Todd felt an instant of deep disappointment. The guy did look a little bit like Albert Einstein, and he did look a little bit like Boris Karloff, but what he looked like more than anything else was one of the seedy old winos that hung around down by the railroad yard. But of course, Todd reminded himself, the man had just gotten up. Todd had seen Denker many times before today (although he had been very careful to make sure that Denker hadnt seen him, no way, Jos), and on his public occasions, Denker looked very natty, every inch an officer in retirement, you might say, even though he was seventysix if the articles Todd had read at the library had his birthdate right. On the days when Todd had shadowed him to the Shoprite where Denker did his shopping or to one of the three movie theaters on the bus lineDenker had no carhe was always dressed in one of three neatly kept suits, no matter how warm the weather. If the weather looked threatening he carried a furled umbrella under one arm like a swagger stick. He sometimes wore a trilby hat. And on the occasions when Denker went out, he was always neatly shaved and his white moustache (worn to conceal an imperfectly corrected harelip) was carefully trimmed. A boy, he said now. His voice was thick and sleepy. Todd saw with new disappointment that his robe was faded and tacky. One rounded collar point stood up at a drunken angle to poke at his wattled neck. There was a splotch of something that might have been chili or possibly A1 Steak Sauce on the left lapel, and he smelled of cigarettes and stale booze. A boy, he repeated. I dont need anything, boy. Read the sign. You can read, cant you? Of course you can. All American boys can read. Dont be a nuisance, boy. Good day. The door began to close. He might have dropped it right there, Todd thought much later on one of the nights when sleep was hard to find. His disappointment at seeing the man for the first time at close range, seeing him with his streetface put awayhanging in the closet, you might say, along with his umbrella and his trilbymight have done it. It could have ended in that moment, the tiny, unimportant snicking sound of the latch cutting off everything that happened later as neatly as a pair of shears. But, as the man himself had observed, he was an American boy, and he had been taught that persistence is a virtue. Dont forget your paper, Mr. Dussander, Todd said, holding the Times out politely. The door stopped dead in its swing, still inches from the jamb. A tight and watchful expression flitted across Kurt Dussanders face and was gone at once. There might have been fear in that expression. It was good, the way he had made that expression disappear, but Todd was disappointed for the third time. He hadnt expected Dussander to be good; he had expected Dussander to be great. Boy, Todd thought with real disgust. Boy oh boy. He pulled the door open again. One hand, bunched with arthritis, unlatched the screen door. The hand pushed the screen door open just enough to wriggle through like a spider and close over the edge of the paper Todd was holding out. The boy saw with distaste that the old mans fingernails were long and yellow and horny. It was a hand that had spent most of its waking hours holding one cigarette after another. Todd thought smoking was a filthy dangerous habit, one he himself would never take up. It really was a wonder that Dussander had lived as long as he had. The old man tugged. Give me my paper. Sure thing, Mr. Dussander. Todd released his hold on the paper. The spiderhand yanked it inside. The screen closed. My name is Denker, the old man said. Not this DooZander. Apparently you cannot read. What a pity. Good day. The door started to close again. Todd spoke rapidly into the narrowing gap. BergenBelsen, January 1943 to June 1943. Auschwitz, June 1943 to June of 1944, Unterkommandant. Patin The door stopped again. The old mans pouched and pallid face hung in the gap like a wrinkled, halfdeflated balloon. Todd smiled. You left Patin just ahead of the Russians. You got to Buenos Aires. Some people say you got rich there, investing the gold you took out of Germany in the drug trade. Whatever, you were in Mexico City from 1950 to 1952. Then Boy, you are crazy like a cuckoo bird. One of the arthritic fingers twirled circles around a misshapen ear. But the toothless mouth was quivering in an infirm, panicky way. From 1952 until 1958, I dont know, Todd said, smiling more widely still. No one does, I guess, or at least theyre not telling. But an Israeli agent spotted you in Cuba, working as the concierge in a big hotel just before Castro took over. They lost you when the rebels came into Havana. You popped up in West Berlin in 1965. They almost got you. He pronounced the last two words as one gotcha. At the same time he squeezed all of his fingers together into one large, wriggling fist. Dussanders eyes dropped to those wellmade and wellnourished American hands, hands that were made for building soapbox racers and Aurora models. Todd had done both. In fact, the year before, he and his dad had built a model of the Titanic. It had taken almost four months, and Todds father kept it in his office. I dont know what you are talking about, Dussander said. Without his false teeth, his words had a mushy sound Todd didnt like. It didnt sound... well, authentic. Colonel Klink on Hogans Heroes sounded more like a Nazi than Dussander did. But in his time he must have been a real whiz. In an article on the deathcamps in Mens Action, the writer had called him The BloodFiend of Patin. Get out of here, boy. Before I call the police. Gee, I guess you better call them, Mr. Dussander. Or Herr Dussander, if you like that better. He continued to smile, showing perfect teeth that had been fluoridated since the beginning of his life and bathed thrice a day in Crest toothpaste for almost as long. After 1965, no one saw you again . . . until I did, two months ago, on the downtown bus. Youre insane. So if you want to call the police, Todd said, smiling, you go right ahead. Ill wait on the stoop. But if you dont want to call them right away, why dont I come in? Well talk. There was a long moment while the old man looked at the smiling boy. Birds twitted in the trees. On the next block a power mower was running, and far off, on busier streets, horns honked out their own rhythm of life and commerce. In spite of everything, Todd felt the onset of doubt. He couldnt be wrong, could he? Was there some mistake on his part? He didnt think so, but this was no schoolroom exercise. It was real life. So he felt a surge of relief (mild relief, he assured himself later) when Dussander said You may come in for a moment, if you like. But only because I do not wish to make trouble for you, you understand? Sure, Mr. Dussander, Todd said. He opened the screen and came into the hall. Dussander closed the door behind them, shutting off the morning. The house smelled stale and slightly malty. It smelled the way Todds own house smelled sometimes the morning after his folks had thrown a party and before his mother had had a chance to air it out. But this smell was worse. It was livedin and groundin. It was liquor, fried food, sweat, old clothes, and some stinky medicinal smell like Vicks or Mentholatum. It was dark in the hallway, and Dussander was standing too close, his head hunched into the collar of his robe like the head of a vulture waiting for some hurt animal to give up the ghost. In that instant, despite the stubble and the loosely hanging flesh, Todd could see the man who had stood inside the black SS uniform more clearly than he had ever seen him on the street. And he felt a sudden lancet of fear slide into his belly. Mild fear, he amended later. I should tell you that if anything happens to me he began, and then Dussander shuffled past him and into the living room, his slippers wishwishing on the floor. He flapped a contemptuous hand at Todd, and Todd felt a flush of hot blood mount into his throat and cheeks. Todd followed him, his smile wavering for the first time. He had not pictured it happening quite like this. But it would work out. Things would come into focus. Of course they would. Things always did. He began to smile again as he stepped into the living room. It was another disappointmentand how!but one he supposed he should have been prepared for. There was of course no oil portrait of Hitler with his forelock dangling and eyes that followed you. No medals in cases, no ceremonial sword mounted on the wall, no Luger or PPK Walther on the mantel (there was, in fact, no mantel). Of course, Todd told himself, the guy would have to be crazy to put any of those things out where people could see them. Still, it was hard to put everything you saw in the movies or on TV out of your head. It looked like the living room of any old man living alone on a slightly frayed pension. The fake fireplace was faced with fake bricks. A Westclox hung over it. There was a black and white Motorola TV on a stand; the tips of the rabbit ears had been wrapped in aluminum foil to improve reception. The floor was covered with a gray rug; its nap was balding. The magazine rack by the sofa held copies of National Geographic, Readers Digest, and the L.A. Times. Instead of Hitler or a ceremonial sword hung on the wall, there was a framed certificate of citizenship and a picture of a woman in a funny hat. Dussander later told him that sort of hat was called a cloche, and they had been popular in the twenties and thirties. My wife, Dussander said sentimentally. She died in 1955 of a lung disease. At that time I was working at the Menschler Motor Works in Essen. I was heartbroken. Todd continued to smile. He crossed the room as if to get a better look at the woman in the picture. Instead of looking at the picture, he fingered the shade on a small tablelamp. Stop that! Dussander barked harshly. Todd jumped back a little. That was good, he said sincerely. Really commanding. It was Use Koch who had the lampshades made out of human skin, wasnt it? And she was the one who had the trick with the little glass tubes. I dont know what youre talking about, Dussander said. There was a package of Kools, the kind with no filter, on top of the TV He offered them to Todd. Cigarette? he asked, and grinned. His grin was hideous. No. They give you lung cancer. My dad used to smoke, but he gave it up. He went to Smokenders. Did he. Dussander produced a wooden match from the pocket of his robe and scratched it indifferently on the plastic case of the Motorola. Puffing, he said Can you give me one reason why I shouldnt call the police and tell them of the monstrous accusations youve just made? One reason? Speak quickly, boy. The telephone is just down the hall. Your father would spank you, I think. You would sit for dinner on a cushion for a week or so, eh? My parents dont believe in spanking. Corporal punishment causes more problems than it cures. Todds eyes suddenly gleamed. Did you spank any of them? The women? Did you take off their clothes and With a muffled exclamation, Dussander started for the phone. Todd said coldly You better not do that. Dussander turned. In measured tones that were spoiled only slightly by the fact that his false teeth were not in, he said I tell you this once, boy, and once only. My name is Arthur Denker. It has never been anything else; it has not even been Americanized. I was in fact named Arthur by my father, who greatly admired the stories of Arthur Conan Doyle. It has never been DooZander, or Himmler, or Father Christmas. I was a reserve lieutenant in the war. I never joined the Nazi party. In the battle of Berlin I fought for three weeks. I will admit that in the late thirties, when I was first married, I supported Hitler. He ended the depression and returned some of the pride we had lost in the aftermath of the sickening and unfair Treaty of Versailles. I suppose I supported him mostly because I got