The next day, the Cookers ran into Claude in the hallway on their way down to the lobby.
“Consuela’s running behind schedule. Why don’t we have a cup of coffee while we wait?”
“Did she have a late night?” Benjamin asked. “We saw her at the bar when we came in around eleven. I take it you turned in early.”
“Yes. The conversation wasn’t all that scintillating. When I left, she was telling that guide about everyone from the cruise, in minute detail. To tell the truth, I expected her in much later, but she stumbled back to the room around midnight. I felt a bit sorry for the kid. Ship gossip wouldn’t be the kind of thing a kid like him would be interested in, I’d think.”
Elisabeth gave Benjamin a look. It wasn’t the conversation that intrigued Zoltán.
“I could use some breakfast. I’m starving,” Elisabeth said.
Claude led Benjamin and Elisabeth into the restaurant, with its crystal chandeliers and mirrored walls, and a hostess seated them next to the American couple who had been on the same boat from Vienna. They smiled politely and focused on the menu. Just as they were about to order coffee and pastries, the man leaned over.
“Did you hear?” he asked.
“Hear what?” Benjamin said.
“The police were in earlier. They were showing a picture around. It was the artist from the boat. The guy with the beard.”
“Why?”
“They found his body near Saint Stephen’s Basilica. Shot dead. It happened last night. Sometime between ten and two in the morning.”
Benjamin glanced at his wife and grabbed her hand.
“We saw him drawing outside the basilica yesterday. We even went over and talked with him. He said his name was Connor Adamson. He was visiting his fiancée’s cousin here.”
“I can’t believe it,” Elisabeth said, looking stunned.
Benjamin sighed. “His fiancée will be devastated. Do the police have a motive? A robbery gone bad?”
“I don’t know,” the American said.
At that moment, Consuela, pale, bleary-eyed, and looking annoyed, made her way to the table. She gulped a cup of café au lait and said she was ready to leave.
They found Zoltán waiting for them in the lobby. He looked chipper in a brand-name black jogging suit. He was also wearing an expensive-looking pair of athletic shoes.
Zoltán grinned and suggested that they take the tram instead of taxis.
“It’s funnier,” he said.
This made the winemaker smile. He didn’t want to object, as Elisabeth still seemed shaken.
“I feel better with somebody who knows the city, Benjamin,” Elisabeth whispered, taking her husband’s arm. “He reminds me a bit of Virgile. Do you get the same impression?”
“Now that you mention it,” Benjamin answered. “He’s certainly a bright young man.”
The tram was packed, and a number of passengers were forced to stand. In an unusually tender gesture, Consuela put her head on Claude’s shoulder. Benjamin glanced at Zoltán, who was looking the other way, as if he and Consuela hadn’t spent the previous evening flirting with each other.
In less than ten minutes the four tourists were standing before the art nouveau façade of the Hotel Gellért. Benjamin and Claude took in every architectural detail. Elisabeth and Consuela went straight into the lobby, which was filled with mosaics and sculpted columns.
They purchased the tickets to the thermal baths. The men and women went to their separate changing areas: large blue-tiled vestibules lined with cubicles that didn’t lock. A prevailing atmosphere of body heat diminished any sense of modesty. Armed with their terrycloth towels, Benjamin, Claude, and their chatty guide joined Elisabeth and Consuela in the large pool. The water was hot and almost turquoise. No one was actually swimming. Instead, the bathers were luxuriating in an atmosphere of muted elegance.
Elisabeth pointed to the glass ceiling. “So much light’s coming through. It’s superb. Zoltán, didn’t you tell us that baths like these are actually part of the health-care system and that doctors think the spring water’s medicinal?”
Zoltán nodded. “Budapest has almost two dozen thermal baths. The Gellért’s is the grandest. People come here not only to spend time in the water—it’s always thirty-eight degrees Celsius—but also to get massages and go in the sauna. Look,” he said, gesturing toward a board game, “you can even play chess while you’re here.”
