Фолькер Кучер - The Silent Death

When he arrived in Homicide, Cora Bellmann and Victor Meisner were already on the bench outside Gennat’s office. Rath greeted them with a nod, but they both ignored him.

You won’t be so arrogant when I’m finished with you , Rath thought and went inside. Nearly all the officers who were assisting Buddha with the interrogations had assembled in the spacious office. Reinhold Gräf was pacing up and down nervously. Cora Bellmann’s was the first name on the list.

Böhm sat behind a desk with customary ill temper, leafing through his files. He didn’t seem to have got a lot out of Manfred Oppenberg on this occasion either. When Trudchen Steiner waved Gräf in, Rath realised that he, too, was getting a little nervous. It would be a while before he was called, so he reached for one of the papers on the desk: the Berliner Tageblatt . He found a short paragraph on the Funkturm’s millionth visitor, without name or photo, and continued leafing through. The report on Krempin’s fatal fall was somewhat longer but Weinert hadn’t made too much of it.

Though police have refused to confirm it, our sources suggest that the previously unidentified man who fell to his death from the Funkturm on Friday was Felix Krempin, who is currently being sought in connection with the murder of Betty Winter. As yet it remains unclear whether the fatal fall was indeed a suicide, as initially assumed. As has been reported on several occasions in these pages, the fugitive Krempin is suspected of having manipulated the lighting system in Terra Studios, Marienfelde, such that a thirty-kilogram spotlight fell on the famous actress Betty Winter during filming. Winter was seriously injured, and died shortly afterwards of electric shock.

Famous actress. Betty Winter had only become famous after her death. He was interested to see what would happen at her funeral tomorrow. It might put Horst Wessel’s in the shade.

He glanced at the time and continued reading. The Association of Prussian Police Officers was campaigning for more trust to be placed in Uniform and for the service to be less military. Meanwhile, the dispute over sound film licences, which Oppenberg had spoken about a few days ago, was entering a new phase. Adopting a rather martial turn of phrase, the Tageblatt headline read: Sound Film Separate Peace in Electrical Industry Patent Dispute .

If he understood the complex subject matter correctly, then through this separate peace the American Warner concern had acquired access to the German market. In future, at any rate, German cinema owners will be able to reckon with an increased selection of high-quality sound films, the paper summarised.

There must be a lot of money in talkies if a dispute of such magnitude was taking place behind the scenes. Rath couldn’t help thinking of Oppenberg’s stubborn business associate, Marquard. The diehards were seeing their hopes go up in smoke. Proponents of silent film would soon be fighting a lost cause.

He thought of Anton Schmieder, the blackmailer of the rueful countenance, another one fighting a lost cause.

What was it he had been yammering about?

That he just wanted everything to stay the same.

Things never did stay the way they were. Nothing in life did, not even oneself.

‘Inspector?’

Rath looked up. Gertrud Steiner was standing in the door to Gennat’s office.

To begin with Buddha said nothing at all and simply leafed through the file. Rath doubted whether that would impress Victor Meisner. The man was in film, and would be used to hanging around. He seemed pretty sure of himself. Rath’s parting shot about the toupee yesterday evening didn’t appear to have caused him any further alarm, but perhaps it was all an act.

Rath kept to the arrangement and maintained an icy silence. In the absence of a file to flick through he lit a cigarette. Christel Temme was starting to fiddle with her pencil when Gennat finally began. He snapped the file shut and gave Meisner a friendly look.

‘Congratulations,’ Buddha said.

‘Pardon me?’

‘I wanted to congratulate you on your theatre,’ Gennat said. ‘So, congratulations! Did you inherit it?’

‘I’ve already told your inspector all this.’

‘You didn’t say anything about the theatre. It is your theatre, isn’t it?’

‘I’m the artistic director,’ Meisner said, ‘if that’s what you mean.’

‘Who bought the building then?’

‘It’s leased.’

‘That’s a lot of money though, and there’s the cost of turning a cinema into a theatre.’

‘We only had to tear out the screen, all the stage machinery was already there. The Tivoli was a theatre before it became a cinema.’

‘All the same it can’t have been cheap. How did you finance it?’

‘I’m not anticipating a large inheritance from my wife, if that’s what you mean, Superintendent. I told your inspector all this yesterday.’

‘Then tell me how it’s being funded.’

‘I have a silent partner. Cora Bellmann bore the costs, and she also stands to benefit the most financially. I’m only interested in the artistic side.’

‘What does Bellmann think about his daughter setting something like this up with one of his actors, and probably with his money too?’

‘It was his idea. We’ll be able to transfer original material from the screen to the stage, and vice versa. It stands to reason, especially with the advent of talkies.’ Meisner came to life discussing his plans. ‘The Betty Winter Theatre will be a people’s theatre. Not like the one on Bülowplatz for those Communist muddle-heads, but in the truest sense of the word. We’ll perform the plays that people want to see when they need a break from the everyday. Plays that speak to the heart, plays in which it’s all right to smile every now and again.’

‘You’ll be making theatre for people who would otherwise go to the cinema.’

‘If you like, yes.’

‘And the famous Victor Meisner will play the leads…’

‘Only to start with. I’m the manager, but we need to gain an audience, and that will work best with my name.’

‘Then why is it called The Betty Winter Theatre?’

‘It’s the least I owe her.’

‘Did your wife intend to perform too?’

‘Smaller roles, perhaps, for my sake, but no more than that.’ Meisner shook his head. ‘You couldn’t talk to Betty about theatre. All she saw was film, film, film. She made far more of an impression on the screen than onstage. It was a wonder how celluloid transformed her.’

‘Then why did she want to leave Bellmann’s company?’

‘Probably because he was too tight.’ Meisner refused to get worked up. ‘It was about money, of course, but she also saw greater artistic possibilities for herself with this new producer.’

‘For herself, but not for you…’

‘They wanted her, not me. That wasn’t at Betty’s discretion. When you’re married to an actor, that’s the kind of thing you have to deal with. I didn’t begrudge her it. Unfortunately…’ He covered his eyes with his hand.

‘Who is this mysterious producer who wanted to sign Betty Winter, but not Victor Meisner?’

‘She didn’t want to say until everything was done. She was superstitious like that. To this day, I still don’t know who courted her.’

‘But you would have stayed with Bellmann?’

‘I did stay with Bellmann. I feel very happy there. I’m his most important male performer; I can film anything I want with him, crime adventure, comedy…’

‘Then why are you opening a theatre? It makes it look as if your film career is stalling.’

‘You really don’t understand anything about our industry.’ Meisner shook his head. ‘My own theatre has been my dream for as long as I can remember. It won’t stop me from making films. I just might make a few less.’