a job and there was tobacco again, and I didnt need to hunt through the gutters when I needed to smoke. I thought, in the late thirties, that he was a great man. In his own way, perhaps he was. But at the end he was mad, directing phantom armies at the whim of an astrologer. He even gave Blondi, his dog, a deathcapsule. The act of a madman; by the end they were all madmen, singing the Horst Wessel Song as they fed poison to their children. On May 2nd, 1945, my regiment gave up to the Americans. I remember that a private soldier named Hackermeyer gave me a chocolate bar. I wept. There was no reason to fight on; the war was over, and really had been since February. I was interned at Essen and was treated very well. We listened to the Nuremberg trials on the radio, and when Goering committed suicide, I traded fourteen American cigarettes for half a bottle of Schnaps and got drunk. When I was released, I put wheels on cars at the Essen Motor Works until 1963, when I retired. Later I emigrated to the United States. To come here was a lifelong ambition. In 1967 I became a citizen. I am an American. I vote. No Buenos Aires. No drug dealing. No Berlin. No Cuba. He pronounced it Kooba. And now, unless you leave, I make my telephone call. He watched Todd do nothing. Then he went down the hall and picked up the telephone. Still Todd stood in the living room, beside the table with the small lamp on it. Dussander began to dial. Todd watched him, his heart speeding up until it was drumming in his chest. After the fourth number, Dussander turned and looked at him. His shoulders sagged. He put the phone down. A boy, he breathed, A boy. Todd smiled widely but rather modestly. How did you find out? One piece of luck and a lot of hard work, Todd said. Theres this friend of mine, Harold Pegler his name is, only all the kids call him Foxy. He plays second base for our team. His dads got all these magazines out in his garage. Great big stacks of them. War magazines. Theyre old. I looked for some new ones, but the guy who runs the newsstand across from the school says most of them went out of business. In most of them theres pictures of krautsGerman soldiers, I meanand Japs torturing these women. And articles about the concentration camps. I really groove on all that concentration camp stuff. You . . . groove on it. Dussander was staring at him, one hand rubbing up and down on his cheek, producing a very small sandpapery sound. Groove. You know. I get off on it. Im interested. He remembered that day in Foxys garage as clearly as anything in his lifemore clearly, he suspected. He remembered in the fifth grade, before Careers Day, how Mrs. Anderson (all the kids called her Bugs because of her big front teeth) had talked to them about what she called finding YOUR GREAT INTEREST. It comes all at once, Bugs Anderson had rhapsodized. You see something for the first time, and right away you know you have found YOUR GREAT INTEREST. Its like a key turning in a lock. Or falling in love for the first time. Thats why Careers Day is so important, childrenit may be the day on which you find YOUR GREAT INTEREST. And she had gone on to tell them about her own GREAT INTEREST, which turned out not to be teaching the fifth grade but collecting nineteenthcentury postcards. Todd had thought Mrs. Anderson was full of bullspit at the time, but that day in Foxys garage, he remembered what she had said and wondered if maybe she hadnt been right after all. The Santa Anas had been blowing that day, and to the east there were brushfires. He remembered the smell of burning, hot and greasy. He remembered Foxys crewcut, and the flakes of Butch Wax clinging to the front of it. He remembered everything. I know theres comics here someplace, Foxy had said. His mother had a hangover and had kicked them out of the house for making too much noise. Neat ones. Theyre Westerns, mostly, but theres some Turok, Son of Stone and What are those? Todd asked, pointing at the bulging cardboard cartons under the stairs. Ah, theyre no good, Foxy said. True war stories, mostly. Boring. Can I look at some? Sure. Ill find the comics. But by the time fat Foxy Pegler found them, Todd no longer wanted to read comics. He was lost. Utterly lost. Its like a key turning in a lock. Or falling in love for the first time. It had been like that. He had known about the war, of coursenot the stupid one going on now, where the Americans had gotten the shit kicked out of them by a bunch of gooks in black pajamasbut World War II. He knew that the Americans wore round helmets with net on them and the krauts wore sort of square ones. He knew that the Americans won most of the battles and that the Germans had invented rockets near the end and shot them from Germany onto London. He had even known something about the concentration camps. The difference between all of that and what he found in the magazines under the stairs in Foxys garage was like the difference between being told about germs and then actually seeing them in a microscope, squirming around and alive. Here was Ilse Koch. Here were crematoriums with their doors standing open on their sootclotted hinges. Here were officers in SS uniforms and prisoners in striped uniforms. The smell of the old pulp magazines was like the smell of the brushfires burning out of control on the east of Santo Donato, and he could feel the old paper crumbling against the pads of his fingers, and he turned the pages, no longer in Foxys garage but caught somewhere crosswise in time, trying to cope with the idea that they had really done those things, that somebody had really done those things, and that somebody had let them do those things, and his head began to ache with a mixture of revulsion and excitement, and his eyes were hot and strained, but he read on, and from a column of print beneath a picture of tangled bodies at a place called Dachau, this figure jumped out at him 6,000,000 And he thought Somebody goofed there, somebody added a zero or two, thats twice as many people as there are in L.A.!But then, in another magazine (the cover of this one showed a woman chained to a wall while a guy in a Nazi uniform approached her with a poker in his hand and a grin on his face), he saw it again 6,000,000. His headache got worse. His mouth went dry. Dimly, from some distance, he heard Foxy saying he had to go in for supper. Todd asked Foxy if he could stay here in the garage and read while Foxy ate. Foxy gave him a look of mild puzzlement, shrugged, and said sure. And Todd read, hunched over the boxes of the old true war magazines, until his mother called and asked if he was ever going to go home. Like a key turning in a lock. All the magazines said it was bad, what had happened. But all the stories were continued at the back of the book, and when you turned to those pages, the words saying it was bad were surrounded by ads, and these ads sold German knives and belts and helmets as well as Magic Trusses and Guaranteed Hair Restorer. These ads sold German flags emblazoned with swastikas and Nazi Lugers and a game called Panzer Attack as well as correspondence lessons and offers to make you rich selling elevator shoes to short men. They said it was bad, but it seemed like a lot of people must not mind. Like falling in love. Oh yes, he remembered that day very well. He remembered everything about ita yellowing pinup calendar for a defunct year on the back wall, the oilstain on the cement floor, the way the magazines had been tied together with orange twine. He remembered how his headache had gotten a little worse each time he thought of that incredible number, 6,000,000. He remembered thinking I want to know about everything that happened in those places. Everything. And I want to know which is more truethewords, or the ads they put beside the words. He remembered Bugs Anderson as he at last pushed the boxes back under the stairs and thought She was right. Ive found my GREAT INTEREST. Dussander looked at Todd for a long time. Then he crossed the living room and sat down heavily in a rocking chair. He looked at Todd again, unable to analyze the slightly dreamy, slightly nostalgic expression on the boys face. Yeah. It was the magazines that got me interested, but I figured a lot of what they said was just, you know, bullspit. So I went to the library and found out a lot more stuff. Some of it was even neater. At first the crummy librarian didnt want me to look at any of it because it was in the adult section of the library, but I told her it was for school. If its for school they have to let you have it. She called my dad, though. Todds eyes turned up scornfully. Like she thought Dad didnt know what I was doing, if you can dig that. He did know? Sure. My dad thinks kids should find out about life as soon as they canthe bad as well as the good. Then theyll be ready for it. He says life is a tiger you have to grab by the tail, and if you dont know the nature of the beast it will eat you up. Mmmm, Dussander said. My mom thinks the same way. Mmmmm. Dussander looked dazed, not quite sure where he was. Anyhow, Todd said, the library stuff was real good. They must have had a hundred books with stuff in them about the Nazi concentration camps, just here in the Santo Donato library. A lot of people must like to read about that stuff. There werent as many pictures as in Foxys dads magazines, but the other stuff was real gooshy. Chairs with spikes sticking up through the seats. Pulling out gold teeth with pliers. Poison gas that came out of the showers. Todd shook his head. You guys just went overboard, you know that? You really did. Gooshy, Dussander said heavily. I really did do a research paper, and you know what I got on it? An Aplus. Of course I had to be careful. You have to write that stuff in a certain way. You got to be careful. Do you? Dussander asked. He took another cigarette with a hand that trembled. Oh yeah. All those library books, they read a certain way. Like the guys who wrote them got puking sick over what they were writing about. Todd was frowning, wrestling with the thought, trying to bring it out. The fact that tone, as that word is applied to writing, wasnt yet in his vocabulary, made it more difficult. They all write like they lost a lot of sleep over it. How weve got to be careful so nothing like that ever happens again. I made my paper like that, and I guess the teacher gave me an A just cause I read the source material without losing my lunch. Once more, Todd smiled winningly. Dussander dragged heavily on his unfiltered Kool. The tip trembled slightly. As he feathered smoke out of his nostrils, he coughed an old mans dank, hollow cough. I can hardly believe this conversation is taking place, he said. He leaned forward and peered closely at Todd. Boy, do you know the word existentialism? Todd ignored the question. Did you ever meet Ilse Koch? Ilse Koch? Almost inaudibly, Dussander said Yes, I met her. Was she beautiful? Todd asked eagerly. I mean . . . His hands described an hourglass in the air. Surely you have seen her photograph? Dussander asked. An aficionado such as yourself? Whats an af ... aff... An aficionado, Dussander said, is one who grooves. One who... gets off on something. Yeah? Cool. Todds grin, puzzled and weak for a moment, shone out triumphantly again. Sure, Ive seen her picture. But you know how they are in those books. He spoke as if Dussander had them all. Black and white, fuzzy . . . just snapshots. None of those guys knew they were taking pictures for, you know, history. Was she really stacked? She was fat and dumpy and she had bad skin, Dussander said shortly. He crushed his cigarette out halfsmoked in a Table Talk piedish filled with dead butts. Oh. Golly. Todds face fell. Just luck, Dussander mused, looking at Todd. You saw my picture in a waradventures magazine and happened to ride next to me on the bus. Tcha! He brought a fist down on the arm of his chair, but without much force. No