The Ludwig Conspiracy

  The king frowned. “I did show myself, Marot. In the past. But since then, there have been two wars that I did not want. The ministers make me their plaything, the smoke of factories hangs over the cities, the people talk of socialism and revolution. This is no longer my world.” Ludwig strode through the brightly lit hall now, and his voice echoed back from the walls. “I do not belong in this age, Marot. And if I am to go under, then let it be as the last great ruler. As an example of what monarchy used to mean. As the last true king.”

  “But Your Majesty,” I began in a pleading tone. However, Ludwig waved me away.

  “Go now, Marot. Leave me alone.” He looked through one of the great windows and out into the garden, and for all his height and portly figure, he suddenly seemed to me like a vulnerable child, like the loneliest human being in the universe, a man on the moon, far from everything that was warm, bright, alive.

  I bowed low and hastily went down the stairs. All of a sudden I wanted only to be gone from here, away from those bare rooms, from all the cold splendor, the silence and darkness. I stumbled out and exhaled deeply, as if that would enable me to cough up all the evil in the castle like a poisonous gas.

  When I glanced up, the king was still standing there, staring out at the woods.

  A bloodless, lifeless waxwork of a king.

  IFGQMT, WFT, IFI, IQT

  The morning of the next day gave me a warm, bright welcome.

  I opened my eyes because the sunbeams were tickling my nose. Last night was only a horrific memory, and I went down in high good humor to the kitchen, where Maria was busy washing dishes. I crept up quietly behind her and put my hands over her eyes, whereupon, laughing, she felt with her own wet hands for my face. Our quarrel of yesterday over Ludwig seemed to be forgotten.

  “Stop that, Theodor!” she cried pertly. “Or shall I put soap on your black coat and tell the king?”

  “Only if you promise to come out for some fresh air with me,” I insisted. “Without Leopold. I promised the boy a new slingshot if he would leave the two of us in peace. In return I promise not to say a word about the king, agreed?”

  “Very well,” she said with a sigh. “But only for an hour. Then I have to do the laundry.”

  I let her go, and together we ran out into the green landscape, laughing like children, down the hill on which the monastery stood, and toward the woodland that spread over large parts of the island. I had not yet said anything to Maria about her strange expeditions to Oberammergau, and I decided that it could wait. Perhaps she might tell me about them herself sometime. Until then, I could hope that Leopold was only the fruit of a brief passion that had long ago grown cold, and no other man stood between me and my beloved.

  As soon as we were in the shade of the beech trees to the south of the island, I tried again to take Maria in my arms and kiss her mouth. This time she looked at me angrily. Every trace of merriment had disappeared from her eyes.

  “If this is what you lured me into the woods for, then let me tell you I’m no loose woman,” she snapped. “You can do that with your other girls, not with me.”

  “There are no other girls,” I assured her. “Maria, I really don’t understand you. Don’t you like me even a little?”

  “More than you can know,” she said, “but it will never do.”

  “For heaven’s sake, why not? If it’s because of Leopold, then believe me . . .”

  But she had already turned away and was running farther into the wood. Shaking my head, I hurried after her. Ever since our first meeting, Maria had been a sealed book. I ardently hoped that she loved me, yet she seemed curiously reserved as soon as I showed my love for her. Did she still feel something for the father of her child, even though he had disavowed her years ago?

  I finally caught up with her. She was sitting on a mossy stone, beside a little bubbling brook, crying quietly. Her whole body shook.

  “He . . . he’ll kill me,” she whispered. “I can’t do it, Theodor, or he’ll kill me.”

  I froze. “Who?” I asked. “Who will kill you? Leopold’s father?” At last I decided to break my silence. “Listen, Maria,” I hesitantly began. “I know about your secret meetings in Oberammergau. I . . . I followed you one day because I was blind with jealousy. The man there has no more power over you. He disavowed you, and . . .”

  “You fool!” she suddenly cried, as if beside herself. “What are you talking about? You don’t understand anything. Anything!”

