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The Eye of the Abyss (Franz Schmidt, 1) - Hardcover

Browne, Marshall

 
9780312311568: The Eye of the Abyss (Franz Schmidt, 1)
Hardcover
ISBN 10: 0312311567 ISBN 13: 9780312311568
Verlag: Minotaur Books, 2003

Inhaltsangabe

It is Germany, 1938, and Franz Schmidt is the chief auditor in a commercial bank in a provincial city. But as Schmidt will soon learn, the bank's prestigious new client, the Nazi party, is at once its least desirable. Schmidt will oversee their account, and soon, he is embroiled in the duplicity, violence and horror that is Nazi Germany. Schmidt can't help but be involved, and the first victim of the harsh realities of the Germans' politics is a Jewish secretary whom Franz tries to help, much to his wife's distress.

As Schmidt finds himself caught up in dangerous political machinations, he also finds himself, as the result of an act of compassion, under deadly suspicion. The Schmidts struggle to protect their marriage and their family without compromising their sense of decency, but eventually, Franz's world explodes. As events spin out of control, Franz must act, and he seeks revenge on those responsible by attempting a massive fraud on the Party itself.

In Eye of the Abyss, Marshall Browne crafts an intelligent historical thriller reminiscent of Philip Kerr, Christopher Reich and Alan Furst with a riveting pace and spellbinding plot all his own.

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Marshall Browne, born in Melbourne, is a sixth generation Australian. He is currently working on a second Inspector Anders thriller. His wife Merell, is an interior designer, and their daughter Justine, works at the Australian Embassy, Washington D.C..

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

 
The Eye of the Abyss
1
AT ONE MINUTE to eight, Franz Schmidt, chief internal auditor of Bankhaus Wertheim & Co., boarded the tramcar standing in Bamberg Platz. His wife, Helga, a tall, full-figured woman with thoughtful eyes, waited beside the line with their four-year-old daughter, Trudi, to wave him goodbye. In the sunlight penetrating the thinning mist, the uplifted faces and hair of his family glowed gold. What a picture! Schmidt thought. Smiling, he gave his self-conscious wave.
The conductor rang the bell, and the tram shuddered along its length. Helga smiled back, Trudi waved vigorously, and called out. He heard only: ‘Papa!’ The two dear faces passed from his vision. Precisely, he folded his paper into a narrow strip. For Schmidt, Tuesday, October 4, 1938, had begun like any other work day.
‘Good morning, Herr Schmidt!’ The conductor, green-uniformed, leaned heavily over the auditor.
Schmidt looked up at the Viennese. ’Good morning, Herr Dorf.’ He gave the correct fare.
‘A real nip in the air, sir.’ Schmidt admitted it. ‘On the wireless, the Wetteramt says it’ll be a hard winter. Well, all the news can’t be good.’
Schmidt concurred again. He wasn’t a morning wireless listener himself. The conductor shrugged, swayed on down the car, agile despite his age and weight.
Schmidt eyed the headlines: still rapturous about the Munich Agreement. He pursed his lips, and scanned the columns. It did appear that the Fuehrer had gained a bloodless victory, not only over Czechoslovakia but over Great Britain and France. Had war been averted? Despite the euphoria in the streets, Schmidt couldn’t quite believe that. He turned to the finance pages. Certainly business was booming, humming in the air like electricity being generated. He had it carefully under observation, as though it were a suspect loan in the bank’s books. A new section of autobahn had been opened. The National Socialist government was pressing forward. Ever forward.
A tooth, lower left-hand side, had an unhealthy tingle. He checked it with his tongue. Damn! He wondered if Dr Bernstein was still in practice.
He alighted at Potsdamerstrasse. Unaccountably, under his shoes glass crunched. Unaccountable only for a second. He looked aside. A brick had been put through the window of the corner shop. A haggard, fearful face glanced at him from the doorway, on which a Star of David had been crudely chalked. Averting his eye, he walked into a narrow street. These days there was more to worry about than weather. Still, this chilly breeze was a tribulation; it smacked into his face, and blew between rows of stone buildings whose bombastic façades, dripping with architectural embellishment, reminded the auditor of overweight burghers. Behind its glass, his eye-socket began to weep. As he walked he gave it dabs with a handkerchief.
Thinking of the Jew’s fear, he entered a building under its carved granite lintel. A brass plate said in small letters: Bankhaus Wertheim & Co AG, Private Bankers.
‘Good morning, Herr Chief Auditor. The post’s gone up.’ Respectfully the head messenger nodded his head. Then, gasping for breath, he bustled to the lift, and flung open its door.
Sympathetically the auditor recalled: Asthma. Touch of mustard gas, too. ‘Thank you, Herr Berger,’ he said. How many men had this mild and responsible servant killed in the war?
Once in his small office on the second floor, Schmidt opened sixty or so letters with precise slits of his ivory-handled knife, a gift from his late father, noted the nature of the business, and put each into its departmental pouch. Nothing to draw his professional attention … except this. He took up the letter from Berlin for Herr General-Director Wertheim stamped Confidential and examined the seal. After a moment, he inserted it unopened into a special leather pouch, pushed a buzzer, and a junior messenger hurried in and took it away.
He resumed work left off yesterday, but the image of that seal – an eagle rampant on the swastika – remained in his mind’s eye. Why on earth would Wertheims be receiving a letter from that organisation?

