This concluding novel opens in New York City in early October of 1978. World famous concert violinist DIETER BACH is mugged and shot after his third Town Hall recital. His hands are shattered and he is told by his surgeons that he will never be able to play again. His agent, SY GLAZER brings him out of deep depression by suggesting he become a conductor. Dieter clutches at the possibility like a drowning man grasping the proverbial straw. Sy loans Dieter his house on isolated Roanoke Island where he will not be distracted from his preparation for study with the renowned conducting teacher, Richard Lert.

However, at a quasi German restaurant, Dieter meets a brassy, beautiful waitress named SUSAN EVERETTE. (The daughter of Sunday and Horst) They fall deeply in love and Dieter is really looking forward to a resurrected musical career with the love of his life beside him.

Their bliss is destroyed when Horst (Now known as “Charlie” Everette) questions Dieter about his family during their first meeting. Dieter then reveals his full name (Von Hellenbach) and that Elisabeth (who had married Harald Von Hellenbach after Horst’s presumed death) was his mother. “Charlie” (Horst) flees the house in a silent rage, taking Sunday with him. Perplexed and vexed, Susan follows them on her motorcycle. The following morning, Charlie fetches Dieter for a short trip on his boat. When they are out of sight of land, Charlie tells Dieter part of his own story and that Dieter cannot marry Susan— because Dieter is his son!

Dieter is once more thrown into a deep dilemma. He seeks advice from his new mentor, Lert, who advises him to go back home to Germany, confront his parents with the revelation that his real father is still alive, make peace with his family and himself, and get on with his new life and career.

Dieter does go back to Germany, but before he can break the terrible news to his mother, he leafs through her wartime scrapbooks and spots a man in the photographs he doesn’t know. His mother tells him it is OSKAR KNAPP, who was Horst’s most trusted shipmate, and who did not make the final trip because he was in the hospital. Dieter decides to make a trip to Hamburg and look the old sailor up. This he does, ostensibly to learn more about the U-Boat ace who was his real father. Oskar is only to happy to relate the many adventures he and Horst had, and also introduces Dieter to a strange man named RUDI WINTER. Winter is a detective, working in the department that chases down Nazi war criminals. Knowing that Captain Horst Von Hellenbach escaped before the fall of Germany, along with Martin Bormann, Winter has kept track of Dieter for years, hoping that one day Dieter will lead him to his father, Bormann and the stolen gold. How does he know so much? He is the illegitimate son of Edda Winter and Bormann, and is just as clever and ruthless as his infamous father had been. He drugs Dieter with truth serum, but Dieter knows nothing of Bormann’s plot, nor where the gold is. In mock return for Dieter’s cooperation, Winter gives him documents that prove that Harald is indeed his father, not Horst. Overjoyed, and anxious to get back to America to set the record straight and marry his beloved Susan, Dieter, in a weak moment, agrees to take Oskar with him. The old sailor is very anxious to have a reunion with his Captain, long thought dead. What Dieter doesn’t know is that Oskar has been in the employ of Winter all along. The climax comes on Sunday’s trawler. In a fight, both Charlie (Horst) and Oskar lose their lives and Dieter kills Winter. Sunday scuttles her boat (which also carries most of the Nazi gold) directly over the ocean site where Horst’s dead comrades lie, giving her common law husband a true Viking funeral.

Once reunited and married to Susan, Dieter returns once more to Germany to chase away all his ghosts by writing it all down in a long narrative to his agent, Sy Glazer, then returns for a triumphant comeback as a conductor. After a tremendously successful debut with the National Symphony, which Susan cannot attend because she is about to give birth to their child, Dieter boards a plane for Florida -- the tragic Air Florida flight that crashes into the frozen Potomac. He is one of the few survivors and after a long recovery, elects to continue his career in Europe.

In the Epilogue, which is in present time, we learn (through Sy Glazer) what happens in the conclusion of the trilogy: Sy himself, through clues left by Charlie, finds the balance of the gold (which Charlie had hidden away for the inevitable rainy day.) He uses it to finance Sunday’s new boat, a decent life for Dieter and Susan, and to educate Susan’s son, who has become a whopping musical prodigy, and who is doubtlessly going to become the next great American concert pianist. The final scene is the boy’s senior recital, at which all are present; Sunday, Susan, the proud Dieter, plus Sy and his own family. The legend goes on…

Copyright © 2006 by Tom E. Lewis, All rights reserved.