Trojan Gold (27 page)

“Not ‘set fire,'” I said automatically. “Oh, never mind. I don't have a clue, Schmidt. I will come clean with you, though. I think Friedl may be having second thoughts. She's wound tighter than
one of Dieter's trick snakes. It's barely possible that, properly persuaded, she will break down and talk to me. Me,” I added, clutching Schmidt's collar as he started to rise. “Confidences of that sort are best induced on a one-to-one basis.”

“Why not me to her?” Schmidt asked hopefully.

“I think Tony to her would be more effective,” I said. “But give me a crack at her first, okay?”

They agreed. Then Schmidt said, “Can I have my gun back?”

“No.”

“Humph.” He glanced at his watch. “Ha. It is time for
Mittagessen
.”

“Schmidt, you just ate a huge breakfast,” Tony protested.

“But it is now almost
Mittag
. Come, I will take you both to lunch. Then…Then what shall we do?”

“You guys can do anything you like,” I said agreeably. “I'm going to Garmisch. I have to do my Christmas shopping.”

“Christmas shopping!” Tony was incredulous.

“This is Christmas Eve,” I reminded him.

“Ha, yes,” Schmidt said eagerly. “And tonight we have the roast goose and the presents and the Christmas tree…. I will find a tree, a little one, and we will put the ornaments on it—”

“I thought you were going to your sister's.”

“I will call and tell her I am dying,” said Schmidt. “I would rather be with you, Vicky.”

“Me, too, Schmidt.” I smiled at him. “And I'd rather be here than trying to explain to the Munich police why there's a dead man in my garden.”

“So that is why you stay,” said Schmidt.

“It's a good reason. What do you want for Christmas, Schmidt?”

 

I figured it was safe to leave Schmidt unattended. After lunch he would have a nice long nap, and then his shopping would keep him busy for the rest of the afternoon. Tony asked to go with me, expecting, I'm sure, that I would fob him off with some excuse or other. He was disarmed, poor innocent, when I said it was fine with me. “But you'll have to go off on your own part of the time,” I warned him. “I'm not going to buy you a present with you looking over my shoulder.”

Tony smiled shyly.

As soon as I'd gotten rid of him, I went to the magic shop Dieter had mentioned. They had what I wanted; I also bought Schmidt a lightbulb nose like Dieter's and a few other props. After that, I let myself go; what the hell, it was Christmas Eve. When I got back to the car, loaded with parcels and wrapping paper, Tony was waiting for me.

“You really did go shopping,” he said in surprise.

“You must stop doubting me, Tony. I told you I wanted to get something for you. Here it is…. No, no fair peeking.”

It was a sweater, made in Taiwan. I had the tag all made out: “From Ann, your imaginary fiancée in the Far East.”

Tony had packages of his own; he showed me what he had bought for Schmidt while we drove
back. It was getting dark. Clouds shrouded the sky and hung low over the mountains. The lights of Christmas trees and candles, placed in the windows of every house to honor the Child, defied storm and darkness. The radio was playing carols, and even the voice of the announcer predicting heavy snow in southern Germany didn't spoil my mood. Damn it, I thought, I'm going to have a happy Christmas Eve. I'll forget about poor frozen Freddy and all the rest of it for a few hours. Caesar would be having the time of his life with Carl, feasting on goose and pudding and anything else his canine heart desired. He would then be violently sick—on Carl's floor, not mine. And John would be—where? Probably freezing his butt in the snow while he spied on me or on someone equally harmless. Serve him right. That cynical creature was as far removed from the gentle kindliness of Christmas as the pagan deities the priest had exorcised.

 

For the first time that year, and under rather inauspicious circumstances, I found I had some genuine Christmas spirit. Tony and I parted at our respective doors after agreeing we would meet in an hour for the start of the festivities. He promised he'd keep Schmidt out of my way until I had finished wrapping my presents, and I promised I wouldn't peek through his keyhole or otherwise cheat until he called to tell me he and Schmidt were ready.

Humming unmelodiously but cheerfully, I spread my purchases out on the bed—including a box of chocolates, Vicky's present to Vicky. The bright wrappings and colored ribbons, an American contribution to old-fashioned German customs, looked pretty and festive. I had even remembered to buy a small pair of scissors and some tape.

Dusk deepened into darkness twinkling with lights. Far away in the distance, muted by the closed window, I could hear the sound of a radio or tape playing Christmas carols. I thought of poor Clara, locked in the dark house all alone. Perhaps I ought to get her and let her share the goose. One of the neighbors must have a key. And if I did happen to run into John…Nobody should be alone on Christmas Eve. I might even ask him to join us. Schmidt would be tickled pink to have him. Tony would be furious…. It would be an interesting combination—a real witches' brew of personalities. Not such a good idea, after all. Besides, it was unlikely I would see him.