 
The first dislocation to Schmidt’s routine came at 9.55: a knock at his door, and Fräulein Dressler entered. Surprised, he stood up. The general-director’s private secretary had never visited his office before. She advanced into his room and stopped, her arms crossed over her abdomen, her hands splayed, cupping her elbows. She regarded him, his room, with considering eyes: brown, flecked with gold. A trick of the light? He regarded her: his surprise had turned to politeness. She seemed curious to see him in his domain.
‘Good morning, Herr Schmidt. The General-Director wishes to see you at 10.30.’ She paused. ‘Please come to his office at that time.’
‘Of course.’ Schmidt nodded gravely.
She paused, smiled. ‘Always so serious, Herr Schmidt! It’s not the end of the world.’ Her eyes were glinting.
Schmidt doubted that it would be. He bowed gravely; he couldn’t help his nature.
She had the reputation of being a humorist; she could afford to be in her rarefied position. Though today, was there an atmosphere of strain behind her remarks?
‘Herr Schmidt.’ With a slight, enigmatic curve of the lips she turned to go. In a rush, unexpectedly, Schmidt found himself registering impressions: darkish down above her upper lip, subtle heaviness in the hips, exaggerated shapeliness of her legs: hard-packed, swelling calves, thin ankles. Dancers’ legs? But the suggestion of thick thighs. About thirty, the raven-black hair cut severely, symmetrically just below her ears. That flicker of a smile … he stopped, startled at himself. Certainly enigmatic, but highly efficient, otherwise she wouldn’t have lasted with Herr Wertheim. Her husky yet melodic voice lingered in his head. So did her perfume — as discreet as the bank. He shook his head, sat down again, and turned back to familiar territory: his monthly report to the board.
At 10.30, in the general-director’s anteroom, the mystique of the first floor bore down on him, aided by wood-panelled walls on which hung the varnished, dead-pale faces of the founding Wertheims. Schmidt was a calm person but he felt his nerves quicken. Only once before had he been summoned to the inner sanctum: in 1934, he’d uncovered a client’s convoluted fraud. Herr Wertheim had seen fit to personally commend him. Occasionally, he did come to the boardroom to explain an abstruse point. Otherwise … The double doors at the end of the anteroom sprang open, revealing a briskly efficient Fräulein Dressler, with no trace of humour now. That letter with its thought-provoking seal flashed back into his mind.
‘Herr Chief Auditor!’
Herr Wertheim, fifty years a private banker, smiling benevolently, offered his recognition, his slender white hand, to the auditor, ushered him to a seat, and sat down himself in a high-backed chair padded with cushions. All wonderfully urbane. For a hundred years, the Wertheims had received royalty, statesmen, an affluent clientele – and sometimes valued employees – with such super-refined courtesy. ‘Quite bloodless,’ according to Schmidt’s friend, deputy foreign manager Wagner. ‘They get it with their mother’s milk.’Also deceptive. Like Wagner, Schmidt knew Herr Wertheim had destroyed many men. However, no-one could doubt the bank’s...

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Verlag
Minotaur Books
Erscheinungsdatum
2003
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
0312311567
ISBN 13 
9780312311568
Einband
Gebundene Ausgabe
Anzahl der Seiten
304
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Verantwortliche Person
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