Doctor Death (7 page)

“Of course.” I thought for a moment. “But can you perhaps venture a guess at whether the mite infection could have caused the young woman’s death?”

He shook his head, just one sharp jerk of his chin. “I don’t yet have sufficient basis for that kind of supposition. If you want to come back in a few days, I’ll be able to give you a clearer and more detailed answer.”

Come back? I had not been planning to make two trips to Heidelberg within a week. Even with the railroad, it was more than six hours in each direction, and the expense was a substantial strain for a modest household like ours. I had somehow imagined that the rest could be taken care of by letter or telegram.

He sensed my hesitation.

“Well, if you can’t come, I shall have to come to you,” he said with a faint smile.

All at once I was very conscious of being alone with a man I didn’t know. True, he had left the door open, presumably out of consideration for my reputation, but still.

“I am not sure that my father can do without me,” I said, embarrassed to note that it sounded like what it was—a schoolgirl’s excuse.

At that moment there were steps in the corridor outside. The professor raised his head and listened.

“You had better discuss that with your father, then,” he said. “I expect to have a result in a few days.”

Through the door burst a long-limbed blond young man,
also sweaty and out of breath and dressed in a luminously white fencing costume.

“What is keeping you, Gussi?” he said. “We can’t manage without you! They have brought von Hahn, and Grawitch is about to shit his pants from fear . . .” He came to a sharp halt when he noticed me. “Aha!” he said. “The cause of the delay. I must ask the Fräulein to excuse me. I did not realize that there was a lady present.”

“I was just leaving,” I said quickly. “Professor, my father is deeply grateful for your help. We look forward to learning the results of your studies.”

“Let me show you out,” said the professor.

“I have delayed you long enough,” I protested. “Goodbye.”

I left before he could offer any further objections and walked away with rapid steps that resounded between the corridor’s shiny walls. That there was an element of flight in my retreat, I knew only too well.

“What did he say?” my father shouted as soon as he could hear me in the hallway. “Did he know what it was?”

“He wanted to study it more closely,” I answered awkwardly, with one of my hatpins between my teeth. “It will be a couple of days before we know more. How have things been? Are you feeling better?”

“I am completely fine,” he growled.

But when I came into the salon, I saw that his facial color was still awful and his breathing heavy from laudanum drops. He was not well.

“I am sending Elise for Doctor Lanier,” I said, and this time I
ignored his protests. They were not as vigorous as before, I noted, which further increased my concern.

“Has the Commissioner been here?” I asked.

“Yes. At noon. They still have not found Father Abigore’s body.”

“And the dog?”

“No, not that, either.”

Two days later, the Commissioner was once again seated in the mahogany armchair. It was his habit to drop by at lunchtime, and there was usually an evident relief in the way his solid, square figure sank into the chair. The Commissioner had neither wife nor children, and at the age of fifty-two it seemed unlikely that this would change. He lived in a rooming house nearby and in many ways probably led a lonely existence. He was a presentable man with a good position in life, and although his income was not princely, it was still quite reputable. He was perhaps not the type to set young girls’ hearts aflutter, but why not a calm, good-natured widow with a bit of sense? Did the dead scare them off, or did he? If you did not know him, he might seem severe and inaccessible.

In any case, the house on Carmelite Street was the closest he came to a home during this time. He stopped by most days of the week, sometimes even twice a day if he thought a case provided him with sufficient excuse.

“How are you feeling, dear friend?” he asked.

“Fine,” answered my father, and then, with an acknowledgment that it had been more serious than he would previously have admitted, “better.”

It was true. My father was much improved. Doctor Lanier had
placed a plaster cast both on his arm and the broken leg according to Antonius Mathijsen’s method, instead of the primitive splints that the medics had used. It was clear that this immobilization led to a dramatic easing of the pain. He now used the laudanum drops only to fall asleep at night and in much smaller doses. This had restored his pallor and his breathing to levels considerably more normal, and he had regained his customary sharp wits.

“Have they found Father Abigore?” he asked.

“No.” The Commissioner sighed. “Marot apparently does not consider that part of the investigation important.”

