Victor O'Reilly - Games of The Hangman

"You're very quiet," said Marta with a smile. She had the disconcerting ability to keep her distance while sounding intimate. "You drive from Bern and then climb a mountain to see me, and then you don't speak."

"I'm in shock," said Fitzduane. He was drinking hot Gluhwein, which seemed like the right thing to do when you were surrounded by snow but unwise when sweat was dripping off your Polaroids. "Those things remind me of helicopters" – he pointed at the ski lifts clanking past quietly about a hundred meters away – "and I don't like helicopters."

"Oh, they're quite safe," said Marta. "We are very experienced in these things here." She saw the Fitzduane's Polaroids had angled to nipple height, and she blushed faintly.

"Mmm," said Fitzduane. Apparently it was true that alcohol hit harder the higher the altitude. He went into the bar to get another Gluhwein and a scotch for Marta. Everybody was clumping along the wooden floor with the rolling gait of B-movie gunslingers. He seemed to be the only person not wearing ski boots. The five-year-old in front of him selected what looked like a beer. He shook his head. Sometimes he missed Ireland. He squeezed his way back through the gunslingers and gave Marta her drink. "Do you yodel?" he said.

"Oskar used to yodel," she said very quietly.

"I thought it was like riding a bicycle," said Fitzduane, "once learned, never forgotten." He had been looking at a particularly spectacular demonstration of skiing prowess by an adult of indeterminate sex. For a moment he had missed the change in Marta's tone of voice. The skier misjudged his approach to the chalet and slammed into the wooden railings.

" Ole! " exclaimed Fitzduane. He started to clap, and others on the veranda followed. A furious-looking mid-European face, dignity severely dented, surfaced from the snow. He shouldered his skis and clomped off toward the ski lift.

"I'm sorry," he said. "Oskar Schupbach, you mean."

"Yes." There were tears in her eyes. "Damn," she said, and wiped them away. A little troop of ski boppers went past, chattering like sparrows.

"‘The man with the face that looked as if it were carved out of solid mahogany,’" quoted Fitzduane. "Vreni told me about him, and so did Andreas. I'm going to see him while I'm here."

"You can't," said Marta. "Oskar is dead."

"He's dead? But I spoke to him only yesterday!" said Fitzduane, taken aback. "I arranged to meet him this evening in the Simmenfalle, the place beside the waterfall."

"He liked the Simmenfalle," said Marta. "He often went there for a glass of wine and a game of jass. He used to meet clients there. He was a guide, you know."

"I know."

Marta was pensive. She ran a long golden finger around the rim of her glass. She stared out at the skiers on the slopes. "He taught me to ski. He taught us all. He was part of our growing up here. Always while we were here in Lenk, there was Oskar. We skied with him, we climbed with him, in summer we walked with him. It's almost impossible to believe he's gone. Just gone."

Marta was silent, and Fitzduane waited. He remembered Vreni's talking about Oskar in much the same way. What had the man known? Being so close the von Graffenlaub family, what had he seem or surmised – and who might have been aware of his suspicions? Perhaps he was jumping to conclusions. There might be nothing irregular about the guide's death.

"How did he die?"

Marta gave a slight start as Fitzduane's question broke into her reverie. "I don't know the details. All I know is that he had gone to meet a client in Simmenfalle. The client didn't show up, and while he was walking home, he was knocked down by a car. It was a hit and run."

"Did anyone see the accident?"

"I don't think so," said Marta, "but you'd have to ask the police."

Fitzduane watched his Gluhwein getting cold. The he went inside and called the Bear. There was a pause at the other end before the Bear spoke. "I'll check with the local police," he said. "When are you seeing Felix Krane?"

"Tomorrow if I can," said Fitzduane. "I haven't managed to track him down yet."

"I'll arrange for one of the local cops to go with you," said the Bear. "It may cramp your style, but I don't like what's going on. "Where are you staying? I'll call you later."

"At the Simmenfalle."

There was another silence at the end of the line. Then the Bear sighed. "Don't go for any midnight walks," he said, "and keep your back to the wall."

"And don't talk to strangers," said Fitzduane.

"That's not so funny."

"No, it isn't."

The canton policeman was a good-humored sergeant named Franze, with a tanned round face setting off an impressively red nose. He had the work-roughened hands of a farmer, which, indeed, he was in his off-duty hours. He arrived in a Volkswagen Beetle, a near-twin of the antique that had transported Fitzduane to the Swiss Army base at Sand. It wheezed to a halt in front of the Simmenfalle as Fitzduane was finishing breakfast. The Irishman ordered an extra cup of coffee and, upon further reflection, a schnapps. The gesture was not unappreciated. Franze talked freely. Since Kilmara's visit, Fitzduane had official status, and the sergeant treated him as a policeman.

It transpired that Oskar Schupbach had been related to Sergeant Franze. Talking about Oskar's death visibly depressed the good sergeant, and Fitzduane ordered him another schnapps for purely medicinal reasons. It crossed Fitzduane's mind that breakfasts with Swiss police sergeants were beginning to fall into a pattern.

"Oskar," said Sergeant Franze, his good humor resurrected by the second schnapps, "was a fine man. I wish you could have met him."

"So do I," said Fitzduane. He was annoyed at himself for to having come to Lenk sooner. "But accidents will happen."

"It was no accident," said Franze angrily, "unless you can be accidentally run over twice by the same car."

On the short drive to Lenk and the cheese maker's where Felix Krane was working, they passed the spot where Oskar Schupbach had been killed. Sand had been sprinkled over the bloodstains, and Franze crossed himself as he pointed out the spot where the guide had died. Fitzduane felt cold and grim and had a premonition of worse things to come. Then the mood passed, and he thought about the making of cheese.

Fitzduane was fond of good cheese and regarded the master cheese maker's business with more than passing interest. A compact but expensively equipped shop in front – featuring a lavish array of mostly Swiss cheeses, each one shown off by a miniature banner featuring the coat of arms of the region of origin – led through to a miniature factory in the rear. Stainless steel vats and electronic monitoring equipment contrasted with a young apprentice's portioning butter by hand, using wooden paddles shaped like rectangular Ping Pong paddles. Each cheese was hand-stamped with the master cheese maker's mark.

The master cheese maker was a big, burly man with a luxuriant mustache to set off his smile. He was tieless, his shirtsleeves were rolled up, and he wore a long, white, crisply starched apron. Fitzduane thought he would do nicely in a barbershop quartet. Sergeant Franze spoke to him briefly, and then he turned to Fitzduane. "His name is Hans Muller," he said. He introduced Fitzduane. Muller beamed when he heard his name mentioned and pumped Fitzduane's arm vigorously. To judge by the size of the cheese maker's muscles, he had served his apprenticeship churning butter by hand.

"I have told him you are a friend of Oskar's," said Franze – Muller's face went solemn – "and that you want to see Felix Krane on a private matter."

"Is Krane here?" asked Fitzduane, looking around.

"No," said Franze, "he no longer works here regularly but does odd jobs. Now he is in the maturing store just outside of town. It's a cave excavated into the mountainside. Without any artificial air-conditioning, it keeps the cheese at exactly the right temperature and humidity. Krane turns the cheeses, among other jobs he does there."