Bayrischer Platz becomes a place of refuge and suspended action after Mieze’s murder. Franz is brought there by car, and Eva tends to him for days and nights as grief leaves him barely able to live or respond; the square also frames a vision of five dead sparrows judging the damaged, dangerous man he has become.

Place in the Aftermath

As evening falls after Mieze’s death, Franz is again on the move. At Bayrischer Platz, five sparrows fly above him. The narration transforms them into five slain villains who debate what should be done with Franz and how to make him stumble. One points to his false arm and his refusal to give up; another accuses him of killing a woman and of further crimes. The square is thus not merely a point on his route: it is where his passage through the city is accompanied by an imagined reckoning with his past.

Refuge and Care

After Franz’s desperate grief at the graves, he climbs into a car outside and is taken to Bayrischer Platz. Eva looks after him there for days and nights. He is described as neither living nor dying, a condition that makes the square a temporary shelter rather than a place of recovery. Herbert is rarely present during this period, leaving Eva to bear most of the work of caring for him.

Renewed Pursuit

Franz’s stay at Bayrischer Platz follows Mieze’s murder and precedes a renewed search for Reinhold. Franz and Herbert spend several days hunting for him; Franz initially resists, then becomes involved, treating the pursuit as the last remedy available to him. Yet the search does not bring relief. Eva sees Franz numb, scarcely speaking or eating, and consuming schnapps and coffee in enormous quantities. He weeps and returns to the fact that they cannot find Reinhold. The narrative undercuts the apparent purpose of the hunt: it calls the pursuit unreal, describing instead an anguish that has already determined the course of events. Bayrischer Platz therefore marks a fragile interval between Franz’s collapse and his movement toward another confrontation, with Eva’s care unable to quiet the grief driving him onward.