My partner merely shook her head.
The phone rang. With a sigh, Heinrich hurried out into the passage and picked up. Hello, Mother, he said. Yes, he’d already heard, he’d just been watching the program. He returned to the living room carrying the phone, which was equipped with an extension cord. Resuming his seat, he deposited the phone on the coffee table.
In a low voice, my partner asked what could possibly be going on in the heads and hearts of the parents; she dreaded to imagine.
Eva came in. Heedless of the fact that Heinrich was on the phone, she complained of the trouble she would have to go to replace the extension cord behind the bookcase. It was time he got out of the habit of phoning in the living room, she said. Heinrich made a dismissive gesture. Still on the phone, he picked up the remote control with his free hand and switched from channel to channel. Six out of twenty-five channels were currently reporting on the crime in West Styria.
We pricked up our ears when a German commercial station broadcast some dramatic news. It had obtained a leaked copy of the films the criminal had made of his victims. After much internal discussion, the editorial board had decided to televise excerpts from them at some still-to-be-determined time, but in the very near future, in order to give the world a graphic illustration of the enormity of the crime in question.
Heinrich uttered a yell. They’re going to show the video, they’re going to show the video, he shouted into the receiver and told the person on the other end of the line (presumably his mother) the name of the channel.
He started to hang up but was evidently dissuaded by his interlocutor. No, he said, Eva and he were not going to celebrate Easter in a big way, their visitors had come for a holiday, not for a Christian festival, and no, he wanted some peace and quiet; he definitely wasn’t going to Mass, so would the person on the line stop bending his ear about it. The Catholic Church, he declared, was a disgusting bunch of power-hungry hypocrites and pedophiles whose crazy German overlord posed as the representative of some nonexistent being. It might even have been one of his minions that had chased the Frauenkirchen children through the forest with his cassock fluttering, panting as he did so.
Heinrich said a curt good-bye and hung up, swearing to himself.
Eva snatched up the phone and replaced it in its cradle. She also participated in the argument over whether we should watch the murder pictures. Leaning against the doorpost and wringing her hands, she begged Heinrich to spare us.
She might be right, said Heinrich, but he couldn’t help it, he simply had to watch them. My partner said she felt the same way. I expressed a similar sentiment.
After some ten minutes’ argument, Eva said she would have to watch the program herself. Heinrich waxed indignant. Why talk such nonsense? He wouldn’t allow her to watch it — she would have nightmares and so on. She retorted that he was to blame, with his stupid news reports and accounts and descriptions. He had dragooned her into it. Now she wanted to watch it. So saying, she left the room. Heinrich jumped up and followed her out. They could be heard arguing in the kitchen for a while.
My partner and I exchanged glances. I was feeling hungry, so I went into the kitchen to get myself a slice of bread. My appearance put an end to the altercation between Eva and Heinrich. Eva cut me a thick slice of bread with a kitchen knife some ten inches long. Would one be enough? she asked. I nodded.
She opened the refrigerator and asked me what I would like on it. She picked up a salami sausage in her left hand and showed it to me. Transferring it to her right hand, she picked up a lump of Swiss cheese in her left and looked at me inquiringly. Then she replaced the salami in the refrigerator and transferred the cheese to her right hand. With her left hand, she removed a fresh packet of butter (organic, the wrapper said so) from the refrigerator. By passing objects from her left hand to her right in this manner and replacing them in the refrigerator, she was offering me a choice of toppings. I opted for cheese spread.
Eva apologized to me for no reason. This horrible business was getting on her nerves, she said. If her indisposition was blighting the atmosphere, she was sorry and would take care not to do so again.
We went back into the living room, where my partner and Heinrich were discussing the fact that the murders had brought, or would bring, reporters to West Styria from all over the world. This might give the tourist industry a boost, said Heinrich. In this connection, he pointed to the cannibalistic crimes committed by a certain Mr. Dahmer, whom he called a monster without equal. To the best of his knowledge, however, the hunt for Mr. Dahmer and his capture had not aroused as much interest in the media.
My partner objected that injuring, robbing, and murdering other people was commonplace in the United States, so those whose actions transgressed the socially accepted bounds of brutality could not expect to attract much attention there. In a civilized Central European country, by contrast, any murder was of importance, and one such as had occurred yesterday in West Styria was correspondingly sensational.
Eva endorsed this view. She also apologized to my partner.
The latter brushed this aside, but she did express the belief that it was essential not to take the world’s misfortunes too hard because this was detrimental to one’s own well-being.
The Stubenrauchs now asked what we, being their guests, would like to have for supper. My partner reminded them of our Easter lunch. I begged them not to go to any trouble. Eva said she would like to make us something special. Heinrich and my partner persuaded her not to devote too much time and effort to supper. This would give us an opportunity to engage in activities that were more fun for all concerned (playing games, talking, etc.). Once agreement had been reached (spaghetti Bolognese), we devoted ourselves to the news, unchallenged by Eva.
Austrian Broadcasting’s news ticker was reporting that a German commercial station was planning to televise extracts from the murder video. Heinrich remarked that this was the first time ORF had advertised on behalf of a commercial channel. The news reported that the archbishop of Vienna had issued a statement. He appealed to the German TV station not to transmit the projected program because it would not only be an affront to the dead children’s memory and human dignity but also have unpredictable consequences on various levels.
Addressing himself to the West Styrian demonstrators, whose numbers were reported to be steadily swelling, he urged them to refrain from physical violence and join with him and the whole of Austria — indeed, with the entire world — in praying for the victims and their parents. The pope himself was praying for the victims, he added. “The holy father has personally assured the children’s parents of his profound sympathy and included them in his prayers.”
That’ll please them, sneered Heinrich.
Re: the possibility of beatification under Benedict XVI: “Members of the clergy have urged that the dead children be beatified, a suggestion opposed by a leading theologian. The victims have not been dead for long enough, he says.”
Reactions from the political parties: “The People’s Party speaks of a dark day for Austria. The Freedom Party expresses its belief that such disasters are encouraged by a judicial system overly favorable to offenders and proposes a referendum on the reintroduction of the death penalty. The Greens declare that the government parties have now been proved to have failed in respect of psychotherapy and the social services.”
The chancellor: “Evil exists. The federal chancellor has stated that evil exists and that it is the duty of the state to protect its citizens.”
Heinrich: Yeah, yeah, you loser.
Heinrich spent a while switching from channel to channel. The four persons present found it difficult to coordinate their response to these reports. A German station was showing live shots of demonstrators gathering outside the studio of the commercial station that was planning to televise the murder video in an hour’s time. Oh-oh, said Heinrich, and he switched to the murder video channel itself. It made no mention of the demonstrators on its doorstep. Heinrich switched back again.