In Matto's Realm: A Sergeant Studer Mystery (22 page)

Fran Laduner had a large basket of mending in
front of her and was busy darning a hole in the heel of
a man's sock. "The Board of Governors has turned up,
too," she said, a smile glinting in her eyes behind her
pince-nez.

The Board of Governors. Studer should have had a
look at them, she said. There was a clergyman on it
whose face consisted of little more than a mouth, an
enormous mouth, making him look like a red frog.
Sometimes he stood in for the prison chaplain on
Sundays, and he had a nickname. Reverend Veronal,
they called him, after the well-known sedative, because
two thirds of the congregation always fell asleep during his sermons. Little Gilgen, she went on, had once
said they should experiment with using the priest for
their sleep treatment. Since they were trying to
economize on everything, they could replace expensive medicines with sermons, they'd be cheaper. Then
there was a retired schoolteacher who supervised
released prisoners and discharged patients. He was
hard of hearing, but probably only because he had
such thick tufts of hair growing out of his ears, she
added. And there was the wife of a member of parliament, too, a friendly, intelligent woman who kept
embarrassing the others by asking, every time they
were taken round the clinic, what was the point of having a Board of Governors? So that the gentlemen
could pocket their expenses? Everything was running so well without the Board. When she did that, the former teacher turned probation officer would pretend
to be even more hard of hearing than usual and ask
two or three times, "What was that you said?"

The telephone rang.

"Could you answer that, Herr Studer," Frau Laduner
said. "I feel so lazy."

Studer stood up, lifted the receiver and said in a
friendly voice, "Yes?"

It was Dreyer, the porter. "Who's that on the line?"

"Studer."

"You must come at once, the administration office's
been broken into."

"What?" Studer asked in astonishment. "In broad
daylight?"

"Yes. You must come down at once, it's urgent."

"Hardly," said Studer, then replaced the receiver
and told Frau Laduner he had to nip down to the
ground floor, the porter had something he wanted to
ask him. Things were all at sixes and sevens down
there. He walked slowly to the door, followed by suspicious looks from Frau Laduner.

He closed the apartment door behind him and ran
down, taking the stairs three at a time. He was somewhat out of breath by the time he reached the ground
floor.

Dreyer, pale and agitated - his left hand was still
bandaged - was waiting for him at the bottom, and
grasped his arm.

On the right, along the corridor leading to the
female wards, a door stood open. Dreyer pushed the
sergeant into the room. An oldish woman, hair dishevelled, was going in circles round and round the
double desk. She reminded Studer of a cat that has
had valerian drops sprinkled on its nose.

"In there," said the porter.

In the neighbouring, smaller room (obviously the
private office of the clinic manager) the safe was open.
There were files in it. Studer went over.

The woman gave up her circuits, joined him and
began to moan. "My God, this is terrible. The manager's gone to the funeral and something like this has
to happen while he's away. I only left the office for five
minutes at the most, I just dashed out to wash my
hands. . ."

She broke off, raised her eyes to heaven, clasped her
hands, unclasped them. "Six thousand francs! Six
thousand francs! Three bundles of twenty hundreds!
Just vanished! And the manager? What will the manager say?"

She went back into the other room and started
going round and round again, mumbling to herself.

In a low voice Dreyer explained that Fraulein Hanni
had taken the death of the Director so much to heart
because she was his sister-in-law, the sister of his second
wife.

"Fraulein Hanni," Studer asked, "was the safe
locked?"

"No, it wasn't." The manager, she said, had been in a
terrible hurry, he'd had a lot of work on, the quarterly
accounts, and it wasn't until the last moment that he'd
been able to go up to his apartment to change - forgetting to lock the safe.

The tears were rolling down her cheeks. Studer
shrugged his shoulders. An old spinster, got worked up
easily ... But why did she keep on trotting round the
table, like a cat that ...

Studer muttered a goodbye. Was there any point in
looking for fingerprints on such an invitingly open
safe? Outside he asked the porter who he'd seen in the central block after the funeral procession had
left.

