The Ludwig Conspiracy (5 page)

The little wooden box was still standing beside his bed on the desk. It had spent the night in his dreams. He vaguely remembered a gigantic royal cloak that threatened to smother him. Men in black hoods had also been there, prodding him with red-hot fingers.

Steven rubbed the sleep out of his eyes, stood up, and limped into the kitchen, where the dirty dishes of the last few days were stacked. He carefully picked an antique edition of the satirical magazine
Simplicissimus
off the table and blew a few croissant crumbs off the front page. This copy of the journal had appeared just before the First World War and deserved better than to get jam on it. Humming quietly to himself, the bookseller filled the espresso jug to the top with freshly ground coffee and twiddled the knob of the radio until he found a classical music concert. The music soothed him instantly. His knees were still sore, and someone was knocking against his forehead from inside his skull, but at least the memories of his bad dreams had gone away. Steven massaged his temples and listened to the deep notes of a cello, while he thoughtfully sipped his heavily sweetened espresso. Yesterday’s events—first the visit of that guy in the Bavarian-style costume, then the hooded men—had upset his stomach. And then, of course, there was the little treasure chest itself, with its sensational contents. Only why had the mere sight of it shaken him so badly?

Well, he’d take a closer look at it all back in the shop. If this man Marot really had taken a royal secret to his grave, Steven would make a few phone calls, earn good money, and then, so far as he was concerned, Frau Schultheiss could go and open her boutique in the downmarket Hasenbergl district. As an expert on the literary history of Bavaria, Steven knew that rumors of King Ludwig II’s homosexuality had come up time and again. To him, it made no difference one way or the other, but he was sure that plenty of newspapers would come up with a large sum of money for actual evidence—money that could pay the rent on his shop for a good long while.

After a long, hot, almost boiling shower, he put on a new brown corduroy suit, with a white shirt and a tweed bow tie, put the little treasure chest back in his leather briefcase, and set off for the Westend district. The rain clouds had disappeared overnight, the leaves on the chestnut trees in the beer gardens were red and yellow, and the people coming toward him had friendly expressions on their faces. As Steven strolled over the Theresienwiese, populated this morning by cyclists and pedestrians, it was hard to imagine that a few teenagers wearing hoods had scared him so badly here only a few hours ago. The almost summery warmth and the mild sunlight helped to banish his headache, and his mood improved with every step he took. It was one of those mornings that herald a very pleasant day.

But even as Steven was still more than fifty yards away from his antiquarian bookshop, he guessed that, on the contrary, this was going to be one of the lousiest days of his whole year.

A
SMALL GROUP OF
curious onlookers stood in front of a pile of broken glass that had once been the display window of his shop. A few books lay out in the street, looking like limp, dead flies, their leather bindings splayed. Pages of parchment had been torn out and were splashed with mud. But that was nothing compared to the chaos that Steven saw when he looked through the broken window into the bookshop itself.

It looked as if a medium-sized and very specific earthquake had wreaked havoc in there.

One of the tall bookshelves had fallen over, and books, maps, engravings, and folio volumes covered the floor like a sea of paper. Steven saw the eighteenth-century book on chess that he had only just bought; someone had slit the leather spine lengthwise. A dirty footprint left by a boot adorned the dramas of Molière; other books had come apart entirely, and their pages were crumpled or torn out. A gust of wind whirled a few ragged pages up in the air like withered leaves. The mahogany table in the backroom of the shop was the only piece of furniture still in place. The scene was so appalling, so unreal, that Steven stood there for a long time as if turned to stone, staring into his shop. It was the thought of a single book that brought him back to life.

Oh God, not the Grimm.
Not the
Grimms’ Children’s and Household Tales.

Taking no notice of the onlookers, he stumbled to the door and unlocked it. He tried to make his way into the shop but was prevented by the pile of books pressing against the inside of the door. For a while the people outside watched, spellbound, as Steven fought a desperate battle against a mass of printed paper and parchment. He continued these useless efforts until someone placed a hand on his shoulder.

