More Beer (13 page)

“Suit yourself.”

He shook his head, raised his index finger to his forehead. “See you later.”

I headed toward the main drag. Half an hour later, I stood in front of the wrought-iron gate of Ruhenbrunn Private Clinic. The rain had stopped, and the large brick building looked peaceful in the morning light. Birds were twittering in the trees that surrounded the edifice, and white bedclothes had been hung out to air from some of its windows. A nurse was pushing a man in a wheelchair across the lawn. I pushed the bell. The intercom asked me what I wanted.

“It’s a family matter. My uncle, well, he’s really my wife’s uncle …”

“How’s that?”

I stopped. The voice was aggressive. “Please express yourself clearly.”

“Well, he’s totally confused, and needs care.”

“Why didn’t you say so in the first place? For admissions, you need to speak to Mrs. Hengstenberger on the second floor, office number three.”

The gate swung open, the sand squeaked under my shoes. The drive had just been raked, and I was the first to leave my footprints on the fine wavy lines. To my left, a large lawn extended all the way to the wall behind which
Villa Böllig stood. A gardener was trimming rosebushes. Complete silence reigned. It almost seemed as if the clinic were closed until further notice. For a moment a head moved past a window, then a second and a third, until I realized it was just one person doing her rounds. Near the entrance, I passed the patient in his wheelchair and his nurse. The patient giggled and said something. I walked through the glass door and up a flight of stairs. Then I almost collided with a mountain of flesh two meters tall. Dressed all in white, he looked like some kind of attendant or male nurse.

“Now, now,” he said quietly. He was rolling a matchstick from one side of his mouth to the other. He stared at me with indifference.

“Sorry,” I murmured. He smiled.

“I want to see Mrs. Hengstenberger.”

He spat the match into a flowerpot and said, “Crazy, huh?”

When I said, “Not me, my uncle,” he smiled again.

“Mrs. Hengstenberger?” I repeated.

He said, “Crazy, huh.”

With a friendly nod, I pushed past him. He chortled.

The door to office number three stood ajar. She was on the phone.

“… No, I’m sorry, the patient does not have permission to receive visitors … not even his mother … what was that? You got a letter from him? That’s impossible, the patient does not have permission … Nonsense. He’s receiving the best medical care. No reason to worry, at all … all right, I’ll see what I can do. Good day.”

She hung up and punched a two-digit number.

“Hengstenberger here. Kunze? Please check up on room thirty-four. He’s managed to smuggle a letter to the outside. All right?”

I knocked.

“Come in.”

It was a voice to cut glass with. Mrs. Hengstenberger was leaning over her desk, writing. An old book case stood in a corner, next to some health insurance calendar with flowers. The room was white and clean, with a view of the drive. She put her pen aside, folded her letter, and put it in an envelope. Without looking up, she asked, “How can I help you?”

“I would like to have permission to visit Oliver Böllig. He’s been in your care for seventeen years.”

“Your name?”

“Kayankaya.”

Her face relaxed.

“You’re not a relative? I’m afraid I can’t give you that permission. I’m very sorry. Good day.”

After a triumphant glance at me, she went back to the materials on her desk. I walked to the window and lit a cigarette.

“Smoking is not allowed here.”

I bounded over to her. “Listen, sweetie”—she gasped for air—”I don’t have a whole lot of time. I need that boy, or else the file on his illness and treatment. I need to know why he’s been cooped up here for seventeen years. It’s a question of a murder case. So just get me the file. Here …”

I tossed my license on the desk. She picked it up as if it were dirt, glanced at it, put it back.

“I have to notify Dr. Kliensmann. Please wait outside.”

I shut the door, sat down in the hallway. Everything was quiet. I lit another cigarette and shot smoke rings through the air. Now I could hear occasional cries, echoing as if from a great distance through the white hallways. I had just decided to go back in to get a little action out of Mrs. Hengstenberger when the mountain of flesh came up the stairs, a fresh matchstick in the corner of his mouth. He approached slowly and stood in front of me, his arms crossed. “Come with me,” he said. Then he smiled, but his eyes remained cold. He led down a flight of stairs, then down another one. In the basement we walked down a hallway, until he ushered me into a windowless yellow room, lit by a fluorescent tube protected by a black iron grate. Thin rubber matting covered the walls and the floor. The mountain leaned against the door, still smiling. “Crazy, huh?”

