CATHERINE AND EMMA are seated at the counsel table, engaged in quiet conversation. To Emma’s right are two boxes they have wheeled into the courtroom. The gallery is anxious for the morning’s proceedings to begin, but not nearly as anxious as Catherine, who keeps looking over her shoulder. Someone is not there. She is plainly nervous. Sparks and Henryks have yet to arrive and their counsel table is empty. Emma is equally nervous. It is nine o’clock and she knows they are a bit out on a limb. They have taken a chance. They did not issue a notice to appear. The court clerk peeks into the courtroom, sees that the plaintiff’s table is empty and closes the door. Finally, Sparks and Henryks arrive. They walk quickly and confidently to their seats, nodding to members of the press as they pass. Catherine looks at Emma and breathes a sigh of relief. “Phew! He’s here. Risk averted.”
The judge enters, asks the attorneys if there are any matters to discuss before bringing in the jury, and hearing none, instructs his clerk to summon them. As they file in, the jurors scan the room to see who the witnesses will be. There is no one sitting with Catherine and Emma. Catherine studies the jurors’ faces. She thinks they look at Henryks sympathetically. Too sympathetically for her liking.
“Ms. Lockhart, you may call your first witness.”
“May it please the court, defendant calls Ole Henryks.”
Ole is shocked. He jumps out of his seat and looks down at Sparks. “I already testified,” he says. “What’s she doing? Is this legal?”
Sparks nods and smiles. “It’s legal, Ole. She can call you. Go ahead, you’ll do fine.”
Ole heads up to the witness stand, takes his seat and nods to the jury with a look that says, “Didn’t we already do this?”
Catherine steps toward the witness stand. She has a document in her hand. “Would you state your name, please?”
“Ole Henryks, same as it was yesterday.” He smiles at the jury.
“Mr. Henryks, you swore to tell the truth this morning, didn’t you?”
“Yeah, so?”
“Well, I just asked you for your name.”
“And I told it to you. Ole Henryks.”
“Was your father’s name Viktor, and your mother’s name Marion?”
“That’s right.”
“Were you born on March 15, 1923, in Copenhagen, Denmark?”
“Yeah.”
“I have here a birth certificate for a boy born to Viktor and Marion Hendricksen, whom they named Ole Hendricksen.” She shows it to Ole, who takes his time reading it.
“So, let me ask you again, Mr. Hendricksen, what is your name, and this time please tell me the truth.”
“Well, now it’s Henryks. I changed it.”
“Did you change it legally? Because I haven’t been able to find any court records of a name change, here or in Denmark.”
“No, I just go by Henryks. It’s shorter, you know?”
“When did you decide to go by an alias? Was it when you entered the United States in 1947?”
Ole shrugs. “It could have been.”
“So then, did you lie to the U.S. Immigration Service when you entered the country in 1947?”
“I didn’t lie to nobody.”
“Did you come to the U.S. with your wife, Margit?”
“That’s right.”
“Did you tell the immigration officer that her name was Margit Henryks?”
“She said that. And it was Henryks. I might have changed it before, when I was in Denmark.”
“Not Margit Hendricksen?”
“No.”
Catherine hands him another document. “Mr. Hendricksen, I am handing you a Danish marriage certificate from June 12, 1946. Can you tell me the names of the two individuals who appear on this marriage certificate?”
Henryks squirms a little. “Ole Hendricksen and Margit Hendricksen.”
“Did the two of you lie to the U.S. Immigration Service?”
“It was her idea. Start fresh in America.”
“Mr. Hendricksen, did you two change your names because you didn’t want anyone in Denmark to be able to find you in the United States?”
“That’s ridiculous.”
“Your wife’s maiden name was Simmons, wasn’t it. And you were working for her father’s company in Copenhagen, am I right?”
“Yeah. Margit Simmons. I worked there from 1943 to 1945.”
Emma takes a breath. “Point for our side,” she says to herself.
“Both you and Margit worked for Simmons Manufacturing, didn’t you? Was that how you met?”
“No, I knew her from school. She got me the job at Simmons. She was working in the office; I was working on the assembly line.”
“Margit was the daughter of the owner, and she also had an ownership interest in Simmons Manufacturing, didn’t she?”
“Maybe.”
Catherine picks up a paper that appears to have military vehicles depicted, then looks back to the witness. “You were manufacturing turrets, I believe?”
“Yeah, I think so.”
“These were turrets to be shipped to Germany, weren’t they?”
“I suppose so. Almost everything Simmons made was sold to Germany. Lots of Danish companies did business with Germany, Miss Lockhart. Farmers, dairies, cattlemen, windows. It was no crime.”
