Jess poured the schnapps and sat across from Dan. “To Roosevelt,” she said, lifting her glass.

He clinked his glass against hers. “We’ve seen so many dead men over the past two years and here we all are, brought to our knees by a death we haven’t even seen.”

“I know,” was all she could say, because she did know. War made one irrational; sights that were incomprehensible failed to pierce one’s consciousness, yet seemingly small moments became the incidents that must be talked over, that could never be forgotten.

“How are your ribs?” Dan asked. “And how many more jeeps have you slid off the road?”

“Ribs are fine. And while at least a dozen correspondents have rolled jeeps lately, I haven’t been one of them. I used to dream about being killed by a shell; now we all dream of being killed in a jeep accident,” she said wryly. “It’s April though, so that should stop soon.”

“It’s not funny, Jess.”

“Nor is watching you walk out of here and not knowing when I’ll see you again,” she said quietly. It was close to what she meant but still skated on the edge of friendship.

Dan stretched out his arm, as if he intended to take Jess’s hand across the table. But then he stopped as the seats around them began to fill with too many people for privacy.

“Shift over.” Martha, bearing more schnapps, bumped Jess’s shoulder and slid in next to her as Lee Carson sat beside Dan.

“It’s interesting, isn’t it,” Marty said. “How it’s impossible to find any Nazis in Germany. Nobody was ever a Nazi; somebody else was to blame. Amazing that an entire country could have been so ignorant.”

“When will we get to the camps everyone’s talking about?” Lee batted her eyelashes at Dan, just as Jess had seen her do at the Hotel Scribe with Major Mayborn.

“Getting your story the usual way, Lee?” Warren Stone jibed as he walked past. “You’re taking lessons from the best, aren’t you?” He smiled at Jess as if he’d meant to compliment her.

Dan stood up. “I’d better get back. Before I punch someone,” he muttered under his breath but Warren had moved on, as always doing enough just to irritate but never enough to justify drawing real fire.

“I’ll walk you out.” Jess stood up too and felt Lee’s eyes on her, watching her accompany Dan out of the mess. Warren’s eyes too, most likely.

And that was the problem. There were eyes and people all around. No possibility of a quiet moment, an actual conversation. Even here, by the entrance, people flowed in and out, nodding at Jess or at Dan or at both.

“Do you think there are camps?” Jess asked as they reached Dan’s jeep. “Some of the correspondents say there aren’t and I was just told in no uncertain terms by the delightful Warren Stone that I was being fanciful and I wasn’t to report anything on the speculation. But…”