by Frank Tallis
“He was stabbed in the chest.”
The professor turned the sheets back, revealing the upper half of the body. Vanek's shirt was dark, but the bloodstains were clearly visible. A vent showed where the blade had entered. The acrid smell of ammonia rose from the corpse's nether regions.
Mathias tried to undo the top button but the task was impossible. It was embedded in a crust of congealed blood. The old man inspected the gritty stains on his fingertips and lifted a giant pair of scissors from the cart. With workaday efficiency he cut the shirt from collar to hem and pulled the stiff cloth away. Two strips of chest hair were removed in the process. Rheinhardt averted his gaze. The sight and sound of the depilation was quite nauseating.
“Was he married?” asked Mathias.
“No.”
“Then let us thank God for small mercies,” said the pathologist.
Beneath the uncompromising light Vanek's wound was vivid: an angry red ellipse caked with a granular black excrescence.
Without looking back at the cart, Mathias reached out and snatched a magnifying glass from the second shelf. He leaned over the corpse and peered through the wide steel hoop.
“Interesting…,” he muttered. “Very interesting. Could you please step back a little, Inspector-you're stealing my precious light.” Reinhardt complied with the pathologist's request. “A stab wound- of course,” continued Mathias, “but somewhat irregular. The blade of a knife-properly so called-has a back and one cutting edge. The weapon used upon this gentleman had two cutting edges.”
“A sword?”
“Patience, Rheinhardt: festina lente.”
The old man carefully insinuated his fingers into the wound- a maneuver that was accomplished with the knowing sensitivity of a young lover. He closed his eyes and seemed to be entering a necromantic trance. Mathias swayed gently and mumbled to himself. In the sharp electric light, his exhalations became rolling white clouds that gathered over the corpse. He was like a medium, belching ectoplasm. Between each breath the old man's mumbling was disturbed by his asthmatic lungs, which produced an eerie harmonium-like accompaniment as the freezing air tormented his constricted bronchi.
“A sabre wound,” he said softly. “A common sabre, not a Turkish one-which has a much more pronounced curvature. The blade was pushed through the sternum, through the pericardium, and reached the back of the heart.” The professor opened his eyes and withdrew his fingers. They trailed a gory mucoid residue.
“The same as in Spittelberg.” Rheinhardt's voice was flat.
“What?”
“The Spittelberg murders. The women… you said that their wounds were most probably inflicted with a sabre.”
“Did I?”
“Yes.”
Mathias seemed distracted-unwilling to make eye contact.
“Do you think it was the same weapon?”
“Poor Evzen,” said Mathias, looking up at the Czech's solemn, almost noble mask of repose. The pathologist's movements were now less fluid, and his limbs seemed to have become ossified. He froze in an awkward attitude, as if-by some strange fluke of nature-he had contracted rigor mortis from the corpse.
“Professor Mathias?” Rheinhardt ventured.
“How many more times?” snapped the old man. “Always trying to rush me!”
Mathias's expression slowly changed. The lines of his face created mosaics that shifted to suggest first compassion, then surprise, and finally curiosity.
The pathologist edged up the table and peered more closely at the dead man's face. His head swung over the corpse, and immediately traced a large figure of eight. There was something feral about his sudden agitation-like a forest animal sniffing out a buried winter hoard.
“Professor!” Rheinhardt insisted. “I would be most grateful if-”
“Look there,” Mathias interrupted, completely indifferent to Rheinhardt's rising impatience. “Some slight bruising around the neck.” Then, more quietly, to himself, “But he hasn't been strangled.”
In a louder voice he added, “There is also something wrong with the cervical region. The laryngeal prominence is somewhat distended.”
Rheinhardt did not possess a great deal of medical knowledge but he knew enough to try. “Goiter, perhaps?”
Mathias responded with a disdainful look and returned his attention to the corpse. “Pardon me, sir,” he excused himself, and proceeded to feel under the dead man's stubbly chin. He pressed the throat on both sides and suddenly withdrew his hands as if he had been burned. “Good heavens!”
