Wehner Don't worry. It's me they'll point the finger at, not you.

Schmidt We can't survive without Willy! I'll never carry the party! They love him!

Wehner They'll love you, too. In time. If you feed them and keep them warm. If I'm there to be hated. If love is what you want.

Schmidt I can't do it, Herbert! Not like this!

Wehner He was right about one thing. Fight or run? Pull the trigger or drop the gun? Not one of us who knows which it will be until it's happened.

Ehmke (with Schmidt, Wehner and Wilke) Where's Willy? I think I may have swung it! Went on television and really did my stuff. Said we'd done all the security checks in the world. Done them ten times over. Lied and lied until I believed it myself . . . Where is he?

Wehner Resigning.

Ehmke I knew it.

Wehner Or not resigning.

Wilke gives Ehmke the newspaper.

Wehner In two minds about it. Making up both of them.

Ehmke Someone should go and make sure he's all right.

Schmidt You, presumably.

Ehmke Strange, isn't it. Everybody loves him - and nobody does he have to turn to. Nobody in the whole wide world.

Schmidt He has you.

Ehmke Not even me.

Guillaume (alone) The nobody he turned to once was me. An upturned face like all the others that he spoke to from his heart. The upturned face for ever at his side. The smiling face with nothing behind it. No secret ambitions, no concealed disagreements, no hidden resentments. He didn't like me much. He told Horst Ehmke to get rid of me.

The expectant murmur of an audience.

Told him to, but never made him do it.

Handbell. Silence.

Woman's voice Ladies and gendemen, I declare the result of the vote to be as follows. Those in favour: 267. Those against: 225.

Applause. Lights up on Schmidt.

I therefore declare, according to article 63 paragraph 2 of the Basic Law, that the proposed Member has received the votes of the majority of Members of the Bundestag. Herr Schmidt, I must ask you if you accept election as Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany.

Guillaume - His faithful nobody. And just when he needed me most I wasn't there.

Schmidt Frau President, I accept the election.

Guillaume I think about it all over the years as I serve my long sentence, and I see just how the pieces in the puzzle fall into place. The distrust, the jealousy. The economics, the illness. Schmidt and Wehner. Nollau and Genscher and Bauhaus. Herbert Frahm and Herbert Moller. And finally me. I've let myself be used! Not just by Mischa. Not just by you, Arno. By Herbert Wehner. That's what burns. I've been picked up by Wehner, like a handy lump of wood by a murderer, and used to club Willy down. Not for one moment do I let anyone see my shame. But ashamed I am, Arno! Ashamed at last . . .