sir, Mr. Dussander. There was more to it than that. A lot, Todd added earnestly, leaning forward. Oh? Really? The bushy eyebrows rose, signalling polite disbelief. Sure. I mean, the pictures of you in my scrapbook were all thirty years old, at least. I mean, it is 1974. You keep a ... a scrapbook? Oh, yes, sir! Its a good one. Hundreds of pictures. Ill show it to you sometime. Youll go ape. Dussanders face pulled into a revolted grimace, but he said nothing. The first couple of times I saw you, I wasnt sure at all. And then you got on the bus one day when it was raining, and you had this shiny black slicker on That, Dussander breathed. Sure. There was a picture of you in a coat like that in one of the magazines out in Foxys garage. Also, a photo of you in your SS greatcoat in one of the library books. And when I saw you that day, I just said to myself, Its for sure. Thats Kurt Dussander. So I started to shadow you You did what? Shadow you. Follow you. My ambition is to be a private detective like Sam Spade in the books, or Mannix on TV. Anyway, I was super careful. I didnt want you to get wise. Want to look at some pictures? Todd took a foldedover manila envelope from his back pocket. Sweat had stuck the flap down. He peeled it back carefully. His eyes were sparkling like a boy thinking about his birthday, or Christmas, or the firecrackers he will shoot off on the Fourth of July. You took pictures of me? Oh, you bet. I got this little camera. A Kodak. Its thin and flat and fits right into your hand. Once you get the hang of it, you can take pictures of the subject just by holding the camera in your hand and spreading your fingers enough to let the lens peek through. Then you hit the button with your thumb. Todd laughed modestly. I got the hang of it, but I took a lot of pictures of my fingers while I did. I hung right in there, though. I think a person can do anything if they try hard enough, you know it? Its corny but true. Kurt Dussander had begun to look white and ill, shrunken inside his robe. Did you have these pictures finished by a commercial developer, boy? Huh? Todd looked shocked and startled, then contemptuous. No! What do you think I am, stupid? My dads got a darkroom. Ive been developing my own pictures since I was nine. Dussander said nothing, but he relaxed a little and some color came back into his face. Todd handed him several glossy prints, the rough edges confirming that they had been homedeveloped. Dussander went through them, silently grim. Here he was sitting erect in a window seat of the downtown bus, with a copy of the latest James Michener, Centennial, in his hands. Here he was at the Devon Avenue bus stop, his umbrella under his arm and his head cocked back at an angle which suggested De Gaulle at his most imperial. Here he was standing on line just under the marquee of the Majestic Theater, erect and silent, conspicuous among the leaning teenagers and blankfaced housewives in curlers by his height and his bearing. Finally, here he was peering into his own mailbox. I was scared you might see me on that one, Todd said. It was a calculated risk. I was right across the street. Boy oh boy, I wish I could afford a Minolta with a telephoto lens. Someday ... Todd looked wistful. No doubt you had a story ready, just in case. I was going to ask you if youd seen my dog. Anyway, after I developed the pix, I compared them to these. He handed Dussander three Xeroxed photographs. He had seen them all before, many times. The first showed him in his office at the Patin resettlement camp; it had been cropped so nothing showed but him and the Nazi flag on its stand by his desk. The second was a picture that had been taken on the day of his enlistment. The last showed him shaking hands with Heinrich Gluecks, who had been subordinate only to Himmler himself. I was pretty sure then, but I couldnt see if you had the harelip because of your goshdamn moustache. But I had to be sure, so I got this. He handed over the last sheet from his envelope. It had been folded over many times. Dirt was grimed into the creases. The corners were lopped and milledthe way papers get when they spend a long time in the pockets of young boys who have no shortage of things to do and places to go. It was a copy of the Israeli wantsheet on Kurt Dussander. Holding it in his hands, Dussander reflected on corpses that were unquiet and refused to stay buried. I took your fingerprints, Todd said, smiling. And then I did the compares to the one on the sheet. Dussander gaped at him and then uttered the German word for shit. You did not! Sure I did. My mom and dad gave me a fingerprint set for Christmas last year. A real one, not just a toy. It had the powder and three brushes for three different surfaces and special paper for lifting them. My folks know I want to be a PI when I grow up. Of course, they think Ill grow out of it. He dismissed this idea with a disinterested lift and drop of his shoulders. The book explained all about whorls and lands and points of similarity. Theyre called compares. You need eight compares for a fingerprint to get accepted in court. So anyway, one day when you were at the movies, I came here and dusted your mailbox and doorknob and lifted all the prints I could. Pretty smart, huh? Dussander said nothing. He was clutching the arms of his chair, and his toothless, deflated mouth was trembling. Todd didnt like that. It made him look like he was on the verge of tears. That, of course, was ridiculous. The BloodFiend of Patin in tears? You might as well expect Chevrolet to go bankrupt or McDonalds to give up burgers and start selling caviar and truffles. I got two sets of prints, Todd said. One of them didnt look anything like the ones on the wanted poster. I figured those were the postmans. The rest were yours. I found more than eight compares. I found fourteen good ones. He grinned. And thats how I did it. You are a little bastard, Dussander said, and for a moment his eyes shone dangerously. Todd felt a tingling little thrill, as he had in the hall. Then Dussander slumped back again. Whom have you told? No one. Not even this friend? This Cony Pegler? Foxy. Foxy Pegler. Nah, hes a blabbermouth. I havent told anybody. Theres nobody I trust that much. What do you want? Money? There is none, Im afraid. In South America there was, although it was nothing as romantic or dangerous as the drug trade. There isthere wasa kind of old boy network in Brazil and Paraguay and Santo Domingo. Fugitives from the war. I became part of their circle and did modestly well in minerals and orestin, copper, bauxite, Then the changes came. Nationalism, antiAmericanism. I might have ridden out the changes, but then Wiesenthals men caught my scent. Bad luck follows bad luck, boy, like dogs after a bitch in heat. Twice they almost had me; once I heard the Jewbastards in the next room. They hanged Eichmann, he whispered. One hand went to his neck, and his eyes had become as round as the eyes of a child listening to the darkest passage of a scary taleHansel and Gretel, perhaps, or Bluebeard. He was an old man, of no danger to anyone. He was apolitical. Still, they hanged him. Todd nodded. At last, I went to the only people who could help me. They had helped others, and I could run no more. You went to the Odessa? Todd asked eagerly. To the Sicilians, Dussander said dryly, and Todds face fell again. It was arranged. False papers, false past. Would you care for a drink, boy? Sure. You got a Coke? No Coke. He pronounced it Kk. Milk? Milk. Dussander went through the archway and into the kitchen. A fluorescent bar buzzed into life. I live now on stock dividends, his voice came back. Stocks I picked up after the war under yet another name. Through a bank in the State of Maine, if you please. The banker who bought them for me went to jail for murdering his wife a year after I bought them... life is sometimes strange, boy, hein? A refrigerator door opened and closed.


The Sicilian jackals didnt know about those stocks, he said. Today the Sicilians are everywhere, but in those days, Boston was as far north as they could be found. If they had known, they would have had those as well. They would have picked me clean and sent me to America to starve on welfare and food stamps. Todd heard a cupboard door opened; he heard liquid poured into a glass. A little General Motors, a little American Telephone and Telegraph, a hundred and fifty shares of Revlon. All this bankers choices. Dufresne, his name wasI remember, because it sounds a little like mine. It seems he was not so smart at wifekilling as he was at picking growth stocks. The crime passionel, boy. It only proves that all men are donkeys who can read. He came back into the room, slippers whispering. He held two green plastic glasses that looked like the premiums they sometimes gave out at gas station openings. When you filled your tank, you got a free glass. Dussander thrust a glass at Todd. I lived adequately on the stock portfolio this Dufresne had set up for me for the first five years I was here. But then I sold my Diamond Match stock in order to buy this house and a small cottage not far from Big Sur. Then, inflation. Recession. I sold the cottage and one by one I sold the stocks, many of them at fantastic profits. I wish to God I had bought more. But I thought I was wellprotected in other directions; the stocks were, as you Americans say, a flier...  He made a toothless hissing sound and snapped his fingers. Todd was bored. He had not come here to listen to Dussander whine about his money or mutter about his stocks. The thought of blackmailing Dussander had never even crossed Todds mind. Money? What would he do with it? He had his allowance; he had his paper route. If his monetary needs went higher than what these could provide during any given week, there was always someone who needed his lawn mowed. Todd lifted his milk to his lips and then hesitated. His smile shone out again... an admiring smile. He extended the gas station premium glass to Dussander. You have some of it, he said slyly. Dussander stared at him for a moment, uncomprehending, and then rolled his bloodshot eyes. Grss Gott! He took the glass, swallowed twice, and handed it back. No gasping for breath. No clawing at the troat. No smell of bitter almonds. It is milk, boy. Milk. From the Dairylea Farms. On the carton is a picture of a smiling cow. Todd watched him warily for a moment, then took a small sip. Yes, it tasted like milk, sure did, but somehow he didnt feel very thirsty anymore. He put the glass down. Dussander shrugged, raised his own glass, and took a swallow. He smacked his lips over it. Schnaps? Todd asked. Bourbon. Ancient Age. Very nice. And cheap. Todd fiddled his fingers along the seams of his jeans. So, Dussander said, if you have decided to have a flier of your own, you should be aware that you have picked a worthless stock. Huh? Blackmail, Dussander said. Isnt that what they call it on Mannix and Hawaii FiveO and Barnaby Jones? Extortion. If that was what But Todd was laughinghearty, boyish laughter. He shook his head, tried to speak, could not, and went on laughing. No, Dussander said, and suddenly he looked gray and more frightened than he had since he and Todd had begun to speak. He took another large swallow of his drink, grimaced, and shuddered. I see that is not it ... at least, not the extortion of money. But, though you laugh, I smell extortion in it somewhere. What is it? Why do you come here and disturb an old man? Perhaps, as you say, I was once a Nazi. SS, even. Now I am only old, and to have a bowel movement I have to use a suppository. So what do you want? Todd had sobered again. He stared at Dussander with an open and appealing frankness. Why . . . I want to hear about it. Thats all. Thats all I want. Really. Hear about it? Dussander echoed. He looked utterly perplexed. Todd leaned forward, tanned elbows on bluejeaned knees. Sure. The firing