Wolf Haas - Eternal Life

“Hold on a sec.”

This was on account of him having two other customers to serve. In front of Andi at the sausage stand were Brenner and the handless old Frau. And Brenner was in shock now, because from a distance, he’d guessed Andi to be forty, if not fifty, and he was just now seeing that he was at most seventeen or eighteen years old.

Andi the Fox had on his red overalls from the gas station like he always did. On the bib Brenner recognized the outline of a Shell seashell that must’ve once been sewed on there, but now the fabric was just a shade darker in that spot, not as washed-out as it was all around it. Like an old man standing there, Brenner thought, but then it was the exact opposite once Andi started talking.

“Hold on a sec, hold on a sec, so I should just, a second, huh, that’s what I should do, huh, hold on?” the Haggl was so giddy talking to the kiosk owner with his high-pitched croak of a voice that you’d have thought his voice hadn’t changed yet-practically a eunuch. And at the same time, he was looking at Brenner anxiously, like, Is he maybe on my side, will he laugh at my jokes? But Andi didn’t give him any time for all that, because practically in the same breath he was already saying something else again:

“You sure got it figured out, Detective.”

Brenner had never tried to somehow make a secret out of it or anything. It’s always been an old rift, undercover detective or more of an official-well, dis- and advantages, there’s always been people from both camps. Trade rags for cops, trade rags for detectives, whatever else there is, it’s been discussed again and again.

It always reminded Brenner of his first two years on the force. Because he was still on the traffic patrol back then. And it was constantly getting discussed, what’s better: secret radar surveillance, or blatant warning: Caution, Radar. Taken together, what scared the speedsters off more.

In his case, though, it’d been clear from the start, I mean, undercover or not undercover. The Zellers already knew him from the police, so, undercover, that wouldn’t have worked anyway. And oftentimes, it’s no disadvantage at all when people start making themselves important like Andi the Fox was doing right now.

“I said, you sure got it figured out, Detective. Because everybody’s a crook. Don’t have to go looking for very long down here, crooks, all of ’em. Gschwentner. Vergolder. Millionaire, but never tips a penny. Clean the windshield, sure, tip, no. Check the coolant, yes please, tip, no thanks, have a look at the air pressure, Andi, tip, sorry no, Herr Crook. No time, Herr Millionaire. Gotta work the nightshift, lifting the Ameri-can’ts.”

Andi sure liked that, what he’d just come up with in his rage, so much so that he turned around now and yelled over to Vergolder Antretter:

“Lifting the American’ts, Mister Antretter. Want your regening ?”

But Vergolder didn’t react at all. And the others didn’t laugh, either, because they didn’t dare laugh in front of Vergolder.

“Get it, Detective? Regening ? In Dutch it means: Do you want your check? Holland’s the best country for tips. Vienna’s good, too. What’s with you, Detective? What, no beer? When are you finally gonna catch the crook?”

Brenner bought a sausage on a bun and then asked Andi, after he had taken a bite, in other words, with his mouth full:

“Who should I arrest then? Gschwentner or Vergolder?”

“Nah, Detective, you’d better not arrest anybody, how stupid do you really think I am?”

Brenner had this unusual habit. He was one of those people who-okay, when they’re eating a sausage on a bun, they only unwrap the paper-wrapper halfway. Because on the end where there’s still paper on it, that’s where they hold the bun. Frankly, I’ve never gotten my fingers dirty from a bun, but please!

As he was unwrapping his sausage halfway, he noticed that Gruntner, in his early retirement, had had his name printed on the napkins. Gruntner used to work for the train, as a shunter, and it shaved his left leg off, so now he’s retired and still works a little at the kiosk.

He makes a good sausage on a bun, Brenner was thinking when he heard Andi say:

“Should I tell you who put those two Americans in the lift?”

But Brenner just wanted to eat his sausage in peace now and gave Andi no reply. He just looked through Andi, straight through to the curling practically. But Andi wouldn’t give it a rest:

“There are only two in question. Either Gschwentner or Vergolder.”

“This is the second time you’ve said that now,” Brenner says, without looking away from the curling.

“The preacher don’t preach twice,” Andi says.

“So be it.”

“But I’m no preacher. I’m a gas station attendant. And only a gas station attendant can know what I know.”

“What do you know, then?” Brenner asks now, but he’s still watching the curling. But that was just what it seemed like. Because out of the corner of his eye, he’s observing how the handless Frau drinks her beer.

She simply wedges the beer glass between her forearm-stumps, and that’s how she drinks, but not what you’re thinking, cautiously, or, as far as I’m concerned, unappetizingly. No, just like you’d have thought, perfectly normal for a person to drink like that. And smoked, too, at the same time. Because she was a smoker, and not just a few. Practically with her wrists. And interesting. This was the first time in months that Brenner was tempted to smoke again, too.

Brenner realized now that this couldn’t be the first time that the woman had come here. Without asking any questions, Gruntner Schorsch placed a second empty beer glass on this wooden ledge that went around the kiosk. And on top of the empty beer glass he put an ashtray, and so the handless Frau was able to set her cigarette down right from her mouth without any problem. Needless to say, couldn’t have been any easier.

It struck Brenner as being somewhat strange now, the one only had one leg, the other no hands, but that’s the way it was.

“I know there are only two people in all of Zell that come into question with a crime like this,” Andi just wouldn’t let up and was wagging his finger in front of Brenner’s face now like a know-it-all.

“Vergolder and Gschwentner,” Brenner answered.

“That’s exactly right,” Andi the Fox said, praising him, “but why?”

“Yeah, exactly. Why exactly?”

“Because out of everybody in Zell, the two of them are the only ones that have never given a single schilling’s tip.”

But at that moment, the handless Frau turned to Andi. And that really took Brenner by surprise now. That the two of them knew each other.

“Lorenz is getting out today,” she says.

“Out today, back in tomorrow,” Andi says.

“I’m picking him up,” Handless says.

“The ambulance picks him up. Then we pick him up. Then they pick him back up. Then we pick him back up, then-”

“Are you with me?” Handless says, because this blabber of Andi’s, well, she wasn’t having it one bit.

“Do you mean, do I understand what you’re saying, or am I going where you’re driving to: nuthouse!”

Handless had these thick glasses, the type that was fashionable in the seventies. And thick glasses like that, well, you don’t see much of her face. Just her eyes, and those were twice as big as normal, because she must’ve been horribly farsighted.

With these enormous eyes of hers, she looks at Brenner now and asks him if maybe he’d like to come along. She says:

“I have to pick up my friend Lorenz Antretter from the hospital. He’s being released today.”

Now, Lorenz, that’s Vergolder’s nephew. And it was Lorenz, too, who’d provided Vergolder with his alibi for the night of the murder. Brenner tried to hide his surprise, though.