The Zurich Conspiracy (37 page)

The cave entrance, hidden behind some bushes and piles of stones, was very narrow; an experienced adult could just force his way through. Josefa stood before it wondering if she’d bitten off more than she could chew. Not until now, dressed in Helene’s climbing equipment, had she fully realized the risks involved in an expedition like this.

Pius picked up on her hesitation and smiled encouragingly. “When we’ve got the eye of the needle behind us, everything gets much wider, more open. No fear. I’ll crawl through first, pull my rucksack behind, and you just follow. You won’t regret it, believe me.”

Josefa’s whole body was shivering. “It’s OK, it’s only fear of taking the plunge,
Schwellenangst
, you know. I can hack it,” she replied, screwing up her courage.

Pius crept on all fours into the hole. Josefa heard rustling and scraping, then nothing. A little while later the rope to the rucksack started to move.

Now it was her turn. She ducked down into the tunnel, lay flat on her stomach, and worked her way forward like a seal. It was dark, and she crawled blindly into the unknown. The sound of Pius calling to her from far ahead gave her courage. She slowly felt her way forward. It seemed to take an eternity. Fortunately she didn’t get claustrophobic. Not yet, at least. She felt smooth, damp rock beneath her. A yellowish glimmer of light became visible in the distance—that must be Pius’s carbide lamp. Suddenly she slipped into nothingness, but a second later she felt a pair of strong hands grabbing hold of her.

“Well done, the worst is over,” Pius enthused.

Her knees were spongy, and her eyes were slow to adjust to the darkness around the circle of light.

“Stand over here, you’ll be safe there,” Pius said. Josefa was still holding tightly to his arm. Then she heard him say in a peculiarly echoing voice, “And now the surprise of your life awaits you!”

They roped themselves together and put on their rucksacks. By the light of their headlamps, they placed their feet carefully on the smooth rock. Pius led, Josefa followed. They ducked under rock ledges and forced their way through narrow cracks. Josefa could only make out sketchy silhouettes, relying on Pius’s instructions. The rope and the helmet gave a false sense of security—she had no illusions about that. A fall wouldn’t only be painful; it could, under certain circumstances, be fatal. But the more headway they made, the more confident she became. If she could make it through this part, she’d be able to make it through the rest.

They only said what was absolutely necessary; climbing demanded total concentration.

Josefa was eager to see what Pius had promised to be a revelation—an experience she’d never forget. She couldn’t turn back now anyway. She was at Pius’s mercy for better or worse.

Richard Auer was sitting in the interrogation room with a slightly irritated expression on his face. The police had summoned him at six in the morning. He had to postpone an important nine o’clock interview with a headhunter, but he wanted to make a show of cooperating. The two officers sitting across from him mustn’t think he had something to hide.

It was like a bad movie, one of those soft porn flicks he sometimes watched in anonymous hotel rooms on business trips—although this was anything but arousing. He felt bossed around, goaded; he was on the point of telling the officers that he thought it an impertinence to have to listen to this lewd tape, but he felt the eyes of the two officers on him so he tried to appear relaxed. One of the men pressed a button at last, ending the embarrassment.

“Why did we play this tape for you, Herr Auer? Can you explain that?” Franz Kündig asked, looking exhausted. His interrogation tactics were not as well honed today as usual. Kündig’s baby was teething, and the pain was worse at night, cutting Kündig’s normal sleep in half—from five hours to two and a half.

In some world, certainly not his, people had sex in public. Or half in public, if you considered that sex in this case took place under a table with a tablecloth that reached the ground. Kündig’s exhausted state rendered him incapable of finding anything erotic in that; he would have gone to sleep under the table, and there’d be nothing on the tape but the sound of his snoring.

Richard Auer frowned. “No, no idea, but I hope you can clear this up for me so I can be of some further help.”

“Do you recognize the voices of the two parties?”

“No, I’m sorry.”

“Are you sure, Herr Auer? We can give you more time to think about it if you’d like.”

“Herr Kündig, I can only repeat what I’ve said: I do not recognize these voices. Sorry.”

“We’ll play a section for you once again,” Kündig said, motioning to Zwicker.

Richard Auer folded his arms, resigning himself to yet another round.

But suddenly he sat up. The male voice on the tape did sound familiar. That was—no, it couldn’t be. The man was speaking English, American English…Now the woman’s voice.
Good God, it really was like a porn tape!

Zwicker cut the sound. “Did you understand that sentence, Herr Auer?”

“Yes.” He was rocking back and forth on his chair.

“‘I love you, Dick.’ Are you that Dick?”

“How’s that?” Auer thought he’d misheard.

“Dick as in Richard. You must know that. It’s your nickname, after all.”

It took a moment for Auer to clue in. And then he didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. But he did neither. Instead he took some deep breaths, something he’d learned to do as a German in Switzerland: always be polite, never arrogant, never didactic, never steamroll the sensibilities of the Swiss confederation.

“Let me hear that part again,” he requested.

Kündig and Zwicker exchanged glances. “Glad to, Herr Auer.” They rewound the tape and pressed play.

You couldn’t miss it now. He hadn’t been mistaken, either time. He waved for them to stop. Then he said, slowly and deliberately, “What the woman on the tape is saying is not ‘I love you, Dick.’ She is saying, ‘I love
your dick
,’ get it?”

Because the officers showed no immediate reaction, he elaborated. “Dick means…well…it means
Schwanz
. Dick is…let’s say, a vulgar word for penis. The woman’s telling the guy she loves his
Schwanz
. It’s got nothing to do with Richard.”

