I immediately made an appointment with Judge Baumann. He received me in his office at court: a jurist in a Standartenführer’s uniform, getting on in years, with a square face and a crooked nose, and a fighter’s look. I had put on my best uniform and all my medals. After I had saluted him, he asked me to sit down. “Thank you for receiving me, Herr Richter,” I said, using the customary address instead of his SS rank. “Not at all, Obersturmbannführer. It’s the least I could do.” He opened a folder on his desk. “I asked for your personal file. I hope you don’t mind.”—“Not at all, Herr Richter. Allow me to tell you what I plan on telling the Reichsführer: I regard these accusations, which touch me in such a personal question, hateful. I am ready to cooperate with you in every way possible so they can be completely refuted.” Baumann gave a discreet cough: “You understand that I haven’t yet ordered an investigation. I can’t do so without the Reichsführer’s agreement. The case file I have is very meager. I made the request based on an appeal from the Kripo, which states they have convincing information that their investigators would like to look into.”—“Herr Richter, I spoke twice with those investigators. All they gave me by way of information was groundless insinuations without proof, some—excuse me—delirious fabrication of their own fantasy.”—“That is possible,” he said pleasantly. “I see here that you attended the best universities. If you had gone on with law, we might have ended up colleagues. I know Dr. Jessen very well, your old professor. A very good jurist.” He went on leafing through the file. “Excuse me, but did your father fight with the Freikorps Rossbach, in Courland? I remember an officer named Aue.” He said the Christian name. My heart began beating violently. “That is my father’s name, Herr Richter. But I don’t know anything about what you ask. My father disappeared in 1921, and I haven’t heard anything about him since. It’s possible it’s the same man. Do you know what became of him?”—“Unfortunately not. I lost sight of him during the retreat, in December of ’nineteen. He was still alive, at the time. I also heard that he had taken part in the Kapp putsch. Many Baltikumer were there.” He thought. “You could do some research. There are still Freikorps veterans’ associations.”—“Yes, Herr Richter. That’s an excellent idea.” He coughed again and settled into his armchair. “Good. Let’s return, if you don’t mind, to your affair. What can you tell me about it?” I gave him the same narrative I had given Brandt. “It’s a horrible business,” he said at the end. “You must have been extremely upset.”—“Of course, Herr Richter. And I was even more so by the accusations of those two defenders of the public order who have never, I am sure, spent a day at the front and who allow themselves to slander the name of an SS officer.” Baumann scratched his chin: “I can understand how wounding that is for you, Obersturmbannführer. But perhaps the best solution would be to shed the full light of day on the affair.”—“I have nothing to fear, Herr Richter. I will accept the decision of the Reichsführer.”—“You are right.” He got up and accompanied me to the door. “I still have some old photographs from Courland. If you like, I can take a look and see if there’s one of that Aue.”—“Herr Richter, I’d be delighted.” In the hallway he shook my hand. “Don’t worry about all this, Obersturmbannführer. Heil Hitler!” My interview with the Reichsführer took place the next day and was brief and conclusive. “What is this ridiculous story, Obersturmbannführer?”—“They’re accusing me of being a murderer, my Reichsführer. It would be comical if it weren’t so tragic.” I briefly explained the circumstances to him. Himmler quickly made up his mind: “Obersturmbannführer, I’m beginning to know you. You have your faults: you are, excuse me for saying so, stubborn and sometimes pedantic. But I don’t see the slightest trace of a moral defect in you. Racially, you are a perfect Nordic specimen, with perhaps just a touch of alpine blood. Only the racially degenerate nations, Poles, Gypsies, can commit matricide. Or else a hot-blooded Italian, during a quarrel, not in cold blood. No, it’s ridiculous. The Kripo is completely lacking in discernment. I’ll have to give instructions to Gruppenführer Nebe to have his men trained in racial analysis, they’ll waste much less time that way. Of course I won’t authorize the investigation. That’s all we need.”
