Drucker had no sympathy for the SS, not after they’d tried to get rid of his wife on the grounds that she had a Jewish grandmother. If all the black-shirts suffered unfortunate accidents, he wouldn’t shed a tear. With SS men in charge of things, his country had suffered an unfortunate accident-except it hadn’t been an accident. Kaltenbrunner had started the war on purpose.
Something else occurred to him: “Is it true what some males of the Race have told me? That France is to be made independent again, I mean?”
“Yes, that is true,” Jonathan Yeager told him. “From the news reports I have seen, the French are happy about it, too.” He sounded pretty happy himself. He was, after all, an American, and the USA and Germany had been at war when the Lizards came. They still didn’t get along very well, and gloating at a rival’s misfortune was a constant all over the world, and probably among the Race as well.
“I do not care whether they are happy or not,” Drucker said. “It will mean a weaker Germany, and a weaker Germany means a stronger Race.” He was sure the Lizards were recording every word he said. He didn’t much care. They’d captured him. They’d beaten his country. If they thought he loved them because of it, they were crazy.
Back in the cubicle Jonathan Yeager shared with Kassquit, he said, “Strange to think I was just talking with a male who could have killed both of us.”
When Kassquit made the affirmative gesture, she almost poked him in the nose. As far as Jonathan was concerned, the cubicle would have been cramped for her alone; being smaller than people, Lizards built smaller, too. But she was used to it. She’d lived in a cubicle like this her whole life. She said, “You can take off those foolish wrappings now. You do not need them any more.”