Free Eternal Life by Wolf Haas Page B

entertaining what Meierling, well, his boss, I should say, because, Meierling wasn’t his real name, just the agency was called Meierling, his name was Brugger. What Brugger would make of this, how he would take what Lorenz was saying and put it into a ten-line summary.
    Lorenz was already lighting one cigarette off the other, and Brenner took advantage of the break now to ask one more time:
    “What’ll happen in December?”
    Lorenz says: “When I was little, my father always called the mountains elephants. Then, they started cutting the forest down. To make way for the ski lifts. But when there weren’t any more leaves withering along the elephants’ backs, then it was like when somebody takes a rheumatoid arthritis blanket made of dry leaves and yanks it off you.”
    Now, Brenner could’ve made light of this and swept the whole thing off the table as pure craziness. But, on the other hand, he thought, it’s not all that different, what Lorenz is saying here and what you read everyday in the papers. And so he didn’t lose his patience and asked:
    “What’ll the people be surprised about come December?”
    And Lorenz says: “When the rheumatoid arthritis blanket gets yanked off of them, the mountains will begin to tremble in order to warm themselves again. Not noticeably, not so much that you’d notice. Only the dam walls will feel it. The Limberg Dam and the Drossen Dam. And the Mooser Dam. One and a half million cubic meters of concrete. The Symbol of the Republic. Indestructible. When the mountains begin to tremble, the dam walls will break away from their holdings. The dam waters will flood the Zell basin—a full meter high—and twenty thousand people will drown. Because it’ll happen so fast, they won’t even have time to think.”
    Lorenz ordered another club soda from the waitress now, even though the glass in front of him was still half-full. And once Erni was out of earshot, Brenner says:
    “And that will happen this December?”
    Lorenz says: “No, no. In December we’re putting on our play. Andi and the German. And Clare.”
    “And you.”
    “And me.”

CHAPTER 7
    When it comes to Saturdays, it’s a big deal. Not always easy for people to bear, Saturdays. For Brenner, it wasn’t much different. Two days after meeting Lorenz, he was sitting right back at the Feinschmeck. Seemed to him like he’d been sitting here the whole time, though, and was only just now leaving.
    As Brenner walked out of the Feinschmeck, Zell appeared more deserted than ever before to him. But there was something else different about it now, too. Because what a Saturday means to the course of a week, let’s say, well, that’s what the end of a season is to the course of a year. In Zell, anyway, that’s how it is. So far as desertedness goes. And as Detective Brenner’s walking down the street, he realizes now, even before the automatic door-closer can draw the door to the Feinschmeck shut: end of a season and a Saturday, at the same time.
    What more do you need. Brenner crossed the church square that was normally teeming with tourists. But, now, not a single tourist on the Kirchplatz. Only a few old ladies, he saw, as they flitted into church. And because it was theend of a season and the end of a week at the same time, he simply followed them into the church.
    Or was it also on account of that thing that Lorenz had told him about two days ago. Exactly the same as what Andi had told him. That they’d been rehearsing with the community theater. That they’d be performing it in December. That that’s why he hadn’t actually been at Vergolder’s. But in a play that was about Vergolder. And how surprised people would be when they performed the play in December. Lorenz and Andi. And the German, in effect, the director.
    And, then, this girl that Lorenz had mentioned. Clare Corrigan, not her real name at all, she simply went by that. Brenner had noticed her around Zell here and there. Because one thing you can’t