Borrower of the Night: The First Vicky Bliss Mystery (24 page)

“Oy,” I said, pushing it away. “That I don’t need. Will you please—”

“I am a student of medicine,” said the boy grandly. “Rest quietly,
Fräulein
, all has been done as you directed. But what in God’s name has happened?”

“Look at my face,” I said hysterically. “I know I’m drunk, but I can’t help looking like this, I didn’t do it on purpose; and I don’t know why all you men can’t stop looking at my—”

He had been patting me—absentmindedly, I’m sure. He got quite red and leaped to his feet.

“I apologize! No disrespect was intended—”

“I know,” I said sadly.

I had not forgotten the
Gräfin
, but I was no longer worried about her; with all those husky witnesses running around, it was unlikely that she could do any more damage. She must have heard all the activity and come down to see what was going on. When I saw her standing in the doorway, I struggled to a sitting position.

She dismissed the student with an autocratic wave of her hand. Her faint smile, as she studied my unkempt person, told me more clearly than any mirror how terrible I must look. It stung me into relative coherence.

“Grin all you want,” I said. “You still lose. All is known.”

Her smile didn’t change.

“Poor girl, you are delirious after all you have suffered. But if you will insist on prying into places where you have no right to be—”

“It won’t work,” I said. “George is dead.”

That did it. Her smile vanished.

“I’m going to let you go,” I said. “I hate to do it, but without George I’m not sure how much we can prove. In your position, though, I wouldn’t risk it.”

“You would turn an old woman from her home?”

“You can go live with Miss Burton. I’ll bet she’s loaded; you wouldn’t cultivate her for her gracious personality. And you probably have plenty stashed away. You’ve been milking this place of its salable antiques for years.”

She stood there looking at me with the Medusa stare that had paralyzed so many luckless victims. It didn’t affect me. She had no power, except over weak minds like Irma’s and Miss Burton’s.

“The police will be here any minute,” I said.

She left.

The local constabulary of Rothenburg, accustomed to drunken brawls and traffic jams, were out of their depth at the
Schloss
. The case was closed. There was nothing for them to do but gather up the wounded. However, they were understandably confounded by the train of events. Finally one of them settled the matter.

“Mad,” he said, tapping his forehead. “The man was mad, no doubt.”

Everyone agreed. Then, at long last, they led me to my room, and with a groan of voluptuous satisfaction I fell full length on the bed, dirty and half naked as I was, and let my poor old eyes close.

It was late the following afternoon when we all assembled in my room for the denouement. I had slept till noon. Then I washed. That took quite a while. I spent the rest of the time at the hospital with Schmidt, who was coming along nicely. We had a fascinating talk. I was giddy with the implications when I joined the others.

Tony and Blankenhagen were still acting like wounded heroes. I thought Tony had overdone the bandages just a bit, but the effect was impressive.

Irma looked beautiful. She hadn’t dug through forty feet of dirt or fallen down a shaft or crawled through a couple of miles of brambles. She had simply rested peacefully for a few hours. She was safe, rich, beautiful, and surrounded by men who had risked all for her sake—at least that was how she thought of it. No wonder she looked gorgeous. She could even afford to be nice to me. She made me a pretty little speech thanking me for my help.

I looked at my bare arms, which were covered with a network of scratches, and squinted at the tip of my nose, which had a scab on it, and I said dispiritedly, “Oh, no problem. I had a talk with your aunt last night. I was dignified, but convincing.”

“You should not have let her escape,” said Blankenhagen critically.

“It would be hard to prove her guilty of anything except poisoning Irma’s mind. That kind of crime is hard to describe in a court of law.”

“It was a nightmare.” Irma shivered prettily. “To think that the soul of that dead woman could seize my body…”

All of us looked at that astounding portrait.

“Damn it,” Tony muttered. “The resemblance is uncanny.”

“Not really.” I lifted the portrait off the wall. I had had plenty of time to study it, and I wasn’t proud of myself for seeing the truth. It should not have taken me so long. “The
Gräfin
didn’t miss a trick. See how faded the rest of the picture is, compared to the face? Someone has touched it up.”

“You mean—that is not how she looked?” Irma gasped.

