As the Crow Flies (79 page)

On
Thursday morning Cathy picked up off the front doormat a purple envelope with
her name written in spidery handwriting. She nervously opened the letter to
find it contained two sheets of thick paper of the same color. The contents
perplexed her, but at the same time brought her considerable relief.

19
Chester Square LONDON

SW1

November
29th, 1950

Dear
Miss Ross, Thank you for your letter of last Monday, but I fear I can be of
little assistance to you with your enquiries. I had two sons, the younger of
whom is Nigel who recently separated. His wife now resides in Dobet, with my
only grandson Giles Raymond, aged two.

My
elder son was indeed Guy Francis Trentham, who was awarded the Military Cross
at the second battle of the Marne, but he died of tuberculosis in 1922 after a
long illness. He ever married and left no dependents.

The
miniature version of his MC went missing soon after Guy had paid a fleeting
visit to distant relatives in Melbourne. I am happy to learn of its
reappearance after all these years, and would be most greatful if you felt able
to return the medal to me at your earliest convenience. I feel sure you would
no longer wish to hold on to a family heirloom now that you are fully
acquainted with its origins.

Yours
sincerely.

Ethel
Trentham Cathy was delighted to discover that Guy Trentham had died two years
before she was born. That meant it was quite impossible for her to be related
to the man who had caused her future parents-in-law so much distress. The MC
must somehow have got into the hands of whoever her father was, she concluded;
on balance she felt she ought, however reluctantly, to return the medal to Mrs.
Trentham without delay.

After
the revelations of Mrs. Trentham’s letter, Cathy was doubtful that she would
ever be able to find out who her parents were, as she had no immediate plans to
return to Australia now that Daniel was so much part of her future. In any
case, she had begun to feel that further pursuit of her father had become
somewhat pointless.

As
Cathy had already told Daniel on the day they met that she had no idea who her
parents were, she traveled down to Cambridge that Friday evening with a clear
conscience. She was also relieved that her period had at last begun. As the
train bumped over the points on its journey to the university city, Cathy could
never remember feeling so happy. She fingered the little cross that hung around
her neck, now hanging from a gold chain Daniel had given her on her birthday.
She was sad to be wearing the memento for the last time: she had already made
the decision to send the medal back to Mrs. Trentham following her weekend with
Daniel.

The
train drew into Cambridge Station only a few minutes after its scheduled time
of arrival.

Cathy
picked up her small suitcase and strolled out onto the pavement, expecting to
find Daniel parked and waiting for her in his MG: he had never once been late
since the day they had met. She was disappointed to find no sign of him or his
car, and even more surprised when twenty minutes later he still hadn’t shown
up. She walked back onto the station concourse and placed two pennies in the
telephone box before dialing the number that went straight through to Daniel’s
room. The ringing tone went on and on, but she didn’t need to press Button A
because no one answered.

Puzzled
by not being able to locate him, Cathy left the station once again and asked
one of the drivers from the rank to take her to Trinity College.

When
the taxi drove into New Court Cathy was even more bemused to discover Daniel’s
MG was parked in its usual space. She paid the fare and walked across the court
to the now familiar staircase.

Cathy
felt the least she could do was tease Daniel for failing to pick her up. Was
this to be the sort of treatment she could expect once they were married?

Was
she now on the same level as any undergraduate who turned up without his weekly
essay? She climbed the worn stone steps up to his room and knocked quietly on
the door in case he still had a pupil with him. As there was no answer after a
second knock, she pushed open the heavy wooden door, having decided that she
would just have to wait around until he resumed.

Her
scream must have been heard by every resident on staircase B.

The
first undergraduate to arrive on the scene found the prostrate body of a young
woman lying face down in the middle of the floor. The student fell to his
knees, dropped the books he had been canying by her side and proceeded to be
sick all over her. He took a deep breath, turned round as quickly as he could
and began to crawl back out of the study past an overturned chair. He was
unable to look up again at the sight that had met him when he had first entered
the room.

Dr.
Trumper continued to swing gently from a beam in the center of the room.

I
couldn’t
sleep for three days. On the fourth morning, along with so many of Daniel’s
friends, colleagues and undergraduates, I attended his funeral service at
Trinity Chapel. I somehow survived that ordeal and the rest of the week, thanks
not least to Daphne’s organizing everything so calmly and efficiently. Cathy
was unable to attend the service as they were still detaining her for
observation at Addenbrooke’s Hospital.

I
stood next to Becky as the choir sang out “Fast Falls the Eventide.” My mind
drifted as I tried to reconstruct the events of the past three days and make
some sort of sense of them. After Daphne had told me that Daniel had taken his
own life whoever selected her to break the news understood the meaning of the
word “compassion” I immediately drove up to Cambridge, having begged her not to
tell Becky anything until I knew more of what had actually happened myself. By
the time I arrived at Trinity Great Court some two hours later, Daniel’s body
had already been removed, and they had taken Cathy off to Addenbrooke’s, where
she was not surprisingly still in a state of shock. The police inspector in
charge of the case couldn’t have been more considerate. Later, I visited the
morgue and identified the body, thanking God that at least Becky hadn’t
experienced that ice-cold room as the last place she was alone with her son.

“Lord,
with me abide...”

I
told the police that I could think of no reason why Daniel should want to take
his own life that in fact he had just become engaged and I had never known him
happier. The inspector then showed me the suicide note: a sheet of foolscap
containing a single handwritten paragraph.

“They
generally write one, you know,” he said.

I
didn’t know.

