In Matto's Realm: A Sergeant Studer Mystery (24 page)

"Bohnenblust," said Studer quietly.

"Among others. They tipped the balance. We joined
the Association of State Employees, and the pious
Christians went into the Protestant Workers' Party.
The Director was happy, of course. When I went to see
Dr Laduner after the meeting, he just shrugged his
shoulders and said there was nothing you could do.
When times were hard ... The others have never
openly attacked me, but the whole campaign against
Gilgen was really directed at me."

Jutzeler looked at the dead body. Gilgen seemed to
be smiling.

"Dr Laduner liked Gilgen. And the others knew that.
I have good people on the ward here, almost all of
them young nurses, but I have to keep on at them all
the time.

"Gilgen was the oldest. I made him my deputy, and
that was a big mistake. Gilgen was a good nurse, but he
had no idea how to maintain discipline. And when all's
said and done, you have to have order in a ward.
Things are different now, especially since Dr Laduner
introduced occupational therapy. We have to take time
with the patients, keep them occupied, even in their
free time, get them reading, playing games, stop
them sinking back into lethargy. We want to be able to
discharge them."

Studer was amazed. This Jutzeler was a simple man,
had started out as a farmer's boy, yet he spoke in a
calm and considered manner, he knew what he
wanted.

"I had to tick Gilgen off. I have one free day every
fortnight and a half day in between. Plus fourteen days
holiday a year. Whenever I came back, everything was
at sixes and sevens. Gilgen was hopeless at giving
orders. Like all shy people, he was either too hard or
too soft. The others started to hate him.

"There's a lot of gossip in a clinic like this. I've never
joined in, but you can imagine, Sergeant, you're in a
similar kind of organization. And you can never quite
tell exactly where Matto's realm stops - as Schiil would
say. The young nurses would go to Knuchel in T Ward,
the conductor of the brass band, to complain about
Gilgen. Perhaps" - Jutzeler patted the red counterpane over the dead body - "perhaps he had done
something not quite according to the rules. Knuchel
advised them to keep an eye on Gilgen. It was generally
known - it's like living in a glasshouse here - that
Gilgen was having a difficult time of it. Once, when he
was out working in the fields, he was caught wearing a
pair of boots with a patient's name written inside
them. One of the young nurses told Knuchel, Knuchel
went to the staff nurse on T, another of the religious
crowd, an Anabaptist or a Sabbatarian or one of the
Evangelical Brethren, I'm not really very well up on all
these sects, and the staff nurse went running off to the
Director. I knew nothing at all about the matter. The
Director took statements from the staff nurse on T,
from Knuchel, from the young nurse on my ward, all
behind my back, behind Gilgen's back. After that the
other nurses were interviewed, then they searched
Gilgen's locker. They found a pair of underpants there that also had a patient's name in them. Now Gilgen
was summoned to the Director and given the third
degree ... You knew Gilgen. He told me yesterday
evening he'd spoken to you the afternoon before ...
He was confused ... I'm convinced he didn't take the
boots, nor the underpants. The underpants could
easily have got mixed up in the wash. The boots? I've
always suspected they were planted, and in the morning, when you're going off to work in the fields, you're
in a hurry, you don't look too carefully ... But Gilgen
was no good at defending himself. He just stayed
silent."

"Yes," sighed Studer, "he was good at that."

"And you have to remember: his wife ill, debts, worries, his children boarded out ... People can be pretty
mean ... Little Gilgen never harmed a soul. You
couldn't hold it against him that he didn't like the way
the brass band was run. But they did. They informed
on him. The statements were taken by the Director
three days before the harvest festival. He was going to
send them to the Board of Governors with the demand
that Gilgen be dismissed.

"If the other party has its spies, I have mine, too. I
heard about the business that evening. Around six
o'clock. I'm allowed to sleep at home, but that night I
stayed in the clinic. I went from one ward to another,
from half past six to eleven o'clock. I talked to them.
We have to stick together, I said, the same thing could
happen to any of us, just think, it's our freedom that's
at stake here. They all turned a deaf ear, found
excuses. The next day I tried again, only I took a
stronger line. If Gilgen's dismissed, I said, we'll call a
strike ... You could say that was stupid ... The `swamp'
didn't go along with it. The frogs in the swamp are
timid little things; somebody just has to walk past on the bank and they immediately hide in the mud. It's
only when it's all quiet again that they start croaking.
Now that the Director's dead the frogs are croaking
very loud. They know there'll be big changes under Dr
Laduner...