squads. The gas chambers. The ovens. The guys who had to dig their own graves and then stand on the ends so theyd fall into them. The ... His tongue came out and wetted his lips. The examinations. The experiments. Everything. All the gooshy stuff. Dussander stared at him with a certain amazed detachment, the way a veterinarian might stare at a cat who was giving birth to a succession of twoheaded kittens. You are a monster, he said softly. Todd sniffed. According to the books I read for my report, youre the monster, Mr. Dussander. Not me. You sent them to the ovens, not me. Two thousand a day at Patin before you came, three thousand after, thirtyfive hundred before the Russians came and made you stop. Himmler called you an efficiency expert and gave you a medal. So you call me a monster. Oh boy. All of that is a filthy American lie, Dussander said, stung. He set his glass down with a bang, slopping bourbon onto his hand and the table. The problem was not of my making, nor was the solution. I was given orders and directives, which I followed. Todds smile widened; it was now almost a smirk. Oh, I know how the Americans have distorted that, Dussander muttered. But your own politicians make our Dr. Goebbels look like a child playing with picture books in a kindergarten. They speak of morality while they douse screaming children and old women in burning napalm. Your draftresisters are called cowards and peaceniks. For refusing to follow orders they are either put in jails or scourged from the country. Those who demonstrate against this countrys unfortunate Asian adventure are clubbed down in the streets. The GI soldiers who kill the innocent are decorated by Presidents, welcomed home from the bayoneting of children and the burning of hospitals with parades and bunting. They are given dinners, Keys to the City, free tickets to pro football games. He toasted his glass in Todds direction. Only those who lose are tried as war criminals for following orders and directives. He drank and then had a coughing fit that brought thin color to his cheeks. Through most of this Todd fidgeted the way he did when his parents discussed whatever had been on the news that nightgood old Walter Klondike, his dad called him. He didnt care about Dussanders politics any more than he cared about Dussanders stocks. His idea was that people made up politics so they could do things. Like when he wanted to feel around under Sharon Ackermans dress last year. Sharon said it was bad for him to want to do that, even though he could tell from her tone of voice that the idea sort of excited her. So he told her he wanted to be a doctor when he grew up and then she let him. That was politics. He wanted to hear about German doctors trying to mate women with dogs, putting identical twins into refrigerators to see whether they would die at the same time or if one of them would last longer, and electroshock therapy, and operations without anesthetic, and German soldiers raping all the women they wanted. The rest was just so much tired bullspit to cover up the gooshy stuff after someone came along and put a stop to it. If I hadnt followed orders, I would have been dead. Dussander was breathing hard, his upper body rocking back and forth in the chair, making the springs squeak. A little cloud of liquorsmell hung around him. There was always the Russian front, nicht wahr? Our leaders were madmen, granted, but does one argue with madmen... especially when the maddest of them all has the luck of Satan. He escaped a brilliant assassination attempt by inches. Those who conspired were strangled with pianowire, strangled slowly. Their deathagonies were filmed for the edification of the elite Yeah! Neat! Todd cried impulsively. Did you see that movie? Yes. I saw. We all saw what happened to those unwilling or unable to run before the wind and wait for the storm to end. What we did then was the right thing. For that time and that place, it was the right thing. I would do it again. But . . . His eyes dropped to his glass. It was empty. ... but I dont wish to speak of it, or even think of it. What we did was motivated only by survival, and nothing about survival is pretty. I had dreams . . . He slowly took a cigarette from the box on the TV. Yes. For years I had them. Blackness, and sounds in the blackness. Tractor engines. Bulldozer engines. Gunbutts thudding against what might have been frozen earth, or human skulls. Whistles, sirens, pistolshots, screams. The doors of cattlecars rumbling open on cold winter afternoons. Then, in my dreams, all sounds would stopand eyes would open in the dark, gleaming like the eyes of animals in a rainforest. For many years I lived on the edge of the jungle, and I suppose that is why it is always the jungle I smelled and felt in those dreams. When I woke from them I would be drenched with sweat, my heart thundering in my chest, my hand stuffed into my mouth to stifle the screams. And I would think The dream is the truth. Brazil, Paraguay, Cuba... those places are the dream. In the reality I am still at Patin. The Russians are closer today than yesterday. Some of them are remembering that in 1943 they had to eat frozen German corpses to stay alive. Now they long to drink hot German blood. There were rumors, boy, that some of them did just that when they crossed into Germany cut the troats of some prisoners and drank their blood out of a boot. I would wake up and think The work must go on, if only so there is no evidence of what we did here, or so little that the world, which doesnt want to believe it, wont have to. I would think The work must go on if we are to survive. Todd listened to this with close attention and great interest. This was pretty good, but he was sure there would be better stuff in the days ahead. All Dussander needed was a little prodding. Heck, he was lucky. Lots of men his age were senile. Dussander dragged deeply on his cigarette. Later, after the dreams went away, there were days when I would think I had seen someone from Patin. Never guards or fellow officers, always inmates. I remember one afternoon in West Germany, ten years ago. There was an accident on the Autobahn. Traffic was frozen in every lane. I sat in my Morris, listening to the radio, waiting for the traffic to move. I looked to my right. There was a very old Simca in the next lane, and the man behind the wheel was looking at me. He was perhaps fifty, and he looked ill. There was a scar on his cheek. His hair was white, short, cut badly. I looked away. The minutes passed and still the traffic didnt move. I began snatching glances at the man in the Simca. Every time I did, he was looking at me, his face as still as death, his eyes sunken in their sockets. I became convinced he had been at Patin. He had been there and he had recognized me. Dussander wiped a hand across his eyes. It was winter. The man was wearing an overcoat. But I was convinced that if I got out of my car and went to him, made him take off his coat and push up his shirtsleeves, I would see the number on his arm. At last the traffic began to move again. I pulled away from the Simca. If the jam had lasted another ten minutes, I believe I would have gotten out of my car and pulled the old man out of his. I would have beaten him, number or no number. I would have beaten him for looking at me that way. Shortly after that, I left Germany forever. Lucky for you, Todd said. Dussander shrugged. It was the same everywhere. Havana, Mexico City, Rome. I was in Rome for three years, you know. I would see a man looking at me over his cappucino in a caf ... a woman in a hotel lobby who seemed more interested in me than in her magazine... a waiter in a restaurant who would keep glancing at me no matter whom he was serving. I would become convinced that these people were studying me, and that night the dream would comethe sounds, the jungle, the eyes. But when I came to America I put it out of my mind. I go to movies. I eat out once a week, always at one of those fastfood places that are so clean and so welllighted by fluorescent bars. Here at my house I do jigsaw puzzles and I read novelsmost of them bad onesand watch TV. At night I drink until Im sleepy. The dreams dont come anymore. When I see someone looking at me in the supermarket or the library or the tobacconists, I think it must be because I look like their grandfather... or an old teacher... or a neighbor in a town they left some years ago. He shook his head at Todd. Whatever happened at Patin, it happened to another man. Not to me. Great! Todd said. I want to hear all about it. Dussanders eyes squeezed closed, and then opened slowly. You dont understand. I do not wish to speak of it. You will, though. If you dont, Ill tell everyone who you are. Dussander stared at him, grayfaced. I knew, he said, that I would find the extortion sooner or later. Today I want to hear about the gas ovens, Todd said. How you baked them after they were dead. His smile beamed out, rich and radiant. But put your teeth in before you start. You look better with your teeth in. Dussander did as he was told. He talked to Todd about the gas ovens until Todd had to go home for lunch. Every time he tried to slip over into generalities, Todd would frown severely and ask him specific questions to get him back on the track. Dussander drank a great deal as he talked. He didnt smile. Todd smiled. Todd smiled enough for both of them. 2 August, 1974. They sat on Dussanders back porch under a cloudless, smiling sky. Todd was wearing jeans, Keds, and his Little League shirt. Dussander was wearing a baggy gray shirt and shapeless khaki pants held up with suspenderswinopants, Todd thought with private contempt; they looked like they had come straight from a box in the back of the Salvation Army store downtown. He was really going to have to do something about the way Dussander dressed when he was at home. It spoiled some of the fun. The two of them were eating Big Macs that Todd had brought in his bikebasket, pedaling fast so they wouldnt get cold. Todd was sipping a Coke through a plastic straw. Dussander had a glass of bourbon. His old mans voice rose and fell, papery, hesitant, sometimes nearly inaudible. His faded blue eyes, threaded with the usual snaps of red, were never still. An observer might have thought them grandfather and grandson, the latter perhaps attending some rite of passage, a handing down. And thats all I remember, Dussander finished presently, and took a large bite of his sandwich. McDonalds Secret Sauce dribbled down his chin. You can do better than that, Todd said softly. Dussander took a large swallow from his glass. The uniforms were made of paper, he said finally, almost snarling. When one inmate died, the uniform was passed on if it could still be worn. Sometimes one paper uniform could dress as many as forty inmates. I received high marks for my frugality. From Gluecks? From Himmler. But there was a clothing factory in Patin. You told me that just last week. Why didnt you have the uniforms made there? The inmates themselves could have made them. The job of the factory in Patin was to make uniforms for German soldiers. And as for us ... Dussanders voice faltered for a moment, and then he forced himself to go on. We were not in the business of rehabilitation, he finished. Todd smiled his broad smile. Enough for today? Please? My throat is sore. You shouldnt smoke so much, then, Todd said, continuing to smile. Tell me some more about the uniforms. Which? Inmate or SS? Dussanders voice was resigned. Smiling, Todd said Both. 3 September, 1974. Todd was in the kitchen of his house, making himself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. You got to the kitchen by going up half a dozen redwood steps to a raised area that gleamed with chrome and stainless steel. His mothers electric typewriter had been going steadily ever since Todd had gotten home from school. She was typing a masters thesis for a grad