Dreyer thought, scratched his bandage. "No one. . he said finally, if a little hesitantly.

"And where were you?"

"In the porter's lodge, of course."

"And no one came to collect or buy anything, or to
ask a question? Think, man!"

"Oh yes! About ten minutes ago Nurse Gilgen of 0
Ward came to buy a packet of cigars and a little later
Nurse Wasem came for some chocolate."

Aha! So Irma didn't go to the funeral. Why did she
need chocolate if there was nothing wrong with her?
And what did Gilgen think he was doing, leaving his
ward in the middle of the afternoon to buy cigars?
The copper-haired nurse who had passed with a run
of four to the ace of spades - and had been in
Laduner's apartment yesterday morning, after which
a sandbag ...

It was all happening at once, just like in a bad film in
which, out of laziness, they didn't bother with the transitions between scenes. Studer left the porter standing
there and hurried off, down the steps, out into the
courtyard and on past the rowan tree with its withered
leaves. He went up more steps, crossed a corridor,
unlocked the door to 0 dormitory and stopped,
breathing heavily, at the foot of one of the twenty-two
beds. They were all empty, the whole ward seemed
deserted, there was not a sound ... Although noise was
coming from the garden below.

Studer went over to the window. In the middle of a
round patch of lawn two men in white aprons were
engaged in a bout of Swiss belt-wrestling. One was Staff
Nurse Jutzeler, the other a man Studer didn't know.
He cast an expert eye over the contest. The two men weren't bad at all. A Brienz lock - the other countered
with a Schlungg, well done! - the first man formed a
bridge ... A draw. It was as if he could hear the puffing
and grunting of the two wrestlers up in the dormitory.

Where was Gilgen? Gilgen because of whom a strike
had almost been called in Randlingen Clinic? He
wasn't in the garden. The patients were running about
down there, one was going round and round the patch
of lawn. Others were lying on the damp grass under
the trees.

Not a sound broke the silence.

Suddenly Studer thought he could hear a sound.
But not there in the dormitory ... In the day room?

Quietly he went to the door, his passkey turned in
the lock, just as quietly as it had on the night when he
had surprised Bohnenblust ... He flung the door
open.

At the table where Studer - it seemed an age ago
now - had once played jass, Gilgen was sitting,
slumped, staring at the table. His shirtsleeves were
rolled up; his arms were covered in freckles.

A slow-motion film: on the screen you see racehorses
taking a jump. You expect their back legs to spring off
the ground, but no, they stretch, and slowly, very slowly
detach themselves from the grass. That was the speed
at which Studer crossed the threshold.

Gilgen did not start at the noise. There was an odd
expression on his face, as if he was completely at a loss
what to do.

"What's wrong, Gilgen?" Studer asked. The nurse
straightened up and the bib of his apron sagged, as if
something was hidden behind it.

"What have you got there?" Studer asked, pointing
to the bulge. Gilgen shrugged wearily. His blue shirt
had lots of patches, some of different-coloured cloth. He shrugged his shoulders, as if to say, Why do you ask
such a stupid question?

His hand disappeared under the bib, pulled something out and threw it on the table.

Two bundles of banknotes. Studer picked them up
and flicked through them. Twenty ... forty. Four thousand francs.

"Where's the rest?"

Gilgen looked up in astonishment. He said nothing.

Studer slipped the bundles into his jacket pocket.
Then he started to pace up and down.

The case with the wrong notes - and not just the
banknotes.

There was always something that wasn't quite right.
Within an incredibly short time he'd managed to clear
up a theft and recover the money - but then of course
some was still missing ... And Gilgen was supposed to
be the thief ...

Grumpily Studer told Gilgen he'd have to search his
belongings. Where was his room?

Gilgen pointed to a door opposite the door to the
dormitory. That was where he slept, he said, when he
had to spend the night in the clinic.

Pieterlen had escaped via the day room. The question of the key had been solved, but still ... Gilgen slept
in a room, the door of which opened off the day room.

The little copper-haired nurse stood up wearily and
preceded Studer into the room.

The window looked out onto the kitchen and was
wide open.