“No one will ever know what she looked like.” I tossed the portrait carelessly onto the bed. “When your aunt mentioned that she had studied painting…” I shrugged. “If you doubt me, have an expert examine this thing. Even I can see that it is modern work.”

“It started so long ago,” Irma said, pressing her hands to her face in another of those pretty, fragile gestures. “Even before my uncle died, she hated me. Then, later, she started to tell me stories—terrible stories about the crimes of the Drachensteins and the burning of Konstanze. I had not noticed the portrait till she showed it to me; there are so many faded pictures here.”

“She had to keep you off balance so she could steal your belongings,” Tony said.

“She sold even the locks from the doors. She said there was no money from my uncle, that we had to live.”

“Forget it,” I said. “Everybody has a few rotten apples on the family tree. We all have the same family tree, if you go back far enough. I have a little surprise for you that should take your mind off your troubles.”

“I hope,” said Blankenhagen apprehensively, “that you do not want any stones moved?”

“I’m no more anxious to move stones than you are. George has already been here, so it shouldn’t be necessary.”

Mortar had been cleared from around four stones that formed a door. It yielded easily to the pressure of my hand, exposing a dark cavity in the wall. The space was almost filled by a big wooden box. Everyone rushed forward to help me get it out onto the table. I brushed off some of the encrusted dirt and broke the corroded hasp with a twist of my hands. The front of the box fell away.

Against a Gothic tracery of carved vines and flowers sat the Virgin, her unbound hair flowing over her blue robe, her hands lightly touching the Child on her knee. Above them, cunningly supported by sections of the vine, hovered two angels, slender youths with austere young faces and lifted golden wings. One of the wings was missing.

The three kings knelt at Mary’s feet, and for a disgraceful interlude my eyes forgot the beauty of the carving and lingered greedily on the stones set in the sculptured forms. Balthasar was dressed in crimson; on his head, framed in gold, was an emerald whose depths caught the sunlight and flung it back in a thousand green reflections. Melchoir, behind him, wore a turban set with a great baroque pearl. The third king, balancing the group on the right, lifted his gift in both hands: a golden bowl, holding a globe of scarlet fire.

Irma’s eyes were as round as saucers.

“Mine?” she said, in a childish squeak.

“Yep,” I said.

She was staring at the stones, not the figures. Her open mouth was pink and pretty and wet and greedy. And then, just as I was enjoying my contempt for her, she did something that cut the ground out from under my feet.

“No, it is yours,” she said suddenly. “Three gems, for the three who saved my life. Do they measure any value compared to that?”

“Certainly not,” said Blankenhagen; and “My God, no,” said Tony.

They could afford to be noble. Whoever married Irma—and I figured they had an equal chance, she was ready to fall into the arms of any man who asked her—got all three stones. I felt old and wise and rather sad. She was corny, but she was a good kid. I think she really meant it—for about a minute and a half.

“Aw,” I said, “shucks. Forget it, Irma.”

“But I mean it!”

“Sure you do. But we can’t accept anything like that.”

“But—but what can I do with it?” Irma asked helplessly.

“The National museum, I think,” said Blankenhagen. “It is the richest in Germany; it will offer a fair price.”

“The Met, or some foreign museum, might offer more,” said Tony. Irma looked at him.

“No,” said Blankenhagen firmly. Irma looked at him. “It is fitting that such a treasure should remain in Germany.”

“Hmmm,” I said. “Tell you one thing. If I were you, I’d take those jewels out and sell them separately. Nobody can afford to buy the shrine as it is; and the jewels will attract every crook on two continents. You can substitute paste copies without affecting the beauty of the workmanship; and isn’t that the important thing?”

“Are you always right?” asked Blankenhagen, looking at me severely. “You are too clever. That is a very annoying quality. How did you know the shrine was here, in this room?”

“Oh, well,” I said modestly, “that was easy. You told Irma about the arsenic, and Burckhardt’s murder? But don’t you see, that was the clue we were looking for. Many of the details will never be known; but I think I can reconstruct the outlines of the story now.

