I got out of the car, shut the door quietly, and, keeping the River Loisach on my right, walked northeast, in the direction of Sonnenbichl, taking a shortcut through the grounds of what had once been the hospital and was now being turned into an R&R center for American servicemen.

I started to think about returning to Munich to pick up the threads of my business. I decided that, in the absence of any new clients, I might see if I could find any trace of the last one. Perhaps I would go back to the Holy Ghost Church and hope that she turned up there. Or speak to poor Felix Klingerhoefer at American Overseas Airlines. Perhaps he could remember something about Britta Warzok other than that she had come from Vienna.

The walk back to Mönch took longer than I had bargained for. I had forgotten that a lot of the walk, most of it in fact, was uphill, and even without a knapsack on my back I was something less than the happy wanderer by the time I crept into the house, crawled onto my bed, unlaced my shoes, and closed my eyes. It was several minutes before Engelbertina realized I had returned and came to find me. Her face told me immediately that something was wrong.

“Eric had a telegram,” she explained. “From Vienna. His mother is dead. He’s rather upset about it.”

“Really? I thought they hated each other.”

“They did,” she said. “I think that’s part of the problem. He realizes he won’t ever be able to make it up with her now. Not ever.” She showed me the telegram.

“I don’t think I should be reading his telegram,” I said, reading his telegram all the same. “Where is he now?”

“In his room. He said he just wanted to be left alone.”

“I can understand that,” I said. “Your mother dies, it’s not like losing a cat. Not unless you’re a cat.”

Engelbertina smiled sadly and took my hand. “Do you have a mother?”

“Naturally I used to have one,” I said. “A father, too, if memory serves. Only somewhere along the way I seem to have lost them both. Careless of me.”

“Me, too,” she said. “That’s something else we have in common, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” I said, without much enthusiasm. As far as I was concerned, there was only one thing we seemed to have in common, and that was what went on in her bedroom, or mine. I looked at Gruen’s telegram again. “This suggests that he has come into a considerable fortune,” I said.

“Yes, but only if he goes to Vienna to see the lawyers in person and claims it,” she said. “And somehow I can’t see that happening. Not in his present condition. Can you?”

“Just how sick is he anyway?” I asked her.