‘We lived very quietly wherever we lived,’ she said defensively. ‘Trent preferred it that way.’
He looked at her almost disbelievingly, then re-started the machine. ‘What about Herr Schiller himself? Did you see much of him?’
She frowned and said, ‘Once or twice a year the firm would hold a sort of convention. We all gathered here in Vienna. I saw him then, of course.’
She had never liked these gatherings. There had been something of the nature of a military parade about them, with honours worn and strict precedence adhered to. The fact that Trent had always been in the top stratum had not made matters easier for her. Nor had the many kind attentions lavished on her by Schiller done much more than embarrass her.
‘And on other occasions?’
‘Yes. If ever he was visiting the branch where Trent was working, he always came to stay with us.’
‘So you were friendly?’
‘I suppose so. But not … friends. To tell the truth, I didn’t care for him much. And he was always so kind and interested. He was always asking if we were starting a family yet. I used to get embarrassed. But he was Trent’s boss, so I had to put up with it.’
‘Very dutiful,’ said Jünger drily. ‘And you moved here to Vienna shortly before Schiller had his first stroke?’
‘That’s right. I think everyone thought he would die, but he seemed to make a marvellous recovery. Trent saw him a lot, of course. I only saw him a few times. He looked remarkably well, I thought.’
She recalled him well, a tall lively man with a shock of white hair and bright blue eyes which never seemed to leave you. It wasn’t till you got close and saw the terrapin creases of his aged, tanned skin that you realized how old he was.
‘Herr Jünger, are you implying that Herr Schiller was behind all this?’
‘Would that surprise you?’ said Jünger.
She thought, and realized it would not. He studied her closely as if dubious about her reaction. She said, ‘He is so highly respected. The State President has honoured him.’
‘Everyone makes mistakes, Frau Adamson,’ said Jünger. ‘There are those who say that if the Allied War Crimes Commission had done its job properly, Herr Schiller would have spent the first two decades of peace in jail instead of making a fortune. But he no longer concerns us, I’m glad to say. He is, I gather, completely decrepit, eking out his days in some nursing home where the rich go to die.’
Again he was watching her. What was he looking for? Pity? Callous indifference?
He sighed and said, ‘Now let us look at some photographs.’
From a desk drawer, he took a leather-bound album and opened it before her. They might have been a pair of distant relatives, newly met, poring over old family snaps together.
Some of the photos were very like family snaps, casual, unposed, with the subject (marked with a red cross) often clearly unaware he was being taken. Others had the grim formality of police file portraits.
Trudi went steadily through the thick album, shaking her head at most pages. A couple she nodded at, both former colleagues of Trent’s though she had no names for them. Jünger made spidery notes on a pad. Trudi turned the page.
And gasped.
Alert, Jünger said, ‘What is it? You recognize him?’
The marked man, drinking a glass of wine at a café table, she had never seen before.
But behind him, slightly out of focus, was another table with two men sitting at it.
One of them, head as always half turned away but instantly recognizable to her, was Trent.
But it was not this that had caused Trudi to react.
The man he was sitting with was the man who resembled Jünger – the man she had last seen falling, naked and stiff, out of the freezer at Well Cottage near Eyam.
‘No. Not him. But him.’
Her finger stabbed down on Trent.
‘Yes. I am sorry, Frau Adamson. I had overlooked that photograph. Forgive me.’
Herr Jünger did not give the impression of a man who overlooked things.
Trudi said, ‘The man with Trent, is that you, Herr Jünger? There is a certain resemblance …’
Jünger looked and shook his head and said shortly, ‘No.’
Then, as if relenting, he added, ‘Yes, there is said to be a resemblance, though not by members of the family. That is my brother, Gerhardt. He is … was … a policeman. A practical policeman, I mean. I was the one for the files, the paper, the organization: Gerdt was always more interested in events, people, flesh and blood.’
‘You say he was a policeman?’
‘He disappeared some months ago, Frau Adamson. At the same time as your husband’s death. He was our liaison with your husband, you see. He had established a cover as a salesman, moving around a great deal. We expected him to surface after your husband’s death, to give his analysis of the situation. He didn’t. After so long a time, we can only fear the worst.’
His tone was studiously neutral.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Trudi helplessly.
‘Yes. Thank you. Shall we carry on?’
The rest of the book was unproductive though probably, in her present confused state of mind, Trudi could have looked at pictures of herself without recognition.
As she reached the last page, a phone rang. Jünger went to the desk and answered it. He listened for a while then said, ‘Yes. I’ll see to it.’
Returning to the fireplace he said, ‘Frau Adamson, a change of plan. You have been most helpful but we will not require you this afternoon after all. You may have lunch here, as I promised, but, alas, I will not be able to join you. Or, if you prefer, you may of course leave.’
Trudi glanced at her watch. It was twelve fifteen.
She said, ‘In that case, thank you, but I’ll make my own arrangements. And tomorrow?’
‘The car will come for you at the same time. Once more, my apologies. In Fräulein Weigel’s defence, I should say that her own sister is a registered drug addict so she has cause to feel strongly about those suspected of links with the trade. This does not, of course, excuse the administrative incompetence shown in your case.’
