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'Why don't you go to hell?' Canning suggested bitterly and he walked out, slamming the door.

When Sorsa went into the bar at the Golden Eagle he found Ritter sitting by the fire, a glass in one hand. Sorsa beat the snow from his parka. Ritter didn't say a word, simply stared into the fire. The door from the kitchen opened and Erich Hoffer entered with coffee on a tray. He put it down on the side-table without a word. Ritter ignored him also.

Sorsa glanced at the sergeant-major, then coughed. Ritter's head turned very slowly. He glanced up, a brooding expression in his eyes.

'Yes, what is it?'

'You sent for me, Sturmbannfuhrer.'

Ritter stared up at him for a moment longer, then said, 'How many did you lose up there?'

'Four dead - two seriously wounded. We brought them back here for the doctor to deal with. Three others scratched about a bit. One of the half-tracks is a complete writeoff. What happens now?'

'We attack at dawn. Seven o'clock precisely. You and your men are still mine until nine, remember.'

'Yes, Sturmbannfuhrer.'

'I'll take command personally. Full assault. We'll use Panzerfausts on the drawbridge. Hoffer, here, was the best gunner in the battalion. He'll blow those chains for us, won't you, Erich?'

It was delivered as an order, and Hoffer reacted accordingly, springing to attention, heels clicking together. 'Zw befehl, Sturtnbannfuhrer.'

Ritter looked up at Sorsa. 'Any questions?'

'Would it make any difference if I had?' Sorsa asked.

'Not really. The same roads lead to hell in the end for all of us.'

'A saying we have in Finland also.'

Ritter nodded. 'Better leave Sergeant-Major Gestrin and four of your best men down here to hold the fort while we're away. You get back to your camp now. I'll be up in a little while.'

'And Herr Strasser?'

'I shouldn't imagine so, not for a moment. Herr Strasser is too important to be risked. You understand me?'

'I think so, Sturmbannfuhrer.'

'Good, because I'm damned if I do.' Ritter got to his feet, walked to the bar and reached for the schnapps bottle. 'I've known a lot of good men during the past five or six years who are no longer with us, and for the first time I'm beginning to wonder why.' There was a kind of desperation on his face. 'Why did they die, Sorsa? What for? Can you tell me?'

'I'm afraid not,' Sorsa said gently. 'You see, I fight for wages. We belong to a different club, you and me. Was there anything else?' Ritter shook his head. 'Then I'll get back to my boys.'

The big Finn gave him a military salute and went out. Ritter moved to the fireplace and stared into the flames. 'Why, Erich?' he whispered. 'What for?'

'What's this, Major Ritter?' Strasser said from the doorway. 'A little late in the day for philosophy, I should have thought.'

Ritter turned, the dark eyes blazing in the pale face. 'No more games, Reichsleiter. We've gone too far for that now, you and I.'

'Have we indeed?' Strasser went behind the bar and poured himself a brandy.

'Is it Bormann in Berlin and Strasser here, or the other way about?' Ritter said. 'On the other hand, does it really matter?'

'Speeches now?'

'I'd say I've earned the right, if only because I had to stand by and watch that sickening spectacle with the de Beauville woman. You left her more degraded than a San Pauli whore. You left her nothing.'

'I did what had to be done.'

'For God, the Fuhrer and the Reich - or have I got that in the wrong order?' Ritter ignored the horror on Hoffer's face. 'Hundreds of thousands of young Germans have died, the cream of our nation, who believed. Who had faith and idealism. Who thought they were taking our country out of the degradation and squalor of the twenties into a new age. I now realize they died for nothing. What they believed in never existed in the first place. You and your kind allowed, for your own ends, a madman to lead the German people down the road to hell, and we followed you with joy in our hearts.'

Strasser said, 'Listen to me, Ritter. This is sentimental nonsense