"The day of the harvest festival arrived. I heard that
the Director knew of my plan for a strike. It could cost
me my job, but I wasn't afraid. I'll always be able to find
work, at the hospital they were unhappy to see me
leave. With Gilgen it was different ...

"That evening I answered the telephone and fetched
the Director."

Studer was leaning forward, his forearms on his
thighs. Now he raised his head. "One question,
Jutzeler. Didn't you recognize the voice on the
telephone?"

A pause. A long pause. Jutzeler frowned. Then he
went on, just as if the sergeant had not asked his
question.

"I stopped the Director when he came back from the
telephone and told him I had to speak to him that
evening. He gave me a mocking look and said, `Urgent
all of a sudden, is it?' I stayed calm and just said, `Yes.'
In that case, he said, I should wait for him outside his
office at half past twelve. Then he walked off.

"He kept me waiting, but not for long. He came and
we went into his office. I demanded to see the statements, but he just laughed. So then I told him what I
thought of the whole business and made some threats.
I told him I'd get the newspapers onto him. It was
disgusting the way he treated the nursing staff, I said. I
upbraided him for his little love affairs and at that he
started to bawl at me. He'd put a stop to my games,
he'd have me blacklisted, he said, I was dismissed on
the spot and he'd see to it I never worked again. I kept on about the statements. After all, I pointed out, the
business with Gilgen had happened in 0 Ward. I was
the staff nurse there and that gave me the right to ask
to see the statements. It was all an attempt to get at me,
I went on, but I knew that Dr Laduner was on my side
... I shouldn't have said that ... He picked up on it
straight away and told me he had a score to settle with
Dr Laduner as well. Did I know, he asked me, how
many patients had died in Dl over the last few days?
He'd had a list drawn up and he was going to submit it
to the Board of Governors to show them the kind of
havoc a doctor could wreak, who ... While he had
been Director, he said, mortality had always been very
low in the clinic, it was only since they'd introduced all
these fancy modern methods that there'd been so
many deaths. He'd checked Dr Blumenstein's autopsy
reports; there were discrepancies, he claimed. He'd
carried out a second autopsy on two bodies himself, he
said, and sent blood samples to forensics. He was just
waiting for the results, then he'd start proceedings
against Dr Laduner. That gentleman had been getting
on his nerves for long enough; he'd turned all the
other doctors against him, but he, Ulrich Borstli, was
still Director of Randlingen Clinic and Dr Laduner, for
all his cleverness, for all his influence and diplomacy,
could do nothing about that ... There were the
autopsy reports, he said, tapping his desk, and there
were the statements about Gilgen - and I was to get the
hell out of the office.

"We left together. I stood in a dark corner of the
corridor; the Director went up to his apartment and
came back down with his loden cape on. He switched
the corridor light off before he went out into the
courtyard ...

"Then I did something stupid, Sergeant. I wanted to see the statements regarding Gilgen, but, even more, I
wanted to see those autopsy reports ... I felt it was my
duty to take them to Dr Laduner to give him a chance
to defend himself. So I went back into the office. I
switched the light on and went through all the
drawers, but I couldn't find anything.

"Then I heard steps outside and I quickly turned the
light out. I didn't want to be caught in the Director's
office like a thief.

"The door opened. A hand went towards the light
switch and I grabbed it. We wrestled silently in the
office for a while. The typewriter fell on the floor, a
window-pane was broken. Finally I got the man on the
floor and made off. I went to see Gilgen. He was still
up, he was on duty that night, but he hadn't gone to
the harvest festival. He was sitting here on the edge of
his bed. I told him not to lose heart, we knew now what
was going on. I intended to speak to Dr Laduner the
next morning, but all sorts of things happened before
then."

"Did you meet anyone on your way back to 0,
Jutzeler?"

