Bugs in The Palais

He had already gone to Fromm & Ehrlich's on the Seilerstätte at noon to pick up his new festive cape. He was glad that he had put on the jumping shoes, brand seven‐league boots. This made the long walk quite manageable; after all, the jumping shoes were a further development of the jumping stilts developed at the beginning of the century, which failed to catch on as such. It was only when people moved away from the acrobatic and rebuilt the stilts for a fast and power‐saving gait that the breakthrough came. His stilts raised his standing position by about 20 cm, the batteries built into the stilts were charged by the kinetic energy of walking, and the more he walked, the more the small built‐in motors supported him, so that he was supported with every step and could walk more easily. This also made him a little taller and more able to overlook the crowds ahead of him. Of course, a gaunt man over 2 meters tall stood out almost everywhere, but he put up with that.

As always in the summer, the streets were full, crowds surged back and forth, and besides, the city was full of tourists. These were mostly recognized by the tablets they could borrow at the border or at the airport, as they otherwise had no access to the com–system. Their smartphones registered abroad did not work within the kingdom. He watched the road intently, carefully avoiding the slower walking people. He was almost at the Freyung when Baron von Stetten paged him and asked if they would like to have a drink together at the Freyung Square. He gladly agreed and hurried on.

On arriving there, he searched among the crowds and quite soon found the Baron. They greeted each other and then found that around the place no seat was free. Shortly decided he asked the baron whether he could invite him into his apartment, he would have wine and beer to choose from. The latter happily agreed, because he had never been in the master's apartment and of course he was curious. They went upstairs, and the rather short baron mocked the master, who towered over him by 2 head lengths. Arriving at the apartment door, the master unbuckled his seven‐league boots and ordered Lucy to unlock the door.

In the living room they made themselves comfortable, the master served chilled white wine with mineral water and offered the baron a cigar. They smoked comfortably, drank white wine sod@ and talked about the state of affairs. The baron, who received hourly updates, reported that more than 45 people associated with the mosque servant had been arrested and interrogated in the meantime. The lively diplomatic exchanges between the Kingdom and the Ottoman Empire of Turkey also led to some arrests in Turkey, but the Baron said that no one knew who the suspects there were and what influence they actually had on the assassination. He added that he suspected that some also served as pawns to show the Ottoman Empire of Turkey's good intentions in a striking way.

Candor nodded, for he had already heard similar things from Kunze. He took a deep breath and said to the Baron that he had picked up his new ceremonial cloak, since the day after tomorrow, on Thursday, would be the funeral of Charles and Louis, and on Saturday and Sunday would be the coronation of the new king. The baron said he had also had beautiful new robes tailored, as the events required everyone to be on their best behavior. Candor said he was very reluctant to walk through the city in the midday heat – that was why, after all, he had put on the seven‐league boots – for, he confessed, he did not like these massed crowds at all. And before he realized he was abruptly changing the subject, he said that society seemed oversexualized to him. He closed his eyes and said that compared to his youth, society had changed a lot with the ubiquity of sex in advertising, sex in public, and the acceptance of breaking taboos big and small.

While he was still pondering this topic further, the baron chatted away about how well he was doing now. His maid Dina was devoted to him, read his every wish from his eyes and was a natural in bed. After the death of his wife, he had lived a monk‐like life of abstinence and had completely suppressed sexual thoughts; his grief and his work had occupied him so much that he no longer even thought about sex. Now, however, everything had changed. Dina awaited him every evening in a neatly tidy household, and then when they cuddled on the couch in front of the television, she was cuddly and purred like a cat. And then ....

Candor's com chirped, it was Lieutenant Colonel Kunze. Candor raised his hand briefly to silence the Baron and listened.

The lieutenant colonel said, "Sorry, I hate to interrupt this most amusing sex conversation, but I would like you to let me in for a moment. I'm already upstairs with you outside the apartment door."

Candor was irritated and amazed at the same time. How did Kunze know what he was talking about with the baron? Determined, he got up and went to the apartment door. "Lucy, open up!"

When the door opened, Candor's astonishment grew even greater. Lieutenant Colonel Kunze came in with two companions, dressed in white plastic overalls, both carrying what appeared to be two very heavy suitcases. All three entered.

Candor stopped as Lucy quietly closed the door. He glanced questioningly at Kunze, who looked around briefly. Then he turned back to the master and introduced his companions, "These are Kammer and Lang, they're from my tech team and they're here to find the bugs hidden in this apartment." He noted with satisfaction that both the Master and the Baron took this news with a brief shock.

