Elizabeth Peters - Trojan Gold

Tony had not had the pleasure of meeting Caesar. He dropped the telephone and went over the couch in a vault that would have done credit to an Olympic athlete. Of course that attracted Caesar’s attention—he loves people to play with him—and a chaotic interval ensued, until I could pry the dog from Tony.

When the dust settled, Tony and Schmidt were sitting on the floor with Caesar between them, and Schmidt was explaining that Caesar was just a big lovable pussycat who happened to be in the body of a Doberman. Caesar was slobbering on both of them, alternately and impartially. I saw no reason to join in, so I sat down and drank my beer.

John had taken advantage of the brouhaha to escape, but not, as I hoped (or feared) out of the house. Before long, he came tripping down the stairs, fully attired. He was wearing the same thing he had worn the night before; I deduced as much, since he had not been carrying a suitcase, but I must admit it was the first time I had actually seen the ensemble. Black, all of it, from his track shoes to the cap he was carrying in his hand. I had expected he would bid us a fond farewell, since he was clearly dressed for the street; instead, he parked himself in the most comfortable chair and proceeded to be charming.

I sat there morosely drinking beer and wondering what the hell John was up to. Oh, I knew part of the performance was designed to calm Tony and persuade him to do what John wanted him to do, i.e., spend the night at the house. He succeeded in the former aim; I saw Tony’s frown smooth out, to be replaced by a pseudo-tolerant smile as he studied John’s graceful gestures and winning smiles and deceptively slender build. I thought John was overdoing it a bit when he started calling Tony “duckie” and patting him on the arm—John’s great weakness is a tendency to get carried away by a role—but Tony has the usual prejudices against well-groomed men who bat their eyelashes at him.

That wasn’t John’s only reason for hanging around. He was waiting for something, I could tell. When the telephone rang, he stiffened perceptibly. At least it was perceptible to me; I don’t think the others noticed.

She apologized rather perfunctorily for disturbing me, and then, as was her habit, got straight to the point. “I heard of your accident. I am so distressed it should happen. I telephoned you this morning but you did not answer—”

“I was here all morning,” I began—then I saw the corner of John’s mouth twitch, and I shut up. The telephone had rung; one of us—I think it was John—had reached out and taken it off the hook. Apparently he had put it back after I left.

“I am calling to ask for your help,” Friedl went on. “I know my husband meant to do so. But I did not realize before that the matter was so serious. Now you are in danger too. It is a matter of life and death.”

“Oh, really?” I couldn’t think what else to say, not only because of the listening ears, but because she gave the impression of someone reciting memorized lines, not quite in order.

“You take it lightly,” Friedl said, sounding more like her sullen self. “I tell you, they want to kill you!”

“Who?”

She went back to the prepared script. “I cannot say more over the telephone. I too am in danger. You must come—here—to the hotel. Bring a friend if you like, someone who can help us. Will you come? Tomorrow?”

“Well…all right.”

In a sudden switch from the melodramatic to the brisk, she thanked me and hung up. I turned to find three pairs of eyes focused on me.

“Who was it?” Schmidt asked.

“None of your business, Schmidt. How about another beer?”

He was agreeable. I picked up the tray and went to the kitchen. John was right on my heels.

“How did you know?” I demanded.

“Was that her?”

“She. How did—”

“Pedant,” John said. “Well, I expected something of the sort; didn’t you?”

“No,” I admitted. “She’s invited me to be her guest at the hotel—dire hints of disasters past and present. Apparently she’s decided to come clean; she admitted her husband had intended to write to me. Maybe I was wrong about her. She had no reason to trust me, walking in off the street the way I did.”

“If you believe that, you are as innocent as a new-laid egg.”

“You think it’s a trap?”

“Could be.” John did not appear particularly perturbed by the idea. “However, in my considered opinion, it seems more likely that they have decided to pick your brains instead of your bones.”

“You have such a poetic way of putting things.”

“In words of one syllable, then— they don’t know where it is . Or, ‘is at,’ as you Americans say. Having searched in vain, they have concluded—somewhat tardily, I agree—that you may succeed where they have failed.”

“I still don’t see—”

“You’ve had a great deal on your mind lately,” John said kindly. “Think. Why would Friedl go to such lengths to lure you to Bad Steinbach when she can murder you just as easily and far more safely, in Munich?”

“Cheerful thought. If they want to pick my brains, why did they try to kill me yesterday?”

“Because they’re a bunch of bloody amateurs,” said John, with professional disdain. “They had been half-expecting, half-dreading your arrival; when you turned up out of the blue, they didn’t know what to do. Someone—probably Freddy the Mindless and Muscle-Bound—acted on impulse. He’s the sort of chap whose natural impulses would be lethal. Later on Friedl got in touch with the Mastermind, who pointed out a more responsible course of action. I trust you realize what that implies? It takes her some time to reach the man in charge. He isn’t on the spot.”

“If you mean Tony…I don’t believe it.”

John’s demonic eyebrow soared skyward. “Of course you know him so much better than I, don’t you?”

My nice neat living room looked like the scene of an all-night binge. It stank of beer—Caesar had knocked a glass over—and the place was littered with empty bottles and glasses, the ashes of Schmidt’s horrible cigars, and the scraps of a bowl of pretzels. Schmidt had turned sentimental, as he usually does after three or four beers, and was looking at my photograph albums. He and Tony had their heads together over the Rothenburg mementos and were giggling as they recalled their encounters with the ghost of the Schloss .

“Yes, she married,” Schmidt said with a sigh; he was talking about Ilse, Countess Drachenstein, who had figured prominently in the case. “A fine young fellow—he was a chemist in Rothenburg. I attended the wedding. I wore my white linen suit I bought in Rome—”

“Chemist?” Tony echoed. “Not the same guy we rousted out of bed in the small hours?”

“The same,” I said.

John listened with bright-eyed interest. “Speaking of chemists,” he began, and went on to tell an outrageous story about an art forgery that had made headlines a few years earlier. The part of the story he told had not been in the newspapers. “And,” he ended, “it turned out he had latent diabetes; it was the sugar that did that trick.”

Schmidt laughed so hard he turned purple. Tony laughed too, but he was still suspicious. “You seem to know quite a lot about detecting forgeries, Sir John.”

John lowered his eyes modestly. “I’m just a dilettante, Professor. Jack-of-all-trades, master of none, as they say. As a matter of fact, I became interested because we had a slight problem with one of the family portraits—a Romney…. But that’s another story. It’s getting late. Shall we go, Herr Direktor?”

“Yes, yes.” Schmidt chug-a-lugged his beer and bounced to his feet. “Where is my coat? Did I have a briefcase?”