Robert Goddard - Found Wanting

Eusden synthesized a smile. ‘Mr Stammati, this is Regina Celeste.’

‘Pleased to meet you, I’m sure,’ trilled Regina, extending a hand.

Stammati’s Italian genes belatedly kicked in. He rose and clasped her hand in both of his. ‘ Buonasera, signora.’

‘Which part of Italy are you from, Mr Stammati?’ Regina asked as they settled at his table.

‘The Swiss part, signora.’

‘Oh, really?’

‘How, may I ask, do you know Brad?’

‘Who’s Brad?’

‘A mutual acquaintance,’ Eusden cut in. ‘Why don’t we look at what we’ve got?’

‘This is an exciting moment for me, Mr Stammati,’ Regina enthused, opening her handbag and pulling out a square brown board-backed envelope.

‘Please, signora , call me Bruno.’ The southern belle was evidently chiming with him. ‘Two sets of fingerprints require matching, I believe.’

‘Oh, they match, Bruno. You can rely on that.’ She opened the envelope and slid the contents out on to the table: two record cards, yellowing at the edges, one headed RECHTE HAND and the other LINKE HAND. There were squares filled with the prints of each finger and thumb and a larger square below where the palm and fingers had been pressed down together.

Stammati peered at the details typed at the base of the cards. ‘Prints of a Frau Tschaikovsky, taken in Hanover, ninth July 1938. A long time ago. Is this lady still living?’

‘Sadly, no. She passed away more than twenty years ago. But we’re about to restore her to life in a sense, aren’t we, Richard?’

‘Richard?’ Stammati frowned suspiciously at Eusden. ‘I thought your name was Marty.’

‘Marty’s a nickname,’ said Eusden, pressing his knee against Regina’s under the table.

‘And a silly one too,’ Regina laughed, casting him an intrigued sidelong glance. ‘I never use it.’

‘The other set of prints,’ Eusden hurried on, taking the sheet of paper out of the double-headed-eagle envelope and placing it next to the two cards.

Stammati looked at it closely. ‘Fourth of August 1909,’ he murmured. ‘Even longer ago.’

‘When she was a child.’ Regina’s tone suggested she had a vision of the child in her mind’s eye as she spoke.

‘That does not matter,’ said Stammati, his gaze switching from the sheet of paper to the cards and back again. ‘The prints acquire their uniqueness in the womb. They never change.’

‘Is that so?’

‘Yes. It is. Now…’ Stammati glanced reproachfully at the ceiling. ‘The light is not good. Tuttavia …’ He opened the briefcase that appeared to be his only luggage and removed a small leather pouch, from which he slid a magnifying glass. He squinted through it at the fingerprints and a couple of minutes slowly elapsed. Then he sighed and laid the magnifying glass down on the table. ‘Who is A.N., may I ask?’

‘They’re Frau Tschaikovsky’s maiden initials,’ Regina replied.

‘I think not, signora.’

‘What do you mean by that?’

‘I mean that these are not matching prints. A full ridge count is unnecessary. One set is looped, the other whorled. They are, obviously and undoubtedly, the fingerprints of two different people.’

Regina had been forced to accept Stammati’s verdict after examining the contrasting loops and whorls of the two sets of prints through his magnifying glass for herself. Eusden needed less convincing. Even to his naked eye the differences were clear once they had been pointed out to him. He replaced the sheet of paper in the envelope and put it back in his pocket while Stammati made further futile efforts to contact Brad by phone and Regina sat staring into space with an expression of undisguised stupefaction on her face.

‘I am sorry if I have disappointed you, signora ,’ said Stammati, when he had given up again. ‘I assure you I also am disappointed to travel so far for so little.’ He glared at Eusden. ‘Since no one is able or willing to explain this… fiasco…I shall check into whatever the Finns have supplied in the way of an airport hotel after booking a seat on the first flight back to Zürich tomorrow morning.’ He closed his briefcase and rose to his feet with a grunt. ‘ Buonanotte to you both.’

‘How in the name of sweet reason can this be?’ Regina asked after Stammati had bustled off.

‘Anna Anderson wasn’t Anastasia,’ Eusden listlessly replied. ‘It’s as simple as that.’

‘But she was. I know she was.’

‘The fingerprints say otherwise.’

‘There’s got to be some mistake.’

That was a considerable understatement. If Anastasia’s survival of the Ekaterinburg massacre was not part of Tolmar Aksden’s secret, then what had Hakon Nydahl’s letters been about? And why had Clem stored Anastasia’s fingerprints with them? Marty must have discovered the envelope when he first examined the attaché case. Otherwise how could Straub have known it contained prints that could be compared with the Hanover set? Why had Marty never told Eusden about them? Why had he kept the secret back? What game had he really been playing when death interrupted him? Eusden’s thoughts reeled as the unanswered questions swirled in his mind.

‘We’re both tired, I guess,’ Regina continued. ‘I need to think this through when I’m properly rested. You look bushed yourself.’

‘That I am.’

‘Let’s get out of this place. Where are you staying?’

‘The Grand Marina.’

‘I booked myself into the Kämp. They tell me it’s Helsinki’s finest. And I need all the comfort I can get after the day I’ve had. Shall we share a taxi? You promised me a full explanation of how you came by those fingerprints, remember. Well, you can deliver over a drink in the hotel bar.’

Regina was silent for the first mile or so of the taxi ride, immersed in her own dejected thoughts. Then, suddenly, she declared, ‘I believe I’ve seen through it,’ and grasped Eusden’s forearm. ‘They aren’t Anastasia’s fingerprints, Richard. Don’t you see? Grenscher tricked me.’

‘I’m not sure I do see,’ Eusden responded wearily.

‘Werner must have guessed I’d try to deal direct with Grenscher and primed the grotesque little man to sell me a forgery. It was the date that convinced me the record cards were genuine. July ninth 1938 was the day Anastasia was summoned to police headquarters in Hanover to meet the brother and sisters of Franziska Schanzkowska. Typically, they disagreed among themselves about whether she might be their missing sister. But it’s still much the likeliest occasion for the police to have fingerprinted her.’

‘Are you saying you doubt now they ever did?’

‘No. I’m saying Grenscher still has the real record cards. He denied receiving a deposit from Werner, you know. A deposit I paid. But the more I think about it the more certain I become he had been paid. It’s just that sending me off with a smile on my face and a set of fake prints in my purse is what he’d been paid to do.’

‘Well, I suppose-’

‘But Werner’s slipped on his own trail of slime, hasn’t he? Because now we have the 1909 record. Which means he’s going to have to do business with us whether he likes it or not. And I can personally assure you that the first item in our negotiations will be reimbursement of the substantial sum of money I paid over to his counterfeiting co-conspirator in Hanover. With interest – at a punitive rate.’

Regina had convinced herself Anna Anderson’s fingerprints did not match Anastasia’s because they were not her fingerprints. Eusden remained sceptical, though he did not bother saying so. He believed Straub had used Regina’s deposit to bribe Marty. Grenscher, grotesque or not, was probably a genuine dealer. The fingerprints were a dead end.