Baumann called me a few days later. It must have been around mid-February, since I remember it was right after the massive bombing in which the Bristol Hotel was hit during an official banquet: some sixty people died, crushed under the rubble, including a number of well-known generals. Baumann seemed in a good mood and congratulated me warmly. “Personally,” his voice said at the other end of the line, “I thought the whole business was ridiculous. I’m happy for you that the Reichsführer settled it. It will avoid problems.” As for the photographs, he had found one showing Aue, but blurred and barely visible; he wasn’t even sure it was he, but he promised to have a copy of it made and to send it to me.
The only people who were unhappy with the Reichsführer’s decision were Clemens and Weser. I found them one night in the street in front of the SS-Haus, hands in the pockets of their long coats, their shoulders and hats covered with fine snow. “Well,” I said mockingly, “Laurel and Hardy. What brings you here?” This time, they didn’t salute me. Weser replied: “We wanted to say hello to you, Obersturmbannführer. But your secretary didn’t want to give us an appointment.” I didn’t react to the omission of the Herr. “She was entirely right,” I said haughtily. “I think we have nothing more to say to each other.”—“Well, see, Obersturmbannführer,” Clemens grumbled, “we think we do, actually.”—“In that case, meine Herren, I suggest you go ask for an authorization from Judge Baumann.” Weser shook his head: “We realize, Obersturmbannführer, that Judge Baumann will say no. We realize that you are, so to speak, an untouchable.”—“But still,” Clemens went on, the steam from his breath masking his fat pug-nosed face, “it’s not normal, Obersturmbannführer, you can see that. There should be some justice, all the same.”—“I agree with you completely. But still, your insane calumnies have nothing to do with justice.”—“Calumnies, Obersturmbannführer?” Weser rapped out, raising his eyebrows. “Calumnies? Are you so sure? In my opinion, if Judge Baumann had really read the file, he’d be less certain than you.”—“Yeah,” said Clemens. “For instance, he could have wondered about the clothes.”—“The clothes? What clothes are you talking about?” Weser replied in his place: “Clothes the French police found in the bathtub, on the second floor. Civilian clothes…” He turned to Clemens: “Notebook.” Clemens pulled the notebook out of an inner pocket and handed it to him. Weser leafed through it: “Oh yes, here it is: clothing splattered with blood. Splattered. That’s the word I was looking for.”—“It means ‘soaked,’” Clemens explained.—“The Obersturmbannführer knows what it means, Clemens,” Weser grunted. “The Obersturmbannführer is an educated man. He has a good vocabulary.” He dove back into the notebook. “Civilian clothing, then, splattered, thrown into the bathtub. There was also blood on the tile floor, on the walls, in the sink, on the towels. And downstairs, in the living room and the entrance, there were traces of footsteps pretty much everywhere, because of the blood. There were prints of shoes, we found the shoes with the clothes, but there were also prints of boots. Heavy boots.”—“Well,” I said, shrugging, “the murderer changed before he left, to avoid attracting attention.”—“You see, Clemens, when I tell you that the Obersturmbannführer is an intelligent man. You should listen to me.” He turned to me and looked at me under his hat. “Those clothes were all of German make, Obersturmbannführer.” He leafed again through the notebook: “A brown two-piece suit, wool, good quality, label of a German tailor. A white shirt, German make. A silk tie, German make, a pair of cotton socks, German make, a pair of underwear, German make. A pair of brown leather town shoes, size forty-two, German make.” He raised his eyes to me: “What’s your shoe size, Obersturmbannführer? If you allow me the question. What’s your suit size?” I smiled; “Gentlemen, I don’t know what godforsaken hole you crawled out of, but I advise you to go back to it on the double. Vermin aren’t allowed to remain in Germany anymore.” Clemens frowned: “Say, Weser, he’s insulting us, isn’t he?”—“Yes. He’s insulting us. He’s threatening us too. Actually, you might be right. He might be less intelligent than he seems, this Obersturmbannführer.” Weser put a finger on his hat: “Good night, Obersturmbannführer. See you soon, maybe.”