Jutzeler avoided the question. He said, "It was striking two when I went across the courtyard."

"You didn't hear a cry?"

14 No ...,,

"Fine," said Studer. "And that's all you have to tell
me?"

Jutzeler thought for a while, scratched his head,
then shook it, smiled and said, "If you want to learn
more about us warders - as they used to say, nurses
they call us nowadays - I could go on for ages. About
the long days with time dragging by because you've
almost nothing to do. You stand around, hands in the
bib of your apron, and supervise the patients, serve their meals, supervise them again, `tend' them in the
garden, come back up here ... And eat. Food is very
important, not only for the patients, for us nurses, too.
We know the menu for weeks ahead: the sweetcorn on
Mondays, the rice on Wednesdays, the macaroni on
Fridays and the Saturday sausage. We know when we'll
get rosti in the morning, when we'll get butter. We've
developed a special walk for going across the courtyard, slowly, slowly, to use up time. We get married so
that we've got a home somewhere, at least during the
night. We feel it when there's a change coming in the
weather - the patients in our care are irritable, and so
are we ... We get paid, but not much ... Some build
themselves a house and have a mortgage to pay off. It's
as if they feel they need worries just to fill the empty
days ... We stand around waiting for the day to end.
They give us courses, but we're not allowed any
responsibility. Every aspirin, every bath we give, we
have to ask first. Why do they give us courses when
we're not allowed to make use of the things they teach
us? Courses! My colleagues who took their diploma
two years ago, what do they remember from it? Nothing. I'm a bit better off: I read, and then Dr Laduner
explains to me things I don't know. But it's all so pointless. What use is it that I can make a better diagnosis
than an assistant doctor who's just started? I have to
stand and watch a junior doctor, Neuville for example,
doing stupid things, making silly jokes with a patient
under stress, say, and I'm the one who has to deal with
the patient when he goes and smashes a few windows.
If only they were all like Dr Laduner."

Silence. The dead man on the bed had a smile on his
face. Outside the twilight was red ...

"I have to go now," said Studer. "Merci, Jutzeler. What
will you do with ... with Gilgen?"

"I'll wait until it's dark, then take him to M with
Schwertfeger. There were three of us who stuck
together, Schwertfeger from D1" - in his mind's eye
Studer saw the man with the muscular arms who
looked like a dairyman - "Gilgen and me. We stuck
together. Now there's only two of us. Though now it's
Dr Laduner who's in charge."

Passing the porter's lodge, Studer went in and
enquired politely whether Dreyer sold Brissagos as
well. Receiving an affirmative reply, Studer took a
packet, then pointed to Dreyer's bandaged hand and
asked, in a quiet voice, "Why didn't you tell me you
broke the window in the Director's office? Was that
how you cut yourself?"

Dreyer gave a slightly foolish smile. He thought for a
moment, then took a deep breath and said, "Yes, I
heard footsteps in the office and went to see what was
up. I was attacked and cut my hand. Why didn't I say
anything? Simple. By that time the Director had disappeared and I was afraid I'd get involved. How did you
find out I'd been in the office?"

"Deduction," said Studer, and had the satisfaction of
seeing a glint of admiration in the porter's eyes.

It might be true, it might not. Dreyer could have had
reasons of his own for looking round the office.
Though what those reasons were would be difficult to
establish. He'd have to wait again ... But he wasn't
going to go and have dinner with Dr Laduner. He
needed to be alone. There was the clock in the clinic
tower just striking six with its usual sharp clang. Studer
went down the steps of the main entrance, heading
along the avenue of apple trees for the village of
Randlingen.

He saw a couple walking in front of him. Dr Laduner, with his wife on his arm. They were walking
in step with each other, slowly, through the twilight,
which was cool and strawberry coloured. An orange
cloud was hanging over the snowy mountains.

They weren't talking. The couple did not have the
look of lovers, Studer thought, but one thing was obvious: they belonged together, they would stick together.
Studer was comforted by the feeling that, whatever
happened, at least Dr Laduner would not be alone.
For, to be honest, the situation looked a lot less rosy
than the evening sky ...