The Castle of Kings by Oliver Pötzsch
The secret of the book had been kept for more than a hundred years. He mustn’t give it away. Not now, when their goal was finally within reach.
The injection had felled him like a hammer blow. He could still remember the deserted street in the Westend district, and the car that had looked so like an old Wartburg. But the hours after that were a nightmarish blur. Even events before the injection seemed curiously vague. Liebermann’s last concrete memory was of his breakfast muesli, the last of which he had brought up some time ago on the woodland floor.
“Want us to work him over some more?” asked one of the two thugs, whom Liebermann saw through the mist, along with the king. “I know a few more tricks from the camp. They’d be sure to make him talk.”
“I suppose it’s pointless.” Shrugging, the king put the cell phone away somewhere in the folds of the ermine fur coat and stared at Liebermann. “This man is stubborn as a mule. And I do so hate violence. Apparently the search of his hotel room didn’t turn up anything either. Gawain and Tristan turned the whole place upside down. If only I knew . . .”
The king fell silent, eyes wandering over the woodland floor, which was covered with leaves and countless scraps of paper. In the middle of them, Liebermann lay like a broken doll, twisted and bound, a piece of paper smeared with soil tickling his nose. The letters on it swam before his eyes. Only after some time did they begin to make sense. It seemed to be a line of poetry.
Don’t you see the Erl-King, father dear?
In spite of his condition, the former professor of modern history smiled. The Romantic period had always been his hobbyhorse, and Goethe’s “The Erl-King,” a ballad in the form of a dialogue between a father and his dying son, who is about to be taken from earthly life by the Erl-King, was his favorite poem. Nothing from any other ballad, he thought, so expressed the longing to die and dissolve into the natural world as those lines. Now Liebermann himself was facing the Erl-King.
O lovely child, come play with me . . .
“Mon Dieu!”
The king kicked the damp woodland floor with the toe of a boot, sending foliage and scraps of paper flying into the air. The white fur coat flapped in the cold October wind, making the king look like a fat monstrous swan.
“Where the hell is the bloody book?” the king hissed. “We were so close, and now this. Nothing but damn poems!” The king grimaced and slowly breathed in and out. “Still, I shouldn’t have torn it up. If anything in this world lasts, it’s art. Only art is timeless. Why didn’t you stop me?”
This last remark was for the two thugs, who awkwardly rubbed their bloodstained fingers.
“It . . . it all happened so fast, Excellency,” one of them muttered. “You were holding that book of poetry, and . . .”
“Ah, arrêtez!”
The king made a dismissive gesture, and then winced, as if afflicted with a terrible migraine. After a long moment, and with no advance warning, the king kicked the professor in the stomach.
“What did you do with the book?” the royal shouted. “What did you do with it? It’s mine. All mine!”
Liebermann spat blood and needles, and a few scraps of paper. Groaning, he curled up in the fetal position to protect himself from further kicks, but luckily none came.
Liebermann wasn’t sure whether he could take any more pain. Maybe he would give the secret away after all?
Stand fast! The royal line is at stake.
Humming quietly, The Royal Highness knelt down in front of Liebermann and let soil and scraps of paper run through those aristocratic fingers.
“Nature and art,” the king murmured. “What could be more beautiful? We must remember the old myths when those two things were still one. A twilight of the gods lies ahead. Away with false idols . . .”
Suddenly the king stopped, staring at a scrap of paper. Then the royal began to giggle.
“Of course,” the king spluttered, hand over mouth like a little girl. “The same wrapping paper, it’s only the book that’s different. You . . . you idiot halfwits!” The king had shouted those last words, waving the scrap of paper in front of the noses of the two thugs. “This is where you ought to have been looking. Merde. I’ll have your eyes put out, all of you!”
The king stopped, eyes glazing over. Walking over to Liebermann and leaning over him, The Royal Highness leisurely took out a small, old-fashioned pistol from beneath the fur coat. Its butt looked like a bird’s head.
“Crafty old man,” the king whispered. “You bourgeois are all the same—you just love to intrigue. And your plan almost worked. But this gave you away.”
Giggling again, the king held a grubby piece of paper in front of the eye that wasn’t swollen shut. Once more, it was some time before the letters came together to make any sense. They seemed to be the imprint from a stamp, a kind of ex libris, using old-fashioned script. On the paper, the professor made out a name and address.
STEVEN LUKAS, ANTIQUARIAN BOOKSELLER
Rare and valuable books of the
seventeenth to nineteenth centuries
Prices on application
Suddenly a shrill bell rang in Liebermann’s mind. He must not endanger the man in the bookshop. If he did, then all was lost.
“Listen,” he stammered. “I . . . I can get the book for you. Give me an hour, and then I’ll . . .”
But the king suddenly seemed to have lost all interest in him.
“My dear Professor,” the king said softly, “thank you for your readiness to cooperate. But you will understand that your survival would stand in the way of my noble aims. At least you are dying in a good cause.”
The Excellency held the pistol against the forehead of the distinguished Professor Paul Liebermann and pulled the trigger. White matter from Liebermann’s brain spurted out over the woodland floor, covering spruce needles and parts of Goethe’s “Erl-King” poem.
