The Dark Frontier

by A. B. Decker

  Ellen was not sure what part of her rambling response the affirmative nod was intended for, since Marthe’s thoughts were clearly elsewhere:

  “That reminds me, Ellen. You have a busy day before you. The police telephoned just before you came to breakfast. They want you to go and see them.”

  What reminded her? Ellen wondered. Marthe was not about to elaborate, but poured another cup of tea for her instead. It fascinated Ellen to watch this elegant Swiss woman with whom she had been intimate the night before. Ellen coloured slightly at the memory, while Marthe poured the tea as if it was the most natural thing in the world for her. She had learned a lot of trivialities to accommodate Ellen – even buying a proper teapot to make it as nearly English as she could. It was hard for Ellen to imagine she might be hiding anything from her. But then she recalled what Marthe had told her that night, about Frank confessing to have killed his mother.

  “When do they want to see me?” Ellen asked. Already she could feel her heart beginning to race. She sensed it showed in her voice. But Marthe either failed to notice her apprehension or chose to ignore it.

  “Whenever you have time. They said there’s no hurry, but if you like I can bring you there later this morning. Then we could have lunch together. There’s a nice restaurant round the corner near the police presidium, overlooking the river. And this afternoon I will drive you to the clinic to see Urs. He wants to talk with you at four-thirty.”

  “Why four-thirty?”

  “He doesn’t get back from Zurich until four. But he’s blocked his appointment book for the rest of the afternoon so he can talk with you in depth.”

  “What are we talking about Marthe? And why the talk of appointment books? He can talk to me when he gets home.”

  “You know how correct he is. He thinks it is not ethical to speak about a patient outside the clinic.”

  However ordinary and matter-of-fact her manner, Marthe dressed up this announcement in a way that had Ellen firmly hooked on its unspoken mystery. She could not imagine what Dr Zellweger might have to say to her within the cold, scientific walls of his clinic that he could not say in the comfort of his own home. The speculation that grew out of her bafflement kept her mind occupied for the rest of the morning. She tingled with a dark, reluctant curiosity throughout her interview at the police station and was unable to concentrate on all the repetitive well-worn questions they threw at her.

  The police had apparently long since abandoned any prospect of Frank returning to his room at the Kolping house and had fetched all his belongings over to the police station. They now wanted her to make a formal identification of the items.

  It was the same dour Malcolm lookalike who had accompanied them to the Kolping house. And he now seemed to Ellen incapable of seeing the absurdity of the scene or appreciating the smile that she sensed spread over her face as she picked out the two pairs of socks and the quaintly worn-out underpants. He took them from her as if they were crucial evidence by which the case for the prosecution would stand or fall. But he wanted more. He wanted to build a picture of Frank, he said. In fact it emerged that he was playing with the same idea Marthe had thrown up at Ellen, that maybe Frank was involved in drug-trafficking – a notion so ludicrous that her interest in it paled away to nothing in the shadow of her impending appointment at the clinic.

  After withstanding this first trial of the day, Ellen hoped the lunch with Marthe would help distract her preoccupied mind. But it was not to be – despite Marthe’s company and the delightful setting of the restaurant, where they sat overlooking the Rhine, watching the water flow beneath the bridge. Occasionally, a barge would pass low down in the water, struggling to compete with the downstream current. It was a scene that only nurtured the apprehension in Ellen’s curiosity all the more, since across the water – almost directly opposite where they were sitting – she could not help but notice the throng of people, mostly young men and women, shabby and stooped with all the homemade sorrows of the world heaped upon their shoulders. They gathered in groups, obviously dealing or just hanging out on the railings of the promenade that ran alongside the river. Marthe saw where her train of thought was running whenever Ellen glanced across the water in their direction.

  “It’s terrible what they are doing to themselves,” she said.

  Her observation served only to darken the shadows of fear that lurked in Ellen’s curiosity, and she staunchly refused to be drawn into any discussion that touched even remotely on Frank. She knew that Dr Zellweger was already waiting in the wings for this opportunity.