  The next moment, a jay called not far away. I started and saw a figure standing behind one of the beech trees, only some twenty paces from us. The figure had moved out slightly from behind the trunk of the tree, presumably to observe us better, and so I could make out a sleeveless black coachman’s coat, a top hat, and the ivory-handled walking stick that the man held. Suddenly he turned his face to me, and my heart missed a beat.

  It was Carl von Strelitz.

  The Prussian agent did not for one moment hesitate. With his free hand, he reached into the inner pocket of his coat and brought out a small black pistol. There was a report, and the bark of the beech tree directly behind me split open as if at the lash of a whip. I seized Maria’s arm and drew her behind the rock.

  “Do you have anything to do with this man?” I whispered as another shot rang out and dust from the rock rained down on us. “Have you set him on me? Is he the man who will kill you?”

  Maria shook her head in silence. Fear seemed to hold her in its frozen grasp.

  Desperately, I tried to calm my breathing, but my heart beat wildly. “He has a double-barreled Derringer,” I said quietly, cautiously peering out from behind the rock. “He fired the same gun at me once before, a few weeks ago. The devil knows how he found me. At least he’ll have to reload.” I looked deep into Maria’s eyes. “Now, we are going to run, do you hear me? Over to the castle, where we’ll be safe. Don’t turn around. Just run as fast as you can. One, two, run!”

  On that last word we shot out from behind the rock and ran like hares. The castle was not very far away, and I could only hope that Carl von Strelitz would not overtake us before we reached it. As we ran, all kinds of thoughts whirled through my mind. What was the Prussian agent doing at Herrenchiemsee? Was he still pursuing me? But he must assume that I had long ago told the king about his meeting with Dr. Gudden. So was it simply a wish for revenge that brought him here, or was there some other reason for Strelitz’s presence on the island? What had Maria meant when she said, He’ll kill me?

  We ran in haste over small streams and through thick undergrowth, so that my coat was soon dirty and ripped at the hem. Beside me, Maria was gasping for breath, but she bravely ran on toward the castle. It must now be hidden somewhere behind the trees to the northeast. I could only hope that in our wild haste we wouldn’t miss seeing it. When, once, I briefly turned around, I saw that von Strelitz still had his walking stick in his hand. Now he pulled the ivory handle, and a long, thin blade appeared. He cut himself a way through the undergrowth with it, steadily gaining ground on us.

  Beside me, Maria stumbled and fell full length in the muddy bend of a stream. I heard von Strelitz let out a cry of triumph. I knew at that moment that we wouldn’t make it.

  “Go on, run to the castle,” I cried to Maria, roughly pulling at her dress. “I’ll hold him off until you get there.”

  “But . . .”

  “No buts!” I hauled her out of the stream. She swayed, tottered, and finally hurried on.

  The Prussian agent was only a few paces behind me now. I could hear branches cracking as he broke through the thickets. I turned to face him. He held the swordstick stretched far out ahead of him; he meant to stick me like a pig. At the last moment I swerved aside and let him run into empty space; the top hat flew off his head.

  Without taking my eyes off the agent, I picked up a stout branch lying on the mossy ground and swung it. Von Strelitz jumped back and feinted a move to the left, in order, finally, to thrust from the right. The blade slit open my coat, wh
ich was ruined anyway, and struck me right in the chest—where it unexpectedly met with hard resistance. I staggered a step back and looked down at myself in astonishment. I had expected to be mortally wounded. But a lucky dispensation of Providence had preserved me from death for the moment: the thrust of the blade had been deflected by my silver pocket watch!

  With fresh heart, I rushed toward my adversary. This time I swung the branch like a scythe and uttered a berserk yell. Von Strelitz swerved, but the branch struck him on the side at chest height and sent him staggering. As he tottered backward, I took aim with the branch again, and this time I struck him on the left temple. Von Strelitz turned up his eyes, dropped the swordstick, and finally collapsed on the ground like a felled tree.

