Fatherland

March takes Jost to the station to make a statement. He thinks back to a few hours earlier when he received a call about the body. He was called accidentally, as it was his day off. However, when he thought of his colleague, Jaeger (who should’ve gotten the call) at home with his wife and four children, March decided it to just do it himself. He’s divorced, as his wife got increasingly upset with how much time he spent working.

As March drives through Berlin, he sees a band practicing despite the cold rain. Because Hitler’s birthday is in six days, it’s common to see such groups preparing for the holiday known as the Führertag.

March and Jost arrive at the Reich Main Security office, led by Reinhard Heydrich. The security forces in Berlin are split into three levels. At the lowest level are the ordinary Orpo officers, who handle petty crimes and everyday patrol, like speeding tickets and intoxicated pedestrians. In the middle are the Kripo officers, like March, who deal with larger crimes like murder, armed robbery, and “mixed marriage.” At the top are the Sipo, or “Security Police” (11) who work with the Gestapo to handle espionage and terrorism and to gather intel throughout Berlin.

Jost gives a simple statement to March. He left for a run alone, spotted the body, called the police, and waited until they arrived. Satisfied, March asks Jost questions about his time training to be an SS officer. Jost is doing so only because his father was part of the original SS during the war. He would rather be in school studying literature.

As they talk, March realizes that something is wrong with Jost’s statement: It took him too long to run from the academy to the lake, leaving about 20 unaccounted minutes. When he asks Jost about it, Jost insists that he may have his timing wrong, but March can tell that he’s lying. He asks March if he’s gay and meets another man early in the morning. Jost denies it, even when March assures him that he isn’t concerned with his sexuality. Jost sticks to his story, but March warns him that he’ll be angry if he discovers he’s lying.

After Jost leaves, March feels “ashamed” for how he questioned Jost. He knows that the punishment for gay acts is forced labor and that SS men are sent to the front of the war. He knows that, even if Jost isn’t gay, he’s likely part of the younger cohort of men who increasingly question Hitler’s rule, consume American media, and circulate banned books. However, March assuages his guilt by assuring himself that his only concern is solving the murder.

March goes upstairs to the third floor of the station, where 12 women answer phone calls reporting crime throughout the day and night. Two maps take up most of the wall, one showing the 122 stations in Berlin and the other the stations throughout the country. The country map “glows crimson” from all the lit-up stations. Since 10 o’clock last night, 18 deaths were reported in “the world’s largest city, with its population of ten million” (17).

March talks with Krause, the officer on duty, and requests reports for missing persons. They look at the map that shows Lake Havel. On one end is an inlet that houses many of the most powerful Party leaders in Berlin, including Josef Goebbels, the Gauleiter (or governing official) in Berlin. March notes how things could get complicated given that a body was found just a few hundred meters away.

Back in his office, March narrows the long list of missing persons, 102 total, down to a handful of names that matches the available information: The body is at least 50 years old. In the end, it doesn’t match any name on the list, raising the question of whether the man has been missing longer or if the time of death was incorrect.

March picks up his 10-year-old son, Pili, from his ex-wife, Klara. They divorced seven years ago, and March seldom interacts with her. He typically sees his son only once a month; however, because of the holiday, Pili is off school.

Because he’s now 10, Pili has started as a Pimpf. He was given a dagger and a uniform. He regularly meets with the other Pimpfs, a path that leads to joining the Hitler Youth at age 14. He excitedly shows March his dagger. March tells his son that he’s “proud” of him, but he’s lying.

Pili insists that he wants to go on the tour bus to look at the city, something he does every time he’s with his father. The tour guide talks about the Arch of Triumph, which she notes is significantly larger than the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, as well as the Great Hall, a ceremonial building for the Party leaders. The guide explains that it’s the world’s largest building. As she describes the various structures, March notes how Germany has an “inferiority complex,” always building things that are “[h]igher, longer, bigger, wider, more expensive…even in victory” (22).

Afterward, Pili accuses his father of being an “asocial,” someone who distances himself from the Party. March describes it as a “nonjoiner of the endless National Socialist associations” and similar in the minds of Party loyalists to a “traitor” (27). March assures his son that it’s nonsense, but Pili says his mother’s boyfriend, Erich Helfferich, insists that it’s true. Pili explains that there is a “file” on March in the Gestapo’s offices, where Erich works.

As March pulls up to Pili’s home, Pili continues to accuse him of being an asocial. He grows angry with his father, telling him that he hates him before running out of the car and into the house. March tries to follow him but stops when he sees his ex-wife in the doorway. He notes how she, her boyfriend, and his son are all wearing uniforms. Klara tells him that he should leave them all alone and then slams the door.

That evening, March checks in with Jaeger. He went back another day on the missing persons reports but was still unable to identify the body.

March goes to the morgue. He checks the body over and takes fingerprints, which he gives to his old friend, Otto Koth, the head of fingerprinting. He asks Koth to check the criminal records that night, even though Koth has a long list of other fingerprints to check. Koth grudgingly agrees.

Back in his apartment, March sees the photograph on his mantelpiece that he found when he first moved in. It is a portrait of a family with a boy about Pili’s age taken in 1929. March researched the family and discovered that they were Jewish and lived there from 1928 to 1942. March knew that they were deported during World War II and that it was dangerous to ask about them, but he did so anyway.

March reads the newspaper. He thinks about how he prefers the sports results, as it’s the only part of the paper that isn’t fabricated. He reads of news of the ongoing war with the Soviet Union, in which Germany is assured of victory, as well as a state visit by the King and Queen of England to Germany.

March falls asleep reading, but a phone call from Koth wakes him. Koth excitedly tells him that he identified the dead man. His name is Josef Buhler. He was arrested on November 9, 1923, in Munich along with Adolf Hitler during the infamous Beer Hall Putsch, an attempted coup d’état by the Nazi Party. He was one of the pioneering members of the National Socialist Revolution.

After March hangs up, he calls Jaeger and the officer on duty. He then calls his friend from the war, Rudi Halder, who is now a historian. He asks him for information on Buhler.

That night, March dreams of the dead body in the lake. He tries to pull it out of the water but can’t. As he turns to leave, the body pulls him into the lake. As he goes under, the body’s face turns to Pili’s, “grotesque in its shame” and repeating the words, “I hate you” (37).