by his stories, though. And I had heard them all before, in his bed. The ‘old’ Bea had insisted that her job was too specialized and so very boring that it was not worth speaking of. The relevant section of the Segirtad website gave nothing away apart from windy platitudes about ‘leadership in the knowledge business’ and ‘full spectrum dominance’ in ‘advanced niche areas of cyber expertise’ which remained unspecified.
Bea still seemed reluctant.
“You’re something of a spook, right?”
“Only very vaguely,” she dissembled.
“You’ve learned to drive fast and shoot straight!”
“Basic skills,” she said modestly.
“Of course. Your weapon of choice is the computer!”
“Things are changing fast, Thea. People communicating with other people using their laptops… that’s so yesterday. There was no panting Peeping Tom with old-school binoculars at the gravel pit, right? More and more we have things communicating with other things, artificial intelligence learning much faster and much more than any human could ever equal or deal with. Segirtad keeps pace with all that and watches how in parallel humans themselves are changing, interfacing with the world through augmented reality, escaping in large numbers into virtual existences, simulating vanishing human relationships with digital avatars. Inanimate companionship is enfolding us, grasping us in its binary embrace.”
Did Bea know of my inanimate Bob? That stands for battery-operated-boyfriend, like the Duracell bunny untiring and never unfaithful.
“Hold on! You lost me at ‘binary embrace’! But… just to keep things simple… what I am faced with is a mystery concerning three old books. Each one is very different, all three are inanimate. They are not able to tell us their story, however, nor are they able to communicate with each other.”
A look of sympathy crossed Bea’s features.
“Maybe they do communicate! You might find the idea far-fetched but it intrigued my supervisor enough for him to approve my request for leave.”
Martin was on the way back. Might he spare a glance for Bea’s derrière, so tight and shapely and veiled by mere gossamer? No!
“You know, Bea, I think there might be a compressor which is compatible. But it would call for a slight dome on the car’s bonnet.”
MONDAY 11 JUNE 2012
A trinity? A trifecta wager? Three books. One message?
I had slept badly and endured a lurid, swirling dream. The setting was my wardrobe, which had expanded to assume vast proportions. My sisyphean task seemed to be to remove from the rails any garment which might look better on Bea than on me. Which might have resulted in an empty wardrobe but I was constantly having to deal with Renate and Eddi Zimmermann, both naked on inline skates, Eddi with an erection as well as his oafish grin. Martin made a blindingly fast drive-through on my skateboard which he had motorized. Vroni the hairdresser sat weeping in a corner. The person who loomed in front of me wearing the single long evening dress I possessed (by Chloé) turned out to be Rudiger Reiß, of all people. I was throwing my clothing into Bea’s Corolla which was driven by Louie Lessinger who was trying to tell me something but the sound of the engine was too loud.
The alarm tone on my cellphone was the infernal clatter of a skateboard on cobble-stones.
The perfecta bet needed first and second to be in order. The red notebook had been added later. But what was the right order for Fortezza and Champbasse? The file of interest to some party in Italy seemed so very ordinary, much detail was in respect of rostering of troops, the dispositions made for their accommodation and provisioning. Kitchen equipment was to be procured from the Zurich firm Techag AG. That provided an aha moment. It was the firm which later became Turmix, the maker of my espresso machine which I pressed into service as I asked myself an important question.
“Do you or do you not have a hangover?”
We all did. What had started as a lazy Sunday became a tediously boring Sunday and then a day darkened by frustration. Dirk was furious when he received the verdict from his editor. His post postulating a Teutonic take-over of the part of the Spanish coastline most favoured by German tourists would not go online. Ostensibly the reason was that the Munich newspaper was hoping to win a big campaign promoting Iberian tourism. Dirk, however, knew his editor well.
“Damned hypocrite! His grandfather was with the Condor Legion during the Civil War!”
It had been my idea to call up Fairouz and have him take us to Cherie-Bar, the establishment which was emphatically not in Weinfelden, if a mere hundred metres beyond the town’s limits. This was now the second enterprise owned by my old friend Hans-Peter. The premises had once housed a factory producing bonbons, but it had been closed when lawyers deemed that the colourful sweets infringed on the intellectual property of the makers of Gummy Bears. The garish bonbon colour scheme of the single story building had been left unchanged. Hans-Peter had decided that all that was needed was some neon to evoke sinful Las Vegas in the leafy depths of rural Thurgau.
Dorfpuff!
Not quite that, not exactly a ‘village brothel’, more a tease, a promise which generally would not be kept. I’d spotted a place of comparable mendacious allure, Tittty Twister, just outside Frauenfeld.
I wouldn’t count Ludmilla and Yulia as friends. We exchanged greetings when our paths crossed in Weinfelden where they took pains not to appear unduly attractive. Hans-Peter had told me the back story. They had indeed started by serving drinks to the Cherie-Bar clientele which was almost a hundred percent male. Then, from the girls point of view, everything went wrong. Their looks so impressed the proprietor of a boat-building yard on Lake Constance that he used them as models for a poster. One thing led to another and a Zurich agency saw in them the statuesque sensuality of Central European athletes, the glamour of countless Sharapovas, and had signed them on.
The problem? Walking the fashion shows and posing for photographers was much harder work. They happily returned to the flat above Cherie-Bar, it was their home and Hans-Peter their protector. The bar thrived with a blow-up of an Italian Vogue cover of Ludmilla having pride of place together with a big poster of Yulia in boots made by Bally. Hans-Peter sent lustful drinkers, local farmers and such, looking for more than sultry drink service and barely-there outfits, to places like Titty Twister, where the girls would never, ever be mistaken for models.
Bea loved the story. A baker I knew from town was visibly trying to work up the courage to chat us up.
“But they surely have their price?” she said.
I loved the dresses Ludmilla and Yulia had been given from the current Just Cavalli collection. Such gorgeous whores indeed had their price, paid gladly by lawyers, accountants and business owners from far beyond Weinfelden, even from Italy. Sure!
From time to time Rico would be handling the table service while the girls earned more much money with far less effort in the Veneto or in the little flat above the bar.
Hans-Peter’s champagne was not the best by any means. But he insisted that for old times’ sake it was on the house.
“You and he… have history?” Bea Schell concluded.
I confess that my answer had been an un-ladylike burp. The baker looked shocked.
We had returned with Fairouz in his taxi. He had handed over a matchbox containing the half-ounce of hash that I had requested.
“You do have a hangover, but a spliff would not be the best remedy,” said Bea who was in better shape than I was.
A double espresso had helped slightly, as had the discovery that my wardrobe had resumed its normal size and shape. I hunted for what might be seen as suitable for what Aunt Ursel had in mind. She had left a note in my room.
“Dress for Zurich. We shall leave