The invasion came in early June, and two weeks later he at last crossed the Channel and set foot again in France to begin his work as an interrogator. It was there he met the first of what were called the Ritchie boys, the Jews who’d fled Nazi Germany, been trained in Camp Ritchie, Maryland, parachuted or made beach landings on D-day, then slogged through the countryside broadcasting surrender offers to retreating Germans or questioning those who’d already surrendered.
His first job was to break down a Wehrmacht officer named Werner Kruger, a short, stocky little man who smoked continuously during the interrogation. By then they’d learned that the Germans were terrified of being handed over to the Russians, and so they’d dressed a couple of the Ritchie boys in Russian army uniforms on the pretense that should the prisoner not cooperate, he would be turned over to Comrade Stalin. The Ritchie boys had played their parts to the hilt, and it had been effective in a surprising number of cases, Werner Kruger’s chief among them.
There’d been scores of others like Kruger, an army of prisoners from whom Danforth had sought information, sometimes successfully, sometimes not, but within each new interrogation still seeking some clue to Anna. Months passed, and summer became fall, and the army marched eastward, and France was liberated and Germany defeated, so that it was amid the ruins of Nuremberg several weeks after the end of the war that he finally met Horst Dieter.
SS captain Horst Dieter had been brought to Danforth’s office for what was described as a “thorough going-over.” Danforth had expected the usual SS type, still arrogant in defeat, lips locked in perpetual sneer, eyes brimming with contempt. Instead, Dieter had affected a nearly jaunty gait as he walked to the chair across the table from Danforth and sat down. He was loose-limbed and gave off an inexplicable casualness, not to say indifference, and it was this oddity in demeanor that Danforth first addressed.
“You don’t seem to realize the situation you’re in,” Danforth told him in his unaccented German.
“I speak English, Captain,” Dieter said. “I lived for two years in Virginia.” He shrugged. “And I know quite well what my situation is. I’m going to be shot. So what? I’m used to executions.”
This was the sort of casual remark that had opened the door on horrendous crimes in earlier interrogations, and so Danforth pursued it like a lead. “Used to executions?” he asked in as similar a tone as he could muster. “Okay, so how during the war did you happen to get used to executions?”
“I was used to them well before the war,” Dieter answered with a dismissive wave of his hand.
“Before the war?”
“Because I was a prison guard,” Dieter answered. He leaned back so far in his chair that its front legs lifted off the floor. “We executed God knows how many.”
“Executing criminals before the war wouldn’t get you shot now,” Danforth said pointedly.
“They weren’t all criminals,” Dieter said. “Unless you call some kid handing out pamphlets a criminal.”
“Are you talking about political criminals?” Danforth asked.
“Reds, mostly,” Dieter said. “One day you Americans will be sorry we didn’t kill them all.”
Danforth was getting nowhere with this and knew it, and so he decided to do as he had been trained to do, take one small piece of information, presumably innocent, then have the prisoner expand on it.
“You were in Berlin before the war,” Danforth said as he glanced at Dieter’s folder.
“Yes.”
“Is this where you worked as a guard?”
“Yes.”
“At Stadtheim?” Danforth asked.
“No. Plötzensee.”
Danforth’s gaze lifted. “Plötzensee?”
“In the suburbs,” Dieter added with a shrug. “It’s mostly blown up now. But it was a busy place before and during the war.”
Danforth gave no sign that the very name Plötzensee was like a hook in his skin.
“Busy with executions?” he asked.
“Yes.”
Danforth decided to test Dieter’s veracity. “These executions, they were by firing squad?”
“No,” Dieter said. “They put up a gallows later.” He chuckled. “But before that, can you believe it, Captain? We had a . . . what’s the word in English? A Fallbeil.”
“A guillotine,” Danforth said.
“That’s it, yes: guillotine.”
“When were you at Plötzensee?” Danforth asked.
“From June of 1936 until the war began,” Dieter answered. “That was in ...”
“September 1939,” Danforth said.
Dieter nodded.
“And you participated in executions during this time?” Danforth asked.
“Yes.”
“How many?”
Dieter shrugged. “Many. I don’t remember. I walked them to the room, that’s all. But that won’t matter, they’re going to kill us all. It’s going to be a big show.”
Danforth worked to keep his tone entirely even despite the storm building within him. “These prisoners that you ... walked, were there any women?”
“Sure.”
“Do you remember any of them?”
Dieter grinned. “A man always remembers the women.”
Danforth faced him stonily. “Who do you remember?”
“There were only two,” Dieter answered. “Benita von Falkenhayn. She was the daughter-in-law of some big shot on the general’s staff. A wild one. Divorced the big shot’s son and got into bed with a Polack spy.” He shrugged. “They killed her with an ax. Like some English queen.”
Catching his breath, Danforth asked, “And the other one?” “She wore thick glasses, the other one,” Dieter answered. “Not very attractive, I must say.” Her unattractiveness seemed to make her life less dear to Dieter. “She was the first woman they used a guillotine on. Another Red. I don’t remember her name, but they called her Lilo.”
“What was her crime?” Danforth asked.
“She wouldn’t stop being a Red,” Dieter answered. “Probably other things as well, but I don’t remember what they were.” He leaned back again and released a slow, relaxing breath. “That’s all. Just two women, like I said.”
“Just two?” Danforth asked. “Are you sure no other woman was executed while you were at Plötzensee?”
Dieter looked at Danforth closely. “Someone you knew, Captain?”
“She was dark,” Danforth said sternly. “She had very curly hair.”
Dieter shook his head.
“You’re sure you never saw a woman like that at Plötzensee?” Danforth asked emphatically. “In the yard or in the cells?”
Dieter dropped forward in his chair. “No.”
Danforth’s mind was working feverishly to determine if Dieter’s testimony, or even his memory, could be trusted. “Anna was her name,” he added. “She might have been called Anna Collier, or maybe Anna Klein.”