The Corpse with the Silver Tongue (26 page)

I settled to my coffee and pulled out my cigarettes. “Is there anything sweet to eat?” I asked Beni, then I realized what a faux pas I'd made. My mother would have “crowned me,” as she used to say. Not only had I asked for something I hadn't been offered, but I'd asked the wrong person.

“There is nothing sweet here,” replied Beni apologetically. “I checked. I too have the sweet tooth sometimes.” He smiled. I couldn't imagine a single cavity daring to form in that perfect mouth.

“Ah well,” I said, and lit my cigarette. “Never mind. Though I would kill for a nice big piece of cake, or something like it . . .”

Tamsin let out a squeal, slammed her coffee onto the table, got up, and ran, sobbing, to the kitchen.

What on earth had I said to set her off like that?
Maybe mentioning “killing”?
Both Beni and Chuck shrugged, looking mystified.

“Ah, poor Tamsin, she is very . . . nervous,” observed Beni. I wasn't sure that, on this occasion, he'd chosen the right word: I'd have gone with “melodramatic.” But there, that's me.

“Someone should go to her,” said Chuck, looking at me.

I sighed, stubbed out my cigarette, and stood. “I'll do it,” I said. I knew I should. I followed Tamsin into the apartment and found her lying on a couch, sobbing into a pillow.
Lovely
.

“Come on, Tamsin. There, there.” I patted her back. “I'm sorry if I said something that upset you. I didn't mean to. I know it must be a very difficult time for you.” I was being as sympathetic as I could be, given that I don't think it's really in my nature. And while Tamsin hadn't exactly endeared herself to me since we'd met, it was true enough that she
had
just lost her husband.

“Oh, don't patronize me,” she hissed at me as she looked around, her face tear stained and angry. Her reaction took me by surprise. “You think you're so clever, so much better than me. Well, I don't want your sympathy. I don't want people thinking you're nice because you're kind to me. You're not nice. You think I'm a fool. You're always showing off how clever you are—how much you know. I think you're stuck up and weird, like Ally said. If it hadn't been for all this, I'd never have had to see you again!”

I was shocked. “You phoned me and asked me to come here!” I replied.

“Well, I made a mistake,” she snapped back. She was still glaring at me with her angry little eyes when Beni came into the room, and I saw her expression soften into helplessness again. She began to sob pathetically. So that was her game. I refused to play.

I sighed and turned to Beni. “I don't think we can be of much use here. Let's leave Tamsin to sort herself out for a few minutes. Let's wait on the balcony.” I got up, smoothed my pants, and whispered to Tamsin, “You won't get him that way, dear. He's not that kind of man.” I was gloating, and being a little cruel.

Tamsin looked at me with a queer smile on her face and whispered back, “Oh, Cait, you're really
not
that clever, are you? They're
all
that sort of man,” and she wiped at her eyes, which were almost dry in any case.

It looked as though the battle lines had been drawn for a fight I hadn't even planned to take part in, and, as I walked back out onto the balcony, it seemed that another confrontation was in progress.

“I tell you, I saw no such thing,” Beni was saying.

“You're a liar and I know it. You must have seen it when you left the table . . .” replied Chuck.

They both shut up as soon as they saw me, and I was left to wonder what they might have been talking about. It could have been anything, but I had a nagging suspicion that it was something important.

I sat, lit another cigarette, which I hoped I was actually going to be able to smoke, and picked up the coffee pot to top up my cup. It was empty.

“More coffee, anyone?”

Both men rumbled a sulky “no” in my general direction, and Beni sucked hard on a cheroot. I decided to not bother with more coffee.

“Any news from the police on the break-in at the museum yet, Beni?” I asked, innocently enough.

“No. Nothing.” He sounded morose.

“Have you heard any more about Madelaine's death through the grapevine here?” I asked Chuck.

“Nothing.” He sounded just as grumpy.

