“But the gold—” Tony exclaimed.

“What gold? We’ve built up a fabric of guesswork and surmise. We haven’t the slightest clue, and there is nothing more we can do here.”

“Not true,” said Tony. Schmidt nodded vigorous agreement.

“What can we do?”

“Inspect Hoffman’s papers.”

“Lots of luck, buster. You can be sure Friedl has already been through them with a fine-tooth comb.”

“I don’t know why you are so prejudiced against the poor woman,” Tony said. I rolled my eyes in speechless commentary. Tony reddened. “Even if she is—er—up to no good, which I consider unproven, I may find something she overlooked. I hope you won’t accuse me of vanity if I suggest I am slightly more intelligent than she.”

“No,” I said. “I won’t.”

Tony wasn’t quite sure how to take that, so he decided to let it pass. “We should also interrogate our colleagues.”

“Now, Tony—”

“Look here, Vicky,” Tony said in a kindly voice. “Let me spell it out for you, okay? You and I both got copies of that photograph of Frau Schliemann—”

“It wasn’t Frau Schliemann.”

“Well, Helene Barton of the Classics Department said it was.”

“Helene Barton is a jerk. She doesn’t know her—”

“Please, Vicky. The point is, if you and I got copies of the picture, maybe the others did, too—Dieter and Elise and Jan Perlmutter. My being here is a coincidence; I have to admit I didn’t give that photo a second thought. Maybe Dieter just happened to fix on Garmisch for his holiday. But you can bet Perlmutter wouldn’t be hanging around, and in disguise, at that, if he weren’t up to something sneaky.”

“Tony,” I said desperately, “if your—my—our—theory is correct, one of them is a killer.”

“Precisely. Therefore it behooves us to find out which one.”

“It is Perlmutter who is the killer,” said Schmidt. “He is in disguise. Or perhaps the one we have not seen—D’Addio. It is very suspicious that she has disguised herself so well we have not even seen her.”

The brilliant illogic of this took my breath away for a moment. “There’s another possibility, just as logical,” I said. “Nobody we know is the killer. The photos were sent as a bizarre practical joke, or the delusion of a sick old man. Freddy’s murder is unrelated to the hypothetical gold of Troy.”

“Then why was his body left in your garden?” Schmidt asked.

“I don’t know. Which is precisely why I intend to return to Munich this evening and make a full confession. I’ll tell my friend Karl Feder the whole story and let him laugh himself sick at my girlish delusions of buried treasure, and then the police can get on with their investigation.”

“She is speaking out of despair,” Schmidt explained to Tony. “She is easily discouraged. We will find a clue and then she will change her mind. Vicky, let us go to Garmisch and give Dieter the third degree.”

“Sorry, I didn’t bring my rubber hose. Besides, I have an errand to do this morning.”