Although Fritz Tolm and his wife Kathe play a representative role in established society, their sympathies are often on the side of their children and their friends. The Tolm family, for example, abandons the most difficult problem to the enormously bloated police apparatus, depending on whether the individuals are more likely to belong to the suspects or the vulnerable or even to both categories. This increases compulsively, as the signs pile up, threatening a new stop. But Fritz Tolm achieves a new clarity.