Wolf Among Wolves (34 page)

“That’s a matter of taste.”

“Have you perhaps fallen out with your mother?”

“Not quite.” A complete lie was difficult for Pagel, and this case was not sufficiently important for one, anyhow. But to tell the truth was impossible; it would have resulted in an unending chain of questions.

“Possibly your mother doesn’t want you to live with her?”

“I live with my friend.”

“And your mother doesn’t want that?”

“She is
my
friend.”

“And so not your mother’s? Your mother disapproves of the intended marriage?”

The secretary looked at the superintendent, the superintendent looked at the secretary.

How clever they must feel to have found this out, Pagel was thinking. But they’re not stupid. No, not at all. I’d like to know how they do it. They find out all there is to know. I must be more careful.

“Your mother has private means?” the secretary began again.

“Who has private means in the inflation?” countered Pagel.

“Then you support your mother?”

“No,” said Pagel angrily.

“So she has enough to live on?”

“Certainly.”

“And possibly supports you?”

“No.”

“You earn your own living?”

“Yes.”

“And that of your friend?”

“Yes.”

“How?”

Stop, stop! Pagel thought. They want to catch me. They’ve heard something. But nothing can happen to me; gambling’s not punishable. It’s better not to mention it at all, though. Peter, I’m sure, has given nothing away.

“I sell things.”

“What do you sell?”

“For instance, my friend’s possessions.”

“Whom do you sell them to?”

“For instance, the pawnbroker Feld in Gollnowstrasse.”

“And if there’s nothing left to be sold?”

“There’s always something to be sold.”

The official pondered a moment, looking up at his superior, who nodded slightly.

The secretary took a pencil, stood it on its point, eyed it reflectively and let it fall. “Your friend doesn’t sell anything?” he asked casually.

“Nothing!”

“She sells absolutely nothing at all?”

“Nothing at all.”

“You know that one can sell things which are not necessarily goods?”

What on earth, thought Pagel, dumbfounded, could Peter have sold for them to ask such foolish questions?

“I, too, didn’t mean only such things as clothes,” he said.

“What, for instance?”

“Pictures.”

“Pictures?”

“Yes, pictures.”

“What do you mean by pictures?”

“Oil paintings.”

“Oil paintings.… Are you an artist, by any chance?”

“No—but I’m the son of an artist.”

“Oh,” said the secretary dissatisfied. “You sell your father’s paintings. Well, we’ll talk about that later. I only want you now to confirm that Fräulein Ledig sells nothing.”

“Nothing. What there is to sell, I sell.”

“It’s possible,” said the secretary, and his bilious pains tormented him acutely—this young fool put on too many airs for his liking—“it’s possible that Fräulein Ledig sells something behind your back—without your knowledge?”

Pagel repressed the inquietude and misgivings which arose in him. “Theoretically it would be possible,” he admitted.

“But in practice?”

“In practice impossible.” He smiled. “For we don’t possess very much and I should at once notice if the smallest trifle were missing.”

“Oh?” said the secretary. He looked round at the superintendent, who returned the glance—it seemed to Pagel as if the shadow of a smile showed in their eyes. His uneasiness, his apprehensions increased. “We agreed, did we not”—the secretary half closed his eyes—“that one can sell not only tangible things, such as goods and paintings but—other things?”

Again this menace, now hardly veiled. What could Petra have sold?

“For example?” said Wolfgang crossly. “I can’t conceive of any intangible things which my friend could have sold.”

“For example …” the secretary began and looked up again at the superintendent.

The superintendent shut his eyes, at the same time moving his melancholy face from right to left, as if to say “No.” Pagel saw it clearly. The secretary smiled—the moment had not yet come to tell the young man, but it was close at hand. “For example—we’ll come to that presently,” he said. “First let’s get back to our questions. So you admit you get your livelihood by the sale of paintings?”

“Gentlemen!”—and Pagel got up and stood behind his chair, gripping it with both hands. Looking down at them he saw the knuckles show white against the reddened skin. “Gentlemen!” he said resolutely. “For some reason unknown you’re playing cat-and-mouse with me. I won’t stand it any longer. If Fräulein Ledig has done anything foolish I alone am responsible. I haven’t looked after her sufficiently, I’ve never given her any money, probably not even enough to eat; I’m responsible for everything. And if any damage has been done I can make that good. Here is money.” He tore at his pockets, he
threw wads of notes on the table. “I’ll pay for whatever damage has been done, but tell me at least what has happened.”

