more of
a tinny rattle. Studer turned round. The sky was the
colour of the wine they call rose; birds were calling in
the pines that grew behind iron railings either side of
the drive. The black spire of the church in Randlingen
village was a long way away.
Beyond the door through which they entered there
were more steps. On the right was a kind of offertory
box with a sign, Remember the sick. Above it was a green marble tablet recording for posterity the names of the
clinic's benefactors. The His-Iselin family, one learnt,
had given 5,000 francs and the Bartschi family 3,000.
The tablet had space left for the names of future
benefactors.
There was a medicinal smell combined with dust
and floor polish, a strange smell that was to haunt
Studer for days. A corridor to the right, a corridor to
the left, both closed off at the end by solid wood doors.
A staircase led to the upper storeys of the central
block.
"I'll lead the way," said Laduner over his shoulder.
He took two steps at a time and Studer followed, gasping for breath. On the first floor he had time to look
out of a window in the corridor onto a large courtyard
with lawns divided into geometrical shapes by footpaths. There was a low building squatting in the
middle and a chimney rising into the sky behind
it. Red-brick walls, the roofs covered in slate and
embellished with a multitude of towers and turrets ...
They'd reached the second floor; Dr Laduner
pushed open a glass door and called out, "Greti."
A deep voice replied, then a woman in a red dressing-gown came towards them. She had short, blond,
slightly wavy hair and a broad, almost flat face. She
screwed up her eyes slightly, the way short-sighted
people often do.
"Studer, this is my wife. Is the coffee ready, Greti?
I'm hungry. You can have a good look at the sergeant
while he's eating his breakfast. Show him to his room
now. He's staying with us, it's been agreed." And then
Dr Laduner was no longer there, a door had swallowed
him up.
The woman in the red dressing-gown had a pleasantly warm, soft hand. She spoke in the dialect of Bern as she greeted Studer and apologized for not being
dressed. No wonder with everything that had been
going on: her husband had been woken by the phone
ringing at three in the morning because Pieterlen had
run off; then they'd discovered traces of blood in the
Director's office and the Director nowhere to be
found, vanished ... All in all it had been a very short
night; the previous day they'd had the harvest festival
(harvest festival? thought Studer. What do they harvest
here?) and hadn't got to their beds till half past twelve
... But Herr Studer would want a wash and brush up, if
he would just follow her ... The long corridor was
floored with brightly coloured, ribbed tiles. From
behind a door came the crying of a child and Studer
shyly ventured to ask whether Fran Doktor didn't want
to go and comfort it first. Plenty of time for that, she
replied briskly, crying was healthy for infants, it
strengthened the lungs ...
This was the guest room ... and that the bathroom
next door. Herr Studer should make himself at home
... There was soap and a clean towel, she'd call him
when breakfast was ready.
Studer washed his hands, then went into the guest
room and crossed over to the window. He was looking
down into the courtyard. Men in white aprons were
carrying large jugs, some balancing trays, like waiters.
A rowan tree on the edge of a square of lawn had
bunches of shining red berries, its feathery leaves a
golden yellow.
And at the back two men were coming out of a
detached, two-storey building. They too were wearing
white aprons. They were walking one behind the other,
keeping in step, and between them a black stretcher
with a coffin strapped onto it swayed from side to side.
Studer turned away. He was wondering vaguely how many people died in an institution like this, after how
many years, and what it was like to