by Rick Blechta
“Another man came this morning. I liked him. He was a proper Austrian gentleman of the old days.”
“And what was he asking you about?”
“My grandniece, of course! He said he had known her, as he had been a guest of Baron Rudolph many times. He wanted to put flowers on her grave.”
Roderick shook his head sympathetically. “This is the terrible thing about being in the centre of such troubles. I am sure that you sent them packing. Imagine bothering a poor, upset woman!”
Frau Braubach cackled delightedly. “Those two felt the wrath of a righteous person!”
“And the nice gentleman?”
“I spoke with him for quite a while. He was very interested in my job at the Schönbrunn.”
Once we got down to the street, we found a bench in a small park, where Roderick filled me in on everything that had been said.
“They’re all still after the damn manuscript,” I said. “But which one of the three is the murderer?”
Roderick nodded. “Our best bet to find out more is the Schönbrunn palace. It’s only about a fifteen minute walk from here.”
***
According to the guide books, the Schloss Schönbrunn was the summer home of the Habsburgs, the hereditary rulers of the Austro-Hungarian empire. If this was their idea of a summer home (all fourteen hundred plus rooms of it), then I really had to see the main palace before I left Vienna. The closest comparison I can think of is Versailles in France. Come to think of it, that was a summer home, too...
In order to give me the full effect, Roderick insisted we use the main gates, where we walked past two tall, eagle-mounted obelisks into a large semi-circular courtyard of outbuildings, with the palace itself stretching the entire length of the flat side—a very imposing structure. Everything had been painted “Habsburg yellow”, a dark hue bordering on orange.
The day which had started out warm and sunny had by this time turned grey and cold, and the few tourists dotting the courtyard seemed intent on getting out of the wind.
Roderick turned to me. “Any ideas as to how we should approach this Hauser character?”
I shrugged. “Why not just go up and threaten him? It’s worked for us every time so far. We already know he was seen with Thekla, and I’ll bet he’d rather answer our questions than those of police.”
“It might be more fruitful to grease his palm and keep the threats as a last resort. People in this part of the world are more ready to pay bribes as a matter of course—and receive them. How much cash do you have?”
I handed over everything I had, and Roderick added it to the impressive amount he had in his money clip.
We found the entrance hall on the left side of the main part of the building. The woman there told us we should ask for Hauser at the Director’s Office.
The ground floor of the Schönbrunn was quite spartan, probably because it contained a warren of kitchens, pantries, storerooms and offices—the domain of the servants. The Director, in recognition of his bureaucratic status, had his space near the ceremonial staircase leading to the imperial rooms. His secretary also displayed a hauteur several notches above the ticket taker. Clearly, she was one of the ten thousand most important people working at the palace.
Looking down her glasses at us, she said in near perfect English, “Herr Hauser? Of course I know him! He is in charge of the late afternoon watch and should be on duty now, but I am afraid that it is strictly against policy to have personal visitations while on duty.”
“When does he get off duty, then?”
“That is confidential information. If you care to leave your card, perhaps he will contact you.”
Roderick said, “That’s quite all right. I have his phone number and can call him later. Thanks for your help.”
As we left the office, I asked, “Why did you give up so easily?”
“Because all we need to do is buy a ticket to view the rooms and walk around asking for Hauser until we find him. I only came here to find out whether he was on duty or not. I think the element of surprise might be of great assistance. The poor bloke has probably been wondering ever since Thekla’s death whether someone would come looking for him.”
“Surprise will work only if we’re the first,” I pointed out.
“Then there’s always bullying.”
We went back around to the entrance hall and bought tickets, ascended the ceremonial staircase and entered the Imperial apartments via a rather plain outer chamber for the Imperial guards.
Past that, though, the rooms, gloomy because of the dim lighting, were quite breathtaking—in an oppressively Baroque way. Frau Braubach was correct in her boast that they were kept scrupulously clean, but some looked as if they could have benefitted from a fresh coat of paint. Figuring it was better to be inconspicuous as part of a crowd, we latched onto one of the scheduled tours: a blue-rinse group of French tourists.
After going through several rooms, we hadn’t seen any guards. This was very odd. All of the rooms had roped-off areas, making a wide corridor for the tourists to follow, and I was just about to try stepping over into the excluded area to see what attention we might attract when Roderick said, “Take a picture, old man.”
“What?”
“You still have Schultz’s camera around your neck. Didn’t you notice the signs saying flash photography is forbidden? If you take a picture, it should attract a guard.”
He was right. I guess the guide in front of us alerted someone with her walkie-talkie because a man arrived within one minute, speaking first in German, then English.
“I am sorry, but it is forbidden to take flash pictures in the Schönbrunn,” he said firmly. “The light will damage the artifacts. That is why we also have the shutters closed in all the rooms.”
“I’m so sorry,” I said with real conviction. “I didn’t know. By the way, I’m from Canada, and my sister said to look up a person she met who works here. You wouldn’t happen to know Heinz Hauser, would you?”