The two officers looked at Auer, the meaning of his words slowly dawning on them. Kündig turned to his colleague and said, “Can this difference be acoustically enhanced—‘you’ and ‘your’?”

Zwicker’s hand stroked his head; he was nearly bald. “We’d best have a sound technician look into it. But we can’t rule out some confusion.”

“Believe me, gentlemen…” Richard Auer began—he wanted to say, you’re barking up the wrong tree but caught himself just in time—“that is not
my
voice. But it does remind me of somebody.” He hesitated. Kündig leaned forward—a movement that subtly encouraged disclosure.

“I would not want to accuse anyone, but I’m just saying the voice reminds me—”

“Of?” Zwicker lacked Kündig’s patience for interrogation.

“Of Pius Tschuor.”

“The photographer?” Zwicker couldn’t conceal his excitement.

“Yes, and it’s not only the voice. It’s the words too. ‘You’ve made me happy, baby.’ That’s what Pius always says after a successful shoot. ‘You’ve made me happy, baby.’ If he’s satisfied with the model and the pictures, he always says that. I was there at the time, at the outdoors shoot and wherever.”

The two officers said nary a word.

Dick as in Richard, it’s the joke of a lifetime
, Auer thought to himself.
That’s how fast things can move. A woman pays her lover the usual compliments, and Richard’s immediately a suspect.

Kündig cleared his throat. “We’ll investigate the matter further, Herr Auer. We request that you tell nobody—”

“That asshole,” Auer burst out. He pounded his fist on the table. “So that’s what Schulmann was talking about the whole time!”

He jumped up and, without realizing it, started talking aloud as if trying to figure something out. “Schulmann made insinuations about my wild sex life on several occasions. He told me it was bad for my career to screw around with women connected to the company. When I told him what he was saying was absolutely uncalled for and indeed insulting, he retorted that he had proof and I’d better keep my mouth shut. He said all that very quietly, with a smile, but I found it…intimidating. And he wanted to be repaid for his silence, of course. He said I was to praise him to the skies in an internal report. I was to say how good the company morale had become, how he was able to motivate people, how enthusiastic the clients were about him.”

Auer took a step toward the officers as if pleading before a jury.

“These are things I’m expected to do all the time anyway, but subtly, gentlemen, oh so subtly. Not outright extortion. Don’t get me wrong—I’m above reproach here. There is not and has not been any wild sex life. I’m firmly in control, and my fiancée has nothing to do with Loyn. But those threats were meant in all seriousness, and as you know even rumors plucked out of thin air can be dangerous.”

He made his hands into fists without thinking. “I knew you weren’t to mess around with Schulmann. And I knew I couldn’t keep on working with a man like that, so I left the company. But
now
I see he really thought he had proof. That tape! He made the same mistake you did! He thought that
I
was Dick. The motherfucker!”

Kündig stood up. “Heinz, is that woman still in Paris?”

“I’ll see to it right away. And the man?”

“He’s probably long gone.”

Josefa was blinded. The harsh light reflecting off the bright walls was too much for her eyes, which had just adjusted to the dark. She blinked and instinctively turned her head away. But what she saw then took her breath away. She felt like she was inside a monumental oyster shell arching high up overhead. The cave walls shimmered in fantastic, mother-of-pearl colors that flowed into one another. Bizarre pillars grew out of the ground, narrowing as they went upward, like gigantic termite mounds. Stalactites inclined toward them, hanging like icicles from a roof. It was overpowering: dripstones like crystal candelabras in an underground cathedral. Neither she nor Pius said a word.

Then they looked at each other, and Pius exclaimed triumphantly, “Did I promise too much?”

Josefa shook her head.

“Come on, there’s more to see. That’s just the beginning!”

“Can it be more beautiful? Is that possible?”

Pius held up the lamp. “Yes. But we’ll have to climb and crawl for another hour. Ready?”

Saturday, February 8

Contacted Loyn. Information: P. Tschuor had no assignments from Loyn from February 8–12. They say he is basically freelance, works for other clients as well. Get tel. number from his photo agency, Outlook. Karin Fabian gives us cell phone number. P.T. not answer cell. Fabian says she does not know where to reach him.

Apartment super says P.T. always on road. Reason for postal box (at Sihlpost Post Office). Make inquiries of other photographers. Make list of friends and acquaintances. Find P.T.’s mother in Schaffhausen. She’s heard nothing from him in three weeks. Check his last tel. calls and numbers. Results negative. P.T. seems to use mainly cell. Ex-girlfriend has no further contact. Gives us names of acquaintances. Alert passed on to other police stations, including P.T.’s license plate. P. Hartwell is shooting in London. Zwicker going there for questioning.

“I don’t like this stuff. Granola bars, sports food, astronaut dog food.” Josefa chewed listlessly on an energy bar.

“Would you rather drag a ton of food around with you? This is all concentrated in a few bites. Very practical, you’ve got to admit.” Pius turned down the gas stove.

“Sure, it’s practical, but it doesn’t particularly stimulate the appetite. Better to concentrate liquids down to a few drops. Water is good and heavy, all right.”

“But it gives you some hot tea. That feels good, right?”

They were sitting on a rocky ledge in a flat hollow. It’s true the steaming liquid slowly thawed her out. Josefa hadn’t given much thought to how cold underground caves could be. She was wearing thermal underwear—also borrowed from Helene—but cold was creeping into all her limbs nevertheless. “I’ve got to pee,” she admitted.