A brief visit to Karl Kraus earlier had brought Werthen quite up to date on the private life of Oberbaurat Otto Wagner. Werthen knew that Wagner had built his villa here in 1888, to be used as a summerhouse for his growing family. All told, Wagner had seven children by three different relationships. Kraus was careful to term them relationships rather than marriages because the first of these was not consecrated. Wagner had two sons, Otto junior and Robert, by Sofie Anna Paupie, daughter of a well-to-do building contractor. Wagner’s domineering mother, however, would not approve marriage to this woman despite the fact that her father had earned an honorary ‘von’ to his name. Their menage was ultimately torn apart by Madame Wagner.
‘A pliable sort of chap, our Oberbaurat Wagner, when it comes to certain women,’ was Kraus’s trenchant comment on this state of affairs.
Wagner’s first wife, Josephine Domhart, who was his mother’s choice rather than his own, was the mother of two daughters, Susanna and Margarete, the second of whom had died in adolescence. With the death of Wagner’s mother, the architect finally determined to leave the unhappy marriage with Josephine, and in 1884 he shocked much of Vienna by his marriage to the much younger Louise Stiffel, governess to his daughter Susanne. Theirs appeared to be a true love marriage according to Kraus, and three children resulted from the union: Stefan, Louise, and Christine.
It was for this third ‘family’ that Wagner had built the villa, and they were just approaching it now at Huttelbergstrasse 26. Sitting stately on a hillock above road level, the building was a graceful Palladian structure, with a central portion reached by an impressive range of steps leading to a magnificent portal entrance. Four large pillars decorated the balustrade, each covered in vertical bands of colored porcelain. Statues of Greek gods were fitted into niches on each side of the entrance. This central rectangular living section was further elongated by a pergola at each end. These had latterly been converted into a spacious living room at one end and into Wagner’s home studio at the other, its windows done in stained glass. This summerhouse had now become Wagner’s year-round abode.
The spacious and dignified villa was made utterly bourgeois by a white picket fence surrounding the grounds at street level; Werthen had to check a laugh as he and Gross went through the main gate and made their way up the wide flight of marble stairs to the front entrance. Painted wrought iron in a riot of design served as a balustrade for the entrance porch; plaster relief work of cupids at play filled three friezes over the door. Similar relief work decorated the overhanging sections of the slightly peaked roof.
How much must such a home cost? Werthen wondered. And how could Wagner, who was essentially a university professor, afford such a place? After all, everyone knew that his building designs were more often discussed than built. His work on the metropolitan railway and the regulation of the River Wien and the Danube Canal was in no way remunerated in accord with the countless hours he had put into these projects, the thousands of sketches he had made in their planning. During the hectic years of the Stadtbahn construction, Wagner’s studio employed a staff of seventy architects, engineers, and draftsmen. Other city buildings by Wagner had been constructed on speculation; he would occupy them for a time, but then always sell them. This villa, however, was his family seat and substantial enough for an archduke. In fact, rumor had it that it was initially intended for Crown Prince Rudolf, but that Wagner’s wife had so fallen in love with it that the architect withdrew his commission to the Hofburg. Which might account for difficulties Wagner had in winning commissions from the emperor.
Meanwhile, Gross had begun rapping on the large front door. After a second round of knocks, they heard footsteps echoing on floor tiles from inside and then the door opened.
Much to Werthen’s surprise, it was the same fellow from the Stadtbahn who opened the door, coat still in hand as if about to hang it up.
‘Oh. . Hello,’ he said in recognition. ‘You must be the detective fellows Father was mentioning.’
‘That is quite all right, Otto Emmerich.’ These words came from a small, round woman who looked rather like a defiant pigeon. She bustled to the door. ‘I shall welcome our guests.’
She seemed put out that Otto junior should have answered the door and not she. The man was clearly Wagner’s illegitimate oldest son, whom he had in fact adopted and given his surname, and who, Kraus had told Werthen, had trained as an architect and sometimes worked with his father. The female pigeon must be Frau Wagner, Werthen surmised. Clearly no mere housekeeper could be as curt as she was to young Wagner.