I was busily wrapping packages when the telephone rang. Expecting Tony, I didn't recognize the voice at first, or understand what it was trying to say. Then the hoarse, rattling sounds shaped themselves into words. “Please—come—help me….”

“Friedl?” I exclaimed. “Is that you? What's wrong?”

“Yes…come, please….” There was a muffled thud, as if the telephone had dropped from her hand, and after that nothing but silence.

I dropped my own phone and bolted for the door. No time to tell Tony—no time to do anything
except get to her, as fast as I could. God, she had sounded as if she were being strangled, even while she was trying to speak to me.

The lobby was full of holiday celebrants, gathered around the tree in the center. The bar had spilled out into the lobby, and people were raising glasses, singing, and laughing. By contrast the private corridor was ominously quiet. Not a soul was visible, not a whisper came from Friedl's apartment. The door to her sitting room was ajar. I eased it open.

Tony was bent over the couch—over something lying on the couch. Hearing me enter, he straightened and turned around. Great drops of perspiration beaded on his forehead, and his face was a horrible gray-green. But it wasn't as bad as the face of the woman on the couch. I recognized her by her frizzy blond hair and by her clothing.

“She's dead,” Tony said.

I touched Friedl's wrist, searching for a pulse—a futile gesture, but one I felt I had to make. “She's dead, all right. It must have happened within the past few minutes.”

“I didn't do it,” Tony said. “She was on the floor—”

“You picked her up? Oh, Tony!”

“I didn't think.” Tony raised one hand to his forehead. “She called me—asked me to come down here on the double—sounded absolutely frantic, I hardly recognized her voice. You believe me, don't you?”

“I believe you.” My response was automatic. As I stared down at the swollen cyanotic face, I was
remembering what John had said earlier that day. “If he ever finds out where it is…”

It would seem that he had found out.

And so had I. I could only marvel that it had taken me so long.

A
CLICKING SOUND, LIKE CASTANETS
, made me start. It was Tony's teeth. Poor baby, he wasn't accustomed to death in such an unattractive form.

Well, neither was I. They say one's mind works with unnatural quickness in times of crisis. Mine doesn't always oblige in that way, but I knew we were in deep trouble. Not that there was any danger of Tony's being convicted for Friedl's murder; he hadn't done it and they couldn't prove he had. This was a delaying tactic, and it was more than likely…

“Get out of here,” I ordered. “Quick, run.”

I followed my own advice, but Tony just stood there, frozen with shock. Before I could return to him and remove him forcibly, there was a crash of crockery and ringing metal. Instinctively I ducked behind the open door. One of the waitresses stood in the doorway. She hadn't seen me; her bulging eyes were fixed on Friedl's hideous face. The tray had fallen from her hands.

The sight of her distress jolted Tony out of his. He took a step toward her. She screamed and fled. She went on screaming all the way down the hall.

“No, wait,” I gabbled, grabbing at Tony as he stumped toward the door. “It's too late. This is what he wants….”

I could see the scheme in its entirety. I should have known the person who had set Tony up wouldn't neglect to provide a witness. Running away now would be the worst thing Tony could do. Not only would it be taken as an admission of guilt, but if he was a fugitive, pursued by the police, one well-placed shot would give the authorities their murderer—dead and unable to defend himself. The safest place for Tony now was the slammer.

There was no time to explain. Already I could hear running footsteps and cries of alarm. I held on to Tony. “Wait, no time,” I insisted. “Wait.”

He didn't struggle. All his natural, law-abiding instincts demanded that he stand like a man and face the music.

What I did was a dirty, low-down trick, but I had no choice. The crowd surged in—guests, waiters, busboys—all shouting in horror and distress—and surrounded Tony and the corpse. His poor white bewildered face was the last thing I saw as I slid quietly out the door.

I had to risk going to my room. I met no one on the stairs or in the hall, but when I opened the door, I saw Clara lying on my bed in a welter of tangled ribbon and shredded wrapping paper.

“Dammit,” I exclaimed. “How did you get in
here? You're not supposed to eat ribbons; they can block your intestines.”

Clara raised her head. A curl of scarlet ribbon dangled from her mouth like an outré mustache, and it seemed to me that there was a distinctly critical look in her eyes.

“Right,” I muttered. “Right. No time…” I snatched up my jacket and backpack and ran out.

How had she gotten into my room? The window was closed. John had locked her in the shop….

As I trotted through the lobby, I heard Schmidt's well-known voice in the distance. He'd keep an eye on Tony. I wished I could have had him arrested, too. But the danger was not in the hotel, I was sure of that; it was heading up the mountain, to the same place I was going.

