“I wouldn’t have thought that—”

  “Wait,” I said. “We’re getting carried away.”

  “Art has always had that effect on us.”

  “This is different.” I picked up the Erinyes. “I would have noticed this the night of the party, but I’m certain it wasn’t here.”

  “How can you be sure? You couldn’t have looked at every single object in the room. There are too many.”

  “I specifically remember seeing the portrait miniature. I had the same reaction to the lace then that I just had now. Given my interest in Greek mythology, I would never have missed a sculpture of the Erinyes so close to it. Further, I didn’t notice it when I was here with Cécile and Ursula the other day.”

  I picked up the wax sculpture, carried it to the study, and asked Ursula about its provenance.

  “How odd,” she said. “I’ve never seen it before.” I’d set it on the table she used for a desk. She crouched down in front of it, her eyes level with the piece. “It’s not bad, but it’s not entirely worthwhile either, is it? The figures are recognizable as the Furies, but the detail on their faces is rather clumsily done as are the folds in their clothing. I’d be no more likely to purchase it than Cécile would be to wear that dreadful wool hat.”

  “Let’s ask Liesel what she makes of it,” Colin said and went to fetch her.

  Like Ursula, she knelt down to examine it. “Do you have a magnifying glass, Baroness?” she asked. Ursula pulled one from a cabinet drawer and handed it to her. “It was molded, which is rather strange. It would make better sense—and lead to a more impressive result—to use metal tools. It’s more precise.”

  “And a sculptor would surely have them on hand,” Ursula said.

  “It’s definitely not ancient,” Liesel said. “The Greeks and Romans did use wax, I believe primarily for funeral offerings, but this bears no resemblance to what I’d expect from something thousands of years old.”

  “Would it be likely to have survived so long?” Colin asked.

  “Possible, I imagine, but not likely,” Liesel said. “Look at their hair. It’s a style that was in favor probably twenty years ago.”

  “I should’ve noticed that,” I said.

  “It’s definitely a modern work,” Liesel said. “Where did it come from?”

  “We were hoping you could enlighten us on that point,” I said.

  “Me? I wouldn’t want to hazard a guess. It wouldn’t have been in a gallery, though. More like a souvenir stand near the Parthenon.”

  “Do you remember cataloging it?” I asked.

  She closed her eyes and paused. “Let’s see … where did you say it was? On the east wall near a portrait miniature? I know I’ve completed that area, but I can’t say I recall seeing this in particular. Forgive me, Baroness—you have so many exquisite things, it’s not possible to remember every single one. May I run upstairs and get my work? We can check whether I noted down its presence.”

  She came back ever so quickly, panting. “No, it’s not in my ledger, which means it was not there at the time. I was cataloging that section the morning of Frau Allerspach’s death. You’d asked me the night before, Baroness, if I’d be willing to take on the project, and I wanted to get started right away.”

  “So it likely wasn’t there until after the murder,” I said.

  “It’s so strange,” Liesel said. “I would’ve thought I’d have noticed it—”

  I didn’t stay to hear the rest of her sentence. I had an idea. I collected the nails and the metal ring from my room and went down to the kitchen.

  “Welcome, Lady Emily,” the cook said. “I do hope poor Fräulein Fronberg doesn’t have another headache and that you’re here for more tea?”

  “No, fortunately she does not. I’ve come with a question for you.”

  “Oh dear, not more about the murder, I hope. I’ve told you everything I can remember.”

  “Were any of your pots missing that day?” I asked.

  “My pots?” She scrunched her lips and her nose. “Not that I recall.”

  “Do you recognize these?” I held out the ring and nails on the palm of my hand.

  “They’re ordinary nails, aren’t they? The kind I use to hang my pots and pans. Oh, I see.” She took the ring out of my hand. “It’s identical to the ones on their handles.” She walked to the wall where they hung, looked at each of them, pulled one down, and handed it to me.

  “There’s a new ring on it,” I said. It was shinier than the others.

  She shouted for one of the kitchen maids. “Who fixed this?”

  “Well, that was me, Cook,” the girl said. She turned to me and bobbed a curtsy. “I was drying the dishes and putting them away and the ring was gone, so I couldn’t hang it up. The opening on the handle isn’t large enough to go over the head of the nail.”

  “When was this?” I asked.

  “The night Frau Allerspach died. Most everyone else was already in bed, but I could tell I wouldn’t be able to sleep, not with a ghost in the place. They wander, you know, those who’ve died violently. It’s not as if I didn’t like Frau Allerspach well enough when she was alive, but I don’t fancy the idea of running into her ghost. At any rate, I got another ring out, put it on, and closed it the best I could.”

  “Probably not very securely, given that the previous one fell off,” the cook said.

  “Did you wash the dishes as well as dry them?” I asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Do you remember what had been cooked in this pot?”

  “Well … not really, no,” she said. “Maybe cheese or something. Yes, that was it. I remember it was ever so hard to get out.”

  “I didn’t prepare anything with melted cheese that day,” the cook said. “Think harder. It had to be something else.”

  The girl shook her head. “I can’t imagine what, but it might be I just don’t remember. A lot happened that day, after all.”

