The Iron Angel

by Edward D. Hoch

  “One-thirty. It’s time you were up.”

  Michael could tell by his eyes and general manner that Conrad was still high on drugs, though he seemed reasonably coherent. “Do you know a man named Jarie Miawa?”

  “Sure, I know Jarie – knew him, that is. He’s dead, isn’t he? Do I remember that right?”

  “Yes, he’s dead,” Jennifer confirmed.

  “Thought so. Came in bleeding like a stuck pig. That was last night, wasn’t it?”

  “Two nights ago. Everyone ran away and left me for the cops.”

  “I’m sorry, Jenny. I wasn’t thinking straight.”

  “Jarie talked about the iron angel,” Michael said. “Do you know about it?”

  “Iron angel – sure! It’s the answer to all problems, the fountain of youth, utopia.”

  “Does it exist? Have you seen it?”

  “I’ve seen it, just once. It was like nothing else on earth, man! There were half-dozen fires burning around it, and there it was shrouded in smoke. We approached like worshippers one at a time, through the smoke, to peer into its three eyes and learn our destiny.”

  “Where can I find it, Conrad?”

  “Why do you ask?”

  “I think Jarie was stabbed there. Otherwise why was it on his dying lips? I need to find the killer or else the police may arrest Jennifer again.”

  “It is nearby,” he said. “But I’m not sure I could find it again. I’ll try to find out where.”

  Michael could see there was no chance of learning more at the moment. “I’ll be going now,” he told Jennifer. “This is the hotel where I’m staying and the phone number. Please call me if he learns anything.”

  “I will,” she promised.

  He went back downstairs. Glancing toward the end of Furtuna Street, where it intersected with Grivitei, he realized for the first time that he was just around the corner from the watchmaker’s shop where the victim’s brother worked. Sigmund was sitting behind the counter where Michael had left him only a couple of hours earlier.

  “I thought of another question,” he told Sigmund. “Is there somewhere we could talk?”

  “There’s a coffee house down the street.” He turned toward Old Kurzbic at the rear of the store. “Can you handle things while I go for a cup of coffee?”

  “I handled them all morning,” the shop owner grumbled.

  “I won’t be more than twenty minutes,” Sigmund promised.

  Over coffee Michael said, “Your employer didn’t seem too please with your taking a break.”

  “Sometimes he feels sorry for himself. He knows more about the business than I ever will. I think he only hired me so he’d have someone to converse with. On days like today there aren’t many customers.” He took a sip of coffee. “But what was it you wanted to ask me?”

  He repeated Conrad Rynox’s description of the iron angel. “Did you ever hear anything like that before?”

  He shook his head. “It sounds like a narcotic dream, all those smoky fires and the angel in the middle. It couldn’t really exist, could it?”

  “I don’t know,” Michael Vlado answered honestly. If this Gypsy didn’t believe in the iron angel, why should he? “Do you know Conrad Rynox?”

  “Slightly. He’s an occasional customer at our shop.”

  “The number 470 was on a small paper in your brother’s pocket. Could it be an address?”

  “None that I know of.” He thought about it. “That number would be about two blocks down from the cellar where his body was found. It wouldn’t be connected.”

  “Connected. What do you mean?”

  “In these old city blocks the building basements often run together. A person can enter on one street and exit through a building on a street around the corner.”

  “But 470 wouldn’t be one of them, in any direction?”

  “No. It would be too far away.”

  They finished their coffee and walked back to the shop. Kurzbic was behind the counter waiting on a customer with a damaged alarm clock. “I’ll see you later,” Michael told Sigmund, leaving him at the door.

  He went back to where he’d left his car and was about to get in when a women stepped from a doorway. Her clothing told him at once that she was a Gypsy, but at first he didn’t recognize her.

  “Michael Vlado!”

  “Yes?”

  “I am Zorica Miawa, Sigmund’s wife. We met briefly at the funeral this morning.”

  “Of course. For a moment I didn’t remember.”

  “There was no reason why you should.”

  “I just left your husband. We had a cup of coffee together.”

  She was a small, dark woman a bit younger than Michael – perhaps around forty. Her eyes had the deep intensity associated with Gypsy beauty, and he imagined she’d broken more than one Rom heart in her youth.

  “I must speak to you about my husband and Jarie.”

  He held open the car door. “Get in here.”

  She slid in next to him, but he made no attempt to start the engine. “I heard you asking Sigmund about the iron angel. He knows more than he pretends. The men talk about it. I have heard it mentioned in their conversations.”

  “Is it some sort of cult? A bizarre religion, or even a sexual thing?”

  “I don’t know. Jarie went there often. He spoke of the cellars, and the heroin-snorting and the iron angel. My husband was intrigued, but I don’t know if he’d ever been himself.”

  “There was a number on a piece of paper in Jarie’s pocket – 470. Mean anything to you?”

  “No. An address, perhaps, but I don’t know where.”

  “How did you happen to find me here?”

  She hesitated only an instant. “I was shopping on this street and saw you returning to your car.”

  Michael nodded. “You’d better go now. I have to see Captain Segar.”