“But not all those dairies and cattlemen manufactured and shipped military war materials or arms to Germany, did they?”
He shrugs. “I don’t know.”
Catherine consults the paper in her hand. She lets it flop forward so that Henryks can see the military vehicles pictured on the document. “But you and your wife did. You made turrets to hold machine guns on German tanks, didn’t you? And at the time you were making these turrets to hold machine guns for the Nazi army, Germany had already declared Denmark to be enemy territory, hadn’t it? Remember that? Martial law?”
“I remember, counsel.”
“After the war, were there war trials held in Denmark for Nazi collaborators? Were they prosecuted in the Danish courts?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t stay in Denmark. My wife and I moved to America.”
“Is that why you and your wife moved to America and changed your name to Henryks? Were you afraid of being prosecuted as a Nazi collaborator? Was Simmons Manufacturing a corporate collaborator?”
“Not true.”
“Did you believe that Danish authorities would come looking for Ole and Margit Hendricksen, both of whom made and sold weapons and war materials to Denmark’s enemy?”
“Total nonsense.”
“Is it? Was Margit’s father, Johann Simmons, the other owner, prosecuted and convicted for collaborating with the Third Reich?”
“It was different. He was always coming and going to Germany and he had contacts with the German army.”
“Contacts with the Wehrmacht, the army that you were manufacturing and shipping weapons to? Wasn’t it your job to manufacture weapons to German specifications?”
“I was on the assembly line.”
“You were more than that, weren’t you? Was the husband of the owner’s daughter just a mere assembly line worker?”
“I was more like a supervisor.”
“So, in 1947, when the war trials were going on and your father-in-law was being convicted, you and your wife came to America under an assumed name to avoid being charged as Nazi collaborators, is that all true?”
“No. Wrong. I was never charged with anything.”
Catherine walks back to the counsel table and puts the document down. Emma looks at it. It’s a page from a toy catalogue showing plastic replicas of Nazi tanks. Standing at the table, Catherine turns and asks, “Mr. Hendricksen, were you a member of the Blue Shirt Club, or as it was sometimes called, the Blue Storm?”
Ole shakes his head and looks at the jury. He spreads his arms. “What are you talking about now? A blue shirt what?”
“I’m talking about the Blue Shirt Club. Were you a member?” She reaches down into a box and takes out a short-sleeve blue shirt.
Ole’s jaw drops. “Where did you get that?”
Catherine savors the moment. The deception worked. “Let me repeat my question. Were you a member of the Blue Shirt Club?”
“Yeah, as a kid, a long time ago. There were lots of clubs in Denmark.”
“Like the Holger Club?”
“Yeah, like the Holger Club.”
Suddenly, there is a rumble of muffled conversation. Everyone’s attention turns to the courtroom door, where Liam enters with Britta and pushes her up to the counsel table. She is dressed in a black knit dress. There is a light gray wool shawl covering her neck and shoulders. Her makeup hides her otherwise pale complexion. Her head is held high. She sits erect. Her composure is solid.
Ole’s shock is appreciable. His nerves are on display. There is an observable twitch. He looks at Sparks plaintively and says, “Sterling?”
“Your honor,” says Sparks, “may we have a short break?”
Wilson shakes his head. “No, not now.” He nods at Britta. “Good morning, Mrs. Stein,” he says. “Continue then, please, Ms. Lockhart.”
Catherine picks up another sheaf of papers and approaches the witness. “Mr. Hendricksen, was the Holger Club one of the Danish teenage clubs that was engaged in resistance activities? Anti-Nazi activities? Sabotage of Nazi installations?”
“Some clubs were. I’m not real sure about the Holger Club.”
Catherine looks through the papers she is holding in her hand. She flips a couple of pages, seems to find what she is looking for, and says, “Calling your attention to January 22, 1943. Did you and the Blue Shirt Club have occasion to be in Jutland that night?”
Ole’s eyes lock on Catherine. He doesn’t know what she has in her hands. He scoffs. “How would I know that? January 1943?” He utters a nervous chuckle. “I don’t remember, counsel, what I was doing in January 1943.”
“Let me try to refresh your memory. On that night, near the town of Vejle, a British plane was dropping arms and explosives by parachute to members of the Holger Club to distribute the weapons to the British underground and Danish freedom fighters. On that night of January 22, 1943, did you and other members of the Blue Shirt Club lead the Gestapo to that site to arrest the boys of the Holger Club?”
“No,” he shouts. “That’s a lie.”
“Did you inform the Gestapo that the weapons drop was going to take place at that time so they could arrest the Holger Club, and did you personally lead them to the site? Did you betray the boys in the Holger Club?”
