The Dilsberg Mountain blended into the gentle hills of the Kleiner Odenwald. It was a spectacular view. The restaurant on whose terrace we were sitting definitely merited its name: Schäne Aussicht-beautiful view.
“No,” he said, “look higher.”
“Are those the…?” I couldn't believe it.
“Yes, the Alps. Mänch, Eiger, Jungfrau, Mont Blanc. I don't know the names of the others. You can only see them a few days a year; one would have to ask a meteorologist why. But I've lived here for six years, and it's only the second time I've seen them.”
On the horizon the sky was a deep blue. Where it became lighter, a delicate white brush had painted the chain of peaks. To the right and left they faded into the mist. Above them arched the clear sky of early summer, a normal Rhine-Neckar sky that did not betray anything of the wonder that it showed on the southern slope of the Dilsberg.
“You and I might well be the only ones who are witnessing this,” I said. There was no one else on the terrace.
He laughed. “Does that make it twice as nice?”
In the magic of the moment I had forgotten that he was a psychiatrist. What would he have deduced from my remark? That I am incapable of sharing? That I was a single child? That I became a private investigator because I want the truth for myself instead of leaving it for others? That I'm infantiliz-ing, and I shit and don't get off the pot-
“Herr Self, I imagine you want to talk to me about Rolf Wendt. The police have told me that you are working for his father. How far have you got?” He looked at me attentively. Tanned, relaxed, his shirt unbuttoned, his sweater over his shoulders, the cane with the silver knob leaning against the railing as if he no longer needed it-there was no sign that the last few weeks might have shaken him, or at least I couldn't see any sign.
I told him that the bullet that killed Wendt had come from a gun belonging to Lemke, whom he knew as Lehmann, and that I didn't know if Lemke had killed Wendt, or why he might have wanted to. I also told Eberlein that all murders were committed by people who wanted to save their life's illusions, and that I would have to know the illusions of all the parties involved, but that I didn't know them.
“What was Wendt's illusion?” I asked. “What kind of man was he?”
“I know what you mean by life's illusions, but I don't believe that they exist in your sense. There are life issues, and Wendt's issue was doing it right.”
“It?”
“Everything. He was the only person I could really and truly rely on, whether it was attending patients and dealing with their families, collaborating on articles, or just administrative stuff. Rolf Wendt wouldn't rest until whatever he had undertaken to do was done as well as possible.”
“Hence that look of strain on his face?”
He nodded. “To shield himself from excessive strain, a perfectionist must limit himself, must ration and budget himself. He cannot live life to the fullest. He can set up his work environment that way, but in his personal life he often ends up being miserable. In his attempt to do the right thing by his friends, the perfectionist doesn't get to enjoy his friendships, and in his attempt to do the right thing by women, he doesn't get around to loving them. Wendt wasn't happy, either. But I must say that in his unhappiness he actually managed to develop an empathy for the unhappiness of others.”
“How does one become a perfectionist? How did Wendt-”
“What a question, Herr Self! We Swabians have perfectionism in our blood. Protestants become perfectionists so that they get to heaven, and children become perfectionists because their parents expect it of them. Does that answer your question? Wendt was a clever, sensitive, competent, and agreeable young man. There was no reason whatsoever to analyze his perfectionism. OK, he wasn't happy. But where does it say that we are here in order to be happy?” He picked up his cane and tapped the dot beneath the question mark.
I waited a few moments. “Did you know what the deal was with Leo Salger, and about Wendt's relationship to her?”
He laughed. “That's why I was fired, so I ought to know a thing or two about it. I did in fact know what Leonore Salger was mixed up in. I took it the way I take all entanglements, entanglements with drugs, with relationships, with work. It was obvious that she wanted to break free from it. It was also obvious that her childhood friend, or friend from her adolescent years-Lemke, Lehmann, this archangel Michael-was playing a disastrous role. You are aware that Wendt knew him? They had had quite a few dealings with each other in the early seventies, when Wendt participated in that radical Socialist Patient Collective, and Lemke was building up his cadre.”
I know nothing about psychiatry and psychiatric hospitals. I know that the idea of the lunatic asylum, with screaming, raving lunatics and barred doors and windows, is out of date. I'm glad it is. The way things were back when Eberhard was in the hospital was not good. But I couldn't agree that Leo belonged in a psychiatric hospital. The therapy offered by Wendt did not seem particularly professional to me: He was a friend of hers, was even in love with her, not to mention that he knew Lemke, from whom Leo wanted to break free with the help of this therapy. The whole thing sounded more like a therapeutic cover for something quite different: Leo's hiding from the police. And all of that was going on right in front of Eberlein's eyes. I could understand the decision of the authorities to suspend him.
I told Eberlein my doubts.
“When Leonore Salger came to us, she was suffering from severe depression,” he replied. “It didn't come out until later, and then only bit by bit, that she had known Wendt from before, and that Wendt knew Lemke, and that she knew Lemke. You are right that these aren't the best conditions for a cure. But then again it is always a delicate matter to break off therapy in the middle. I must say that once all the problems were laid out on the table, Wendt went ahead and did the right thing: He brought Leonore Salger's therapy to a quick conclusion and arranged for her release from the hospital.”
I must have looked skeptical.
“I can't convince you? Your view is that I should have handed Wendt and Leonore Salger over to the police?” He waved his left hand in resignation.
The Alps had disappeared.
17 Too Late
When I got into bed that night, I hoped I would dream about the Alps. I would take a running start on the Dilsberg, swing into the air, and with wings calmly beating fly over the Oden-wald Range, Kraichgau, and the Black Forest, all the way to the Alps, where I would circle around the peaks and land on a glacier.
I had just fallen asleep when the phone rang. This time, too, there was a rustling and an echo on the line. But I could hear her voice clearly, and as far as I could tell she could hear mine, too.
“Gerhard?”
“Are you doing OK? I've been worrying about you.”
“Gerhard, I'm frightened-and I don't want to stay with Helmut anymore.”
“Then don't stay with him.”
“I think I want to go to America. What do you think?”
“Why not? If you like the country and the people. After all, you liked it there when you were in high school.”
“Gerhard?”
“Yes?”
“Must one pay for everything in life?”
“I don't know, Leo. Tell me, did you know about the poison gas in the American military depot?”
“I have to go. I'll call you again.” She hung up.
I lay awake listening to the bells from the tower of the Heilig-Geist Church pealing off the time, quarter hour by quarter hour. At dawn I fell asleep. Again the phone woke me. This time it was Nägelsbach.
“A warrant for your arrest has just come up on our computer.”
“What?” I looked at the clock. It was eight thirty.
“Aiding a terrorist organization, obstruction of justice- according to this, you warned little Miss Salger and got her across the border. For Christ's sake, Self-”