That’s it, he decided, I’m going to go. I simply have to know what’s happening. Then he remembered that at nine o’clock he could call Fräulein Gersch, but after a moment’s hesitation he decided to leave after all. He was so impatient that instead of going on foot he took a taxi.

The eighteen-year-old son of the doorman was standing in front of the building, dressed in the uniform of the SA. When he saw Silbermann climbing out of the cab, he turned around and hurried inside.

That’s a bad sign, thought Silbermann, pausing for a moment to weigh his options. In any event I’ll have to be very quick and leave the apartment right away, he concluded.

He rushed up the stairs. He rang several times and, since he didn’t hear any footsteps, he unlocked the door. He was distraught to see glass splinters on the rug. Then he noticed that the large front-hall mirror had been shattered.

Calling card of the master race, he thought, incensed, and hurried into the dining room. Seeing that the furniture was still intact, he concluded that yesterday’s visitors hadn’t ventured into this room. And even though they must have posed a great temptation for such robust hands, the crystal bowls were also still intact.

“Elfriede!” Silbermann called, and rang immediately for the maid. Obviously they’re not here—I knew it, he thought, and once again called out his wife’s name. He opened the door of the parlor. Here the marks of heavy feet were evident. The floor was littered with shards of porcelain. Silbermann saw the étagère standing amid the shattered tea service.

He again called out, “Elfriede!” Then he sensed that was pointless. She isn’t here, they’ve taken her away, it’s possible they’ve done something to her. And meanwhile I took a train to Hamburg … I ate and I drank coffee and chattered away and saw to my business deals. I was everywhere but here, which is where I should have been.

He went to the back part of the apartment to look for the maid. He called out for her, checked in the kitchen and in her room, but of course she wasn’t there. Of course! How on earth could he have thought that everything would be normal and exactly the way it had been except for the telephone being out of order?

“I made it too easy for myself,” he groaned as he moved quickly to the bedroom and then the dressing room. “My optimism was nothing but cowardice! If only I’d come back sooner, but instead I chose to sit down with Becker—as if I couldn’t just have easily waited until later to let myself be cheated. What use are the forty-one thousand marks to me now!”