“We got to Belzec in April,” Bianco said quietly. “April ninth, just as the snow was melting.” He held out the cup, and Abrams refilled it. “The weather was crazy then. It would rain, then the sun would come out, then it would rain again. Little squalls like that all day long. It was warm for April, but there was still a crust of ice on the ground, and our boots broke it and sank in the mud, so we had to go slowly, staggering from barracks to barracks, following the food trucks and medics. There was an English squad with us and their major was an aristocrat of some kind. Named Reynolds. One of those thin-nosed Englishmen who looks like everything smells bad. Only there it did. Awful. And Reynolds had this silver flask with him and he’d take a sip, then hand it to me, and when we finished it, he’d send his sergeant back to the truck to fill it up again. I can see that flask clearer than I can see Reynolds’s face. It was silver, and it had vines and flowers carved on it; and the guy’s initials, and some kind of crest . . .” Bianco stopped, then smiled. The skin around his narrow light brown eyes was dark, and he was too thin, but the smile was attractive and made him look younger. “I’m not here to describe English heirloom silver, am I?” he said.

“No,” Abrams said gently.

“The point is, I looked at the flask so I wouldn’t look at what was all around us. We drank, and checked lists to keep from looking at it. Ah, the lists . . .” Bianco finished his third whisky, and Abrams poured another.

“The Krauts kept lists of everything. Who the prisoners were, where they came from, when they died. Lists of kapos, and the Jews who wouldn’t be kapos. Lists of the supplies that came in and of the stuff that went out. . . . That was some list, that was.” He leaned forward, holding his cup. “Clothes, money, jewels, gold by the ounce, from their teeth, Captain. But you know that. They cut the women’s hair, weighed it, put it on a list, and sent it home to stuff mattresses . . .”

Bianco’s voice had gotten shaky, and he stopped. Abrams was quiet, and after a moment, Bianco went on.