Knights of the Blood (18 page)

“Sure,” said Drummond, “but I’ve got to make a phone call first.” He looked at his watch. “It’s nearly three—thirty, and I have to meet a man tomorrow, if he can see me.”

“Okay, how about this? You go back to the hotel and make your calls, and I’ll come back for you at–say, seven—thirty. Then, we can either take in the nightlife or, if you’d prefer, we’ll answer a couple of calls with the local homicide team.” Eberle gave him a quizzical look. “I’m sure some of the boys would really like to meet you.”

“See you at seven—thirty for some police work,” Drummond said.

“Great,” Eberle replied. “I’ll walk you back to your hotel.”

Back in his room, Drummond was surprised to discover that some of his clothes seemed to be missing from his closet. Picking up the phone, he rang the desk.

“This is Captain Drummond,” he began. “I seem to be missing a suit and a couple of shirts from my closet. “

“Yes,
Kapitän
. The porter has sent them out to be pressed. They should be back about four—thirty, if that’s all right, sir.”

Amazing,
thought Drummond. “Yes that’s fine,” he said. “Thank you,” and then he hung up.
I’II probably
own
American Express when I get home,
he mused.

Reaching into his pocket, he brought out a small notebook and flipped through it until he found the page he was looking for. Carefully he dialed the number for Ritterbuchs.

The phone purred softly in Drummond’s ear repeatedly. Finally, just as he was about to hang up, an elderly voice answered on the other end.

“
Bitte?
” the voice asked.

“Baron von Liebenfalz, please,” Drummond replied.

“Ah. Who is calling, please?”

“John Drummond. With whom am I speaking, please?”

“This is Liebenfalz. How may I help you?”

“Well, sir, you wrote me in Los Angeles and suggested that we meet here in Vienna to discuss–“

“Ah, yes. Now I remember. So you would like to meet. Is tomorrow convenient, at–say, eleven?” Von Liebenfalz spoke quickly, although without much of an accent.

“Eleven o’clock tomorrow morning will be fine, sir,” Drummond said.

“You have my address, Herr Drummond?” von Liebenfalz asked.

“Yes, on your card.”

“Good. Then, I see you tomorrow. Good—bye.” There was a click and the line went dead.

Drummond stared at the phone for a few seconds, then dropped it back onto its cradle. With nothing to do but wait for his suit to come back from being pressed, he decided to head upstairs and take a nap.

* * *

The shabby stucco—fronted building in another part of Vienna had been a modest middle—class home when it was built shortly before the First World War. The revolution that had followed the abdication of King Carl after the war had changed Vienna, and by the time the Second World War was over, there was no middle class left in Vienna who could afford to keep the house. Like other houses whose owners were either dead or simply vanished, the building was taken over by the municipal authorities and converted into numerous small apartments.

Frau Kettleman had lived in the small ground—floor flat since the winter of 1947, when her husband had secured the job of building janitor. She kept to herself and rarely spoke to any of the other tenants, especially the old Jew in the apartment above her own.

Hans Stucke kept to himself, which was exactly how Frau Kettleman wanted it. It was loathsome, she thought, that the old Jew should have returned to Vienna after the war. “Why couldn’t he have gone to Israel with the rest of them,” she used to ask her husband, “instead of coming back here to make the rest of us feel guilty, as though we had committed some sort of crime?”

Still, he paid his rent: on time, every week, for nearly thirty years. Except for this week. It had been due two days ago, but this time his rent payment envelope had not appeared in the box next to Frau Kettleman’s front door. At first, she didn’t think too much of it; most of the tenants were usually behind in their rent.

Today, however, when the dark stain appeared on her ceiling, and water began to drip down on her carpet, Frau Kettleman remembered the late rent and went upstairs to confront Hans Stucke, and to complain about the water coming from his apartment.

When Stucke didn’t answer the pounding on the door, Frau Kettleman unlocked his door with her pass key and let herself in. It was dark inside, with the lights off and the blinds pulled down to the sill of the room’s only window.

“Herr Stucke?” she called, trying to be heard over the sound of the running shower without actually shouting.

There was no reply; only the hissing of the shower running in the small bathroom next to the kitchen.

Frau Kettleman walked across the room to the bathroom door, the water—logged linoleum slick beneath her shoes. She rapped on the closed door.