  Instead of dealing him the final mortal blow, in my fear I threw the branch far from me, and hurried away. I almost expected von Strelitz to come after me, but suddenly the trees thinned out, and I saw the green, well-tended turf on the western side of the castle before me. On my right were the two fountains and the garden complex, and two gardeners with wheelbarrows stared at me in astonishment as I broke through the bushes like a wild boar being pursued.

  Frantically, I looked around for Maria. She must be here somewhere! Or had she run on to the monastery in her panic? At last I found her, lying like the dead beside one of the basins. I stumbled a few more steps, and then I, too, sank to the ground. When I turned once to look back, the trees towered up in silence behind me, like a dark, high wall with evil raging beyond it.

  There was no sign of von Strelitz.

  “Who . . . who was that?” Maria gasped, as she lay there, still fighting for breath.

  My mouth was full of a taste of iron; my rib cage hurt from the thrust of the sword. “An . . . old acquaintance,” I finally managed to say. “And you? Are you sure you have never seen the man before?”

  “By God, no, never! How could I have known him?” She sat up and looked at me, distraught, her face smeared with dirt and blood running in a fine trickle from an injury to her forehead. “For heaven’s sake, Theodor!” she wailed. “What are you keeping from me?”

  I shook my head and bent over her to wipe the blood away. “Nothing that has anything to do with you,” I said. “Believe me, it is better for you to know nothing about it.”

  “But how am I to trust you in the future if you don’t trust me?”

  “I’ve sworn an oath.”

  “An . . . an oath?”

  I closed her lips and went on cleaning her face and dress, in rough-and-ready fashion, with water from the basin of the fountain. When I had finished, I turned away and went in silence toward one of the many flower beds.

  “What are you doing?” she cried. “Don’t leave me here alone.”

  I began hastily picking a bunch of white lilies. When I had finished, I came back and knelt down in front of her. Reverently and with bowed head, like a paladin before his queen, I offered her the flowers.

  “Dearest Maria,” I tentatively began. “The . . . the lily has been a symbol of purity and innocence since time immemorial. By the holy Virgin Mary and these flowers, I solemnly swear that none of the terrible recent events can destroy my love for you. I love you, Maria.”

  With these last words I drew her down to me, the white lilies fell from her hand, and we sank into a sea of flowers in a close embrace. For the first time I kissed her on the mouth. She tasted of mud and blood, of sweat, and of the sweet fragrance of an apple cake that she had baked that morning. I had never in my life tasted anything so wonderful.

  At that moment steps crunched over the gravel behind us. I sat up in alarm, fearing to see Carl von Strelitz standing on the path.

  But it was not Strelitz; it was the king.

  Ludwig did not seem to have slept at all. His face was even more waxen than I remembered it when I had seen him in the night. His eyes glowed with a cold rage that I had never seen in him before.

  “How . . . how could you dare do this, Marot?” he said in a hoarse voice, as if someone were constricting his throat with a thin cord. “My friend . . . I trusted you.”

  “Your Majesty . . .” I hesitantly replied, getting quickly to my feet as I brushed dust and dirt off my coat. “It is nothing that . . .”

  “Get out of my sight before I put an end to you!” he shouted. His face swelled red as a turkey cock. He seemed to be inflating himself to twice his usual size, his whole stout body shaking like a mountain about to explode at any moment with the force of a power within it.

  “I trusted you!” he roared. Picking up the lilies, he flung them in my face like someone throwing down a gauntlet. “I told you my idea, and this is how you repay me? Get out of here, both of you!”

  At that moment, I was indeed afraid that the king might kill us both—strangle us with his fleshy paws, or drown us like a couple of kittens in the basin of the fountain. So I turned and ran with Maria toward the nearby castle.

  Behind us, I heard Ludwig’s bestial roar. But as we moved farther away, I realized that it changed more and more into weeping—a pathetic whining, like the sound of a child whose favorite toy has been taken away.

  It was to be many months before I saw the king again.

  21

  SHAKEN, STEVEN LUKAS PUT the diary down on the bench beside him.

