He opened a drawer and took out a pen case, from which he removed a gold Pelikan and handed it to me with both hands, as if he had been presenting me with a field marshal’s baton. About two or three dozen documents followed, which I signed with a perfect facsimile of Eric Gruen’s signature. I had practiced it in Garmisch, so that I might match the signature on the passport. Which, incidentally, Bekemeier remembered to check. Then I returned the pen and, our business apparently concluded, stood up and fetched my coat from his hat stand.

“It’s been a pleasure, Dr. Gruen,” he said, bowing again. “I shall always endeavor to serve your family’s interests. You may depend on that, sir. As you may also depend on my absolute discretion regarding your place of residence. Doubtless there will be inquiries as to how you may be contacted. Rest assured that I shall resist them with all my usual vigor, sir.” He shook his head with distaste. “These Viennese. They inhabit two worlds. One is the world of fact. The other is the world of rumor and gossip. The greater the wealth, the greater the attending rumor, I suppose. But what can you do, Herr Doktor?”

“I’m grateful for everything,” I said. “And I’ll see you tomorrow. At the funeral.”

“You’ll be there, then?”

“I said so, didn’t I?”

“Yes, you did. I’m sorry. I tell you frankly, sir, my memory is not what it was. It’s a terrible thing for a lawyer to admit to his client, but there it is. Things were hard for us here in Vienna, after the war. We all of us had to deal on the black market, just to stay alive. Sometimes it seems I’ve forgotten so much. And sometimes I think it’s best that way. Especially with me being a lawyer. I have to be careful. My reputation. The standing of this firm. I live in the Russian sector, you know. I’m sure you understand.”

I walked back to my hotel understanding only that there had been something I had not understood about Dr. Bekemeier. I felt like a man who had been trying to handle an eel. Every time I thought I had grasped it, the thing slipped away from me again. I decided to mention our curious conversation to Eric Gruen when I telephoned him with the good news that the meeting with the lawyer had gone without a hitch, and that his inheritance was as good as in the bank.

“How’s the weather in Vienna?” he asked. Gruen sounded like a man who wasn’t much interested in money. “It snowed a lot here last night. Heinrich is already waxing his skis.”

“It’s snowing here, too,” I reported.

“What’s your hotel like?”