Komödianten des Lebens (1924)

Professor Labori, a distinguished radium researcher based in Lugano, Switzerland, has gone blind as a result of his scientific experiments. His supply of radium has been stolen several times after various scientific lectures, most recently in Turin. Since these thefts have mostly taken place near the Swiss border, the professor assumes he has fallen victim to professional radium smugglers. The police in northern Italy and the border police make little progress with their investigations, so a young and especially dedicated border guard takes the case on. When Labori’s niece Elga and her little brother Fred drive to visit their professor relative, the border guard stops them and searches their car for smuggled radium. The young man immediately falls in love with the young driver. When the border guard turns up at Professor Labori’s house, he at once notices the young Lona, who lives there too. His instincts make him very suspicious of Lona, and he rightly suspects that she is connected with the radium smuggling. The resourceful border guard then discovers that Professor Labori himself committed the radium thefts, and that Lona is his accomplice. It also turns out that Labori has only pretended to be blind so that no one would suspect him of masterminding the radium smuggling. He is just preparing to escape with Lona when the border guard stops him, after their getaway car overturns. Elga, who had been in mortal danger for a time, finally falls into the arms of the man she loves.