  “Could it have been wax?” I asked.

  “Wax? Who would ever eat that?” She pulled a face. “I guess it could’ve been, though.”

  She’d scrubbed the pot well. There was no sign of wax or anything else in it. I thanked them both and went back upstairs. Colin was waiting for me in the corridor.

  “Did you learn what you hoped to?” he asked.

  “I did. I’m reasonably certain I know what happened, but I haven’t the slightest idea of what the killer’s motive was and—given that there’s still hardly any physical evidence—without it, don’t have a strong case.”

  “Do you want to talk it through? We might be able to figure it out together.”

  “We might, but hard evidence is always better, isn’t it? There’s something I want to check. I have an idea.”

  I took him by the hand and led him back to the gallery. “Take that down from the wall.” I pointed to Klimt’s portrait of Cécile. He did as I asked. The frame was unexpectedly light. He lowered it to the ground, keeping it balanced upright. I went around to the back. There, tucked in between the canvas and the frame, was a large envelope, stuffed almost to the point of bursting. “This may give us our answers.”

  “How did you know to look there?” he asked.

  “The painting was constantly hanging off-kilter. I straightened it more times than I can count. It occurred to me that something must be causing that to happen. The packet is so thick it pushed one side out from the wall and that must have been enough to keep it out of balance.”

  He pulled out a penknife from his pocket and handed it to me so I could slice open the envelope. I pulled out a sheaf of papers and read the one on top. My heart caught in my throat. “I can’t say it’s something I’d ever have suspected,” I said, handing it to him, “but at least now we know.”

  42

  Schloss Hohenschwangau

  1869

  It didn’t take long after arriving at Hohenschwangau for Niels’s wife to understand that, although he’d started treating her as a friend, the husband who’d been forced upon her had very little interest in any kind of meaningful relationship with her. She couldn’t begin to understand the connection between Niels and the king, but there was no denying they shared a bond. When she asked Ludwig about the art in the castle, he had no interest in talking to her about it. Instead, he’d pull Niels outside for a walk. They’d disappear for hours and when they returned there was something off about the both of them. She couldn’t determine what precisely, but it was something almost familiar.

  She took to spending her time with Elisabet, but was reluctant to bring up the subject. In the end, she didn’t need to; Elisabet did instead.

  “It’s quite a relief to have you here,” Elisabet said. “You can’t imagine what it’s like when there’s no one around but the two of them. They were always focused entirely on each other, but it’s all the more noticeable since they’ve been separated for so long. Before, I could almost believe we were the Three Musketeers. We had heaps of fun together. Perhaps things will go back to normal after a few months.”

  “Months? Surely we won’t be here that long,” the Valkyrie said. “What am I meant to do?”

  “Whatever you’d like.” Elisabet looked at her through narrowed eyes. “You’re not madly in love with him are you?”

  “With my husband? Heavens, no, but I’d come to believe we were friends who would make a life together.”

  “If you’re not in love with him, you’re in a brilliant position. Travel. Take a lover. Now that you’re out from under the thumb of your father-in-law, the world is offering you endless possibilities.”

  “You make it sound so easy.”

  “It is, once you throw off the mantle of obligation,” Elisabet said. “Do you see me living as a slave to my husband?”

  “You’re married?”

  “I am.”

  “And Herr Ney doesn’t mind you living here at the palace, without him?”

  “He’s Dr. Montgomery, if you must know,” she said. “Most of the time I don’t even tell people I’m married. What business is it of theirs, after all?”

  “You didn’t take his name?”

  “Why should I have? I’ve got an identity of my own. I don’t need his.”

  The Valkyrie had not the slightest idea how to respond to that. When she retired to bed that evening, she stayed awake, listening for Niels to open the door to his bedroom on the other side of the corridor. He and Ludwig had decided to go for a midnight walk under the full moon, but he didn’t return until luncheon the next day.

  “Where have you been hiding?” she asked, pulling him aside when he and Ludwig came into the dining room.

  “Forgive me, I’ve been a beast. The night was so beautiful we stayed out until the sun started to rise. I fell asleep as soon as I got to my room and only just awakened. What have you done this morning?”

  “Nothing except wait for you.”

  “You have all the resources of this magnificent place at your fingertips. You don’t need me to take advantage of them.”

  She realized that once again, she was on her own, destined to never be happy, not unless she took the only action she could think of that would make a positive change in her life.

  43

  Villa von Düchtel

  1906

  Taking the stack of papers with us, Colin and I headed back toward the study, detouring first to telephone the police. The snow had stopped overnight and the sun had been shining all morning. The roads were bound to be passable soon, if they weren’t already.

  “You two look rather serious,” Ursula said when we entered the room. “We’re having quite a laugh over the Furies. I think I may keep them after all.”

  “You admitted to me that you have some skill as a sculptor, didn’t you?” I asked.

  “Yes, when Cécile told you I’d studied at the academy in Munich.”

  “Yet the talent didn’t pass on to your daughter,” I said.

  “My daughter? Good heavens, no, but then Sigrid never had any interest in art. I hired a drawing master for her when she was twelve, but he told me she was hopeless before the end of the first day and refused to return to the house.”

