The bookseller-fetched a map and ringed the areas. There is the Blumenstrasse, the Vorkloster – both are Catholic. And here is the Protestant burial-ground…'
Claire was waiting when Martel descended the steps into the otherwise deserted subway. She stood gazing at a scene behind an illuminated window set into the wall. The glass protected relics of an archaeological dig which had unearthed the ancient Roman town which once stood on the site of present- day Bregenz.
'Spooky, isn't it?' Clare remarked and gave a little shudder. 'All that time ago. And today in this mist the whole place seems creepy – and I haven't found a trace of Warner…'
'Last Saturday he was standing not a hundred feet from where we are standing now…'
She listened while he summed up his interview with the helpful bookseller. As he completed his resume she was frowning. 'I'm not grasping the significance…'
Join the club – except that one thing's almost frighteningly certain. He was here last Saturday. Sunday he's murdered out on the lake. Whatever he found in Bregenz probably triggered off that murder
…'
'But how long ago was the French military occupation of Austria, for God's sake? This goes back to just after the war…'
`Not necessarily. The Allied occupation of Austria ended May 15 1955 – so whatever Warner dug up could have happened close to that date…'
`It's still over a quarter of a century ago,' she objected, 'so what could have happened then that's relevant to today?'
'Damned if I know – that's what we have to find out. That yarn Warner spun about his closest friend dying here was eye-wash, but he had his teeth into something. The period – the time of the French occupation might mean something…'
`So how do we find out, where do we start?'
'We hire a car first at a place I saw near here. Then we visit the three cemeteries Warner was enquiring about. The secret has to lie in one of them. Literally…'
Erwin Vinz walked into the bookseller's shop in Kaiserstrasse. Despite his later arrival in Bregenz he had, without knowing, an advantage over Marteclass="underline" six men were scouring the town. He spoke first to a girl assistant and asked for the manager. She went upstairs to find the proprietor who had talked to Martel.
'I'd better go down and see this man myself,' the bookseller decided.
On the ground floor he listened while Vinz told his story. The verbal description Vinz gave was graphic. Take away the glasses and add a cigarette holder and the bookseller recognised that this man was describing his earlier visitor. The Austrian studied Vinz and was careful not to interrupt.
`You say that this man has escaped from a mental asylum?' he enquired eventually.
`Yes. A very violent patient. Unfortunately he can give the impression he is completely normal and this makes him even more dangerous. You have seen this man?'
CHAPTER
Thursday May 28
IN GOTTES FRIEDEN ALOIS STOHR 1930-1953
In God We Trust… Inside the mist-bound cemetery known as the Blumenstrasse three people stared at the headstone. Martel and Claire were bewildered. Alois Stohr? The name meant nothing to either of them. Martel turned to the gravedigger who had brought them to this spot. Again he showed him Warner's photo.
'Look, you're quite certain this was the man who asked to see this particular grave?'
The old gravedigger wore an ancient cap and his moustache dripped moisture globules from the grey vapour swirling amid the headstones. So far as Martel could see – which was not very far – they were the only visitors. It was not a day to encourage sentimental journeys.
'This is the man.'
The gravedigger, Martel noted, spoke with the same conviction of recognition as had the bookseller when viewing the photo. And he had identified Warner previously before Martel gave him a sheaf of schilling notes.
'When did he come here?' Martel asked.
'Last week. Saturday.'
The same story that the bookseller had told. It was maddening. Martel no longer had any doubt that Charles Warner had visited this particular grave only a short time before he was murdered. But where was the link-up – what made Alois Stohr so important he must remain undisturbed at all cost?
'Did he say anything else, anything at all?' Martel demanded.
'Simply asked me to show him the grave of Alois Stohr
Watching on the sidelines Claire had an overpowering impression the gravedigger was withdrawing into his shell under the impact of Martel's interrogation. The Englishman continued.
'Did he give the date of Stohr's death?'
'Only said it was near the end of the French occupation…'
Warner had used a similar phrase while talking to the bookseller in Kaiserstrasse. It was during the French military occupation… Why pinpoint the time like that instead of giving an approximate year?
Claire had remained silent, studying the gravedigger, and she spoke suddenly, her voice confident as though she knew the reply and was interested only in confirmation?
'Who else visits this grave?'
'I don't know as I should talk about such things,' the old boy said after a long pause. Martel almost held his breath: Claire, by a flash of intuition, had put her finger on something they would otherwise not have been told. She kept up the pressure.
`My friend gave you a generous sum so we expect complete frankness. Who comes here?'
`I don't know her name. She comes every week. Always on a Wednesday and always at eight in the morning. She lays a bunch of flowers, waits a few minutes and then goes…'
`How does she get here?' Claire persisted. 'By car? By cab?'
`She comes in a cab- and keeps it waiting till she leaves…'
`Her description? Colour of hair? Her age roughly. How is she dressed? Modestly? Expensively?'
The barrage of questions reinforced the gravedigger's obvious reluctance to say more. He handed Warner's photo back to Martel and picked up his shovel, prior to departure.
`Expensive – her clothes…'
`Colour of hair?' Claire went on relentlessly.
`Can't say – she always wears a head-scarf…'
`And you passed on the same information to the man in this photo when he came here?' Martel asked.
The gravedigger, shouldering his shovel like a soldier, was moving away, vanishing into the mist shrouding the headstones. His voice came back like that of a ghost.
`Yes. And I think he found out where she lived. While she was here I saw him talking to her cab-driver. Money exchanged hands
Have you seen this man?
The bookseller who had talked to Martel adjusted his glasses and gazed at Erwin Vinz. He took his time before replying.
`You have some form of identification?' he enquired.
`You have seen the escaped patient then?' Vinz pressed eagerly. 'As to identification – we're not police, we don't carry cards…'
`Your description means nothing to me. I have never had anyone in my shop remotely resembling this man. If you will excuse me, I have a shop to run…'
He watched Vinz leave, shoulders hunched, his mouth a thin line. He climbed into a car outside, said something to the driver and the vehicle disappeared. The girl assistant spoke tentatively.
'I thought we did have a man in here earlier…
'You think that man who just called had anything to do with an asylum?' There was a note of contempt in the Austrian's voice.
'For one thing he was a German so he would have approached the authorities if his story were true…'
'You think he was…'
'Lying in his teeth. You have just met a neo-Nazi – I can smell the breed, to say nothing of the badge he flaunts in his coat lapel. If he returns, tell me and I will call the police…'
The sun had burnt off the mist and it was now a brilliant afternoon. When Vinz arrived and left two men to watch the railway station there remained a team of six – including himself and he had divided them up into pairs. Each couple took one of the three cars to explore the district allocated to them.