“Is this your shop?”

The female police officer in front of him was still young, maybe in her midtwenties, and she looked genuinely concerned. Her older male colleague was waiting, with a bored expression, in the police car parked at the curb with its blue light switched on.

As Steven nodded silently, the police officer went on calmly. “We’ll have to investigate this break-in, although it looks more like a few young hooligans out to make trouble than anything else.”

Or like Frau Schultheiss, who just can’t wait to open her fashion boutique,
thought Steven.

Would she really go that far? Had she hired a few thugs to hurry things along and make sure Steven moved out?

He was so deep in thought that at first he failed to hear the police officer’s next question.

“Can you tell us if there’s anything missing?” she repeated gently. “Money? Valuable items?” She took out a notepad.

Steven looked at the chaotic muddle of torn, dirty, soiled, and slashed books, and heard himself laugh quietly.

“Sorry, silly question,” said the young woman sympathetically. “We’ll just record details of the scene and report back to police HQ, and then you’ll probably want to start cleaning up.”

She patted him on the shoulder, then went over, notepad in hand, to her colleague, who was dispersing the crowd of onlookers in a loud, official voice.

Steven said nothing, just went on staring at his wrecked shop. He corrected his earlier impression: this was not just the lousiest day of the year; it looked more like one of the lousiest days of his entire life.

“A
RE YOU OPEN
?”

Steven paused his tidying up, and looked at the broken pane of the display window, which he had sketchily and temporarily mended with sticky tape. It was evening, and an unpleasantly cold wind whistled through the cracks and kept sending torn pages flying about.

The face of a young woman peeked through the network of black strips of tape. She had dark hair and was wearing a bright green headscarf and a pair of black-framed 1950s sunglasses that made her look remarkably like Audrey Hepburn. Steven had always admired that delicately built movie star, but right now he simply was not in the mood to make polite conversation to anyone, not even her double.

“Closed for now,” he growled, and went on putting any books still intact back on the shelves. A heap of torn copies on the counter had grown larger and larger over the last few hours. Actually, the damage had turned out to be not quite as disastrous as Steven had feared at first—but it was certainly bad enough to be depressing. The restoration of old books was very expensive. Steven knew that he would never be able to scrape together the money to have approximately forty damaged volumes restored to their original condition. At least the Grimm had survived. He had found it lying under an overturned bookshelf, slightly crumpled, but otherwise unharmed.

“Stock-taking?” the woman asked curiously, pointing to the pile of books that he hadn’t looked at yet.

Steven sighed. “If you really want to know, someone broke in. And I’m just trying to get my ruined shop back into some kind of order. Thanks for asking. Goodbye.”

“Oh,” Audrey Hepburn said. After a moment, she asked, “Was anything stolen?”

“I really don’t know what business that is of yours.”

His tone was far harsher than he had intended, but he was worn out. Hours of dealing with damaged books had hit him harder than he liked to admit. Curiously enough, as far as he could tell, only one book was actually missing. It was a volume of German ballads that had not been especially valuable. Perhaps he just hadn’t found it yet. Which was why he had said at the precinct house that afternoon that nothing was missing. The duty officer told him in friendly but detached tones that they would be looking into the crime committed by a person or persons unknown, and sent him back to his shop, where he had been clearing up and brooding ever since.

Over the next few hours, Steven had kept wondering who could be behind the mysterious break-in. He didn’t really think Frau Schultheiss was capable of hiring someone to trash the place. Maybe her husband, though? And then, of course, there was yesterday evening’s stranger in the Bavarian-style suit. What was it he had said before leaving?

We’ll come back to you.

Whom had he meant by
we
? The same people who had turned his shop upside down? Searching for something that was still, apparently, in his possession? Were these people after the little treasure chest?

I am interested in eyewitness accounts from the time of King Ludwig the Second. Do you have anything of that nature?

Steven sneezed as the dust he had raised went up his nose. When he had blown his nose thoroughly, he looked up. The woman was still standing outside the broken display window, smiling like a diva.

“Gesundheit.”

