Self's Murder (22 page)

Welker smiled. “That would be quite ironic, wouldn’t it, if the silent partnership, which was my pretext for bringing you into this affair, now posed a threat to me?”

“I don’t think that’s funny. I don’t think your murder of Samarin is funny, either, a murder you committed with cold premeditation and which you presented to us as the act of a desperate man. I don’t think it’s funny that you’re continuing Samarin’s practices. No, I don’t see anything comic in any of this.”

“I said ‘ironic‘, I didn’t say ‘comic.’”

“Ironic, comic—either way, I don’t see anything I could laugh about. And when I weigh the fact that Samarin, who didn’t murder Schuler, probably also didn’t murder your wife—about which you always spoke with such emotion—then I stop laughing entirely. What happened to your wife? Did you find that she, having had a fatal accident, could be of some use as a murder victim? Or wasn’t it an accident at all? Did you kill your wife?” I was furious.

I thought he would jump to his own defense. He had to. He couldn’t allow me to get away with what I’d just said. But he uncrossed his legs, leaned his elbows on his knees, pursed his lips, sullen and sulking, and slowly shook his head. “Herr Self, Herr Self …”

I waited.

After a while he sat up in his chair and looked me straight in the eye. “It is a fact that Gregor, wearing a straitjacket, was shot in the Luisenpark. If you have something to say about how he came to be there, why he was in a straitjacket, and why he was killed, I suggest you go to the police. It is also a fact that Schuler had high blood pressure and that he drove into a tree in front of your office and died. If he came by to bring you something, if you were with him before the incident and saw that he was in a bad way, then why did you let him get into his car? From what I can see, there are one or two inconsistencies, if not more. Perhaps there are also one or two inconsistencies in the matter of my wife’s death, where naturally the police suspected me first but ended up counting me out. We all have to learn to live with inconsistencies. We can’t just start leveling unsubstantiated accusations …” He shook his head again.

I wanted to intervene, but he wouldn’t let me.

“This is one of the things I wanted to tell you. The other is—how shall I put it?—I’m not interested in history: the Third Reich, the war, the Jews, silent partners, dead heirs, old claims! All that is water under the bridge. It has nothing to do with me, and I won’t be drawn into it. It bores me. I also have no interest in East Germany. I’d be happiest if everyone in the East would just stay where they are. But when the East comes over here, strikes root, starts meddling and trying to take over my business, then I have to show them that that’s not the name of the game. Samarin and his Russians came here to usurp me—don’t forget that. The past, the past! I’ve had enough of it. Our parents bored us with all those tales of their suffering during the war, their deeds in rebuilding Germany, and their part in the economic miracle, the young teachers with their myths of 1968. Do you, too, have a tale to offer? Enough! My job is to keep Weller and Welker above water. We’re an anachronism. On the great ocean of the world economy we’re just a little barge among the oil tankers, container ships, destroyers, and aircraft carriers—a barge that gets tossed about in the rough seas through which all those other ships can sail smoothly. I don’t know how long we can hold out. Perhaps my children won’t be interested in continuing. Perhaps I myself will lose interest one day. As it is, I don’t belong here. I’d have done better to become a doctor and collect art on the side or even to have picked up a brush myself. I’m old-fashioned, you know. Not in the sense that I’m in any way interested in the past. But I would have liked a quiet, old-fashioned kind of life. Old-fashioned—it’s old-fashioned, too, that I followed family tradition and am now running the family bank. But the only way of doing this is all or nothing, and as long as I’m running this bank, as long as we Welkers still exist, nobody will take us for a sleigh ride.” He repeated emphatically: “Nobody!” Then he smiled again. “I’m surprised you let me get away with that mixed metaphor. A barge can hardly be used for a sleigh ride.”

He got up, and so did I. I’d had enough of his words—his well-considered, well-crafted lies, truths, and half-truths.

On the stairs he said: “It’s amazing how old habits can come back to haunt one.”

“What do you mean?”

“If Schuler hadn’t made a habit of storing his Catapresan pills in those bottles, nobody could have replaced them.”

“He didn’t do it out of habit. His niece did it because with his arthritic fingers he couldn’t get the pills out of the foil.”