Not wishing to invite yet another admonishment, Rheinhardt suppressed the urge to ask the professor what he had discovered.
Mathias removed a rubber stop from the cart and handed it to Rheinhardt. Then he pried open Vanek's mouth, an action that produced a loud, liquid “clop.” Holding the maxilla and mandible apart with both hands, Mathias said, “Inspector, could you please wedge the jaw open?”
The dead man's rotting teeth appeared as his lips retracted. Rheinhardt could see the pink roof of his mouth and a pendulous uvula. He did not want his fingers to make contact with the lifeless flesh.
“Come on, Inspector!” huffed Mathias.
As it was the professor's frequent habit to chastise Rheinhardt for being hasty, the Inspector's impulse to make an acerbic comment was almost overwhelming. Fortunately, good sense prevailed, and Rheinhardt obediently pushed the rubber stop between the Czech's teeth.
“Thank you,” said Mathias.
“My pleasure,” said Rheinhardt, producing a profoundly disingenuous smile.
The old man shuffled over to his cart and found some oddly shaped forceps. Then he returned directly to the head of the table and peered down Vanek's throat.
“So…,” he said, producing a puff of condensation. “Let us solve this mystery.”
Mathias inserted the forceps into Vanek's mouth and tutted a few times, seemingly frustrated by the complexity of the action he was trying to perform. After a few abortive attempts, his expression relaxed and he began to withdraw the instrument.
“Extraordinary,” said Mathias, raising the forceps up to the light.
Rheinhardt blinked. He could not have been more surprised. Not even if he had been standing in an exhibition tent on the Prater bearing witness to a particularly impressive piece of prestidigitation. For there, gripped between the closed bills of Professor Mathias's forceps, was a common padlock.
“Well, what do you make of that, Rheinhardt?”
The inspector was speechless.
“I dare say,” continued Mathias, “that the presence of this object might explain the phenomenon you described earlier. Perhaps it allowed the gases to pass more freely past the vocal cords.”
“What on earth does it signify?” Rheinhardt gasped, a note of panic shaking every syllable of his exclamation.
Mathias shook his head. “Of course, if the murderer were deranged enough to secrete one object…”
The pathologist raised his eyebrows, pursed his lips together, and produced a long interrogative “Mmm?”
“I'm sorry?” said Rheinhardt, recovering just enough firmness of purpose to simulate composure. “What are you suggesting?”
“Merely,” said Mathias, “that it would be prudent to examine our unfortunate friend more thoroughly. We should take a look in his stomach-and inspect the contents of his rectum, of course.”
Rheinhardt coughed. “If you don't mind, Herr Professor, I would prefer to take a cigar outside while you…”
“Complete the autopsy?”
“Indeed.”
“Do as you please-it's all the same to me. I'll call you if I find anything interesting.”
Rheinhardt walked across the stone flags, but before leaving, he stole a quick glance back into the morgue. There was Mathias, standing in his circle of icy light, preparing to embark upon a bizarre corporeal treasure hunt. Misty exhalations poured out of his mouth like dragon's breath. The pathologist had become quite animated, his movements quickened b
y an eagerness-a childlike enthusiasm and excitement-that made Rheinhardt feel distinctly uncomfortable.
In the corridor outside the mortuary, Rheinhardt rested his back against the damp wall and took out a Trabuco cheroot. He struck a match and allowed the end to burn.
Sabre wounds… a crooked cross… a padlock.
This is the work of the same man.
Karsten Krull is entirely innocent, and the maniac is still at large.
For the first time, Rheinhardt worried about the safety of his family.
29
THE ROOM WAS OPULENT: chandeliers, heavy drapes, gilt furniture, and a selection of Biedermeier oils. Gustav von Triebenbach was standing by a plinth, which supported a white marble bust of Richard Wagner. There were many guests-not all of them fully fledged members of the Richard Wagner Association but all committed to the cause. In the far corner of the room was a gleaming Steinway piano. Behind it sat Hermann Aschenbrandt and another young musician. They were playing a four-hands arrangement of Strauss's Morgenblatter.