Henryks stands and points at Britta. “She’s lying,” he screams. “She’s the liar. She and her brother-in-law, Lukas Holstrum. They’re both liars. I didn’t have anything to do with that roundup. It wasn’t my fault that Holstrum got shot running away. You can’t blame that on me.”
“Mr. Hendricksen, I didn’t say anything about Lukas Holstrum, or that he was shot, or that he was running away. Obviously, you knew those things because you were there.”
“I was not. You tricked me.”
“And while we’re on it, I’m a little confused, Mr. Hendricksen. I thought I heard you testify yesterday that you didn’t know Britta Stein. I think your words were, ‘I don’t even know who she is.’ But yet you know that Lukas Holstrum is her brother-in-law?”
Henryks utters a nervous chuckle. “I meant I didn’t really know her. I mean, I knew who she was, but we weren’t friends or anything.”
“Speaking of Lukas Holstrum, did you bring two Gestapo agents to the Viking Bookstore to question Lukas Holstrum on October 4, 1943?”
“He wasn’t Jewish, you know. I didn’t bring Nazis to a Jewish family like you claim. They wanted information from Holstrum about Jews who were hiding. So I didn’t inform on any Jews.” He nods in satisfaction.
“Was Lukas Holstrum’s family Jewish?”
“His married family, but they weren’t there in the bookstore.”
“Mr. Hendricksen, I submit to you that they were there, hiding in the back room, and they heard you say you wanted a book about hiding.”
“A lie! Another bald-faced lie! She’s lying, can’t you see that? How could I know her family was hiding there? Obviously, they were hiding somewhere. They were all hiding somewhere. All the Jews. Hiding like little mice in a cupboard.”
“And you thought that Lukas could tell the Gestapo, after a little persuasion, where his family was hiding, didn’t you?”
“Nonsense. Maybe the Gestapo thought that, but how could I know what Holstrum would or wouldn’t tell them?”
“In October 1943, was the Gestapo paying informers to tell them where they could find Jewish families?”
“I didn’t take any money.”
Sparks closes his eyes. That was a terrible answer. Things are going badly. He stands. “Break, please, your honor?”
Wilson raises his eyebrows. “All right. Ten minutes. Mr. Henryks, you are not to speak to anyone during the break.”
“How are you feeling, Britta?” Catherine says quietly. Liam and Emma are keeping listeners at a distance. “Better,” Britta says. “Nice to get out of … hospital.”
Catherine notices that her speech is improving. “Did they discharge you?” Catherine says.
Britta has an impish smile. “Not exactly. I discharged me. I couldn’t miss this.”
“Your presence has rattled him, Bubbe,” Emma says. “He’s stumbling all over himself. Catherine is doing a masterful job.”
Catherine shrugs. “The truth has a way of wiggling out.”
Britta reaches out and squeezes Catherine’s hand. “Thank you for what you have done.”
“Don’t thank me yet. I don’t know if we have enough to convince the jury.”
THE GAVEL SOUNDS the resumption of the proceedings and Henryks retakes the stand.
“Mr. Hendricksen, I want to call your attention again to the photograph on the easel. You identified your father and yourself. There is a third person, who appears to be a young man like yourself. Who is that?”
“I don’t remember. Probably one of the guys I hung around with.”
“And it’s your testimony that the three of you on this very night transported Jewish families to Sweden in that very boat.”
“That night and the nights after.”
“Did you call that boat the Perlie B and tell people that you led Jewish families to that boat?”
“Right. The Perlie B. Perlie Bjorn was my grandmother.”
“Your son, Nils, testified that the other young man in the picture was named Henning.”
Henryks leans forward. “No. He said Henry, and you said Henning. You tricked him like you trick me.”
“Is the other man in the picture Henning Brondum?”
“I had a friend Henry Wolf, you know. That’s probably him. I don’t know any Henning Brondum.”
“Mr. Hendricksen, please look at the photograph again and read the numbers and letters on the side of the boat you call the Perlie B.”
“BC2342.”
“What do those numbers stand for?”
“You have to register your boat in the Copenhagen Harbor. There is a fee.”
“Precisely. I believe it is your testimony that your father owned this boat, is that right?”
“He did, named after his mother. And we rescued Jews in that boat.”
Catherine hands a document to Henryks. “Mr. Hendricksen, this is a registration form from the Copenhagen Harbor for the year 1943. Do you see the registration for boat BC2342?”
Ole finds it on the page and scowls. “It says it’s owned by Henning Brondum. But I don’t know him. I mean it’s possible that we were standing in front of someone else’s boat when the picture was taken. It’s a long time ago. I could have forgot the numbers.”
