The Water-Method Man

I know how it must have been; I was familiar with your American Express approach. I'll hand it to you, Merrill; you could cultivate a marvelous look. It was the former fighter-pilot look; the ex-Grand Prix racer who'd lost his nerve, and perhaps his wife too; the former novelist with a writer's block; the ex-painter, out of oil. I never knew what it was you really were. The unemployed actor? But you had a great look; you had the aura of an ex-hero, a former somebody. Biggie said it right: women liked to think they could bring you back to life.

I remember the tour buses from Italy unloading in front of American Express, and the collection of sneering onlookers watching the clothes, imagining the money. A mixed group would leave the bus. Older ladies, unselfconsciously speaking English, expecting to be taken advantage of, wise enough not to mind looking foreign and perhaps stupid. Then a younger crowd - embarrassed even by being associated with such a crowd. They would try to set themselves apart and to look fluent in four languages. They wore a cool disdain for their fellow tourists, their cameras inconspicuous, their luggage not excessive. You would always pick the prettiest one of these, Merrill. This time her name was Polly Crenner.

I can visualize it. The girl at the information counter, perhaps with a copy of Europe on $5 a Day, reading through a furnished list of the pensions she can afford. You would come up to the counter briskly and speak a rapid German to the information man - some pointless question, like asking if anyone's left a message for you. But the German would impress Polly Crenner; she'd at least look at you, then turn away when you glanced at her and pretend to be reading something interesting.

Then, casually, you would say in English - the language making her aware that you and nobody else can tell she's American - 'Try the Pension Dobler. A nice spot, on Plankengasse. Or the Weisses Huf, on Engelstrasse; the woman there speaks English. You can walk to them both. Do you have much luggage?'

Reading this as a pickup, she would only indicate her luggage with a nod; then she'd wait, ready to refuse your gentlemanly offer to carry her bags for her.

But you never offered, did you, Merrill? You'd have said, 'Oh, that's not much to carry,' and thanked the information man in your polished German when he returned to tell you there were no messages for you. 'Auf Wiedersehen,' you'd say, and then walk out - if she'd let you get away. Polly Crenner must not have let you go, Merrill.

What then? Your usual comic tour of Old Vienna? 'What's your interest, Polly? The Roman or the Nazi period?'

And some of your invented history, Merrill? 'You see that window, the third one from the corner, fourth floor up?'

'Yes.'

'Well, that's where he hid when they were all looking for him.'

'Who?'

'The great Weber.'

'Oh ...'

'Every night he'd cross this square. Friends left food for him in this fountain.'

And Polly Crenner would feel the old suspense and romance settle on her like dust from the Holy Land. The great Weber! Who was he?

'The assassin took a room in the opposite building - just there.'

'The assassin?'

'Dietrich, the miserable bastard.' And you'd glare at the assassin's window, Merrill, like a raging poet. 'It cost just one bullet, and all Europe felt the loss.'

Polly Crenner would stare at the fountain where food for the great Weber had been stashed. But who was the great Weber?

The dull old city glowing like a live coal all around her, Polly Crenner would ask, 'What are you doing in Vienna?' And which mystery would you have used on her, Merrill?

'For the music, Polly. I used to play, before ...'

Or, more enigmatically, 'Well, Polly, I had to get away ...'

Or, more daringly, 'When my wife died,

I wanted nothing more to do with the opera. But somehow I haven't been able to break completely clean ...'

Then what, Merrill? Perhaps your Erotic Art Tour (EAT, INC.)? And if the weather was nice, surely you would have taken Polly Crenner to the Zoo. A heavy walk through the Schonbrunn Gardens. You used to tell me, Merrill, that the animals inspired sexual notions. A sip of wine on the terrace, watching the giraffes rub necks? Then into the tried-and-true patter: 'Of course, this was all bombed ...'

'The zoo?'

'In the war, yes ...'

'How awful for the animals!'

'Oh, no. Most of them were eaten before the bombing.'

'People ate them?'