Fresh perspective.

It was then that he saw it.

Slipped under the cabinet next to the blood: a sliver of white beneath the dark wood.

He stepped around the blood and tried to pull whatever it was out of the tiny gap. He cursed himself for biting his nails, then dug in his pocket for his penknife.

He used the blade to flick at the card, easing it forward until he could finally pull it free from under the cabinet.

“No,” he finally said, turning to look at March and holding up a German citizen’s identity card. “They used it to keep her alive.”

 

CHAPTER 10

ROSSETT HAD TRIED to stop drinking many times before.

And failed.

He’d battled the bottle and ended up bruised, but that last time—­that time he thought he’d done it. He’d seen the light at the end of the tunnel, so close; he almost made it.

It was the boy.

Losing a child had made him start drinking, and finding a child had nearly made him stop. They hadn’t found his son’s body after the resistance bomb at Waterloo, and although he would never say it, Rossett was glad.

He knew what explosives did to ­people; he’d wiped enough blood off his face and picked up enough pieces to know that some things should never be seen.

And the body of your son was one of those things.

The boy’s mother had died that day as well, and Rossett missed her dearly, an aching loss that called across the years.

He could remember her voice.

Someone had once told him the first thing you forget when a loved one dies is the sound of their voice. Rossett knew that wasn’t true.

He could close his eyes and listen to his wife singing in the kitchen, he could hear her laugh, and he could feel the whispering breath of her words in his ear anytime he was alone.

But the boy, his dear sweet boy: the boy he’d never touched, never heard, never met, and never known.

That was why the pain was greater; the boy would never know how much Rossett loved him.

The boy would never hear him say it.

And then came Jacob, a little Jewish child hiding in the dark, praying to be saved.

A bit like Rossett himself.

Rossett had nearly died for Jacob. He’d done the right thing for the first time in years, and as a result he thought, for a moment in time, that he could love again.

He’d saved the child, and a woman he thought he might love, and in doing so he’d lifted the cloud and seen the sun again.

He’d felt human again.

He’d done a good thing; away from the misery of his job and his loneliness, he’d done a good thing.

There had been one glorious, aching afternoon. He’d come out of hospital and rounded up the collection of half-­empty bottles that littered his room and his life.

He’d thrown them into the bin at the back of his lodgings. He knew it was over, he knew the cork was back in the bottle.

He’d woken up.

He realized what he’d been doing—­to himself, to the Jews, to his soul. He was going to change, do better, and earn forgiveness for his sins by doing good work. He would become a policeman again; he would protect the weak, not persecute them. He couldn’t turn the country around, but he could turn himself around.

He had purpose, he had his soul again, and he knew, more than anything else, he was never going to drink again.

It wasn’t long before he also knew he was wrong.

First it was beer to take the edge off the pain of the damage he’d caused to his body.

Then it was a Scotch to take the edge off the pain he’d caused to his mind.

He’d been a fool to think the wounds had gone just because he couldn’t see them. They were still there, waiting in the darkness when he fell asleep. The dreams returned, the faces, the blood, the shouting; the tossing, the turning, and then the worst part.

The staring at the ceiling in the small hours.

He couldn’t remember the exact date the bottle reappeared. But he could remember sitting on the edge of his tossed bed, the bottle cool, smooth in his hands as he rested it against his forehead. His body covered in sweat, but still shivering in the light from the streetlamp outside.

The soft ticking of the clock in the corner of the room.

Then the rattle of the bottle on the edge of the glass.

The burn of the Scotch.

The back of the hand across the mouth to cover the cough.

He drank that night to push himself off into the river of sleep, and then again when he’d gotten tangled in his nightmares once more.

He was numb when he passed out.

He’d been numb many nights since.

He wasn’t numb now.

The knocking sounded far away on the other side of a dream. His head banged with it as he slid, squinting, into consciousness. Rossett felt like he was rising up from deep water, and then he was awake, and the knocking was still there, along with the banging of his hangover.

At his door.

He coughed, rolled onto his side, and coughed again, clearing his throat.

“Okay, I’m coming.”

The knocking stopped.

Rossett grabbed the alarm clock off the chair next to his bed: 11:35 P.M. He was surprised. His head felt like he’d been asleep all night. He must have started drinking earlier than he thought. He put the clock back down, knocking some loose change onto the bare floorboards.

There were three more knocks on the door.

“All right!” Rossett shouted as he kicked his legs out from under the blankets. “Fuck’s sake,” he muttered to himself as he padded across the room.

Subconsciously he touched the barely healed scar on his stomach as he opened the door.

The hallway light was on and the glare made him squint.

Koehler stood on the landing in a black woolen civilian coat, open over black suit, white shirt, and black tie, black leather gloves, pale skin, and blond hair.

Immaculate.

Worried.

Rossett didn’t speak. He was surprised to see his boss and his friend; he’d never visited before. He stepped back and let Koehler in. As he closed the door the light on the landing went off. He flicked the switch for the light in his own room and considered shouting down to his landlady for tea, but then decided against it.

He still had some whiskey left.

Koehler was standing by the window looking out. Rossett rattled another smoker’s cough and then ran his hand through his sleep-­stuck hair, suddenly aware that his room smelled musty.

“What’s up?” His voice was gravelly and he coughed again as he scratched his scar.

“I’m sorry to wake you. I need your help.” Koehler’s English carried the barest whiff of a German accent; he turned from the window toward Rossett. “Jesus, John, you look terrible.”

“Thanks.” Rossett looked around for his undershirt.