by John Brady
“Shit,” said Gebhart. “Already.”
He walked to the doorway.
“The Kontrolinspektor is on the phone,” he called out.
Felix watched the man’s reaction. A smile, a glance at his wristwatch, a hand holding a small device.
“Keep him waiting,” said Gebhart when he came back. “Do him good.”
“Who is he?”
“A scribbler, from the Kleine.”
“A reporter? The Kleine…?”
“Correct. What, you don’t read the Kleine Zeitung? Everyone else in the province does. But this one has got the foreign angle already, no doubt. Now you forget about that side of things, okay?
That was yesterday. You’ve done your paperwork, and it’s moved on.
And remember: don’t talk to any reporter or media type. Schroek does that stuff.”
Felix nodded.
“You’re set up for the morning anyway, okay?”
“I think so.”
“Bike safety video? Armbands?”
“Got it, and the posters.”
“Those new bookmarks with the ‘cool’ website? The T-shirt prize?”
Felix almost grinned at how Gebhart did the air quotes for “cool.” Again, Felix nodded.
“Well, bugger off then.”
Gebhart yawned and sighed.
“Didn’t you sleep?”
“I slept like a Christian, in case you need to know. But in the Coliseum.”
Felix waited until Gebhart looked up from the paper.
“What is it? You have a question?”
“Have you done stuff like that before? Yesterday, I mean.”
“No.”
“Nothing like this? Never?”
Gebhart seemed to gather his thoughts by staring at his desk.
“You mean scare-the-hell-out-of-yourself stuff, or just things you see? Car accidents? Factory accidents?”
“I suppose.”
“There was one thing comparable maybe,” Gebhart said. “But I was in the army. Yes, I was keen, after National Service even. I took five years in it. You’d learn things, you know? Straightened me out actually. The service, it bred fellowship, you know? No, I don’t mean mountain rescue camp or the trekking or the rest of it. Maybe we knew who the enemy was, then.”
Felix zipped up the bag.
“Ach, you wouldn’t want to hear it.”
“What enemy, the Russians?”
A look of irritation crossed Gebhart’s face.
“What’s with all the Q amp; A today? Go do your duties.”
“My dad said it was partly the whole Eastern Bloc thing, to be ready at least, if they came in. But that’s been gone for years.”
“Oh, I get it. The sun rises in the west now? The official line is we need Uni boys, more computer jockeys, more foreign languages.
Well let me tell you something. Maybe we were a bit rough around the edges, or we didn’t use the dictionary much, but, boy, you knew where you stood. Yes, we got things done. And no, that wasn’t ancient times.”
“Was it in the army, or in the Gendarmerie?”
“The thing that happened? It was the army. It was a winter exercise. Winterwerk, we used to call it. They gave us a lot of gear, and we had a hell of a lot of lugging to do. It was up high, you know, with a load of heavy snow. Anyway. A heavy machine gun went off on a guy. Seven or eight rounds, just like that. Everyone was bone tired, see? Sleeping in the goddamned snow. It was careless. But it was bad, I tell you.”
He looked down at the nylon carry-all that they called the School Bag.
“Four hit him. And that’s the nearest I’ve been in my life. It’s not like TV.”
He stretched again.
“I had nightmares, for a while, then.”
Then Gebhart jerked his head up.
“No more yammering,” he declared. “Scram, will you? You’ve got stuff to do.”
Leaving, Felix caught a glimpse of Schroek’s stone face as he listened to the reporter ask some questions. It was a look that he had seen on other cops too, part of the buttoned-up look that cops seemed to pick up with their uniforms and wore when they were not amongst their own.
But it was Giuliana’s face that rose up in his mind again as he crossed the yard. This time tomorrow they’d be leaving, maybe on the road already. He’d be practising his Italian, but it wouldn’t be serious for long. It was almost a year since that Night They’d Never Forget, a terrible evening of arguing and shouting and tears that had quickly become The Night They Never Mentioned Since. The closest they had come was “that other time… ” or “we don’t want to go there again… ”
It had been a stressful time for her, with evaluations and things.
