The Ludwig Conspiracy(67)

“Erlkönig” (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe), “The Erl-King”

“Belsazar” (Heinrich Heine), “Belshazzar”

“Thal”?

“Zauberin”?

“Lorelei” (Heinrich Heine), “The Lorelei”

“Winsperg”?

“Fluch”? (perhaps “Des Sängers Fluch,” Ludwig Uhland?), “The Singer’s Curse”

“Ring”? (perhaps “Der Ring des Polykrates,” Friedrich Schiller), “The Ring of Polycrates”

“Siegerich”?

“Taucher” (Friedrich Schiller), “The Diver”

“Der Fischer” (Goethe), “The Angler”

“Legende”?

“Ballade”?

“I really don’t know what Theodor Marot was trying to tell us with these poems,” he mused. “The ones I know are all from the German Romantic and Classical periods. And they look back at the Middle Ages or other distant times. But apart from that, I can’t see anything in common among them.”

“Presumably Ludwig would have liked to live in a poem like those,” Sara said. “Or in a booming opera by Richard Wagner. We can only hope we find another clue soon.” She pointed to the laptop, which was now in a lady’s purse between Steven’s feet. “By the way, I transferred all the other puzzle words in the diary to my laptop last night. See for yourself.”





IDT, G, NFTQM, WFIFBTQT, GQT, 1DT, WQI, ID, WFIFBGQTP, WFT, IFGQMT, IFI, IQT, J, JG, JT , W, JTI, JG, JG, J, JG, JG, JG, IT





“There’s one interesting thing,” she said thoughtfully. “The words get shorter and shorter. At the end of the diary, most of them consist of just one or two letters.”

“Why don’t we simply try KOENIG as the key?” Steven suggested, but Sara dismissed the idea.

“I’ve already tried that. Along with the other usual suspects such as LUDWIG, REX, or ROI. No luck. Nothing comes up. It must be something less obvious.”

Steven sighed and looked ahead to where the lake now clearly shone among the hills. At close quarters, it almost looked like an Alpine inland sea.

“Look, we can already see the Herreninsel!” Uncle Lu bellowed in his ear from the back seat. “And the smaller one beyond is the Fraueninsel with its convent of Benedictine nuns. What a picturesque place for a castle.”

“And what a terrific tourist magnet.” Sara pointed to a ferry, small but crammed with passengers. It plied between the islands and a harbor on the mainland. “Let’s hope we don’t have to stand around too long. Your books had better stay in the car. I guess you don’t want to drag them all over the island.”

Albert Zöller gave her a conspiratorial wink. “You just leave that to me. You won’t be sorry you brought good old uncle Lu along on this mysterious trip.”





A QUARTER OF AN hour later, they had parked the Mini down by the harbor.

Little rowboats in which fishermen mended their nets gently rocked on the water, tied up to countless landing stages. On the right there was a jetty bleached by rain, where a paddle steamer whistled as it waited to put out. Somewhere a horn hooted. When Steven looked around, he saw a puffing steam locomotive pulling green cars trundling along behind the boathouses, looking as if it had come straight from the nineteenth century.

“Pinch me, Herr Lukas,” Sara said, looking at the locomotive in amazement. “We haven’t by any chance just time traveled back into Marot’s diary, have we?”

“The paddle steamer dates from 1926, and the steam locomotive made its maiden trip just after Ludwig’s death,” said Albert Zöller behind them. “So you’re right to some extent, Frau Lengfeld. The people here like it when the world changes as little as possible. And so do the tourists.” He pointed to the jetty, where Steven only now saw the noisy crowd of tourists waiting for the next steamer trip. They seemed to come from all over the world and were happily snapping photos, from all possible angles, of the locomotive, the steamer, and the fishermen mending their nets.

“Well, I’ll see what can be done,” Uncle Lu said. Puffing, he heaved the laundry basket full of books out of the car and went, without further comment, toward the rather dilapidated boathouses to their right. Sara and Steven followed a little way behind him.

“Do you know what he’s planning to do?” the bookseller asked.

Sara shrugged. “Maybe he’s looking for some other way to get to the island. That could only be a good thing for us. See that green Bentley over there?”

Steven turned to look and saw an elegant vehicle, polished until it shone, with darkened windows. It was parked inconspicuously beyond the locomotive with its engine running. “What about it?”