  The love story of Theodor and Maria affected him more than he had expected. Maybe his sudden sympathy for them also had something to do with Sara. Like Theodor Marot, Steven didn’t know what was happening to him. Angrily, the bookseller brushed that thought aside. When all this was over, and he could finally convince the police of his innocence, there would be time for Sara and him.

  But first he must decipher the damn book.

  The worst thing was that even after reading those last pages, he couldn’t say what the second keyword was. He could only hope that the guided tour of the castle that evening would get him farther.

  It was noticeably cooler now in the evening twilight. Steven buttoned up his coat, shouldered the rucksack, and walked back to the castle, where he was to meet Sara and Uncle Lu in half an hour’s time.

  As he walked along beside the lake under the shade of the beech trees, Steven several times felt as if he were being observed. Something creaked, a twig cracked somewhere, but whenever he turned around, all he saw was the red and yellow of the autumn leaves and the gray trunks of the beech trees forming a labyrinth behind him. He was reminded of the Cowled Men whom Sara thought she had seen on the island. Had they followed him? Steven quickened his step when a large black crow suddenly flew up in front of him and moved away through the air, cawing loudly. The bird sounded as if it were laughing at him.

  At last he reached the canal that ran in a straight line from the lake to the castle. It led past hedges, flower beds where the flowers had faded, the empty basin of a fountain, green with algae, and ended at the forecourt of the princely building. There were only a few tourists about at this late hour. The little café in the side wing had closed, and the manager was just bringing in the tables and sun umbrellas. A gardener was wearily loading rakes and spades on a small truck before going off to enjoy his well-earned relaxation after the day’s work.

  Steven admired the basins of the two great fountains, with the mythological figures raising their arms to the twilight sky, where the air was breathless as if before a storm. He remembered the passage in Marot’s diary when Ludwig II had stood exactly here, overcome by one of his famous fits of rage. For a split second Steven felt he had been catapulted back to those days, but he shook himself, and the moment was over.

  If I’m not careful, I’ll end up as crazy as Ludwig . . .

  Steven was looking at his watch, to see if it was time to find Sara and Uncle Lu, when he suddenly heard a click to his left. A man in a voluminous green coat stood behind one of the hedges with a camera in his hands, and he seemed to be taking random pictures of the castle. But then Steven noticed that the lens was trained on him; the soft click sounded like the safety catch of a gun bei
ng taken off. Was this character photographing him?

  Another man in a similar hunter’s coat appeared behind one of the fountains. The stranger slowly raised a pair of field glasses to his face and examined the castle.

  Is he looking at the castle or at me? Maybe I’m more paranoid than I thought.

  The man in the hunter’s coat came toward him, walking with long strides. He took something from under his sleeve; it had a silvery glint in the evening light. The sun was so low over the canal that it dazzled Steven, and he could not see the man properly. But he seemed about to speak to him; he was coming closer and closer; he . . .

  “Hey, Steven! Here we are!”

  Startled, Steven turned away and looked at the castle. Sara and Albert were standing at the entrance. The art detective waved cheerfully to him.

  “Where were you?” she called to him. “We thought the woods must have swallowed you up.”

  “They almost did,” Steven muttered. When he turned again, the man in the hunter’s coat had disappeared. So had the man with the camera.

  “I have good news and bad news for you,” Uncle Lu said when Steven reached the castle. “The bad news is that so far we haven’t found a single clue to any possible keyword. The good news is this.” Grinning, he held up and jingled a bunch of keys. “All Herrenchiemsee, including the glass cases and the alarms, is open to us with these keys. The head of the security firm is a real Ludwig fan. In my time as a double, I once gave him my autograph and put a couple of my books at his disposal. Ever since then, he’s thought as highly of me as if I were the king himself. Come along.” He strode toward the entrance. “The night watchmen are leaving the emergency lighting on for us, and if it seems a little eerie, I have a couple of flashlights here as well.”

  “Good to see you again,” Sara said quietly as they entered the dimly lit first floor. “I was beginning to miss you.”