guarded. However, the young Gestapo man looked at her uniform and waved her through without questioning her. Perhaps he no longer saw any point in his job.
She was inside the camp, now. She wondered whether it would be as easy to get out.
The smell here was worse, and she soon saw why. The basement was overcrowded. Hundreds of people were packed into four storerooms. They sat or lay on the floor, the lucky ones having a wall to lean against. They were dirty, smelly and exhausted, and they looked at her with dull, uninterested gazes.
She found Hannelore after a few minutes.
The doctor’s wife had never been beautiful, but she had once been a statuesque woman with a strong face. Now she was gaunt, like most people, and her hair was grey and lifeless. She was hollow-cheeked and lined with strain.
She was talking to an adolescent who was at the age when a girl can seem too voluptuous for her years, having womanly breasts and hips but the face of a child. The girl was sitting on the floor, crying, and Hannelore was kneeling beside her, holding her hand and speaking in a low, soothing voice.
When Hannelore saw Carla she stood up, saying: ‘Good God! Why are you in here?’
‘I thought maybe if I tell them you’re not Jewish they might let you go.’
‘That was brave.’
‘Your husband saved many lives. Someone ought to save yours.’
For a moment, Carla thought Hannelore was going to cry. Her face seemed about to crumple. Then she blinked and shook her head. ‘This is Rebecca Rosen,’ she said in a controlled voice. ‘Her parents were killed by a shell today.’
Carla said: ‘I’m so sorry, Rebecca.’
The girl did not speak.
Carla said: ‘How old are you, Rebecca?’
‘Nearly fourteen.’
‘You’re going to have to be a grown-up now.’
‘Why didn’t I die too?’ Rebecca said. ‘I was right beside them. I should have died. Now I’m all alone.’
‘You’re not alone,’ Carla said briskly. ‘We’re with you.’ She turned back to Hannelore. ‘Who’s in charge here?’
‘His name is Walter Dobberke.’
‘I’m going to tell him he must let you go.’
‘He’s left for the day. And his second-in-command is a sergeant with the brains of a warthog. But look, here comes Gisela. She’s Dobberke’s mistress.’
The young woman walking into the room was pretty, with long fair hair and creamy skin. No one looked at her. She wore a defiant expression.
Hannelore said: ‘She has sex with him on the bed in the electrocardiogram room upstairs. She gets extra food in exchange. No one will speak to her except me. I just don’t think we can judge people for the compromises they make. We are living in hell, after all.’
Carla was not so sure. She would not befriend a Jewish girl who slept with a Nazi.
Gisela met Hannelore’s eye and came over. ‘He’s had new orders,’ she said, speaking so quietly that Carla had to strain to hear her. Then she hesitated.
Hannelore said: ‘Well? What are the orders?’
Gisela’s voice fell to a whisper. ‘To shoot everyone here.’
Carla felt a cold hand grasp her heart. All these people – including Hannelore and young Rebecca.
‘Walter doesn’t want to do it,’ Gisela said. ‘He’s not a bad man, really.’
Hannelore spoke with fatalistic calm. ‘When is he supposed to kill us?’
‘Immediately. But he wants to destroy the records first. Hans-Peter and Martin are putting the files into the furnace right now. It’s a long job, so we have a few hours left. Maybe the Red Army will get here in time to save us.’
‘And maybe they won’t,’ Hannelore said crisply. ‘Is there any way we can persuade him to disobey his orders? For God’s sake, the war is almost over!’
‘I used to be able to talk him into anything,’ Gisela said sadly. ‘But he’s getting tired of me now. You know what men are like.’
‘But he should be thinking of his own future. Any day now the Allies will be in charge here. They will punish Nazi crimes.’
Gisela said: ‘If we’re all dead, who’s going to accuse him?’
‘I will,’ said Carla.
The other two stared at her, not speaking.
Carla realized that even though she was not Jewish she, too, would be shot, to prevent her bearing witness.
Casting about for ideas, she said: ‘Perhaps, if Dobberke spared us, it would help him with the Allies.’