Oh great, I was stuck with two miserable men and a woman who had the knives out for me—fantastic! I got up and walked to the balustrade that surrounded the balcony, letting the breeze blow away the feeling that invisible walls were beginning to close in on me. I wanted to run away from it all, back to Vancouver, to my little home, and to my friends—well, okay then, to Bud and Jan who are about the only friends I've got—and to a place where everything was clean and fresh . . . not full of people who were wearing masks to hide their true selves. Then I remembered that even in paradise there's danger, as poor old Bud knew only too well. Even amid the wonders of nature, I'd helped him on so many cases where hiding the truth was what had got people into trouble—killed, even.

I finished my smoke and walked back to the ashtray on the table to stub it out. Tamsin re-emerged and floated across the balcony, smiling weakly.

“Oh Beni,” she whispered huskily as she sat down beside him, “I wanted to ask if you'd come with me to the funeral? I've arranged everything for Tuesday morning.”

Well, that was news to me, and Beni and Chuck, too, by the looks of it.

“How have you done this?” asked Beni, puzzled. “Have the police said that you can?”

“Have they released Alistair's body?” echoed Chuck.

Tamsin looked quietly pleased with herself. “Oh yes, they called this morning, so I made all the arrangements. I had to ring and ring before that vicar-man at the church answered, but I got him in the end and he said that ten o'clock on Tuesday would be fine.”

“I guess the rector was quite busy, today being Sunday,” I observed, as wryly as I could.

“Oh, is it?” replied Tamsin, airily. “One loses track of time when one is grieving,” she added, looking suitably tragic. “One” this and “one” that—who did she think she was—Lady Bountiful?! She was really laying it on thick. Surely Beni would see through it?

It seemed he didn't.

“But Tamsin,
of course
I will escort you. You must not worry, I will be there to support you, as you wish.” Beni smiled kindly at Tamsin as he replied, then looked at me and added, “Will you still be here then, Cait? You will come to Alistair's funeral, of course?”

Instead of replying that I'd rather be on a plane back to Canada, I said, “Of course.” I used my most gracious voice. But I couldn't just leave it there, could I? “It will be an odd experience for you, Tamsin, I'm sure,” I said, looking directly at the woman, almost daring her to answer, “because you don't believe, do you? I mean, you're not a Christian, right? That twig waggling and chanting that you did when Alistair died—that all seemed to be . . . well, not Christian anyway. What was it exactly?”

Tamsin smiled a happy little smile and replied brightly, “Oh, that's something I was reading about in a book.” I tried not to let my shock show. “It's very interesting. Chuck loaned it to me, didn't you Chuck?”

Chuck looked vague as he replied, “Which book was that?” I wondered how many books he'd ever loaned to Tamsin.

“Oh, you
know
, the one about that place in Germany where all the Knights of the Round Table used to meet . . . you know, like King Arthur. It's got that funny name . . . Wewy-something. You
know
! Where they had all those big ceremonies and all those important relics—like in
Raiders of the Lost Ark
. It was ever so good! Oh—what was it
called
?” She was wailing like a child.

“Do you mean Wewelsburg Castle?” I asked.

Tamsin looked surprised. “How do
you
know about it?” she snapped. I suspected that what I was about to say would fall under Tamsin's heading of “showing off.”

“Oh, I guess I read about it, too, someplace,” I replied as casually as I could. “It was the Nazi's ‘Camelot' wasn't it, Chuck? Himmler's spiritual home for the
SS
once they'd achieved the perfect balance of race and power they were striving for in Europe? I think they just opened it up to the public. It was pretty controversial, I remember. Have you been yet? I should think it's just your cup of tea.” I recalled the medals that adorned his walls upstairs.

“Oh, why would Chuck want to go to a nasty place like that?” asked Tamsin, annoyed. “In the pictures in the book it wasn't even pretty on the outside, so it can't have been pretty on the inside. They used to have some interesting secret ceremonies there. Like back in the olden times. I thought it couldn't
hurt
to do that when Ally died. If his spirit was passing right by us, which it must have been, it was my duty to help it on its way. Even if I didn't want him to go. So that's what I was doing. But, no, you're right, I'm not really into church, or spirity things. It's all a bit much for me, kneeling and bowing and singing. I like the old stuff better. Lots of love potions and spells and gallantry and horses. I like the idea of having an ‘eternal flame.' The rector at the church said I couldn't have one for Ally. They don't do that there. Maybe they'd do it in that castle place.”

