Mielke senior turned just in time to meet my fist coming the other way. The blow rocked the big head on his meaty shoulders like a sudden bad smell in his nostrils, and as he took a step backward, I hit him again with a right that descended on the side of his head like a Borotra first service. That lifted his legs off the ground like a plane’s undercarriage, and for a split second he actually seemed to fly through the air before landing on his knees. As he rolled onto his side I twisted one arm behind them, then the other, and managed to hold them long enough for a groggy-looking Heller to get the irons on his wrists. Then I stood up and kicked him hard, because I wasn’t able to kick his son and because I was wishing I hadn’t saved the young man’s neck. I might have kicked him again, but Heller stopped me and, but for the fact that he was a counselor and I was still feeling sick, I might have kicked him, too.

“Gunther,” he yelled. “That’s enough.” He let out a gasp and leaned heavily against a wall while he tried to recover all of his wits.

I shifted my jaw; my head felt larger on one side than the other and there was something singing in my ears, only it wasn’t a kettle.

“With all due respect, sir,” I said, “it’s not nearly enough.”

And then I kicked Mielke again before I staggered out of the apartment and onto the landing and, a minute or two later, puked over the banister.

13

GERMANY, 1954

I stopped talking. My throat felt tight, but not as tight as the handcuffs.

“Is that all there is?” demanded one of the two Amis.

“There’s more,” I said. “A lot more. But I can’t feel my hands. And I need to use the lavatory.”

“You saw Erich Mielke again.”

“Several times. The last time was 1946, when I was a POW in Russia. You see, Mielke was—”

“No, no. Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. We want everything in the correct order of appearance. That’s the German way, isn’t it?”

“If you say so.”

“All right, then. You went to his home. You had a police witness. You found the murder weapons in the drain. I take it those were the murder weapons?”

“A long-barreled Luger and a Dreyse .32. That was the standard police automatic back then. Yes, they were the murder weapons. Look, I really do need a rest. I can’t feel my hands—”

“Yes, you said that already.”

“I’m not asking for apple pie and ice cream, just a pair of handcuffs off. That’s fair, isn’t it?”

“After what you just told us? About kicking Mielke’s father when he was handcuffed and lying on the floor? That wasn’t very fair of you, Gunther.”