  She smiled slightly and slipped out of the car. He watched her walking back along Furtuna Street and wondered if she might have been there spying on her husband. Or on Jennifer Beatty.

  Back in Segar’s office, Michael was openly discouraged. “I’m no detective. I’ve gone about as far as I can, but I’ve learned nothing about this so-called iron angel except that a great many people seem to know about it.”

  “If a great many people know about it, but not the police, that implies some-thing beyond the law.”

  “Perhaps but in which direction? Maybe drugs are involved, maybe it’s merely a heroin-induced fantasy. Then again, it could be a sort of religious cult. Jarie Miawa might have been stabbed to death as some sort of sacrifice.”

  Segar snorted at that. “What sort of angel would demand a blood sacrifice?”

  “The Angel of Death.”

  “Michael, you are seeing darkness where there is only human fallibility. I am convinced that drugs are the key to this.”

  He told Segar about his meeting with Conrad Rynox. “I hate to see Jennifer back there with him.”

  “Do you think they might be still using that cellar for their activities?”

  “I doubt it, so soon after Jarie Miawa’s murder.” But Michael wondered about it. “I suppose I should look at the place where his body was found.”

  “Go there tonight,” Segar said. “I can equip you with a body microphone and I’ll be waiting outside with some men. This is the number where we fount he body – 117 Furtuna.”

  “I know. It’s right across the street from the apartment Jennifer shares with Conrad.”

  “You’ll do it?”

  “All right.”

  They waited until darkness descended on the city, soon after dinnertime, and Segar carefully taped a microphone and small transmitting unit to Michael’s chest. “With that Gypsy tunic you wear, no one will notice it,” he assured him.

  “I hope I’m doing the right thing,” Michael said, aware that Jennifer might be back in that cellar, if anyone was.

  Segar had two men with him, and they dropped Michael at the corner of Grivitei and
Furtuna. “We’ll be listening,” he promised.

  Michael saw that old Kurzbic’s shop was dark, and he pictured Sigmund back in the caravan with his wife and child. He walked around the corner, seeing only a few pedestrians hurrying home, and made his way to the building numbered 117. The sign outside identified several offices located there, but once past the front door he made his way back to the cellar stairs. The door was unlocked and no sound reached him from the darkness below. He turned on the light and started down.

  The basement area was empty except for a few upended crates which could have served as seats for the heroin sniffers. He moved around it, wondering if he should report in to Segar. There was a door, perhaps leading to one of the adjoining cellars. It was unlocked and he swung it open.

  Almost at once he saw the figure, about ten feet in, lit only by the faint glow

  from his side of the basement. It wasn’t an iron angel, or an angel of any sort.

  It was Conrad Rynox, and he was dead.

  Back at headquarters, Segar slumped in his chair, staring at Michael Vlado, “You found me another body when I wanted you to find a murderer.”

  “I found what was there.”

  “He was stabbed just like Miawa, though this time the wound was right to the heart. He didn’t live long enough to run away.”

  “The killer is getting better with practice,” Michael observed. “When I touched him the body was cold. Any idea how long he’d been dead?”

  “Several hours. They’ll do an autopsy right away.”

  “What about Jennifer?”

  “I’m sorry, Michael. I’m having her picked up for questioning.”

  “Tell your men to search the rest of those basements.”

  “I’m having that done too.”

  Michael was waiting when Jennifer Beatty arrived. “He’s dead, isn’t he? They told me he’d been stabbed and I know he’s dead.”

  “I’m sorry, Jennifer. He was never any good for you.”

  She flared into anger at his words. “How would you know?”

  “He gave you heroin –”

  “He gave me lots more besides that! Where is he? I want to see him.”

  “Perhaps later,” Segar murmured. “First I must ask you some questions. If you do not wish Michael to stay –”

  “Would you like a lawyer?”

  “I have no money for one. My God, do you think I killed the only man I ever really loved?” Her eyes flooded with tears.

  Segar sighed, perhaps realizing that communication would be difficult in her present condition. Still, he pressed on. “When was the last time you saw Conrad Rynox?”

  “This afternoon,” she answered listlessly. “Michael drove me back to the apartment and we found Conrad asleep on the sofa. After Michael left a little before two I fixed Conrad a light lunch. Then he said he had to go out for a while. That was the last time I saw him.”

  “Did he say where he was going?”

  She shook her head. “He often went out without telling me where, especially if he needed drugs from his supplier.”

  “Who’s that?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I hope your memory improves, Miss Beatty.”

  “It was someone across town. His address is in the apartment. I insisted Conrad give it to me in case I got desperate some day when he wasn’t home. Now are you going to let me see him?”

  “First I want you to go over the contents of his pockets.” Segar dumped a plastic evidence bag on the desk in front of him. There was German and Romanian currency gripped by a golden clip, a leather wallet with some papers, a few coins, a handkerchief, some unidentified capsules, and a six-inch spring knife with the initials J.M on it.

  “That’s Jarie Miawa’s missing knife,” Michael observed.

  “Looks like it.”

  “He – he took it off Jarie’s body,” Jennifer said. “He went through his pockets before the police arrived, looking for drugs.”

