Trojan Gold vbm-4

by Elizabeth Peters

  “Oh. All the same, you might have mentioned it.”

  “It could have been an accident. Some drunken hunter.”

  “Yeah. But Friedl seems to think not. Are you sure you never got a letter or a package or anything from her husband?”

  I looked him straight in the eye and said firmly, “No. I mean, yes. How about you?”

  “Me? Why would I…” Tony considered the question. “No reason why it shouldn’t have been me, come to think about it. According to Friedl, the object in question is a work of art—she didn’t seem to know more than that. I met Hoffman last year, chatted with him…Hey. What about the rest of them—Dieter, Elise, Rosa…”

  “I’m sure he liked you best,” I said.

  “I might not have taken notice of a letter,” Tony muttered. “We get a lot of crank mail.”

  “I know.”

  “Just the week before I left, there were half a dozen or so. People seem to get weirder during the holiday seasons…. An appeal for funds from that Psychic Archaeology crowd in Virginia, a curriculum vitae from some loony who thinks he should be appointed to the staff because he’s the reincarnation of Herodotus, a copy of that photo of Sophia Schliemann—Hey, watch out!”

  I had spilled my beer. “Sorry. Did you say Sophia Schliemann?”

  Tony grabbed a handful of napkins off a nearby table and swabbed at his sweater. “Damn it, Ann made this for me…. Yeah, you know, the one where she’s wearing the jewelry from Troy. I don’t know what the hell that was all about; there wasn’t even a letter with it.”

  That answered one question, unless Tony was a lot sneakier than I had ever known him to be. “What else did Friedl tell you?”

  “She didn’t make a lot of sense,” Tony admitted, “what did she tell you?”

  “She hasn’t told me anything yet,” I said, with perfect truth.

  “Well, let’s go see her. Maybe the two of us can extract some information. So far it’s a damned fishy story.”

  I was about to endorse this assessment when Tony’s mouth took on the wistful curve that made strong women want to mother him. “It would be too good to be true,” he said longingly.

  Friedl did not rise to greet us. She gave Tony her hand at an angle that made it impossible for him to do anything with it except kiss it.

  Usually I can tell when people are lying. Friedl defeated me; she was so accustomed to putting on an act that everything she said sounded phony. The gist of her long and rambling narrative was that (a) her husband had some hidden treasure, (b) she didn’t know what it was, and (c) she didn’t know where it was.

  Though visibly moved by her quivering lips and pathetic story, Tony was not moved to the point of excessive gullibility. Tactfully he pointed out that old men sometimes suffer from delusions.

  “He was not old,” Friedl protested.

  “Seventy-five?” I suggested.

  “Not in his heart—in his love…” Friedl covered her face with her hands.

  Tony patted her clumsily on the shoulder and gave me a reproachful look. Like all men, he is quite willing to believe that a young and beautiful girl will adore him when he’s eighty.

  Friedl restrained her grief, which had left not a smudge on her make-up, and proceeded with her story. She had not learned of the treasure until the past spring. It was something her husband had rescued at the end of the war and had kept safely hidden for forty years. Recently, however, he had begun to fear that his enemies had finally tracked him down.

  “Enemies?” Tony said. “What enemies?”

  Friedl opened her eyes so wide her mascara flaked. “The Russians. The Communists.”

  “Oh,” said Tony.

  I said, “Bless their red hearts, they make such handy villains.”

  The comment passed over, or through, Friedl’s head. She went on. Her husband would tell her nothing more for fear of endangering her, and when she suggested that he turn the treasure over to the authorities—she didn’t specify which authorities and neither of us pressed her—he had angrily refused. The treasure was his. It had passed through many hands, the original ownership had always been in dispute, and now it was his by right of possession. He had as much right to it as anyone. He had saved it.

  This part of the story had the ring of truth.

  Then, late in the fall, Hoffman had changed his mind. His enemies were closing in. He feared for his life—and hers. He had spoken of getting in touch with me—was I sure, absolutely certain, he had not told me…

  “I have no idea where it might be,” I said. “That’s the truth, Frau Hoffman. Are you sure you—”

  “No. I mean—yes. Would I have called on you for help if I knew?”