Otto junior ignored her. ‘I was just arriving myself. Had I known you were the ones Father invited, I would have told you to stay on till the last stop. There’s a shortcut.’
‘And I am sure the von Adrassys do not take kindly to your traipsing through their grounds.’
Nothing Frau Wagner said, however, seemed to get through to Wagner’s illegitimate son.
‘Leave your coats and follow me,’ he said. ‘I’ll take you to the studio.’
Gross was having none of this. ‘Doktor Gross,’ he said, with a head nod to Frau Wagner. ‘And my colleague, Advokat Werthen. Do we have the pleasure of addressing Frau Wagner?’
She puffed up her chest at this. ‘Yes, you do. And it is a delight to make your acquaintance.’ She hesitated for a moment as if about to offer her hand, but thought better of it.
‘This way, gentlemen,’ called Otto junior as he strode across the marble floor of the foyer.
‘You must excuse Otto Emmerich.’ she said, shaking her head.
‘May we?’ Gross asked, motioning his hand at the retreating figure of Otto Emmerich Wagner.
‘Yes, but of course. Hurry or you shall be completely lost.’
They did not bother divesting themselves of coats, but did doff their hats as they entered the high-ceilinged vestibule. Wagner led them something of a chase through suites of rooms at the back of the central portion of the villa, all nicely appointed. Werthen noticed that there was not one piece of Jugendstil furnishing or any Secession paintings hanging on the walls of the main house, not even by their mutual friend Klimt. This seemed odd to the lawyer, considering Wagner’s recent defection to the Secession from the more conservative Kunstlerhaus and its slavish devotion to historicism.
Finally they came to the south wing of the villa, and entered the converted pergola. A rainbow of light filled the room, as a sudden break in the clouds outside allowed the sun to shine through the stained glass windows of the eastern side of the studio. Here, then, was their first discovery of Secession work, for the swirling trees in a riot of shades was clearly Jugendstil in design.
‘You like it?’ Otto Wagner stood at the door to greet them.
‘Yes, I do,’ Werthen said, looking again at the windows.
Under his open white work coat Wagner wore a gray, vested, wool suit and a black tie loosely knotted under wing collars. His Van Dyke beard was more salt than pepper, the moustaches rather dramatically twisted and curled upwards at the ends. Thinning gray hair was swept back off his forehead. His most prominent features, his eyes, were lightly cloaked, as if the eyelids had extra folds. However, their piercing glance gave one the sense that this man saw everything and through everything. Eyebrows that arched upward added to a general air of knowing and almost condescension.
‘The series is called “Vienna Woods in the Autumn,”’ Wagner said. ‘Gives the studio a bit of warmth in the winter, too.’
Introductions were made all around, and Werthen shook the architect’s hand, noting that Wagner used only his forefinger and thumb for a grip. Another detail Kraus supplied came to mind: Wagner lost the use of the middle finger on his right hand as a result of a hunting accident in his youth. That did not stop the architect from becoming one of the best draftsmen in the world.
‘You’ve met my son, of course.’ Wagner clapped Otto Emmerich on the back. ‘Boy’s taking after his father. Make a fine architect one day.’
Otto junior smiled
like a schoolboy at the praise.
Wagner quickly lost his affability, however, turning to the matter at hand.
‘Now what is this nonsense about Steinwitz?’
‘We do not find it nonsense, Oberbaurat,’ Gross said.
A drawing on one of the drafting tables caught Werthen’s attention. It appeared to be the sketch of a large domed church standing alone like a beacon on a hillside. Another building project that would go unbuilt?
‘Well, I was there just moments after the shot. I can assure you that I saw no one leaving the room.’
‘I understand there was some confusion in the hallway,’ Gross said.
‘Yes, of course. One does not expect to hear a gunshot go off in the Rathaus.’
‘Where were you when you heard the shot?’
‘In my special office. It is on the same floor. I was on my own and looked up immediately from the drafting table when I heard this crack sound. Unmistakably a shot.’
