The Third Place

by J Sydney Jones

  THIRTY-ONE

  He cleaned the wound back in his hotel room. No one had seen him come in. He had waited across the street for the doorman to leave the entrance for a moment before he made his way up to his room.

  Klavan was lucky in one regard: it was only a flesh wound. He washed it with carbolic soap, wincing at the pain and watching as the blood turned the basin of water rose pink.

  Lucky. That was worth a laugh, but he did not have the energy even to so much as smile at his reflection in the bathroom mirror.

  He tore one of his new shirts into strips and wound several of them tightly around his arm one-handed, using his cheek to help get the knot tight. The bleeding would soon stop, but not the pain. He would not have to risk a doctor, and the pain would keep him on edge.

  He took stock of the situation. He could not stay here. Too risky for obvious reasons. Neither could he go to Lisette; they would surely look for him there.

  Klavan gave no thought to simply leaving Vienna and saving himself. Not a hesitation. No. He had another plan now. Perhaps it was always there in the back of his mind. It would take some planning, but not much, and it would be a fitting end to Werthen and Gross.

  He would need to change his appearance one more time. He had not yet used the identity papers of Herr Gregor Tollinger of Bolzano that he had collected from the safe deposit box. His priest’s collar had been sufficient identification to check into the hotel; that and he had paid in advance. And he still had plenty of cash left from that same box.

  Now he managed a smile at his reflection in the mirror. He was still wearing the fake glasses. He took them off quickly. He would leave them with the rest of the priest clothes in the room. The other new suit he’d purchased yesterday would help him look the part of a man from the Tyrol.

  As he was finishing dressing he suddenly remembered the young girl he was holding as hostage to make the old frau do his bidding.

  Leave her there to rot, he thought. He did not want to waste energy on killing her nor risk being seen going to the cellar. Neither did he have time now for revenge on the bureaucrat who had betrayed him with Postling.

  He had time for something else, though: a gift for Doktor Gross.

  As he was leaving his room dressed in his new clothes and freshly cleaned, his hair pomaded and parted in the middle, he passed an elderly couple in the hallway making their way to their room. They nodded at one another as they passed. The old man reminded him of someone, but Klavan could not make the connection.

  At twelve thirty-two that night the night clerk at the Hotel zur Josefstadt made his way down to the wine cellar, using the special key kept behind the desk and marked ‘X’. The porter, Wilhelm Kraiczek, heard the day clerk one time comment on the X-factor knowingly with Frau Steiner, their bookkeeper. It took him another month to learn what that meant: it was their secret way of referring to the special wine cellar below stairs. Since that time, he had used it judiciously when all the clients were safely tucked in their beds.

  Herr Kraiczek could not afford good wine on his salary, and so he occasionally treated himself to a bottle of Bordeaux. The hotel would never miss it.

  He was just inserting the key when he heard what sounded like sobs coming from the gloom deeper in the cellar. He held the candle above his head to try and illuminate the darkness.

  The sobbing grew louder, as if in response to the light. He wanted to turn around and flee back to the safety of the front desk, but something about the sobs drew him into the darkness. He was startled with a skittering in the shadows and saw a rat darting along the wall. He pushed on and then he saw a bundle of clothes crumpled on the floor. He almost dropped the candle when the lump of clothes suddenly stirred.

  Then he could see the long hair and frightened eyes blinking out of the darkness at him.

  Gross was just buttering his semmel the next morning in the breakfast room at his hotel when he saw Inspector Drechsler stumping down the stairs in the company of the desk man and another police officer. Drechsler noticed Gross at the same moment and looked startled at first, then shook his head, a grin on his face.

  ‘Fancy finding you here, Doktor Gross,’ the inspector said as he approached Gross’s table.

  ‘It is my usual residence when visiting Vienna,’ Gross said. ‘The surprise is to find you here.’

  Drechsler rubbed his long chin. ‘Not much surprise in that. I go where crime has been committed.’

  This piqued Gross’s curiosity. ‘And what crime has been committed at the staid Hotel zur Josefstadt? Perhaps someone has made off with the shoes of a guest left out in the corridor for polishing?’

