The SS removal of Jost is a turning point in Xavier March’s investigation: the cadet’s sudden disappearance shows that the authorities are acting against potential witnesses, and March recognizes that his own questioning may have exposed Jost to danger. The scene changes the cost of inquiry from professional risk to personal responsibility for another man’s fate.

Discovery at the Barracks

March reaches the Sepp Dietrich SS Academy after running there, exhausted and disheveled. His Kripo identification gets him past the sentries, and his appearance is alarming enough that no one stops to question him. In the dormitory, the signs of Jost’s absence are plain: the pillow and blankets are gone, the locker is empty, and only the iron bedstead and hard mattress remain.

A cadet polishing his boots explains that two men came for Jost during the night. They said he was to be sent east for “special training.” Jost left without a word and appeared to have expected them. The cadet reads the removal very differently from March: he is jealous, as are the others, believing Jost has been chosen to see real fighting. The contrast exposes how an unexplained disappearance can be presented as an opportunity to those left behind.

March’s Involvement and Guilt

The disappearance takes on its full meaning as March considers the sequence that preceded it. The Gestapo must have found Jost’s statement in the file concerning Josef Bühler’s death, March reasons, and checked with the academy after learning that March had returned to question him. That inquiry would have sent officials to the barracks; March concludes that his visit was Jost’s death warrant. The account establishes March’s belief about the cause, rather than independently showing who ordered Jost’s removal or what happened to him afterward.

March’s response is not simply fear of the Gestapo. He feels rage at Odilo Globocnik, intensified by guilt, and understands that his pursuit of evidence may have helped expose a witness to lethal retaliation. The phrase that there is no witness anymore condenses the danger into a blunt consequence: a person who might have contributed to the investigation has been taken away, and March sees himself as implicated in that loss.

Consequences for the Investigation

Jost’s removal changes March’s understanding of what it means to keep asking questions. The authorities’ action appears linked to the statement he had given about Bühler’s death, making the witness’s knowledge—and March’s renewed attention to it—dangerous. The event therefore marks a shift from investigation under surveillance to investigation that may bring harm to those who assist it.

The episode also sharpens the novel’s concern with the destruction of witnesses. Later evidence in the investigation reveals the scale of the crime concealed behind official language, while the removal of Jost gives that larger problem an immediate human consequence for March. He does not merely lose a source: he believes his own investigative decision helped place Jost in the authorities’ reach.