Heartbeat Detector Page #4

many of whom were orphans.

By the end of the war,

these children had been adopted

by German families,

which was the case of Karl Rose.

He is a "Lebensborn child".

It obviously isn't his fault.

He grew up in a family nostalgic

for the Schwarzen Orden,

and maintained dubious links

with people sharing

the same ideology.

I have concrete proof of this.

He sent donations

to a bogus company,

which passed them on

to an extreme right-wing group,

which had its own paramilitary cell.

I have all this information

at my disposal.

Do you understand now?

Now you can do as you like.

I've said everything I have to say.

How's your little orchestra going?

-Did I scare you?

-No.

Where are you going?

What's wrong?

What's going on?

What's happening?

-Stop it!

-What?

My lover is a madman.

Look.

You're cold.

Dark as a prison.

Yes, now I'm scared.

The letter Rose sent me

filled me with unhealthy curiosity.

It looked like an ordinary

technical report,

full of production figures

and staff data.

Rose wanted to draw my attention

to the differences

between the version

written in German by Jst

and the typed copy

Lynn Sanderson.

Concern.

Selection.

Reintegration.

Restructuring plan.

Relocation.

Concern.

Selection.

Reintegration.

Restructuring plan.

Relocation.

Reading the handwritten letter again,

I noticed that it was

full of missing words,

as if Jst's mind

contained a censoring device

like a computer virus,

deleting certain words

and leaving blanks,

as if they belonged

to a forbidden, secret language.

One morning I was struggling

to complete a routine selection file.

It was the first time

I'd felt distaste,

even disgust for my job.

I called in sick with the flu.

Jst's report is due

at the end of the week,

but I can't write a word.

I'm going to make a hole.

I need your cigarette.

What?

Don't move.

I let it burn.

I push it well in.

Do it again.

Annoying, isn't it?

Usually I only do it once.

Is it lit?

You're trying it on the cashmere?

Cashmere burns well.

It works the same way.

Don't move.

Oh, what's going on?

I'll give you another one.

Good evening, gentlemen. Police!

Hands on the table!

Stop playing, please.

What did we do?

Mathias!

This accident

has really shaken me up.

Have you spoken to the doctors?

Yes, of course.

But they were very discreet.

I didn't find out much.

And Mrs. Jst?

She says her husband

is very sensitive.

Since their child's death,

he's had bouts of severe sadness.

Of course.

You could have tried harder

to find out what really happened.

Mrs. Jst was very distressed.

I didn't want to press her further.

Before this incident, what was

your clinical opinion of him?

He's difficult to read.

He's highly principled

with a strong sense of duty.

A workaholic with a one track mind.

He's suffering from exhaustion.

Despite his hard exterior,

he seems very sensitive

to what he calls the "human question".

Where did you meet?

Here, in his office.

-How many times?

-Twice.

You mentioned a third meeting

just now.

The first time was over the phone.

As I said, I tried to find out more,

to ask more personal questions,

but without success.

He is very wary.

You mean, he's paranoid?

No, I meant his irascible nature

makes it hard for him

to confide in people.

He's just going through a hard time.

He's got worries that might lead

to a personal crisis.

The kind we've all been through.

What do you mean,

"the kind we've all been through"?

It's a phase more than a crisis.

It's not depression.

An ordeal.

That's a better way of putting it.

Wait a minute.

Is it a crisis or not?

Depression or not?

You mentioned exhaustion.

What kind?

That's the impression I got.

Maybe he just needs a vacation.

There's a difference between clinical

exhaustion and needing a break.

And his secretary?

She doesn't think there's a problem.

You must be joking!

She's the one who first alerted me.

She spoke of a breakdown,

depression,

discrepancies in his work.

If I brought you in,

it was to report on his mental decay.

To be honest,

this assignment

is causing me great distress.

What's making you pull back?

What are you keeping from me?

I want to know everything.

Everything is in the file.

You're contradicting yourself,

playing dumb and avoiding questions.

I think the man's just tired.

You're lying.

You lied about seeing him.

-When?

-I know you saw him at his house.

- I needed a clearer picture of him.

-What happened?

Nothing. I just gave him a file.

I don't understand your distress.

You're not making yourself clear.

By calling

a "personal crisis" a "phase",

you're either trying

to create a smoke screen

or deliberately misleading me

with unrelated facts.

I think I was wrong

in coming to you.

I overestimated

your professional abilities.

You're a dutiful subaltern

but you lack imagination.

For a moment,

I saw him as Jst had:

Karl Kraus,

child of the Schwarzen Orden,

nobody's child,

one of another breed of children,

all perfect and alike.

A child with no childhood,

no heart, no soul, no descendants.

A child from the new, pure,

technical generation.

For over a year, Karl Rose

has been blackmailing me.

I couldn't stand it anymore.

I betrayed Mathias.

I was afraid of reprisals

and his state of health scared me.

It's kind of you

to have come so quickly.

You sounded worried on the phone.

I was Mathias' girlfriend

at the time of the Quartet.

We grew apart

because of his unpredictable

and violent behavior.

He drove me home after rehearsals.

I found poetic letters

he had left me.

Mathias was an anxious,

possessive lover,

obsessed with the idea

that we'd be caught.

I loved Mathias.

He's been nursing his sorrow

for so long.

I've often seen him cry.

I still love the inconsolable child

in him.

His wife was at the hospital.

Did she tell you what happened?

Not really.

I think he passed out.

You're not telling me the truth.

Mathias' father was called Thodor.

During the war

he was in a police battalion.

He collaborated with the SS

during the occupation

in Poland and Belarus.

He did more

than just administrative tasks.

There were many Jews there.

He was involved in relocating them,

if you see what I mean.

Got a cigarette?

Mathias never knew

exactly what his father did.

But he did witness

one particular event.

One day in the early '50s,

he was eating out with his father.

A man recognized Thodor Jst.

He came and spoke to him.

Thodor pretended not to hear him,

but the boy remembered

what the man said.

"I saw you in Miedzyrzec

in October '42.

There were women and children

lying by the cemetery wall.

Remember?"

Thodor Jst got up,

grabbed his son and left.

Next day, the man was waiting

outside the school.

He gave Mathias a note

addressed to his father.

The boy couldn't resist reading it.

"Miedzyrzec, 88 - 13".

A place and some figures.

He asked his father,

"Where's Miedzyrzec?

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