“It concerns you,” Christian answered, breathing deeply, “because you associated constantly with Joachim Heinzen, and so you ought to be in a position to give me a hint. You must have some definite thoughts of your own on the matter; in one way or another it must touch you. It is my unalterable conviction that Heinzen is not and cannot be the murderer, but I am equally convinced that he has acted under the influence of the real culprit, so the latter must be among those with whom Heinzen associated. Now I cannot imagine that this individual failed to concentrate upon himself the attention of all his acquaintances, for he must be a man who is essentially different from the others. It only confirms my opinion of him that he has so far escaped the arm of justice. But he must be known; a man who was capable of that deed could not be overlooked. And that is why I turn to you. If you had not come to me, I would have gone to you.”
Niels Heinrich grinned. “Awf’ly good of you,” he said, with contorted lips. “I’d’ve been tickled to death.” Oppression and rending excitement betrayed themselves in his convulsively raised brows. He tried to control himself, and yet stammered as he continued: “Is that so? So that’s your conviction—unalterable conviction, eh? And where do you get that conviction, I’d like to ask, eh? Why shouldn’t he have killed her, seeing as how he confessed in court? Why not, eh? Nobody made him say it. This is all dam’ nonsense; you just simply dreamed this business or you was drunk. What made you think of it?”
“I shall tell you that,” said Christian, with an expression that had grown more meditative from minute to minute. “A human being like this Joachim Heinzen was not capable of killing Ruth. Think what it means to kill a human being. And when that human being is Ruth! Oh, no, it’s quite out of the question. The poor fellow is actually weak-minded. Many believe him guilty for that very reason; but no weak-minded man could have killed Ruth. Even if we suppose that he obeyed his animal instincts utterly, and that in his bestial rage he lost all self-control and all human semblance, yet he could never have gone to the ultimate length, to murder. Not this lad; it is out of the question. I have looked at his hands—at his hands and at his eyes. It is out of the question.”
He paused. Niels Heinrich leaned against the oven, holding his hands carefully between his back and the tiles.
Christian continued, in a voice that was gentle and yet extraordinarily clear and penetrating: “It is out of the question, because he does not possess the necessary qualifications for the deed. I have tried to sink myself as profoundly as possible into his psychical life. I have succeeded in excluding from my consciousness all other thoughts and images, in order to arrive at a vision of his character as well as of the rôle which he played in connection with the crime. And when I have imagined him in his most bestial unrestraint, in all the rage of his lechery, I am still convinced that at the last moment he would have succumbed to Ruth. If Ruth had looked at him as he raised his arm, being what he is and as I know him, he would have weakened. He would have fallen whimpering on his knees, and rather killed himself than done her any hurt. And if she had inspired him with but one spark of thought or feeling, she would have won him over entirely. You may reply that these are mere hypotheses and suppositions; but that is not the case when one considers what Ruth was. Did you know her? Had you ever met her?”
This innocent and harmless question brought a ghastly pallor into the face of Niels Heinrich. He murmured something, and shrugged his shoulders.
“You may also make this objection: the same pressure which drove him to his confession may also have driven him to the deed itself. What will not a human being do in the darkness of mania, especially one so degraded and brutal and spiritually infirm. I consider his confessions quite valueless; it is clear that he has been influenced and commanded to make them. He contradicts himself constantly, and denies to-day what he affirmed yesterday. He sticks only to the one point of his guilt. But in this stubborn self-accusation there is more than mere persistence; there is despair and utter horror. And these are not manifested as they would be by a guilty soul in the torments of conscience, but as they would be manifested by a child who has spent a long night in a dark room, where monstrous and ghastly horrors shook the very foundations of its soul. His conscience should have been eased by confession, but the contrary is true. How is that to be explained?
“Furthermore, he is supposed to have lured Ruth to a hidden place. Certainly it must have been obscure and hidden, for the deed was not done in woods or lonely fields. But in spite of the most rigid search, no such spot has been discovered, and at no hearing has it been possible to persuade Heinzen to point it out. He is being questioned on this point continually, but he is resolutely silent or answers nonsense. Two explanations have been proposed. One is that he desires to save an accomplice who might be tracked from the scene of the crime. The other is that he suffers from one of those disturbances or even complete interruptions of the memory, such as are familiar to psychiatrists in their study of abnormal types. I accept neither the one explanation nor the other. It is my opinion that he doesn’t know the place. He was not perhaps even present when the murder was committed. It is possible that he was drugged or drunk, and awakened from his stupor only to see the body. And it is possible that the sight of the body produced in him a fearful self-deception, or that he was tricked and driven into believing himself the murderer....”
Niels Heinrich advanced a single step. His jaw shook. He felt as though a rain of burning stones were falling on him. A dark astonishment and horror were revealed in his face. He wanted to be silent, to jeer, to go; he wanted to seem cold and unconscious of any knowledge or understanding. For danger was upon him, the ultimate danger of vengeance, of the sword, the rope, the axe. He saw them all. Yet he was not capable of self-control; something within was stronger than he. “Man alive....” The words came clucking from his throat on fire. “Man alive....” Then came a wild terror of increasing the danger by his behaviour. He couldn’t stand that; it was too much for his nerves. What had that man to do with it? And again he fell silent before Christian’s slightly blinking glance, and became tense with staring and waiting. He’d have to watch this man now; the business was getting bad; it was necessary now to guard his life. God, what wouldn’t that accursed mouth utter?