student. The grad student had short hair, wore thick glasses, and looked like a creature from outer space, in Todds humble opinion. The thesis was on the effect of fruitflies in the Salinas Valley after World War II, or some good shit like that. Now her typewriter stopped and she came out of her office. Toddbaby, she greeted him. Monicababy, he hailed back, amiably enough. His mother wasnt a badlooking chick for thirtysix, Todd thought; blonde hair that was streaked ash in a couple of places, tall, shapely, now dressed in dark red shorts and a sheer blouse of a warm whiskey colorthe blouse was casually knotted below her breasts, putting her flat, unlined midriff on show. A typewriter eraser was tucked into her hair, which had been pinned carelessly back with a turquoise clip. So hows school? she asked him, coming up the steps into the kitchen. She brushed his lips casually with hers and then slid onto one of the stools in front of the breakfast counter. Schools cool. Going to be on the honor roll again? Sure. Actually, he thought his grades might slip a notch this first quarter. He had been spending a lot of time with Dussander, and when he wasnt actually with the old kraut, he was thinking about the things Dussander had told him. Once or twice he had dreamed about the things Dussander had told him. But it was nothing he couldnt handle. Apt pupil, she said, ruffling his shaggy blonde hair. Hows that sandwich? Good, he said. Would you make me one and bring it into my office? Cant, he said, getting up. I promised Mr. Denker Id come over and read to him for an hour or so. Are you still on Robinson Crusoe? Nope. He showed her the spine of a thick book he had bought in a junkshop for twenty cents. Tom Jones. Ye gods and little fishes! Itll take you the whole schoolyear to get through that, Toddybaby. Couldnt you at least find an abridged edition, like with Crusoe? Probably, but he wanted to hear all of this one. He said so. Oh. She looked at him for a moment, then hugged him. It was rare for her to be so demonstrative, and it made Todd a little uneasy. Youre a peach to be taking so much of your spare time to read to him. Your father and I think its just . . . just exceptional. Todd cast his eyes down modestly. And to not want to tell anybody, she said. Hiding your light under a bushel. Oh, the kids I hang around withtheyd probably think I was some kind of weirdo, Todd said, smiling modestly down at the floor. All that good shit. Dont say that, she admonished absently. Then Do you think Mr. Denker would like to come over and have dinner with us some night? Maybe, Todd said vaguely. Listen, I gotta put an egg in my shoe and beat it. Okay. Supper at sixthirty. Dont forget. I wont. Your fathers got to work late so itll just be me and thee again, okay? Crazy, baby. She watched him go with a fond smile, hoping there was nothing in Tom Jones he shouldnt be reading; he was only thirteen. She didnt suppose there was. He was growing up in a society where magazines like Penthouse were available to anyone with a dollar and a quarter, or to any kid who could reach up to the top shelf of the magazine rack and grab a quick peek before the clerk could shout for him to put that up and get lost. In a society that seemed to believe most of all in the creed of hump thy neighbor, she didnt think there could be much in a book two hundred years old to screw up Todds headalthough she supposed the old man might get off on it a little. And as Richard liked to say, for a kid the whole worlds a laboratory. You have to let them poke around in it. And if the kid in question has a healthy home life and loving parents, hell be all the stronger for having knocked around a few strange corners. And there went the healthiest kid she knew, pedaling up the street on his Schwinn. We did okay by the lad, she thought, turning to make her sandwich. Damned if we didnt do okay. 4 October, 1974. Dussander had lost weight. They sat in the kitchen, the shopworn copy of Tom Jones between them on the oilclothcovered table (Todd, who tried never to miss a trick, had purchased the Cliffs Notes on the book with part of his allowance and had carefully read the entire summary against the possibility that his mother or father might ask him questions about the plot). Todd was eating a Ring Ding he had bought at the market. He had bought one for Dussander, but Dussander hadnt touched it. He only looked at it morosely from time to time as he drank his bourbon. Todd hated to see anything as tasty as Ring Dings go to waste. If he didnt eat it pretty quick, Todd was going to ask him if he could have it. So how did the stuff get to Patin? he asked Dussander. In railroad cars, Dussander said. In railroad cars labelled MEDICAL SUPPLIES. It came in long crates that looked like coffins. Fitting, I suppose. The inmates offloaded the crates and stacked them in the infirmary. Later, our own men stacked them in the storage sheds. They did it at night. The storage sheds were behind the showers. Was it always ZyklonB? No, from time to time we would be sent something else. Experimental gases. The High Command was always interested in improving efficiency. Once they sent us a gas codenamed PEGASUS. A nervegas. Thank God they never sent it again. It Dussander saw Todd lean forward, saw those eyes sharpen, and he suddenly stopped and gestured casually with his gas station premium glass. It didnt work very well, he said. It was... quite boring. But Todd was not fooled, not in the least. What did it do? It killed themwhat did you think it did, made them walk on water? It killed them, thats all. Tell me. No, Dussander said, now unable to hide the horror he felt. He hadnt thought of PEGASUS in ... how long? Ten years? Twenty? I wont tell you! I refuse! Tell me, Todd repeated, licking chocolate icing from his fingers. Tell me or you know what. Yes, Dussander thought. I know what. Indeed I do, you putrid little monster. It made them dance, he said reluctantly. Dance? Like the ZyklonB, it came in through the showerheads. And they... they began to leap about. Some were screaming. Most of them were laughing. They began to vomit, and to ... to defecate helplessly. Wow, Todd said. Shit themselves, huh? He pointed at the Ring Ding on Dussanders plate. He had finished his own. You going to eat that? Dussander didnt reply. His eyes were hazed with memory. His face was far away and cold, like the dark side of a planet which does not rotate. Inside his mind he felt the queerest combination of revulsion andcould it be?nostalgia? They began to twitch all over and to make high, strange sounds in their throats. My men... they called PEGASUS the Yodeling Gas. At last they all collapsed and just lay there on the floor in their own filth, they lay there, yes, they lay there on the concrete, screaming and yodeling, with bloody noses. But I lied, boy. The gas didnt kill them, either because it wasnt strong enough or because we couldnt bring ourselves to wait long enough. I suppose it was that. Men and women like that could not have lived long. Finally I sent in five men with rifles to end their agonies. It would have looked bad on my record if it had shown up, Ive no doubt of thatit would have looked like a waste of cartridges at a time when the Fuehrer had declared every cartridge a national resource. But those five men I trusted. There were times, boy, when I thought I would never forget the sound they made. The yodeling sound. The laughing. Yeah, I bet, Todd said. He finished Dussanders Ring Ding in two bites. Waste not, want not, Todds mother said on the rare occasions when Todd complained about leftovers. That was a good story, Mr. Dussander. You always tell them good. Once I get you going. Todd smiled at him. And incrediblycertainly not because he wanted toDussander found himself smiling back. 5 November, 1974. Dick Bowden, Todds father, looked remarkably like a movie and TV actor named Lloyd Bochner. HeBowden. not Bochnerwas thirtyeight. He was a thin, narrow man who liked to dress in Ivy Leaguestyle shirts and solidcolor suits, usually dark. When he was on a construction site, he wore khakis and a hardhat that was a souvenir of his Peace Corps days, when he had helped to design and build two dams in Africa. When he was working in his study at home, he wore halfglasses that had a way of slipping down to the end of his nose and making him look like a college dean. He was wearing these glasses now as he tapped his sons firstquarter report card against his desks gleaming glass top. One B. Four Cs. One D. A D, for Christs sake! Todd, your mothers not showing it, but shes really upset. Todd dropped his eyes. He didnt smile. When his dad swore, that wasnt exactly the best of news. My God, youve never gotten a report like this. A D in Beginning Algebra? What is this? I dont know, Dad. He looked humbly at his knees. Your mother and I think that maybe youve been spending a little too much time with Mr. Denker. Not hitting the books enough. We think you ought to cut it down to weekends, slugger. At least until we see where youre going academically . . . Todd looked up, and for a single second Bowden thought he saw a wild, pallid anger in his sons eyes. His own eyes widened, his fingers clenched on Todds buffcolored report card... and then it was just Todd, looking at him openly if rather unhappily. Had that anger really been there? Surely not. But the moment had unsettled him, made it hard for him to know exactly how to proceed. Todd hadnt been mad, and Dick Bowden didnt want to make him mad. He and his son were friends, always had been friends, and Dick wanted things to stay that way. They had no secrets from each other, none at all (except for the fact that Dick Bowden was sometimes unfaithful with his secretary, but that wasnt exactly the sort of thing you told your thirteenyearold son, was it? ... and besides, that had absolutely no bearing on his home life, his family life). That was the way it was supposed to be, the way it had to be in a cockamamie world where murderers went unpunished, high school kids skinpopped heroin, and junior high schoolerskids Todds ageturned up with VD. No, Dad, please dont do that. I mean, dont punish Mr. Denker for something thats my fault. I mean, hed be lost without me. Ill do better. Really. That algebra... it just threw me to start with. But I went over to Ben Tremaines, and after we studied together for a few days, I started to get it. I just . . . I dunno, I sorta choked at first. I think youre spending too much time with him, Bowden said, but he was weakening. It was hard to refuse Todd, hard to disappoint him, and what he said about punishing the old man for Todds fallingoff... goddammit, it made sense. The old man looked forward to his visits so much. That Mr. Storrman, the algebra teacher, is really hard, Todd said. Lots of kids got Ds. Three or four got Fs. Bowden nodded thoughtfully. I wont go Wednesdays anymore. Not until I bring my grades up. He had read his fathers eyes. And instead of going out for anything at school, Ill stay after every day and study. I promise. You really like the old guy that much? Hes really neat, Todd said sincerely. Well . . . okay. Well try it your way, slugger. But I want to see a big improvement in your marks come January, you understand me? Im thinking of your future. You may think junior highs too soon to start thinking about that, but its not. Not by a long chalk. As his mother liked to say Waste not, want not, so Dick Bowden liked to say Not by a long chalk. I understand, Dad, Todd said gravely. Mantoman stuff. Get out of here and give those books a workout then. He pushed his halfglasses up on his nose and clapped Todd on the shoulder. Todds smile, broad and bright, broke across his face. Right on, Dad! Bowden watched Todd go with a prideful smile of his own. One in a million. And that hadnt been anger on Todds face. For sure. Pique, maybe... but not that highvoltage emotion he had at first