At a small company party, Arthur Pauling wants to say goodbye to his employee Bettina Sandorf, who is to be transferred to Beijing for work. While Arthur Pauling and his colleagues Ella and Hartmut Mosch sit together, Pauling's successor Ernst Streidler plays chess with Sandorf's friend Markus Klammer. The party is abruptly interrupted when Streidler not only loses the game, but collapses dead after slapping Klammer in the face.
