a call from Seidelmann,” I answered. “What’s up?”
“The examining magistrate is very angry and thinks that we are out to make a fool of him because we did not tell anyone of this music, and he has also been convinced that Fräulein Morgan’s mental problems are all play acting. That is why she has been taken from the hospital. Do you possibly have any new information for me? I cannot stress how much we now need it.” I gave Schultz a quick sketch of what the great-aunt had told us, and he said, “I will make sure my investigators follow every move of those three,” he said, “Montenegro, Terradella and Schatzader. We will get the bad guy, as they say in your country!”
Elen and Roderick had heard everything, since Schultz had been so angry his voice had been clearly audible to anyone nearby.
Elen made a face. “Every step we take, things just seem to get worse. What next?”
“I want to bring a few points to your attention,” Roderick said gravely. “Firstly, what precipitated the news of the concerto being leaked after all these days?”
“It was bound to come out,” Elen said. “One of von Heislinger’s servants wanted to make some pocket money perhaps.”
“Maybe it was Montenegro,” I offered. “After all, a bit of media sensation would make his proposal for a documentary more attractive.”
“I disagree,” Roderick said. “The result of the news coming out is that Tory is back in a jail cell, despite what she tried to do last night. I think someone wants us to be distracted with that and not be off looking for the concerto—or Thekla’s murderer.”
“Or both.”
“What’s all this telling us?” Elen asked.
“Not to be knocked off the path we’re on, that’s what,” I stated firmly.
Off in the distance, we could hear the sound of some emergency vehicle. It seemed to lend a further cold reminder of urgency.
TORY
Seidelmann had very kindly checked in to make sure I was okay and had attempted to be at his most positive for the brief visit allowed, but the plain fact of the matter was that we had been beaten. I was back in prison and at the lowest ebb of my life. I don’t know if it was my imagination
, but everyone seemed harsher to me than they had been the first time. I wondered if it was due to that big, loudmouthed Overly-lieutenant Whatsis. At least they weren’t going to keep me waiting long. The trial would begin in a mere seven days.
Schultz had seemed pretty down when he came and assured me that “everything that can be done will be done”, but nevertheless he looked pretty whipped. Wonderful! The self-proclaimed best lawyer in all of Austria looked ready to throw in the towel.
Staring at the grey walls, the grey floors, the grey food, I didn’t know how long I could stand it. No Tristan, no one to talk to, and worst of all, no clue as to the whereabouts of the manuscript. That was probably the worst thing: because of me that precious music was still lost. I should have just spread my legs and let von Heislinger have his way with me.
If someone had had the kindness to hand me a gun at that point, I would have saved them the trouble of holding a trial.
ROCKY
The previous evening, Ertmann and I had arranged for him to pick me up in the hotel’s underground garage. He insisted on that to minimize the risk of anyone finding out what we were up to.
The pressure of the past two weeks had been taking a toll on my nerves, leaving them feeling scraped and raw. Since movies always portray parking garages as places where danger lurks and dark
deeds are done, I was unnaturally alert as I exited the elevator, aware that anyone down there could see me, but I couldn’t see them. As I stood for a moment reconnoitering, a pair of headlights blinked at me. I began moving warily in their direction.
Ertmann had his own car again that evening, something significant. It meant that what was about to take place between us was off the record. Shaking hands warmly, he asked after Tory.
“I now have to get written permission from some damn magistrate to speak to her, and it will probably be done through glass, using a phone. Schultz is trying to arrange that for me. Seidelmann, the psychiatrist who was originally examining her, saw Tory a few hours ago and says she’s totally depressed, and frankly, we’re all worried about her. They’re going to watch her as closely as they can, but it’s the magistrate’s opinion that her...episode last night was just a ploy.”
“I am aware of that,” Ertmann said. “I have a number of things to tell you, my friend, and papers for you to look at as well. However, to procure them, some, ah, acts on the shadowy side of our laws have had to be committed, ja? You will have to give me your solemn assurance that you will not pass these documents on to anyone else, and I must insist on this point. Not only would I be seriously compromised, but a person who did me a very great favour would be in large amounts of trouble. You do understand?”
I nodded, and Ertmann started his car. We left the garage, and I looked away so the guy in the kiosk couldn’t identify me. My companion drove for several minutes, concentrating on travelling a winding path through several streets south and east of the hotel.
Eventually satisfied that we weren’t being followed, Ertmann relaxed and began to talk. “As you were hoping, what you asked for my help with yesterday has fortunately yielded several quite interesting pieces of information. That has also led to other developments which I will tell you about later. Please get my attaché case from the back seat.”
The case contained photographs of a number of documents grouped together with paperclips, as well as a few typed sheets. Ertmann pulled into a parking lot. In the distance, I saw a large supermarket called Spar. Being late on a week night, there were not many cars left.
“The photographs are of documents that lie in the safe of Rudolph von Heislinger in his Vienna apartment.”
They were in German. “What do they say? I notice Tory’s name here several times.”
“The first document contains a detailed psychological profile of your wife. Someone went to much trouble and expense getting the information it contains, assuming that medical records are difficult to obtain in your country.”
“They’re passing around Tory’s medical records?” I asked, totally shocked.