Catherine nods to Emma, who turns on her computer at the counsel table. “Your honor,” Catherine says, “we are going to play a short video clip which will be displayed on the monitors.”
Wilson nods. “Go ahead.”
The clip begins. It is a crowded party at The Melancholy Dane. Catherine lets it run for a minute or two and then pauses it. “Mr. Hendricksen, can you tell us what is going on in this video?”
“Yeah. Of course I can. That was a party thrown for me at my tavern. It was called Ole Appreciation Night. You can see all the people that were there to appreciate me. They did it to show their love after Mrs. Stein wrote all those terrible lies about me.”
“There were many speeches that night, weren’t there? Including one by you?”
“Yep. There sure were.”
“Let’s play the second clip,” Catherine says.
All eyes are on the video monitors. A major is giving a toast. He says, “My uncle and Ole would share fascinating stories of Copenhagen back in the day. They talked about the resistance, they talked about fighting the Nazis, they talked about saving lives. Oh, those were the days. My uncle Ole and their buddy, Henning Brondum, like the Three Musketeers.” Then the picture shifts to Ole Henryks, who says, “Henning, ya, we had a club. There were others. My friend Kai Nielsen. It was good times; when we were young. We went fishing; Henning had a boat.”
The courtroom is silent. Henryks jumps to his feet in the witness box. “Sterling?” he says. “We need a recess. We need a break right now. I need to talk to my lawyer.”
“No, Mr. Henryks, not now,” Judge Wilson says.
Henryks appeals to Sparks, who shakes his head. Then to the judge, he says, “I need to use the washroom.”
Wilson rolls his eyes. “Very well. Mr. Sparks, you will stay seated. My clerk will accompany Mr. Henryks to the bathroom. We will stand in recess for ten minutes.”
Catherine says, “One question, if I may before we break, your honor.” He nods. “Henning Brondum didn’t rescue any Jews, did he, Mr. Hendricksen? He turned them over to the Gestapo, didn’t he?”
“No, I don’t know.”
“He lured them to that boat and then turned them over to the Germans, didn’t he? On that night in 1943.”
“I have to use the washroom.”
“WHERE ARE YOU going with this?” Britta whispers to Catherine during the break. “The evidence must be pretty damning.”
“Nothing I have is as damaging to Ole as what he has just done to himself. He has validated an accusation that I could not possibly prove.”
The gavel signals the return of Henryks to the witness stand and Catherine steps forward.
“MR. HENDRICKSEN, WHEN you talked about the club that you had with Henning Brondum and Kai Nielsen, the club that you were referencing that night in your restaurant, that wasn’t the Blue Shirt Club, was it?”
Henryks slowly shakes his head. He looks beaten. “No, it wasn’t. Henning was not in the Blue Shirt Club.”
“That’s right,” Catherine says. “What was the name of the club that he and Kai Nielsen formed?”
Henryks hesitates. He takes deep breaths. The jury’s eyes are locked on him. There is no escape. “Sometimes it was called the Brondum Gang. Other times it was called the Peter Group. Petergruppen.”
Catherine is holding another document. “Am I correct that the Petergruppen was sympathetic to the Nazis in 1943?”
It’s over and Ole knows it. He nods. “It was created by the German administration in Denmark. They named the club after Peter Schafer, the German who formed it.”
“Am I also correct that the Brondum Gang, or the Petergruppen, was a counter-resistance group?”
“Yes.”
“Did it fight Danish resistance efforts?”
“I think so.”
“Isn’t it a fact that on the night of the exodus, Henning Brondum lured Jewish families to his boat, BC2342, and then turned them over to the Gestapo?”
“I know you won’t believe me, but I didn’t do it personally. I never turned in people, I never went on any of those raids. But they did; Brondum and Nielsen and others. They attacked the Danish freedom fighters. They led Jews to the Gestapo. But they were only my social friends, I didn’t go on any of their raids. Not me, you have no proof.”
“In 1947, were seven members of the Petergruppen, including Henning Brondum and Kai Nielsen—your social friends, your Three Musketeers—were they tried in a Danish court, convicted and executed for war crimes?”
Ole hangs his head. The courtroom is deathly silent. He says, “Yes, they were.”
“And is that why you and your wife, Margit, came to America and changed your name?”
Ole nods.
“No further questions, your honor. The defendant rests.”
Wilson looks at Sparks, who is hunched over his papers. “Any redirect of this witness, Mr. Sparks? Will there be any rebuttal?”
“No, your honor.”
“Then the evidence is closed. We will hear final arguments tomorrow morning.”