Tamsin's interpretation of the bizarre occultism that had been practiced by Himmler's Grail Order, the
SS
, was not only frighteningly naive, but also sadly familiar. We humans often fill our spiritual void with all sorts of rubbish that we half understand, then hang onto as though our lives, or our souls, depended upon it. Funnily enough, she'd alighted upon a particular area of fascination for me: how man, as an animal, is differentiated from all other animals by his desire to worship something bigger than himself—something mysterious, and just beyond his grasp. It was clear that this wasn't the place for a metaphysical or spiritual conversation, so I just sat there and pondered poor Tamsin . . . and wondered to what extent Chuck might be interested in this field.

“I doubt they'd do anything like that there,” replied Chuck to Tamsin's comment. “I should imagine they'd be over-run with such requests if they did.” It was an interesting comment, and one I couldn't let pass.

“Do you mean there are lots of people who'd like to be remembered with their own eternal flame at the place that was built by concentration camp inmates and prisoners—people used as slave labor so that Heinrich Himmler could practice his own unique form of religion at ‘The Center of the World'? Surely not.”

“There's a surprising number of neo-Nazi groups all around the world these days, and some are very big, and powerful,” replied Chuck gravely, “and many of them think of Wewelsburg as a shrine. They hope, one day, to see the Spear of Destiny in its appointed place there. But I'm pretty sure that the German government wouldn't allow personal memorials to be placed at the site. As you said, Cait, renovating the place and opening it to the public was pretty controversial in its own right.”

Somewhere in my head a picture was forming. Ideas and thoughts were shifting and resettling. I was still at sea. I lit another cigarette and drew on it, hard.

“We should collect some clothes for Gerard and take them to him at the hospital, as he asked,” said Beni, his practical tones cutting across the suddenly heavy atmosphere, restoring a sense of time and place.

I looked up and said, in a chorus with Tamsin, “We should.”

The widow and I looked at each other, then she said, sharply, “I
know
Gerard, you don't.
I
should be helping him, not you. He's
my
friend. You'll be leaving as soon as you can. I'll still be
here
. With my
friends
.” She was looking at Beni as she spoke. It was clear that she wasn't just talking about Gerard. I got it.

She was right. I was just passing through . . . at least, if I could work out what had happened to Alistair, Madelaine, and the necklace I was. In that instant, I sighed and faced the facts. I'd have to take the moments of flirtation and flattery and put them into my memory banks . . . and get on with the job of working everything out, so I could go home.

Beni said he'd get Gerard's key from Daphne to collect some things for the old man. Tamsin offered to help him. Chuck said he had a few things to sort out at his place before he could leave. I offered to stay behind and, once again, clear away the remains of our meal. We all agreed with the plan of action. After lots of cheek kissing, everyone headed off in their various directions.

I carried a few plates into the kitchen, put them down, and found a beer on the counter, freshly poured into a lovely cut crystal glass. I wondered who had poured it—and for whom? Beni, Tamsin, and Chuck had all just gone out through the kitchen, one after the other. Surely no one would mind if I drank it? It looked very inviting.

“Fancy a cold one, Cait?” I asked myself.

“Don't mind if I do,” I replied to myself. I picked up the glass and let the cool bubbles wash the back of my throat. It was a beautiful day, and pretty soon we'd all be on our way to visit poor old Gerard in hospital, with his much needed supplies. Until then, there wasn't
that
much to clear . . . so I couldn't see the harm.

I WOKE WITH A SPLITTING
headache, and knowing that I'd had some pretty wild dreams. Everything was black. I had no idea where I was. I rubbed my forehead. It was damp . . . or was that blood? I couldn't even see my hand in front of my eyes. I realized I was sitting against a wall made of big, rough blocks of stone. I knew this because their lumps were digging into the base of my spine. Beneath me the floor was slightly less bumpy, but stone nonetheless. Everything was cold, me especially.