“And now to go and pick up my property at last,” the king hissed, stalking away through the wood, bearing erect as if inspecting an invisible parade.
The professor’s empty eyes stared up at a nocturnal October sky where a few crows were circling.
1
STEVEN LUKAS SAT AT THE scratched old mahogany desk in his antiquarian bookshop in Munich’s Westend district and watched the water in his teapot slowly turn brown. The aromatic fragrance of bergamot and orange peel rose to his nostrils. He gave the tea infuser another minute, then took it out and placed it carefully on a saucer beside a couple of large disintegrating tomes.
As a small cloud of vapor rose from the teacup, the bookseller let his eyes wander around his small domain. He very much hoped not to be disturbed for the next few hours. Outside, the dull gray of an October afternoon reigned, plunging the little shop, which was full of nooks and crannies, into dim twilight. The bookshelves up to the ceiling cast shadows like mighty trees; in the back part of the shop, beside the door leading to the stockroom and the large archive in the cellar, stood a 1950s brass lamp, casting warm yellow light on the desk. The place smelled of tea, leather, and old paper. The only sound was the ticking of an old nineteenth-century grandfather clock that Steven had bought in better times at a Munich antiques fair.
Steven sighed with pleasure and turned to the book on top of the stack to his right. This leather-bound folio volume was his latest acquisition. Carefully, he opened the discolored brown cover and began reverently leafing through it. Before him lay one of the early editions of the Grimms’ Tales, dating from 1837. The illustrations of giants, dwarves, bold princes and soulful princesses were smudged here and there, and some of the pages had been torn, but even so, the folio volume was in very good condition. Steven guessed that it would be worth five thousand euros, if not more. He had found it at an estate sale in the upmarket Bogenhausen district of Munich, along with a few crates of other books from the attic of an old lady who had recently died, and he had pressed three hundred-euro bills into the hand of her startled nephew. A Philistine—the nephew had taken the money, not even wonde
Steven smiled as he spooned brown sugar into his tea. Buying that book had been a real stroke of luck. In theory, it would allow him to pay the rent on the shop for the next six months. In reality, he knew he wouldn’t be able to part with the Grimm. Old books were like a drug to Steven; the mere smell of yellowing paper made him feel weak. He loved the rustle of the pages, the firm feel of painted parchment or printed handmade paper between his fingertips. It was a sense of happiness that had accompanied him since childhood, and the feeling couldn’t be compared to anything else.
Dreamily, the bookseller leafed through the Grimm, admiring the hand-colored engravings. How many generations had held this book in their hands? How many grandfathers had read its stories to their grandchildren? Steven stirred his tea and immersed himself in a world of castles, wolves, witches, and good fairies. He had been born in the United States, in Massachusetts, where people still thought of Germany as a country of dark forests, castles, and the romantic banks of the Rhine. As a child, little Steven had liked the idea of that, but grown-up Steven had discovered that the Germans cared more about expressways and shopping malls than dark, mysterious legends. The old, fairy-tale Germany existed only in the dreams of American and Japanese tourists these days.
And in books.
The shrill sound of the doorbell stirred him from his thoughts. Annoyed, Steven looked up and then sighed. Obviously it wasn’t going to be as peaceful a weekend as he’d hoped.
“Frau Schultheiss,” he murmured, sipping his tea. “To what do I owe the honor?”
An elderly lady with a pinched expression and combed-back hair had marched into the shop as if she owned it. Now she took off the sunglasses that she wore in spite of the fall rain outside. Small, icy gray eyes flashed at the bookseller, but she at least tried to produce a smile.
“You know exactly what I’m here about, Herr Lukas. I thought we could talk about your price. My husband can come up with another two thousand euros if you—”
“Frau Schultheiss,” Steven interrupted, pointing to the walls of shelves overflowing with books, old Jugendstil journals, and framed engravings. “This place is like my home. Would you move out of your nice apartment just because someone offered you a few thousand euros?”
Frau Schultheiss looked disparagingly at the once-valuable but now-scratched cherrywood shelves. The varnish had peeled off here and there. Dust had settled on them, and they sagged in places under the weight of the books. In the corridor, a few crates stacked unsteadily on top of one another held newly acquired treasures waiting to be put on display. Steven’s unwelcome visitor, still with that iron smile, shrugged her shoulders.
“This is not an apartment but, if I may say so, a rather untidy bookshop.”
“Not just a bookshop, an antiquarian bookshop,” Steven corrected her. “If you know the difference.”
Frau Schultheiss frowned. “Very well, then, an antiquarian bookshop. But not living quarters, anyway. Or if it is, not in a state that I would care to live in.” She stopped, as if realizing that this was not the cleverest way to conduct negotiations.
“Herr Lukas,” she went on, more mildly, “when did you last sell anything? Two weeks ago? A month ago? The Westend is not a district for bookshops these days. Maybe it was once. But now people in this part of town want to buy shoes and clothes, and then drink a nice latte macchiato. The fashion boutique I’m planning, with an integrated café and lounge, would fit in here just perfectly. And I don’t understand how you, as an American . . .”
