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"This is my girlfriend, Frieda Franck."
Carla was surprised. Was Frieda his girlfriend now?
Frieda said: "I had a younger brother who was born with spina bifida. Earlier this year he was transferred to a hospital at Akelberg in Bavaria for special treatment. Shortly afterward we got a letter saying he had died of appendicitis."
She turned to Carla, who took up the tale. "My maid had a son born brain-damaged. He, too, was transferred to Akelberg. The maid got an identical letter on the same day."
Peter spread his hands in a so-what gesture. "I have heard this kind of thing before. It's anti-government propaganda. The Church does not interfere in politics."
What rubbish that was, Carla thought. The Church was up to its neck in politics. But she let it pass. "My maid's son did not have an appendix," she went on. "He had had it removed two years earlier."
"Please," said Peter. "What does this prove?"
Carla felt discouraged. Peter was obviously biased against them.
Heinrich said: "Wait, Peter. You haven't heard it all. Ilse here worked at the hospital in Akelberg."
Peter looked at her expectantly.
"I was raised Catholic, Father," Ilse said.
Carla had not known that.
"I'm not a good Catholic," Ilse went on.
"God is good, not us, my daughter," said Peter piously.
Ilse said: "But I knew that what I was doing was a sin. Yet I did it, because they told me to, and I was frightened." She began to cry.
"What did you do?"
"I killed people. Oh, Father, will God forgive me?"
The priest stared at the young nurse. He could not dismiss this as propaganda: he was looking at a soul in torment. He went pale.
The others were silent. Carla held her breath.
Ilse said: "The handicapped people are brought to the hospital in gray buses. They don't have special treatment. We give them an injection, and they die. Then we cremate them." She looked up at Peter. "Will I ever be forgiven for what I have done?"
He opened his mouth to speak. His words caught in his throat, and he coughed. At last he said quietly: "How many?"
"Usually four. Buses, I mean. There are about twenty-five patients in a bus."
"A hundred people?"
"Yes. Every week."
Peter's proud composure had vanished. His face was pale gray, and his mouth hung open. "A hundred handicapped people a week?"
"Yes, Father."
"What sort of handicap?"
"All sorts, mental and physical. Some senile old people, some deformed babies, men and women, paralyzed or retarded or just helpless."
He had to keep repeating it. "And the staff of the hospital kill them all?"
Ilse sobbed. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I knew it was wrong."
