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‘It’s okay,’ she said. ‘I’m just teasing you.’

Johann laughed with her, glad to make light of his embarrassment. He was about to speak again when the low rasp of a car horn sounded close behind them. They turned to see who it was.

‘It’s my papa,’ Ava said.

The car pulled up ahead of them and a smartly dressed man in his mid-forties got out. He stood by the open door with his elbow on the roof. ‘Ava! Thank goodness! With everything that’s going on tonight, I was worried about you.’

Ava looked into Johann’s eyes. ‘I have to go,’ she said. ‘Can we take you somewhere?’

‘No, that’s okay. I really should find my friend.’

‘Well, stay out of trouble.’ Ava made for the car, and as she reached it she turned back with a smile and said, ‘Thank you for rescuing me.’

‘It was my pleasure.’

Johann watched her open the passenger door and slip delicately into the car. It began to pull away and he wished then that he’d asked to see her again. However was he going to find her in such a big city?

He called out. ‘I’m glad your bicycle has a flat tyre!’

Ava leaned out of the car window. She was still smiling, yet at the same time she looked confused. ‘Why?’

Johann returned her smile. He could feel his face beaming as he said, ‘Because if you had taken your bicycle today I might never have met you!’ He waved as the car sped off, and knowing that she was now too distant to hear him, he added, ‘And I’m very glad I did.’

Chapter Five

Present Day.

All at once, Johann Langner’s voice broke off and the ECG monitor he was wired to went into a state of alarm. It began to beep and flash, and Langner began to convulse as if he were having a seizure. Ingrid Keller was on her feet in an instant.

‘Out! Now!’

However caught up in Langner’s reminiscences Tayte and Jean were, they both did as they were told. They jumped to their feet and Tayte grabbed his briefcase while Jean gathered from the bed the documents they had previously shown to Langner. They were at the door, and Tayte was about to open it when Langner’s voice stopped them.

First he coughed, and then in a hoarse whisper he said, ‘Where are you going? I haven’t finished my story.’

Keller gave a loud sigh. ‘If you don’t rest, your story will finish you!’

Tayte didn’t know what to do. ‘Maybe we can come back later, when you’ve had some sleep and are feeling better.’

‘And what if I don’t wake up?’

Tayte glanced at Jean and she gave him a look that said it was his call. ‘Are you sure you’re up to it?’ he asked, concern in his voice.

Keller answered. ‘No, he’s not up to it.’ She pressed a few buttons on the ECG machine and the beeping stopped. ‘You should leave.’

‘I won’t hear of it,’ Langner said. ‘These little episodes come and go. Sit down again, please.’

Tayte and Jean went back to their seats and Keller shook her head at them. She made Tayte feel uncomfortable, and she was arguably right to want them to leave, but he wanted to hear what Langner had to say, and Langner, it seemed, was keen to tell them.

‘Take your time,’ Jean said. ‘We’re in no hurry.’

Langner smiled weakly. ‘You’re very sweet, my dear.’

Keller helped him to sit up again, and she made him drink some more water before he was allowed to continue.

‘Just weeks before the terrible events that came to be known as
Kristallnacht
, Volker and I were invited to attend the
Reichsparteitag Grossdeutschland
—the Rally of Greater Germany, which was the last Nuremberg rally to be held in peacetime. We were having fun, like two of your boy scouts, with little notion of what was ultimately to come. It was held in September, and we’d been given the honour of marching into the city stadium as an eighty thousand strong army of
Hitlerjugend
members to spell out Hitler’s name.’

Langner was smiling at the memory by the time he’d finished speaking. Then his expression soured. ‘Ah, but those days before the war soon faded. Before long I would be fighting alongside many of those same boys, who were to become my
Kameraden
in the
Waffen
-
SS
.’

Jean tapped at her tablet PC, calling up some of her prior research. ‘It was because of your association with the SS that you faced trial for war crimes after the war ended.’