“Money, a lot of money,” said the secretary, and looked with anger at the preposterously mounting pile of notes. The superintendent had shut his eyes, as if he wanted to avoid seeing the money, as if he could not bear the sight.

“And here are two hundred and fifty dollars,” Pagel cried, himself overwhelmed by the heap of money. It was the last wad to be thrown on the table. “I can’t think of any damage which nowadays couldn’t be repaired with that. I’ll give you the lot,” he said obstinately, “if you’ll let Fräulein Ledig go this evening.” He, too, was staring at the money, the monotonous white or brown of the German notes, the bright colors of the American.

The man in uniform let in Frau Thumann, Madam Po, her slatternly fat quivering in her loose garments. At a time when women’s skirts barely reached the knee, a draggle-tail skirt reached to her heels. Her flabby gray face trembled, her underlip hung down, revealing the inner side.

“Thank heavens I’m still in time, Herr Pagel. How I did run. I was in such a to-do lest you should set my place on fire again as you threatened you would. I’d have been in good time but just as I was in Gollnowstrasse and thinking of nothing else but you and getting here in time, a car ran into a horse. Then I ‘ad to stop, of course. All its guts outside and I says to myself—Auguste, take a look at that. They always say not to compare man and beast, but they must be pretty like inside, and then I thought to myself, you’ve always something wrong with your bladder and that oats-engine’s got a bladder too.…”

“So Herr Pagel threatened to set your flat on fire if you didn’t come here at once and withdraw your charge?”

But Frau Thumann wasn’t born yesterday; she talked a lot but she couldn’t be pinned down to anything. She had seen the money on the table, had acquainted herself with the situation, and was already gabbling on. “Who said that? He threatened me? I never said so, I demand that be showed on record, Herr Lieutenant. You put that in your own pipe and smoke it. Threaten me! And Herr Pagel such a pleasant, kind gentleman! I wouldn’t have signed that statement against ’im and ’is girl if that man of yours hadn’t talked me out of my senses. It’s the law, he says. ‘Ow can it be the law when I get my money? There can’t be any talk of fraud then. No, I want my statement back, I make you responsible for that.…”

“Silence!” thundered the superintendent, for the secretary’s halfhearted attempts at interruption were of no avail against this flood of talk. “Please go out of the room, Herr Pagel. We’ll talk this matter over with your landlady herself.”

Pagel looked at them for a moment, then at the money and papers on the table. He bowed and stepped out into the corridor. Opposite him was the door of the registration office; toward the street, just inside the exit, was the charge-room. He could see people in the street, where it seemed to have stopped raining. A cool breeze entered and strove with the stale air in the corridor.

Pagel leaned against the wall and lit the long-desired cigarette. They haven’t arrested me yet, he thought, or else they wouldn’t have let me go out by myself.

Inside, Frau Thumann’s voice was rambling on, but tearfully. From time to time the bark of the superintendent could be heard—how well the melancholy man growled! But he had to; in his job one had to. And their letting him out proved nothing. All his money was lying there on the table; they knew quite well that nobody would run away from so much money. But why should they arrest him at all? And what was the trouble about Petra? What could Petra have sold?

He racked his brains. He wondered whether she might have sold some of Frau Thumann’s belongings, bed linen or the like, to buy herself food. But that was all nonsense. Madam Po would have blurted it out long ago. Except for that, Petra had had no chance of taking anything.

Absent-mindedly he went to the exit; the air in the corridor had given him a headache, and the voices in the secretary’s room disturbed him.

He stood in the street. The asphalt was shining like a mirror. Difficult day for taxi drivers, he thought as the cars passed him cautiously, feeling their way. No, I shouldn’t like to be a taxi driver. But what on earth would I like to be? I’m no use for anything. I’ve wasted the whole day and now I shan’t get Petra out, after all—I feel it. What can she have done?

He remained on the curb. Lights were reflected on the wet asphalt, but there was no light to guide him. Then somebody knocked into him, and it was Madam Po, of course.