In spite of the circumstances, Steven couldn’t help grinning. “Sorry I snapped at you like that, but all this”—he pointed to the pile of wrecked and damaged books and loose pages on the table—“has been a bit too much for me.”

Audrey Hepburn nodded. “No need to apologize. I just have one very simple question, and then I’ll be off.” She took something out of her purse, which was bright green like her headscarf, and handed it to Steven through the open doorway. “Do you know this man?” she asked seriously. “He’s my uncle. Did he by any chance visit your shop?”

Steven looked at the photo and gave a start. No doubt about it, it was the elderly man who had been in the bookshop yesterday—the man with the bundle done up in wrapping paper and the hunted look in his eyes who had disappeared so suddenly. It was not a good picture, but all the same it was easy to recognize the amiable old gentleman with the gray blazer and the nickel-framed glasses.

Steven nodded and gave the photo back to the woman. “Yes, in fact he was here yesterday morning,” he said. “We talked a bit, and then he left.”

“About what?” The young woman’s voice suddenly had a hard edge. “What did you talk about?”

“Oh, this and that. Mainly literature. He was interested in the diaries of Samuel Pepys, and . . .”

“You didn’t by any chance talk about King Ludwig the Second?”

Steven froze. He straightened up and gave the young woman with the black sunglasses a dark look. “Listen, if you have anything to do with the guy who turned up here yesterday evening, then . . .”

“What guy?”

“The guy who asked me the same thing. If I have any books about King Ludwig the Second.”

“Who asked you that?”

At that moment Steven saw something flash behind the woman’s back; it was a brief flicker behind the side window of a black Chrysler just pulling up to the deserted sidewalk. Two powerful-looking men in dark green tracksuit jackets got out and slowly came toward the bookshop in the twilight. When the woman saw them, her face behind her sunglasses suddenly went white as a sheet. She came into the shop and looked around the still-untidy room in a harried way. “Can you lock the door?” she whispered.

“Er . . . that wouldn’t be much use.” Steven pointed to the broken glass. “The window’s done for. And anyway, what . . .”

“For God’s sweet sake, do it! And quickly.” The woman’s voice was nothing like Audrey Hepburn’s in
Breakfast at Tiffany’s
now. Only at this point did he catch the faint touch of a Berlin accent in it. “Lock the door, then help me push that bookcase in front of the window. That ought to hold them up for a little while, anyway.” She was already tugging at the bookcase, while Steven, in total confusion, locked the door.

“I’m afraid you owe me an explanation,” he said. “Did those men do something to you? Are they after you?”

“Not after me, you idiot. They’re after
you.
Now, push this hard, will you?”

Too baffled to say anything, Steven helped her push the bookcase over to the broken window. Only a moment later someone was hammering at the door.

“Herr Lukas,” called a deep, hoarse voice. “We know you’re in there. Don’t be stupid. We won’t hurt you. We just want to have a little talk. You have something that belongs to us. Unfortunately, we didn’t find it last night. Herr Lukas, can you hear me?” The voice sounded like it was running out of patience. “We’re ready to pay you a hefty sum for the book. How much do you want? Ten thousand? Twenty thousand?”

Steven was about to say something, but the woman beside him put a finger to her lips.

“Do you have it?” she whispered.

“Have what?”

“You know what I mean. Do you have it?”

Steven hesitated for a moment and then nodded. “I . . . I think so,” he said. “In my briefcase on the table. Although I don’t know—”

“Is there a back way out?” the woman interrupted.

Steven pointed to the bookshelves on the back wall. “There’s a little door beside the toilet, out into the backyard. Do you really think that . . .”

Just then the man’s deep voice spoke up again outside. “Listen, Herr Lukas, we can always do it another way. Last time we only searched your shop. Next time we’ll burn it. All that paper—what do you bet it’ll burn so bright that they can see for miles around? So how about it? Think of the money you can earn.
One . . .
”

“We have to get out of here,” the woman beside him hissed. “And don’t forget your briefcase.”

“Two . . .”