  A shake of Drechsler’s head. ‘Real crime, Gross. Crime that you should be interested in. A kidnapping.’ He eyed Gross closely. ‘And by a priest, no less. Or someone dressed like a priest.’

  ‘Mein Gott,’ Gross bellowed, disturbing the other guests. He could not help himself. ‘You don’t meant to say he hid the girl here?’

  ‘Not only that – he was staying here himself.’ Drechsler, despite the seriousness of the matter, seemed to be enjoying himself. ‘Imagine he wanted to be close to the great criminologist to find out your next move.’

  ‘How do you know this?’

  ‘Well, the night clerk apparently heard sobs coming from the cellar. The girl had badly damaged her mouth managing to partially remove the tape.’

  ‘I don’t mean that,’ Gross said irritably. ‘I mean how can you know Klavan was staying here?’

  ‘The girl’s description of the man who abducted her matched that of one of the guests, a Father Hoffmann, he called himself. A clerk called the police Praesidium and we investigated this morning. Gone, of course. But he left behind his calling card. A dark jacket with blood on the left sleeve. He’d been here a couple of days, as it turns out. In room 206.’

  ‘Well, that is the most dastardly thing I have heard of,’ Gross sputtered. ‘Room 206 is just above my own.’

  At that moment, Werthen’s parents entered the breakfast room. The father, Emile von Werthen, had an eager look on his face. He was a man who enjoyed his breakfast. Seeing Gross, his face lost a bit of glow, for he also liked eating his first meal of the day in the privacy of his wife’s company.

  Frau von Werthen, on the other hand, was only too glad for some company at breakfast, and took the opportunity to approach.

  ‘What is so dastardly, Doktor Gross?’

  Gross and Drechsler both glanced around the breakfast room. This was not the sort of conversation to be having in public. The attempted assassination at the Hofburg yesterday was, like the earlier one at Schönbrunn, being kept out of the press. No mention was made to those involved of what was actually in the atomizer.

  Gross decided to redirect the conversation. ‘Might I present Inspector Drechsler?’ he said. And then to Drechsler, ‘These are Advokat Werthen’s parents.’

  They made small talk for a time, discussing the advantages of proximity of this hotel to Werthen’s flat and the coming Easter holiday.

  But Emile von Werthen was not to be put off. He might want privacy in the morning, but given the opportunity to reflect on the situation, he decided he enjoyed receiving insider knowledge on the workings of the criminal justice system in Vienna even more.

  ‘And what brings you to our hotel?’ he asked Drechsler. ‘It can’t be solely for the possibility of socializing with Doktor Gross.’

  ‘Emile!’ his wife said, touching his arm in reproof.

  ‘It’s quite all right,’ Gross said to her.

  ‘You mentioned room 206,’ von Werthen plunged on. ‘That is quite near our own.’

  Drechsler and Gross again exchanged glances.

  ‘Perfectly nice chap staying there,’ von Werthen added. ‘We saw him last evening just as we were coming back to our rooms.’

  ‘Interesting,’ Gross said, controlling his excitement. ‘Can you describe him? A priest, was it?’

  To which von Werthen laughed lowly. ‘Hardly. By the looks of h
im the man was from the west. Tyrol, perhaps.’

  ‘You’ll pardon me for asking, sir,’ Drechsler said, ‘but how could you tell that?’

  ‘The trachten, of course. Fellow wore a green loden jacket, leather britches and cardinal red vest. He was either from Tyrol or the Burgtheater.’

  He laughed at his little joke, but neither Gross nor Drechsler joined in. Klavan had opted for a new disguise, a new persona. At least they knew he was still in Vienna, which meant that he planned to go on with his mission.

  Where would he strike next?

  THIRTY-TWO

  He almost missed the note.

  They left the von Werthens in the breakfast room without an explanation. Gross wanted badly to examine room 206 to see if he could find any clue overlooked by Drechsler and his men.

  In the event, they reached the room just in front of two cleaning ladies who were intent on preparing it for new guests.