Two built-in wardrobes, painted light blue. Gilgen
went over to one, opened the door with a key from his
keyring, then sat down on the bed. It had a red counterpane with white fringes that reached down to the
floor.

It was quiet in the room.

Three shirts, one apron, a cardboard box with a
razor, shaving brush, soap, leather strop. One old
patched coat. A white coat, neatly pressed; on the lapel
the white cross on a red background, the badge of the
qualified nurse.

Poor little Gilgen, thought Studer. What kind of a
mess had he got himself into? He presumably only
wore the nurse's coat on special occasions. When the
Board of Governors was going round the wards, for
example. The Board of Governors with Reverend
Veronal, whom Gilgen loved to mock ...

"You didn't take just two bundles of banknotes,
Gilgen," said Studer. He continued to search the
wardrobe, though he really had no idea what he was
expecting to find. "Where's the rest?"

Silence.

"Did you take something from my room yesterday?"

Silence. You couldn't call it either defiant or obstinate. More sad, despairing. It would be a terrible blow
for his sick wife, up there in Heiligenschwendi, when
she heard her husband was in prison. Studer would
have liked to help Gilgen, but how could it be done?
He sat down on the edge of the bed, patted Gilgen
on the shoulder and spoke the sentences that were
traditional in that kind of situation.

"You'll only make things worse for yourself, Gilgen,
if you don't tell me where the other two thousand
francs are. You'll feel better for it ..."

Silence.

"Then at least tell me why you stole the money.
Unburden your conscience."

As he said this, the sergeant had an uncomfortable
feeling again - he seemed to feel that way all the time
in this clinic. He had a vague sense that behind the apparently clear facts of the case lay something
disturbing, something he couldn't quite grasp.

"Debts." Gilgen suddenly spoke quietly, then fell
silent again. Although the expression on his face was
like that of an anxious mouse, it was also remarkably
determined.

Still silence in 0 block. Presumably all those who
were not in the garden had gone to the funeral. At that
moment one of the Board of Governors was probably
giving a speech at the open grave. God, they had to
have something to do.

"Debts?"

Gilgen nodded and Studer didn't probe further. He
knew the story of the house and the mortgage.

Gilgen recounted what had happened in a monotone.

"During my hour - you must know that when we're
on duty until nine o'clock we have the right to one free
hour in the day - so during my free hour, I went to
Dreyer to buy a packet of cigars. Then I thought that as
I was there I might as well go to the admin office and
ask when the next wage-cut was due - you never know,
nowadays they can come overnight. I get on well with
Fraulein Hanni, I thought I'd ask her. The manager
had gone to the funeral and you hear all sorts of things
in the admin office. The door was open, so I went in.
I saw the safe open in the other room and. . . "

"How many bundles did you take?"

"Two..."

"Two? Where were they? On the top shelf? On the
bottom shelf?"

"On ... on ... on the bottom shelf, I think?"

"Not on the middle one?"

"Oh yes, on the middle one?"

"How many shelves are there in the safe?"

"Three. . ."

Studer looked at Gilgen.

The safe was divided in two by one shelf halfway up.
Studer had seen that.

Therefore ...

Gilgen's expression was like that of a whipped dog.
Studer looked away. His eye fell on the open wardrobe.
There was something grey right at the bottom, behind
the shoes. Studer got up, bent down - the sandbag!
The cosh in the shape of a huge salami.

"And this?" asked Studer. "Are you finally going to
come clean?"

But Gilgen maintained his silence again. He passed
the flat of his hand across his bald head once - his
fingers were trembling visibly - then shrugged his
shoulders. The shrug of his shoulders could have
meant anything.

"Where were you on Wednesday night?"

"Here in the clinic." The answer was accompanied
by a wave of the hand, as if to say there's no point to all
this.

"You sleep alone in this room?"

A nod.

"Did you talk to Pieterlen when he was having a
smoke in the day room?"

Studer placed his powerful, broad-shouldered figure in front of the little man.

Gilgen looked up fearfully. "Don't bully me,
Sergeant," he said softly.