thought hed seen there. If Todd was that mad, he would have known; he could read his son like a book. It had always been that way. Whistling, his fatherly duty discharged, Dick Bowden unrolled a blueprint and bent over it. 6 December, 1974. The face that came in answer to Todds insistent finger on the bell was haggard and yellowed. The hair, which had been lush in July, had now begun to recede from the bony brow; it looked lusterless and brittle. Dussanders body, thin to begin with, was now gaunt... although, Todd thought, he was nowhere near as gaunt as the inmates who had once been delivered into his hands. Todds left hand had been behind his back when Dussander came to the door. Now he brought it out and handed a wrapped package to Dussander. Merry Christmas! he yelled. Dussander had cringed from the box; now he took it with no expression of pleasure or surprise. He handled it gingerly, as if it might contain explosive. Beyond the porch, it was raining. It had been raining off and on for almost a week, and Todd had carried the box inside his coat. It was wrapped in gay foil and ribbon. What is it? Dussander asked without enthusiasm as they went to the kitchen. Open it and see. Todd took a can of Coke from his jacket pocket and put it on the red and white checked oilcloth that covered the kitchen table. Better pull down the shades, he said confidentially. Distrust immediately leaked onto Dussanders face. Oh? Why? Well . . . you can never tell whos lookin, Todd said, smiling. Isnt that how you got along all those years? By seeing the people who might be lookin before they saw you? Dussander pulled down the kitchen shades. Then he poured himself a glass of bourbon. Then he pulled the bow off the package. Todd had wrapped it the way boys so often wrap Christmas packagesboys who have more important things on their minds, things like football and street hockey and the Friday Nite Creature Feature youll watch with a friend whos sleeping over, the two of you wrapped in a blanket and crammed together on one end of the couch, laughing. There were a lot of ragged corners, a lot of uneven seams, a lot of Scotch tape. It spoke of impatience with such a womanly thing. Dussander was a little touched in spite of himself. And later, when the horror had receded a little, he thought I should have known. It was a uniform. An SS uniform. Complete with jackboots. He looked numbly from the contents of the box to its cardboard cover PETERS QUALITY COSTUME CLOTHIERSAT THE SAME LOCATION SINCE 1951! No, he said softly. I wont put it on. This is where it ends, boy. Ill die before I put it on. Remember what they did to Eichmann, Todd said solemnly. He was an old man and he had no politics. Isnt that what you said? Besides, I saved the whole fall for it. It cost over eighty bucks, with the boots thrown in. You didnt mind wearing it in 1944, either. Not at all. You little bastard! Dussander raised one fist over his head. Todd didnt flinch at all. He stood his ground, eyes shining. Yeah, he said softly. Go ahead and touch me. You just touch me once. Dussander lowered the hand. His lips were quivering. You are a fiend from hell, he muttered. Put it on, Todd invited. Dussanders hands went to the tie of his robe and paused there. His eyes, sheeplike and begging, looked into Todds. Please, he said. I am an old man. No more. Todd shook his head slowly but firmly. His eyes were still shining. He liked it when Dussander begged. The way they must have begged him once. The inmates at Patin. Dussander let the robe fall to the floor and stood naked except for his slippers and his boxer shorts. His chest was sunken, his belly slightly bloated. His arms were scrawny old mans arms. But the uniform, Todd thought. The uniform will make a difference. Slowly, Dussander took the tunic out of the box and began to put it on. Ten minutes later he stood fully dressed in the SS uniform. The Cap was slightly askew, the shoulders slumped, but still the deathshead insignia stood out clearly.


Dussander had a dark dignityat least in Todds eyesthat he had not possessed earlier. In spite of his slump, in spite of the cockeyed angle of his feet, Todd was pleased. For the first time Dussander looked to Todd as Todd believed he should look. Older, yes. Defeated, certainly. But in uniform again. Not an old man spinning away his sunset years watching Lawrence Welk on a cruddy black and white TV with tinfoil on the rabbit ears, but Kurt Dussander, The BloodFiend of Patin. As for Dussander, he felt disgust, discomfort... and a mild, sneaking sense of relief. He partly despised this latter emotion, recognizing it as the truest indicator yet of the psychological domination the boy had established over him. He was the boys prisoner, and every time he found he could live through yet another indignity, every time he felt that mild relief, the boys power grew. And yet he was relieved. It was only cloth and buttons and snaps . . . and it was a sham at that. The fly was a zipper; it should have been buttons. The marks of rank were wrong, the tailoring sloppy, the boots a cheap grade of imitation leather. It was only a trumpery uniform after all, and it wasnt exactly killing him, was it? No. It Straighten your cap! Todd said loudly. Dussander blinked at him, startled. Straighten your cap, soldier! Dussander did so, unconsciously giving it that final small insolent twist that had been the trademark of his Oberleutnants and, sadly wrong as it was, this was an Oberleutnants uniform. Get those feet together! He did so, bringing the heels together with a smart rap, doing the correct thing with hardly a thought, doing it as if the intervening years had slipped off along with his bathrobe. Achtung! He snapped to attention, and for a moment Todd was scaredreally scared. He felt like the sorcerers apprentice, who had brought the brooms to life but who had not possessed enough wit to stop them once they got started. The old man living in genteel poverty was gone. Dussander was here. Then his fear was replaced by a tingling sense of power. About face! Dussander pivoted neatly, the bourbon forgotten, the torment of the last four months forgotten. He heard his heels click together again as he faced the greasesplattered stove. Beyond it, he could see the dusty parade ground of the military academy where he had learned his soldiers trade. About face! He whirled again, this time not executing the order as well, losing his balance a little. Once it would have been ten demerits and the butt of a swagger stick in his belly, sending his breath out in a hot and agonized gust. Inwardly he smiled a little. The boy didnt know all the tricks. No indeed. Now march! Todd cried. His eyes were hot, glowing. The iron went out of Dussanders shoulders; he slumped forward again. No, he said. Please March! March! March, I said! With a strangled sound, Dussander began to goosestep across the faded linoleum of his kitchen floor. He rightfaced to avoid the table, rightfaced again as he approached the wall. His face was uptilted slightly, expressionless. His legs rammed out before him, then crashed down, making the cheap china rattle in the cabinet over the sink. His arms moved in short arcs. The image of the walking brooms recurred to Todd, and his fright recurred with it. It suddenly struck him that he didnt want Dussander to be enjoying any part of this, and that perhapsjust perhapshe had wanted to make Dussander appear ludicrous even more than he had wanted to make him appear authentic. But somehow, despite the mans age and the cheap dimestore furnishings of the kitchen, he didnt look ludicrous in the least. He looked frightening. For the first time the corpses in the ditches and the crematoriums seemed to take on their own reality for Todd. The photographs of the tangled arms and legs and torsos, fishbelly white in the cold spring rains of Germany, were not something staged like a scene in a horror filma pile of bodies created from departmentstore dummies, say, to be picked up by the grips and propmen when the scene was donebut simply a real fact, stupendous and inexplicable and evil. For a moment it seemed to him that he could smell the bland and slightly smoky odor of decomposition. Terror gathered him in. Stop! he shouted. Dussander continued to goosestep, his eyes blank and far away. His head had come up even more, pulling the scrawny chickentendons of his throat tight, tilting his chin at an arrogant angle. His nose, bladethin, jutted obscenely. Todd felt sweat in his armpits. Halt! he cried out. Dussander halted, right foot forward, left coming up and then down beside the right with a single pistonlike stamp. For a moment the cold lack of expression held on his facerobotic, mindlessand then it was replaced by confusion. Confusion was followed by defeat. He slumped. Todd let out a silent breath of relief and for a moment he was furious with himself. Whos in charge here, anyway? Then his selfconfidence flooded back in. I am, thats who. And he better not forget it. He began to smile again. Pretty good. But with a little practice, I think youll be a lot better. Dussander stood mute, panting, his head hanging. You can take it off now, Todd added generously... and couldnt help wondering if he really wanted Dussander to put it on again. For a few seconds there 7 January, 1975. Todd left school by himself after the last bell, got his bike, and pedaled down to the park. He found a deserted bench, set his Schwinn up on its kickstand, and took his report card out of his hip pocket. He took a look around to see if there was anyone in the area he knew, but the only other people in sight were two high school kids making out by the pond and a pair of grosslooking winos passing a paper bag back and forth. Dirty fucking winos, he thought, but it wasnt the winos that had upset him. He opened his card. English C. American History C. Earth Science D. Your Community and You B. Primary French F. Beginning Algebra F. He stared at the grades, unbelieving. He had known it was going to be bad, but this was disaster. Maybe thats best, an inner voice spoke up suddenly. Maybe you even did it on purpose, because a part of you wants it to end. Needs for it to end. Before something bad happens. He shoved the thought roughly aside. Nothing bad was going to happen. Dussander was under his thumb. Totally under his thumb. The old man thought one of Todds friends had a letter, but he didnt know which friend. If anything happened to Toddanythingthat letter would go to the police. Once he supposed Dussander might have tried it anyway. Now he was too old to run, even with a head start. Hes under control, dammit, Todd whispered, and then pounded his thigh hard enough to make the muscle knot. Talking to yourself was bad shitcrazy people talked to themselves. He had picked up the habit over the last six weeks or so, and didnt seem able to break it. Hed caught several people looking at him strangely because of it. A couple of them had been teachers. And that asshole Bernie Everson had come right out and asked him if he was going fruitcrackers. Todd had come very, very close to punching the little pansy in the mouth, and that sort of stuffbrawls, scuffles, punchoutswas no good. That sort of stuff got you noticed in all the wrong ways. Talking to yourself was bad, right, okay, but The dreams are bad, too, he whispered. He didnt catch himself that time. Just lately the dreams had been very bad. In the dreams he was always in uniform, although the type varied. Sometimes it was a paper uniform and he was standing in line with hundreds of gaunt men; the smell of burning was in the air and he could hear the choppy roar of bulldozer engines. Then Dussander would come up the line, pointing out this one or that one. They were left. The others were marched away toward the crematoriums. Some of them kicked and struggled, but most were too undernourished, too exhausted. Then Dussander was standing in front of Todd. Their