“But you said a moment ago that you feel a moral obligation to do whatever you can — ” I was aware that unconsciously I had clenched my fists and that I was straining to remain civil with this man. The rules of my office prohibited physical assault but the temptation to circle Thilo Rotfogel’s scrawny neck with my bare hands was almost overwhelming. “I take it, Rotfogel, that your ‘moral obligation’ comes with a price tag. You want us to intercede on your behalf with the Maestro so that you can return to your post with the opera orchestra. But aren’t you being selfish? Aren’t you placing your personal interests above those of the woman for whom you profess to feel pity?”
“The way I see the situation,” Rotfogel said calmly, as though analyzing a financial statement or the results of a laboratory test, “the gods have handed me a golden opportunity. You see, Inspector Preiss, the humiliation I suffered when Wagner ordered me out that day weeks ago, and without a speck of justification, was enough to crush any man’s spirit once and for all. But now … now, at last! I can, and I will, bring Richard Wagner to his knees … with the weight of Munich’s Chief Inspector of Police, no less, behind me.”
“Be sensible, Rotfogel,” I said. “Fräulein Vanderhoute has nothing to fear from speaking to me. It is Wagner, as you yourself say, who is the villain.” I hoped this lie would be convincing. “Tell us where we may find her. It is for her own good.”
Again Rotfogel shook his head. “No no, Inspector Preiss,” he said. “First give me Wagner. Then I will give you Vanderhoute.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Helena Becker’s return to Munich on the Friday train from Düsseldorf turned out to be a frenzied affair. An engine breakdown halfway along the route resulted in a three-hour delay in her arrival. Met at the station by the frantic leader of the Bavarian Quartet, Helena had time only to blow me a kiss and wave an elegantly gloved hand before being whisked away for her first rehearsal with the group, leaving me to escort Madam Vronsky to the Eugénie Palace and see to it that she was comfortably settled in her room.
“Thank you for being so gracious,” Madam Vronsky said, giving me a sympathetic smile. “I’m sure you’d rather have Helena’s company instead of wasting your time with mine.”
“Not so,” I said. “In fact, things couldn’t have worked out better for me. You see, Madam Vronsky, I have a little job for you …”
“So, Inspector, a second piece of the Russian puzzle — ”
Madam Vronsky was holding both fragments of the envelope addressed to Henryk Schramm up to the light streaming through the windows of her room at the Eugénie Palace, as though the paper were translucent and, thus exposed, might reveal some secret code. “I’m sorry to disappoint you,” she said, pouting, “but the second piece contains nothing more than the name of the sender and his address in Minsk. And here I thought you and I were about to share a moment of high drama. The least you can do is tell me what this is all about. After all, I am appointed your official translator. Which brings up a question: Surely there are others in a cosmopolitan city like Munich who could have translated this for you?”
“I don’t trust ‘others,’” I replied. “True, Munich is cosmopolitan, but whisper a secret at one end of Munich at eleven in the morning and by noon everyone at the other end will be chattering about it. It’s one of the lessons a policeman learns his first day on the job.”
“Oh, I see. So you’re worried that if you tell me more about Schramm and this mysterious business with the envelope, an hour from now I’ll be mounted on a makeshift pedestal at Marienplatz shouting the news to thousands of passersby.”
“You’re pouting again,” I said. “Mind you, you do have a particularly fetching way about you when you’re like this.”
“Shame on you, flirting with an old woman!”
She pretended to scold me. I pretended to be contrite. “You’ve always been able to see through me, haven’t you, Madam Vronsky.”
“If you’re referring to your ambitions back in Düsseldorf … your dream of playing Beethoven’s sonatas as they should be played … yes, I did see through your … shall we be charitable and say your digital deficiencies. And I told you so honestly, did I not?”
“And that is exactly why I trust you,” I said.
“But not enough to tell me the details behind these envelope fragments — ”
I threw up my hands in a gesture of helplessness. The fact was that, up to this point, I had chosen not to tell a soul about my discovery of the second fragment. Larger than the first, its torn edges closely matched those of the other fragment. Whoever had possession to begin with must have disposed of the letter the envelope contained, for try as I might I failed to find even the most minute portion. What was especially confounding was that the first fragment had shown up in the lodgings of Wolfgang Grilling, while the second was located — of all places — in the bedroom of Karla Steilmann, tucked away under a neatly bundled stack of letters in the drawer of her night table. I had not the slightest notion who initially would have had access to this piece of mail. Nor had I the slightest notion as to why both Grilling and Steilmann would have had an interest in it.
Purloined letters were the stuff of playwrights and novelists, an all-too-convenient and rather tawdry literary device I had long regarded with derision. In real life, I told myself, this kind of thing simply didn’t happen.
Until now, that is.
“I apologize, Madam Vronsky, I sincerely do,” I said. “Here you are, once more about to do me a great favour, in return for which I’m compelled to stand before you tightlipped and seemingly ungrateful.”
She gave me a forgiving smile. “Apology accepted,” she said, adding quickly, “though now I understand what Helena means when she speaks of you. She says what you demand most from a woman is a bottomless well of patience. Those are her exact words, not mine, my dear Preiss … a bottomless well of patience. A word of advice, if I may: even a bottomless well may run dry. Ah, but I see that your eyes are fixed once again on these — ”
She held the envelope fragments in the open palm of her hand, the two pieces, when joined, forming an almost perfect whole. “To business, then. The return address reads: Professor M.J. Klayman, care of Imperial Conservatory of Music, Minsk. The penmanship is that of an educated person, done with a certain flourish and meticulous punctuation.”
“Does the name ‘Professor Klayman’ sound familiar to you?”
“Again I’m sorry to disappoint you. No it does not. But two things immediately come to mind: Klayman is a fairly common Jewish surname. And any Jew holding a professorship in a Russian institute of higher learning must be a man of remarkable accomplishment. There’s an old saying, Inspector Preiss: In the heart of every Russian there’s a cold spot for a Jew. Of course, it’s possible that this Professor Klayman has converted to Christianity in order to secure his position. After all, here in Germany some Jews have resorted to conversion to advance their careers.”
“Would a conservatory in Minsk typically have an opera department?”
“Most definitely. Opera is very popular in Russia among the upper class. Attending the opera is a kind of status symbol in high society. The women sit fanning themselves, imprisoned in their tight corsets; the men sit perspiring in their evening clothes and military tunics; everyone, having overeaten beforehand, tries desperately not to belch or let wind; and during intermissions they pretend they’re French and fawn all over one another. Why, even your Richard Wagner has had his works performed in Russia, although his experience as a conductor of an opera orchestra there has gone down in the annals as the greatest upset caused by any foreigner since Napoleon’s invasion! It’s one of the choicer bits of gossip to come out of my humdrum homeland in at least a generation, believe me. Oh, but you’ve undoubtedly got too many urgent concerns and too little time on your hands for gossip, so we’ll leave it for another time.”