The twinkling Christmas lights and warmly lit windows of the houses I passed were poignant reminders of a misspent life. If I had settled down to domesticity, I'd be in just such a pleasant cottage, baking cookies and patting the dog and kissing the kiddies, instead of skidding along icy roads under a sky dark as death, on my way to a rendezvous with a murderer.

The traffic was surprisingly light. Not so surprising, actually; it was Christmas Eve, sensible people were safe at home. I swore—at myself—and swerved to avoid some idiot who was standing in the middle of the road waving his arms. As I turned sharply into the narrow track leading up the mountain, it occurred to me that the idiot had been wearing a uniform of some kind.

The wheels hit a stretch of ice and the car went into a skid. Despite the cold, I was sweating when
I pulled out of it, and I forced myself to let up on the gas. There was no hurry. He couldn't be more than fifteen minutes ahead of me, half an hour at the most. And what he had to do would take a long time, even if he had thought to bring the proper equipment. Needless to say, I had not. It wasn't the gold I was after, it was the man. Not that I had the slightest idea of what I was going to do if I found him.

With a sharp stab of relief I remembered that Schmidt's gun was in my backpack. Good old Schmidt.

The road was bad. I had to concentrate on keeping a steady pace, fast enough so the car wouldn't stall on the slope, slow enough so I could handle the frequent skids. Only my own headlights broke the darkness ahead of me. I must have gone half the distance before a flash of light in my rearview mirror betrayed the presence of a following vehicle.

Could I be ahead of him? Certainly I could. My foot had started for the brake; the car wove wildly when I returned it to the gas, a little too emphatically. It made no sense to stop; if I did, I'd never get started again, and there was no place to turn until I reached the cemetery. Perhaps it was the law behind me—the cop I had narrowly missed. Such dedication over a simple traffic violation? I sincerely hoped so, but I wasn't counting on it.

I had to keep both hands tight on the wheel, but how my fingers itched for that lovely gun. Time enough for that later, I told myself, and set my mind to considering alternative strategies. Or was it tactics? I can never remember which is which. Any attempt at innocent coincidence—“Fancy
meeting you here”—was O-U-T, out. There was only one reason why anyone, including me, would visit the abandoned churchyard on such a night—and it wasn't the desire for a quiet spin in the country. No, it would be a direct, honest confrontation for once, no pretense, no kidding around. I would have to get him—or her—before whoever it was got me.

I think if I had known who it was, I wouldn't have been so nervous. Dieter or Jan or Elise? I wasn't afraid of any of them, or of any hypothetical third party. I was afraid of the unknown. And of the possibility that it might be someone I did know but had not wanted to suspect.

The following headlights behind me alternately shone out and vanished, as I swung around the tight upward curves. The car wasn't making any attempt to catch up; it stayed at the same discreet distance. So, I thought, not the police. No flashing lights, no siren.

Intent on the car behind me, I almost passed the cemetery. My turn was too sharp and too fast; the Audi slid sideways into a high snowbank, and the engine died.

I had closed my eyes involuntarily. When I opened them, I saw nothing but snow. Mercifully, my door was still clear. I fought my way out, pausing only long enough to snatch my backpack and turn out the lights.

There was no moon to shine on the breast of the new-fallen snow, but the pale surface was lighter than the sky. The desolate church loomed like a crouching dinosaur, its tower the stiff, raised head. I floundered through the drifts, leaving a trail a
blind man could follow. Maybe abandoning the car had not been such a great idea after all. But the prospect of being trapped inside, with the opposite door blocked, was even more unpleasant.

The night blossomed with light. I fell face down, burrowing into the snow.

After a while I realized the light was gone. The car had passed by. It hadn't turned into the churchyard; I would have heard the engine cut off.

I got slowly to my feet and brushed the snow from my face, and listened. The night was not silent. The wind blew shrill from the east, wailing under the eaves of the church and rattling the branches of the trees. It made a lonely howling in the night, like the poor demons of paganism, cast into outer darkness and bewailing their banishment from the throne of light.

As I stood there slowly congealing, I faced the unpleasant truth. I had panicked. I do that sometimes; what the hell, I'm not Superwoman. While I was thinking patronizingly about poor old Tony's inability to react quickly in a crisis, I was reacting too quickly, mounting my horse and riding off in all directions. I should have tried to find help. Though whether I would have succeeded, on Christmas Eve, with a new-laid murder preoccupying the small police force, was open to question.

Either I was all alone in the cemetery, or the other denizens of the region were singularly silent types…. Obviously nobody had arrived on the scene before me. There was no sign of activity near the lonely grave. It would require a blowtorch or a long-burning fire to soften the frozen earth before anyone could begin digging. The driver of the car
that had been following me must have been an innocent local, homeward bound to his cottage on the other side of the mountain.