eyes met for a long, paralyzing moment, and then Dussander levelled a faded umbrella at Todd. Take this one to the laboratories, Dussander said in the dream. His lip curled back to reveal his false teeth. Take this American boy. In another dream he wore an SS uniform. His jackboots were shined to a mirrorlike reflecting surface The deathshead insignia and the lightningbolts glittered. But he was standing in the middle of Santo Donato Boulevard and everyone was looking at him. They began to point. Some of them began to laugh. Others looked shocked, angry, or revolted. In this dream an old car came to a squalling, creaky halt and Dussander peered out at him, a Dussander who looked two hundred years old and nearly mummified, his skin a yellowed scroll. I know you! the dreamDussander proclaimed shrilly. He looked around at the spectators and then back to Todd. You were in charge at Patin! Look, everybody! This is The BloodFiend of Patin! Himmlers Efficiency Expert! I denounce you, murderer! I denounce you, butcher! I denounce you, killer of infants! I denounce you! In yet another dream he wore a striped convicts uniform and was being led down a stonewalled corridor by two guards who looked like his parents. Both wore conspicuous yellow armbands with the Star of David on them. Walking behind them was a minister, reading from the Book of Deuteronomy. Todd looked back over his shoulder and saw that the minister was Dussander, and he was wearing the black tunic of an SS officer. At the end of the stone corridor, double doors opened on an octagonal room with glass walls. There was a scaffold in the center of it. Behind the glass walls stood ranks of emaciated men and women, all naked, all watching with the same dark, flat expression. On each arm was a blue number. Its all right, Todd whispered to himself. Its okay, really, everythings under control. The couple that had been making out glanced over at him. Todd stared at them fiercely, daring them to say anything. At last they looked back the other way. Had the boy been grinning ? Todd got up, jammed his report card into his hip pocket, and mounted his bike. He pedaled down to a drugstore two blocks away. There he bought a bottle of ink eradicator and a finepoint pen that dispensed blue ink. He went back to the park (the makeout couple was gone, but the winos were still there, stinking the place up) and changed his English grade to a B, American History to A, Earth Science to B, Primary French to C, and Beginning Algebra to B. Your community and You he eradicated and then simply wrote in again, so the card would have a uniform look. Uniforms, right. Never mind, he whispered to himself. Thatll hold them. Thatll hold them, all right. One night late in the month, sometime after two oclock, Kurt Dussander awoke struggling with the bedclothes, gasping and moaning, into a darkness that seemed close and terrifying. He felt halfsuffocated, paralyzed with fear. It was as if a heavy stone lay on his chest, and he wondered if he could be having a heart attack. He clawed in the darkness for the bedside lamp and almost knocked it off the nightstand turning it on. Im in my own room, he thought, my own bedroom, here in Santo Donato, here in California, here in America. See, the same brown drapes pulled across the same window, the same bookshelves filled with dime paperbacks from the bookshop on Soren Street, same gray rug, same blue wallpaper. No heart attack. No jungle. No eyes. But the terror still clung to him like a stinking pelt, and his heart went on racing. The dream had come back. He had known that it would, sooner or later, if the boy kept on. The cursed boy. He thought the boys letter of protection was only a bluff, and not a very good one at that; something he had picked up from the TV detective programs. What friend would the boy trust not to open such a momentous letter? No friend, that was who. Or so he thought. If he could be sureHis hands closed with an arthritic, painful snap and then opened slowly. He took the packet of cigarettes from the table and lit one, scratching the wooden match on the bedpost. The clocks hands stood at 241. There would be no more sleep for him this night. He inhaled smoke and then coughed it out in a series of racking spasms. No more sleep unless he wanted to go downstairs and have a drink or two. Or three. And there had been altogether too much drinking over the last six weeks or so. He was no longer a young man who could toss them off one after the other, the way he had when he had been an officer on leave in Berlin in 39, when the scent of victory had been in the air and everywhere you heard the Fuehrers voice, saw his blazing, commanding eyes The boy . . . the cursed boy! Be honest, he said aloud, and the sound of his own voice in the quiet room made him jump a little. He was not in the habit of talking to himself, but neither was it the first time he had ever done so. He remembered doing it off and on during the last few weeks at Patin, when everything had come down around their ears and in the east the sound of Russian thunder grew louder first every day and then every hour. It had been natural enough to talk to himself then. He had been under stress, and people under stress often do strange thingscup their testicles through the pockets of their pants, click their teeth together . . . Wolff had been a great teethclicker. He grinned as he did it. Huffmann had been a fingersnapper and a thighpatter, creating fast, intricate rhythms that he seemed utterly unaware of. He, Kurt Dussander, had sometimes talked to himself. But now You are under stress again, he said aloud. He was aware that he had spoken in German this time. He hadnt spoken German in many years, but the language now seemed warm and comfortable. It lulled him, eased him. It was sweet and dark. Yes. You are under stress. Because of the boy. But be honest with yourself. It is too early in the morning to tell lies. You have not entirely regretted talking. At first you were terrified that the boy could not or would not keep his secret. He would have to tell a friend, who would tell another friend, and that friend would tell two. But if he has kept it this long, he will keep it longer. If I am taken away, he loses his . . . his talking book. Is that what I am to him? I think so. He fell silent, but his thoughts went on. He had been lonelyno one would ever know just how lonely. There had been times when he thought almost seriously of suicide. He made a bad hermit. The voices he heard came from the radio. The only people who visited were on the other side of a dirty glass square. He was an old man, and although he was afraid of death, he was more afraid of being an old man who is alone. His bladder sometimes tricked him. He would be halfway to the bathroom when a dark stain spread on his pants. In wet weather his joints would first throb and then begin to cry out, and there had been days when he had chewed an entire tin of Arthritis Pain Formula between sunrise and sunset . . . and still the aspirin only subdued the aches. Even such acts as taking a book from the shelf or switching the TV channel became an essay in pain. His eyes were bad; sometimes he knocked things over, barked his shins, bumped his head. He lived in fear of breaking a bone and not being able to get to the telephone, and he lived in fear of getting there and having some doctor uncover his real past as he became suspicious of Mr. Denkers nonexistent medical history. The boy had alleviated some of those things. When the boy was here, he could call back the old days. His memory of those days was perversely clear; he spilled out a seemingly endless catalogue of names and events, even the weather of such and such a day. He remembered Private Henreid, who manned a machinegun in the northeast tower and the wen Private Henreid had had between his eyes. Some of the men called him ThreeEyes, or Old Cyclops. He remembered Kessel, who had a picture of his girlfriend naked, lying on a sofa with her hands behind her head. Kessel charged the men to look at it. He remembered the names of the doctors and their experimentsthresholds of pain, the brainwaves of dying men and women, physiological retardation, effects of different sorts of radiation, dozens more. Hundreds more. He supposed he talked to the boy as all old men talk, but he guessed he was luckier than most old men, who had impatience, disinterest, or outright rudeness for an audience. His audience was endlessly fascinated. Were a few bad dreams too high a price to pay? He crushed out his cigarette, lay looking at the ceiling for a moment, and then swung his feet out onto the floor. He and the boy were loathsome, he supposed, feeding off each other ... eating each other. If his own belly was sometimes sour with the dark but rich food they partook of in his afternoon kitchen, what was the boys like? Did he sleep well? Perhaps not. Lately Dussander thought the boy looked rather pale, and thinner than when he had first come into Dussanders life. He walked across the bedroom and opened the closet door. He brushed hangers to the right, reached into the shadows, and brought out the sham uniform. It hung from his hand like a vultureskin. He touched it with his other hand. Touched it ... and then stroked it. After a very long time he took it down and put it on, dressing slowly, not looking into the mirror until the uniform was completely buttoned and belted (and the sham fly zipped). He looked at himself in the mirror, then, and nodded. He went back to bed, lay down, and smoked another cigarette. When it was finished, he felt sleepy again. He turned off the bedlamp, not believing it, that it could be this easy. But he was asleep, five minutes later, and this time his sleep was dreamless. 8 February, 1975. After dinner, Dick Bowden produced a cognac that Dussander privately thought dreadful. But of course he smiled broadly and complimented it extravagantly. Bowdens wife served the boy a chocolate malted. The boy had been unusually quiet all through the meal. Uneasy? Yes. For some reason the boy seemed very uneasy. Dussander had charmed Dick and Monica Bowden from the moment he and the boy had arrived. The boy had told his parents that Mr. Denkers vision was much worse than it actually was (which made poor old Mr. Denker in need of a Seeing Eye Dog, Dussander thought dryly), because that explained all the reading the boy had supposedly been doing. Dussander had been very careful about that, and he thought there had been no slips. He was dressed in his best suit, and although the evening was damp, his arthritis had been remarkably mellownothing but an occasional twinge. For some absurd reason the boy had wanted him to leave his umbrella home, but Dussander had insisted. All in all, he had had a pleasant and rather exciting evening. Dreadful cognac or no, he had not been out to dinner in nine years. During the meal he had discussed the Essen Motor Works, the rebuilding of postwar GermanyBowden had asked several intelligent questions about that, and had seemed impressed by Dussanders answersand German writers. Monica Bowden had asked him how he had happened to come to America so late in life and Dussander, adopting the proper expression of myopic sorrow, had explained about the death of his fictitious wife. Monica Bowden was meltingly sympathetic. And now, over the absurd cognac, Dick Bowden said If this is too personal, Mr. Denker, please dont answer . . . but I couldnt help wondering what you did in the war. The boy stiffened ever so slightly. Dussander smiled and felt for his cigarettes. He could see them perfectly well, but it was important to make not the tiniest slip. Monica put them in his hand. Thank you, dear lady. The meal was superb. You are a fine cook. My own wife never did better. Monica thanked him and looked flustered. Todd gave her an irritated look. Not personal at all, Dussander said, lighting his cigarette and turning to Bowden. I was in the reserves from 1943 on, as were all ablebodied men too old to be in the active services. By then the handwriting was on the wall for the Third Reich, and for the madmen who created it. One madman in particular, of course. He blew out his match and looked solemn. There was great relief when the tide turned against Hitler. Great relief. Of course, and here he looked at Bowden disarmingly, as man to man, one was careful not to express such a sentiment. Not aloud. I suppose not, Dick Bowden said respectfully. No, Dussander said gravely. Not aloud. I remember one evening when four or five of us, all friends, stopped at a local Ratskeller after work for a drinkby then there was not always Schnaps. or even beer, but it so happened that night there were both. We had all known each other for upwards of twenty years. One of our number, Hans Hassler, mentioned in passing that perhaps the Fuehrer had been illadvised to open a second front against the Russians. I said, Hans, God in Heaven, watch what you say! Poor Hans went pale and changed the subject entirely. Yet three days later he was gone. I never saw him again, nor, as far as I know, did anyone else who was sitting at our table that night. How awful! Monica said breathlessly. More cognac, Mr. Denker? No thank you. He smiled at her. My wife had a saying from her mother One must never overdo the sublime.  