“You never wanted to find out whether your parents survived the war?”
“Of course I did. But there was no way I could go back. And when I came to this country—well, I guess I forgot about that old Mykhail. I’m sure changing my name helped. It’s a different life, and I’m a different person.”
“Except, of course, that you’re not, are you?” Asher stood up.
“What are you going to do?”
“I don’t know.”
“But you said you wouldn’t tell the authorities. You promised.”
“Oh, for God’s sake, Mykhail. Will you quit with the self-preservation! I’m just disgusted with you, that’s all. History is history, I know, but the worst thing, the very worst thing, was what you did to me only last month.”
“Last month? What the hell are you talking about?”
“I was in hospital. You were by my bedside. I poured my heart out to you about Rina, told you how much I missed her all my life, how she could have become something special had she not been murdered. And you just sat there listening to me and nodding and telling me how terrible it all was. But all the time you were listening you knew that you were one of those sons of bitches who murdered her.”
“You think it would have helped to tell you then?”
Then Asher sat back down and spoke through gritted teeth, jets of spittle coming out with his words. “It would have shown me a little respect! It would have shown my sister a little respect. Mykhail, I’ve been your friend all these years. We’ve shared some good times and you’ll always be my brother in all but blood, and now I find . . . Oh, I just don’t know how I can cope, but I don’t think I’ll ever be able to forgive you.”
Mykhail’s eyes turned glassy. He pursed his lips and gulped. “Asher, I’ll do anything you want me to do. Please.”
“Killing thousands of people—Jews or otherwise—is not something I find easy to forgive, regardless of the circumstances.”
“Asher, I’ve explained what I did but I can’t make excuses for it. You know if I could turn the clock back to that day in the POW camp, I’d like to be able to tell you I would have chosen to stay in the camp and rot. But . . .”
“But what?”
Mykhail let out a heavy sigh. “We both know I’d be lying if I said that. You’re a friend and I’m being honest. I did what I needed to do to survive.”
“And that’s as close as you can come to apologizing? To admitting your guilt?”
“I’m . . . I’m sorry, but I’m afraid it is. You wanted the truth. That’s the truth.”
“And if people were to know about this? Your daughter? Your friends and neighbors?”
Mykhail’s voice trembled. “Please don’t destroy my life, Asher. I feel terrible about what I did. I hate myself at times for it, but what good would it do to admit everything publicly?”
“It would tell people the truth.”
“Come on, Asher. You know that people wouldn’t understand. How can anyone make a judgment about this from behind a desk? They’ll make the same decision I would have done if I’d been sitting at a desk instead of rotting in a squalid POW camp.”
Asher nervously rubbed his forehead and thought for a moment. “And that’s your final word?”
“Well . . . yes, it is. I . . . I don’t want to talk about it anymore.”
Then Asher stood up again and glanced at the back door. “Very well.”
“Very well, what?” Mykhail said. “What are you going to do?”
Chapter 32
Interview room 3, Allegheny County Jail, Pittsburgh, August 2001
Diane needed a few deep breaths. It had been a hard story to take in—one not only of her own father’s part in the running of the Treblinka death camp, but of his subsequent lies and deceit. She stared absently across the table at Asher. Her mind was again back in that kitchen, witnessing the aftermath of her father’s death. The smell of blood brought to her nose by the cool air, the stillness of her father’s body at the table, the back door swinging so slowly she had to stare at it for a few seconds to tell that this was no freeze-frame but reality.
“Diane?” he said. “Are you all right?”
She took a hard swallow, and brought out a Kleenex to wipe away the tears she’d only just realized were wetting her cheeks.
“I won’t go on,” he said. “I think you can guess the rest.”
“You . . . you went back and shot him.”
“I signed a confession to that effect. Hardly seems polite to go back on it now.”
“And you think he got what he deserved?”
Asher thought for a few seconds. “That depends on your views, I guess.”
“On what, exactly?”
“What does and doesn’t constitute a free choice. Your father said I played my own part in the murders at Treblinka, and he was right. He said he would almost certainly have perished in that POW camp had he not volunteered to be a Trawniki, and he was right.”
“That sounds like a no.”
“Did he deserve to die? No, I don’t think he did. The vast majority of choices are free, but in this case?” He shook his head.
“So why did you kill him?”
“You know, Diane, I’m unable to answer that question truthfully. I just know that life’s full of conundrums. If your father had rejected the choice of being a Trawniki, you wouldn’t be sitting in front of me now.”
Diane nodded. “I guess not. But if all you’ve told me is true—”
“Oh, it is,” Asher said. “I might have lied to others, Diane, but I haven’t lied to you. I’ve made that a kind of mission.”
“But why didn’t you just tell the police what Father did at Treblinka?”
“Because I promised him I wouldn’t do that.”
Diane opened her mouth to speak, but she couldn’t find the words; as a conversation or argument, it was a dead end.
“I guess he was thinking of you,” Asher continued. “Of the stigma or shame you might suffer if the story got out.”
“I can see that. And what if I tell the police what you told me?”