Von Triebenbach sipped his champagne and surveyed the scene. He recognized several important dignitaries, including some close associates of the mayor and a minister belonging to the Christian Social party. Standing by the fire was a tall, distinguished-looking lady wearing a long black dress and a ruby necklace. This was Baroness Sophie von Rautenberg-Olbricht's patron. Von Triebenbach made a mental note that he should pay her a compliment by the end of the evening. Though in her fifties, she was still an attractive woman. To his knowledge, since the death of Von Rautenberg she had never taken a lover. He wondered whether he might one day persuade her to consider him as a possible candidate. Close to the baroness sat the Englishman, Houston Stewart Chamberlain. He was an honorary member of the association and was addressing a small group of admirers. Von Triebenbach had read Chamberlain's books and essays on “the great composer” and had enjoyed them immensely.
On the opposite side of the room, Von Triebenbach spotted Ruprecht Hefner. The lieutenant stood out from the crowd on account of his bright blue uniform (an Austrian officer was not permitted to wear mufti off duty). Hefner was talking to a pretty young lady in a dress made of yellow silk. Von Triebenbach did not recognize her but strongly suspected that she was the minister's daughter.
The cavalryman leaned close and whispered something in her ear. She blushed, looked nervously around the room, and marched awaylifting her skirts slightly in order to facilitate a nimble escape.
One day that boy will get into serious trouble.
Von Triebenbach caught Hefner's attention and raised his champagne flute. The officer smiled and crossed the floor, allowing the golden tassel to swing conspicuously from his pommel. A few people stopped talking in order to enjoy the Uhlan's magisterial progress.
“Baron!” said Hefner, bowing. “So good to see you again.”
“And you, Hefner-how long has it been?”
“Too long.”
“Indeed, I can't remember the last time I saw you at one of our little gatherings.”
“Ah yes, Baron, forgive me. I have been otherwise engaged of late. There was a rumor circulating around the barracks that His Majesty intended to inspect the eighteenth. Well, you can imagine the effect that had on a stickler like Kabok! We've been drilling day and night!”
“Of course-but you really must come again soon. We've had some very interesting guests, you know. At our last meeting we were honored by no less a personage than List.”
“Really? I was under the impression that the old man was dead.”
“Not Liszt, dear fellow-Guido List! The famous writer?”
“Oh, yes…”
The soldier's response lacked the brightness of tone associated with genuine recognition, but Von Triebenbach was not inclined to press the matter. “Never mind. Just come when you can.”
The music stopped and the room resounded with enthusiastic applause. The musicians half-rose from their seats, bowing and grinning in all directions. As soon as they sat down again, a stealthy staccato introduction preceded a fortissimo chord, which was in turn followed by a weightless, swinging accompaniment. When the melody of the Liebeslieder Waltz trickled down the keyboard-liquid and delicate-some of the audience began to clap again.
Von Triebenbach leaned closer to the handsome cavalry officer and lowered his voice. “Speaking of rumors, I heard that you had a set-to with Freddi Lemberg-at the opera?
“Did you?”
“Yes-and I understand too that he demanded satisfaction.”
“Who told you that?”
“Hefner, you cannot expect such an exchange to pass unnoticed.” The officer shrugged. “My dear boy,” Von Triebenbach continued, “you must be more discreet.” He nodded then toward the girl in the yellow dress, who had just reappeared. “With respect to all matters.”
Hefner grinned. “As usual, Baron, I am indebted to you for your wise counsel. However, I must beg to be excused-the matter that you now refer to is still unresolved.”
Hefner bowed and slipped into the crowd, clearly in pursuit of his quarry.
Von Triebenbach shook his head.
Oh, to be young again! To feel invincible!
Wistfully remembering the conquests of his own youth, Von Triebenbach edged toward the alluring Rautenberg widow. As he drew closer, he was distracted by the group seated around Chamberlain. Von Triebenbach could not hear his every word but he soon perceived that the Englishman was discoursing on his compatriot Sir Francis Galton. The thin but clear voice floated above the general hubbub. His German was perfect: “He has been petitioning the British government since the sixties… must sponsor competitive examinations in hereditary merit… those of superior stock might be invited to marry in Westminster Abbey and be encouraged by postnatal grants to produce strong and healthy progeny.” The crowd parted and Von Triebenbach got his first clear view of the Englishman.
