The boy, he was tall for ten but not so tall as his mother, hung his head, buried his face in a maternal bosom and whispered, “I do not know, Mutti. He didn’t say. He never says.”

“He was never like this before the Great War, Hansi, before he lost the arm.”

The boy could not cry, that had long since been beaten out of him. He shrugged. The mother could cry… and did.

* * *

Later, in a Mercedes, one of the pair said, “I must say, you are a cool one, Herr Brasche.”

“I am old. I have seen much. I have never seen where being afraid, or showing I was if I was, ever did me or anyone else any good. Would it now?”

The other, the driver, answered, “In this case you have no cause to fear, Herr Brasche. We are here to do you a favor.”

Hans shrugged. “I have been done favors before. Little good I had of them.”

* * *

The times had changed. Plenty and hope had replaced hunger and despair. From the windows, from the street lamps, on the arms of men and women all over Germany fluttered a new symbol. On the radios crackled the harsh, gas-damaged voice of a new hero.

Hans felt his thirteen-year-old heart leap at the sound of his Führer’s voice speaking via the radio, to the nation.

“Meine alte Kameraden,” began the distant Hitler, and Hans felt his one-armed father, standing beside, stiffen with filial love. “Die grosse zeit ist jetzt angebrochen… Deutschland ist nun erwacht…” (My old comrades… the great time is now brought to pass… Germany is now awake.”)

“You see, little Hansi? You see what a favor I have done bringing you here?”