“No, no,” said the American. “I’m not lost. This is the place I’m looking for. That is, if this is the Hotel Schroderbrau.”

“This is the Hotel Schroderbrau.”

“Then we are in the right place.” The American was about five-feet-eight, with smallish hands and feet. His shirt, tie, pants, and shoes were all varying shades of brown, but his jacket was made of a light-colored tweed and nicely tailored, too. His gold Rolex told me there was probably a better car than the Buick in his garage back home in America. “I’m looking for two rooms, for two nights,” he said. “For me and my friend in the car.”

“I’m afraid we’re not a hotel that is approved for Americans,” I said. “I could lose my license.”

“I won’t tell if you don’t,” he said.

“Don’t think I’m being rude, please,” I said, trying out the English I’d been teaching myself. “But to be honest, we are almost closing. This was my father-in-law’s hotel, until he died. My wife and I have had very little success in running it. For obvious reasons. And now that she’s ill—” I shrugged. “I’m not much of a cook, you see, sir, and I can tell you’re a man who enjoys his comfort. You would be better off at another hotel. Perhaps the Zieglerbrau or the Hörhammer, on the other side of town. They are both approved for Americans. And they both have excellent cafés, too. Especially the Zieglerbrau.”

“So am I to take it that there are no other guests in the hotel?” he asked, ignoring my objections and my attempts to speak English. His German accent may have been nonexistent, but there was nothing wrong with his grammar or his vocabulary.

“No,” I said. “We’re empty. As I said, we’re on the verge of closing.”

“I only asked because you keep on saying ‘we,’” he said. “Your father-in-law is dead and you said your wife is in the hospital. But you keep on using the word ‘we.’ As if there’s someone else here.”

“Hotelier’s habit,” I said. “There’s just me and my impeccable sense of service.”

The American pulled a pint of rye out of his jacket pocket and held it so I could see the label. “Might that impeccable sense of service run to a couple of clean glasses?”

“A couple of glasses? Sure.” I couldn’t guess what he wanted. He certainly didn’t look like he needed a deal on two rooms. If there was a rat crawling over his well-polished wingtips, I couldn’t yet smell it. Besides, there was nothing wrong with the label on his rye. “But what about your friend in the car? Won’t he be joining us?”

“Him? Oh, he doesn’t drink.”