Фолькер Кучер - The Silent Death

Rath shrugged his shoulders and looked innocent. ‘I’m not trying to insinuate anything. I’m only interested in the facts. If I’ve miscalculated the size of her fee, all you have to do is show me the contracts.’

‘Before you go snooping around my business, you should take a look at Oppenberg.’ Bellmann was now struggling to keep his anger in check. ‘That Jew is free to smuggle saboteurs and murderers into my studio, while I’m treated like a common criminal!’

‘Are you one of those people who view being Jewish as a crime?’

‘You’re putting me, the victim, in the pillory, and you’re leaving the real criminals be. That’s the issue here! You have superiors too, Herr Rath. There are limits to what I’m prepared to put up with.’

‘I always push my limits. Sometimes I even exceed them.’ At this point they were interrupted.

‘You wanted to speak to me, Inspector?’ The senior lighting technician, Lüdenbach, appeared beside them, glancing irritatedly at Bellmann, who was eyeing Rath like an attack dog ready to pounce. Then the producer seemed to flick a switch and bring himself back under control.

‘I’ll give you half an hour, Inspector,’ he said. ‘But if you should delay the shoot for any longer, I’ll be lodging a complaint with your superiors. I really have no idea what you can still be looking for.’

‘Let me worry about that,’ Rath said, smiling pleasantly. ‘And thank you, I appreciate your co-operation. Now if you would excuse me, I’d like to speak to Herr Lüdenbach alone.’

Rath took the technician by the shoulder and moved away. ‘I see you’ve fixed the lighting system,’ he said. ‘Did you notice anything unusual?’

‘How do you mean?’

‘Was anything missing apart from the threaded bolt? Or was anything in the wrong place? A rod, a wire, I don’t know, anything suspicious…?’

‘A wire?’

‘Yes.’

‘There was something caught in the grating. A thin wire, scarcely visible. I only noticed it when my colleagues were checking the effects lever down below. The wire ought to have triggered the thunder machine, but somehow it must have come loose and got caught, before the tension catapulted it back up onto the lighting bridges. I can’t explain how it could have got there otherwise.’

‘Can you show me where this switch is? And the wire?’

‘You don’t think…’ Lüdenbach shook his head. ‘No, no! Even if the wire hit the flood at full force, it’d never be enough to wreck the suspension. Never!’

‘Just show me,’ Rath said through gritted teeth. He was on the verge of losing his patience with the man again. ‘Please!’

The technician led him to a wall where a big lever had been installed, one of those huge switches that were used on the railways to change tracks or set the signals.

‘Max, can you come here?’ Lüdenbach called backstage. A powerful man appeared wearing similar overalls to Lüdenbach. He seemed more like a butcher.

‘Morning,’ he said, and Rath thought he discerned the Duisburg dialect that his mother used to revert to when she was angry or drunk – neither of which happened very often.

‘The inspector’s interested in the wire you found in the grating yesterday. Show him everything. I need to get back to work.’

Max held out a hand once the technician had disappeared. ‘Krieg,’ he said.

‘Pardon me?’

‘That’s my name. Max Krieg.’

‘Very well, Herr Krieg. Perhaps you can explain this lever to me. Is this the wire?’

‘Strictly speaking it’s a thin wire rope.’ Krieg pointed towards a cable that was connected to the lever and passed through various eyelets and coils, ultimately disappearing somewhere in the studio roof. Rath looked up but could only see the familiar labyrinth of steel catwalks and thick lengths of material.

‘That’s how the thunder machine is triggered,’ Krieg said. ‘It gets a lot of use in Liebesgewitter. It’s a normal thunder run in which iron balls are rolled up and down wooden slats: a trick from the theatre. When the film’s finished you won’t be able to distinguish it from real thunder.’

‘I thought things like that were recorded later.’

‘Anything that needs to be added later costs time and money. Bellmann is an old theatre hand; he insists we make direct recordings wherever we can. Thunder’s an easy one, but gunshots are more difficult. They overload the microphones.’

‘Can you show me this thunder machine?’

The stage technician led Rath behind the scenes to a large, wooden box, which rose ten metres and almost reached the lighting bridges. Two microphones had been mounted in front of the box.

‘Impressive, isn’t it?’ Krieg said. ‘It’s been going almost fifty years. From Bellmann’s old theatre. It was a bit of a grind, heaving it out this way.’

Rath gave an appreciative nod. ‘How does it work?’

Krieg gestured towards the top of the wooden box. ‘The iron balls are inside. When you release them, it thunders.’

‘And you release with the switch back there…’

‘Correct.’

‘Why isn’t it next to the machine?’

‘When I trigger the thunder I need to have the scene in view. The timing is essential, especially with a script like this. We’re talking split seconds.’

‘Why?’

‘The thunder plays a decisive role. The male lead – how can I put this? It sounds a little crazy…’

‘You wouldn’t believe the kind of crazy things policemen sometimes hear.’

‘Well, it isn’t my idea anyway. So: Count Thorwald is actually Thor, the God of Thunder, who has fallen in love with a woman and is living amongst mortals in present-day Berlin. Naturally, this is a source of confusion. At any rate, whenever the Count – that is, Thor – shows certain feelings for this woman, the first time he speaks to her, for example, when she looks him in the eye, when she slaps him and so on, it thunders. Gets a laugh every time. And in the last scene, when they finally kiss, everyone’s waiting for the thunder but it never comes. Because he’s become mortal for her sake.’

‘It does sound a little crazy.’

‘It’s a romantic comedy, with a hint of the supernatural. Bellmann believes in it, and says it’s part of the new wave. That’s why he wants to get Liebesgewitter in cinemas as quickly as possible. Before Montana brings out its Zeus story…’

‘ Vom Blitz getroffen is about Zeus?’

‘That’s what people are saying. They’re both written by the same author. It’s two different stories, but with the same basic idea. It’s first come first served.’

‘Or every man for himself, and the Devil take the hindmost.’

Krieg nodded. ‘After the thing with Betty, I thought that’s it, you can look for a new job. But Dressler just filmed the missing scenes with Eva. I still haven’t seen the rushes, but it was uncanny how authentic she was. She could even imitate Betty’s voice. It can’t have been easy for poor Victor, but he’s an actor and gets the job done no matter how he’s feeling.’

‘Meisner’s back filming?’

‘Yesterday.’

‘Where is he today?’

‘Everything’s in the can, the boss has given him the day off. Doesn’t he have to go to the station?’

Rath nodded. Neither Bellmann nor Oppenberg had told him the whole truth about their rivalry. ‘Now show me where you found this wire.’

They had to go back up. Max Krieg was considerably heavier than the senior lighting technician, and the lighting bridges wobbled more. The stage technician squatted on the grating and pointed. ‘This is roughly where the wire was stuck. Hardly visible – unless you scramble along here on all fours.’