Then I remembered that though I had told him about a blood-pressure medication, I hadn’t mentioned Catapresan. Had he just betrayed himself? I stopped.

He also stopped, turned to me, and looked at me pleasantly. “The medication
was
Catapresan, wasn’t it?”

“I never …” But there was no point of capturing on tape: “I never mentioned the name of the medication.” It wouldn’t prove a thing. There was no point, either, in saying that to Welker. He knew it well enough. He had permitted himself a little joke.

I
went home and sat outside on the balcony. I smoked a cigarette, then another. The third tasted once again the way cigarettes used to when I smoked as many as I wanted.

I was furious. Furious at Welker, at his sense of superiority, his composure, his impudence. At how he’d gotten away with two murders, with the theft of the silent partnership, with money laundering. At how he’d let me know that he had done these things, all the while making it clear that I shouldn’t presume to match myself against him. I shouldn’t presume to match myself against
him
?
He
shouldn’t presume he’d get away with this!

I called my friends and insisted they come over that evening. The Nägelsbachs, Philipp, and Füruzan promised to be over by eight. “What are we celebrating?” “What’s for dinner?” “Spaghetti carbonara, if you’re hungry.” Brigitte said she couldn’t come till later.

They weren’t hungry. They didn’t know what to make of the sudden invitation and sat around expectantly, nursing their wine. All I told them was that I had spoken with Welker and had recorded the conversation. I played them the tape. When it ended, they looked at me questioningly.

“If you remember, Welker hired me to find the silent partner, just to bring me into the game without Samarin suspecting anything. Banks and family stories, stories of yesterday and the distant past—it all sounded innocent enough. Welker wanted me in the game so I’d be there when he got the opportunity to move against Samarin. The matter of the silent partner didn’t interest him at all. But then the silent partner
did
become interesting. He took on a face—and not in a figurative sense, but a literal one. A face with a receding hairline, large ears, and protruding eyes. You’ll recognize this face.” I handed them Laban’s picture.

“Well I’ll be damned!” Philipp said.

“Old Herr Weller and Herr Welker had acted correctly enough: they helped the silent partner’s great-nephew establish himself financially in London and saw to it that the great-niece, who hadn’t managed to leave Germany in time, got new papers under the name Samarin. When she died, they looked after her child. Though as the boy was born with the name Gregor Samarin, they also raised him as such. The great-nephew died in London, and the great-niece had disappeared as ‘Ursula Brock.‘ The silent partner’s share was to go unclaimed for good.”

“How big was this share?”

“I’m not exactly sure. When Laban brought his money into the bank, it was as much as the bank itself had. The bank had been on the brink of bankruptcy. I have no idea how from a bookkeeping standpoint his share might be valued up or down over the years.”

“What part did Schuler play in all of this?”

“Schuler had been Welker’s and Samarin’s teacher, and later the bank’s archivist. When I mentioned to him that Welker was interested in the silent partner and that I was to shed light on his identity, Schuler was gripped by jealousy. He wanted to prove that he was more capable than I, that he could look into all of that without me. He burrowed through the bank’s archives until he got lucky. This is the passport of Laban’s great-niece.”

Frau Nägelsbach turned it this way and that.

“How did Schuler know that Ursula Brock was Laban’s great-niece?” she asked. “And how did he conclude that she was Samarin’s mother?”

“He had known her as Frau Samarin and Gregor’s mother, and any documents concerning the Brocks could only have been in the silent partner’s file. Along with this passport he might also well have found some other documents that he didn’t give me. Not to mention that he found something else that he did bring me: money that was to be laundered at the bank. That money made me miss finding the passport for quite a while. What I initially thought was that Schuler had threatened Samarin with exposing his money-laundering racket and had consequently signed his own death warrant. But all the while, he had signed his death warrant by revealing to Welker that he knew Samarin’s true identity. What Welker did then was to switch Schuler’s pills. That wasn’t a fail-safe way of killing him, but it was worth a try. If it succeeded, it would get Schuler out of the way; if it didn’t, there was always time for a second attempt. Welker wasn’t in a hurry. He knew how loyal Schuler was and that he wouldn’t immediately go to Samarin with what he had found out. But it worked. Schuler was in a bad way, became disoriented, and drove into a tree. And yet Schuler was alarmed by fact that he was feeling worse and worse, so he quickly brought me what he had found: the money and the passport.”

