Dusk was setting quickly in the Austrian town of Braunau am Inn. Felix Roth sighed as he noticed the quickly fading light outside. His wife of less than a month no doubt had dinner on the table. He was all-to-close to arriving home late, as he had every night this week. Maria never seemed to mind, but Felix could not bear the thought of her bustling to re-heat his food yet again while he offered another excuse. In the three weeks that had passed since their wedding, they had fallen even further in love. The past few days an unusual spike in violent crimes had kept Felix late every night, cutting short their treasured evenings together. But not tonight. He could still make it. Smiling at the thought, he turned the knob to open his door when suddenly it slammed back into him, knocking the wind out of him as the handle jabbed into the space below his ribs. "Ooooommmph," Felix gasped. A gigantic patrolman clumsily forced his way into the doorway, pushing Felix back against his desk. He sputtered a stream of apologies as he squeezed himself into a chair. "So sorry, Detective Roth, again, sir. And sorry to keep you, it's just that Detective Otto sent me. He has that young woman from yesterday in interrogation. Uh, that is the one they found with the body of one of the local children." Felix nodded, still wheezing lightly. "Yes, the Hitler boy. Terrible tragedy. You said Otto asked for me?" "Not exactly sir. He said to tell you that she did." Felix rubbed his temples in exasperation. "I'm sorry? The suspect? What did she do?" "She asked for you. She asked to speak with Detective Felix Roth." Felix walked briskly to interrogation, hoping to clear up whatever mistake had been made quickly. Hans Otto was standing outside of the door, muttering aloud as he peered down at a tiny note pad. "You need glasses old man." Felix taunted, tapping his former partner's shoulder gently with a playful punch. Otto chuckled as he looked up. "Ha! Need is all in the eye of the beholder. I might see half of what you do, but I still solve cases twice as fast. How does that make you feel?" "It sounds like your memory is going too!" Otto smirked at the retort, then paused as he glanced back at the pad. "Did Franz tell you?" "He tried to, but I think he was mistaken. Do you need help with something? Because I'm really trying to get home to my wife...." Felix trailed off as he saw Otto's brow furrow. "What is it?" "He wasn't mistaken. She's asking for you. By name." "I thought she was a foreigner - an American?" Felix said. "How would she have any idea who I am?" "I don't know what to tell you Felix. She is American, from what I can tell. But it's been almost 24 hours since we arrested her and I can’t get anything out of her. Not a single word, except that she promises to cooperate if she can speak with you." Felix's heart sank. His perfect evening at home was vanishing before his eyes. And worse - it was being replaced by something he hadn't prepared himself for today. Diving head-first into the interrogation of a child murderer? He'd been relieved when Otto was assigned to this disturbing case. "Listen, Felix - I have one more hour with her before the Viennese Detectives arrive. They’ll use any excuse to take this over, already they have tried to tell me it’s too controversial for our local department to handle. I need to get somewhere with her to have any chance of keeping this case here. I need you to go in there." Felix nodded in resignation. "No problem, Otto – I can’t imagine what she wants with me, but I’ll find out." After quickly reviewing the extremely sparse case file, Felix poured a cup of tea and walked back to the interrogation room. As he unlocked the door, a wave of nausea flooded his gut. He had never been less prepared to interrogate a suspect. The only two facts he entered with were these: (1) this woman knew his name and (2) yesterday Mr. and Mrs. Hitler found her in their backyard burying the bludgeoned body of their 1-year-old local son. Felix swung open the door and strode in briskly, taking a seat across the table from the suspect. He surveyed her in one glance. She was younger than he had expected – she couldn’t be any older than Maria. A handful of chestnut curls hung limply around her face, free from the thick braid that ran halfway down her back. Bright, blue eyes darted anxiously across Felix's face. "Hello," he began as he scraped his metal chair closer to the table. "My name is Felix Roth. What’s yours?” Her eyes lit up vibrantly. “I’m Alix,” she said while her hands began scrambling wildly below her tunic. "Stop! Hands where I can see them!" Felix bellowed as he sprung out of his chair. Hissing a sigh of frustration, she placed her arms upon the table. Felix nodded. "Miss…… “ he trailed off, waiting for her to fill in the blanks. “Alix. Just Alix. No Miss.” “Okay, Alix - now, it looked like you were reaching for something and because of that I'm going to have to search you." "By all means, Detective Roth. I'm reaching for a stack of papers, nothing more, but what I need most of all is for you and I to review those papers as quickly as possible. So if this will get us there, please waste no time - conduct your search.” Perplexed, Felix nodded and stood up. He paused on his side of the table, glancing at the door. Would it be better to enlist Otto's help before searching her? It was his suspect after all. And he didn't want her to feel threatened, if they had any hope of a confession she couldn't feel alienated. Swish His train of thought was interrupted by the sound of air passing over fabric and a sudden movement across the table. "Hands up!" "They're up, they're up." Alix stood across the table, naked except for undergarments, arms raised high in the air. "I'm sorry, but you were taking forever and this is really quite urgent." He flushed with discomfort as he quickly scanned the front of her body, then nodded. She turned her back to him and, amid a sea of smooth, olive skin, was just what she had said - a stack of papers, taped to her lower back. "Well?" Her eyes searched his face impatiently. "Do you have to remove them or can I?" "Uh... you can remove them." She peeled the papers from her back and tossed them on the table. Before he even thought to turn around, she was reaching for the waist bottom of her pants, then quickly sliding her tunic over her head. In a matter of seconds she was dressed and seated. As Felix pulled out his chair he watched her pick up and begin frantically shuffling through the stack of papers. She seemed to be separating them - placing each sheet into one of two new stacks in the middle of the table. No more than 30 seconds after she started, she separated the final two sheets of paper, each of which contained only a few words of extra-large, bold type. "Felix Roth Family - Holocaust" read the sheet that she placed on top of the stack to his right. "Adolf Hitler" was placed at the top of the stack to his left. Felix's stomach turned at the sight of the boy's name. "Miss, I don't know what this is, but there is very compelling evidence that you murdered a child yesterday. Knowing my name won't change that, so we need to talk about what your next steps are here...." "Please!" She interrupted, her voice shrill with what sounded like desperation. "Please, Detective Roth, Felix, I don't have long to explain all this and I just need you to listen." "Why? I'm sorry but nothing you say about my family can change the facts of the crime." "You're right. These can't change the fact that I beat that little boy to death. But they can explain why. What I know about Adolf Hitler. Please listen with an open mind, Felix. What I'm about to tell you is going to sound insane, but I know too much about your life and your family for it to not be true. Most importantly, I know something about your family that you won't find out for many years. So, first things, first - can you confirm something for me? Is Roth a Jewish name?"