As soon as Frau Gruber had left them, Harriet and Crowther went in search of Krall. They found him surrounded by paper in a cloud of tobacco. He greeted them happily enough.
‘I have traced the mask! It seems it was not tainted before it arrived in Oberbach — Padfield’s housemaid tried it on to amuse the footman and suffered no ill-effects.’ He realised the English were not listening to him with the attention he had hoped for.
‘The Honourable Diether Fink,’ Crowther said at once.
Krall drew heavily on his pipe then wafted away the smoke as if it had come as a bit of a surprise to him. ‘A good man. Banker and adviser to the court. Died in his bed some two weeks ago. The Duke himself rode before the coffin. What of him?’
‘You did not feel that another suspicious death following on that of Lady Martesen was of significance?’
Krall rubbed at his forehead with his fingertips. ‘Suspicious? It wasn’t suspicious. He choked. His doctor hooked the nut that killed him out of his throat himself — he told me so. A tragic loss, of course. But people die and he had reached a fair age.’
‘His wrist had been cut,’ Harriet said. ‘Deeply. Then cleaned and bandaged.’
Krall dropped his hand to the table and stared at her. ‘His wrist? His wrist?’ His eyes narrowed, making Harriet think of the rocks overhung with vines she had seen on the road to Castle Grenzhow. ‘How do you tell me of this?’
‘His housekeeper came to see us,’ she replied. ‘She saw the wound as she was laying him out. There was no other mark on his body.’
Krall hunched his shoulders. ‘His wrist? Yet cleaned and bandaged? You trusted the woman?’
Crowther nodded. ‘She seemed quite respectable, and kept apologising for troubling us with her fancies. Is the fact Lady Martesen’s wrist was injured widely known?’
‘No, no … I don’t know. It seemed an unimportant detail. The gossips had plenty to feed on. No, I don’t think it was widely known. Why did the woman wait to speak till now?’
It was Harriet who replied. ‘She had been uneasy about it since the morning of Fink’s death, but when she heard there was some doubt after all about Lady Martesen’s murderer …’
‘I see, I see. Well, my humiliation is complete. Damn that incompetent sawbones. How could he not notice?’ Krall sank his chin into his chest. His craggy face had grown red and his fists were clenched. He said in a lower voice, ‘What else?’
‘That there were no servants in the house that evening, but there were signs Fink had a guest.’
‘That I had heard. No one knows who …’
‘That did not strike you as suspicious?’ Crowther said.
‘Fink had plenty of guests!’ Krall exploded. ‘The man loved his whores — half the bastards in Ulrichsberg are his! There was no surprise he chose to entertain on the quiet while his wife was in Strasbourg. I heard because the other gentlemen liked to say that at least he died content. And why should we look? We had Lady Martesen’s murderer safely locked up. Were it not for Mr Clode’s connections and nationality, we would probably have condemned him already.’
Harriet moved to the window. As the day of the arrival of the new Duchess approached, activity in the palace seemed to continually increase. As she watched, a number of gentlemen, musicians by the shapes of the cases they were carrying, were crossing the yard in the direction of the Royal Opera House. A man in green and gold was directing an over-laden cart under one of the archways. ‘It must be related. From her description, the wound was not accidental. I believe whoever killed Lady Martesen killed this banker too.’ She felt the fabric of the curtain hangings with one hand. Thick material, heavy and the colour of blood. ‘Two killings of members of the court. Was Clode merely a convenient scapegoat then? The attack on him incidental?’
‘I think not,’ Krall replied, rubbing his temples. ‘Whoever killed Lady Martesen went to some trouble to drug that mask, then lead Mr Clode to the scene. It would have been simpler to drag in some fool from the streets. He would have had no rich friends to support him, no Ambassador to force us to keep him safe. Two … two targets. What is the phrase?’
Crowther twisted his cane. ‘Kill two birds with one stone, I think is what you have in mind, Herr Krall. Mrs Westerman, the answer must be locked in with Mr Clode. He must give us a list of those people he met at court since his arrival here, and his dealings with them.’
‘Graves and Rachel will return to the castle today to continue his interrogation. And you and Herr Krall are right: whoever has performed this killing is clever enough to know a peasant would make a better scapegoat than the agent of an Earl.’
‘We cannot be sure that Fink was murdered,’ Krall said, almost to himself. ‘Some coincidence, some accident.’
Crowther watched him steadily. ‘I do not think you believe that, Herr District Officer.’
‘No. I do not.’ Krall kept his chin low. ‘What am I to tell Swann? The cortege of the Princess arrives at the border tomorrow morning. She arrives here the day after. Well, it is too late for her to go home now. As long as news doesn’t reach them before they are past the borders of Maulberg.’ He brought a fist down on the table. ‘Damn this to hell.’
He looked up at Harriet, a slight air of challenge in his eye, but she made no sign of offence or distress.
‘What if Lady Martesen were not the first victim?’ she said instead.
‘What?’ Krall said, distracted. ‘What do you mean, madam?’
‘I mean, whoever has done this has managed to throw sand in our eyes most effectively. Perhaps they have tried and succeeded before. Have there been any other deaths in the last few months?’
‘People do die, Mrs Westerman.’
‘Yes, Herr Krall, but I am talking about members of the court and ignoring any case of long illness, or falls. Fire, for instance.’
Krall looked at her suspiciously, but said nothing.
‘Fire, Mrs Westerman?’ Crowther asked.
Rather than give him any answer, she turned to Krall, her head tilted to one side.
‘I believe,’ Krall said wearily, ‘Mrs Westerman might be referring to the death of Count von Warburg. He was indeed killed in a fire at his house just before Christmas.’
‘The circumstances?’ Crowther said shortly.
Krall looked a little angry. ‘There was a fire and he died. Just before Christmas! Von Warburg had supped at court and returned to his own house. The maid woke in the night smelling smoke; by the time she knew what she was about, the whole of the top floor of the house was ablaze. Luckily for her, she slept in the kitchen. They managed to save the neighbouring houses, but there was nothing much left of Warburg’s place. It was assumed he had gone to bed drunk and the candle had caught on the bed-hangings.’
‘And that might be exactly what happened,’ Crowther said.
‘It might well be,’ Harriet replied, ‘or it might be another murder concealed.’
Harriet saw her friend close his eyes briefly. This was exactly what Crowther hated most. When he had a body, or a collection of facts to examine, he was content, focused. This sort of speculation frustrated him, made him feel lost in the fog.
‘Was the body examined?’ he asked.
Krall turned to stare out of the window. ‘The upper storey collapsed. There was not much of a body to bury, let alone examine.’
He then groaned slightly and put his head in his hands.
‘You have remembered something else?’ Crowther said, perhaps unnecessarily.
‘And then there was Bertram Raben,’ Krall said heavily.
Harriet folded her arms. ‘Yes?’
‘A suicide. It seemed. In January. He was a serious sort of fellow, a writer and poet, a young man but well thought of. He wrote for our newspaper here. We thought perhaps this fashion for suicide which has swept the country in recent years had finally caught up with us. But something was a little odd about it to me.’