“Herr Stucke?”

The sound of the shower was the only reply. Convinced that the room was empty, Frau Kettleman pushed open the bathroom door. In the half—darkness of the apartment, the bathroom looked empty. It wasn’t until she reached across the tub to turn off the shower that Frau Kettleman realized that Hans Stucke, slumped in the corner of the tub, was staring at her.

* * *

The phone next to his bed had rung several times before Drummond was awake enough to realize where he was and answer it. When he did finally pick it up, Eberle was on the other end.

“Time to rise and shine, amigo. The Vienna PD is anxious to show you how we tackle crime on the Donau.” Eberle was buoyant.

“Gimme five minutes. I’ll be right down.” Drummond half—heartedly considered a quick shower, but settled instead for washing his face, a fast shave, and a fresh shirt. A quick glance at his Rolex told him that it was almost eight—fifteen. His suit had reappeared in the closet, along with the missing shirts, so he donned the suit instead of his blazer, also pulling a pair of Rockport shoes out of the closet. When he was dressed, he headed down to the lobby to meet Eberle.

Like Drummond, Eberle had changed clothes from that afternoon. In place of his light brown suit was a dark tweed jacket, a gray shirt with black tie, and charcoal trousers. Also like Drummond, he was wearing a pair of thick—soled black shoes, of the kind designed for standing in for hours.

Eberle grinned at Drummond. “Okay, sleepyhead, let’s go.”

On their way to the car, Drummond asked where they were heading.

“A dead body, over in the sixth district.” Eberle shook his head with disappointment. “Not much excitement tonight, I’m afraid. It was the best I could do.”

Drummond laughed. “Markus, don’t worry. It’ll be exciting enough.”

The sixth district was a shabby working—class neighborhood full of cheap apartment houses and empty shops. Eberle’s BMW pulled up to the curb opposite the front door of one of the apartments, and the two policemen got out.

“The body’s upstairs,” Eberle said as they crossed the street. “Call came in about ten minutes before I left to pick you up.”

The men climbed the two flights of stairs that led to the dead man’s apartment, pushing past a knot of curious neighbors on the landing outside the door. A uniformed police officer stopped them just outside the apartment, but Eberle produced his ID, said something in German, and with a smart salute from the policeman on duty, they entered the small flat.

The cramped apartment had, at one time, been one room of not over—generous size. After the war, when housing in Vienna had been at a premium, a couple of flimsy partitions had been put up, and a small kitchen and bath installed. The rest of the apartment had been turned into a bed—sitting room that measured not much more than nine by twelve and was dominated by an ornate brass bed.

A chest of drawers and a small bookcase stood to either side of the bed, and a pair of ancient leather armchairs were huddled next to an enameled stove, the only source of heat for the apartment. A wardrobe was tucked into one corner of the room, and next to that a small fold—top table and two small cane—back chairs stood pressed to the wall under the only window in the room.

Drummond would have described the room as tidy, if it hadn’t been littered with cops. Pressing his way into the room with Eberle, Drummond squeezed past a half—dozen of Vienna’s finest, most of whom were engaged in cop—talk, the universal chatter of policemen comparing crimes, the latest court rulings, and changing departmental policy. Drummond didn’t have to speak German to know what the men were saying; he was part of that universal brotherhood, the freemasonry of law enforcement. Like policemen the world over, he saw society as divided into two classes, the good and the bad, separated only by a thin blue line. As part of that thin blue line, policemen tend to withdraw into a society of their own—a society with its own rules and mores, and a universal language all its own, understood by all cops, regardless of their mother tongue.

“Well,” Eberle asked, “what do you think?”

“I think this is a little over—crowded, for one thing,” Drummond replied.

“Yeah. Real crime of the century stuff, for most of these guys.” Eberle said. “Actually, most of ‘em are rookies, still doing their probationary years. They’ve been called out so that they can see a real live stiff–sorry about that.” He gave Drummond a sour grin and continued. “I’ve had a word with Sacher, the chief investigating officer, and he thinks this was probably a suicide. Subject’s name was Hans Stucke.”

“What makes him think it was suicide?” Drummond asked.