  It was the first time Ellen had returned to the clinic since the day she arrived so full of expectation from London. It seemed far sadder that afternoon than she remembered it – perhaps because the grounds now lay completely washed out with the winter and the building had been dampened to a dark grey by the rain. Marthe accompanied Ellen and led her down the long dingy corridor to her husband’s office.

  “Ah, Mrs Goss,” he said, getting up from his desk as they entered. He gave Ellen his hand with a ritual posture as if in some kind of pretence that they did not see each other almost every day in the privacy of his own home.

  “I see my wife has brought you. Very good.”

  From the way he moved, the way he touched his bow tie and adjusted the waistcoat under his white clinician’s coat, before self-consciously buttoning it up, gave Ellen the feeling he was nervous.

  “Schatz,” he said, turning to Marthe, “I was talking with Lorenz this morning – he is an old colleague in Zurich,” he added for Ellen’s benefit, “and he has offered us to use his chalet in St Moritz at the end of the month. He says it will be free for a few weeks. Unfortunately, I will be much too busy preparing for a symposium, but it would be a nice opportunity for Mrs Goss to see another side of Switzerland than psychiatric clinics. Do you ski, Mrs Goss?”

  “I’m afraid not,” Ellen replied. She could not help wondering as he spoke these words whether he knew that Marthe and she had slept together. Was this the explanation for the appointment in his office, an attempt to formalise his wife’s relationship with her in some way and give it the air of respectability? She recalled what Marthe had said about how ridiculous she found her own husband’s body, and tried to picture him with no clothes on, without even his bow tie. Would this be the last layer to fall? Ellen wondered. It was hard for her to imagine this pillar of correctness making love to Marthe with any passion, let alone satisfying her. Ellen’s wayward thoughts were broken by a knock at the door.

  “Ah, Professor Abegg. Please come. You remember Mrs Goss.”

  Ellen too recalled him, the tall but frail-looking figure from her first visit to the clinic, not so old, but prematurely aged by all the cares of his profession. He had grown a wispy beard since they last met. Perhaps for strength, Ellen told herself. He gave her his hand, while Dr Zellweger drew the earlier conversation with his wife to a close.

  “I suggest you phone Lorenz when you get back home and arrange a little holiday in the mountains for you and Mrs Goss.”

  This was Marthe’s cue to leave. Did he really not know what Marthe and I had been getting up to? Ellen asked herself. Or was he actively encouraging it with this invitation? The speculation was tantalising. But futile. And it died a sudden death as she watched Marthe close the door behind her, leaving Ellen to face the inquisition alone. Only Marthe’s promise to wait for Ellen outside kept her from falling into a panic when Dr Zellweger returned to his desk, fixed her with his eyes and addressed her so solemnly that she was convinced he had some terrible news to impart.

  “Although I now have responsibility for your husband’s case, Professor Abegg is with us today in his function as the head of department,” he explained.

  Dr Zellweger smiled nervously at the professor with this introduction. Ellen had the impression that he was not enjoying the experience, that he had been thoroughly ticked off for letting the patient discharge himself and just walk out of the clinic. Dr Zellweger rested his elbows on the de
sk and leaned on them awkwardly as he shifted his gaze from Ellen to the books in front of him.

  “I must confess,” he continued, “that we are making worries for ourselves.”

  It was not the first time Ellen had noticed how his English suffered when he felt uncomfortable. Now in the oblique backlight of the window behind his desk she saw a dense white – almost silver – in the hair around his temples; it had never struck her before. She wondered if it had appeared overnight with the worries he shared with the professor. Or was it just a trick of the light?

  Professor Abegg sat beside the desk nodding in agreement with a discreet smile on his lips. The weakness of the smile was somehow accentuated by the half-hearted growth on his chin. Ellen speculated on how these two ever managed to cope with a patient – were they suddenly invested with self-confidence when they found themselves in a position of advantage, she asked herself. Then he spoke:

  “You see, Mrs Goss, we are knowing your husband since too short a time, but we are becoming a picture which confuses us.”

