I had no choice but to do what I did. You have to remember: whatever I think about the machine, how I feel about what it does, it doesn’t matter. If I don’t do what I’m supposed to do . . . I die.” Koehler rummaged in his coat pocket for his cigarettes again, then thought better of it. He looked back at the cigarette butt on the floor before continuing, his voice lower this time, softer. “I still have my family, John. They mean everything to me. I couldn’t risk their future, not for you, not for the Jewish kid you were trying to help, and not for the Jews we round up. I’m sorry.”

“I know.”

“I’m here to fix things—­between us, and between you and my bosses. We need to get you back in the machine before it is too late,” Koehler said, half turning his head to look at Rossett again, checking his reaction.

“What if I don’t want to go back into the machine?”

“You don’t want to start thinking like that, trust me. You need to get back on board and quickly, while we can still keep some sort of lid on this.”

“How?” Rossett opened his eyes again.

“It’s complicated.”

“Am I going to prison?”

Koehler shrugged, removed his cap, and ran his right hand through his thick blond hair.

“I still don’t understand. Why did you do it?” Koehler looked at his cap. He gently straightened the death’s-­head badge as he waited for Rossett’s answer.

Rossett swallowed, staring up at the ceiling, looking for the words before he finally replied.

“Saving the boy, getting him away from it . . . from this . . . this place.”

“London?”

“England, Britain, what it’s become.”

“One kid? You’ve helped send thousands to . . . wherever they go to.”

Rossett looked at Koehler. “I wanted it, helping him . . . I wanted it to save me. I woke up, looked around at what I’d done, what I was doing. I wanted him to save me from what I . . . what we were doing.”

“If you don’t mind me saying so, John”—­Koehler nodded his head to the injury on Rossett’s stomach—­“you don’t look much saved.” Koehler spun his cap in his fingers slowly.

The edges of Rossett’s mouth twitched and he went back to staring at the ceiling.

“I feel saved. I feel better inside than I’ve felt in years. Doing something good, instead of doing what we usually do. Whatever happens to me from now, I know I did the right thing for Jacob.”

“But not for yourself?”

“You don’t get it, do you?”

“Apparently not.”

“I had someone other than myself to think about, for the first time since my wife and son died. When they were blown up by the resistance, something in me . . . stopped working. Some part of me changed. I thought I was broken forever.” Rossett paused, and then went back to looking at the cracked hospital ceiling. “I don’t know, Ernst. That kid brought me back to life; he made me see what I’d become.