“Well, take a look for yourself–although before you go into the bathroom, I’d better warn you that the body has been under the shower for at least a week.”

Drummond moved past the two young police officers standing at the door to the bathroom and elbowed his way into the cramped little room. A policeman wearing a gray boiler suit and elbow—length plumber’s gloves was furiously working away with a snake as he tried to clear a blockage in the drain of the tub. Finally, with a tremendous tug, the snake pulled free and the water began to slowly subside in the porcelain hip bath. The body was leaning back in the corner of the deep tub, its head lolled back against the white—tiled walls, a deep, clean—washed gash opened in the right side of the neck.

As the water began to recede from the edge of the tub, Drummond could see why Eberle had warned him about the condition of the corpse. The spray of the shower had been directed against Stucke’s left leg, slowly softening the tissue until it began to fall away from the bone, like some piece of meat left to simmer too long in a stew pot. Finally, the flesh of Stucke’s calf had separated from the bone and sunk to the bottom of the tub, momentarily clogging the drain and causing the tub to start filling with water.

But each time the tub filled, Stucke’s parboiled flesh had floated to the surface, only to plug the drain again as the tub slowly emptied. During the next few days this cycle was repeated over and over, until several chunks of flesh became impacted in the drain pipe and the tub finally overflowed, attracting the attention of the now sedated Frau Kettleman. Drummond had seen the parboiling effect before, in Los Angeles, when people had died in their hot tubs and their bodies hadn’t been discovered for days, or even weeks.

The level of the water in the tub had dropped enough by now for Drummond to see the pinkish bones in Stucke’s lower leg, shreds of skin still clinging to his ankle and foot. The policeman in the rubber gloves was carefully feeling around the bottom of the tub, at once trying to prevent the drain becoming blocked and at the same time searching for something.

“Ah—ha!” he said, holding up an old—fashioned straight razor.

In response, the drain made a thick sucking sound as the last of the water sluiced down the pipe and headed toward the Donau. Another officer was shaking out a black plastic bag, watching a little queasily as his gloved partner began fishing out the soggy chunks of flesh now lying on the bottom of the tub. Trying not to breathe too deeply, Drummond moved back into the sitting room, where he found Eberle talking to another detective.

“John,” Eberle said, “I’d like you to meet Alois Sacher, the officer in charge of the investigation.”

The two men shook hands.

“So tell me,
Kapitän
Drummond, what do you think of our suicide?” Sacher’s accent was heavy, and hard to understand.

“Well,” began Drummond, “it was messy enough. What makes you suspect it was suicide?”

“Ha.” Sacher’s laugh was humorless. “The body of the man is in his bathtub, his razor is lying on the bottom of the tub, and his throat has a cut just so.” Sacher brought his index finger up to the side of his neck, indicating Stucke’s wound.

“Did he leave a note?” Drummond asked.

“No. But then, his kind rarely do.” Sacher made a face.

“His kind? I’m afraid I don’t follow.” Drummond stared blankly at Sacher.

Sacher looked at Eberle and said something in German, causing Eberle to nod his head in agreement.

“What Alois means, John, is that Herr Stucke over there in the sitzbath was mentally unstable.” He gave Drummond a knowing smile, as if to say,
I agree with you, Sacher
is jumping to conclusions, but it’s his case.

Drummond smiled at Sacher, and tapped his head with his index finger. “Crazy, huh?”

Sacher smiled. “Yes. That is so. He was in the local precinct offices all the time, claiming that he had seen a Nazi.”

“Had he?” Drummond asked.

“Nein, nein,”
Sacher said impatiently. “When he filed his first complaint, it was sent to Special Investigations. They checked out his ‘war criminal,’ but the man was at least thirty years too young to have been in the war, let alone the SS.”

Drummond could feel a cold knot in the pit of his stomach. “Did Herr Stucke identify the man from photos?”

“Ja–
and
the resemblance
was
amazing. I suppose almost like a twin.” Sacher shook his head. “But from the Special Investigations office we were told that the accused was in his early thirties, and a well—respected businessman. When Herr Stucke came back later, I told him this, but he did not want to believe it. It’s often the same with former concentration camp inmates. They think they have seen one of the old guards, and nothing will shake that from their mind.” Sacher pulled out a small cigar case from his pocket. ”Smoke?”