“Poor soul,” muttered Moeller. “I know how she feels. I have an elder brother who’s still a prisoner.”

“Why didn’t you say something?” I said. “Suppose he’d turned up here? What would you have done?”

Moeller shrugged. “I was sort of hoping he would. That’s one of the reasons I got put forward for this job. But now that I’ve seen that refugee camp, I’m not so sure. There must be better ways of treating our men, Herr Gunther. Don’t you agree?”

I nodded.

“They don’t do so bad,” said Grottsch. “Every week, the camp commander at Friedland gets hundreds of letters from single women all over Germany who are looking for a new husband.”

The five of us squeezed into the car and set off north for Göttingen, some fifteen kilometers away.

Sitting in the back, I switched on the courtesy light and nervously scanned the list for the names of any others from Johannesgeorgenstadt. And it didn’t take long to find the name of SS General Fritz Klause, who had been the SGO at the camp. It was beginning to look as if the radiation at the camp hadn’t been nearly as lethal as I had been led to believe. Then again, a man can use hate for his enemy as a blanket just warm enough to keep him alive through even a Russian winter.

“I wish someone would write and offer to marry me,” said Wenger as he drove the car. “Or, at the very least, offer to take the place of the wife I already have.”

“I wonder what they’ll think,” said Moeller. “About the new Germany.”

“I imagine they’ll think it’s really not quite German enough,” observed Grottsch. “That was my impression when I came back from a British POW camp. I kept looking for Germany. And all I found was new furniture, cars, and toys for American boys.”

“Turn the car around,” I said. “We have to go back.”

Vigée, sitting beside Wenger in the front seat, ordered him to pull up for a moment. Then he turned in his seat to look at me. “Found something?”

“Maybe.”

“Explain, please.”

“As we were leaving, there was a woman back at the station seeking information about her loved one. She had written all of his details on a sign.”

“Yes,” said Vigée. “What was her name?”

“Kettenacher,” I said. “But there was also a Kettenacher who was on the train. Who’s on this list prepared by the Red Cross.”

“It’s not an uncommon name in this part of Germany,” said Moeller.

“No,” I said firmly. “But Frau Kettenacher’s son was in the Panzer Corps. He was a Hauptmann. A captain, same as me. Richard Kettenacher. Fifty-sixth Panzer Corps. Last heard of in the battle for Berlin.”

“He missed his mother in the crowd,” said Moeller. “It happens.”