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Bauer watched helplessly as five of his comrades were marched out of the beer hall with their hands behind their backs and shoved forward, some falling to the pavement. The shoemaker. The barber. The salesman. The shopkeeper. The musician. Each was forced into the rear cabin of the truck.

Bauer watched the truck speed away, surely whisking the group away into protective custody.

For a long time, Bauer did not move, too stunned and horrified to process his next move. After a while, he walked into the tavern. The door to the private room they used stood open, the room empty, the large table overturned. He made eye contact with the bartender. Ernest, a bald war veteran with only three fingers on his right hand and half a right ear, courtesy of a British explosive device, gave Bauer a knowing nod.

Bauer approached the bar and ordered a stein of ale.

Ernest delivered a foamy mug. “Be glad you were late,” he said under his breath.

Bauer kept a poker face, nodding matter-of-factly and sipping his beer. “They got five. Where are the others?”

“The one who does spycraft, he didn’t show. The professors I assume were rounded up earlier with the academic purge.”

Bauer continued to nod, like he was just making conversation, though his heart dropped. “How did they know about us?”

“Don’t know,” said Ernest. “But they pay for information. They threaten for information. If you know something and don’t say, you’re just as guilty. They have people everywhere, listening, watching.”

Bauer looked around the crowded tavern at customers enjoying their beers, some laughing heartily. It could be any of them.

Bauer slid money across the bar for his beer. “Just one more question,” he said. “And I want you to look me in the eye.”

Ernest did not, in fact, look him in the eye. Instead, he focused on wiping the bar counter with a rag. “I had no choice,” he said. “They’d lock me up. They’d burn down my tavern.”

Bauer grabbed his arm. “Those were brothers-in-arms you betrayed. Veterans who fought for this country. And for what? So you’d betray them to the first fascist who comes along?” He swatted the beer, knocking the mug over, and left the tavern.

Outside, he looked both ways before proceeding, watching out for SA thugs. A man stepped out from the alley and walked under a streetlamp.

“Erich,” said Bauer.

“So we’re down to two patriots,” said von der Haas, looking every bit the spy with his diminutive frame, his mousy face, his wandering eyes. “Let’s see how long it lasts.”

77

April 1, 1933

Geiger Department Store

Jakobplatz

SELIG GEIGER CLEARED HIS throat as he stood before some four hundred employees on the top floor, the third floor of the building, the section of the store reserved for household wares.

“You all know what is happening today,” he began. “The government is urging a one-day boycott of Jewish-owned stores. I do not expect this to deter us. I hope business will be as prosperous as always. I can’t be sure. I wish I knew.”

Selig looked over his employees, people as young as fifteen and as old as seventy, of various nationalities and creeds.

“I’ve never hidden my Judaism,” he continued, walking among his workers. “But neither have I mixed my personal life with business. Did you even know I was Jewish? Have I ever asked any of you about your faith? The Geiger Department Store isn’t a Jewish store or a Christian store or a Nationalist store or a Communist store. It’s a store, period. A store that has served Munich for ninety-eight years, since my grandfather founded it. If I have anything to say about it, it will serve Munich for ninety-eight more. We have expanded over the years. We now employ over eight hundred people with well-paying jobs, and we provide fine goods to the people of this city—people of whatever faith. We have weathered storms before. We survived the Great War without closing for a single day. We will survive today’s boycott. Let’s just stick to—”

“Herr Geiger! Herr Geiger!” Selig’s store manager came rushing up the escalator. “You have to come outside now!”

Selig raced down the escalators, nearly toppling over. As he ran along the tiled floor toward the main entrance, passing the men’s formal clothing area, he looked through the large glass doors to see a commotion, a gathering of people.

He pushed through the doors into the cool spring air. A half dozen members of the SA, in formal brown uniforms and swastika armbands, were setting up barricades. One was blocking a woman in a fur coat who was trying to enter the store. Another was painting a Star of David in yellow and black on the window. Others were posting cardboard signs: DEUTSCHE WEHRT EUCH and KAUFT NICHT BEI JUDEN!

Germany, beware.

Do not buy from Jews!

“You can’t do this!” Selig cried. “People can enter this store if they please! You have no right to harass them or us!”