I
began to read Daniel’s neat academic hand:

Act
hat ~ AC. t0 .~ – ~:~ `;~

I
must have repeated those twenty-eight words to myself over a hundred times and
still I couldn’t make any sense out of them. A week later the doctor confirmed
in his report to the coroner that Cathy was not pregnant and had certainly not
suffered a miscarriage. I returned to those words again and again. Was I
missing some subtle inference, or was his final message something I could never
hope to comprehend fully?

“When
other helpers fail...”

A
forensic expert later discovered some writing paper in the grate, but it had
been burned to a cinder and the black, brittle remains yielded no clue. Then
they showed me an envelope that the police believed the charred letter must
have been sent in and asked if I could identify the writing. I studied the
stiff, thin upright hand that had written the words “Dr. Daniel Trumper” in
purple ink.

“No,”
I lied. The letter had been hand-delivered, the detective told me, some time
earlier that afternoon by a man with a brown moustache and a tweed coat. This
was all the undergraduate who caught sight of him could remember, except that
he seemed to know his way around.

I
asked myself what that evil old lady could possibly have written to Daniel that
would have caused him to take his own life; I felt sure the discovery that Guy
Trentham was his father would not have been sufficient for such a drastic cause
of action especially as I knew that he and Mrs. Trentham had already met and
come to an agreement some three years before.

The
police found one other letter on Daniel’s desk. It was from the Provost of King’s
College, London, formally offering him a chair in mathematics.

“And
comforts flee... “

After
I had left the mortuary I drove on to Addenbrooke’s Hospital, where they
allowed me to spend some time at Cathy’s bedside. Although her eyes were open,
they betrayed no recognition of me: for nearly an hour she simply stared
blankly up at the ceiling while I stood there. When I realized there was
nothing I could usefully do I left quietly. The senior psychiatrist, Dr.
Stephen Atkins, came bustling out of his office and asked if I could spare him
a moment.

The
dapper little man in a beautifully tailored suit and large bow tie explained
that Cathy was suffering from psychogenic amnesia, sometimes known as
hysterical amnesia, and that it could be some time before he was able to assess
what her rate of recovery might be. I thanked him and added that I would keep
in constant touch. I then drove slowly back to London.

“Help
of the helpless, O abide with me...”

Daphne
was waiting for me in my office and made no comment about the lateness of the
hour. I tried to thank her for such endless kindness, but explained that I had
to be the one who broke the news to Becky. God knows how I carried out that
responsibility without mentioning the purple envelope with its telltale
handwriting, but I did. Had I told Becky the full story I think she would have
gone round to Chester Square that night and killed the woman there and then
with her bare hands I might even have assisted her.

They
buried him among his own kind. The college chaplain, who must have carried out
this particular duty so many times in the past, stopped to compose himself on
three separate occasions.

“In
life, in death, O Lord, abide with me...”

Becky
and I visited Addenbrooke’s together every day that week, but Dr. Atkins only
confirmed that Cathy’s condition remained unchanged; she had not yet spoken.
Nevertheless, just the thought of her lying there alone needing our love gave
us something else to worry about other than ourselves.

When
we arrived back in London late on Friday afternoon Arthur Selwyn was pacing up
and down outside my office.

“Someone’s
broken into Cathy’s flat, the lock’s been forced,” he said even before I had a
chance to speak.

“But
what could a thief possibly hope to find?”

“The
police can’t fathom that out either. Nothing seems to have been disturbed.”

To
the puzzle of what Mrs. Trentham could have written to Daniel I added the
mystery of what she could possibly want that belonged to Cathy. After checking
over the little room myself I was none the wiser.

Becky
and I continued to travel up and down to Cambridge every other day, and then
midway through the third week Cathy finally spoke, haltingly to start with,
then in bursts while grasping my hand. Then suddenly, without warning, she
would go silent again. Sometimes she would rub her forefinger against her thumb
just below her chin.

This
puzzled even Dr. Atkins.

Dr.
Atkins had since then, however, been able to hold extensive conversations with
Cathy on several occasions and had even started playing word games to probe her
memory. It was his opinion that she had blotted out all recollection of
anything connected with Daniel Trumper or with her early life in Australia. It
was not uncommon in such cases, he assured us, and even gave the particular
state of mind a fine Greek name.

“Should
I try and get in touch with her tutor at the University of Melbourne? Or even
talk to the staff of the Melrose Hotel and see if they can throw any light on
the problem?”

“No,”
he said, straightening his spotted bow tie. “Don’t push her too hard and be
prepared for that part of her mind to take some considerable time to recover.”

I
nodded my agreement.

“Back
off” seemed to be Dr. Atkins’ favorite expression. “And never forget your wife
will be suffering the same trauma.”

Seven
weeks later they allowed us to take Cathy back to Eaton Square where Becky had
prepared a room for her. I had already transferred all Cathy’s possessions from
the little flat, still unsure if anything was missing following the break-in.

Becky
had stored all Cathy’s clothes neatly away in the wardrobe and drawers while
trying to make the room look as lived in as possible. Some time before, I had
taken her watercolor of the Cam from above Daniel’s desk and rehung it on the
staircase between the Courbet and the Sisley. Yet when Cathy first walked up
those stairs on the way to her new room, she passed her own painting without
the slightest sign of recognition.

I
inquired once again of Dr. Atkins if perhaps we should now write to the
University of Melbourne and try to find out something about Cathy’s past, but
he still counseled against such a move, saying that she must be the one who
came forward with any information, and then only when she felt able to do so,
not as the result of any pressure from outside.