"Yes, we found that your apartment had been bugged with what appears to be very sophisticated technology." After a brief dramatic pause, he explained to the master that his technicians had been trying for days to pick up and evaluate the bugging signals, but they had not succeeded in doing more than plugging in and listening.

The master was completely shocked. He briefly ran over what all had been said in the apartment, and he was visibly uncomfortable. For he had been completely open and honest with Roxane, and had not held back his opinion, nor any information from the castle, the crown prince, or the police investigation. Of course, this could still become very embarrassing. He turned to the lieutenant colonel and said, "Please, your men can start and search everything without reservation, I will also be happy to open the safes for you."

Both men declined when he offered them a soft drink and immediately began unpacking their suitcases.

Lieutenant Colonel Kunze sat down next to the Baron and gladly accepted the offer of a white wine soda. His technicians would have become aware of the strange signals in the master's apartment during their routine check of all – he glanced at the Baron and repeated: all. – Since there seemed to be no other reasonable explanation for this, he had ordered this search. He put a paper on the living room table and said to the master, "I was sure of your consent."

Candor nodded and said, "Sure thing, my friend! I want to know for myself who dares to eavesdrop on me and what was the purpose." Thoughtfully, he said to the lieutenant colonel, "The thought of someone spying on me is very disturbing. I will not conceal the fact that not everything that is spoken here within my four walls should be made public. By this I mean not only the really private things, but also everything concerning my work. I have no secrets from Roxane, we discuss almost everything together."

The lieutenant colonel reassured him, saying that he had already and immediately had the existing recordings deleted and had ordered Kammer not to make any more. Nevertheless, he was very worried, he said, because another team of technicians was also tracking down the strange bugs at Master Gregor's. And he himself had no idea at all who could have an interest in bugging these two masters. Then, turning to the baron, he said not to worry, his apartment was bug‐free. Since this apartment was in the castle, he did not need a court order to search it. Then he grinned impudently and said that they had waited to search until Dina had gone out of the house for shopping. Relieved, the baron breathed a sigh of relief.

The two technicians, Kammer and Lang, had set up a device on the living room table and said this was a jammer that shielded all radio– and microwave signals. When the master turned to Lang and asked how they were going to proceed, Kammer interfered and said, "The Lang can't understand you, he's deaf and dumb. Yes, and we will now go through room by room and scan everything, the bugs have to be somewhere!" Then he took some devices and disappeared with them in the back room, in the guest room.

The baron got up and said he couldn't do anything here anyway and said goodbye. After he left, the master and the lieutenant colonel talked about who might be interested in this eavesdropping. The master ruled out most political parties, since he had hardly any points of contact with them and very rarely got involved in day‐to‐day politics. There he rather thought of the large and rich families, because with it he had occupied himself last with king Karl and also after its death. These families pushed with all their might for the reintroduction of the old, fuddy‐duddy hierarchies, they wanted counts, dukes and other fine‐sounding titles of noblesse. And of course they wanted to profit financially from it, but fine people never talked about that. But both the king and Master Candor and the Council of Masters wanted to stick to the idea that there would be only barons. It was enough to be able to buy a barony with a very large sum, if it was accepted by the king. Moreover, the king reserved the right to appoint barons as he saw fit or to take the barony away from them.

Kunze listened to everything patiently, but then objected that he did not believe that the patricians would act in such a way and behave so impudently. So they pondered back and forth while the two technicians placed small, glittering objects on the living room table from time to time. Most were barely larger than a match head. Kunze photographed each and sent the images to the forensics lab.

Lieutenant Colonel Kunze looked at the time display and said goodbye, saying he would be back soon but had something urgent to do now. After he left, the master sat in the living room, smoking his cigar and thinking hard.

And while he was sitting quietly in the living room, smoking and sometimes sipping from his wine glass, the feeling came over him as if someone was rummaging in his thoughts. "But that can't be," said his reason, and a voice answered him, "Yes, it can!"

.

He startled as if thundered, but the voice in his head said, "Don't be afraid, it's me, the technician, Josef Lang." He remained sitting rigidly and looked around, but the two technicians were not to be seen, they were working in the back rooms. After a few seconds, he spoke in his mind, "How can this be?"

Shortly after, he received the answer, "I am deaf and dumb, but I can communicate mentally with some people."

In a flash, thoughts about the institute ran through his head. "I can't understand you like this, you have to think as if you are talking. It's just an ordinary conversation on a mental level, I can't read minds."

"I see," said the master in thought, "I didn't know about this until now. Is this a special talent of the deaf and dumb?"

