Maybe the SS. Maybe he was in the resistance.

Or the Gestapo, Alena said. He might have been a Jew.

Or he might have been a collaborator, Miroslav said, and the resistance left him as a sign. Gutsy people those. He nodded to himself, set his cup down. God this is awful coffee.

He looked ordinary. Dark pants, a black sweater. He lay there on his back in the sun. You might have thought him drunk.

Except for the price of beer, Miroslav said.

His feet, they lay splayed flat, as if his ankles were broken. He still had on his shoes.

That’s what the police were guarding then. As soon as the crowd departs they grab the shoes. Probably one each.

May I have that coffee, Alena?

She brought it, sat herself.

He looked so like anyone, Trn said.

Probably a collaborator, Miroslav said. They’re everywhere now, top to bottom. Did you hear that Goring was in Prague the other evening? Called on our president and invited him out to dinner. When the waiter handed Hacha the menu he opened his pen and said, Now where do I sign?

Miroslav laughed and clapped the table so the spoon jumped in the saucer.

***

They left Horst-Wessel-Allee for Hermann-Goring-Strasse and took the slope rising to the square, the street closed to traffic but still so busy they could not walk abreast, Aleks in the middle with a hand for Alena, a hand for Trn leading them through the jostle, the songs. The way widened into Wehrmacht-Platz, the second Christmas under war, their second German Christmas. In their staved pools round the old public fountain the black carp drifted through the cold water. The buyers peered in, considered, the men in rubber gloves reached to haul out the Christmas feast. O Tannenbaum from a chorus in one corner, Stille Nacht from the competing steps of St. Jakub. All the towered clocks said afternoon but the light failed in the sky, the square so crowded as if each cobblestone must be occupied.

From wooden stalls like old barns, gaps between the rough and crooked boards, the merchants hawked their grog and sweaters and wooden toys, fur caps and mufflers. A trio of policemen in black rounded helmets extended their palms over a fire in a barrel. Smoke or steam or the fogs of breath everywhere rising. Aleks reached into a basket of stuffed toys guarded by a stout woman in an apron that fell to her muddy boots. She gummed a smile. Two of his fingers strayed over the false fur, the leather patch of a stuffed dog’s nose.

Look. Here they come already, Trn said bending to be heard. Are you prepared?

A girl and a boy in their teens, the first in pure white, came to look down at Aleks and the angel said, Have you been a good boy or a naughty one?

Yes, Aleks said, very good.