It came to Felix then that he had not fully understood at all how his own parents had shielded him, and Lisi too, from the remote person who was their grandfather. Now he wondered if Oma Kimmel had spent her own life, and probably her health, protecting her son from the same cold presence.
The dog slid onto its side with a low wheeze of contentment.
Felix stopped rubbing its ears and stared instead at the faint liquid slit of its eyes. Sleeping, yes. He looked around the hall again. This house, he thought, where nothing was complicated and no one was appraising you. It was a refuge.
He was actually getting drowsy himself now. He let his eyes close, and Giuliana’s face came to him. He struggled to hang onto it as other thoughts edged in, even as it became her hurt look, the reproachful one when they’d had words. The “talk” she wanted: he’d been annoyed because he’d been thinking things were actually going okay. The new police force need people like him. Lots of things would open up for him in the new police force. Even Gebi had conceded that. He might even go back to Uni for evening courses, and maybe even get paid for it too. Next thing you’d know, there’d be the applications for the Alpines, or even the Cobra, and plainclothes jobs anywhere across Austria. Why not even think about international stuff too?
The vibrations from his phone startled him, and the dog’s eyes opened.
Speckbauer didn’t sound one bit drowsy.
“You’re doing okay?”
Felix didn’t know what to say. He patted the dog’s head again, but the eyes stayed open now, the ears up.
“I’m awake, for sure. Where are you?”
“Why are you whispering?”
“I don’t want to wake my grandparents. Are you on the road?”
“I’m outside, beyond the light there in the yard.”
“But I don’t see your car I didn’t see it coming up the valley.”
“You’re in the house?”
“Yes. I’m downstairs. I can come out.”
“Stay put,” said Speckbauer. “We’ll take care of things. Has there been anything since? Any noise or stuff?”
“No.”
“Good. This is what we’re doing, for the time being, so listen.
Me and Franzi are moving about out here, eyeballing the place.
We’re going to keep doing that for a while. Verstehst?”
“I get it, but what do I do?”
“What? You want me to sit beside you and hold your hand?”
“It’s dark, what can you see?”
“Pretty well anything I want to damned well see. Really, believe me, we’ve done this kind of work before.”
“If I may say, Herr Oberstleutnant, I think we should try to get things clear.”
“Nothing is clear,” said Speckbauer sharply. “Nix. So save it.
It’s just the work. We’re in the business of wading around in a big swamp. It’s called Der schein trugt, this area we work in: the land of Nothing-Is-Clear. Shitty, isn’t it, but that’s life.”
‘All is not how it looks,’ Felix thought.
Speckbauer didn’t say anything for several moments.
“How am I going to explain this to them?” Felix asked.
“Deal with it later. It’ll work out.”
“What should I be doing, though? There has to be something.”
“Know what I want from you right now? Go to bed. That’s it.
But here’s something to think about while you’re nodding off.
Anyone passing down the way here, this road, can see your car parked there in the yard. That’s not helpful.”
THIRTY-TWO
Felix jerked his head away from the wall.He could remember deciding to rest it there, but only for a moment. The milky half-light softened the interior of the farmhouse and made the view from where Felix had slouched both mysterious and familiar. There was a glow at the edges of the hilltops which were framed by the kitchen window, but a handful of stars held out in the pale blue above.
Five-thirty. Berndt watched him with doleful eyes, his eyebrows shooting up and down but his head never stirring from its resting place on his paws. Felix switched off the yard light and threw on an old jacket. Slowly he opened the kitchen door and stepped into the yard. The birds were busy, and the cold tang of air that met his face revived him. He heard the pigs shuffling, one of them kicking a plank, and a grunt, as he made his way across the yard to the cars.
He slowed and even stopped several times on his way, but could not see traces of any visitor last night. Nothing had changed. In the distance he heard a cowbell clanking.
His phone went off.
“You’re not going for a little drive now, are you?” said Speckbauer.
“Where are you?”
“I’m in a ditch. Freezing my ass off.”
“I can’t see you.”
“Then I’m doing my job. Look, stay there. And don’t walk around yet. Me and Franzi are going to do a bit of basic police work.”
“You’re leaving?”
“No. Now we have a bit of light, I want to give the place a lookover, from where your car is down to the road. We’ll see if there are signs of any company last night, any uninvited guests. Right?”
“Yes.”
“Meanwhile, wait,” said Speckbauer.
Felix heard his voice change. He seemed to be getting up.
“Now remember,” said Speckbauer. “Don’t phone anyone.
Right?”
“Who would I be phoning?”
“The local Gendarmerie, that’s who. We’re handling it.”
Speckbauer seemed to be waiting for a reply. Felix wondered if Speckbauer had guessed he’d have been thinking of Gebhart, or even Schroek.
“I understand.”
“Gut. Now can you get some coffee started or something? It’s only polite.”
“You’re coming down to the house after?”
“Of course we are. Franzi and I have a good spiel ready and we’ll come in off the road. We’ll be visiting to, let me see, ‘speak with you on a very pressing matter.’ If he asks, your grandfather.”
“He’s not stupid, you know.”
“Did I say he was?”
Felix closed the connection first. He looked through bleary eyes around the fields. Speckbauer must be near the orchard. As Felix stared at it, movement to his right made him turn. It was Franzi, the spook, looking pale and very cold. As he nodded, the sky, glowing lemon where they met the hills, glanced once off his glasses. Then he said something into his collar, turned away, and stepped back behind the firs.
Felix didn’t move, but pretended instead to savour the crisp air, the glory of a mountain sunrise. He was able to control his breathing, even if spots began to appear in front of his eyes. The problem he was focusing on however was that he didn’t trust his knees not to buckle the minute he began to stroll about the yard. He was putting his anger into preventing Speckbauer, wherever he was, from enjoying any sign of his shock.
It wasn’t the sight of Franzi shrouded under what looked like a hooded army poncho, with the reflected dawn on his glasses giving his face the look of an insect up close that had Felix now measuring out his breath and struggling to keep an appearance of composure. It was the glimpse of what Franzi’s hand was holding down by its strap. It was a sturmgewehr, the assault rifle that every Gendarmeriepost had, which was taken out only for drills and inspection. This one with a peculiarly large sight attached.
After a minute Felix made his way back to the kitchen and began to prepare drip coffee. He cursed aloud when he dropped the lid, but he trapped it quickly with his foot to stop it skittering on the floor. He stared at it before picking it up, as though it might have a life of its own there, and tried to clear his thoughts.
Gebi would be up already. He pulled out the phone but hesitated then, and gazed back out the window and up to the slopes. A flood of sunlight built up behind the hills was about to burst.