The Silence vm-3

by J Sydney Jones

  In bed later that night, Berthe put her fingertips to the bruise on his cheek.

  ‘Does it hurt?’

  ‘It’s nothing, really.’

  ‘Don’t be so stoic. And please do not insult me in the privacy of our bedroom with that story about a drunk. What really happened?’

  ‘It seems that Gross and I may have stirred a hornet’s nest this afternoon.’

  He quickly explained his earlier activities: the visit to Kraus and then to City Hall, and finally the revelations of Frau Steinwitz.

  ‘Well, a hornet’s nest it is,’ she agreed. ‘The only question is who at the Rathaus commissioned that ruffian to dissuade you from further investigations.’

  ‘So sure it was City Hall?’ But he needed no convincing, he just wanted confirmation of his own suspicions.

  ‘A matter of timing, darling. Your mind is still reeling or you would see that for yourself. It could hardly be Frau Steinwitz, as you had just left her. There was no time — not to mention no reason — for her to set a mastiff on you. No, it had to come from the Rathaus. The only question is, from how high up?’

  Eleven

  He and Adele had a late night at the Hausmanns’, and Gross had taken one too many snifters of Pierre Ferrand ’65. This morning — a brutal and blustery day — he was nonetheless in a buoyant mood as he made his way to the Ninth District, the Alsergrund, for his meeting with Doktor Siegismund Praetor, father of the murdered journalist.

  As far as Adele knew, he was busy in the hallowed halls of the Kunsthistorisches Museum, working on another monograph to be published under his nom de plume, Marcellus Weintraub. He had, to be sure, already published one such article, dealing with stylistic irregularities in the early career of Bruegel, or as the painter called himself then, Brueghel. Gross would probably have to write something about the missing ‘h,’ if only to keep the deception alive with Adele.

  Such a thought brought a wry smile to his lips.

  He enjoyed this morning’s brisk walk along the Ring, turning off the broad boulevard at Universitatsstrasse and then making his way to Schwarzspanierstrasse, where the elder Praetor had his office. As it turned out, the office was in a building just next to the one — so a bronze plaque at number thirteen told him — where Ludwig van Beethoven had died on Monday, March 26, 1827. Looking at that building with its gabled roofs and crumbling facade, Gross wondered how long before it was torn down to make room for a new block of flats. And good riddance. Gross’s musical tastes had their upward limits with Haydn and Mozart; the excesses of Beethoven rang in his ears like the cacophony of a metal works.

  On the other side of this Beethoven death house was a Protestant church which Gross, Catholic that he was, ruefully thought might also be torn down with no great loss.

  Prejudices in order, Gross entered the door of house number fifteen, itself a baroque structure, but one kept in much better condition than its neighboring buildings. An odd place to have one’s office, he thought, even if it were just consulting rooms. For surgeries, Doktor Praetor would employ the nearby General Hospital with its three thousand beds.

  The doctor’s rooms were on the top floor of the three-story edifice, and Gross climbed the circular stairs with ease. A highly polished brass plaque on a white-lacquered door identified the consulting rooms and told visitors to show themselves in. Gross did so, and the door opened on to a ballroom-sized waiting room filled with the fragrance of a bouquet of yellow and brick-red hothouse chrysanthemums atop a large, oval rosewood table in the middle of the room. Comfortable armchairs ringed the room, but none of them were occupied, for — as he had told Gross earlier on the telephone — Praetor did not have office hours today.

  A small door at the far end of the room opened as Gross entered the waiting area, and out stepped a small, neatly dressed man with the reddest cheeks Gross had ever seen.

  ‘Doktor Gross?’ the man asked.

  ‘Doktor Praetor,’ Gross responded. ‘Good of you to make time for me.’

  The doctor merely nodded by way of reply, and then turned leading the way for Gross to the inner rooms.

  Gross was surprised at the extent of Doktor Praetor’s suite of rooms in the old baroque house. There had been some clever partitioning of space under the rafters. Praetor’s office was in one corner of the building; paned windows gave off on to a quiet inner Hof with a large, though bare, linden tree spreading its branches almost to the height of the panes. It would afford, Gross decided, a pleasant green view in the spring, reminiscent of his own office in Czernowitz.

