Somewhere down a corridor a phone started to ring.

Eventually Hahn turned to look at Koehler and smiled like a grandfather—­warm, soothing. His face was half in shadow as he waited for an answer.

“It seems vindictive, sir,” Koehler heard himself say. His heart pounded, one, two, three. He swallowed and spoke again. “We’ve won the war, these ­people are pathetic, and yet . . . and yet we keep punching them like . . . playground bullies. It seems so pointless. I’ve seen them, I see them every day.” Koehler looked at the carpet and lowered his voice to a whisper. “They aren’t a threat.”

Hahn nodded.

“You think the job is done?”

Koehler looked up. “I don’t know, sir . . . I’m just struggling to do it. I can’t sleep, I feel guilty, so guilty about it all. I’ve turned into a monster.” Koehler paused, feeling his cheeks flush and pressure build behind his eyes. “Having my family here, it’s made me see myself. What I do to others . . . and what it does to me.”

Hahn crossed the room and sat down on the corner of his desk near to Koehler.

“Why did you join the SS, Ernst?”

“To be the best, sir. I wanted to fight with the best, and to be the best.”

“Not just the uniform?” Hahn smiled.

“Well, a little of that, sir, yes,” Koehler smiled back.

“I joined in the early days, back in ’33; we had real enemies then, real threats. The Jews and the Bolsheviks were destroying Germany. The enemy was real. You could see them, punch them in the nose, and they punched you back. Now . . .” Hahn chuckled. “The enemy is some frostbitten Russian peasant sitting in a ditch waiting to starve to death. Soon he’ll be gone and we’ll have nobody left to fight.” Hahn took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Do you know what happens to a warrior who has nobody left to fight?” Hahn didn’t wait for an answer. “He gets fat, fat and lazy, and he starts to question the point of his existence.”

“I . . . I don’t . . .” Koehler trailed off, aware he was lost in a minefield of his own making.

Hahn continued as if he hadn’t spoken.

“My son died in Moscow, did you know that?”

“No, sir.”

“My son.” The smile slipped from Hahn’s lips and Koehler felt his cheeks flush at the intimacy of the moment. Hahn was the third most important German in the country, and one not renowned for his emotions. “Just after the communists fled the city, a sniper they’d left behind got him.”

“I’m sorry, sir.”

Hahn turned to look at Koehler.

“Yes.”

Koehler didn’t know what to say. His hand hurt like hell and he squeezed it tightly into a fist.

“So much waste.”

“Yes, sir.”

“I’m tired, too, Ernst.