Romantic Road

by Blair McDowell

  “What’s your friend’s name?” she asked. “How can I reach him?”

  Zsuzsa handed Lacy a card with a name, Kardos Andor, and telephone number. “It’s a small village near Tihany, on Lake Balaton,” Zsuzsa said. “You won’t have difficulty finding it.”

  She smiled. “Now perhaps we could release your young man from his banishment.”

  She went to the door and spoke. “You may rejoin us if you like, Mr. Petersen. I think we’re through here.”

  Max came into the room, holding the slim volume he’d borrowed. “If I’d known how long you were going to be, I’d have borrowed War and Peace.” He smiled to take any sting out of the words.

  Zsuzsa laughed. “I don’t have it. I’m not a particular fan of Russian authors.”

  “I think we’re through here,” Lacy said, linking her arm through Max’s. “Thank you so much for seeing us, Zsuzsa. I understand so much more about Igor’s life now than I did when I married him.”

  “He loved you deeply,” Zsuzsa said. “He discussed it with me. He felt quite helpless where you were concerned. It was a new experience for him, being in love. He’d always pursued women more for the game than for the end. With you it was different. I suppose it may have had something to do with his age. At fifty, men often begin to examine their lives and behave idiotically.”

  Lacy turned and looked at Zsuzsa Szilard. At this woman who’d had the courage to walk away from Igor.

  “When did you divorce him?” she asked.

  Zsuzsa sighed. “I’d hoped you wouldn’t ask that question. It’s irrelevant now.”

  “What do you mean?” Lacy’s voice shook with sudden apprehension.

  “I didn’t, my dear. I never divorced Igor Telchev. When he married you, he was still legally married to me, even though we hadn’t lived together, or even seen each other in thirty years.”

  Lacy swayed, and the room spun around her. Max caught her and lowered her to a chair.

  “Oh, dear.” Zsuzsa came to Lacy and gently pushed her head down between her knees. “Deep breaths. Breathe.” She turned to Max. “Get a cold wet cloth from the kitchen.”

  The dizziness lessened. Lacy slowly sat up, her face white with shock. “He was still married to you, and he didn’t tell me?”

  Zsuzsa’s voice was soft. “And what would you have done if he’d told you?”

  Lacy thought. “I’d have stopped seeing him. I’d never have become involved with a married man.”

  “Exactly. And do you think Igor didn’t know that?” Zsuzsa said.

  “But why didn’t he, that is, why didn’t you get a divorce in all those years?” Lacy struggled for understanding.

  “When I married him, I told him I considered marriage to be for life. I’d never agree to a divorce. For years our marriage worked to his advantage. He could always tell his women, if they became serious, he wasn’t free to marry.”

  Zsuzsa stared out of the window into the night, seeing another time, another place. “In the beginning, I hoped he’d return to me, to our marriage, not because we had a child, not out of some sense of duty, but because he wanted to. You see, I never stopped loving him.”

  She returned her gaze to Lacy. “Then he met you, and it was different. He wanted to marry you. He called me and asked for a divorce. I refused. It was unkind of me. I was exacting revenge, and it was a petty thing to do. In retrospect, I’m sorry. He took the only action he could to tie you to him. He married you. He thought there would be little likelihood of our two lives ever intersecting.”

  Max spoke. “Surely when he sent Lacy here to meet with you, he must have known she’d discover the truth?”

  “But he also knew that if Lacy came here, he’d be dead. A little thing like the legality of a marriage would no longer be of concern to him,” Zsuzsa reasoned.

  Max gave a short bitter laugh. “You have to hand it to the son of a bitch.”

  Zsuzsa put her hand gently on Lacy’s shoulder. “I’m sorry, my dear. I intended to keep that bit of information to myself. But when you asked…”

  Lacy shook her head. She couldn’t quite absorb what she’d just heard. She’d thought of herself as Lacy Telchev, married to Igor Telchev, for five years. It was all a lie. It was…

  “Please, let’s go, Max.” Her eyes burned and she could feel the tears starting. She was afraid if she didn’t get away from here quickly she just might have hysterics.