  Drechsler looked embarrassed that there was no policeman on duty to keep out intruders. Then he protested: ‘They’ve been thorough. Noting to be found here but a bloody coat.’

  Gross made no reply, waiting for the inspector to unlock the door. There was a close and stuffy odor to the room once the door was open. Gross immediately went to the curtained windows and drew back the heavy drapes. Light flooded into the room. He began methodically going through every drawer of the night stand and dressing table, examining the interior of the wardrobe, digging through the medicine chest of the bathroom. The killing business must pay well, Gross ruefully thought; he himself could only afford a room with a bath in the hall on a professor’s pay.

  Drechsler dogged each step. Finally he said, ‘If you told me what it is you’re looking for, I could be of some help.’

  Gross turned to face him. ‘If I knew what I was looking for, I would.’

  This shut the detective up for a few more minutes as Gross went back into the combined bedroom and sitting room. He surveyed the walls now.

  ‘Really, Gross. My men may not have read your books on crime scene inspection, but—’

  ‘Ah,’ Gross said with deep satisfaction.

  On the wall hung a reproduction of Brueghel’s Hunters in the Snow, one of Gross’s personal favorites. And lodged in the lower left-hand corner of the frame was a playing card. He picked it out of the frame; it was from a Tarock deck. He nodded his head excitedly.

  ‘A playing card,’ Drechsler said. ‘So what?’

  ‘He’s talking to me,’ Gross said. ‘He stayed at my hotel. He puts a card in a reproduction of a painting I love, that I have written about. Klavan knows me. He wants me to understand that.’

  ‘It’s still just a playing card,’ the inspector said.

  ‘No. Not just any playing card. Do you know Tarock, Inspector?’

  ‘Don’t have much time for card games.’

  ‘No. I thought not. You see this is the Pagat, and this little beauty is one of twenty-two trump cards.’

  ‘It’s got a number one on it.’

  ‘Very good, Inspector. Yes. It is the lowest of the trump cards, but together with the twenty-one and the joker it has the highest point value.’

  ‘This is precisely why I do not play cards,’ Drechsler said, losing interest.

  ‘Patience, my good man. All shall be revealed. You see, this little card has a particular move. If you play it last and win the trick, or even better, tell the others you are going to play it last and do so and win – then there are extra points. But even more so, there is a certain elegance to such a play, a confidence, even a cockiness. It is called Pagat Ultimo. The ultimate move.’

  ‘Like checkmate in chess,’ Drechsler said.

  ‘Yes, Inspector. Very much like it. An apt analogy.’

  ‘And you’re saying this is a message from Klavan to you personally.’

  Another excited nod of the head from Gross.

  ‘His final move,’ Drechsler said. ‘But what is it?’

  Gross shook a forefinger at him. ‘That is what I need to discover. But now I know it is in this room. He has left me a message. And as I know it is directed at me specifically, I ask myself, what connection do Klavan and I have?’

  His eye went back to the wardrobe, for at their last confrontation, Klavan had humiliated Gross by locking him in a wardrobe dressed rather unceremoniously.

  Drechsler had been on the scene at that time as well, and knew what Gross was thinking.

  ‘You may be on to something, Doktor Gross.’ He tried to keep a smile off his face, remembering the scene of the eminent criminologist attired in a green silk evening gown that Klavan – going by the name of Schmidt at that time – had forced Gross to put on.

  Gross wasted no time in returning to an inspection of the wardrobe. There must be something, he told himself. Something I missed the first time examining the wardrobe.

  It took ten minutes, but finally he saw the corner of a piece of white paper barely peeking out of a seam in the cedar lining. Gross gingerly drew it out and unfolded it to see it was written on hotel stationery.

  ‘Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,’ he sighed as he read the hastily scrawled message.

  Readers of the afternoon edition of the Neue Freie Presse may have been curious at the small notice placed in the bottom right of the front page, cutting into the space for the daily feuilleton.

  ‘Researchers in Vienna agree that communicable diseases may be on the rise due to increased population mobility. More on this story in later editions.’

  It was hardly the sort of article or notice that a paper such as the Neue Freie Presse would print voluntarily.