  ‘Again, it was good of you to see me, Herr Doktor,’ Gross said, taking an offered chair. They did not sit at Praetor’s desk, but instead at an informal Biedermeier grouping nearer the window. Another display of yellow mums adorned the small table between them.

  ‘Nonsense. It is I who thank you for taking interest in this. The police surely are not.’

  ‘They have their own theories, of course.’ Gross quickly sized up the man: tailor-cut three piece suit in fawn brown, clean shaven, hair thinning on top and two silvery wings of hair on the side brushed neatly back. No-nonsense, logical, pragmatic.

  ‘By which you tactfully suggest they subscribe to homosexual jealousy gone berserk. No need to worry about sparing my feelings, Doktor Gross. I have lost my son. I have no need for platitudes, only vengeance. Measured vengeance, to be sure. Legal vengeance. But I want to see the person who killed my lovely Ricus brought to justice. That is my only concern now.’

  There was a slight trembling in Praetor’s voice as he said this, but his gray-blue eyes remained steely cold as they fixed on Gross.

  ‘We will do everything we can to find the perpetrator,’ Gross assured him. ‘But to that end I need to ask you for more information.’

  ‘Anything.’

  ‘From what Advokat Werthen tells me, you and your son were close.’

  ‘Yes. Very. He was, aside from my profession, my whole life. You see, my wife, God rest her soul, died not long after Ricus was born. I raised him, I watched him form as a young man. It is very hard to lose a child.’

  Gross, momentarily thinking of his own son, Otto, and their eternally strained relationship, quickly moved on.

  ‘Devastating, I am sure. Did he confide in you?’

  ‘I believe he did. Though I have no way of knowing what he did not tell me.’

  ‘He seemed to be happy, content?’

  ‘Yes. Very. His work was progressing. Writing was extremely important for him. He took it seriously. He viewed himself as society’s watchdog.’

  ‘And his own social life?’ Gross said.

  ‘By which you mean possible lovers.’

  Gross arched his eyebrows in assent.

  ‘I only know that he had recently met someone whom he felt to be important in his life. Ricus did not share the intimate details of his life, nor did I inquire further. It was enough to know that my boy was happy. And, I believe, in love.’

  He said this last without the least hint of irony, Gross noted. Doktor Praetor was, he decided, as much a critical scientist about his son as he might be in the diagnosis of a patient. He was, in short, exactly the sort of witness Gross respected.

  ‘No talk of where the two might have met? Any indication at all about the man’s identity?’

  Doktor Praetor squinted at him. ‘The man’s identity? I do not recall saying that Ricus was in love with a man.’

  ‘I simply assumed-’

  ‘There was every possibility that Ricus may have met a young woman who finally put him on the right path. Who would make him settle down, start a family. Give me grandchildren.’

  Gross internally sighed. It seemed the good doctor was no better than the usual unreliable witnesses: he confused his own needs with those of others. The farther into the recent past his dead son receded, the more Doktor Praetor would reshape him in the form he desired.

  ‘And the notebooks,’ Gross said, changing the subject. ‘Have you found any trace of those?’

/>   ‘None. Ricus lived on his own. He had very few possessions left at my flat. Mementoes of his youth only. Nothing recent.’

  ‘Did he discuss his work with you? I ask because we have discovered that your son and Councilman Steinwitz appear to have been working together to uncover corruption at the Rathaus.’

  ‘You mean the councilman who killed himself?’

  Gross nodded at this; no reason to go into his suspicions about that death.

  ‘This is the first I have heard of it.’

  After another five minutes of questioning, Gross determined that Doktor Praetor was not as much an intimate of his son as he would like to have been. That too was being reshaped with time, however. But it was not Gross’s job to point this out to his client.

  Suddenly the man’s clamoring need for justice outweighed his self-delusion.

  ‘I want justice for my son,’ he blurted out. ‘One way or the other. Do you understand? Justice.’

  Werthen had not expected to see her so soon.

  ‘A pleasure,’ he said, guiding Frau Steinwitz into his office.