  They were silent on the drive back to the hotel.

  When they were in their room, Max spoke. “Don’t think too harshly of him, Lacy. He loved you.”

  Lacy didn’t answer.

  That night Max simply held her. At first sobs racked her. Eventually she fell into a troubled sleep.

  ****

  Cradling her protectively in his arms, Max was wakeful, his mind broiling with anger at Igor Telchev. How could he have done this to her? She’d been just an inexperienced young girl, no match for a man of Igor’s years and experience. It’s a good thing you’re dead, Igor, old buddy, Max thought. I’d have to knock your lights out if you were alive.

  Chapter Twelve

  “You’re not eating, Lacy,” Max said over breakfast the next morning. “Please at least have some tea. You look so exhausted.”

  Lacy absently picked up her cup, then put it down again, untouched.

  “It’s time to stop this, Lacy. Just call the whole thing off. You don’t owe Igor anything anymore. You certainly don’t owe him the endangerment your life.”

  Lacy could hear the frustration in Max’s voice, but her mind was far away. She stared sightlessly at her untouched breakfast. She kept thinking about her marriage. Igor had lied to her in the most fundamental way imaginable. A lie of omission, but a lie of gigantic proportions.

  “I don’t understand,” she said, lifting her eyes to Max’s. “The last chapters of his book aren’t even here in Budapest. They’re probably down at Lake Balaton with someone named Kardos Andor. He could have sent me directly to him, and I’d never have known the truth. Or he could have left those chapters with someone else, anyone else. It seems there was no shortage of candidates among his past women. So why did he send me to Zsuzsa? He knew if he sent me there, I’d discover he was still legally married to her when he married me. So why did he do it? It seems so cruel. And Igor was never a cruel man.”

  Max was silent for a moment. Then he said, “Perhaps to set you free?”

  Lacy looked at Max, startled. “How do you mean, free?”

  Max answered her question with a question. “Were you happy with Igor?”

  “Yes, of course. At least…at least for the first three years. After that…”

  “After that, according to what you’ve said,” Max supplied, “Igor became increasingly withdrawn, and you became increasingly unhappy. Igor was an intelligent man. He knew you were miserable. He watched, and he couldn’t help you because he was wresting with his own inner demons.”

  Lacy shook her head. “It wasn’t me Igor was worried about. He was obsessed with writing this book. This damned book.”

  “I don’t question the importance he placed on what he was writing, Lacy. But no small part of his conflict was his knowledge of what he’d done to you. I think Igor sent you to Zsuzsa so you wouldn’t spend the rest of your life mourning him, wondering where you went wrong. I think it was his way of setting you free.”

  Free. Lacy thought about what Max had said. She was free. Married or not, she had lived with a wonderful man for three happy years, then helped him, unwilling as he had been to accept her help, through another two. She’d considered him to be her husband, and in every way except in the eyes of the law, he had been. He’d been a devoted and loving husband until his heart attack.

  But now she was free. She was free to walk away from this whole mess. She was no longer obligated to pursue this mad chase for the last chapters of Igor’s book. He had offered her a choice by sending her to Zsuzsa. Max was right. There could have been no other reason for his having taken th
at action.

  “I don’t have to go to Lake Balaton,” she said to Max. “I felt obligated to before. I wanted to do this last thing for Igor to atone for my failures during the last two years of our marriage.” She gave a wry laugh. “Our marriage. But we weren’t married. Not legally, anyway. I don’t have to do this anymore. The choice is now mine.”

  “That’s right, Lacy. The choice is yours.” Max looked at her untouched breakfast. “Now eat something.”

  A weight seemed to lift from Lacy’s shoulders. Mechanically, she picked up a crescent roll and started munching.

  “So when do we leave for Lake Balaton?” she asked between bites.

  Max laughed. “I knew that’s what you’d decide.”

  As they were putting their clothes into their backpacks, Max said, “Let’s call the hospital and see how Inga’s doing before we leave.”

  A few minutes later he smiled broadly. “She’s conscious. She can talk to us. They’re connecting us with her now.” He handed the phone to Lacy.

