“At least you weren’t a loner.”
She retired with the bottle into the kitchenette. The apartment was a large one-room affair that boasted a small balcony for the sunworshipers. One wall was lined with books from floor to ceiling. In front of them stood a huge antique desk that I had thought of marrying the girl for. There were also a pale-beige carpet, two sofa beds, some good Swedish chairs and a small dining table. The wall along the balcony was all glass and the other two walls were hung with some good prints and some outspoken originals. It wasn’t a place just to hang your hat. Somebody lived there.
Fredl placed the drinks on a low ebony cocktail table that seemed to float in the air because of its cleverly concealed legs. She sat next to me on the couch and kissed me on the temple.
“You’re getting grayer and grayer, Mac. You’re getting old.”
“Nothing soon but memories. When all of us old geezers gather around the corner bar in a few years to spend our Social Security checks and start wheezing and drooling to each other about all the girls we’ve laid, I’ll just let that film of memory descend and mutter, ‘Bonn, lovely, lovely Bonn.’”
“Whom do you know in the States, Mac?”
I thought a minute. “Nobody, really. Nobody I want to see. A couple of reporters and embassy types perhaps, but I met them over here. I had a doting and dotty great aunt I was fond of, but she died years ago. That’s where I got the money to open the saloon. Or part of it.”
“Then where’s your home now?”
I shrugged. “I was born in San Francisco, but, hell, that’s nobody’s home town. I like New York and Chicago. I like Denver. I even like Washington and London and Paris. Padillo thinks Los Angeles is Paradise-west. If he had his way he’d have the Autobahn run right through the heart of Bonn and plant palm trees along the verge.”
“How is Mike?”
“Fine. Off on a trip.”
“And how was Berlin, rat? You knew I had a couple of days off.”
“A pure and unsuccessful business venture, laced with too many Martinis — and an assassination waiting for me when I got back.”
Fredl had nestled her head on my shoulder. Her blond hair tickled my ear. It smelled clean and feminine and fresh. I didn’t see why it needed washing. I let the comment sink in and she sat up with a jerk. I almost spilled my drink.
“You’re kidding me again.”
“Well, it happened like this. Two men came in and shot another one. Dead.” I sat back and drew on my cigarette. Suddenly Fredl was all reporter. She fired questions and didn’t take any notes either, and I had a hard time deciding whether Fräulein Doktor Arndt or Lieutenant Wentzel knew more about the killing. It was probably a draw.
“Does Mike know?” she asked.
“I haven’t seen him today,” I lied. “He’ll probably think it’s good for business. And God knows the correspondents will descend on us tomorrow at lunch. By the time they stagger out there’ll be a dozen theories and inside stories ranging from a political assassination to a grudge killing by a couple of superannuated SS members.”
“It depends upon the paper they work for,” Fredl said.
“And the number of drinks they’ve had.”
“It might be interesting at that. Buy me lunch tomorrow?”
“Sure.”
“Now you can kiss me again.”
“I haven’t kissed you for the first time yet.”
“I’m too proud to admit it.”
I kissed her and, like always, it was as if I were kissing her for the first time — as if everything were new and we both were very, very young but had been born into the world with a postgraduate degree in technique.
“Get the light, darling,” Fredl whispered.
“Both of them?”
“Just the one. You know I like to see what I’m doing.”
I left Fredl reluctantly at four A.M. She was sleeping, a slight smile on her lips, her face slightly flushed but relaxed. The bed looked warm and inviting. For a long moment I was tempted to lie down again. Instead I padded barefooted and buck-naked into the kitchen, groped for the Scotch bottle, took a long drink, and moved back into the living room, where I dressed quietly. I leaned over and kissed Fredl gently on the forehead. She didn’t stir. That irritated me, so I kissed her again, this time on the lips. She wriggled and opened her eyes and smiled.
“I just wanted you to know what you’re missing,” I said.
“Are you leaving, darling?”
“I must.”
“Come back to bed. Please.”
“Can’t. I have to see the police again. Don’t forget lunch.”
She smiled and I kissed her again. “Go back to sleep,” I said. She smiled again, drowsy and content. I let myself out, rode the elevator down, and got into the car.
At four in the morning Bonn seems like an abandoned Hollywood set. In fact, most of the good burghers have bolted the doors by ten, unmindful of — even indifferent to — the fact that theirs is one of the world’s most important capitals. In some respects, Bonn is very much like Washington. So I made it from Fredl’s place to mine in something less than ten minutes, a new kind of record, considering that we lived a good six miles apart. I parked the car in the garage, closed and locked the overhead door, and walked up the steps to my apartment.
After five moves in eight years I finally had an apartment that suited. Up in the hills outside Muffendorf, it was a duplex built by a bicycle manufacturer from Essen who had struck it rich in the early 1950s, when bicycles were the major form of personal transportation in postwar Germany. He had a penchant for contemporary architecture, but as a widower he spent most of his time following the girls and the sun. I think he was in Florida then, or it may have been Mexico. His frequent and prolonged absences gave me the privacy I wanted, and even when he was in Germany he spent a great portion of his time gossiping with cronies in the cafés of Dusseldorf — or just watching the girls walk by. He was a Social Democrat, and sometimes we would sit around, drink beer, and speculate on how long it would be before Willy Brandt was Chancellor.
The house was a two-level affair, built of dark-red stone with a shake-shingle shed roof, and it had what my parents would have called a veranda running the full length of two sides. The owner had the smaller, lower flat; I had the upper one, which consisted of a bedroom, a small study, a kitchen and a large living room with a fireplace. I had to walk up twelve steps to reach my front door. I climbed the steps and put the key in the lock and turned. The voice came from the deep shadows to my left.
“Good morning, Herr McCorkle. I’ve been waiting for you for quite some time.”
It was Maas.
I shoved the door open. “The cops are looking for you.”
He moved out of the shadows. In one hand he carried his familiar briefcase, in the other he held the Luger. It wasn’t pointed at me. He just held it loosely at his side.
“I know. A regrettable affair. I’m afraid that I must invite myself in.”
“That’s nice,” I said. “The bath’s on the right and there are fresh. towels in the linen closet. Breakfast is at ten, and if there’s anything special you want, just tell the maid.”
Maas sighed. “Your English is very fast, Herr McCorkle, but it seems you are making a joke. I think it is a joke, ja?”
“I guess so.”
Maas sighed again. “Shall we go in? You first, if you do not mind.”
“I don’t mind.”
We went in — me first. I walked over to the bar and poured myself a drink. Maas watched with a disapproving manner. Perhaps it was because I didn’t offer him one. To hell with him. It was my booze.
I drank the first one and then poured another. Then I sat down in an easy chair, put one leg over the arm, and lighted a cigarette. I thought I was putting on a very good show. Calm, nonchalant. The epitome of the sophisticated barkeep. Maas stood in the middle of the room, fat, middle-aged and tired. The briefcase was clutched in one hand, the Luger still dangled from the other. The brown suit was rumpled; his hat was gone. I said: “Oh, hell. Put the gun down and go fix yourself a drink.” He looked at the gun as if he had just grown a second thumb and tucked it away in his shoulder holster. He fixed himself a drink.