An icy breeze brushed my face and set the foliage sighing. Something hit the ground with a soft thud; I knew it must be snow falling from the laden branches of the trees, but my pulse skipped a beat or two. I was about to turn away when the door swung silently open into a space of absolute blackness.
The warm familiar smell of shavings and wood smoke wafting out of the house did not move me to enter. I stood squinting into the black silence until a hand wrapped around my arm and yanked me inside. My nerves were in such a state that I swung wildly at the dark. I missed him, of course; the door closed, two arms wrapped around me, pinning my arms to my sides, and two lips planted themselves firmly on mine. I had always suspected he could see in the dark.
“It is you,” John said, after a prolonged interval.
“Who did you think it was?”
“One never knows.” He continued to hold me immobile. I knew the futility of struggling against a man who knew more dirty, underhanded wrestling holds than Bruce Lee. Besides, I couldn’t see a thing. Besides, I didn’t especially want to struggle.
“No more hitting?” he inquired hopefully.
“Sorry about that. I find all this a trifle unnerving.”
“You aren’t the only one.” He let me go. Then a light went on. It came from a door to the right—the door into the workshop, which John had opened. He gestured. “In here.”
He had made himself comfortable. The room now contained an overstuffed chair and a reading lamp, next to the workbench, where a tall slim bottle stood in incongruous juxtaposition to Müller’s tools.
I was about to ask what had become of the cat when a muffled yowl and the sound of claws on wood gave me the answer. Clara was in the parlor, across the hall. Clara didn’t want to be in the parlor, across the hall.
“A nice warm purring cat would add to the creature comforts,” I suggested.
John pushed me into the shop and closed the door. I could still hear Clara. The complaints of a Siamese cat are hard on the ears—and, after a time, on the nerves. John said shortly, “That is not a nice warm purring cat.”
“You can’t keep her in there all the time.”
John turned to face me, displaying a neat row of parallel scratches along one cheek. “Oh yes, I can,” he said.
“But the poor thing…”
“Forget the damned cat,” said John. “It won’t be neglected; have you ever known me to be cruel to a living creature? Don’t answer that….”
“A complete inventory would take too long,” I agreed.
John’s face darkened. His sense of humor was decidedly under par that evening. “I haven’t time to exchange feeble witticisms with you. Any news?”
“Quite a lot.” I sat down in the chair and picked up the glass from which he had been drinking. “Delicate and fruity, with a fresh bouquet,” I said appreciatively, after sampling the contents. “Piesporter Goldtröpfchen? Or do you call it hock?”
“I don’t call it anything, I just drink it.” He poured wine into another glass and hoisted one hip onto the table.
“Guess who I ran into this evening,” I said coyly.
“I don’t have to guess. I saw you being matey with your colleagues in Garmisch.”
“Oh, those convenient ski masks,” I murmured.
“As you say. One was the chap from Berlin—I recognized him from your snapshots. Who was the woman?”
“Elise. She’s dyed her hair.”
“Aha. That makes two of them. Three if we include your lengthy admirer.”
“Four. Jan Perlmutter is in Bad Steinbach.”
That didn’t surprise him either. “I rather thought he might be.”
“Did you rather think Schmidt might be here?” I inquired, hoping to puncture that smug, know-it-all façade.
I succeeded. He stopped swinging his foot and slammed it to the floor. “Schmidt here? I told him to stay in Munich!”
“I know it must be a blow to your reputation as world’s champion spinner of fantastic stories, but you obviously failed to convince Schmidt.” I held out my empty glass and added generously, “He isn’t easy to convince. Even a master liar like you—”
Frowning, John splashed wine into my glass. “I told him I wanted him to stand guard over your house—promised him armed desperadoes, attack, invasion, or some other form of entertainment. I fully expected the little elf would arm himself to the teeth and squat there indefinitely. You don’t suppose…”
“Impossible. There wasn’t a mark on him.” I chewed on my lower lip; then I said reluctantly, “He was absolutely bombed by the time we found him. He doesn’t do that without good and sufficient reason.”
“What did he say?”
“He mentioned you. He didn’t explain, though; he had just spotted Perlmutter and was all excited about him. Then he—well, he passed out.”
“Wake him.”
“No use. He’s out for the next six hours, I’ve seen it before. I’ll talk to him in the morning.”
“Bloody hell,” John muttered. “I don’t like this.”
“I don’t like any of it. How about you? Any luck?”
“Only in a negative sense. Look here.” He put his glass down. The back of the shop was dark; when he pulled the chain of a hanging bulb, I saw that the pieces of the Schrank had been neatly arranged in something like the original order—the back against the wall, the two side pieces next to them, and, in between, a pile of rougher boards that were obviously the shelves. John picked up the topmost of these; it was a solid slab of hardwood three-quarters of an inch thick, unadorned and unfinished. He turned it to the light. The marks were clearly visible—slightly indented, faintly stained.
“Something stood on that shelf for years, probably decades,” he said. “Something heavy and rectangular—”
“The treasure chest?” I said dubiously. “Boy, talk about jumping to conclusions—”
“I know it was a chest.” John put the shelf down and indicated a smaller pile of scraps, off to one side. “Here are the pieces of it. The dimensions fit the marks on the shelf. Now observe—there is nothing up my sleeve….” He carried the scraps to the workbench and laid them out. “Bottom, sides, top. It’s oak, hardened with age. Even Freddy must have had a spot of bother chopping it up. Threads caught on splinters within indicate it was once lined with wool, possibly a piece of blanket.” I opened my mouth to object; John raised a minatory finger. “Wait. The best is yet to come.” From his breast pocket he took a small plasticized envelope, the kind jewelers use, and waved it. Sparks flared and danced. I snatched it from him.
“Gold!”
John resumed his pose on the edge of the bench, his foot swinging. “Gold. A grand total of five minuscule grains caught on splinters, or on the wool threads. No, don’t open it, they’re so light they’ll simply float away. There’s not enough to test, but from the color and the texture it appears to be virtually pure—twenty-four carat.”
“No wonder they smashed the Schrank,” I murmured. “It was there—my God, it was there all the time, while I sat listening to Brahms with Hoffman. Less than five feet away from me….”
The small envelope swayed in my fingers; the gold twinkled like tiny stars. John took it from me and replaced it in his pocket.
“That would appear to be the case,” he said coolly. “Friedl knew where it was kept; when she went looking for it, after Hoffman’s—shall we stretch a point and say ‘accident’—she found he had removed it. Hell hath no fury, et cetera; she may have been angry enough to kick the chest to bits with her own dainty foot.”
“I can’t believe he would be so casual about it! Right there in his living room—”