  “Inga, it’s Lacy Telchev.” She winced as she said her married name. She’d have to decide what to do about that. Her bank accounts, her credit cards, even her will…all in the name of Telchev.

  Inga’s voice was strong and clear. “Oh, Lacy! I’m so glad you called. I wasn’t sure how to reach you. You must warn Riana Rolfe. I gave him her name.”

  “I will. But how are you? I was so sorry to hear about the attack on you,” Lacy said. “I feel somehow responsible.”

  “It wasn’t your fault,” Inga replied. “And I’m doing so much better. The doctor feels sure I’ll be able to attend the opening of my show. I don’t think he meant to hit me so hard. It seems I cracked my head on the table as I went down. Twelve stitches. I have a funny bald spot where they had to shave my head, but I’m going to be fine.”

  “I’m so sorry, Inga. Is there anything we can do?”

  “Just warn Riana Rolfe. He’s coming after her next.” Inga was clearly worried.

  “Could you identify him if you saw him again?”

  “Of course. It was the man who came enquiring about you.” Inga sounded incensed. “He threatened to destroy all my paintings, all my hard work.”

  Lacy shook her head. “You had to give him the information he wanted. You had no choice. But what I don’t understand is why, after he got what he wanted, did he hit you?”

  “I think he just meant to incapacitate me for a short while, so he could get away. Lucky for me he left my door wide open and the tenant from upstairs found me when she came home from shopping. It’s fortunate she returned so quickly.” Inga spoke urgently. “Please, Lacy, call Frau Rolfe. She’s in danger. He’s not going to stop until he has it all.”

  “I’ll call Riana right away, don’t worry. Take care. And good luck with your show.”

  Lacy turned to Max. “He threatened to destroy all her paintings, Max. The ones she was preparing for her show. She gave him Riana Rolfe’s name to prevent that. And then he knocked her unconscious anyway.”

  Max spoke grimly. “Richard.”

  “The man who abducted me in Salzburg wasn’t Richard, Max. He was short and stocky. He didn’t say much, but he seemed, I don’t know how to put it…rather like a petty criminal. A thug.”

  “Richard could have ordered your abduction.”

  “But why? It just makes no sense. Why should Richard want Igor’s book?”

  Max paced back and forth in the small room. “It seems to me we have two sets of people competing for Igor’s book. There are the men who’ve been following you ever since that incident you told me about in the Berkshires. They’re the ones who found our car in Miltenberg and accosted you again in Wurtzburg and found us again in the Salzkammergut.”

  He stopped and looked at Lacy perched on the bed. “You said they were federal agents of some kind. Let’s assume for argument’s sake that they’re CIA. They represent the government’s interest. Whether the government wants to suppress the information Igor uncovered or to act on it by investigating Igor’s charges, we have no way of knowing.”

  Lacy nodded. “It could be either. But what about Richard? He’s not government.”

  “No, he’s not. What other organization could be hurt by this publication, Lacy?”

  “Organized crime…the Mafia? She looked at Max in astonishment. “You think Richard is Mafia?”

  “Think about it, Lacy. Richard was in a singular position to know everything about Igor. He could easily have been behind the trashing of your apartment. And he’s been right behind us all the way across Europe. There has to be a strong motivation to keep him coming after you. The Mafia has even more reason to want this book suppressed than the government.”

  “Richard…” Lacy blanched as another thought occurred to her. “Richard was the only person Igor saw in the weeks leading up to his death. He had ample opportunity to…”

  They looked at each other afraid to voice their suspicions.

  “I’m worried about Riana, Max. We need to warn her to be on her guard.”

  “I should have thought about the possible danger to Riana Rolfe when we were in Vienna,” Max answered. “But all I could think about was finding you and getting you to safety. You have her number?”

  A man’s voice answered on the first ring. “Anton Briem, here.”

  “I’d like to speak to Riana Rolfe, please.”

  “I’m sorry, but my wife’s at the opera house, in a rehearsal.”

