Requiem in Vienna by J. Sydney Jones

and highly competitive.
    Yesterday, Gross had apprised the inspector of the Mahler affair, but Drechsler quite appropriately indicated that until there was a crime, there could be no investigation. The death of Fräulein Kaspar had been put down to accident. Gross, of course, hadknown this. He had approached Drechsler not assuming the police would take part in the case. Instead, he wanted a conduit to the inside; if any other opera-related incidents were to take place, Gross wanted to know of them.
    The death of Friedrich Gunther was such an incident. Gunther, a member of the Vienna Philharmonic, was also part of the Hofoper orchestra, third violinist.
    Discovered by his cleaning lady at nine this morning, Gunther was hanging by his neck from a tasseled length of chartreuse green curtain cord attached to the brass chandelier in his sitting room. Under the body was a faux Jacobean dining chair, tipped on its side. Werthen and Gross had arrived while the body was still suspended; Werthen caught sight of the swollen, reddish blue face and came close to being ill.
    Gross, however, was fascinated by the dangling body, approaching it from all angles, closely examining the carpeting underfoot with a strong, handheld magnifier plucked from out of his ever-present crime-scene bag. He muttered to himself, examined the carpet more closely, and then glanced quickly at the largest of the constables, his arms still crossed in front of him.
    “I assume you wear a size forty-seven boot, Officer.”
    It was not a question.
    The constable nodded his head, suspicion now replacing bemusement.
    “And that you have also violated the most basic of crime-scene principles. Do not trample the evidence.” Gross’s voice raised in volume.
    “Didn’t know it was a crime to kill yourself . . . sir.” Insolence gleamed in the constable’s eye.
    “That’ll do, Schmidt,” Drechsler cautioned. Then to Gross: “They were summoned from the local police station. I arrived in time to stop them cutting the man down.”
    “We thought the chandelier would come falling down any minute,” Constable Schmidt said by way of self-defense.
    Gross appraised the condition of the chandelier. “If it withstood the initial drop, then it will hold.” He glanced from the chair to the boots of the victim, dangling in front of him. “Did you touch anything? Rearrange anything? The chair, for instance.”
    Schmidt shook his head. The other constables stood mute beside him.
    “Officers?” Gross indicated the other two.
    “No, sir,” they chimed in unison.
    While Gross produced a tape measure and chalk from his crime-scene bag, Werthen took in the ambience of the room.
    Gunther had obviously been a bachelor. The size of the flat and its appointments would have told him that if the cleaning lady, still sobbing in the kitchen, had not already done so. No wife, for example, would have tolerated the cheap reproduction furniture with which Gunther had littered his flat. Through a small archway to the left was a dining area. Darkly painted chairs in medieval design were clustered around a dining table that was at least two shades lighter and of Renaissance design. The chair Gunther had used to stand on before hanging himself was from the dining area. In the sitting room a solitary and massive armchair of execrable taste was placed quite near the middle of the room, a marquetry table at its side. On the walls hung prints of fine artworks: Vermeer, Hals, Brueghel. Gunther’s taste veered toward the Dutch and Flemish schools; toward the trappings of culture, but with no coherence, no taste. Werthen did not need to go to the small back bedroom in order to know that there would most likely be a single bed and cavernous wardrobe, both in the heavy Alt Deutsch style. Or perhaps more of the faux Jacobean.
    Gross still busied himself beneath Gunther’s body. Now he was photographing the scene from several different angles, a spark of flash illuminating the room from time to