Letting it go

f the dirt-track that twisted its way across the dry cactus-sprinkled scrub-land to walk up the rocky path towards his house. It was the way the man walked that gave him away: the purposef

xties, perversely dressed for the merciless heat of Thailand in a neat dark grey business suit, his figure long and gaunt, his silvering black hair thinning to near baldness beneath the little circular brown yarmulke that c

the final act, but now he could see that it was not to be, and he knew that it was an indulgence he had no right to expect. In a way it pleased him that the issues were going to be addressed. Not put right of course, that lay far beyond his gift. No atonement was possible. All that he had

w moments without speaking, staring into Henry's face with cold grey eyes that betrayed absolutely no e

ore scuffed of Henry's two wicker armchairs. Still staring blankly at

an accent. He felt a momentary crazy impulse to make a joke, to answer something like: You've come to read the water-meter. Or: You've come to re

belled manila folders, which he placed on the cracked glass top of Henry's coffee-table. "My name is Sa

rop. "Wolfgang," he mumbled abstractly, "yes,

stion: "Do you deny that you are Wolfgang Heinrich Muller, a former

the question. "'Major' was an honorary rank," he said at las

meone who had waited for this moment almost as long as Henry himself had waited. He said it as though he hardly dared

in his head. And that young man grew into me. I wouldn't even recognise him now. I wouldn't know him if I bumped into him in the street. I don't remember a great

That will not m

you want one?" The other shook his head. "It won't be laced with poison, by

brams had taken a document from one of the manila folders and was holding it stiffly before him, but he was still looking at Henry. "Do you remember th

s a long time ago, Mr. Abr

dred and fifty. Does that sound to

me very quiet and his eyes, almost unbl

en hundred and fifty people, or thereabouts, all ages, both sexes......

is head. "I h

ing. "These are signed and sworn statements from each of the six. You will notice that they have been translated into Englis

." He fumbled around in his inside pocket to find his reading glasses and put them on. Such a cosy little scene, he thought to himself. Fo

witnesses describe experiments in which human subjects were deliberately infected with life-threatening diseases, including typhoid fever, syphilis and hepatitis, and then used as guinea-pigs for the testing of novel drugs and treatment regimes. They alle

any differenc

able and Henry picked it up and held it carefully, moving i

age, watched his head nod very slightly as he hurri