Werthen was pulled out of his observation of the schematic of the church by this remark.
‘Excuse me, Herr Wagner, but did you not tell the Neue Freie Presse in an interview that you thought it might be an automobile backfiring?’
‘Well, one could hardly hear such a thing several floors up in the Rathaus.’
‘But it was your first reaction?’
‘Yes. Silly of course.’
‘Nonetheless,’ Werthen went on, ‘it would not have alarmed you as the sound of a shot would have. You would not have been spurred into immediate action.’
Wagner sighed. ‘Yes, I quite see what you mean. Perhaps there was a moment or two before I went to investigate matters.’
Werthen left it there. No use in antagonizing the man by driving home the point that there may indeed have been time for someone to leave the office before he, Wagner, arrived first on the scene.
Gross picked up the interview again. ‘And what brought you to the door of Steinwitz’s office? How could you know that was the origin of the noise?’
‘The smell. Cordite. That I recognized immediately. I followed the odor.’
‘Did you touch the body?’ Gross asked. ‘I mean, in order to ascertain if he were dead or not.’
‘Absolutely not,’ Wagner replied. ‘I did not enter the room. One look from the doorway was enough for me. Half the man’s head had been shot off.’
‘And you are sure you saw nothing suspicious? Someone, for example, in the vicinity of the office who did not belong there?’
‘I was rather more concentrating on Steinwitz.’
‘Yes,’ Gross allowed. ‘Quite understandable.’ A pause. ‘One other thing. Perhaps you could indicate how far you were from the door to the office. Would it be possible to measure the distance by one of your strides?’
‘But I was standing in the doorway itself.’
‘Actually inside?’
‘No. Well. Let me see. . How might this be important?’
The Oberbaurat was obviously losing his patience.
‘Please indulge me,’ Gross said. ‘I am something of a perfectionist in my approach to a crime scene, much as you are in your preparation for building. Let us say this is the door.’
Gross marked a rectangle in the space in front of him.
‘Now perhaps you could indicate exactly where you were in relation to that door.’
Wagner sighed. ‘If you insist. But I really-’
‘It would aid in knowing your field of vision,’ Gross assured him.
‘Go on, Father. The sooner you answer their questions, the sooner we get back to the Steinhof drawings.’
Wagner said nothing, but took a stride forward, positioning himself just at the outer extension of Gross’s imaginary door.
‘Excellent,’ Gross said. ‘Now perhaps again, just to be sure. Could you take two normal strides backward, and then approach once more, just to be sure?’
Again Gross sketched the imaginary door in the air.
Wagner did as he was bid, eager to be rid of his intruders now. Werthen noticed that Gross was careful to observe the stride.
‘That should do it, then,’ Gross said as Wagner approached the air door at approximately the same point as before. ‘We will leave you to your work.’
‘A new commission?’ Werthen said, gesturing toward the sketch of the church.
‘A competition,’ Wagner said. ‘For the church and sanatorium on Steinhof. Why I bother, though, I don’t know. They will surely give it to someone with better connections than I have.’
‘But one assumes your work for the municipality-’ Werthen began.
‘Indeed,’ Wagner interrupted. ‘The municipality, not the state. I have no friends in the higher corridors of power. That is why I am relegated to building my castles in the air.’
‘It’s hardly as bad as that, Father.’
Wagner gave his adopted son a withering glance. ‘Tell me that in twenty years when none of your prized plans have been built. We can have a philosophical discussion about Vienna and connections at that time. For now, please show our visitors out.’
Wagner turned to his drawing, not bothering with goodbyes. Werthen and Gross followed the son out of the studio.
‘You must forgive my father,’ he said once they were out of earshot of the elder Wagner. ‘It has been difficult for him. Dozens of first-class projects — for an art colony, for an imperial museum, for a new war ministry building — and the contracts have been awarded to far less able men.’
‘Still,’ Werthen said, ‘he is a university professor, the head of the architecture department at the Academy of Fine Arts.’