“No. Someone was hired to procure them illegally. A great many people who know your wife were also interviewed under the guise of research for a magazine article. The information is quite exhaustive and quite revealing. Fräulein Morgan is far more interesting than I could have imagined,” Ertmann said dryly.
“Yeah, there are some people who really don’t like Tory. I’ll bet they spared nothing.”
“Nein. You misunderstand. What I learned is that Fräulein Morgan’s public ‘face’ is much different from her private one. I can now see why you are so concerned about her mental well-being and why she was able to be manipulated by von Heislinger. The second document is an analysis based on the first document’s facts. It tells in detail how your wife’s mental state could be undermined and suggests several ways to accomplish this.”
“And one of the suggestions was a scathingly bad review from Easterbrook, right? We’ve already found out that he was paid to say what he did.”
Ertmann nodded. “Useful information to be sure. Everything done was very impressively orchestrated. It was a most thorough job.”
“All this effort just so some horny Austrian nobleman could have sex with my wife? It’s crazy!”
“Mania takes many forms, my friend, and the more I see of human nature, the less I am surprised by it. I agree with you that, for von Heislinger, his enjoyment came from the joy of the chase. He hunted women, and your wife, sad to say, was the biggest game of all.”
“Unfortunately, his ‘game’ bit back.”
“Ah, but that is only ‘the tip of the iceberg’ as you say in English. Aren’t you curious about who provided the information and analysis to von Heislinger?”
“Who?”
“Heinrich Schatzader’s academic training was in psychology, and by all accounts he was headed for a very brilliant career when he was asked to voluntarily cease practising. I have not yet been able to find out why. It was long ago. Fortunately for him, he came from a wealthy family and proved also to be good at business. He is now worth much. Not at the level of his friend von Heislinger, of course, but quite well off nonetheless.” Ertmann looked at me for a moment with his eyebrows raised. “You do not seem very surprised by this news.”
“It does not surprise me that Schatzader is involved. He’s been my number one suspect. The puzzling thing is that his wife told me that he desperately wants that manuscript. Why would he aid von Heislinger in ‘capturing’ Tory? Von Heislinger had his manuscript, and it didn’t sound like he was going to hand it over to his friend when he was done with it.”
“To understand that, you have to look at the photograph at the bottom of the pile. I only figured this part out late in the afternoon, and mostly by good fortune since I recalled it passing across my desk several months ago.”
It was a morgue photo showing a rather overweight male corpse. I shuddered as I looked at it more closely. Most of the face was destroyed. However, it was the one visible hand that made my skin crawl. The last joint of each finger had been lopped off.
“Who was he?” I asked.
“A man I now believe was named Hans Drost. The body in the photograph was pulled from the Danube a little over six months ago. As it was not possible to identify the body through normal means, the photograph made its way to my section to find out if it might be a foreign agent. Obviously, he was not, and no one reported Drost missing, since he had no living relatives and had recently quit his job. By that time, the body had been buried in a special cemetery, and I am afraid that the police missed the connection between the body and this Hans Drost.”
“The Cemetery of the Nameless.”
Ertmann looked surprised. “You have heard of it?”
“By coincidence, I saw it yesterday. Am I right in assuming that Drost was the person who discovered the concerto?”
“I now believe this could be so. He was a musician of sorts and would have been able to recognize the manuscript for what it was. There i
s something else, though, and it is very intriguing. I can find no connection between Rudolph von Heislinger and Drost. As a matter of fact, at the time of Drost’s disappearance, the baron was on an extended trip to South America.” Ertmann smiled broadly, and I could tell that he’d enjoyed this chase. “However, I did discover that Drost was once the tuner of Heinrich Schatzader’s piano.”
My mind raced ahead. “So if von Heislinger had been out of the country for some weeks, then it must have been Schatzader who killed Hans Drost.”
“That is my belief also.”
A big chunk of the puzzle fell into place. “Gertrud Schatzader told me von Heislinger bought the manuscript from the finder, obviously a lie and told to protect her husband. Suppose von Heislinger found out about the murder, and by blackmailing Schatzader, not only got possession of the manuscript but also the aid of his psychological expertise. It’s then not a very great leap to assume that Schatzader had a damn good reason to want von Heislinger dead. He’s got to be our murderer.”
Ertmann nodded in agreement, although it seemed tentative.
“We should dump all this on Müller’s desk. Then he’d have to pay attention!”
“You forget that much of this evidence was obtained through illegal means.”
“Then maybe I should confront Schatzader with this!”
“Mein Gott! No such thing! Otherwise I might well be pulling your body from the Danube.”
“What then! We suspect Schatzader of murdering Drost, and it’s a good bet that he’s the murderer of von Heislinger and probably Thekla. And I guess you’re saying he can’t be brought in for questioning until the proper official hoops are jumped through. Where does that leave Tory, and what good does all this do her?”
“I have a suggestion which I will make, but you will need the help of the lawyer Schultz.”
“Help with what?”
“You must have Schultz set in motion a request to have von Heislinger’s apartment searched for evidence of his manipulation of your wife. The safe could be legitimately opened at that time, and although the von Heislinger family will most certainly object, the profile documents of your wife will be ‘found.’ This will go a long way to strengthen Fräulein Morgan’s defense and bring Schatzader into the trial.”