“Go on.”
“And I had trouble with my car and couldn’t go. I had to put the car in the garage. I was in my bedroom when I saw Werner drive up with Ramón. I suspected they came here when they thought I was gone.”
“Not to Ramón’s house? Apartment?”
“Ramón is married,” she said.
“A married poufter?”
“He and Werner have that in common,” Inge said. “Anyway, I was curious. I hid in my closet. Werner didn’t see my car, but he looked into my bedroom. . . .”
“You have separate bedrooms?”
She nodded. “And when I wasn’t there, they went to his. I could hear everything that went on in his bedroom. That was interesting. Werner is the woman. I thought it would be the other way. And when Ramón went home to his loving wife, I walked over here to the Casino and took a room. He didn’t suspect a thing.
“Sometimes they didn’t even—you know, do it. But they talked about what they should do with Werner’s money—the money the Jews gave him; the confidential fund—and I found that fascinating. And then I started looking in his safe. I knew where he kept the combination; he could never remember it. All the details and property deeds—and of course the money waiting to be invested—were in there.”
“So what are the poufters doing in Paraguay?”
“Werner is worried about you. He thinks you have concluded he knows too much and are going to order him back to Germany and send him to Sachsenhausen.”
“I couldn’t risk him running off at the mouth, either on his way to Sachsenhausen or once he was in there,” von Deitzberg said.
“I thought about that too,” she said matter-of-factly. “And I thought about you, that you should know, but how was I going to get in touch with you?”
“That raises several questions in my mind,” von Deitzberg said. “What did you think I should know?”
“That Werner, especially after he decided the war is lost . . . Is the war lost, my darling?”
What does she think, that after we have rolled around like two dachshunden in heat, that we are now lovers, that she can call me “my darling”?
“Things do not look good,” von Deitzberg said.
She nodded thoughtfully, then said: “Where was I? Oh, yes. Werner decided that even if you didn’t order him back to Germany, the war was lost and he had to protect himself. That he had decided to take all the cash and go to Paraguay. With Ramón, of course.”
Can I believe her?
Of course I can’t believe her. She’s a Hotel Am Zoo whore.
A very good one, to be sure, but a Hotel Am Zoo whore.
“Inge, why did you want to tell me all about this?”
“To whom else could I turn?”
“Why would you think I would help you?”
“That’s what I meant when I said I have no choice but to put my life in your hands.”
“Why, Inge, did you think I would give a damn?”
She exhaled audibly.
“Here goes. You knew all about me before you set me up with Werner . . .” True. I knew everything about you except your ability to sexually arouse me as no other woman ever has. Arouse and then satsify me.
“. . . so you know that not only are we from the same background . . .”
Partially true. You are upper bourgeoisie. Your family had money. My family is noble but had no money. Where is she going with this?