  The answer to that was so obvious no one felt the need of voicing it. Tony cleared his throat. “Forgive me, Friedl—Frau Hoffman—”

  She interrupted him, looking up at him from under her lashes and reaching for his hand. “Please, you must not be so formal. We are old friends.”

  “Thank you.” Blushing, Tony did not emulate her use of the informal du. “I was about to say—I don’t see how we can help you. I must be honest; I am still not convinced your husband was—er—in his right mind. All this business about Communists—”

  “Then who was it who shot at Fräulein Bliss?”

  “Hmmm,” said Tony.

  “And,” Friedl continued, “not long after my adored Anton’s death, someone broke into his room and searched it. Several pieces of furniture were smashed to pieces. I thought at the time it was an ordinary thief—but after the terrible incident of the shooting…Please, you will not abandon me? You will help me to find it?”

  “We’ll try,” Tony said dubiously. “Though, with so little to go on…Have the police no idea who could have fired those shots?”

  Friedl shrugged. Watching her, I said, “Freddy isn’t on duty today. Has he left town?”

  She wasn’t as dim as she appeared—or else she had had reason to anticipate the implied accusation. “Are you suggesting it was Freddy? Impossible. My own cousin—”

  “I’d like to talk to him,” I said mildly.

  Her eyes fell. “I—you cannot. He has gone. There was—he has—someone offered him a better position. He was only helping me temporarily.”

  “Where has he gone?”

  “Zürich.” The answer came so pat that a new-laid egg might have believed it.

  “Who is Freddy?” Tony inquired.

  “I’ll fill you in later,” I promised.

  “Freddy had nothing to do with it,” Friedl insisted. “It was the Communists.”

  Every time she mentioned Communists, Tony’s skepticism level shot up. “We’ll try,” he repeated. “If you think of anything else, anything at all—”

  After a further exchange of insincere promises and protestations, we took our leave. I told Tony about Freddy, which seemed to cheer him a little. “Guy sounds like a thug,” he said hopefully. “And his sudden departure is suspicious. Friedl is so trusting, anyone could take advantage of her.”

  “Uh-huh,” I said.

  It was possible—not that Friedl was a trusting innocent, but that someone could have tricked her. Her explanation of the destruction of the Schrank was feasible, too. I didn’t believe it, but it was feasible. I saw no reason to disillusion Tony. He would only have accused me of being catty, jealous, and a few other things.

  Freddy’s departure was suspicious. He might have taken fright after the failure of his attack and fled from a possible police investigation. Or, if John’s theory was correct, he might have fled from someone else.

  Once out of Friedl’s cloying presence, Tony’s spirits rose. “Communists aside,” he remarked, “her story isn’t as unlikely as it sounds. The Nazis were the biggest looters of art objects the world has ever seen. Hitler was collecting for his Sonderauftrag Linz, Göring was collecting for Göring, and everybody else was picking up the leftovers. A lot of the loot ended up in Bavaria; even Göring shipped his treasures to Berchtesgaden when the
Russians began to close in on Berlin. Remember the salt mines at Alt Aussee? Over ten thousand paintings, dozens of sculptures—including Michelangelo’s Madonna and Child—and thousands of minor works. According to one estimate, there were at least two hundred official caches of art treasures in southern Germany, and God knows how many unofficial ones. Some have never been found. This prize of Hoffman’s needn’t be a whole mineful; maybe it’s a single piece, something that had special importance to him.”

  He was getting uncomfortably close to the truth. I hoped he wouldn’t think of looking up Hoffman’s name in the professional literature; that would turn his attention away from the paintings-in-the-salt-mine theory, which was where I wanted him to stay. The trouble with my friends, and enemies, is that they are too intelligent.

  “It’s a hopeless cause, Tony,” I said. “These mountains are like Swiss cheese, full of holes, caves, and abandoned mines. It could be anywhere—if it exists.”

