Brenner stayed there in the grass for another half an hour, just watching the garbage trucks and the garbage men clean the island. They moved through the grassy fields, rousing the occasional drunks and sending them slowly on their ways, a moving sight somehow, almost like flamingos in an animal paradise.
The new Rapid Response chief proposed a mutually agreeable solution to Brenner’s contract of employment, and Brenner signed on the spot. Three months’ wages without having to work, not bad. And in three months’ time, surely something would present itself. Besides, summer. If you’re going to be unemployed, ideal timing really.
The new chief’s only request was that he not return to his apartment at the station. Because, crucial to morale among the EMTs that the grass grow as quickly as possible over the whole matter. The new chief promised that he’d arrange for the few personal effects of Brenner’s to be moved and stored, all on Rapid Response’s dime. And he even booked a room for him at the Hotel Adlon in the second district.
It was nine-thirty when Brenner checked in. Walked the whole way, a good ten kilometers. And along the way, a beer on Mexicoplatz. The hotel porter gave him an envelope containing 50,000 schillings. And sincere thanks from Lanz and Angelika.
You can’t forget that while Lanz was in jail, he’d been rid of his entire gambling debt. Junior couldn’t exactly demand the money back that he’d used to pay off Lanz’s debt. So, Brenner pocketed the 50,000 schillings with a good conscience now.
He lay down on the hotel bed, but needless to say, huge disappointment. Because a musty hotel room, no comparison to the dewy grass back on Danube Isle. What he would’ve liked to do most was get right back up and take the train back out to the island. But he was just too tired, and besides, you can’t make a nice experience happen twice anyway.
You can’t make anything happen twice, Brenner said to himself. And I won’t call Klara, not today, he said to himself. And not tomorrow, either. You shouldn’t brood.
As he closed his eyes, he pictured the fleet of shiny orange garbage trucks and orange garbage men that had made all the festival detritus disappear as if by magic.
And this morning’s experience of detritus and Friday’s experience of music seemed to blend together into one and the same experience as he drifted off to sleep. And it occurred to him that perhaps it’s only upon dying that a person has such a sublime experience of music. But he doubted that Junior, as his head flew smack into the rear door of the 590, had as sublime an experience as he did.
It’s upon surviving that one has these sublime experiences, not upon dying, Brenner said to himself upon falling asleep. A good thought, he thought. Upon surviving, not dying. I mustn’t forget this. When he woke up later that evening, though, he was just glad that he still knew his own name.
From the internationally bestselling mystery writer Wolf Haas
RESURRECTION
“Wolf Haas and Detective Brenner’s debut shows how a washed-up private investigator can solve a double murder on a Swiss ski hill and become an Austrian policeman. If you like the Coen brothers, you will adore Inspector Brenner.”
—The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
$14.95 U.S./Can.
Paperback: 978-1-61219-270-3 | Ebook: 978-1-61219-271-0
THE BONE MAN
“As Brenner chases the clues amid the picture-book countryside (one waits for a chorus of Edelweiss), he encounters sex workers, fake tour guides, war profiteers, slimy art dealers and even a white slaver. Fans of Carl Hiaasen ought to love this series.” —The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
$14.95 U.S./Can.
Paperback: 978-1-61219-169-0 | Ebook: 978-1-61219-170-6
BRENNER AND GOD
“Brenner and God is a humdinger … a sockdollager of an action yarn, concerning the potentially fatal situation ex-cop Simon Brenner finds himself in when the two-year-old girl he’s been chauffeuring is kidnapped.” —The Austin Chronicle
$14.95 U.S./Can.
Paperback: 978-1-61219-113-3 | Ebook: 978-1-61219-114-0
MELVILLE INTERNATIONAL CRIME
Happy Birthday, Turk!
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978-1-935554-20-2
More Beer
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978-1-935554-43-1
One Man, One Murder
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978-1-935554-54-7
Kismet
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Brother Kemal
Jakob Arjouni
978-1-61219-275-8
The Craigslist Murders
Brenda Cullerton
978-1-61219-019-8
Death and the Penguin
Andrey Kurkov
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Penguin Lost
Andrey Kurkov
978-1-935554-56-1
The Case of the
General’s Thumb
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978-1-61219-060-0
Nairobi Heat
Mukoma wa Ngugi
978-1-935554-64-6
Black Star Nairobi
Mukoma wa Ngugi
978-1-61219-210-9
Cut Throat Dog
Joshua Sobol
978-1-935554-21-9
Brenner and God
Wolf Haas
978-1-61219-113-3
The Bone Man
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978-1-61219-169-0
Resurrection
Wolf Haas
978-1-61219-270-3
Come, Sweet Death!
978-1-61219-339-7
Murder in Memoriam
Didier Daeninckx
978-1-61219-146-1
A Very Profitable War
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978-1-61219-184-3
Nazis in the Metro
Didier Daeninckx
978-1-61219-296-3
He Died with
His Eyes Open
Derek Raymond
978-1-935554-57-8
The Devil’s Home
on Leave
Derek Raymond
978-1-935554-58-5
How the Dead Live
Derek Raymond
978-1-935554-59-2
I Was Dora Suarez
Derek Raymond
978-1-935554-60-8
Dead Man Upright
Derek Raymond
978-1-61219-062-4
The Angst-Ridden
Executive
Manuel Vázquez Montalbán
978-1-61219-038-9
Murder in the Central
Committee
Manuel Vázquez Montalbán
978-1-61219-036-5
Manuel Vázquez Montalbán
978-1-61219-034-1
Off Side
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978-1-61219-115-7
Southern Seas
Manuel Vázquez Montalbán
978-1-61219-117-1
Tattoo
Manuel Vázquez Montalbán
978-1-61219-208-6
Death in Breslau
Marek Krajewski
978-1-61219-164-5
The End of the World
in Breslau
Marek Krajewski
978-1-61219-274-1
Phantoms of Breslau
Marek Krajewski
978-1-61219-272-7
The Minotaur’s Head
Marek Krajewski
978-1-61219-342-7
The Accidental Pallbearer
Frank Lentricchia
978-1-61219-171-3
The Dog Killer of Utica
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978-1-61219-337-3
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