Page 66 of The Little Liar

Six months later, Udo Graf was working in a laboratory in suburban Maryland, under the new name of George Mecklen,whose paperwork indicated he was a Belgian immigrant. The Americans who recruited him had learned of Udo’s science background and assumed he’d utilized it in the SS. They’d been eager to learn what he knew about the Russian military. Udo, so skilled at destroying me whenever he got the chance, lied boldly about having such knowledge, even boasting that he spent most of the war working on espionage and weaponry. The more he said the wordCommuniststhe more the Americans were inclined to believe anything he told them.

“And what about these reports that you were at Auschwitz?” an American agent had asked him during an interview in a wood-paneled office. The agent, stocky and crew-cutted, spoke fluent German. Udo answered his questions cautiously.

“Auschwitz? I traveled there, yes.”

“You didn’t work there?”

“Certainly not.”

“What was the purpose of your visits?”

Udo paused.

“What did you say your name was, officer?”

“I’m not an officer. Just an agent.”

“Apologies. Your German is excellent. I assumed, with such skill, you were a superior.”

The agent pushed back in his chair and smiled with false modesty. Udo took note.A man who enjoys compliments can be molded, he told himself.

“Ben Carter,” the agent said. “That’s my name. I learned German from my mother. She was raised in Dusseldorf.”

“Well, Agent Carter, you must understand that Auschwitz was more than a camp. It had many factories vital to our warefforts. I visited those factories to share plans in case of air attack.”

He added, “By the Russians.”

The man’s eyes widened.

“And what do you know of the atrocities that took place in Auschwitz?”

“Atrocities?”

“The gas chambers? The executions? The many Jews they say were murdered there?”

Udo tried to look horrified. “I only learned of such accusations after the war. I was focused on our defense. Of course, I was shocked to read about what may have gone on.”

He saw Carter holding his pen, studying Udo’s eyes.

“As a German, naturally, I wanted my country to prevail,” Udo continued. “But as a human being, I cannot condone such brutality against Jewish prisoners. Or anyone.”

When the agent began writing, Udo kept going, his words and thoughts racing in opposite directions.

“Some terrible things may have been done.”

We were kings. And we will be again.

“If so, such inhumanity is not right.”

Unless your victims are subhuman.

“I regret what others may have done in the name of our nation.”

I regret nothing.

Once Agent Carter finished his notes, he closed the folder. And when he leaned over and said, “Let’s talk about Russian missiles,” Udo knew he had been absolved of his sins. The priest was wrong. He didn’t need God at all.

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