‘Yes. The entire
Schutzstaffel
was declared a criminal organisation, including the combat units of the
Waffen-SS
. Every German soldier who wore the
Sieg
runes of the SS on their tunic was subject to trial at Nuremberg for crimes against humanity—and we were all considered guilty unless proved innocent.’

‘I read about your trial,’ Jean said. ‘You were charged with inciting your troops to give no quarter to surrendering soldiers, and the deaths of seventeen prisoners.’

‘Those were the charges, yes, to which I pleaded not guilty. But while I was acquitted of directly ordering the deaths of those soldiers, I was found guilty of allowing their murders. In truth—and at my age I have nothing to gain from lies—I had not known about the murders until it was too late to prevent them.’ Langner paused to sip some more water. ‘The death sentence was passed and I accepted my fate. It was as I waited to die that I was encouraged to appeal, and then after a good deal of discussion by the prosecuting committee, the sentence was commuted to life imprisonment, of which, as I’m sure you are aware, I served ten years. I later learned that a key consideration for this clemency was due to one of the officers for the prosecution stating that there wasn’t a commander on the Allied side, that he knew of, who had not told his troops that this time they did not want to take any prisoners.’

‘So you had no involvement with the rounding up or extermination of Jews?’ Tayte asked.

Langner gave an emphatic shake of his head. ‘I did not, and I would not,’ he said, his voice wavering with emotion. ‘I was a soldier of the
Leibstandarte
, committed along with the entire youth of Germany to fight what we had been indoctrinated to believe was our common enemy—Bolshevism. I did not hate the Jews.’

‘I see,’ Tayte said. He saw a tear fall onto Langner’s cheek then, and he decided it was best to steer the subject back to kinder memories. ‘I guess you bumped into Ava Bauer again. How did that come about?’

Langner wiped his cheek with the back of his hand. He smiled awkwardly, as though still racked by his thoughts, yet keen to change the subject, as Tayte had supposed.

‘Bump into her?’ Langner began to laugh at the idea until he set himself coughing again. ‘Mr Tayte, I didn’t just bump into her. I couldn’t leave such a thing to chance. I had to find her, and it wasn’t as difficult as I’d at first imagined.’ His smile dropped again. ‘Although I should have gone to find Ava by myself that night. Not that I could have kept her a secret from Volker for long. But I regret with all my heart the day Volker Strobel ever met Ava Bauer.’

Chapter Six

Munich. 23 November 1938.

Beneath a hissing gas lamp, leaning against the stone archway that led into the meeting place of Munich’s League of German Girls Faith and Beauty Society, Volker Strobel lit a cigarette and offered the packet to Johann.

Johann shook his head. ‘Not just now.’

‘Really? It’s not like you to turn down a cigarette. Especially on a cold evening like this.’

‘I don’t feel like one.’

Volker laughed to himself. ‘It must be because of the girl, eh? You want to keep your breath fresh, is that it? Have you kissed her yet?’

‘How could I have? I’ve only seen her once, and that was only briefly.’

‘Yes, of course. So maybe she’ll show up tonight, eh?

‘I hope so.’

After meeting Ava two weeks before, having learned that she was a member of the society tasked with raising girls as torch bearers of the national-socialist world, Johann had made it his mission to find out where the society met every week. He had tried in vain to see Ava on the Wednesday after he’d met her. Now he was trying again in the hope that she had gone to the meeting this week. He had his black winter coat with him tonight, but having stood outside the building with Volker for close to an hour already, the cold was beginning to bite regardless. He crossed his arms and stamped his feet as he took in the busy street before him. He watched a crowded tram go by, and he cast his eyes further along the street and up at the tall buildings whose Nazi Party flags were all flapping in the chill breeze. He rubbed his hands together to warm them, and under his breath he wished that Ava would come out soon.

Volker crossed the steps that divided the archway and stood close beside him. ‘You know, you worry me, Johann. I find the circumstances of how you met this girl very disturbing. If you were not my closest friend I would be obliged to report you both. Have you told anyone else?’