“Konstanze was young, seventeen or eighteen, when Burckhardt married her and brought her here. Yet even then she must have been deeply involved in the witch cult; they started young, usually at puberty. It isn’t surprising that she should have learned to despise her oafish husband. Maybe she turned to Nicolas because he was available, and corrupted him. Maybe he didn’t need corrupting. A man of his ability must have hated the social system that labeled him inferior, and the ignorant clod who exemplified that system.

“Anyhow, I’m sure the two became lovers before the Revolt broke out. Konstanze had been poisoning her husband for some time; it takes several months for arsenic to work its way through the body and show up in the hair and nails. And there were all those references to Burckhardt’s queasy stomach, remember?

“Burckhardt’s call to arms must have pleased her. She wouldn’t have shed any tears if he had been killed in battle. Then the matter of the shrine came up, and that was a real bonus. I can see Konstanze drooling over those jewels and cursing the old count for giving them to the church.

“At first, everything seemed to be working out for the lovers. Burckhardt practically handed the shrine over to them by sending it to Rothenburg in Nicolas’ charge. Nicolas murdered or bribed the guards and brought the shrine to the
Schloss
alone. He and Konstanze hid it in the tomb of the old count. Then Konstanze wrote that letter to her husband saying that the expedition had never arrived.”

“He kept her letters,” Tony muttered. “Carried them around with him, brought them here….”

“He was a stupid sentimentalist,” said Blankenhagen, looking contemptuously at Tony. “Stupid not to suspect such a story…”

“We didn’t suspect it,” I said wryly. “And he was deeply in love with her; love has a very dulling effect on the brain. There was no reason why anyone should have been suspicious. Even when we found Nicolas’ body, and the wing that had been broken off the shrine, there was no evidence to show that Konstanze knew anything about it.

“After that night, when Nicolas appeared as the Black Man, he went into hiding. He couldn’t be seen hanging about; Konstanze meant to kill her husband, if he wasn’t killed in battle, but until he was dead she couldn’t let him get suspicious. And he wasn’t the only one who had to be deceived. The bishop was after the shrine and he was giving Konstanze a hard time. I’ll bet her reputation was already shaky. The mere fact that she read authors like Albertus Magnus and Trithemius would be enough to start nasty gossip.

“So Burckhardt came home from the wars, hale and hearty, and delighted to see his loving wife. She didn’t waste any time. He was taken ill the day after his return.

“On the crucial night, the night of the steward’s murder, the conspirators decided to move the shrine. We’ll never know why; Burckhardt was dying, so maybe they thought it was safe to proceed with their plans. At any rate, there they were, down in the crypt; I can see Konstanze holding the lamp and Nicolas working on the tombstone. He raised it. The shrine was lifted out, losing a wing in the process. And then…

“Then they looked up and saw, in the lamp-light, the face of the man they had robbed and cheated and tried to murder. God knows what aroused him, or how he got the strength to come looking for them. But he was there. He must have been there. He saw the lovers, with the shrine between them, and he knew the truth. You can’t blame him for turning berserk. The theft of the shrine was bad enough, but the knowledge that his servant and his beloved wife had cuckolded him…he went mad. By the time he finished Nicolas, who must have put up a fight, Konstanze was gone—with the shrine. I suppose she had someone with her, a servant maybe, who had helped with the heavy work. She could quietly bump him off at any time with her handy store of arsenic. Nobody asked questions in those days about the death of a serf.

“After stabbing Nicolas and throwing him down at Harald’s feet, like a dead dog, Burckhardt piously closed his father’s tomb. What I can’t get out of my mind is a suspicion that Nicolas wasn’t dead when the stone was lowered. If you remember the position of the body…Well, enough of that. It certainly wouldn’t have worried Burckhardt. Having disposed of one traitor, he went after his wife. He would have killed her too, if it hadn’t been for the nurse, who thought he was delirious. She testified to his insane strength and mentioned that his dagger was not at his belt. But Burckhardt was half dead from arsenic poisoning. They wrestled him back into bed, and Konstanze finished him off in the next cup of gruel.

“Maybe he had time, before he died, to whisper an accusation to a servant or priest. Maybe not; she would have watched him closely, and arsenic doesn’t leave a man particularly coherent. In any case, the bishop got suspicious. He disliked Konstanze anyhow. So she got her just deserts, by an ironic miscarriage of justice—though I think the punishment was worse than the crime.”