I walked up to him with a twinkle in my eye. “Listen, you look like a smart fellow. Take me to your boss. If you do, I’ll let you try out my car. On the freeway, if you like. OK?”

He looked offended, took a step forward, and punched me in the stomach. I fell down, and he said, “The doctor will be here in a minute.” The door slammed shut. I reached for my loaded Beretta. Why hadn’t I thought of it sooner? I crawled to the door, and an acrid smell rose into my nostrils. Something began to coat my brain like a layer of lead. In slow motion, I managed to pull the gun out of my pocket and aim at the lock on the door. “Sleep,” I thought. “Sleep, and never wake up again.” I almost forgot the Beretta while I pursued that thought, but the first shot woke me up. Then I emptied the whole clip into the door. My fingers clawed at the crack, and a moment later I fell through the door into
fresh air. I dragged myself a couple of meters down the hall and sat down. Just as my head was beginning to clear again, I heard footsteps come downstairs, and the mountain of flesh reappeared with a pair of handcuffs in one hand. He looked at me in astonishment.

“How did you do that?”

I pulled the Beretta out from behind my back and let him take a good long look at it.

“Pretty good trick, eh?”

He looked offended, studied his shoes. Slowly, holding on to the wall, I managed to rise to my feet.

“Take me to the Böllig kid.”

“Oh …” He sounded scared. “The doctor won’t like that at all.”

I waved my cannon, and he led the way.

The Böllig kid was so tall he had to stoop if he wanted to stand up in his cell. I motioned to him to sit down again. With a dull gaze, he went back to his clothespin construction, his long back bent over the table. It seemed as if he had never learned to speak; he reacted to none of my questions. He was a seventeen-year-old wreck, nothing but pale skin and bones. A faint beam of light fell onto his worktable from a barred window. An iron bed stood in a corner. The mountain leaned against the wall. He looked miserable.

“How long has he been doing that shit?”

“Dunno. But,” he came closer and whispered, “that’s all they know how to do.”

“But you, you know better things to do, don’t you?”

Oliver Böllig could have grown up to be a big strong man, but seventeen years in Ruhenbrunn Private Clinic had
turned him into an idiot beanstalk. He resembled his father, Friedrich Böllig, about as much as I resemble a Swedish tennis star. I stood there for a moment, watching the last of the Bölligs fiddling with his clothespins. I stood there a moment too long. Something exploded above my head.

“… an injection that paralyzes his memory. Kliensmann, I’ll pay you whatever you want.”

“That’ll be expensive, madam. My reputation, my livelihood—you must understand. For less than five hundred thousand … you see … my silence … and besides …”

“That’s all right. I’ll get the money.”

“But then there’s something else too. You may remember. Until now you’ve refused, but today, I think … You’ll comply, won’t you? Well, I too would have preferred pleasanter circumstances, but …”

“What are you talking about?”

“Take off your clothes.”

My nose itched. With difficulty, I managed to rub it against my shoulder. My arms were securely tied behind my back in a straitjacket that smelled of chlorine. I was lying in some kind of treatment room, and while I twisted and turned to loosen my bonds, the down payment for my blackout was being made next door. From time to time, Kliensmann uttered a few obscenities that made him sound like his own best patient. I crawled toward a picture framed behind glass. Slowly I slid up against the wall and managed to raise the bottom edge of the frame with the top of my head, until the picture came off its hook and crashed onto the floor between my feet. The two next door did not interrupt their activities. I started rubbing the straitjacket
against the glass splinters that were still firmly lodged in the frame. Soon I had torn a small hole above my elbow. I kept working it against the splinter until it slowly cut through the jacket, my shirt, and my skin. I clenched my jaws and kept at it until a bloodstain spread over my right side, down to my waist. A little later I managed to extricate my arm. It looked as if someone had worked on it with a fretsaw. Now I was able to reach the leather straps on the back and open them. After wrapping a towel around my arm, I tiptoed to the door and listened.

“… We should do this more often.”

No comment.

“So: five hundred thousand cash, within the next three weeks. If I don’t get it by then, I’ll go to the police. You understand.”