  She wore an anxious expression, but that was hardly uncommon for clients seeing their lawyer. Or for someone in fear of her life.

  Once seated, she began fidgeting with her fox stole. ‘I do not mean to make a pest of myself.’

  ‘Not at all,’ Werthen reassured her.

  ‘I simply wanted to ascertain if what you said yesterday was more than merely conciliatory.’

  ‘I am at your service, Frau Steinwitz.’ Internally, Werthen cursed Gross for his high-handed generosity with other people’s time.

  ‘So you do not fear to take on such a responsibility?’

  Suddenly she peered closer at his bruised face.

  ‘Whatever did you do to your cheek, Advokat?’

  He shrugged the question away. ‘A collision with a door, I am afraid. Nothing heroic. But to answer your previous question, no, I have no fear in taking on a commission to protect you. I have men whom I can employ to keep a watch on you and your children.’

  This suggestion seemed to alarm her more than the prospect of sudden death.

  ‘That would hardly be au fait. After all, I do have a social life to conduct.’

  ‘These men can be quite discreet,’ he said, though truth be told, the fellows he was thinking of might stand out a bit at afternoon tea at the Sacher.

  ‘I must consider it,’ she said. ‘I imagined that you personally. .’

  ‘Frau Steinwitz, I have a law office to run and an investigation under way.’

  She straightened in her chair. ‘I see. Investigating the murder of Herr Praetor takes precedence over protecting a defenseless widow.’

  He tried to be reasonable. ‘You must understand that in any circumstance I would have to hire assistants to maintain a watch around the clock.’

  But she apparently was little concerned with reason. ‘I only understand that you were my husband’s trusted attorney and that you owe his widow similar allegiance.’

  There were so many responses he could make to that absurd contention; instead, Werthen remained silent, steadily looking at her.

  Finally she glanced away with a sigh. ‘Forgive me, Advokat. I am under a great deal of strain. Let me consider your offer.’

  She stood and he did so, as well. ‘Of course. Take your time. But really I cannot believe that you or your children are in any real danger.’

  She merely shook her head at this comment and adjusted the fox stole.

  As he was escorting her out the outer office, the pink face of young Ludwig Wittgenstein peeked around the door.

  ‘Oh, hello,’ he said to them both as he might to old friends. ‘I was just coming to see you, Advokat.’ Wearing his distinctive loden coat with a fur collar, he cast a smile at Frau Steinwitz.

  ‘Master Wittgenstein,’ Werthen said with a smile. ‘How good to see you. Just a moment while I show this good lady out.’

  Frau Steinwitz looked from the Wittgenstein boy to Werthen, squared her shoulders and nodded an adieu.

  ‘I shall consider your proposal,’ she said once more before leaving.

  Turning, Werthen noticed that Master Wittgenstein had already introduced himself to Fraulein Metzinger and in fact was aiding her in replacing the ribbon in her Underwood typewriting machine. Into this charming domestic scene entered Heidrich Beer, freshly back from delivering copies of a will to the Countess Isniack on the Stuben Ring. Like young Wittgenstein, the boy’s cheeks were flushed red with the cold.

  ‘Good day to you, Huck,’ Werthen said, giving in to the use of the boy’s nickname.

  ‘Advokat Werthen,’ Huck said importantly, struggling to make his voice deeper than it was.

  ‘Huck,’ said Fraulein Metzinger. ‘Come and meet Master Wittgenstein.’

  ‘They call me Luki,’ he said turning his attention from the typing ribbon to the older boy.

  ‘Pleased to meet you,’ Huck said, extending his thin hand.

  Fraulein Metzinger smiled to herself as the two boys shook hands with great seriousness.

  That done, Huck promptly reported delivery of the documents.

  ‘Do you work here?’ Ludwig asked, his eyes growing large.

  Huck breathed in deeply, expanding his chest. ‘Yes.’

  ‘That’s wonderful. I mean, you go out into the town and all?’

  ‘Every day.’

  Ludwig simply shook his head in disbelief. ‘That’s the life,’ he muttered.

  ‘You’ve got a very handsome coat, if you do not mind my saying so.’

  Huck had been taking lessons in polite small talk from Fraulein Metzinger and was obviously trying his new skills out now.

