AllFreeNovel
Share Us
He looked at number 71 Cobenzlgasse and saw that it was a large masonry building behind a fence. He saw that the fence had sheet metal attached to it, which blocked a good view of the lower floor of the building. The closed French doors opening on the building-wide balcony were heavily draped, except for one, which was half open.
“Damn! A privacy fence,” Wasserman said. “Which makes me wonder how long it’s been up.”
They continued up Cobenzlgasse to the top and pulled into the parking lot of a restaurant whose wrought iron grape-bedecked sign identified it as the Restaurant Cobenzl.
“They used to serve a nice Wiener Schnitzel mit Ei in here,” Niedermeyer said.
“They still do,” Wasserman said. “But I hope you brought a lot of money.”
“I thought Charley invited us,” Cronley said.
“Charley doesn’t have any money,” Wasserman said. “He has his own ballerina, and they don’t come cheap.”
“Colonel,” Spurgeon protested, “I don’t have my own ballerina. I happened to meet a young lady who was a ballerina and is helping to support herself by helping me improve my German and by showing me around Vienna.”
“That’s why I said you don’t have money,” Wasserman said. “That sort of service can’t be cheap.”
“Charley,” Cronley asked, “why do I get the idea this is the first you knew Colonel Wasserman knows about your ballerina slash tour guide?”
Spurgeon didn’t answer.
“A word of advice, Charley,” Cronley went on. “If things go the way I’m sure you’re hoping they will with your ‘tour guide,’ make sure nobody’s making movies of your mattress gymnastics.”
“Screw you, Cronley.”
“Maybe Cronley is speaking from experience,” Wasserman said.
“Under the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States . . .”
Niedermeyer, Wasserman, and Zielinski laughed.
—
They were shown to a table by the windows that provided a spectacular view of Vienna.
When the waiter appeared, Wasserman said, “I think Wiener Schnitzel mit Ei for everybody, right?”
“Thank God it’s winter and I can’t be tempted into a Heuriger,” Niedermeyer said. “But I think a nip of Slivovitz is in order to celebrate the return of my memory.”
“What did you say was the name of von Dietelburg’s ‘tour guide’?” Wasserman asked.
Cronley saw that he had taken a notebook and pencil from his pocket.
“Olga Reithoffer.”
“Spell it, so I can write it down.”
Niedermeyer did so.
“Charley,” Wasserman ordered, “go fetch that telephone.”
He pointed to a socket in the center of the table, and then to a telephone sitting on a sideboard. He saw Cronley’s curiosity.
“Plug-in telephones. Very convenient. We would have them in the States if Bell Telephone, for reasons I can’t imagine, didn’t insist that their telephones be securely wired to the wall.”
Spurgeon delivered the telephone. Wasserman plugged it in and dialed a number.
“Write this down,” he said, without any preliminaries. A moment later, “Olga Reithoffer. I’ll spell . . .