Felix himself had been grouchy, full of doubts and aversions to the training at the Gendarmerieschule, and the future he could imagine in the job. The bottles of wine hadn’t helped. Maybe he’d brought it on unconsciously. Maybe she had?
He winced as he sat into the patrol car, remembering.
“Can you commit to anything?” she had yelled. “Anyone?”
Commitment: did the word haunt everyone these days?
It was true: he had been whining, and he had been whining because he was covering up something, even from himself. She sure had hit a nerve when she yelled that he was faking it.
Faking? All his moaning: how this had all been rigged by his mother, and that he should have known it; how he’d signed up at a time of guilt and bad judgment, when he was broke and unsure, and the dates had gone by for readmission to repeat the year; that many others in his class were stand-offish because he’d gone beyond a Matura. Others in the class hadn’t even finished that far in school.
Felix had never found out, and never tried to find out, for sure if some of the trainees had heard about his father. And he had to admit that he too would have wondered about this Kimmel guy and if someone hadn’t greased the way for the poor widow Kimmel’s young lad to join up the Gendarmerie.
Faking, most definitely. The simple fact was that he didn’t mind the training at all. The complex fact however was something that Giuliana had latched onto right away in that rousing, bitter fight. It was that he complained because he was beginning to enjoy the demands made of him, its impositions and schedules, its rules and habits. He just couldn’t admit it to himself.
He checked his walkie-talkie and then the car radio. Korschak okayed him and reminded him to speak slowly. Ha ha. He pulled out of the yard, mentally plotting his way to the school again, and scanned the platz and the corner by Gasthaus Weber as he coasted by. He returned a small wave from the geezer who usually hung around on the bench there.
That was the thing with Giuliana, he’d understood: she said it right out. Always.
It was as if she could reach right in and say exactly the thing he couldn’t, or didn’t want to, put into words. She had learned that growing up, he was sure. Her father had walked out when she was four. Her mom had been a waitress, a cleaner, and some kind of higher up at the old folks place in Weiz. Too proud to go back to some place near Milan, the mom had stayed and made a new life, that of a single mom, with an Italian accent that could only remind all she met in the small town where they had been stranded that she was from an inferior society. You didn’t get many chances with a background like that.
Felix got by the lights near the schule and was soon in sight of the huge chestnut trees that hid much of the library across from the school. He began to add up the years people spent in schools of one kind or another. He thought of Vikki, a perpetual student in the making. If he was up at all, he was maybe in some cafe in Graz. He was probably chatting up a girl. Now that the spring was here, he might even be up on the Schlossberg at that cafe near the top, looking for unattached female tourists of a certain age.
It would be only later in the day that his friend would be arguing in that mocking way he had about how people were addicted to work, or how Austrians were boring, dutiful. Cowed that was his word. That required be
er, probably at the Parkhaus in the evening, the restaurant in the city park that had just been rebuilt and had returned to popularity, pretty well instantly, with the melange of bohemians, disguised civil servants, artsies that Graz brought together with ease. As long as someone was paying for the beer, of course.
Felix found himself smiling at the thought as he drove along.
Vikki would always be okay for a night on the town, even if Felix had paid for most of the beer again. Would he ever tell Vikki how he had hiked up a half a kilometre hand in hand with a retarded kid?
That he counted that as part of his day’s work, the “Nice job” that Gebhart had called it? Probably not.
He parked near the library and took the carry-all and the case with the projector out of the back of the patrol car. Already there were faces in one of the windows upstairs.
It went well at the start. The little ones were suitably awed. Most got passionately involved with the welfare of Helpless Hans, the cartoon character. Hans was thoughtless near traffic, stupidly did what his sneaky peers wanted of him. There he was drinking from bottles whose contents he did not know. Next he was distracting a shopkeeper while his so-called mates rifled chocolate from a shelf. He was then telling whoppers at home to cover for himself and others.
