J. Jones - The Third Place

‘That is correct, Inspector,’ Werthen said, though he was damned if he was going to turn over his notebook. ‘Records of any witness I may have spoken to and any possible motives and suspects in the case. I am afraid I did not get very far, only to ascertain that Herr Karl, the first man killed, was running a bit of a fiddle on the side, extracting money from workers and vendors alike.’

‘And this second death,’ Meindl said. ‘Another waiter.’

Drechsler spoke up now. ‘The under waiter at the same establishment, sir.’

‘Well there’s motive for you,’ Meindl said brightly. ‘Hadn’t thought of that, had you, Advokat? Kill the boss to get his job. Then contrition sets in, the man can’t live with himself and commits suicide.’

Another clearing of the throat from Drechsler. ‘Not a suicide, sir. Chap’s neck was broken, according to the medical examiner.’

‘He could have broken it diving into the canal. Hit a bridge brace.’

‘No water in the lungs, sir,’ Drechsler replied. ‘Herr Falk had his neck broken before being thrown into the canal. It was murder.’

‘Well,’ Meindl said, trying to salvage some respect, ‘I am glad we have cleared that up. And now, you two, remember what I said.’

Werthen and Gross exchanged glances. What had Meindl said? But neither uttered a word as they got up and left the Police Praesidium to its hit-and-miss investigation.

They were cutting it close: their appointment with Montenuovo was at one in the afternoon and they finished their business with Meindl at twelve-thirty. Gross did not bother consulting Werthen’s wishes about walking or finding a fiaker. Instead, once out of the main door of the police headquarters, he set off at a furious pace toward the Ring, and Werthen was again left to catch up as best he could. Today was one of those days – with the renewal of raw, cold winter weather – when his left knee was acting up. Wounded in a duel in his first case as a private inquiries agent, his knee had a way of painfully reminding him of that earlier escapade. Every step was an agony and the wind whipped snow flurries in his face.

Finally he called out to the criminologist, ‘Gross! For pity’s sake, slow down.’

Gross turned abruptly, waiting for him. As Werthen approached, Gross smiled.

‘Serves you right,’ he said, ‘for taking away my fun with Meindl. Now let’s hop to it. Don’t want to keep the prince waiting.’

Gross did not give him a chance to explain about his leg; any normal person with a sense of empathy would have noticed him limping. Not Gross, however. He was devoid of empathy – a characteristic as foreign to him as humility.

Gross plunged on into the darkening day, into the sheet of snow that had begun to cover the city.

And in the end it was all for naught. Montenuovo treated their discovery exactly as Gross had prophesied: too little evidence to proceed. How could Austria send an ultimatum to another sovereign country on the strength of three shell casings? Neither would his eminence, Franz Josef, agree to a curtailment of public appearances. Not at Easter time, to be sure.

‘But it is not the sovereign state of Serbia,’ Werthen protested. ‘It is most likely a cabal of officers around this Apis fellow.’

‘Do you hear yourself, Advokat?’ Montenuovo said. ‘“Most likely.” That is not good enough. Find me a perpetrator able to link this assassination attempt to Belgrade and we will do more than send an ultimatum, I can guarantee you. But for now there is nothing to be done but ensure the emperor’s safety.’

‘And how are we to do that,’ Werthen complained, ‘if the emperor insists on taking part in all manner of public appearances?’

‘That, my friend, is what you have been hired to ascertain and to insure.’

‘I appreciated your help back there,’ Werthen said with heavy irony once they were back on the open square beneath Montenuovo’s Hofburg office. The snow had intensified; there was already a good six inches coating the cobbles.

‘I am sure you will not appreciate this, Werthen, but in fact-’

‘I told you so,’ Werthen finished for him. ‘For God’s sake, let us find a gasthaus and round of slivowitz before we suffer frostbite.’

Werthen had transcribed his notes for Drechsler, keeping the original in his leather pocket notebook. Berthe was grateful for this; she had a starting point. Now going over those early notes the next morning, she was able to check off the unfortunate Herr Falk as a suspect.

Berthe was not so sure about her husband’s theory of his death. It seemed a stretch that the murderer would somehow find out that there was a witness to his homicidal activity. And why strike nine days following the murder of Herr Karl? Surely the killer would assume that by that time Falk would have told the police everything he knew, if he were ever going to do so.

Berthe took a different tack: what if the murder of Herr Falk were not a matter of defense at all, but of offense? In this version of events, the deaths of Herr Karl and Herr Falk were related in motive and not a matter of the killer covering his or her tracks. But what could that motive be?

Examining her husband’s list of suspects, she could easily check off those who might have killed because of Herr Karl’s pay-off scheme and monetary kickbacks from vendors and staff. Herr Falk had himself been victim of this scheme. Likewise, the relatives of the previous head waiter at the Cafe Burg, Herr Siegfried, the traces of whom Herr Karl had thoroughly expunged when he’d become head waiter. Herr Falk had nothing to do with that, either.

Other ambitious waiters or jealous head waiters could also be put to the bottom of the list. From what Berthe’s husband told her, Herr Falk was only temporarily serving as head waiter following Herr Karl’s death. The management of the Cafe Burg was going to bring in another waiter from outside the staff. And the literary critic, Moritz Fender, could surely have no quarrel with Herr Falk, for it had been Herr Karl who had made his cafe the home of one of Vienna’s many literary circles.

Also, if she were looking for common motive, then clearly Herr Karl’s Bosnian Serbian roots that Kraus had pointed to had nothing to do with these murders.

Which left her with only one avenue of investigation: Herr Karl’s bosom friend, Oberstabelmeister Johann Czerny. Hardly a suspect, but her husband had been keen to talk with the man right up to the point where he was commissioned by Prince Montenuovo. Perhaps Czerny would have some information about his old friend that could help to explicate his and Falk’s deaths.

But what to make of the mysterious stranger Falk saw talking with Herr Karl? Again, Berthe’s husband seemed to find this incident of interest, mentioning twice in his notes that he should follow up on this possible lead. Yet such a possibility went against her new theory of shared motive for the deaths of Falk and Herr Karl. If the mysterious stranger – with an awkward way of holding his cup – were the murderer, that would take matters back to the original theory: Herr Falk’s death was to keep him from talking.

She put a question mark next to this section of the notes.

And what to make of the name scrawled on a crumpled piece of paper and used as a bookmark?

‘Hermann Postling.’

This could mean anything, but once again Berthe trusted her husband’s instincts for keeping this scrap of paper found at Herr Karl’s rooms. She wondered if he had included the name in his transcription of notes he’d handed over to Drechsler and somehow doubted it. The police would surely want the original for handwriting analysis.

With such a dearth of investigative leads, Berthe decided to keep her options open with Herr Hermann Postling. Perhaps there would be a Meldezettl listing for him, a way to track the man. Could Postling and the mysterious stranger at the cafe be one and the same? It was worth a bit of time in the city archives, she decided.