Reginald Hill: Death of a Dormouse

‘I admired your husband greatly. I am proud to think I was his friend as well as his physician. So I rearranged my schedule in order to be here.’

‘That was kind,’ said Trudi.

They were approaching the open grave.

‘We will talk later,’ said Werner.

What about? wondered Trudi, who was finding it very hard to believe that this brass-handled box contained her husband. Her husband . Who was he? What had he been? She concentrated hard upon his image but found that somehow her knowledge seemed to stop round about their wedding day. Up till then, there were plenty of people willing to fill in on Trent’s origins. East-ender, orphan, Barnardo boy who had grabbed with both hands the opportunity offered by the war to advance himself. He had made per ardua ad astra his own personal motto, his best man, an old RAF chum, had said at the reception. And he had finished his drunkenly risqué speech by saying, ‘One thing the boys always said about Trent, you might not trust him with your wallet or your wife, but by Christ, old Trent was the chap you wanted to fly with. He always came back!’

Well, old Trent wasn’t coming back this time.

As though in confirmation of her irreverent thought, the vicar was scattering earth on the coffin. She was not listening to his words and it took a slight pressure from Werner’s hand to tell her it was all over.

But not quite. As she turned away, she saw a bright red Fiat Panda, with a long pennant bearing the name of a hire firm streaming from its aerial, come rocketing through the cemetery gates. It halted on the narrow driveway and a long, slim, blonde woman in her thirties got out and came running towards Trudi.

She reached her, embraced her.

There were tears streaming down her face.

‘ Oh Trudi, mein’ liebe Trudi! Es ist schrecklich, ganz schrecklich .’

‘Hello, Astrid,’ said Trudi Adamson.

Astrid Fischer had been Trent’s personal assistant during the whole of his time in Vienna. She was a striking woman, full of nervous energy. Her bright blonde hair was matched with smoky-blue eyes and the kind of skin which would stick at twenty-nine for at least another decade.

She was the only one of Trent’s colleagues Trudi knew at all well, apart from Manfred Schiller, the head of the firm, and even this closeness was only relative. But a couple of years earlier, perhaps in an attempt to rekindle her own almost extinct emotional fires, Trudi had gone through a period of intense jealousy concerning Astrid. There had been no material cause of it, she had never said anything to Trent, and the flame had died as rapidly as it ignited, dowsed by trust, indifference, or fear, she didn’t care to find out which. But jealousy’s the next best thing to friendship and for a moment she felt genuinely moved by the woman’s appearance.

Werner was shaking her hand.

‘I must go. Already I’m late,’ he said. ‘Again, my deepest sympathy.’

Astrid whispered, ‘Who’s he?’

‘Trent’s doctor. It was nice of him to come. I thought he would stay longer though.’

Astrid seemed to take this as an invitation and accompanied Trudi back to Hope House. Trudi did not mind. In fact she found herself almost pleased at last to have a partner in mourning.

They sat in the kitchen whose gaudy surfaces best reflected the brittle blank of Trudi’s feelings, and drank whisky.

‘I wasn’t really awake when he left that morning, you know. He kissed me goodbye. He didn’t always, sometimes but not always. He said he’d try not to be late. Then he was gone. I heard the car. I didn’t go out to wave or anything. We were past all that. And that was the last I saw of him, alive or dead.’

‘Alive or …’ Astrid hesitated delicately.

‘I never saw him. He was burnt …’

She felt her voice tremble like a rail at the approach of a train. But it was a long way away. She took a deep breath and described the accident as it had been described to her.

‘I don’t even know what he was doing there!’ she concluded.

‘Why he stopped, you mean?’

‘Presumably he stopped to read his map, stretch his legs, something. No, I mean I don’t know why he was driving around Derbyshire. I don’t even know what we were doing in Sheffield. Why did Schiller-Reise send him here, Astrid?’

The girl was regarding her uneasily and Trudi, guessing at the cause of her unease, said, ‘It’s all right. I can talk about him. Really.’

‘It’s not that. No. Trudi, you clearly do not know, but Schiller-Reise did not send Trent here. No. He had handed in his resignation only a week before he left the country. Trudi, he was no longer working for the company!’

Trudi was dumbfounded.

Astrid said, ‘You knew nothing of this?’

She shook her head slowly and the movement brought back her voice. ‘No. We rarely talked about his job. He didn’t want to … or perhaps I didn’t want … but we didn’t talk … The move was sudden, but then we’d made sudden moves before. When we came to Vienna from Milan, that was quick. Well, this was even quicker, but not so quick that … though it’s true when I saw where he’d brought me, I thought of the other places we’d lived, the apartments, the cities, and compared with this …’

Her gesture took in the room, the house, the suburb, the city.

Oh God! she suddenly thought. I’m a widow and I’m complaining about the domestic arrangements.

She said quite sharply, ‘Astrid, if Trent had left Schiller-Reise, what are you doing here?’

Astrid said, ‘I was on holiday in London. I had to ring the firm on a personal matter. When I heard of Trent’s death, I was dumbstruck! I asked about the funeral. They knew when it was, but didn’t seem to know if anyone was going from the company. This made me very angry. It was not a proper way to act. If Herr Schiller had still been in charge … but I’m sure you must have worked out that if Herr Schiller had still been in charge, probably Trent would not have left.’

Trudi shook her head.

‘I didn’t realize Herr Schiller was no longer in charge,’ she said.

‘It’s not official. Technically while he’s still alive … but he’s a very sick man, you knew that?’

‘I know he had a stroke just after we came to Vienna and spent a lot of time at his house in the Wachau. The last time I saw him was there, about six months ago. He looked ill, yes, but still alert.’

‘He’s deteriorated greatly in the last couple of months,’ said Astrid. ‘A second stroke. You didn’t know?’

‘No,’ said Trudi, with an indifference not caused solely by her circumstances. Even if her own troubles didn’t exist, she would probably have felt little sympathy for the old man. She had never liked him, despite the many kindnesses he showered on her as Trent’s wife. Something about the dry voice, the coldness of his skin when he took her hand, the way in which the rarely blinking pale blue eyes never left her face, as though searching for something there that she did not have to give; in short, a sense of a cruelty mingled with his kindness had always repelled her, and she sometimes thought he sensed it though she did her best to keep it hidden.

‘No. I did not know. Trent and I agreed that it was best if he could relax at home and not talk of office matters.’

That was one way of explaining one area of non-communication.

‘Yes. I see,’ said Astrid unconvincingly. ‘In that case, well it’s none of my business, so forgive me for asking, but have you any idea how you stand financially?’

Trudi said in surprise, ‘I don’t know. I’ve not thought. I’ve no idea how much or little there may be.’

‘What I mean is, well, since you do not know about Trent leaving his job, you may be relying on a pension from Schiller-Reise. If Herr Schiller had still been in charge … well, he always seemed very fond of you, Trudi, and I’m sure he wouldn’t have … but it’s the accountants in control now, and I don’t think there will be anything coming …’