There was a tap at the door. Jünger opened it to reveal Weigel. He said, ‘Frau Adamson is leaving now. Please show her out.’
They shook hands and Trudi went into the corridor.
‘This way please,’ said the girl briskly.
How severe would her reprimand be? wondered Trudi. Jünger’s words had struck a small spark of sympathy in his bright and comfortable room, but here in the dim corridor which brought back sharp memories of her earlier humiliation, it was soon quenched. The best she could resolve was to accept any proffered apology with cool courtesy.
The girl stopped by a door and pressed a button almost invisible in the wall. The door which looked just like all the others slid aside to reveal a lift. At least they were going to be spared all those stairs. Trudi entered. Weigel followed. The lift began to descend.
There was no indicator and the cubicle was ill-lit and rather stuffy. The descent seemed to take for ever. Weigel stood staring straight ahead. Far from looking apologetic for her earlier error, she gave off waves of cold hostility. Trudi’s initial anger had cooled during her talk with Jünger, but now its embers began to glow once more.
‘Look,’ she said reasonably. ‘You made a mistake before. Everybody does. It doesn’t hurt to admit it.’
Suddenly the girl swung round to face her.
‘A mistake, Frau Adamson?’ she said, her voice vibrant with dislike and contempt. ‘I don’t believe so; the only mistake I see is letting you go out of here!’
The lift halted with a suddenness that threw the two women against each other. Trudi felt the other’s taut young body pressing her back against the wall.
Then Weigel drew back and turned away. The door opened on to a well-lit vestibule with a marble floor. Weigel stepped out, halted, turned and said in her previous neutral voice, ‘This way please,’ and walked away. The h
eels of her flat shoes clacked on the marble floor in stark contrast with the utter silence of her movement along the grey corridors.
Too shaken to be angry yet, Trudi followed. A uniformed commissionaire opened a tall double door and she found herself looking out, not into the mean little courtyard through which she’d entered the building, but into a quiet elegant street of tall houses with the noise of Kärntner Strasse off to her right. She did not pause but stepped out on to the pavement with eager haste. ‘Goodbye, Frau Adamson,’ said Weigel behind her. ‘Till tomorrow.’ And the door closed.
5
Back at the hotel, she looked for James Dacre but he was nowhere to be found and his key was on the rack. Not expecting her ‘release’ till mid-afternoon, he must have gone off sight-seeing.
Trudi was disproportionately disappointed. Her mind was full of the morning’s revelations, not to mention Weigel’s extraordinary behaviour, and she had been looking forward eagerly to pouring them out. She looked into the hotel dining room. Its air of quiet efficiency and the discreet spacing of the tables which would normally have attracted her today seemed alienating and merely contrived to accentuate her loneness. The head waiter approached, smiling. She shook her head and withdrew. She wanted either the complete loneliness of her room or the bustle of a crowded Beisel. Rather to her surprise, she opted for the latter and after leaving Dacre a note, she set out once more.
It was barely one o’clock but the day was already darkening as cloud built up from the north, smudging out the morning’s wintry blue. Soon there would be more snow to refresh the dingy relicts of the last big fall.
Shivering, she stood on the pavement waiting for a break in the traffic. She paid no special attention to the long white Mercedes that slid past until it stopped a few metres beyond her and the rear door opened and a voice called, ‘Mrs Adamson!’
As she turned towards the car, Dr Werner stepped out and she recognized the limousine as the one which had brought her down from the clinic at Kahlenbergerdorf the previous month.
‘It is you,’ said Werner, coming towards her. ‘I thought I recognized you. How are you, my dear lady?’
‘I’m fine,’ she said. ‘And you?’
He smiled faintly as if to suggest the question was superfluous to a man whose clothes cost more than many men earn in a month and whose car, in a year.
‘Well enough,’ he said. ‘But I’m eager to hear what has developed in the sad business we talked of last time you were here. How long are you staying? Were you perhaps planning to call on me again? I hope so, if only socially. Be assured, I would be most hurt if I discovered you were visiting our city without paying me a call!’
He had charm enough to get away with such insincerities, and just in case he didn’t, his dark intelligent eyes invited her to be amused at his Viennese floweriness.
Before she could reply, the northern clouds drifted a couple of feathery flakes on to her chilly lips.
‘But we can’t talk here,’ he said. ‘Come into the car. Where are you going? Can I give you a lift?’
Taking her elbow, he hurried her along to the Mercedes. Dieter, lean and muscular in his SS uniform, said, ‘Good day, Frau Adamson.’ He spoke courteously, but she still sensed mockery in his tone.
Trudi paused, half into the car, and said, ‘I was just going for lunch. Somewhere simple like Drei Hacken, I thought, but I can easily walk.’
Werner’s eyebrows, which were almost as elegantly groomed as his luxuriant hair, arched themselves in reaction to her choice either of eating place or of locomotion.
He said, ‘If you are uncertain, then you must be eating alone. Please, won’t you keep me company? I was just on my way to the clinic. We have really first-class cuisine there. You’ll join me? I insist!’
‘I’ve got an appointment later,’ she said feebly, getting into the car.
