Morley Torgov - The Mastersinger from Minsk

Helena shot me a defiant look. “And what have you got to offer, Hermann? Years and years of on-again off-again? And before we know it we’re both too old and dried out to make love. So what’s left for me? The thrill of watching you sift through the cinders of your career after you’ve retired? Thank you, no!”

“Then there’s nothing more to be said?”

Helena handed me my hat. “Nothing.”

As I turned to leave there was a knock on the door. A voice called out, “It’s me, Helena, I’ve just arrived — ”

I recognized the voice of Madam Vronsky. “I didn’t know you were expecting company, Helena,” I said.

“I’ll get the door,” Helena said quickly. Admitting Madam Vronsky, she said, “You must be exhausted, my dear. Hermann is just leaving — ”

“I am exhausted. The night train from Düsseldorf, you know — ” Madam Vronsky shrugged, as though shaking off a bad experience. “But Inspector Preiss, what a pleasant surprise!”

Helena planted herself between Madam Vronsky and me. “Yes, well the Inspector was just on his way out.”

Madam Vronsky said, “What a pity. Oh well, I’m sure we’ll see one another this evening.”

“So you’ve come to Munich for the premiere?” I asked.

Before Madam Vronsky could reply Helen interjected. “Hermann, the poor woman is a wreck after her overnight journey. This is no time for interrogations. Go, and let her get some rest, for heaven’s sake!”

“By all means,” I replied. “But first, a question for my sake, Helena.” Gently pushing Helena aside, I confronted Madam Vronsky. “Perhaps you can help me, old friend. I know it’s been a while since you lived in your homeland, but they say ‘once a Russian, always a Russian,’ so tell me: if a Russian man wishes to get away from everything, to relax, maybe even to hide out for a bit, where does he go and what does he do?”

My question brought a mischievous smile to Madam Vronsky’s face. “Are you suggesting that somehow I, Madam Vronsky, a humble piano teacher, have some special acquaintance with the dark side of Russian men, with their intimate habits?”

“Madam Vronsky,” I said, “one of the reasons you are a great piano teacher is that you are a true woman of the world, a Russian one at that.”

“Ah, Inspector, Russian women — unless they are peasants, of course — are raised in bird cages. We are not women of the world in the way that women are in France, or England, or Italy. But for what my knowledge is worth, if I were a typical Russian man and wanted, as you say, to get away from everything, there is one place I would go — ”

“And that would be — ?”

“To a Russian bathhouse.”

“I beg your pardon. To what ?”

“A place that has plenty of hot steam, boiling hot in fact, and pails of cold water. Russian men love to scald themselves alive until every pore in their bodies is screaming for relief. Then comes the pail of ice-cold water. Sometimes they do this for hours until their flesh is almost beet red. My own father was addicted to this routine. Spent nearly every Sunday doing it. My mother would pack him some bread, a couple of chicken legs, and a flask of vodka. ‘There you go, Alexei, off to the cookery’ and we wouldn’t see him again until suppertime.”

“I believe I know Munich from one end to the other,” I said, not hiding my disappointment, “but I can’t recall ever coming across a Russian bathhouse.”

“Don’t look so discouraged,” Madam Vronsky said. “Think of the next closest place, then. There must be a public bathhouse somewhere in this city that offers similar facilities, surely.”

Hastily Helena attempted once more to position herself between Madam Vrosnky and me. This time I placed a restraining hold on her arm that made her wince. “Madam Vronsky, I won’t detain you another moment. You’ve been most helpful.”

Smiling, Madam Vronsky piped up, “I suppose the Russian man you’re speaking of is that handsome young tenor?”

“How would you possibly suspect that?” I asked, smiling back. “Now, if you will excuse me — ”

Very nervously Helena said, “Where are you going in such a hurry, Hermann?”

I settled my hat carefully on my head. “ That , my dear Helena, is none of your business,” I replied.

This being the first day of summer, I was expected to attend a noon-hour meeting of senior staff traditionally presided over by von Mannstein at the commencement of each new season. From past experience I knew what would be uppermost on the agenda. Fair weather never failed to bring to Munich’s surface two things: flowers and crime. After hibernating like bears during the winter months, the city’s underworld were in full blossom. Therefore extra duties were the order of the day, a decree that would invariably be met with stifled groans and rolled eyes. This would be followed by the commissioner’s recital of unsolved cases and his recommendations for demotions among the lower ranks. Congeniality at these briefings was never in the air. On the other hand, protocol called for full dress uniform to lend pomp to the occasion, not that von Mannstein’s arm had to be twisted when it came to sporting one of his beloved uniforms and his array of decorations (all earned in peacetime).

I knew — oh, how well I knew! — that the case of Richard Wagner would raise its Medusa head at some point, most likely in a private dressing-down afterward, for the commissioner still preferred that his and the mayor’s strategy concerning the infamous troublemaker be carried out sub rosa for the time being. Faced with a choice — to attend or to be truant — I chose the latter. I therefore dispatched a note by messenger to Constable First Class Emil Gruber (whose gratitude to me for his recent promotion was still eternal) requesting him to inform the commissioner that I was indisposed due to a severe urinary infection. Von Mannstein possessed a special sensitivity about such male disorders, having exposed his own organs on more than a few occasions to extra-curricular risks and consequences, and could be counted on to feel a pinch or two of sympathy. This would leave me free to concentrate on what was at the very top of my agenda … the hunt for Hershel Socransky.

It was now well past noon and time was shrinking fast. I had learned that Wagner’s new opera was longer than most, taking up some five hours from start to finish. The curtain would therefore rise earlier than usual, that is, at seven o’clock. Being a stickler for punctuality the Maestro would not tolerate even a minute’s delay.

I was absolutely certain that nowhere in Munich was there to be found the kind of Russian bathhouse Madam Vronsky described. Granted Munich was a remarkably cosmopolitan city, its restaurants and bakeries influenced by the French, its gardens and parks influenced by the English, its architecture influenced by the Romans and Greeks, but one foreign influence thus far had failed utterly to take hold in Munich: Russian-style bathhouses.

Think of the next closest place, then … there must be a public bathhouse somewhere in this city that offers similar facilities …

I could think of only one — Müllersches Volksbad, on the banks of the Isar in the south part of the city, steps from Ludwig’s Bridge and not at all distant from the opera house. A popular tourist attraction and highly visible thanks to its tall white tower with clocks on all four sides, it houses the most beautiful indoor swimming pool in the country. But was there somewhere in that imposing edifice anything even vaguely resembling a Russian-style steam bath?

Entering the main reception hall I spotted an information kiosk occupied by a uniformed attendant, his peaked cap sitting squarely on a massive head, which in turn sat on massive shoulders without the benefit of a neck, features typical of retired military veterans blessed in old age with government patronage. I knew such men to be invariably sour, bored, rude, and bullies to the core. This attendant turned out to be an exception; he had all of the aforementioned qualities multiplied by ten!