Read Games of the Hangman Online
Authors: Victor O'Reilly
"Did he
say anything?" asked the intern.
He
was drying his hands.
"Something,"
said the Bear.
"Not a lot.
He hadn't a lot left to talk with."
"But you
know who did it?"
"It looks
that way."
"Is it
always like this?" asked the Berp.
"That noise when they die?"
The young policeman had an unseasoned look about him.
Not a good choice, thought the Bear, but then
you have to start sometime.
"Not
always," he said, "but often enough.
It's not called the death rattle without good reason."
He gestured at the cassette in the envelope.
"Take it to Examining Magistrate von
Beck.
The fresh air will do you
good."
Afterward the
Bear went to the Bärengraben for a little snack and a think.
There would be a warrant out for Ivo within
the hour.
This time it would not be a
matter of routine questioning.
The
little idiot would be charged with murder — at least until more information was
available.
Even if he ended up with a
lesser charge, he was going to be locked up for an awfully long time.
The Monkey had
not actually died from having his face destroyed but from a one-sided encounter
with a delivery truck as he ran in panic through the streets near the
Hauptbahnhof.
Whether that made Ivo —
them man who had wielded the chain and thus induced the panic —
guilty
of
murder was
something for the lawyers to decide.
But
what had possessed Ivo to behave so savagely?
He had no track record of violence, and the Bear would have bet modest
money that he would never do such a thing.
Nonetheless, the Monkey was undoubtedly telling the truth.
Ivo had done it.
Had he understood the damage he was doing
when he struck?
Probably not, but such
an excuse wouldn't take him very far in court.
The Bear doubted that Ivo would survive a long stretch in prison.
The Monkey had
been incoherent most of the time, but he had had some lucid moments.
The Bear remembered one in particular:
"...and I gave them to him.
I did.
I did.
But he wouldn’t stop.
He's mad.
I gave them to him."
What
had the Monkey been trying to say?
What
did he mean by ‘them’?
The Bear
enjoyed his meal.
He made a list on his
table napkin of what the Monkey might have been referring to, but then he
needed it to remove the cream sauce from his mustache.
He thought the Monkey's demise was one of the
better things that had happened to
He felt sorry for Ivo.
He also thought that the Chief Kripo, with
yet another dead body on his hands — albeit the killer identified — would be
shitting bricks.
Well, rank had
its privileges.
*
*
*
*
*
It was
Fitzduane's third or fourth visit to Simon Balac's studio after Erika von
Graffenlaub had introduced the two men at Kuno Gonschior's vernissage.
Simon didn't project the smoldering anger of
so many creative artists, or the sense of insecurity heightened by years of rejection.
His manner was charming and relaxed, but his
conversational style was enlivened by a pointed wit.
He was well informed and widely
traveled.
Good company, in fact.
Simon was
often away at exhibitions or seeking creative inspiration, but when in
amounted to a salon.
This took place
every weekday between twelve and two, when the painter broke for lunch and
conversation with his friends.
For the
rest of the day Simon was ruthless in guarding his privacy.
The doors were locked and he painted.
Posters of
Balac's various exhibitions held throughout Europe and
It was said that a Balac routinely commanded
prices in excess of twenty thousand dollars.
He painted fewer than a dozen or so a year, and many, after one showing,
went immediately into bank vaults as investments.
His corporate customers, keenly aware of his
ability to market his output to maximum advantage, admired his business acumen
as much as his artistic talent.
Socially he was
much in demand.
Balac was a good
listener with the ability to draw others out and spend little time talking
about
himself
, but Fitzduane gathered that he was an
expatriate American who had originally come to the Continent to study art in
"My
affair with Sabine didn't last," he had said, "but with
She tolerates my
little infidelities when I sample the delights of other cities because I always
return.
To me
woman.
Innocence has novelty but
experience has performance."
He
laughed as if to show that he didn't want to be taken seriously.
It was hard to know where Balac stood on most
issues.
His warm, open manner, combined
with his sense of humor, tended to conceal what lay beneath, and Fitzduane did
not try to dig.
He was content to enjoy
the painter's hospitality and his company.
Sometimes the
Irishman just wanted to relax.
The three
weeks he'd spent in
Apart from
the immediate family, he'd interviewed more than sixty different people about
Rudi von Graffenlaub.
It might all be
very interesting, and it might even lead somewhere — but relaxing it was not.
There was also
the matter of the language.
Most of the
people the Irishman was dealing with seemed — seemed — to speak excellent
English, but there was still a strain attached to conversation that was absent
when both parties spoke a common language.
As the day wore on and people got tired and drink flowed, the situation
got worse.
People reverted to their
native tongues.
Even the Bear had taken
to suggesting he learn Berndeutsch.