  Dr Zellweger was sharp enough to see the blank expression written on Ellen’s face and came to his colleague’s rescue. “What Professor Abegg tries to say is that your husband has not been with us under observation since long enough to make a diagnosis.”

  “He’s not here now, is he?” she asked. Perhaps it was the panic in her eyes that made Dr Zellweger flinch slightly when she interrupted his train of thought. Or was it a self-consciousness as he struggled to get his English back into shape, Ellen wondered.

  “I’m sorry to say he’s not. No. But I am confident we will find him very soon, especially now where we are having the police on our side.”

  “I’m afraid I don’t follow. Whose side are you talking about?” Ellen asked. His choice of words quietly enraged her. “I certainly don’t feel they’re on my side.”

  “You must understand, Mrs Goss, that your husband is very labile and could be a danger.”

  “What do you mean a danger? You admit yourself that you don’t even know what’s wrong with him.”

  The look which Dr Zellweger exchanged with his professor had a conspiratorial quality. It suggested to Ellen that they knew more than they were letting on.

  “That is precisely the point,” he said, finally getting to grips with his English. “We cannot be sure about anything, and for this reason we are having to be very cautious.”

  Ellen watched him get up from his seat and walk over to the window, his hands deep in the pockets of his white coat. He seemed anxiously pensive, as if looking for inspiration or help, which he knew he could not expect from Professor Abegg. Ellen was unable to let go of the feeling that he knew of her relationship with Marthe. The impression was reinforced when he turned round and resumed the conversation with a faster and more frenetic turn of speech that suggested to Ellen he was trying to cover something up. Or suppress an unpleasant truth.

  “It’s really a fascinating case,” he continued. “We cannot be sure, but something which Professor Abegg and I agree, we are both thinking that your husband is showing features of a schizoaffective psychosis.”

  “Psychosis?” Ellen sensed her mouth hang open in disbelief.

  “Thought disorder. Delusions. Auditory hallucinations. And his behaviour generally would appear to suggest this,” he insisted. “It is possible that this condition has been induced by drug abuse.”

  “Oh no, not that again. Please Dr Zellweger, there’s no way Frank would have anything to do with drugs. I’ve been through all this with the police. Is this what you mean when you say they’re on our side?”

  All of a sudden, Ellen was beginning to appreciate why Marthe was having difficulty with her husband. And she could see in turn that he was becoming impatient with her – as far as his sense of correctness would allow it.

  “It is possible that he is acting through what he sees as failures in his life.” It was Professor Abegg who took the reins now, but Ellen had the feeling he just wanted to have something to say, and she sensed an irritation in Dr Zellweger’s eyes at the interruption. “People who take drugs are often having a very poor self-esteem,” the professor insisted.

  Perhaps Dr Zellweger agreed with the sentiment. But Ellen could see he was not impressed by the way it was put across.

  “Mrs Goss, we are not concerned about the moral or the legal aspects of the case. We are concerned about the health issues – both for your husband and for you,” he added ominously as he fiddled with his bow tie again and searched for his next line. “After what he said in the clinic, he appears to feel great resentment for his mother.”

  “I’m not surprised,” Ellen chipped in, and earned a withering schoolmasterly gaze for the interruption. He knew that story. They had spoken of relations with her mother-in-law at length.

  “And he is almost certainly rejecting outside help. He probably sees this as interference or pressure. It is interesting that he never mentioned your name. But we have discussed this once before. You see, we cannot be sure whether he also rejects you in his psychosis. It is very unpredictable. And there is no way to know how he will behave when he sees you.”

  “Dr Zellweger, I don’t think you can possibly imagine how tired I am. My husband has been missing for goodness knows how long now. I’ve been told by the police that he’s a drug-dealing criminal. Now you’re telling me he’s a dangerous psychotic. And slowly I’m beginning to wonder whether I’ve even got a husband. So even if I believed a word of what you’re trying to tell me, I don’t actually care anymore. It doesn’t mean anything to me any longer. I’m just tired. So I hope you won’t think me rude and callous when I say that all I’d like right now is to go home.”