  “These are deadly things.” Segar demonstrated by pressing a button on the side of the knife. The spring-powered blade shot out one end.

  Michael was more interested in the wallet. He looked through its contents, found an apartment key, some routine identification cards, and a folded slip of paper with a number on it.

  “117,” Michael read.

  “The building where we had our drug parties,” Jennifer said.

  “Where Jarie Miawa died,” Segar added.

  Michael frowned at it. “The building was right across the street from his own apartment. Why would he need to write down its number?”

  “Maybe to give to someone,” Segar speculated. He took out a second evidence bag. “Here are his watch and rings. A battery-powered wristwatch with the correct time. No clue there to when he died.”

  “I saw that in his room.” Michael picked up two fancy rings. “What about these Jennifer? Was he wearing them both when he left you?”

  “Yes. I gave him the sapphire.” She seemed close to tears again. Segar was starting to gather up the objects when the phone on his desk rang. He picked it up and listened intently. “Fine,” he said. “All right.” He hung up and turned to Michael. “The autopsy shows he died within a short time of eating, probably around two o’clock.”

  “It was after two when he left the apartment!” Jennifer insisted.

  “He must have crossed the street to number 117 and been stabbed to death in basement almost at once,” Michael said. He was remembering meeting Zorica, Sigmund’s wife, on that street.

  The phone rang again and this time it was one of Segar’s men reporting that a search of the connecting basements in the block had yielded nothing unusual.

  “Can I see him now?” Jennifer asked again.

  Michael tried putting an arm around her shoulders. “What good will it do? It’ll only make you feel the loss all the more.”

  She shook off his comforting arm. “I want to see him! It’s my right!”

  Michael and Segar exchanged glances over her head. “All right,” the captain said. “Come this way.”

  “Life might be better for you know,” Michael tried to tell her as they went downstairs. “You can get into a treatment program and stop your dependence on drugs.”

  “It’s not just the drugs, it’s not even Conrad, really. It’s just that this is another ending. My life has been too full endings. When I fled into the mountains to your Gypsy village it was an ending, and when I left Zurich it was another ending. By now I’ve run out of endings.”

  “Here we are,” Segar said, holding open a white door with a No Admission sign. The attendant pulled out one of the drawers and lifted the sheet.

  Jennifer froze, staring at Conrad’s chalk white face, thinking thoughts that Michael couldn’t imagine. Yes, it was another ending for her. There was no denying that.

  A low moan started then deep in her throat, building toward a fearful culmination. Michael, standing across the open drawer from her, tried to move, then shouted, “Segar! The knife!”

  It was tight against her chest, just beneath the breastbone and she had only to press the button for the spring release. They both saw the spurt of blood as the blade went in and even as Segar grabbed her Michael knew it was too late.

  In all the years that he’d known Captain Segar, he’d never seen anything hit him as hard as Jennifer Beatty’s death. He sat in his office chair, his face almost as ashen as Conrad’s had been. “How could I have done it, Michael? When I was distracted by those phone calls she must have slipped the knife up her sleeve or into her blouse. I never even noticed!”

  “Neither of us noticed. She didn’t want us to. She decided she wanted to die like that. Perhaps she was thinking of Juliet stabbing herself and falling on Romeo’s body.”

  “My God, Michael! Do they read Shakespeare in your village? “At least he was stirring a bit and some color was creeping back into his face.

  “I read it, and I’m sure Jennifer Beatty did too. She was an American kid, over here
attending college, and she just took the wrong turn in the road. If there’s fault to be found, it started a long time before you or I ever knew her.”

  Segar shook his head, as much to clear it as to deny the truth of Michael’s words. “There is nothing to keep you here any longer,” he said.

  “Yes, there is.”

  “What’s that?”

  “The iron angel.”

  “A heroin dream, nothing more. Our men searched the basements and found nothing.”

  “Wouldn’t an angel more likely be up than down?” Michael was examining the contents of the victims’ pockets, especially the numbered slips of paper. “This 470 and 117. They could have been written by the same person. The sevens are almost identical. And both slips seem to have been torn from a notebook of some sort.”

  “We know what 117 is – the address of the office building where they gathered for the heroin parties. But what about 470?”

  Michael pondered that, studying the slips of paper. “I can’t believe Conrad would have written down the street number to give someone. And why should he have needed it for himself?” Then suddenly he knew. He knew it all. “Up, Captain, up! The angel is up, not down.”

  “Up?”

  “On an upper floor of one of those buildings, where your men didn’t search. Come on – I’ll wear the body microphone again.”

  “You’re going back there? It’s almost midnight.”

  “I have to bring the killer to justice. I owe Jennifer that much.”

  As soon as he saw men entering the building at 117 at this late hour, he knew it was the place he sought. This time he went upstairs instead of down to the cellar, following people to the top floor of the old building. No one stopped or questioned him. He passed through a door with the others and found himself in a large darkened loft area lit only by a half-dozen small smoky fires. Beyond them, the focus of everyone in the room, stood an ancient statue of iron as tall as a man, its colors chipped and faded with the passage of time. The men approached one by one, and as they turned away they seemed to drop an offering into one of the burning pots.