Thomas Ochiltree by Death Waltz in Vienna Read Free Book Online Page A

thoughts.
    “Schmidt,” von Falkenburg said, “if someone were to tell a lie about you – don’t worry, no one has – what would you do about it?” He asked the question in a tone that implied a purely theoretical interest on his part. But he was curious as to what the answer would be. Von Falkenburg had no illusions about his orderly’s intelligence, but perhaps a simple brain was what was needed to find the answer to what was possibly only in appearance a complex question.
    “I report most obediently, Captain, I’d go to the liar, and ask him why he had lied about me, and if I didn’t like the answer, which I wouldn’t, since the captain said I should imagine that this person was lying about me, then I’d punch his nose.”
    “An interesting approach,” von Falkenburg said carelessly, and then realized that in a way it
was
an interesting approach. Go ask the liar why he was lying. Perhaps the place for him to begin was with a confrontation with this person who was prepared to give perjured testimony to the effect that von Falkenburg was his accomplice.
    Not that von Falkenburg could hope to get the truth out of the man. But he might get a fragment of the truth: a name carelessly dropped, an embarrassed silence in the face of a leading question. It was at least somewhere to begin.
    And now that von Falkenburg had a starting point, he longed inexpressibly for a chance to get started. How long would it take the colonel to finish his discussions with Military Intelligence? Von Falkenburg found himself pacing up and down the room in impatience for a final decision, even if that final decision meant immediate death. Schmidt’s presence was somehow intolerable, so he sent him off to check on his mare Resi, which had been suffering from hoof trouble.
    The hands of the mantelpiece clock seemed glued to the face, so slowly did they move, despite the rapid swings of the pendulum. Von Falkenburg went to a cabinet and took out a bottle of cognac. He poured himself a glass and drank it slowly, hoping for word from the colonel before he finished it. The word did not come. He poured himself another, and lit a cigar.
    Von Falkenburg told himself that he would hear from the colonel before he had smoked the cigar down to the band, which against his usual custom he had left on. The ash crept down the cigar as slowly as the hands of the clock were moving.
    Finally, just as the edge of the paper band was starting to turn brown from the heat, and the cigar had begun to give off that unpleasant taste that comes from having been smoked too far down, there was a knock at the door.
    “Come in,” he said, trying to keep the tension he felt out of his voice, and suddenly wishing he had had time to smoke a dozen more cigars before he learned what the decision was regarding his fate.
    The door opened, and in came Lieutenant Pfitzerheim, the colonel’s aide.
    “Servus,
Captain
.”
    “Servus.”
    “Playing with your revolver?” Pfitzerheim said, noticing the weapon on the desk. “Not planning on doing yourself in, I hope. At least not until you give me the chance to win back last month’s pay.” It was clear from his light, friendly tone that he had no idea of von Falkenburg’s desperate situation.
    “I’ll put it in my will that you have the right to play one evening of tarock against my estate, such as it is,” von Falkenburg replied with a smile, hoping that Pfitzerheim would not notice the edginess beneath it. “Does the Old Man have anything for me?”
    “Yes, he wants you to report to him at once.”
    Von Falkenburg stood in front of his mirror and made sure that his uniform was in perfect order, and that his sword and sword-knot hung just right. In the Austro-Hungarian Army,
Adjustierung –
proper appearance – took precedence over everything, including an order to report at once, or a man’s eagerness to know whether his life would be over within fifteen minutes. Von Falkenburg sometimes thought that it would be