  Klavan, seated at a window table of the Café Burg, read the notice with evident glee. His teeth showed when he smiled. It was not a usual occurrence, this smile.

  So Gross found my message, he thought. I declare Pagat Ultimo.

  Prince Montenuovo threw the newspaper to the floor. ‘Outrageous,’ he fumed. He glared at Gross. ‘How dare you take it upon yourself to play the game of this lunatic?’

  ‘There was hardly time to consult the Hofburg,’ the criminologist said, exerting great effort to control his own temper. ‘The deadline for the afternoon edition was upon us. We were simply buying time …’

  ‘Negotiating with the enemy, more like. You’ve given him the upper hand in this ludicrous threat.’

  Drechsler spoke up now. ‘It’s too early to determine how ludicrous or realistic his threat is, Prince. The researchers at the lab tell me there are two vials missing. But there is no way to know the quantity of bacilli used for each of the atomizers. Klavan may well have another vial in reserve, as his note implies.’

  Montenuovo glanced down at the note on his desk, the very one Klavan had left for Gross. He read the salient part out loud once again: ‘If I do not receive the sum of one million Krone by Easter Sunday, I will turn Vienna into a charnel house. The plague shall once again stalk the House of Habsburg and its minions.’

  The prince stabbed the note with an angry forefinger. ‘The man is living in cloud cuckooland.’

  Werthen, who was also in attendance at this emergency conference, hoped the prince was right. However, the rhetoric rather than the monetary demand bothered him. It was the sort of inflated writing that someone very sure of himself would employ. The ‘minions’ stood out in this regard, as did the verb ‘stalk.’

  ‘And why go to all the bother of hiding the note?’ Montenuovo asked.

  ‘It was a test,’ Gross said. ‘I passed.’

  ‘And if you hadn’t?’

  ‘One assumes he would continue with his plan, whatever it is.’

  ‘So this is about you now?’ Montenuovo said. ‘Not the emperor?’

  ‘We do have a history,’ Gross allowed. ‘There is obviously a touch of personal animus in all of this.’

  ‘In that case,’ Prince Montenuovo pronounced in a very un-princely manner, ‘perhaps we should use you as bait.’

  ‘We’re getting ahead of ourselves here,’ Drechsler interrupt
ed. ‘One assumes there will be a further communication from Klavan after he reads the notice in the newspaper. On one level, this should be handled as a straightforward case of extortion.’

  ‘Yes, but with all of Vienna held hostage,’ Montenuovo added. Finally he appeared to realize that his behavior was unseemly. More sensibly, he asked, ‘If he is serious about spreading the plague, how would he go about it?’

  ‘I’ve been over that with Professor Doktor Nothnagel of the bacteriological institute at Vienna’s General Hospital,’ Gross replied. ‘He told me that airborne transmission is the most effective for this form of pneumonic plague. A sick person coughs or sneezes and releases the bacilli from their own infection.’

  ‘Thus the atomizers,’ Montenuovo said.

  Gross nodded. ‘But there are any number of other ways of spreading the infection, from contaminated or undercooked food to spraying the bacilli in a crowded area. Open-air markets, theaters, churches, public transportation – anywhere people gather en masse could be the staging ground for this perverse menace.’

  ‘In other words, our Herr Klavan could carry out his deadly threat with impunity. Who’s to stop him? The same as with these infernal anarchists and their bombs.’

  The large baroque room was silent at this statement.

  ‘Perhaps we should take the precaution of closing public entertainments for the time being,’ Drechsler said.

  Montenuovo shook his head. ‘We can close a theater down, but an entire city?’

  It was a statement that resonated with Werthen. He needed to get Berthe and Frieda out of Vienna until this was sorted out. Klavan was crazy enough to follow through with such a threat, he knew.

  Gross spoke again, picking up the conversation from several statements before. ‘Not without impunity.’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’ Prince Montenuovo looked at him as if he were wearing his hair backwards.

  ‘You said Klavan could carry out his threat with impunity. But that is not the case. We will stop him.’

  Or die trying, Werthen thought.