  Ellen’s outburst left an awkward silence in its wake that seemed to last forever. The pensive concern on Dr Zellweger’s face eventually prompted him to get up and walk with slow deliberation around his desk to where she was sitting. She felt the firm reassuring pressure of his hand on her shoulder.

  “I understand. We will talk another day,” he said, and went over to the door. “Marthe, Mrs Goss would like to go home already.” His voice was muffled by the door that he held between them as he talked to his wife. The Swiss German was incomprehensible to Ellen, but she did pick up the mention of St Moritz.

  In the car back to her house, Marthe confirmed what she suspected their conversation had been about.

  “Urs thinks you need a break. I will telephone to his colleague in Zurich, and we will have a nice time together in St Moritz. Just the two of us. It’s very beautiful there.”

  The comfort of her hand on Ellen’s knee as she spoke these words put her instantly at ease.

  “I’ve never been to the mountains,” she said.

  “You will love it,” Marthe reassured her.

  “But we’ll need to find something more suitable for your feet,” she added, glancing down at the thick platform soles on Ellen’s high-heel boots.

  “St Moritz,” Ellen repeated. It was a name she had often heard, but it had always been another world for her, a stamping ground for rich playboys. She never imagined for one moment that she would ever spend a holiday there.

  “Isn’t that where the Cresta Run is?”

  Marthe nodded, and Ellen could see from the smile on her face that she found her ingenuousness faintly amusing.

  “That always used to fascinate Frank. He was always saying he’d like to try it again someday.” Her words became lost in the sound of an aeroplane taking off from the nearby airport. It was still very low in the sky, and Ellen could see quite clearly that it was a BEA flight. Presumably on its way to Heathrow, she told herself. At that moment, Ellen felt further from home than ever.

  Chapter 21

  Frank sensed that Patricia would not go through with their trip to the mountains and would stand him up. But putting these defeatist thoughts to one side, he had dropped into a bookshop on the way to the station to buy a copy of Les fleurs du mal. And to feel the book now resting in his pocket imbued him w
ith a new sense of optimism as he made his way to meet her. Not even the clouds that gathered overhead as he strode to the station could dampen this excitement.

  They had agreed to meet at the top of the steps down to the underpass that ran under the station. As he was approaching, he caught sight of a tall figure wearing a light grey fedora. The man emerged from a grand building with a woman unknown to him, but the man himself was uncomfortably familiar. It was Silverstone. He glanced in the direction of Frank, but was too focused on his female companion to notice him. While curious to know who the American’s companion might be, Frank felt a keen sense of relief when they turned and walked in the opposite direction towards the Schlotterbeck garage.

  The central square itself resembled a global playground that lunchtime. Children romped and tumbled in a Babel of languages and dialects that were mostly beyond Frank’s powers of recognition. Some he identified as approximately Slavonic. Others betrayed something of the Hungarian cadence he had come to know from his frequent visits to the Csarda restaurant all those lifetimes ago in Berlin. And a number of the children laughed and played with a clearly Yiddish lilt in their voices.

  The scene was one of uncommon happiness that defied the dark clouds above. It surprised him, until he recalled that space had been made in one of the station buildings to accommodate the growing stream of refugees in transit. These were plainly some of the refugee children, who had been allowed a lunch-time opportunity to escape from the tedium of their new freedom. But their happiness saddened him. They put him in mind of Achim’s baby boys.

  “Refreshing, their innocence, isn’t it?” Patricia’s voice instantly lightened the load on his heart. He turned around to her smoky, captivating smile. He was instantly comforted to see that his doubts had been unfounded and, in that moment of relief, planted a kiss on her lips that almost knocked her off balance. Yet, in his excitement, he had failed to hear the flatness of tone in her words.