  “I didn’t mean Sigrid,” I said, “rather your other daughter, Liesel.”

  “Liesel?” She balked, but her face turned a dark shade of red. “You’re very confused, Emily, if you think that—”

  Liesel shot toward the door, but Colin stepped in front of her, took her by the shoulders, and brought her back to us. “Don’t try it again,” he said. “I’ll physically restrain you if necessary.”

  “It’s not necessary,” Liesel said, taking a seat. She clasped her hands in her lap and focused her eyes on the floor in front of her feet.

  “Do you remember this document?” I asked, passing Ursula the first of the papers I’d found behind the painting.

  “Good heavens.” She was trembling. “I never thought I’d see this again. I—” She looked at Liesel. “Are you really her?”

  “The child you abandoned? I always have been, since the day of my birth in Paris.”

  “I’m overwhelmed.” Ursula dropped onto a chair. “Not a day has gone by that I haven’t wondered what happened to you. I knew your father would take care of you, but to have had no details, for all these decades, was a tremendous source of … well, it would’ve been worse for you than me. Is Hugo…” Her voice trailed and she swallowed, hard.

  “My father?” Liesel asked. “He’s dead.”

  Ursula closed her eyes. “It was too much to hope.”

  “Too much to hope? Too much to hope?” Liesel’s voice reached a painful pitch. “What did you think? That he was still in love with you? Carrying a flame for you all these years? That he was waiting for you in Paris?”

  “Arrêtez, both of you,” Cécile said. “Start at the beginning. You cannot open the book of someone’s life in the middle and expect it to make sense.”

  “She’s the only one who can tell it from the start.” Liesel spat the words.

  “That’s correct.” Ursula sighed and looked at Cécile, rather than her daughter, as she spoke. “You know I was unhappy as a young woman.”

  “Oui, the story is infamous. Your mother took you to Paris, where your senses were lit on fire, but your father insisted you return to Munich and forced you to marry a man you did not know.”

  “That’s all true, but it’s not complete. After I started collecting art, I met a sculptor from Mainz called Hugo Kratzl. He’d come to Munich to exhibit some of his work in a gallery I knew well. His talent was—”

  “Mediocre at best,” Liesel said.

  “Yes, that is true,” Ursula said, “but everything else about him was magnificent. He was intelligent and curious and handsome and I fell in love with him before I’d known him for five minutes. Most of my friends were passionate about the idea of a bohemian lifestyle, but I was the only one of us daring enough to adopt it. Hugo and I became lovers and before long, I found myself with child.”

  “Hardly surprising,” Liesel said.

  “No, it shouldn’t have been, but in those days, such things weren’t discussed. I had a vague notion of how it all worked, but no knowledge of the specifics. I knew I was doing something I shouldn’t, but it never occurred to me what might come next. My naïveté was painful. Hugo wanted to marry me, and I was prepared to run away with him. I would’ve given anything up for him.”

  “Yet you chose not to,” Liesel said. There was anger in her voice, but an equal measure of pain.

  “We made plans to elope. He needed to go back to Mainz and I was to accompany him. We’d be married there and raise our family. When the night came that we were to go, I slipped out of my bedroom with only a small valise containing some clothes and the few pieces of jewelry I owned. It was nothing valuable, all that belonged to the family and was in my mother’s possession, but it would bring us some money. By then, I was so enamored with Hugo, I was convinced we could live on the proceeds of his art.”

  “The stupidity is astonishing,” Liesel said.

  “Yes, it is, but it’s also beautiful to love someone so much you have infinite faith in him,” Ursula said.

  “You never got to Mainz,” Cécile said.

  “No, I didn’t. My father was waiting for me at the bottom of the stairs. My maid, whom I’d foolishly believed to be my confidante, had told him of my plans. He ordered Hugo away, making it clear he would never see me again. I was desperate, furious, and terrified, but Hugo had the presence of mind to remain calm. He agreed to leave and to make no fuss, but only if my father would let him have the baby after it was born. My mother came down when she heard the commotion—my father hadn’t bothered to tell her what was happening—and when she heard the whole story, agreed that Hugo should raise the child. It would be immoral, she argued, to keep an infant from his father. Neither of them had the slightest concern for its mother.

  “They concocted a plan,” she continued. “My mother would notify Hugo when the child was born and tell him where to come to collect it. My father wanted me to spend my confinement in the French countryside, where his sister lived, but my mother objected. She didn’t want anyone else to know what I’d done. My reputation—and that of the family—would be destroyed. So instead, she insisted on Paris. It’s far easier to be anonymous in a large city. Once we arrived there, I wasn’t permitted to leave the rooms we’d rented. I was being punished, after all.

  “When my labor started, a midwife tended to me, and took the baby away as soon as she was born.” She looked at Liesel. “I wasn’t even allowed to see you.”

  “Why should you have been? I was obviously of no value to you.”

  “I understand why you feel like that, but at the time, I had no power over my own life. Had the elopement succeeded, things would’ve been different; but because it didn’t, there was nothing I could do. I’d already taken the only action I could to try to protect you.”

 

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