Benjamin asked Claude if he’d like to start a game.
Elisabeth and Consuela talked quietly. Zoltán was showing off his muscled torso as he floated in the water. He smiled at the women from time to time without getting too close.
After an hour in the pool, Elisabeth and Consuela got out to have some mint tea. Benjamin, who had lost his match against Claude, was keeping an eye on Zoltán. The tour guide seemed to be in familiar territory. Zoltán, too, had emerged from the water and had walked over to a group of older men, who seemed quite interested in him. So, was the boy selling his body regularly in order to buy his expensive shoes and pay for his gym membership?
Benjamin had read about the infamous Ergo insurance sex party in the Gellért baths. The boy would be foolish to drum up any business here, considering all the surveillance the hotel probably had by now. But maybe he was risking it and giving these men his contact information. Zoltán’s guided tours evidently had back-room options.
When Benjamin told his wife what he was thinking, Elisabeth glanced at Zoltán and agreed. Consuela, however, didn’t believe it.
“He’s one hundred percent hetero, I’m telling you. I know them well, the ones who swim both ways.”
Elisabeth corrected her with a giggle. “You mean swing.”
“Swing, if you prefer, although here swim is more appropriate,” Consuela said, throwing her damp black mane over a shoulder.
“Shush,” Elisabeth said. “He’s coming our way.”
Sure enough, Zoltán was approaching them, his stretchable polyester bathing suit hardly concealing his virility.
After telling him that they’d be happy to stay a little longer, Elisabeth invited Zoltán to join them for tea. He accepted.
Benjamin was always impressed with his wife’s ability to get information from people. She made it seem effortless. Benjamin listened as Elisabeth questioned Zoltán about his past and present. As he suspected, Zoltán was not a city boy. He had been in Budapest for a year and lived with his elderly and half-crazy aunt. He was from Szerencs, a godforsaken town in eastern Hungary.
“Tokaj, you know?” he asked Elisabeth.
No, his parents were not winemakers. His mother did housecleaning, while his disabled father could only contribute his income from a pension and the meager amount he made on the garden vegetables he sold at market. But his Uncle Antal and cousins Pavel and Vilmos all worked in the vineyards and made a very good wine.
“Gold wine!” he insisted, as if he were ready to divulge some magic formula for a price.
As Zoltán continued his story, Benjamin glanced at Consuela. She was staring at the boy while discreetly rimming her cup with the tip of her tongue. Zoltán didn’t seem to notice. How pathetic, Benjamin thought.
From the corner of his eye, Benjamin noticed another young man. He had just winked at Zoltán. The tour guide’s face tensed, and he suggested that they get dressed. They had more to see.
The couples reunited in the hotel lobby a half hour later. Exiting the building, they hailed two cabs. Destination: Margaret Island. Zoltán climbed in with the Cookers and commented on all the buildings they passed. At the Margaret Bridge, he explained that this scrap of metal spanning the Danube was the work of a French engineer.
“Eiffel?” Benjamin asked.
“No, he only built towers,” Zoltán answered. Benjamin didn’t bother to correct him.
The cab came to a stop, and Benjamin and Elisabeth got out. But before the winemaker could pull out his money to pay, a frantic Claude came running up. A giant in dark glasses and leather was by his side, demanding immediate payment for the cab ride.
When Claude had reached into his pocket, he discovered that his wallet, credit cards, and passport were missing. Benjamin tried to appease the cab driver, but he couldn’t make himself heard above Consuela’s shrieking. She was livid—not that her lover had been robbed, but that he was inconveniencing her.
Benjamin paid both drivers and appealed to everyone to remain calm. Zoltán looked indignant and said he knew the address of the French Embassy.
“No panic,” the boy kept telling Consuela, but she wasn’t hearing it. She looked ready to slap him. Benjamin shook his head. When would his friend come to his senses and dump this woman?