Фолькер Кучер - The Silent Death

A beautiful image. A beautiful, final image.

The wind up here is cold, and prickles his face like needles, but he scarcely feels it. The man beside him is shivering. Ever since he gave him the gun, he no longer speaks, only shivers.

The killer is silent because he has understood. If he shoots they will both be plunged into the depths, no matter who the bullet hits. The handcuffs see to that. He threw away the key as soon as they assumed their position on the parapet. He thinks he might even have heard the soft pling as the metal struck the roof of the restaurant one hundred metres below.

The horrified expression of the man at the moment of realisation! They are two dead men sitting on the parapet and there is nothing anyone can do.

He doesn’t want to spare him the fear of imminent death, those torturous final minutes knowing that the end has come, and that it is inevitable.

He had to wait the entire night, and when the killer finally emerged from his car half an hour ago on Lietzensee, still intoxicated, and gazed into the barrel of a gun, he had no inkling of what awaited. He pulled out his purse, but soon realised it wasn’t about money.

With the gun in his coat pocket he drove the killer onto the Funkturm and into the lift. The attendant didn’t notice a thing, and let them out on the viewing platform on the upper floor. ‘You haven’t exactly picked the best day for it!’

They stood facing each other for a moment in silence, before he forced the killer upstairs, out onto the platform, into the wind and cold. There he took the handcuffs out of his pocket and gestured towards the parapet. The killer still didn’t know why, but he climbed to the top of the railing, shivering with fear and cold, and babbling, endlessly babbling, to drown his fear. Then he sat down, knees facing outwards, hands clinging to the rail until his knuckles turned completely white.

A killer frightened to death. Babbling like a child.

For a moment he gazed at the white knuckles before pushing the piston all the way down. A single shot for himself, that’s enough, the killer should be fully conscious for his own demise. Then he sat down next to the man, clicked the handcuffs shut and listened to his jabbering.

‘What’s going on here? This is dangerous! Did Rath send you? Don’t go thinking you can intimidate me like this!’

Since he has held the gun in his hands, the killer no longer speaks. He has understood the significance of the gesture. Even a pistol can’t help you now.

Victor Meisner will die in the next few minutes, because that’s what Wolfgang Marquard wants, and even with a gun in his hands he is powerless to prevent it.

Down below, police cars are circling. They have picked up his trail again. Perhaps the lift attendant did notice something after all.

All the better, let them see it!

It is almost time, the pain is over. He feels the fine film of sweat on his skin. All his muscles relax, completely loose now. He is ready.

Just one question occupies his mind.

Will he be able to hear it?

Can it be heard at all?

Then it comes and answers all his questions, because he can hear it. Hear it approaching, as quickly and inexorably as a raging tornado. Hear it ploughing everything else to one side, the roar of the world, the whistling of the wind, even the unbearable racket deep within his own heart until, finally, it arrives.

The silence before death.

‘Gripping evocative thriller set in Berlin’s seedy underworld during the roaring Twenties. A massive hit in its native Germany, Volker Kutscher’s series, centered on Detective Inspector Gereon Rath, is currently being filmed for television.’

‘Kutscher successfully conjures up the dangerous decadence of the Weimar years, with blood on the Berlin streets and the Nazis lurking menacingly in the wings.’

‘ Babylon Berlin is a stunning novel that superbly evokes Twenties Germany in its seedy splendor. An impressive new crime series.’

‘Gripping, skilfully plotted and rich in historical detail, Babylon Berlin introduces us to Detective Inspector Gereon Rath, who navigates the turbulent waters of Weimar Germany in a suspenseful and noirish tale. The novel is hopefully the first of many to be translated from this best-selling German crime series.’

‘The best German crime novel of the year!’

‘Kutscher’s undertaking to portray the downfall of the Weimar Republic through the medium of detective fiction is both ambitious and utterly convincing. Let’s hope it receives the attention it deserves.’

‘With his detective novel Babylon Berlin , Volker Kutscher has succeeded in creating an opulent portrait of manners.’

‘Has all the allure of an addictive drug: you won’t be able to put it down until you’ve read to the end.’

‘A highly readable piece of crime fiction set against a politico-historical background.’

Volker Kutscherwas born in 1962. He studied German, Philosophy and History, and worked as a newspaper editor prior to writing his first detective novel. Babylon Berlin , the start of an award-winning series of novels to feature Gereon Rath and his exploits in late Weimar Republic Berlin, was an instant hit in Germany. A lavish television production has been commissioned and is due to air in the UK on Sky Atlantic. Since then, a further four titles have appeared, most recently Märzgefallene in 2014. The series was awarded the Berlin Krimi-Fuchs Crime Writers Prize in 2011 and has sold over one million copies worldwide. Volker Kutscher works as a full-time author and lives in Cologne.

Niall Sellarwas born in Edinburgh in 1984. He studied German and Translation Studies in Dublin, Konstanz and Edinburgh, and has worked variously as a translator, teacher and reader. Alongside his translation work, he currently teaches Modern Foreign Languages in Harrow. He lives in London.

Babylon Berlin (Der nasse Fisch)

Goldstein (Goldstein)

The Fatherland File (Die Akte Vaterland)

The March Fallen (Märzgefallene)

Lunapark (Lunapark)

First published in Great Britain by

Sandstone Press Ltd

Dochcarty Road

Dingwall

Ross-shire

IV15 9UG

Scotland.

www.sandstonepress.com

All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form without the express written permission of the publisher.

First published in the German language as “Der stumme Tod” by Volker Kutscher © 2009, 2010 Verlag Kiepenheuer & Witsch GmbH & Co. KG, Cologne/ Germany

© 2009, Volker Kutscher

The right of Volker Kutscher to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs & Patents Act 1988.

Translation © Niall Sellar 2017

English language editor: Robert Davidson

The publisher acknowledges support from Creative Scotland towards publication of this volume.

The translation of this work was supported by a grant from the Goethe Institut which is funded by the German Ministry of Foreign Affairs.