“I’ll deny it. I’ll lie to them, Diane, but not you.”
“Okay.”
“And I hope you can move on with your life. I hope you can be happy with Brad.”
“Thank you.”
“Everyone deserves a little happiness, no matter how late in life. Tell me, are you going to move in with him?”
“I’m going to see my mother first. I don’t know what after that.”
“I know. All this must be a big shock.”
“Quite a few big shocks.”
Asher held his hands out flat on the table. “Well, that’s it,” he said. “I hope you got what you were after.”
“I did.”
“Good,” Asher said, nodding thoughtfully. “Good. I have to go now.”
Diane noticed pain on his face like she hadn’t seen before, his jowls trembling, his frown casting a dark shadow over his eye sockets. He sniffed the tears away as the guard outside let him out, leaving Diane alone.
She called Brad, who picked her up. She didn’t initiate a conversation all evening, and Brad didn’t push her on the matter.
By daylight the next morning Diane had given up trying to sleep and was lying on the couch, her eyes shut but her mind firmly locked in the “on” position. Giving up trying to sleep must have done the trick, because then she managed to sleep in fits and starts, and was woken some hours later by the sound of the fridge shutting and the aroma from Brad’s coffeemaker.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I was trying my best not to wake you.”
“Oh, it’s fine. I thought I was disturbing you in the night, so I figured I’d better come out here.”
“I didn’t notice, but you’ve got the bed to yourself now if you want to sleep more.”
She shook her head. “No. I’ll feel better for getting up. I’m restless and I don’t think that’s going to change. I’m sorry.”
“Don�
��t apologize. You’ve lost your father, and it’ll take time to come to terms with it.”
She glanced at him, and by the time she realized she was chewing her lip and grimacing, it was too late.
“What is it?” he said. “Is there something you’re not telling me?”
“It’s not that, Brad. It’s not just that I’ve lost Father.”
He eyed her quizzically. “It must be something pretty big to overshadow that.” He gave her that brief window to reply, as he always did, before the politeness kicked in. “Look, you don’t need to tell me if you don’t want to.”
“You know, I really do. I should have told you yesterday, and I can’t keep it to myself any longer.”
“Okay.” He nodded—one of his serious nods. “Give me a minute to get us coffee.”
Diane used that time to stretch the crick out of her neck and sit up. Soon they were next to each other on the couch, their hands clasped around steaming cups.
Diane went to speak, but only exhaled.
“Why not try saying it as it is?”
“Okay. I think Father was, uh . . .”
He waited. She didn’t finish.
“You can tell me. Whatever it is, you can tell me.”
“Well . . . okay . . . I’m not sure whether I told you at the time—it happened a couple years after we started dating—but Father was questioned by the authorities about war crimes.”
“About what?” Brad almost spilled his coffee.
“Obviously I didn’t tell you; it’s not the kind of thing you go shouting about.”
“Jeez. No, I guess not. But carry on.”
“It was 1997. Some old guy said he recognized Father from one of the death camps—Treblinka, to be specific. He said Father helped operate the gas chambers there. Of course, the case came to nothing. Father said the allegations were the ramblings of a madman, that thousands of Ukrainians would have looked like him at that age, that he’d never been near the place in his life. And the cops—or whoever it was—obviously agreed, as they dismissed the allegations for lack of evidence. But some newspaper printed Father’s picture, Asher saw it, and traced him. That was how they got back in contact.”
“That was some coincidence. I never realized.”
“Like I said, I probably chose not to tell you.” Diane took a long breath. “Anyhow, earlier this year, Asher goes to Treblinka, sees a photo, suddenly goes along with this guy that I thought was a madman. He insists my father was there, that the allegations were true. I told him about the authorities dismissing the case, but he wasn’t having it, said Father had admitted it to him.”
Brad absentmindedly chewed on a nail for a few seconds. “That doesn’t mean anything legally if he didn’t get it on tape. But it would explain why Asher killed your father. It ties everything in so it all makes sense, because now we have a motive.”
“It also means Father was a war criminal.”
For a moment Brad stared, his face turning a shade lighter. He took a gulp before speaking. “Hey, I’m sorry, Diane. I . . . I wasn’t thinking straight. It must be awful for you.”
“It’s no party, but I have to admit, it’s like stubbing your toe after you’ve broken your leg.”
“No wonder you hardly slept. He told you all that yesterday?”
“The day before. I didn’t tell you at the time because I wasn’t sure whether I believed him.”
“And now?”
Diane huffed. “And now I’m starting to accept it. I trust Asher. And yes, I guess, stubbed toe or not, it makes me feel terrible to know what Father did.”
“I totally get that. Is that why you . . . the question that night about the sins of the father?”
“That aspect kind of plays on my mind. I loved my father. I still do. He wasn’t perfect, but he was good to me. It’s hard to come to terms with.”
Brad stood up and walked aimlessly around the room. “Your father? I mean . . . I thought I knew him too . . . but this?” He shook his head as though trying to discard his confusion and disbelief. “And you’re telling me you feel some sort of guilt or blame?”