"I can't answer that exactly" was Lang's reply, "I know a few deaf‐mutes, but they can't speak in thought. I had assumed until now that this is because these deaf‐mutes are relatively uneducated and also not concerned with their possibly existing abilities." A long pause followed.

"I didn't become deaf and dumb until I was 9. Until then, I developed normally as a child. I could read and write and was very curious about everything life offered me. My parents, thank God, insisted on having me privately educated, so that I could learn everything that one should learn up to that age until I graduated from high school. Only after that it became clear that I would not be able to study at university, so I decided to do an apprenticeship as an electrical engineer and electronics technician, which I completed as a master craftsman. I did quite well, I think, and got a very interesting job with the police, where I have been working now for over 15 years. That probably makes me different from other deaf people who were thought to be stupid in their childhood and didn't get a good education at all."

The master listened to Lang and soon could make out the difference between this thought–speaking and thought–reading. This thought‐speaking was a conscious action corresponding to normal speech. Thought reading was a process that took place mainly in pictures or sequences of pictures. This difference seemed important to him.

He said in his mind, "How many people can do that?"

"Not very many," Lang replied, "I've only met five or six people I could have a mental conversation with."

"Nationwide, then, there should be a few hundred," the master said. They talked for a while longer until the two technicians finished their work. Kammer asked Candor to let him examine Lucy, and Lucy was given temporary instructions to cooperate with Kammer. Kammer found nothing; Lucy had not recorded a break‐in or tampering of any kind. Lang silently approached Candor to see if Lucy could check to see if there was a gap in the records. Candor asked Lucy and told her to go back at least half a year. After a few seconds, Lucy said, completely unemotionally, that there was a gap on April 6, 3 hours and 22 minutes from 10:42 a.m. That was the only gap during the past three years, she added.

Kammer and Candor went through the master's personal calendar, which had shown on that day, it was only four weeks ago. But both the master and Roxane and Marco as well were out of the house. Kammer questioned Lucy about what the last entry before the gap was. It was a food delivery from their known supplier. Candor briefly explained how it usually went, Lucy gathered her special orders and stock to be replenished, then ordered from the supplier and the two systems agreed on a code for the delivery boy to open the small service door outside and slide in the goods. Kammer wanted to see this door immediately, they went into the stairwell and Lucy opened the little door. Lucy was asked again what had been ordered, but she said nothing. She hadn't ordered anything before the delivery, although the department store's system had retrieved a delivery code just before.

Chamber recapped. The perpetrators had retrieved a code through the deliveryman, opened the little door and gotten in, shut Lucy down, and in just over three hours had installed the 9 bugs, gotten out and turned Lucy back on. At least one perpetrator had to have been a child or a petite person, could have opened the door and let someone in. But it was also possible that it was only one person, the time was quite enough to install the 9 bugs.

Candor felt that this theory sounded quite coherent. He asked again how to classify the quality of the bugs and Kammer assured him that it certainly came from a Western secret lab. You wouldn't get these things on the black market either, surely not. England, France or USA, only these three had such laboratories. Certainly not the Russians, nor the Chinese, nor the Germans, nor anyone else. But of course the bugs will be examined in detail. Candor said he would check his activities again to see if he could find a connection, but he couldn't think of anything offhand. Kammer received a message that no bugs were found at Master Gregor's, a false alarm. So Master Candor was the only one affected, Kammer said, looking at the master seriously. He was the only one, Kammer said, and the bugs pointed to a Western intelligence agency. This is no small matter, I'm afraid, and we have to follow it up by law.

The technicians left, leaving a rather pensive and unsettled master behind.

Day after day he discussed with Kunze and the Baron, rolled all kinds of theories, but nothing came out. Of course, he maintained contact with all three states and was on good terms with all of them. If someone wanted to know something delicate, the master asked at the Foreign Ministry and was usually able to provide information. This was basically a normal procedure. Nothing spoken in his apartment seemed worth eavesdropping on. Roxane had long since withdrawn from the Romanian association, so she could not be the target. After a week, the subject had disappeared into the drawer of Unexplained, Damned Unexplained and UFO–sightings. After a month, Master Candor did not think about it either.

The funeral for King Charles and Prince Ludwig was very serious and dignified, as was the coronation of King Erich the other day. Master Candor excused himself from the banquet with reference to his sensitive stomach, he preferred to celebrate with Roxane in the marriage bed. The new king had beer and wine served in the streets around the castle for all the people, as well as Viennese Fried Chicken and other delicacies, artists from all over the kingdom performed and the people laughed, danced and enjoyed themselves as they had not done for a long time.

Long live King Erich!

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