  ‘You think so?’

  Huck nodded. ‘Really. Kein Mist.’

  He reddened when he realized he had slipped into his old street argot again, meaning ‘no manure,’ or, in this context, no nonsense.

  ‘So, Herr Wittgenstein,’ Werthen broke in. ‘What brings you here, and. .’ he exaggerated a glance at the door, ‘apparently on your own.’

  ‘Luki,’ he reminded. ‘And I have to make this quick. I am supposed to be at the Fine Arts Museum with my tutor. We are studying Raphael today,’ he said with a sigh. ‘He left me there for a time to have his gabel Fruhstuck.’

  Werthen thought he could do with a mid-morning snack today, too, and led Ludwig into the inner office. ‘And what was so important that you are playing truant?’

  Werthen closed the door behind them, and Ludwig promptly pulled out a maroon-colored leather-bound diary from his coat pocket.

  ‘I thought you would be interested in this. Hans left it with me.’

  ‘But that is all settled. Hans is in New York.’

  ‘Yes,’ Ludwig said somewhat impatiently. ‘But Hans told me I should give this to someone I really trust. Someone who could make use of it. I don’t know many people and this has been nagging at me. Please take it.’

  The boy handed the diary to Werthen. ‘Anything to relieve you of the burden.’

  ‘You make a joke about it, but it really has been bothering me. I feel badly about not giving it to you earlier when you were investigating Hans’s disappearance. But you see, at that time I did not know if I could trust you.’

  Werthen smiled at the child’s conundrum. ‘And now you do?’

  ‘Trust you? Well, as much as anyone, I guess. But this diary’s been bothering me so much that I have made no progress at all on the model of Herr Daimler’s motorcycle.’

  ‘Well, I hope now you can concentrate on your work,’ Werthen said kindly. ‘What’s in it that it is so important?’

  Ludwig looked abashed. ‘Gentlemen don’t read other men’s mail or diaries. Papa always says so.’ Then he brightened. ‘You were trying to trick me, right? To find out if I could be trusted. Very good. Now I know I have the right person.’

  On the way out, Ludwig and Huck exchanged a few more words. Fraulein Metzinger had another envelope ready for delivery, and so H
uck accompanied Ludwig on his way back to the museum.

  When the boys were gone, she beamed at Werthen. ‘I really think they hit it off.’

  ‘And I do believe you would make a fine matchmaker. That letter you gave Huck already went out two days ago.’

  She had the good grace to blush at being caught out.

  ‘I was thinking of getting tickets for the Remington show in the Prater. What do you think, Advokat?’

  What he thought was that Remington’s Wild West Show was the most tasteless performance event yet thought up by Americans, in many cases the kings of bad taste. He would never subject even his basest enemy to the supposed jollities of seeing fake Indians slaughtered or herds of buffalo decimated by sharpshooters. Remington himself was a crass businessman and showman whose Wild West Show had traveled several times around the world and was definitely the worse for wear. That’s what Werthen thought.

  ‘What an excellent idea, Fraulein Metzinger,’ he said. ‘I am sure Huck would love seeing it.’

  ‘Really, Gross. Each time you come to town, you make everything topsy-turvy.’

  Police Praesidium Inspector Meindl was a small, fastidious man who did not like his closed cases reopened. He was ensconced in a massive armchair behind his cherry wood desk at police headquarters and cast Gross a look of exasperation at his request for crime scene photographs from Steinwitz’s office at the Rathaus and for permission to enter the Praetor apartment, which was still under seal, there to obtain the platen and ribbon from the dead man’s typewriting machine.

  ‘I do not live to complicate your life, I assure you, Meindl.’

  Gross used a teasing tone; Meindl had been a former junior colleague of his in Graz before finding higher office in Vienna and well before Gross himself had been elevated to his current position in Czernowitz.

  Detective Inspector Bernhard Drechsler, sitting beside Gross and looking more painfully gaunt than usual, followed these proceedings with a sardonic expression.

  ‘I’ve no objections to Doktor Gross taking those items from Praetor’s apartment,’ he offered. But there was an unpleasant edge to his voice that Gross could not fail to notice.