“Blood-pressure medication?” Herr Nägelsbach said. “I admit to being a hypochondriac, Reni is one, too, and I’m interested in medicine. But I had no idea you could kill a person with blood-pressure medication.”

“You can’t actually kill anyone with it,” Philipp explained, “but if you’re on Catapresan and suddenly stop taking it, you run the risk of blackouts. The only question is how Welker could have known …”

“He studied medicine,” I said. “After he finished his studies, he sacrificed his medical career to the bank.”

“What happened then?”

“You mean after Schuler’s death? As you know, Welker shot Samarin, leading us to believe that he had been overwhelmed by pain, sorrow, and anger. But the truth is that he shot him with a cool hand and in cold blood. He wanted to get rid of Samarin, the silent partner’s heir, the lackey who all of a sudden wanted a say in the bank, the man with dangerous connections who was blackmailing him, the man with the lucrative connections who was standing in his way.”

They sat there in silence for a while.

“Why are you telling us all this?” Philipp asked.

“Don’t you find it interesting?”

“It
is
interesting. But to be perfectly honest, it’s the kind of thing I’d have preferred not to know,” Philipp said. I must have looked at him as if he were mad. “Don’t get me wrong, Gerhard. I’m a practical man. I’m interested in things you can do something about: operating on a heart, fixing my boat, cultivating my flowers, making Füruzan happy.” He laid his hand on hers and looked at her so devotedly that everyone laughed. “But we simply can’t not do anything!” Philipp continued. “We got involved, we helped Welker, we … Well, if it hadn’t been for us, Samarin would still be alive!” I understood Philipp less and less. “Didn’t you say that the world we thought was Samarin’s world and which we now know to be Welker’s, isn’t your world and that you don’t want to give up your world without a fight? Isn’t any of that true anymore?”

“That was different,” I replied. “Back then we thought Welker was in danger and wanted to help him. Who do you want to help now? Who’s in danger? Nobody. And as for the world no longer being … Perhaps I went a little overboard. What I meant was about danger and helping.”

Frau Nägelsbach eyed me quizzically. “Only a few weeks ago you were against—”

“No, I wasn’t against informing the police. I only felt that your husband and Philipp both had to agree what they would do. The possible consequences were more serious for them than they’d have been for me.”

Philipp shook his head. “My contract with the private hospital is as good as sealed. But what would happen if there were a scandal?”

“I’m afraid, Herr Self, that we missed the right moment, if there ever was one,” Nägelsbach said. “Back then the lead was fresh and we were good witnesses. Today we’re bad witnesses. Why did we keep silent for so long? Why are we speaking up now? Furthermore, it was dark, we didn’t see Welker shoot Samarin, there were no prints on the murder weapon, and Welker will deny everything. As for Schuler’s murder, things look even bleaker. A public prosecutor might make a case against Welker for money laundering, but it wouldn’t be easy.”

Nobody said anything, and in the silence I felt as if everyone was waiting for me to officially drop the subject, to leave them alone. But I couldn’t. “We know Welker has two murders on his conscience. Doesn’t that interest us? Don’t we have some kind of obligation?”

Nägelsbach shook his head. “Haven’t you heard of the presumption of innocence? If Welker can’t be convicted, he can’t be convicted. It’s as simple as that.”

“But we—”

“Us? We should have gone to the police right away. We didn’t, and now it’s too late. Do you remember what I told you when this happened? How can you think I would ever agree to our taking justice into our own hands?”

The silence in the room was oppressive until Philipp could no longer bear it. “Herr Nägelsbach—Rudi, if I’m not mistaken? Rudi, if I may call you that. Would you like to join Gerhard, me, and an old friend of ours in a game of Doppelkopf every two weeks, or perhaps even once a week?”

Nägelsbach was uncomfortable. He is a man of old-fashioned, formal politeness. He tends to recoil at over-familiarity. Being addressed by his first name took him aback, and he was put out by the abrupt change of subject. But he made an effort. “Thank you, Philipp. That is very kind of you, and I would be delighted. But I do insist that when any of us holds the two aces of hearts—”