  Tony refused to be discouraged. The prospect of another treasure hunt, and of playing detective, was too exciting. “Don’t be such a pessimist. Hoffman must have left some clue. He was an old man; he wouldn’t take the chance of its being lost forever.”

  We had reached my room. I unlocked the door.

  “I wonder how big it is,” Tony mused.

  “Bigger than a breadbox,” I offered. “Are you coming in?”

  “I have my own room, thank you. Friedl was more than happy to accommodate me.”

  He was infuriatingly calm about being exiled from my tempting proximity. In fact, there was a swagger in his step and a certain swing to his shoulders as he walked away….

  “Tony,” I said gently.

  “What?”

  “I have a feeling Ann would rate Friedl as a succubus, too.”

  Tony’s smile was the sublime quintessence of smugness. “Why don’t I ask her? I told her I’d call today. So if you’ll excuse me for, say, half an hour—maybe an hour…” He disappeared into his room, leaving me to contemplate his closed door and the shame of my evil imagination.

  We decided to drive to Garmisch for dinner. Actually it was I who decided; Tony was in favor of sticking around the hotel, in hopes of God knows what—another attempt on my life, perhaps. I wanted to get away. The town was preying on my nerves—not that it wasn’t a nice town, but it was so small. Too small for the three of us—especially when John was one of the three.

  Since it was still early, we poked around the shops for a while, and Tony, who was still smarting from what he considered my treacherous behavior, got his revenge by carrying out an act of atrocity from which I had dissuaded him on several previous occasions. He bought a pair of lederhosen.

  Lederhosen are those short leather pants. Let me repeat the word “short.” They do not come to the knee, or just above the knee, or to mid-thigh; they are, not to belabor the point, short. On Tony they were a cross between a visual obscenity and a bad joke; he had to buy the largest pair in the shop in order to cover the essentials, and they were so big around the waist there was room inside for two of him. He said it didn’t matter, the suspenders would hold them up.

  The suspenders, brightly embroidered with objects such as edelweiss, were part of the costume, which also included knee socks and one of those silly little hats with a feather or an ostrich plume or a Gamsbart (chamois beard) tucked into the band. Tony’s had a white ostrich feather. When attired in the complete ensemble, he looked exactly like Peter, Peter, Pumpkin-Eater in a German edition of Mother Goose I had bought for one of my nieces.

  He wanted me to try on dirndls—so we’d match, I suppose. I actually love those cute little outfits; the astute reader has probably realized that my nasty remarks about the waitresses were prompted by pure jealousy. A dirndl looks as absurd on me as the lederhosen looked on Tony, if not as indecent. I tried on a few, to shut him up; when I saw him in a whispered conference with the shopkeeper, I realized he was planning to buy me one for a Christmas present. I also realized I didn’t have anything for him, so we cruised a few more stores and I took mental notes on the items Tony admired.

  We stowed his parcel in the car. By mat time it was dark, and the town was aglitter with thousands of Christmas bulbs strung from storefronts and lampposts. Snow crunched underfoot, the air was redolent with the smell of pine branches and wood fires; the colorful ski jackets and caps glowed like neon—raspberry, turquoise, hot pink—and the sound of carols poured from every door. It was very pretty and festive, and all I could think of was John’s advice: Look out for familiar faces. Between the ski masks and the scarves and the caps pulled low over ears and foreheads, it would have been difficult to recognize my own mother. The season and the setting could not have been more convenient for someone who preferred to pass unrecognized.

  We hadn’t gone a block from the car before I saw a familiar face. He was as swathed in scarves as all the others; I recognized him by the globular red nose that flashed on and off.

  He saw me at the same time. Dropping the arm of the woman who was with him, he came pelting toward me, arms extended, nose glowing. “Vicky! Adored and most elongated of womanly pulchritude”—he made it all one word, which you can do in German, if you aren’t particular about syntax. “You changed your mind! You came!”

  He flung his arms around me and burrowed his face into my chest.

  It was merely a token gesture, since I was wearing three layers of clothing and my parka had a zipper that closed it tighter than a chastity girdle, but Tony decided to take offense. Twisting a hand in the back of Dieter’s collar, he removed him.