The false friends all had eyebrows that arched, Felix noticed.
Felix himself had done pretty well all these things in varying degrees. Now his work was to urge others not to follow in the miscreant’s way. The colouring sheet and word puzzles were a hit.
There were no men teachers at these ages apparently, and, so busy and keen were the little ones, that he had time to chat with a few teachers about the Internet, about burglaries, about a first cousin stationed in Judenburg name of Rudi, and about other matters. He had a little time to stroll the hallway. It wasn’t Helpless Hans he was thinking of then for a moment, but a different Hans, the unshaven Hansi Himmelfarb. He distracted himself by paying attention to the wild improbability of the art on the walls. He liked the serious intent on the kids’ faces, and the cheerful teachers. The tiny chairs, and the huge toys made him smile. Some kids picked their noses fearlessly.
He heard at least one fart.
Fortified by not-bad coffee in the staffroom where he saw but two men amongst a dozen teachers, he had forgotten what the older kids could be like. His guide was a talkative, bespectacled nerd in the senior class. He kept asking Felix how fast he had ever driven “chasing the bad guys” while he unhelpfully guided the trolley with the TV and video, and Felix’s charts and handouts, down the terrazzo hallways.
They had congregated two classes for the presentation. The teacher who remained was a defeated-looking guy with a finely trimmed beard. He expected to be left to mark things and after a few perfunctory remarks, retired to a desk and began writing things.
The kids had that X-ray vision and a feral instinct for new teachers, visiting teachers, and it transferred well to the probationary Gendarme.
Questions started early. Felix heard himself say “Good question” too many times and for a while he was unable to stop. He managed to improvise, however: “Let’s take that after you see the video.” One dickschadel, a short fellow with a smile that was more of a leer, a ringleader no doubt, kept going, of course. He wanted to know about drugs, parties, and if you had to say even one word to a policeman who wanted to talk to you. And had he ever shot someone, by the way? And why? And had he been shot?
By the end of the hour Felix was close to the edge. He wanted to walk over to Teacher Man and tap him on the head so he’d look up. Then he wanted to tell Junior Lawyer of the Year that a little pisser like him would last about a nanosecond on the street with a mouth like that.
It was recess when he left the room. A smartass followed him down the hall and told him about Rohypnol, MSN house party lists, and how a kid he knew had to go to the hospital last Christmas with alcohol poisoning.
“Thanks,” said Felix. “I think it’s recess, isn’t it?”
“They know so much,” said the useless Teacher Man, safely behind his glasses and with a vacant look to him. “But they understood so little.”
Felix, who had badly wanted overpaid Teacher Man to wade in a half-dozen times so the big mouths could be shut up, nodded. He even offered a sympathetic shrug when Teacher Man droned on about the perils of unsupervised Internet access at home and the American video games that were so violent. And the movies and TV, Mein Gott!
But as he passed by the doorway, Felix heard the shouts from the schoolyard. Recess was definitely his best subject at that age. It was a breezy, sunny day now. Kids were on swings, playing soccer.
The winter was gone. This wasn’t the time or place for thoughts of two dead men in the woods. He and Giuliana would be making their escape tomorrow, and they’d head down to the beaches on the Adriatic side. Soon, there’d be time to bum around the Hofgasse to take a day at the hot springs in Waltersdorf.
He caught sight of the kid who’d been the pain in the ass in the senior class Mr. Rohypnol, he would call him calling out something that his friends laughed at. Felix didn’t see the victim of his wit, but Mr. Rohypnol caught his eye. Felix nodded. Mr. Rohypnol mimed smoking a joint to his friends.
Felix turned away and strolled down the hallway. He rehearsed a conversation with Gebhart, one he would never have, while he waited for recess to end:
Felix: Gebi, this is going to be hard on you. It’s about our work.
Prepare yourself.
Gebhart: You’re a Gendarme for five months and suddenly you’re a genius?