Police Inspector Marot’s investigation of the circumstances of Father Abigore’s death proceeded slowly, the Commissioner told us. His housekeeper, an elderly widow from the parish, had explained that someone had knocked on the door a little past eleven on the night in question, just as she and the priest were going to bed—a little earlier than usual because Father Abigore was still ill from the cold weather at Cecile’s burial. When the housekeeper opened the door, she found an errand boy who delivered a message and disappeared into the darkness again before she had adjusted her spectacles properly. “No proper description” it said in the report, which made the Commissioner grumble crankily.

“No proper
report
,” he corrected. “The woman must have said something, no matter how imprecise. Fat, thin, tall, little? They have given up in advance on finding him, in spite of the fact that he may have spoken with the murderer! And she used the note to light the stove.”

But what was clear in spite of everything was that the note had said that a railroad worker had been hurt so badly that last rites were required. Ignoring his own illness, the priest immediately grabbed the bag that always stood ready for precisely this kind of emergency and rushed off on his bicycle. They found the bicycle
later, propped against a gable at the Varbourg East railway station, but the bag had not resurfaced, and there was still no sign of the missing corpse.

“Marot’s theory is that the body has simply been stolen and sold by an opportunistic street gang. My dear friend, is it possible for you to ask around? One might tell things to a colleague one doesn’t feel like admitting to the police—or to me.”

My father raised an eyebrow. “Who is it you think I should ask?”

“You probably know better than I,” rebuked the Commissioner. “Varbourg is not Paris, of course, but even here there must be researchers and certain institutes of higher learning that have a hard time procuring sufficient . . . materials.”

“Marot has read too many lurid scandal sheets,” said my father. “As far as I know, there are no doctors in Varbourg who pay people to dig up corpses.”

“But there must still be those who would pay for a cadaver for dissection purposes?”

My father’s lips tightened, but he admitted the point. “Yes. About ten francs. Not a princely sum, but . . .”

“But seven or eight times more than a factory worker makes in a week. So if someone found an ownerless corpse, then . . .” The Commissioner said no more.

My father sighed. “I’ll ask around.”

And when the Commissioner had gone, he asked me to go see Doctor Lanier.

Saint Bernardine’s gray façade had been undergoing repairs in the fall, and the luxurious ivy that had covered it had been cut down. I was still not used to this new stark exterior. It looked peculiarly
bald, like a novitiate who had had his hair shorn but had not yet received his habit. A soft vernal rain moistened the gray walls and condensed itself into fat, tear-shaped drops on the windowpanes.

The concierge recognized me at once.

“Well, if it isn’t Mademoiselle Karno,” she said and lit up. She was a cheerful, stocky woman who was always referred to as Madame Bonjour, a nickname she had received as a result of the unusual almost twittering way she pronounced this word. “Is your father feeling better?”

“Yes, thank goodness. Is Doctor Lanier in the hospital?”

“Yes, he is scheduled to operate at one o’clock. The operation is drawing quite a crowd, in fact—he will be employing a brand-new surgical technique.”

My heart skipped a beat. “Where?” I exclaimed. If only I could observe . . .

Madame Bonjour smiled. My eagerness was apparently obvious.

“Theater A. If you stand in the upper gallery, most likely no one will notice you.” She gave me a conspiratorial wink. It was not the first time she had helped me sneak into this masculine domain, albeit usually to observe one of my father’s operations.

Theater A was in the old main building’s center wing, and it really was reminiscent of a theater—double balconies along three of the room’s walls, the so-called galleries, allowed up to a hundred onlookers to observe what was happening in the operating theater. As Madame Bonjour had suggested, I made my way discreetly to the uppermost gallery, which was often empty because it was more difficult to observe the details of the operations from up here. But today I was not alone. A small group of medical students
had been exiled because of the crowds below. They chatted while they waited for the operation to begin, nonchalantly leaning against the railing. When they saw me, however, all conversation ceased. Then two of them began to giggle, as if someone had said something funny.

“Madame . . . eh, mademoiselle . . . you must be in the wrong place,” said one of the others, a tall, bespectacled young man who seemed a bit more mature than the rest. “What were you looking for?”

“Theater A,” I said shortly, leaning against the railing at the opposite end of the gallery.

“But . . .”

“Thank you for your kindness, but I am precisely where I wish to be.”

There was a small, astonished pause.

“I was only trying to be of assistance,” he finally said, and the whispering voices of his colleagues sounded like the low hissing of a cave of snakes in the darkened room. I focused my gaze on the operating theater—
this
was why I was here, and the sibilant clique of students was merely an irritating interruption.