Prisoner of Night and Fog by Anne Blankman Page A

before the car spun in the other direction. But there was no reason she could refuse a ride. She would have to go with him.
    “A rough bunch tonight,” Kurt said as he caught up to her. “A few more minutes and we would have had the best of them. We’d better get out of here before the police arrive.”
    They ran onto a side street. At this late hour, it was deserted, the lights in the office buildings extinguished. Halfway down the block, Kurt’s auto sat at the curb. As Kurt began to drive, Gretchen stared through the smeary windshield, listening to the tires rumble over the cobbles, wondering what she could possibly say to fill the silence. The old man! Cautiously, she watched Kurt from the corner of her eye. He leaned over the steering wheel, frowning, peering hard at the street.
    “I knew I should have washed the windshield,” he muttered.
    Ahead, a few men weaved drunkenly along the sidewalk. Somewhere, a door opened and closed, letting out a quick blare of music.
    “Kurt,” Gretchen said, “who was that old man? The one you fellows removed from the Circus Krone tonight?”
    “Hmm? Oh, just a half-dead Party crank.” Kurt’s frown deepened. The drunks had spotted them, and one of them had started to unbutton his trousers, leering at Gretchen. “Fools!” Kurt stuck his head out the open car window. “Nobody wants to see your pitiful excuse for manhood!” Must he fight with everyone? Gretchen bit back a sigh.
    After a quick glance for traffic, Kurt jammed the accelerator, speeding the car through an intersection. “Boss’s orders,” he added. “Röhm said the man’s to be dragged out of every meeting he attends.”
    The response seemed strange. Gretchen suppressed a shiver. What interest could Röhm have in an elderly, infirm Party comrade?
    “What happened to him?” she asked.
    “Hmm? Oh, I don’t know.” Kurt patted his pocket, probably searching for cigarettes. “We taught the fellow a lesson and then he staggered off with some boy. Weeping like a child.” He grinned and held up a pack. “Hurrah, cigarettes!”
    “Why does SA-Stabschef Röhm care about the old man?”
    Kurt slammed on the brake, so hard that she had to fling out her hands so she didn’t fly into the gearbox. “Idiot drivers.” He gestured at the Opel crawling front of them. “The fellow’s been hanging around Party headquarters and attending the Führer’s speeches. Asking all sorts of questions about the putsch.”
    The putsch . Her heart beat faster. The event that had ended in the street shoot-out that had killed her father.
    “Questions?” She hoped she sounded casual. “What did he want to know?”
    Fumbling in his pocket for a lighter, Kurt steered one-handed along a quiet street. When the lighter flared into life, its tiny orange flame illuminated his face for an instant, revealing his fair eyebrows and jade-green eyes. “All manner of nonsense. The position of the men in the front line. Powder burns. Stupid old man’s probably going senile.”
    She froze. A dull roaring filled her ears. Your father did not die a martyr to the Nazi cause, and your family’s precarious position within Hitler’s party is predicated on a lie . An old Party comrade, who had known her father during the early years of struggle, who might have marched alongside her father during the final minutes of his life . . . “Yes, nonsense,” she managed to say. “He must be losing his mind.”
    When Gretchen finally got back to the boardinghouse, closing the door in Kurt’s face as he leaned in for a kiss, which struck her as ludicrous, she hurried up the stairs, skipping the creaking steps. As she did every night, she locked the door, slid the chair under the knob, and untied the heavy curtains. Alone, at last.
    She found Striped Peterl in her armoire, curled on the toes of her winter galoshes. She carried him over to the bed and stretched across the chenille coverlet, letting the cat lie on her chest, rumbling, as she petted