Felix: Listen, it came to me today, in school. I was actually conflicted.
Gebhart: Get married. That fixes all that psychological stuff.
Felix: Here it is: we’re actually inciting kids to do things that we warn them against. It’s the old forbidden fruit thing!
Gebhart: That’s you. I wish I could forbid you from talking.
Felix: Kids want to be trouble; they want to do the naughty stuff.
Gebhart: What a colossal idiot you are. Unbelievable.
Felix: It’s evolution, Gebi. There’s nothing we can do.
Gebhart: Absolute shit. That’s nihilism, and nothing but. And you learned that at the Uni? Sue them for your fees back. You were robbed, I say.
Felix: You’re in denial. That’s how I know I’m right, my friend.
Gebhart: I’m not your friend. I don’t make friends with bullshitters.
Felix: They want danger. They want to trespass. It’s arousing.
Gebhart: Are you on medication? Too much? Too little?
Felix: The uniform, the school, the rules and signs they cannot stamp out human nature. If we only took a look down through the levels of consciousness more, instead of lectures and rules Gebhart: I know it’s a democracy. But maybe it’s time for laws against blode talk like this. Especially from a cop.
Felix: Did you ever wonder if, maybe some cops are people without the courage to be criminal?
Gebhart: Really? Your dad would be delighted to hear you talk this way. I don’t think.
Felix: One must suffer sometimes for the truth, Gebi The door to the office opened. It was the secretary he had been introduced to first thing this morning. Her glasses hung almost on her nostrils.
“Gruss Gott, Inspektor can you take a telephone?”
“For me?”
Then he remembered: he had switched off the walkie-talkie.
Gebi had reminded him to do it.
He pulled his trolley back to the door of the office.
“Kimmel, Felix?” the secretary asked, eyeing him over the rim of her glasses.
“Yes.”
“Well, I went to school with your father,” she said. “God rest his soul. Felix.”
“He had many friends.”
“‘Ein bisschen Kummel,’” she said. “‘A little caraway goes with everything.’”
Felix did not tell her he had never heard that one before. He smiled and he followed her thro
ugh to a small room with a table and a phone, and a small window that looked out over the schoolyard.
It was Gebhart.
“You’re just about finished your arduous duties there?”
“I am.”
“Okay. Me I’m going to lunch but I wanted to get in touch with you before I left. It’s so as you can prepare yourself. A two o’clock meeting, with you involved.”
“Just me? What for?”
“It’s the KD from Graz, some of the ones who came out to the site yesterday.”
“Himmelfarbs?”
“You remember them?”
“A weird-looking guy with shades, who said nothing. A big guy, moustache, Speckbauer?”
“Well, maybe you can be a real cop, with recall like that. They he, Speckbauer wants to talk to you. So the minute you get back, get your notes, get a printout and get ready. I say you should buy a sandwich and do your reading over lunch. You don’t want to look stupid, okay?”
Felix thought about the big mittagessen that Gebi favoured, his favourite soup and pork and potatoes in a small stube at the back of the butcher’s. It was always full of farmers and older men.
“What about you?”
“What about me? I told you, I’m hungry.”
“No. I meant the interview.”
“Oh, I talked to them already. No big deal. But they didn’t want to take you away from the school thing.”
“On my own, these two guys?”
“Was gibt? What’s the issue here? You think they’re going to beat you up, Mr. Prime Suspect?”
“But I didn’t do much, Gebi. Nor did you. And we talked to them yesterday up at Himmelfarbs’, didn’t we?”
“Well, burli, you may be a bit puzzled. So am I. They seem quite keen to talk to you. Don’t forget you and Hansi were together. This Speckbauer, he’s quite the character. I checked him out.
He’s no joker, this guy.”
“Okay. Thanks. Maybe.”
“Don’t let any of that smartass sarcastic stuff leak out of you, didn’t I tell you? That’s if you want to keep this job. ‘Felix the Second.’”
“What’s this about, this ‘Felix the Second’ crap?”