Obviously I couldn't spend the night squatting on Frau Hoffman's grave, waiting for the unknown to turn up. I could freeze to death before that happened, if it ever did. I decided I had better get back to the car. In the enthusiasm of new-car ownership I had stocked the trunk with a variety of suggested emergency equipment. Some of it might even be there. The blanket was kaput; I had used it to cover the seat one day when I took Caesar to the vet, and he had eaten most of it. But if memory served, I still had a small folding shovel and a few other odds and ends. If I couldn't dig the car out and get it back on the road, I might at least survive until morning.

It was at that point in my cool, deliberate reasoning that I heard something that was not the wind moaning in the branches. The wind wouldn't call my name.

The voice came behind me—between me and the car. Did I panic? Of course I did. I started forward, my progress agonizingly slowed by the depth of the snow. Get behind something—that was my only thought. A snowbank, a wall—how about a tombstone? Plenty of them around.

“Vicky!” Unmistakably my name, though the wind snatched the syllables and played with them. High-pitched and distorted by emotion, it could have been the voice of a man or a woman.

I reached an area where the snow was slightly less deep—only about to my knees. The black square framed in whiteness was Hoffman's tomb
stone. The snow lay deep and untouched over the graves. One of my wreaths had toppled forward, only a black half-circle showed, partially veiled by the drifting snow.

I could hear him now, thrashing after me. I reached into my bag and found the gun. My hands were stiff with cold, despite my gloves. I realized I'd have to remove one of them to get my finger around the trigger.

“Vicky!” Then, at last, I knew the voice.

He was a dark featureless shadow against the paler blanket of snow, but I would have known that shape anywhere. His voice was rough and uneven, barely recognizable. “What the hell are you doing? It's thirty degrees below freezing; are you trying to turn yourself into an icecube?”

I said, “Friedl is dead. Murdered. Strangled.”

“Ah.” His breath formed a ghostly plume against the darkness. After a moment he said, “It's here. I should have known. The bulb.”

“The wrong time of year, you said.” My lips were numb with cold. “Bulbs are planted in the fall, before the ground freezes. I expect he put the chrysanthemums in at the same time. Even if anyone noticed, in this remote place, the signs of digging would be explained.”

“And what more appropriate spot than the grave of his Helen,” John murmured.

Had he read Hoffman's love letters? Not necessarily. His quick, intuitive mind was capable of appreciating the poetry of real life, even if he couldn't feel it himself.

When he spoke again his voice cracked with anger. “So you came rushing up here in the dead of
night, with a blizzard forecast, to catch a killer. Are you out of your mind? Even if he knows—”

“She's safe until he finds out, you said.”

“I said a lot of things. What am I, the voice of God? He may have had other reasons for murdering her.”

I said, “I have a gun.”

“How nice.” He had regained control of his breathing; his voice was almost back to normal, light and mocking. “I suppose you could use it to start a fire. But if I may venture to make a suggestion, a packet of matches would be more useful.”

“I'm not so sure. What are you doing here?”

“I followed you, what do you think? You came haring out of the hotel as if your jeans were on fire and took off like a bat out of hell.” The dim shadow shifted, and I said warningly, “Don't come any closer.”

“For God's sake, Vicky! Do you want them to find us frozen in place, like Lot's wife and her brother? Let's go back to town and have a hot drink and a nice long—” His voice broke, in a long indrawn breath. Then he said quietly, almost reverently, “My God.”

Even the great John Smythe couldn't have feigned that emotion. I glanced behind me.

It was almost upon us. I caught only one flashing glimpse before it engulfed me, but the sight burned an image into my eyes.

Snow. A solid, opaque wall of whiteness, silent, deadly, moving down from the mountain heights.

Within three seconds it had filled my mouth and nostrils, weighted my lashes, hidden the world. I heard John call out, and tried to fight my way to
ward him, but the wind tore his voice to tatters and drove me to my knees. When I struggled up, I had lost all sense of direction. Groping blindly, I stumbled forward. My foot caught on a tombstone and I fell again. The faint far-off wail I heard might have been his voice, or the wind—or my own whimper of fear. I couldn't even see the ground, it was the same color as the air around me, but I felt it cold against my face as I slid forward. The blackness that filled my vision was a pleasant change after all that uniform white.

 

Warmth. Still dark, but warm and therefore wonderful. Surely there was a faint red glow, a specific source of heat not far away…. I was afraid to open my eyes. Mother always warned me I'd go to the bad place if I didn't mend my sinful ways. Little did she know. After being frozen to death, hell seemed like…

“Heaven,” I murmured blissfully.

“You aren't the first woman to tell me that,” said John's voice.