Silence by Mechtild Borrmann Read Free Book Online

possibility.
    “Yes, that could be. It could also be that your father had something to do with Wilhelm Peters’s disappearance.”
    “You must be mad!” Robert Lubisch exclaimed vehemently, and Rita thought she could sense his fear down the telephone line.
    Then he collected himself and went on more calmly. “Frau Albers, that is a completely absurd suspicion. I consider it conceivable that my father didn’t know the man was still alive, but . . .”
    She heard him take a deep breath. “Listen, I don’t want you to carry on with this. It was a stupid idea, and it’s now clear that Frau Peters obviously began a new life. I’d ask you not to pursue the matter any further.”
    Rita smiled to herself. “Herr Lubisch,” she answered coolly, “I’m interested in this story, and I’m not employed by you. I’m going to go on looking for Therese Peters. I’m an inquisitive person and, above all, I’m a journalist. A story might yet emerge from this, a story I can sell.”
    There was a pause. Then she heard a tight, “That’s not fair, Frau Albers.” He breathed hard several times before going on. “Please, let’s talk about this. I’ll be here in Nimwegen until tomorrow evening. I could drop by your house afterward.”
    She ignored his comment. “You know, I did a bit of digging on the Internet yesterday evening. Your late father, was he Friedhelm Lubisch, the building contractor from Essen?”
    The call was abruptly cut off from the other end.
    Rita looked at the telephone in astonishment. Then she reread the summary of her research. It was still quite meager. She added Friedhelm Lubisch , with a question mark.
    “Not fair,” Robert Lubisch had said, but what had he been expecting? Did he really think she would just go out and collect information on his behalf, out of the goodness of her heart? Besides, she had told him yesterday afternoon, in the kitchen, that the case interested her. She added her notes to the other files in the folder. He would calm down soon.

Chapter 10

    April 21, 1998
    Robert Lubisch sat in the hotel lobby, discussing the day’s presentations with his colleagues, in English. Normally he had no difficulty following such conversations, but today he kept losing the thread, and on two occasions he even had to ask people to repeat questions addressed to him.
    The telephone conversation with Rita Albers worried him more than he cared to admit, but at the same time he cursed himself for being an idiot. What had he been thinking when he left the copies with her?
    Now it was definite: he could follow the conversation no longer. He made his excuses, went over to the bar, and ordered espresso and cognac.
    It had been pure folly. All his curiosity about this Therese Peters was silly sentimentality, which he could no longer explain to himself. He had uncritically considered it a happy coincidence that he had come across a journalist, and now she could no longer be stopped. He felt like a traitor. What else would this woman bring to light? He took a sip of his cognac.
    The idea that his father might have had something to do with this Wilhelm Peters’s disappearance was absurd. He had been a prisoner of war until 1948; afterward, he had scraped a living as a laborer in the Ruhr. Besides, how could Peters have moved freely in the area, five years after the war, equipped only with an SS card and a safe-conduct pass?
    No, the only thing his father could perhaps be reproached for was that he had not known Peters was still alive when he took his papers. Perhaps he had even known, but had taken them anyway.
    The thought left him feeling faint. He sat down on a bar stool and drank his espresso. How matter-of-factly he thought this. How matter-of-factly he thought it possible of him.
    He felt the heat of shame rising in him. What did he really know about his father?
    He could list the facts, the things one put in a résumé. But he had never been close to Friedhelm Lubisch, the man.
    When Robert was of