“My father was American, Frau Schultheiss,” Steven said. “I’ve told you that a thousand times. I’m as German as you or Chancellor Merkel. Anyway, what, in your opinion, should an American be doing? Selling hamburgers and donuts?”
“You misunderstand me,” Frau Schultheiss said. “I only meant . . .”
“If you’re interested in eighteenth-century engravings or literature from the Enlightenment, you’re welcome to look around,” Steven said brusquely. “Otherwise I’ll ask you to please leave.”
Frau Schultheiss compressed her lips, which were thin enough anyway, then turned without a word and went out. A last chime of the doorbell, and Steven was alone again.
The bookseller took another sip of his tea, which by now was getting unpleasantly cool. Frau Schultheiss just wouldn’t let it be! She’d already offered him eight thousand euros to give notice to his landlord, old Seitzinger, and leave the premises available for her boutique. Kurt Seitzinger used to have his joinery workshop in these rooms, but he had retired twenty years ago. At the time, just as Steven finished studying literature at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, he had been entranced by the shop at once; he still thought he could smell the wood, the wood shavings, and the glue. He had never regretted his decision to open his antiquarian bookshop in the Westend district. But that had been at a time when it was still a genuine working-class district with a high proportion of foreigners and students among its inhabitants; now boutiques, trendy bars, sushi takeouts, and hairdressing salons were shooting up like colorful toadstools. The Westend was hip, and his antiquarian bookshop seemed to belong to a forgotten epoch. Even the way Steven dressed seemed old-fashioned compared to the people living here. Other men of his age wore tight-fitting sweatshirts printed with hip logos or band names, paired with sneakers and baseball caps. Steven preferred tweed and corduroy, combining them in suits that, together with his graying, neatly combed hair and reading glasses, made him look like an impoverished British country gentleman. In a Scottish castle, he would look like the rightful heir; here, he sometimes felt twenty years older than he really was. Only a few months earlier, he had quietly celebrated his fortieth birthday. He didn’t fit in with his times. He preferred the company of very old books to that of most people, and on most days, he was perfectly happy if the store remained empty of customers.
Sighing, Steven rose from his mahogany desk and wandered around the little shop into which he had put so much of his heart—and so much of his money—for twenty years. Lovingly, he stroked the spines of individual books, straightening one here or there, putting copies gone astray back in their proper places. Finally he began emptying the crates from the estate of the old lady in Bogenhausen and putting the books in the few open spaces on the shelves. Among the books he had bought were an 1888 Baedeker travel guide to Belgium, an eighteenth-century work on chess, and Shelton’s standard work on shorthand, Tachygraphy, in one of the later editions—treasures, all of them. Whether he would ever sell them was another question.
On one point at least Frau Schultheiss was right: business was going badly, in fact very badly. Not that it had ever really gone well, but until now Steven hadn’t minded that so long as he could rummage around in flea markets, libraries, and other antiquarian bookshops to his heart’s content. But now the once-handsome inheritance left by his parents was exhausted, and he had to turn his mind to one of the least edifying aspects of human existence: earning money.
When people did come into the shop, most of them were just passersby who didn’t want to wait out in the rain for the next bus, or who hoped to buy a cheap Perry Rhodan or the latest Dan Brown. Not to mention drunks visiting Oktoberfest and looking for a public toilet.
The distinguished old gentleman with glasses and an ivory walking stick that morning, however, had been different. He had shown a great deal of interest in Steven’s life in the antiquarian book trade, and he had asked him many questions about an early copy of the diaries of Samuel Pepys. Experts considered particularly valuable the rare work that Steven had acquired only recently.
But knowledgeable as he was, the man had seemed to Steven slightly distracted—indeed, almost as if he were being hunted. His hands had been nervously clutching a package done up with gray wrapping paper and string, obviously a fairly large book. When Steven mentioned it to him, the man just smiled and whispered something that made no
The royal line is at stake . . .
He had also been intrigued by the stranger’s nervous glances. Several times, the man had looked through the display window as if expecting something to happen. When Steven went into the stockroom behind the shop for a few minutes to fetch the Pepys diaries, he came back to find that the old gentleman had simply disappeared without so much as a goodbye.
The memory made Steven smile.
Oddballs and old fools, he thought. No one else comes into my shop anymore. If I don’t watch out, I’ll be turning into an oddball myself. Maybe I already am?
He went on clearing the crate, distributing books around the appropriate shelves by subject, climbing up a narrow ladder again and again, and humming the theme of Schubert’s Death and the Maiden.
Suddenly he stopped.
Level with his head, in between an old, leather-bound Bible and an antique edition of Molière’s works, there was a large tome, almost as wide as a man’s hand, that he had never seen before. He took the book off the shelf and saw, to his surprise, that what looked like a folio volume wasn’t paper at all, but was made of cherrywood glued together. Only the back, made to look like the spine of a book, was leather. The fake book seemed to be one of those camouflaged containers in which, back in the old days, good, respectable middle-class citizens used to hide their bottles of liquor or their cigars in the family library. Steven was reminded of the kind of small treasure chest where little boys sometimes kept their marbles, penknives, and Lego figurines. Surely he’d had a very similar little box for his treasures when he was a child.