Aaaiiieee!

Начало книги

I appreciate the drink, my friend, but please don’t take pity on me; those boys meant me no real harm. My face frightens them and bullying me gives them control over their fears. It is easier to be cruel to the maimed, the weak, the cowed. We don’t respect these things, they fill us with disgust…because we don’t want to become them.

And please, don’t feel sorry for me on account of my disfigurement. After all, I did this to myself. Literally, of course. But also, I earned this face. My face changed to match what I had become. It was a miracle that I could fire a bullet from a .455 through the roof of my mouth and live. It is nothing but that; a true miracle. God did not want me dead, my friend. Death would be too quick and merciful. God spared my life through divine intervention so that I could grow old as I have…and suffer the contempt of boys. And suffer my memories of that pit…

When I was a boy myself I once went out on the broken ice of a pond to save a friend’s dog from the water. I might have died, rescuing that animal. How, then, did I become the man I was in 1945? What changes in my heart, in my soul, shaped me…led me…fated me to become an SS guard at the camp of Bergen-Belsen?

Читать дальше →