The Devil's Opera(167)

“‘All men die, Simon.’” The memory of Pastor Gruber’s voice came to him. “‘What matters is how you die.’” Samson indeed, Simon thought. “‘So the dead which he slew at his death were more than they which he slew in his life,’” he murmured.

“What did you say?” Lieutenant Chieske asked.

“Nothing.” Simon gave one final glance to his friend. “Fraulein Ursula will want his body.”

“It will be released from the morgue after the investigation is complete.”

Simon took a deep breath and looked around. No one was close by. “It was Master Schardius, wasn’t it?” he asked quietly, almost in a whisper. The two policemen said nothing else, simply drew him farther away from the crowd and the other policemen and waited.

In a whisper, Simon told them about the conversation he overheard after Hans’ last fight. It didn’t take long. The two policemen looked more and more intent as he spoke.

“You’re sure he said Vogler?” Lieutenant Chieske asked, keeping an eye on the crowd.

“Yes.”

The lieutenant looked at the sergeant. “Schardius, and tied to Vogler,” Sergeant Hoch breathed. “Delt we were looking for…but a link to Vogler. That answers so many questions.”

“I can’t tell you how much I wish we could have learned this another way,” Lieutenant Chieske said in a low voice. “What Hans finally told us and what you’ve just told us is important, and will help us continue our investigation. I just wish it hadn’t come to us at so high a price.”

Simon blinked back tears. “Hans was a hard man,” he said. “He had trouble trusting watchmen, even you new policemen. But in the end, he told you.”

Before he left the scene of Hans’ death, Simon looked back at his friend one more time. After a moment, he heard a whine and looked up. There was a dog looking at him from another ruined wall. “Schatzi? Is that you?” The dog whined again with a slight wag of the tail, standing over something dark lying on the ground. Simon walked over and picked it up. The dog whined again, then disappeared behind a mound of rubble.

Simon looked down. He was holding Hans’ hat. There was no mistaking it. Simon knew every spot and wrinkle and crease and nick on it. That brought the loss home to him even stronger. He stood there with his eyes burning for a long moment, trying to hold his feelings in, but they burst forth and he began to sob, tears running down his cheeks. He turned his back on the Polizei and the crowds as the cold hand around his heart expanded to fill his entire being.

Hans was dead. Simon’s world was now a very dark place indeed.

* * *

Friedrich von Logau was seated at a table in Walcha’s Coffee House with his friends. This was not unusual. Friedrich was not doodling with a new epigram, however, and that was a bit unusual. Instead, he was listening to Karl Seelbach read from his latest essay on the natural order of government.

He was also thinking about getting out his notepad and beginning an epigram. Karl was not the greatest reader in the world, and his approach to the topic was…arid, to say the least.

Friedrich’s attention was distracted by a movement. For a moment, he felt as if he had been transported back two months, for approaching their table were Marla Linder and Franz Sylwester. He raised a hand to interrupt Seelbach’s drone.

“We have guests, my friends.”

They all turned to see who it was. When they saw Frau Linder, chairs began to scrape on the floor as each man stood. They had all seen Frau Linder’s great performance at the Green Horse, and to a man they revered her for it.

“What have we here?” Frau Linder asked with a grin as she drew near. “A gathering of gentlemen of leisure?”

“Nay,” Johann Gronow replied. “We are all workmen here, toiling under the lash for a pittance.”

“I know better than that.” Marla laughed. “You’re all writers, every man of you.”

“Alas, she knows us well,” Johannes Plavius said with drama, throwing the back of a hand to his brow.

“All is revealed,” Friedrich said in despair. “She will tell the world, and we shall be reviled.”

Frau Linder broke into laughter, and clapped her hands.

“You guys are as crazy as musicians.”

They all bowed to her, deeply and with flourishes.

“Thank you,” Friedrich said with some sincerity. “From you, we will accept that as a compliment.”

Frau Linder’s deep curtsey was marred only by the gamine’s grin on her face.

She then turned to Gronow.

“Herr Gronow, I have not had an opportunity to thank you for your libretto for Arthur Rex. It is superb.” Behind Frau Marla, her husband Franz Sylwester nodded in agreement. Gronow stood there with an idiot grin on his face, saying nothing.