“Three weeks? But I’ll have to sell shares!”

“You’ll manage. And the regular payments will continue, as usual.”

Barbara Böllig used some foul language.

“Come on, take it easy. You’re just buying some peace of mind. You’ll
know
that snooper won’t be able to make trouble anymore.”

A door slammed shut. Barbara Böllig must have left. Kliensmann called Hengstenberger.

“I don’t want to be disturbed for the next half hour.”

I got into position behind the door. Kliensmann came in, halted, and I punched him in the jaw. While he was reeling across the room, I grabbed the tattered straitjacket and kicked him squarely in the ass so that he fell flat on his face. Then I wrapped him up in best institutional fashion, leaned
him against the wall, and slapped his cheeks. Reluctantly he opened his eyes.

“Good morning. What was it you were going to shoot me up with, doctor? Just out of personal curiosity. I had dreams of going to medical school once.”

“Bah!”

“Amazing, isn’t it. Half a million down the drain. But it’s nice to know one’s value.”

Kliensmann coughed and spat on the floor.

“That young Böllig … I guess the charge would be clinical murder? What do you think?”

He turned his head away.

“In his seventeen years, has he ever seen anything but four walls and barred windows?”

Kliensmann remained silent.

“Why, do you think? Because he had the wrong father? Or was it the wrong mother? Interesting question. Or was it just because characters like you will do anything for money?”

“Bah!”

“You called Barbara Böllig as soon as you heard that someone was asking for her son?”

He didn’t say anything. I got up and checked out the white medicine cabinet. I found some sleeping pills, got a glass of water, and hunkered down in front of him.

“All right, doc. Time to go beddy-bye.”

He resisted. I had to slap him around a little before he opened his mouth; then I tossed a hefty dose of sleeping pills into his craw, poured some water on top of them, and held his jaws shut.

“That’s it. Good night.”

I left the room, locked the door from the outside, and pocketed the key. I found my Beretta in Kliensmann’s desk drawer. I looked out the window at the leafless birch trees. My arms were throbbing. Now both of them were damaged. I wished I had a beer, I wished the fifth man were behind bars. Then I remembered Slibulsky.

The Roma was one of those Italo-German Frascati joints that demonstrate what cultural exchange is all about. Amid the oak paneling and furniture, the red-and-white checked tablecloths and fluted windows, the Pope in a gold frame looked just as good on the wall as the poster of the local bowling club. Juventus Turin shared a wall with the players of the Doppenburg team, and the pickled eggplant in the glass case tolerated a display of frankfurters right next to it. The flags of both countries were attached to a string stretched across the room. The place was empty, no waiters, no patrons. I found Slibulsky in a corner, between Bello Adriano and a mounted set of elk antlers. He was grumpily studying the menu.

“You must have had a great time. I’ve been sitting here for three hours.”

I gave him a brief report. He looked at my arm and growled, “Have something to eat, my boy, and get your strength back.”

I picked a mutton dish from the menu. No waiter appeared.

“Seems like this place is a little shorthanded.”

“Once in a while you can see one pass.”

Eventually a small, friendly Italian came to the table, and I ordered. Then I lit a cigarette and waited for Slibulsky to tell me about his morning. When he remained silent, I prodded him.

“What did the night watchman tell you?”

Slibulsky tongued his toothpick into a corner of his mouth.

“He didn’t tell me anything. He wasn’t even there.”

The waiter brought two cups of coffee.

“This morning he left the house with some suitcases. That’s what the baker across the street told me. Then he went to the airport. I heard that from the cabbie.”

“He took a taxi?”

Slibulsky nodded.

“Paid with a five-hundred-mark bill.”

“And his wife?”

“Left just a little later, went to the railroad station, and took the first train to Frankfurt.”

“To buy her vodka. Is that all?”

Slibulsky gazed out the window.

“I talked to your lawyer. The ‘Freedom and Nature’ people haven’t called again.” After a pause: “Why should they? Now that there’s a warrant out for you, for murdering that guy.”

“Schmidi?”

“Right. Murder, and robbery too. There’s a police artist’s sketch of your partner that looks quite a bit like me. I’ll put it up on the wall between the Playmate and the barred window. If they allow pinups in the joint.”