‘No. Only you.’

‘Good. I suggest you keep it that way. It could otherwise be very dangerous for you.’ He paused, as if considering the consequences. ‘Perhaps it would be for the best if this Ava girl failed to show again tonight. You really shouldn’t have anything more to do with her. Let’s go and get a drink, eh? What do you say?’

Johann smiled at his friend. He turned and held him by the shoulders forcing their eyes to meet. ‘I have to see her again, Volker. Just wait until you meet her. Then you’ll understand.’

Volker shook his head. ‘I’m sure you must see a great deal in her, but it’s freezing out here and I could use a drink to warm me up. Besides, there are hundreds of girls in Munich. Why must it be this one?’

‘They’re not like Ava. She’s special. You’ll see.’

The sound of the main doors opening drew Johann’s attention then and he turned towards them as light spilled out onto the steps.

‘Look, they’re coming out now,’ Johann said.

He pulled Volker aside, his eyes still on the doors as the first two girls came out. He smiled at them as they passed, and then he quickly turned back to the doorway as several more young women left the building.

‘Do you know Ava Bauer?’ he asked one of the girls at random. ‘Was she at the meeting tonight?’

The girl shook her head and carried on talking to her friend.

Volker blew smoke across Johann’s face. ‘It’s a lost cause, I tell you. Her father’s most likely forbidden her to come to these meetings again after all the trouble on the streets the last time she attended. You said her father came to find her because she was late home.’

‘Yes, because her bicycle had a flat tyre.’

Johann was paying more attention to the girls now pouring out of the building than he was to his friend. The throng had forced the two of them down onto the pavement and he’d lost track of who he’d looked at and who he’d missed as the seemingly endless parade of girls parted to his left and right. It seemed hopeless. He was about to start calling Ava’s name, but at that moment his conversation with Volker caught up with him. His eyes widened.

‘Her bicycle! Of course.’

Johann grabbed Volker’s arm and pulled him along the street, turning the corner to the bicycle racks he’d seen on their way there. He saw a few girls getting onto their bicycles, and a few others were already cycling away. He ran ahead to see them better, but he didn’t recognise Ava among them. There were still dozens of bicycles waiting to be claimed.

He turned back to Volker. ‘Her bicycle will have been fixed up by now,’ he said. ‘She’ll be easier to spot if we wait here.’

Volker checked the time on his wristwatch. ‘I’ll stay another ten minutes, then I’m going for that drink, which you’re paying for, by the way. You owe me that much. I’ve been very patient.’

‘Yes, you have. Another ten minutes then.’

During that time, Volker smoked three more cigarettes and Johann watched the bicycle racks gradually deplete. As before, there was no sign of Ava Bauer. Although when he had asked one girl whether she knew Ava, and whether she had seen her at the meeting, she had told him she thought she had. It renewed his hope.

But where was she?

‘Time’s up, my friend,’ Volker said.

Johann felt Volker’s hand on his shoulder and he knew it was indeed time to go. There were only a few bicycles left now, and he had to concede that the odds of one of them belonging to Ava were small. He had missed her again.

‘Come on, I’m frozen to my bones,’ Volker said.

Dejection must have been written all over Johann’s face as he turned to his friend because Volker returned a sympathetic smile.

‘It’s not so bad, Johann. We’ll give it one more try next week, eh?’

Johann gave a slow nod. ‘You’re a good friend, Volker. But I really don’t mind coming by myself.’

They set off at an amble, back along the pavement.

‘Nonsense, I won’t hear of it,’ Volker said. ‘Besides, you’ve built her up so much now that I want to see this Ava Bauer almost as much as you do.’

They were laughing together as they turned the corner and crossed the street beneath the pale glow of the lamplight. Then a familiar voice stopped Johann in his tracks.

‘Johann?’

He turned back, and at once he caught his breath. It was Ava Bauer.