Fitzduane had replied that since most of the Irish didn't even speak their
own language, such suggestions were on the foolish side of optimism.
The attendance
at Balac's daily salon varied considerably from several dozen to zero depending
on who knew he was back in town, other commitments, the weather, and one's
appetite for basic food.
Balac
discouraged people who liked to treat his place as a handy location for a quick
lunch, both by his manner and by minimizing the attractiveness of his
table.
Balac's was about talk and
company — not gourmet cuisine and fine wines.
There was a selection of cold meats and cheeses laid out on a table, and
you drank beer.
The fare never changed.
This was one
of the quiet days, and since Fitzduane had come late and the others had
departed early, for the first time the Irishman and Balac found
themselves
alone.
"You like
our fair city, eh?
"
Balac said.
He uncapped a Gurten beer and drank straight
from the bottle.
It seemed to Fitzduane
that he cultivated the bohemian image when he was working.
In the evenings, by contrast, he was polished
and urbane.
There was a touch of the
actor about Balac.
"Well,
I'm still here," said Fitzduane.
He
ate some Bündnerfleisch, thinly sliced beef that had been cured for many months
in the mountain air.
"Are you
any the wiser about Rudi?" asked Balac.
"A little,
not much," said Fitzduane.
He
refilled his glass.
He spent enough time
in countries where either beer or glasses or both were lacking not to have
learned to make the most of what was offered.
"Do you
think you ever will find out more?
Is it
possible to know what truly motivates someone to
take
his
own life — when he leaves no
note?
Surely all you can do is
speculate
, and what good does that do?"
"No,"
said Fitzduane, "I don't think I ever will find out the truth.
I'm not sure I'll even come close to an
intelligent guess.
As to what good it
does, I'm beginning to wonder.
Perhaps
all I wanted to do was bury a ghost, to put an unpleasant event in context.
I don't really know."
He smiled.
"I guess if I can't work out my own motives, I'm not going to have
much luck with Rudi.
On the other hand,
I have to admit that coming over here has made me feel better.
I expect it is just being in a different
environment."
"I'm a
little surprised," said Balac.
"I've read your book.
You're
an experienced combat photographer.
Surely you've become accustomed to the sight of a violent death?"
"Aren't I
lucky I'm not?" said Fitzduane
The
conversation drifted on to art and then to that topic beloved by the
expatriate:
the peculiarities of host
countries, in this case of the Swiss, and the Bernese in particular.
Balac had a seemingly bottomless store of
Bernese jokes and anecdotes.
Just before
two o'clock Fitzduane stood up to go.
He
looked at the clock.
"This is sort
of like Cinderella in reverse," he said.
"She had to leave because she switched
images at midnight and didn't want to be found out.
So what happens here after the doors
close?"
Balac
laughed.
"You’ve got your stories
mixed up," he said.
"Having
drunk the potion — in this case a liter of beer — I turn from Dr. Jekyll, the
gregarious host, into Mr. Hyde, the obsessional painter."
Fitzduane
looked at the large canvas that dominated the wall in front of him.
No art expert, he would have called the style
a cross between surreal and abstract — descriptions Balac rejected.
The power of his imagery was immediate.
It managed to convey suffering, violence, and
beauty, all interrelated in the most astonishing way.
Balac's talent could not be denied.
As he left,
Fitzduane laughed to himself.
He heard the
multiple electronic locks of Balac's studio click behind him.
He could see television monitors watching the
entrance.
Twenty thousand dollars a
picture, he thought.
Van Gogh, when he
was alive, didn't need that kind of protection.
A little later as he window-shopped, the signs of Easter, from
colored eggs to chocolate rabbits, everywhere, he thought about Etan, and he
missed her.
*
*
*
*
*
Fitzduane
watched the Learjet with Irish government markings glide to a halt.
The Lear was
the Irish government's one and only executive jet, and it was supposed to be
reserved for ministers and those of similar ilk.
But Kilmara, he knew, liked to work the
system.
"They
wanted to send a reception committee," said Kilmara.
"Good manners, the Swiss, but I said I'd
prefer to use the time to talk to you first."
He held his face up to the sky.
"God, what beautiful weather," he
said.
"It was spitting cats and
dogs when I left Baldonnel.
I think I'll
emigrate and become a banker."
"I take
it you haven't flown over to wish me a Happy Easter," said Fitzduane.
Kilmara
grinned.
"An interesting
Easter," he said.
"Let's start
with that."
They left
Belpmoos,
little airport, and drove to the apartment.
They were followed by two unmarked police cars, and a team carrying
automatic weapons guarded the building as they talked.
At Belpmoos the Lear was held under armed
guard and searched for explosive devices.
It would be searched again prior to takeoff.