“Lor’, Herr Pagel, it’s a good thing I saw you standing ‘ere. I thought you’d hopped it. Don’t do that, whatever you do. Fetch your good money. Why should you leave it to those fellows? I don’t know, and never will, why they call themselves policemen, with a copper’s sharp eye and a good wage and all that, and then somebody pulls their legs, telling ’em that you’re a sharper with the three-card trick. You know, they squeeze the card like this and chuck it on the table and the other’s got to guess what it is.… The blinking fools! A gent like you. But I’ve given them an earful. All above-board gambling, I told ’em, good class with the bank and gents, men in tail coats, only those who rake in the money, not you, of course. Ain’t I heard about it often enough through the door when you were telling Peter? …”

“What’s the trouble about Peter?”

“Well, you know, Herr Pagel, the trouble about her—well, I don’t know either. They won’t say a word, but there’s something queer. The fraud charge and so on, that’s finished with, they had to give it back to me, and I’ve torn it to pieces in front of Mister Yellow Eye—Mister Yellow Mug. An’ about the curtain, I told them that was only a tipsy joke of yours, and if you’d like to give me something toward a new one …”

“I must get my money first,” said Pagel and went back.

The secretary was now alone. Yes, interest in his case had slackened. It seemed that the dying man had made a mistake, after all; it wasn’t an important matter, only a trifle. And this was no time for trifles. The secretary was no longer in a mood to employ his detective technique. Leo Gubalke’s last official act had been wiped out before the dying man had drawn his last breath.

With indifference the secretary examined the copy of the art dealer’s purchase note. It would be in order. He did not even ring up. It was too improbable that a man could win a thousand dollars in a couple of hours by the three-card trick. “But you’re not to gamble,” he said wearily and gave Pagel back the purchase note. “Games of chance are prohibited by law.”

“Certainly,” said Pagel politely. “I shan’t gamble any more. May I stand bail for Fräulein Ledig?”

“She’s no longer here,” said the secretary, and for him she no longer existed, indeed. “She’s already at Alexanderplatz.”

“But why?” shouted Pagel. “Tell me why?”

“Because she indulges in lewd practices without being under police supervision,” said the secretary, tired out. “Moreover, she is said to have a venereal disease.”

It was just as well that there was a chair near—Pagel gripped it so hard, he thought it would break. “That’s impossible,” he managed to say at last.

“She’s been recognized,” explained the secretary and made to get on with his work. “By another girl of the same profession. Besides, she admitted it.”

“She admitted it?”

“She admitted it.”

“Thanks,” said Pagel. He let go the chair and went toward the door.

“Your money, your papers,” called the secretary impatiently.

Pagel made a renunciatory gesture, then thought better of it and pushed the lot back into his pockets.

“You’ll lose your money,” said the secretary indifferently.

Pagel repeated his gesture and marched out.

Only five minutes later, in the midst of his scribbling, did it occur to the secretary that he had given Herr Pagel false, or at least misleading, information. Petra had admitted to having practiced lewdness a few times about a year ago. She had not admitted to having a venereal disease.

The secretary deliberated a moment. Perhaps it wasn’t so bad after all. Perhaps he wouldn’t marry her now. One shouldn’t marry such girls. Never!

And he returned to his writing. The case Ledig, the last official act of Oberwachtmeister Leo Gubalke, was wiped out as far as he was concerned.

Chapter Six
It Is Still Sultry after the Storm

I

After the first assault of junior and senior hotel staff, peace reigned round the friends von Prackwitz and Studmann. The reception manager lay sleeping on a rather dilapidated sofa in a basement room of the hotel. His was the leaden and ugly sleep of the drunken, with dropped jaw and wet mouth, a puffy face and a skin which looked suddenly stubby, as if he had not shaved for some time. Across his forehead was a red scratch received while falling down the stairs.

Von Prackwitz looked at his friend, then at the room into which he had been carried. It was not an inviting place. A big electric mangle took up most of the room, empty laundry baskets were piled up in one corner, against the wall leaned two ironing boards.

A waiter peered in—everybody seemed to think that he was entitled to do so without a word of apology, to make frivolous remarks, even to laugh. “Surely Herr von Studmann has a room of his own in the hotel?” Rittmeister von Prackwitz inquired angrily. “Why hasn’t he been taken to it?”