“Yes, he does work here.”
“Could you tell me where I might find him? My sister asked me to give him a message from her, if you know what I mean.” I winked at the guard.
“I think Herr Hauser is stationed in the Hall of Mirrors today. If you just follow the circuit, you will come to it on the other side of the building from where we are standing now.”
“Can’t we just cut through?”
“There are the old servants’ passages between, but they are not open to the public. Go around. It is not far.”
We pushed our way ahead of the tour, going through the Imperial bedrooms, wardrobe rooms, dressing rooms and sitting rooms, finally coming to the aptly-named Hall of Mirrors.
“I think this is where Mozart played for Empress Maria Theresa when he was about six,” Roderick told me.
“Thanks for the important info,” I returned. “Now where the hell is Hauser? That tour is barking hard on our heels, and I don’t want to get tangled up with them again.”
“Take a picture,” Roderick said with a smile. We again got a guard from the room adjacent—in about ten seconds this time.
“Es is verboten, Blitzphotos im Schönbrunn zu nehmen,” he said, rushing up to us.
“Herr Hauser?” Roderick asked.
Using his name seemed to totally flummox the guard for a moment. He peered at us through glasses with those heavy black plastic frames which have come back into fashion again. “Kenne ich Sie?”
Roderick smiled pleasantly. “Please speak English. My friend does not speak German.”
Hauser switched to English with no trouble. “Do I know you?”
Around six feet, his middle turning to fat, the guard looked to be in his late thirties. With longish, slicked back dark hair and sideburns, he had the appearance of an aging rock star. He probably thought that women would see him as someone sexy and maybe slightly dangerous. And who knows? Maybe they did. I saw someone who was too full of himself for his own good.
“We have never
met,” I answered, “but we would like to talk to you about something that concerns all of us.”
He recovered a bit of what was probably his normal manner. “And what would concern me and someone who admits that we have never met?”
“Thekla Grillzer.”
He hesitated for a second too long. “I am sorry. I do not know of whom you are speaking.”
Roderick said, “Odd you should say that. You were seen together right here in this building.”
Some of the bluster seeped out of Hauser, and he peered at me again. “What is your name?”
“Oscar Lukesh. We may not have met, but perhaps you have seen me on television recently?”
By his expression, it was not hard to tell when Hauser at last made the connection.
The tour had caught up with us, and the old folks spilled into the room, chattering loudly.
“I tell you I know nothing of the dead girl!” he whispered intensely. “Now please go away!”
Roderick stepped forward and said something in German. Hauser’s eyes registered shock, then interest, and finally his eyes narrowed shrewdly. Some bills were discreetly passed and pocketed.
“All we want is a quiet word,” Roderick added for my benefit, as he looked around. “But I don’t think we’ll get it here.”
“I have a break in an hour. We could speak then.” I wasn’t about to let him have time to think—or run off.
“No, it has to be now. Where can we go?”
Surprisingly, Hauser gave it a mere five seconds of thought, then led us over to a wall, which he pushed on, revealing a concealed door. Inside, we found a corridor, its utilitarian appearance completely at odds with the magnificence just on the other side of the wall. This was obviously the servants’ area the other guard had mentioned.
Hauser shut the door behind us and immediately pulled the cash out of his pocket, counting it. “I tell you I had nothing to do with the girl’s death!”
“We are not suggesting that you did,” Roderick said. “We just want to hear anything you can tell us about her.”
“I barely remember anything,” he answered with a completely ingenuous expression.
Reaching into his pocket again, Roderick came out with a crisp one hundred dollar bill. “Would this help you to remember?”
Hauser shrugged magnanimously and took the money. “What is to tell? I met her here at the Schönbrunn. She was the grand-niece of one of the old hags who work on our cleaning staff. To hear them talk, you would think that the whole building would collapse without their hard work. Pah! They are all cows, and that aunt is the worst of the lot!”
“So Thekla came here with her aunt and...”
“We started to talk. She was a pretty girl.”
“Very pretty,” I agreed. “What did you talk about?”
He looked down his nose at me. “Just chatter. The things men usually say to pretty girls who seem to have an interest in hearing them.”
“I certainly would have wanted to do more than talk with someone the likes of Thekla. I only met her once, but she had a certain charm, if you know what I mean. She wouldn’t have anything to do with me, though.”
My impromptu bit of fishing got a nibble.
Hauser smiled slyly. “You only need to know how to talk to them, my friend! She could be flattered—like all the rest. It is simple when you know how.”
I feigned an incredulous look, part “well done, old man” and part “you lucky dog, you!” Hauser’s grinned widened. I found it hard to believe that he could be so transparent—and so dumb.
“And that was all it took? Her aunt said she disappeared for a night, but...”
Indicating that I didn’t believe his hints was all it took for full disclosure from the buffoon. “I assure you gentlemen that Thekla Grillzer did warm my bed for a night, and there would have been a second, but she never came back from her ‘appointment’. It was unfortunate. My wife is seldom out of town for so long.”