Chamberlain's complexion was pale, and his hair and mustache displayed a variety of tawny shades. Below an extremely high forehead his face was curiously elongated. Indeed, his general appearance suggested attenuation-as though his whole body had been stretched. His lips were too full, almost feminine, and his eyes were large and reminded Von Triebenbach of those of a nocturnal mammal. Yet there was something distinctly aristocratic in his demeanor; perhaps it was his stillness, or the precision of his speech.
Von Triebenbach could now hear Chamberlain's every word.
“It is impossible to estimate the genius and development of our north European culture if we obstinately shut our eyes to the fact that it is a definite species of mankind which constitutes its physical and moral basis. We see that clearly today; for the less Teutonic a land is, the more uncivilized it is. He who at the present time travels from London to Rome passes from fog into sunshine, but at the same time from the most refined civilization and high culture into semi-barbarism-dirt, coarseness, falsehood, poverty.”
A waiter offered the baron a salmon canape, which he refused, eager to hear the Englishman.
“…On the one hand depth, power, and directness of expression as our most individual gift, and on the other, the great secret of our superiority in so many spheres, namely, our inborn tendency to follow nature honestly and faithfully.”
“Very true,” said one of his acolytes, which roused a rumble of general approval.
When the time comes, thought Von Triebenbach, we shall certainly be able to depend on the English.
30
PROFESSOR FREUD WAS ALMOST hidden in a dense cloud bank of cigar smoke. He had been talking at length about the psychological differences between conscious and unconscious processes. As the exposition proceeded, Liebermann was distracted by a curious fantasy. It was playing, like a Greek drama, in the penumbral outer circle of his mind. In this fantasy, he-or someone very much like him-was a neophyte in an ancient sect, consulting a spirit oracle that was made manifest in the semi-opaque twisting veils that floated up from a gold incense bowl…
“Every
thing conscious is subject to a process of wearing away, while what is unconscious is relatively unchangeable. Look at these antiquities.” Freud passed his hands over the figurines that stood guard on his desk, among which Liebermann spied a winged Sphinx, a brachycephalic dwarf, and a falcon-headed deity. His fantasy receded.
“They are, in fact,” continued Professor Freud, “objects that were found concealed in the tombs of Egypt. The oldest here is nearly three thousand years old. Yet their burial has been the cause of their preservation. So it is with an unconscious memory-it is protected beneath the superficial sedimentation of the psyche. Think of Pompeii. Was it really destroyed by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79? Not at all. The destruction of Pompeii is only just beginning, now that it has been discovered and dug up!”
Freud cut another cigar and offered it to his companion, but Liebermann declined. If he attempted to keep up with the old man, then they would both be rendered invisible by the intensifying dun fog.
Freud's extemporization had been detailed and extended. Liebermann was reminded of the professor's Saturday lectures: it was Freud's habit to deliver them without notes, yet they were always intricately argued and perfectly structured. Realizing that the great psychoanalyst might start discoursing again and continue for at least another half hour, Liebermann thought it wise to take advantage of the interruption. The old man struck a match and drew on his corona.
“Professor?” Freud's penetrating eyes peered out from a tawny cloud. “You have written a great deal about the appearance of symbols in dreams, and I was wondering whether you would be willing to examine a certain emblem that I have chanced upon in the course of my… my work.”
“Of course,” said Freud. “Although in the matter of dream interpretation, as you will appreciate, symbols do not occur with a permanently fixed meaning like the grammalogues in shorthand.”
“This symbol did not occur in a dream,” said Liebermann impassively. Freud's stare remained constant-his eyes were two points of fixed concentration. “I suspect,” Liebermann continued, “that it is a sacred image of some description-an ideogram. Given your extensive knowledge of the ancient world and its cultures, I hoped that you might be able to identify it.”
