The smaller man was wearing a gray Trachten jacket with hunter green lapels and matching oak-leaf-shaped pockets, cuffs, and elbows. His trousers were gray flannel, his shoes were brown, and he looked like the Führer ready to make a night of it at Berchtesgaden. His voice was soft and civilized, which might have made a pleasant change but for the fact that experience has taught me how it’s usually the quiet ones who are the worst sadists of all—especially in Germany. Landsberg Prison was full of quiet-spoken, civilized types like the man wearing the Trachten jacket. “You’re a lucky man, Herr Gunther,” he said.

“That’s how I feel about it, too,” I said.

“You really were in the SS, weren’t you?”

“I try not to brag about it,” I said.

He stood perfectly still, almost to attention, his arms by his side, as if he had been addressing a parade. He had a senior SS officer’s manner and bearing and a senior SS officer’s eyes and way of speaking. A tyrant, like Heydrich, or Himmler—one of those borderline psychopaths who used to command police battalions in the far-flung corners of the greater German Reich. Not the kind of man to be flippant with, I told myself. A real Nazi. The kind of man I hated, especially now that we were supposed to be rid of them.

“Yes, we checked you out,” he said. “Against our battalion lists. We have lists of former SS men, you know, and you are on it. Which is why I say that you are very fortunate.”

“I could tell,” I said. “I’ve been getting a strong feeling of belonging ever since you boys picked me up.”

All those years I had kept my mouth shut and said nothing, like everyone else. Perhaps it was the strong smell of beer and their Nazi manners, but suddenly I remembered some SA men coming into a bar and beating up a Jew and me going outside and leaving them to it. It must have been 1934. I should have said something then. And now that I knew they weren’t going to kill me, suddenly I wanted to make up for that. I wanted to tell this little Nazi martinet what I really thought of him and his kind.

“I wouldn’t make light of it, Herr Gunther,” he said gently. “The only reason you’re alive now is that you’re on that list.”

“I’m very glad to hear it, Herr General.”

He flinched. “You know me?”