“What appointment was this?” Roderick asked.
“She did not say. She used my telephone privately two or three times. She asked a lot of questions about my computer, as well. Maybe she was in contact with your wife,” he smirked.
I bridled visibly at that, and Roderick stepped forward, trying to keep the conversation on track. “When she went to her appointment, the girl didn’t leave anything behind, did she? You said she was planning to come back.”
Hauser’s expression clearly said “they always come back”, but his mouth answered, “I, ah... I am not certain...”
Roderick peeled off another hundred and pressed it into Hauser’s hand. When the guard stood looking down at the cash for several seconds, Roderick forked over my last hundred. We were down to Roderick’s pounds and Euros now.
Hauser grinned at us like we were fools. “She left a small knapsack. It had nothing in it but a few old papers.”
I said, trying to keep my face blank, “For what we’ve paid you, I would like to see it.”
“I cannot.”
“You must. There will be more money for you once we have seen it.”
Hauser shrugged and whipped out his walkie-talkie, saying a few rapid words.
“Getting somebody to cover for him,” Roderick explained as we moved off down the corridor. A few turns brought us to a freight elevator.
“This is the quickest way to get to the floor where my rooms are.” Hauser told us.
For a “half-floor”, the ceilings of the Pacassistock were at least eight feet high. The original height of the rooms below must have been something else.
Hauser took off at a brisk pace along a corridor running the length of the building. Up here the construction was more modern, with recently fitted metal doors, but everything was still rather spartan. Several of the doors we passed did indeed appear to be offices and storage rooms, but cooking odours hanging in the air spoke of living quarters, too.
Hauser stopped near the end of the corridor and fished out a key ring. When the door swung back, he gasped, and Roderick and I crowded forward to look over his shoulder.
The last time I’d seen a place turned out like this had been our original rooms at the hotel.
“There is no way that this woman is not guilty of the crimes with which she’s been charged. Oh, her lawyer may argue, and they will have a big image campaign to try to sway public sentiment in her favour, but in the end Austrian justice will prevail. Our case is too strong for it to be otherwise.”
—a high-ranking officer in the Viennese Gendarmarie, speaking off the record.
Chapter 30
ROCKY
Roderick and I watched Hauser rant as he waded through the wreckage of his apartment. What was he upset most about? Not that his apartment had been trashed. Oh, no. He was far more worried what his wife would say. Hauser, that infamous debaucher of women, was petrified of his wife!
“It must have been that reporter! He said that the information I was withholding was dangerous.”
“What information?” Roderick asked.
“What reporter?” I asked.
Hauser, trying futilely to put the apartment to rights, picked up an end table. It stood for about a second before one leg gave way, and it crashed down again.
“What information?” Roderick repeated.
“The same things that you have been asking about! Whatever it was that little bitch had got herself mixed up in. I wish that I had never laid eyes on her!”
“Describe this reporter, please,” I asked.
“There was a phone call by someone who said he was a reporter and would pay me for information. I was supposed to meet him earlier this afternoon, but he never showed up.”
“And your wife was also out at that time?”
At the mention of his wife, Hauser became frantic again. “Whatever am I going to tell her? She will want to call the police and then... Gott im Himmel! I would strangle that girl myself if she was not already dead! What has she gotten me into?”
�
�Is the knapsack still here?” I asked.
Hauser rummaged around in the back of a closet and came out shaking his head.
“Do you remember anything about what was in the knapsack?”
“I have already told you: just some papers!”
“What kind of papers?” I asked with my heart thumping.
“Music. I don’t remember.”
Roderick, looking at me shrewdly, asked, “Can you think of any place here where Thekla might have hidden something else?”
“Hidden what?” Hauser asked despairingly as he dropped down heavily on the only chair that was still whole.
“More papers, old ones, though, and maybe video tapes.”
“I saw neither. Except...”
“Except what?”
“She took one of my video tape players. I came upstairs the day she went out to her ‘important meeting’ and found a note. She promised to bring it back, but then, she promised many things. I suppose she took it to that damned apartment where they found her.”
“We did see a video player there, yes,” I said, then needled him with, “I suppose you could always ask the police to give it back to you.”
“Never! I do not want to be involved!”
“We may be able to help you avoid that,” Roderick said reasonably.
“How can can such a thing be done?”
“We need to find something which we think Thekla brought with her, something that belonged to her late employer—the one who was murdered. You do not want to know what this thing is. Since there’s no knapsack, just help us understand exactly what Thekla did while she was here with you.”
At the little hint of “let’s talk man-to-man” Roderick put into his voice, Hauser seemed to relax slightly. I guessed rightly that the idiot was the kind to brag about his conquests in the presence of his buddies and then go home to cower in fear that his wife would find out.
“We spent the first night doing what you might imagine,” he smirked. “I opened some wine first and then we made love. I was a tiger that night! Then I poured some more wine—a little too freely, it would seem.”