  “Can you get a message to her? It’s very important. Ask her to call Lacy Telchev.” Lacy cautioned, “And tell her I said to be very careful. There’s a possibility she may be in danger.”

  “Danger? What do you mean?”

  “Please. I can’t explain more. Just ask her to call.”

  There was a moment’s silence. Then Anton Briem replied, “I’ll go to the opera house myself. I think I’d better deliver your message in person.”

  “Thank you,” Lacy said, relieved. She gave him the number. “Please tell her to call. It’s urgent.”

  “She’s on stage, rehearsing,” Lacy told Max, “but her husband’s going there now. I hope she gets my message and calls back soon. But she should be safe enough for the moment, at the opera house, surrounded by people.”

  Max closed his bag. “Let’s go get those last chapters of Igor’s book. The sooner we can be finished with this whole business, the happier I’ll be.”

  ****

  By noon they were driving into the little village of Tihany. Before them, the twin-steepled Benedictine Abbey, standing high on a promontory, dominated the view, and just beyond it was the largest inland body of water in Europe, Lake Balaton.

  Max parked the car and took Lacy by the hand. “We don’t know where Kardos Andor lives or exactly where his vineyard is. But Tihany’s a small town. People probably all know each other. We’ll ask a few questions.”

  They wandered up a steep path and found themselves at the entrance to the Abbey. “Want to go in?” Max asked. “There’s a crypt in there dating from the eleven hundreds.”

  “You know how I feel about being underground. Just forget it!”

  “Sometimes I think you lack a spirit of adventure.” He took her hand and led her into the little chapel. “At least look at the Baroque interior.”

  When Lacy’s eyes adjusted to the darkness, she saw a riot of gilt cherubs surrounding the pipes of an ornate organ. It was like a wedding cake, she thought, all cream and gold and curlicues. The altar was similarly decorated.

  “I love it,” she said. “It’s almost effervescent. It seems filled with joy. It’s so much more inviting than all those massive dark cathedrals I’ve seen.”

  “You sure you don’t want to visit the crypt?”

  “Don’t push it, Maximillian.”

  “Oops. I guess we won’t go there. That’s what my grandmother always calls me when she means business.”

  Once out of the church they continued along the path and found a Csarda. Delicious aromas we
re coming from the kitchen.

  “Lunch time,” Max announced, striding onto the terrace and taking a table with a view out over the lake. “I’ve heard there’s a fish in Lake Balaton found no place else in the world. Can we try it?”

  “Of course,” Lacy replied.

  “You order,” Max suggested. “I have a feeling the food will be better if it’s ordered in Hungarian. If they think we’re tourists…”

  Lacy was happy to comply. To the young waitress who came to take their order she said, “We’ll start with the sour cherry soup, then we’ll have the fish, the Fogas, that is, and some good local white wine, whatever you recommend.”

  The meal when it came was spectacular. The cold soup was tart and refreshing, and the fish was deep-fat-fried whole in a golden batter and was crescent shaped, standing proudly on a platter surrounded by chunks of fried potatoes and parsley. A salad of thinly sliced cucumbers garnished with sour cream and paprika was served on the side. The wine, in an earthenware pitcher, was crisp and cool and tasted of the local grapes.

  Max looked at the table full of food. “I can hear my arteries hardening.”

  “It was your idea,” Lacy replied.

  They were able to finish only half the fish between them before they pushed their chairs back. “I hope this restaurant has a resident cat,” Max said, looking at the fish still remaining on the platter. “Now I think it’s time to ask a few questions.”

  When their waitress returned to ask about dessert, Lacy declined for them both.

  “Have you lived here long?” she asked the young woman.

  “Not really,” the pretty brunette answered. “I just moved here a few months ago.”

  “Would you know where we might find a local vintner named Kardos Andor?”

  “Let me ask.” The serving girl went into the kitchen and returned with a man who, judging by the splatters on his long black apron, appeared to be the chef.

  Lacy repeated the question to him.

  He commented without answering her. “You speak Hungarian very well for a foreigner. American?”

  “American, yes, but my grandparents were Hungarian.”