“I know it’s stupid, but . . . well, yes, I do, if I listen to my heart. We’re talking about my own father. I can’t completely accept it. He was such a good man. He seemed such a good man.”
Brad sat back down and held her hand. “Just listen to your head on this one, not your heart. None of this is your fault.”
“I guess not. Thanks.”
They leaned in and held each other, their lips touching, and for a few seconds their heads rested on each other’s shoulders.
“I’m not sure it’s my father’s fault either.”
Brad pulled away and frowned.
“No, really. Asher told me what happened. Father was just a pawn. He had very little real choice. One day I’ll tell you. Not now.”
“I . . . I don’t know,” Brad said. “I trust you, Diane. It’s just that there’s too much to take in. But I can understand it’s complicated.”
“To put it mildly,” Diane said.
“So, where do we go from here?”
“There’s nowhere we can go. I swore to Asher I wouldn’t tell the authorities.”
“Should you let that stop you?”
“Oh, I can’t. It’s Asher’s story; it’s up to him to tell the authorities if he wants to.”
“Sure.” Brad thought for a moment, his frown deepening. “I don’t understand,” he said after a pause for thought. “One minute I think I understand, the next minute I’m confused again. Why wouldn’t Asher want such a thing to come out in the open? I mean, why should he care for your father so much, and at the same time want to kill him? It kind of makes sense, but equally makes no sense at all.”
“I agree. It’s a mess.”
“Unless he wants to protect you.”
“You mean, the publicity?”
“Oh, yes. If the story gets out, you’ll have reporters and all sorts to cope with.”
“You know, at this moment I really don’t care.”
“I get that. And I guess it solves one problem.”
“What?”
“You said you found it hard to believe Asher murdered your father. This sort of solves that. We know he had a good enough reason to do it.”
Diane nodded. “I guess he did.”
Chapter 33
Pittsburgh, September 2001
Three weeks had passed since Diane had listened to Asher’s version of events, and she and Brad had discussed the story at length many times. What they hadn’t discussed was where Diane was going to live. She’d arranged to visit her mother in Baltimore and stay there for a few weeks initially, and hadn’t yet made a decision on what she was going to do after that. She told Brad again that she figured her mother had lost out due to her father’s behavior, and was owed something.
Getting away from Pittsburgh was also starting to have an appeal. At first, when she’d come to accept Asher’s story about her father, she was sure only she and Asher knew the truth. But every time there was a knock on the door and every time the phone rang there was a split second when she wondered whether she would meet someone who also knew. Details of her father’s murder had been released to the newspapers, so she’d had journalists approach her about the story. That was bad enough, but Diane knew some were smart and very persistent; it was quite possible that one would investigate the case, dig deeper—specifically, into the 1997 charges—and put two and two together.
Each of those split seconds was a seed that germinated into a moment’s thought that grew into a few seconds, enough for a conscious appraisal of the risks, and soon Diane could hear a little voice on her shoulder every time she was talking to strangers. The voice was asking, “Does this person know?” and the more she ignored it, the more it spoke up for itself.
She put it down to the stress of dealing with her father’s estate. Yes, perhaps he was haunting her and perhaps it would all go away when the property was sold. The story of her father’s dea
th would certainly die down as more news was loaded onto the conveyor belt.
The practicalities were no less stressful. Diane had originally wanted little to do with the contents of the house, so had given the clearance firm instructions to remove everything, valuable or not. It had taken Brad to point out the obvious: that most of her own clothes and personal effects were still there. So she and Brad returned to Hartmann Way before the firm turned up. As it turned out, Diane couldn’t bear to enter the house—not after the last time she’d been there and had stepped into a scene from a murder movie.
So Brad dutifully went inside and packed everything from her room into a few cardboard boxes. As he was loading them into the car, she asked him to return for a few other things, because she still wanted some reminders of her father. So he did, returning with a couple more boxes.
She’d extended her leave from work, and so, with a little time on her hands and on the other side of town from Hartmann Way, she found it easier to sort through the contents. She was doing just that the next day when the doorbell sounded.
“Diane Peterson?” the man at the door said.
Diane hesitated. “Who wants to know?”
The man took his baseball cap off and rubbed dirty sweat from his brow. “Big Steve’s house clearance. We’re doing your father’s house on Hartmann Way.” He pointed a thick thumb at the truck across the street.
“Oh, yes.” Now Diane forced a smile. “Yes. I’m sorry. I’ve had reporters coming here ever since . . .”
His face cracked. He knew. It was understandable that he might have been curious. After all, he was emptying the very house where the event had taken place. He’d probably already loaded most of the contents into the truck; even the chair Diane’s father had been sitting in when the bullet had trashed his brain and distributed a good proportion of it onto the opposing kitchen wall.
“Well, I’m no reporter,” he said. “But we found this.” He handed her an envelope. It was thick and obviously contained something more than paper. “I know you said to remove everything from the house, that you’d taken all you wanted, but this has your name on it. We found it underneath a kitchen cabinet.”
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