‘A sinecure. But yes, as a teacher Father has great influence. He is cultivating a new generation of architects, people who will take his dictums of form following function around the world. Yet, it does not compensate. He often feels that he is Vienna’s neglected genius.’
‘Is that how you see your father?’ Gross asked as they approached the foyer once again.
‘How is that?’ Frau Wagner said, coming out of the shadows as if lingering in ambush. ‘You see your father in what way?’ she insisted.
‘A genius,’ Otto Emmerich said, smiling at Gross and Werthen.
‘And rightly so,’ she said. ‘And a compassionate man. After all, he has so many of his own children, and he still adopts you and your brother.’
A squeal of girlish laughter from deeper in the house reminded Werthen that the children born to Wagner by his present wife would range from only eleven to sixteen years in age.
‘As I said,’ young Wagner noted, ‘a genius and a saint.’
Back out in the blustery day, Gross and Werthen headed down the Huttelbergstrasse toward the Stadtbahn station.
‘A bitter man,’ Gross said as they set a brisk pace.
‘Father or son?’
‘The elder, of course. The son is a puppy looking for love.’
Werthen sensed that Gross had formed one of his instant dislikes. Werthen always found this odd for a man such as Gross who professed to use the methods of deduction rather than pure intuition; who championed reason over emotion.
‘Nothing wrong with instant dislikes,’ Gross had once told him. ‘I find it saves so much time.’
‘Do the strides match those found on the carpet?’ Werthen asked.
‘Bravo for you, Werthen. I hope it was not that obvious to everybody.’
Werthen made no response to this.
‘I could think of no subtler way to view his stride length. Doors made of air. What idiots brilliant people can be.’
‘Do they?’
Gross puffed his lips. ‘Difficult to ascertain. Well within the range of possibility, and the man’s boot is on the smallish side.’
‘Do you think he knows of the Vienna Woods sell-off? Rather ironic if so.’
Gross looked perplexed. ‘My dear Werthen, whatever could irony have to do with this case?’
‘I simply meant that Wagner has his family seat in the Vienna Woods. A
full fifty percent of this very district is part of the Vienna Woods. The irony is in his stained glass windows. Leave it to the mayor and his cronies and those windows will soon be all that is left of the woods to see.’
‘No need for melodrama, Werthen. As yet we have only the diary of Hans Wittgenstein to attest to such a scheme.’
‘I see no reason for him to lie,’ Werthen retorted.
Gross merely shrugged at this and quickened his pace toward the station.
‘Brutal weather,’ he muttered. ‘Goes right to the bone.’
‘Could he have done it?’ Werthen asked suddenly.
They were now nearing the station, done in the Jugendstil mode that was so sparsely represented in Wagner’s home.
Gross stopped mid-stride.
‘Yes, I suppose he could have. He has no alibi. After all he told us himself that he was on his own in his office. And as for motive, let us say that Herr Wagner is party to this scheme to sell off the woods. .’
‘He has written widely about the modern city,’ Werthen interrupted. ‘That progress and business should regulate such a city. Its growth should not be restricted by natural impediments or boundaries.’
‘Quite,’ Gross said, taking small umbrage at being interrupted. ‘As I was saying, let us assume there was or is a scheme to sell the Vienna Woods and that Wagner was somehow involved with it. Perhaps he is offered the monumental job of planning the building of it. Such an offer would mean much to him, that is clear.’
‘And then he somehow gets word that Steinwitz and his journalist friend Praetor are set to spoil the deal,’ Werthen added.
‘Ergo, a man in extremis,’ Gross said. ‘He clearly knows his way around firearms. He tells us he is familiar with the smell of cordite.’
Werthen offered the information Kraus had earlier given him regarding the hunting accident Wagner had suffered as a youth.
‘All in all, I should say yes. Oberbaurat Wagner surely is a suspect. And not simply because of instant dislike,’ Gross added. ‘In fact, I rather liked the man. He is devoted to his work, that much is clear. And he is talented. Qualities I admire.’
‘Pity if he were a murderer, too,’ Werthen said.
The Silence vm-3 Page 16
