Father Weichs nodded. “He came to see me. I must explain that when the army occupied the sanatorium, I visited the Commandant of the school to offer the services of my church to those who wished them. The Commandant was not himself of the religion, but he was sympathetic and made it as easy as possible for those who wished to come to Mass.”
He looked thoughtfully at George. “I do not know if you served in the army, Mr. Carey,” he went on after a moment or two. George nodded. “So! Then you may have noticed that there were some men-among the young front fighters I mean-who were not religious and yet found it necessary sometimes to seek some of the consolations of religion. It was when they had to find the courage to face death or mutilation, after they had seen what those things were, that the need seemed to come. Then the elaborate materialism of the intelligent among them proved as useless and sterile as the hero myths they had brought with them from the Hitler Jugend. They found that they needed something else, and sometimes they went to a priest to look for it.” He smiled faintly. “Of course, it never appeared as simple as that at the time. They came to me for many commonplace reasons, these young men-to talk about their families, to ask advice on some material problem, to borrow a book or a magazine, to show photographs they had taken, to enjoy the privacy of a garden. But the outward reason was unimportant. Though they might not always realize it, what they wanted was, in some way, to come to terms with me as a priest. They wanted something that in their hearts they thought I might be able to give them-an inner peace and strength.”
“And Schirmer’s grandson was one of them?”
Father Weichs shrugged. “I was not sure. Perhaps, yes. But I will tell you. He had been sent to the school for special training. He was a-”
He broke off, hesitating, and then, glancing at Miss Kolin, said the word Fallschirmjäger.
“He was a paratrooper,” she said.
The priest nodded. “Thank you, yes. He came to see me one day in September or October-I do not quite remember. He was a tall, strong-looking young man, very much a soldier. He had been wounded in Belgium in the attack on the fortress of Eben-Emael, and was not yet well enough to return to combat duty. He came to ask me if I knew of his grandfather, Friedrich Schirmer.”
“Did he say where his home was?” asked George quickly.
“Yes. He came from Köln.”
“Did he say what his father’s occupation was?”