The Dark Frontier A. Decker (i like reading TXT) 📖

border. But in this case, I sometimes wonder if the fear is driven mostly by tax issues. As so many things are in this country.”

“So frontier workers I suppose.”

“Exactly,” said Marthe. Then asked: “Do you work?”

Ellen smiled to herself.

“Why do you laugh?” Marthe’s expression betrayed a sense of hurt.

“I’m not laughing,” Ellen insisted, following Marthe back into the lounge. “You just reminded me of a play I saw at the theatre recently with Frank. A man asks a woman whether she works, and she replies: ‘My arms and legs move’.”

The quiet, neatly furnished lounge that exuded gentility and decorum suddenly exploded with a guffaw of laughter that seemed completely out of character from what Ellen had seen of Marthe until now.

“That’s very good! It should be our motto!”

There was an inclusive, conspiratorial turn of phrase in Marthe’s words that gave Ellen a sense of warmth and belonging.

“But yes,” she said. “I work as a secretary. And the professor kindly let me phone England from the clinic. My boss has given me the rest of the week off.”

“I hope you won’t need more than a week,” Marthe said in a tone that left Ellen fearing she almost certainly would.

Dr Zellweger did nothing to dispel this fear when he arrived home in the evening from work. His wife and Ellen were still in the lounge talking. Only the tea tray was missing. Replaced by a bottle of wine.

“Salü Schatz,” he said, planting a kiss on his wife’s cheek. Then turning to Ellen: “Mrs Goss. I hope my wife has been looking after you?”

Without waiting for an answer, he disappeared into the kitchen, promptly returned with a glass in his hand and poured himself some wine after topping up the other glasses.

“I’m sorry to say, Mrs Goss, that there is still no news of your husband. We shall just have to be patient.”

For the rest of the evening, over a light dinner, the conversation remained polite and restrained. Ellen said little more. She felt herself sinking into a morass of despair and felt it better not to sit at the dinner table with her hosts any longer than necessary. She decided to have an early night.

For Ellen it seemed a particularly dark night. Left her in a sleepless turmoil, dwelling on her irritations and deep concern. Irritation over Frank getting himself into this mess in the first place and concern about where he might be at that moment, as she lay in the comfort of a warm bed and the temperature outside fell below zero.

It was before breakfast – before she had even had a chance to wake properly – that her next ray of hope set her heart beating with anticipation. She heard the phone ring from her bedroom. When Marthe called her down and handed her the receiver, Ellen heard the voice of Dr Zellweger on the line. He had long since left for work by the time she rose for breakfast.

He apologised for disturbing her so early, but he wanted her to know that a man answering Frank’s description had been picked up that night by the police. He had been found sleeping in the Storchen. This was a multistorey car park, he explained, and by coincidence it lay almost next door to the police station at the Spiegelhof. He had arranged to be at the Spiegelhof at ten that morning and said that Marthe would bring Ellen into town to meet him.

Once again, the doctor insisted that Frank had displayed a native fluency in the Alemannic dialect – even to the extent that, on this occasion, the man who was supposed to be Frank Goss convincingly persuaded the police that he was a German national from just across the border by the name of Eigenmann. Yet Dr Zellweger persisted in speaking of this man as Ellen’s husband. His conviction, it seemed, was based entirely on Frank’s passport photo, and she had to admit there was no escaping the fact that the photo he had shown her in the clinic was authentic. Yet this very photo, from a British passport, was confirmed by the police as being the exact likeness of their Eigenmann. How this could possibly be, the doctor was unable to explain. But Ellen had the distinct feeling that he saw this simply as evidence of how shaky their marriage must be and how little she knew her husband.

Still, now that the man was in police custody, Ellen was sure they would soon get to the bottom of the mystery, and she would be able to correct everyone’s impression of her. For she was certain the professor saw her as a rather unstable woman at the very least. And possibly even a potential patient in his clinic.

It was a short walk to the tram stop. And the tram ride into town took no longer than twenty minutes. But it seemed much longer to Ellen, whose heart raced with a mix of excitement and anxiety for the whole journey.

The Spiegelhof was a long, grey, soulless building from the 1940s. Despite an endless succession of windows on each floor, it gave the impression of a closed, impenetrable garrison. The intimidating air about the place did nothing to dampen Ellen’s spirit. She and Marthe arrived just before ten. Dr Zellweger was already outside the main entrance awaiting their arrival.

By now, Ellen’s heart was pounding even faster at the prospect of finally seeing Frank. Or the man who was said to be Frank. Her excitement was short-lived.

When Dr Zellweger caught sight of her approaching with Marthe, he hurried towards them.

“Good morning, Mrs Goss,” he said, offering her his hand. “I’m afraid we have a problem. When I arrived here a few minutes ago, I was told that your husband somehow managed to slip out and disappear again. No one knows where he is.”

Chapter 6

When Frank eased open his eyes, he was confronted by two solid dark table legs, like menacing boots. Uncomfortably close to his head. The hard floor had left his