Todds small, troubled frown deepened slightly. Do you think he was sent to one of the camps? Dick asked. Your friend Hessler? Hassler, Dussander corrected gently. He grew grave. Many were. The camps . . . they will be the shame of the German people for a thousand years to come. They are Hitlers real legacy. Oh, I think thats too harsh, Bowden said, lighting his pipe and puffing out a choking cloud of Cherry Blend. According to what Ive read, the majority of the German people had no idea of what was going on. The locals around Auschwitz thought it was a sausage plant. Ugh, how terrible, Monica said, and pulled a grimacing thatsenoughofthat expression at her husband. Then she turned to Dussander and smiled. I just love the smell of a pipe, Mr. Denker, dont you? Indeed I do, madam, Dussander said. He had just gotten an almost insurmountable urge to sneeze under control. Bowden suddenly reached across the table and clapped his son on the shoulder. Todd jumped. Youre awfully quiet tonight, son. Feeling all right? Todd offered a peculiar smile that seemed divided between his father and Dussander. I feel okay. Ive heard most of these stories before, remember. Todd! Monica said. Thats hardly The boy is only being honest, Dussander said. A privilege of boys which men often have to give up. Yes, Mr. Bowden? Dick laughed and nodded. Perhaps I could get Todd to walk back to mine house with me now, Dussander said. Im sure he has his studies. Todd is a very apt pupil, Monica said, but she spoke almost automatically, looking at Todd in a puzzled sort of way. All As and Bs, usually. He got a C this last quarter, but hes promised to bring his French up to snuff on his March report. Right, Toddbaby? Todd offered the peculiar smile again and nodded. No need for you to walk, Dick said. Ill be glad to run you back to your place. I walk for the air and the exercise, Dussander said. Really, I must insist ... unless Todd prefers not to. Oh, no, Id like a walk, Todd said, and his mother and father beamed at him. They were almost to Dussanders corner when Dussander broke the silence. It was drizzling, and he hoisted his umbrella over both of them. And yet still his arthritis lay quiet, dozing. It was amazing. You are like my arthritis, he said. Todds head came up. Huh? Neither of you have had much to say tonight. Whats got your tongue, boy? Cat or cormorant? Nothing, Todd muttered. They turned down Dussanders street. Perhaps I could guess, Dussander said, not without a touch of malice. When you came to get me, you were afraid I might make a slip ... let the cat out of the bag, you say here. Yet you were determined to go through with the dinner because you had run out of excuses to put your parents off. Now you are disconcerted that all went well. Is that not the truth? Who cares? Todd said, and shrugged sullenly. Why shouldnt it go well? Dussander demanded. I was dissembling before you were born. You keep a secret well enough, I give you that. I give it to you most graciously. But did you see me tonight? I charmed them. Charmed them! Todd suddenly burst out You didnt have to do that! Dussander came to a complete stop, staring at Todd. Not do it? Not? I thought that was what you wanted, boy! Certainly they will offer no objections if you continue to come over and read to me. Youre sure taking a lot for granted! Todd said hotly. Maybe Ive got all I want from you. Do you think theres anybody forcing me to come over to your scuzzy house and watch you slop up booze like those old wino pusbags that hang around the old trainyards? Is that what you think? His voice had risen and taken on a thin, wavering, hysterical note. Because theres nobody forcing me. If I want to come, Ill come, and if I dont, I wont  Lower your voice. People will hear. Who cares? Todd said, but he began to walk again. This time he deliberately walked outside the umbrellas span. No, nobody forces you to come, Dussander said. And then he took a calculated shot in the dark In fact, you are welcome to stay away. Believe me, boy, I have no scruples about drinking alone. None at all. Todd looked at him scornfully. Youd like that, wouldnt you? Dussander only smiled noncommittally. Well, dont count on it. They had reached the concrete walk leading up to Dussanders stoop. Dussander fumbled in his pocket for his latchkey. The arthritis flared a dim red in the joints of his fingers and then subsided, waiting. Now Dussander thought he understood what it was waiting for for him to be alone again. Then it could come out. Ill tell you something, Todd said. He sounded oddly breathless. If they knew what you were, if I ever told them, theyd spit on you and then kick you out on your skinny old ass. Dussander looked at Todd closely in the drizzling dark. The boys face was turned defiantly up to his, but the skin was pallid, the sockets under the eyes dark and slightly hollowedthe skintones of someone who has brooded long while others are asleep. I am sure they would have nothing but revulsion for me, Dussander said, although he privately thought that the elder Bowden might stay his revulsion long enough to ask many of the questions his son had asked already. Nothing but revulsion. But what would they feel for you, boy, when I told them you had known about me for eight months . . . and said nothing? Todd stared at him wordlessly in the dark. Come and see me if you please, Dussander said indifferently, and stay home if you dont. Goodnight, boy. He went up the walk to his front door, leaving Todd standing in the drizzle and looking after him with his mouth slightly ajar. The next morning at breakfast, Monica said Your dad liked Mr. Denker a lot, Todd. He said he reminded him of your grandfather. Todd muttered something unintelligible around his toast. Monica looked at her son and wondered if he had been sleeping well. He looked pale. And his grades had taken that inexplicable dip. Todd never got Cs. You feeling okay these days, Todd? He looked at her blankly for a moment, and then that radiant smile spread over his face, charming her ... comforting her. There was a dab of strawberry preserves on his chin. Sure, he said. Fouroh. Toddbaby, she said. Monicababy, he responded, and they both started to laugh. 9 March, 1975. Kittykitty, Dussander said. Heeere, kittykitty. Pusspuss? Pusspuss? He was sitting on his back stoop, a pink plastic bowl by his right foot. The bowl was full of milk. It was onethirty in the afternoon; the day was hazy and hot. Brushfires far to the west tinged the air with an autumnal smell that jagged oddly against the calendar. If the boy was coming, he would be here in another hour. But the boy didnt always come now. Instead of seven days a week he came sometimes only four times, or five. An intuition had grown in him, little by little, and his intuition told him that the boy was having troubles of his own. Kittykitty, Dussander coaxed. The stray cat was at the far end of the yard, sitting in the ragged verge of weeds by Dussanders fence. It was a tom, and every bit as ragged as the weeds it sat in. Every time he spoke, the cats ears cocked forward. Its eyes never left the pink bowl filled with milk. Perhaps, Dussander thought, the boy was having troubles with his studies. Or bad dreams. Or both. That last made him smile. Kittykitty, he called softly. The cats ears cocked forward again. It didnt move, not yet, but it continued to study the milk. Dussander had certainly been afflicted with problems of his own. For three weeks or so he had worn the SS uniform to bed like grotesque pajamas, and the uniform had warded off the insomnia and the bad dreams. His sleep had beenat firstas sound as a lumberjacks. Then the dreams had returned, not little by little, but all at once, and worse than ever before. Dreams of running as well as the dreams of the eyes. Running through a wet, unseen jungle where heavy leaves and damp fronds struck his face, leaving trickles that felt like sap . . . or blood. Running and running, the luminous eyes always around him, peering soullessly at him, until he broke into a clearing. In the darkness he sensed rather than saw the steep rise that began on the clearings far side. At the top of that rise was Patin, its low cement buildings and yards surrounded by barbed wire and electrified wire, its sentry towers standing like Martian dreadnoughts straight out of War of the Worlds. And in the middle, huge stacks billowed smoke against the sky, and below these brick columns were the furnaces, stoked and ready to go, glowing in the night like the eyes of fierce demons. They had told the inhabitants of the area that the Patin inmates made clothes and candles, and of course the locals had believed that no more than the locals around Auschwitz had believed that the camp was a sausage factory. It didnt matter. Looking back over his shoulder in the dream, he would at last see them coming out of hiding, the restless dead, the Juden, shambling toward him with blue numbers glaring from the livid flesh of their outstretched arms, their hands hooked into talons, their faces no longer expressionless but animated with hate, lively with vengeance, vivacious with murder. Toddlers ran beside their mothers and grandfathers were borne up by their middleaged children. And the dominant expression on all their faces was desperation. Desperation? Yes. Because in the dreams he knew (and so did they) that if he could climb the hill, he would be safe. Down here in these wet and swampy lowlands, in this jungle where the nightflowering plants extruded blood instead of sap, he was a hunted animal . . . prey. But up there, he was in command. If this was a jungle, then the camp at the top of the hill was a zoo, all the wild animals safely in cages, he the head keeper whose job it was to decide which would be fed, which would live, which would be handed over to the vivisectionists, which would be taken to the knackers in the removers van. He would begin to run up the hill, running in all the slowness of nightmare. He would feel the first skeletal hands close about his neck, feel their cold and stinking breath, smell their decay, hear their birdlike cries of triumph as they pulled him down with salvation not only in sight but almost at hand Kittykitty, Dussander called. Milk. Nice milk. The cat came at last. It crossed half of the back yard and then sat again, but lightly, its tail twitching with worry. It didnt trust him; no. But Dussander knew the cat could smell the milk and so he was sanguine. Sooner or later it would come. At Patin there had never been a contraband problem.