  “She came, and I came with her,” he said, biting off the words so that his breath made irritated white puffs in the cold air, like a dragon hiccuping. “Cut it out, Dieter.”

  “I saw you,” Dieter admitted. “I hoped you were only a figment of my imagination and that if I ignored you, you would dissolve into air. Where is my nose?”

  He fumbled at his face. “Here,” I said, handing it back to him. “Must you, Dieter?”

  “Yes. Yes, yes, I must, or go mad with longing….” He began pounding on his chest.

  I indicated the woman who stood some distance away, her arms folded and her foot tapping. “Isn’t that Elise?”

  “It was Elise,” Dieter admitted. “No doubt it still is Elise. You see, when you turned me down, Vicky, I had to find another companion. Don’t tell Elise I asked you first. She would not like to be second choice.”

  Elise did not come rushing to greet us. “Look who I have found,” Dieter cried, presenting us like trophies.

  “Yes,” said Elise. “Quite a coincidence that we should all be here again.”

  “It certainly is,” said Tony.

  “Why do you stand looking hard at one another like two strange dogs?” Dieter asked curiously. “That is no way for old friends to behave. Let us all kiss one another.”

  Whereupon he flung his arms around Tony and stood on tiptoe, his lips pursed. Torn between amusement and disgust, Tony finally succumbed to laughter; he pushed Dieter away and reached for Elise. “Good idea, old buddy.”

  He had to lift Elise clean off her feet to kiss her; when he put her down she was looking a lot more amiable. Giggling, she linked arms with Tony and leaned against him. “We were about to have dinner. You will join us, won’t you?”

  There was no way of getting out of it without rudeness, even if we had wanted to, which neither of us did. The coincidences were falling as thick as the leaves in Vallombrosa.

  But as the meal progressed and everyone mellowed with wine and food, I began to wonder whether this particular coincidence might not be legitimate. Dieter was a keen skier, and Garmisch was one of the most popular winter-sports areas in Germany. Elise’s presence surprised me a little, but there again, Dieter’s explanation made sense. They had certainly been friendly the year before; now that her marriage was kaput, she would be looking for entertainment.

  I wondered whether Schmidt would approve of her new hairstyle. It was jet-b
lack instead of pink, and arranged in the wispy, wind-blown style fashionable that year. She had lost weight, which in her case was not becoming. The hollows under her cheekbones were as deep as scars, and her wrists looked brittle as dry twigs. She laughed a lot.

  Tony wasn’t buying the coincidence, but he didn’t make much progress in his subtle attempt to elicit information. One of his problems was that he had no idea what we were supposed to be looking for; it could have been a painting or a piece of sculpture, a rare coin or an entire frescoed ceiling. He twitched at the mention of Tintoretto and started at Saint Stephen’s Crown. It was the most entertaining aspect of the evening, a lot funnier than Dieter’s dreadful jokes.

  During the course of the usual shoptalk and professional gossip, I had a chance to inquire after Rosa and Jan. Elise’s comments about Rosa were surprisingly catty, even for her; from what she said, I got the impression that a professional feud was brewing, probably over some earth-shaking issue such as whether a painting was by Rembrandt or by one of his students. Dieter professed to know nothing about her; since their fields of expertise were so different, they would not ordinarily meet professionally, and—as Dieter candidly and crudely remarked—Rosa had nothing else to attract a man of his tastes.

  He had more to say about Jan Perlmutter. They lived in the same city, though divided from one another by a wall that was more than material, and communication between the museums of the two Berlins was not infrequent. According to Dieter, Jan had recently been passed over for promotion because of some petty political issue, and was very bitter about it.

  The only other subject of interest arose when Elise asked where we were staying.

  “Ah, the Hexenhut,” Dieter said reminiscently. “Yes, it was a pleasant little place—especially that waitress—you know who I mean, Tony….”

  He rolled his eyes and smacked his lips in a display that made it difficult for Tony to admit a like knowledge. I said, “You’re revolting, Dieter. I suppose you mean Friedl.”