‘No problem. Dieter will drive you back whenever you wish.’
He rapped on the partition which cut them off from the driver. The limousine pulled quietly away, its long wipers already moving to clear a sight-path through the snow-curded air.
Trudi leaned back in the soft warm comfort of her seat and closed her eyes.
‘You are tired, Frau Adamson?’ asked Werner solicitously.
‘No,’ she said. ‘Just enjoying the treat. I’m a public transport person now, Dr Werner.’
He smiled again and shook his head slightly as if in disbelief.
He was right. She was lying. What she had really been trying to work out was a route from Werner’s city surgery to Kahlenbergerdorf which would take him sensibly past her hotel.
It was impossible. But she didn’t know what necessary diversion he might have had to make, did she?
Nor was she certain, she who had spent so much of her life in an incurious torpor, where careful suspicion became chronic neurosis.
She left the matter in abeyance. One thing did seem certain, however. Whether the meeting was accidental or planned, Werner’s enthusiasm for her company derived neither from natural courtesy nor from lust for her lily-white flesh.
By the time they reached Kahlenbergerdorf, the snow was so heavy that it could as easily have been obscuring sky-scrapers as cottages and once they were beyond the village and on to the forest road, there seemed to be no way of distinguishing the path ahead. Dieter, however, seemed untroubled by either visibility or road conditions, and Trudi, far from being afraid, let herself be lulled by the sense of cosy cocooning given by the warmth within and the swirling whiteness without. Werner was content to share her mood and, apart from a few sociable trivialities, said nothing during the journey.
Finally the car stopped.
‘We are here,’ said Werner.
‘Are you sure?’ said Trudi doubtfully, peering out of the window.
Werner laughed, the chauffeur blew the horn, a door opened, leaning a rectangle of yellow light against the whiteness, and two orderlies emerged, one sweeping the snow aside with a broad broom, the other carrying a huge umbrella.
‘Is this for you, or do they imagine I’m a rich patient?’ enquired Trudi.
Werner frowned. Perhaps it was bad taste to joke about rich patients in front of the staff. Trudi giggled to herself, wished she had Janet here to share the giggle, then remembered.
Inside, the elegant Elvira Altenberg greeted her with pleasure, though without surprise.
‘Frau Adamson, how nice to see you again. Herr Doktor, here is your list of calls. I think the top two need immediate attention, the others may wait till after lunch.’
‘Thanks,’ said Werner. ‘Will you excuse me for five minutes? Elvira will look after you.’
He ran lightly up the staircase.
The young woman said, ‘Will you come this way, Frau Adamson?’
She led her through a large oak door. The room they entered was a medium-sized lounge, very comfortably furnished, with a small bar in a corner. Two men and a woman were seated in armchairs drinking glasses of wine. They looked up and smiled at Elvira.
‘What would you like to drink?’ asked the younger woman.
‘An orange juice,’ said Trudi firmly.
Nodding as if in approval, Elvira went to the bar. The trio of wine-drinkers rose and exited through a door whose momentary opening let in the sight of a small dining room and the sound of half a dozen diners. Trudi sat down in an armchair in the box bay. In better weather it probably afforded a spectacular view but all that was visible today was a swirl of snow.
‘It looks bad out there,’ said Elvira, sitting beside her. She too was drinking orange juice.
‘Yes,’ said Trudi. ‘I was just thinking that perhaps I shouldn’t stay too long. I don’t want to get stuck.’
Elvira laughed and said, ‘No one wants to get stuck, least of all Dr Werner. We have a snow-plough and a tractor and most of our vehicles are four-wheel drive. Once down at the village, you’ll find that the authorities are very good at keeping the public road open into the city. Ah, here is the doct
or already. Dr Werner, shall I get you a drink?’
‘A Perrier water only, thank you. There, that didn’t take long, did it, Frau Adamson? What do you think of our staff facilities?’
He sat down in the chair vacated by his secretary. Trudi said, ‘They seem excellent.’
‘That’s the aim,’ said Werner. ‘We set out to attract the top echelon of patients to the clinic, I make no bones about it. They are used to nothing but the best, so it is the best that we must employ. And they in their turn require excellence in their working and relaxing conditions. Thank you, Elvira.’
The young woman placed a glass before him, smiled at Trudi and left.
‘Trent would have been flattered to be numbered in the top echelon,’ said Trudi.
‘Herr Adamson? Well, certainly so I would have regarded him, of course.’
‘Would have? But he was your patient.’
‘Happily only for minor ailments in my city practice,’ said Werner.
‘You mean he was never a patient here at the clinic?’
‘Good Lord, no!’ said Werner in surprise. ‘What makes you say that?’
‘I don’t know; something Fräulein Altenberg said about meeting him here,’ said Trudi, affecting vagueness.
‘Elvira? Ah! You must have misunderstood! Of course, she would meet him when he came visiting.’
‘Visiting?’
‘Why, yes. He came regularly to visit Herr Schiller, his old employer.’
‘Herr Schiller is here?’ exclaimed Trudi. She recalled what Jünger had said: Schiller was old and decrepit and eking out his days in a nursing home where the rich go to die.
Death of a Dormouse Page 18
