As a result, she was called a monster, an unnatural woman and an unfit mother, as she recalled in interviews afterward.

Stoper recalled afterward that it had seemed less a question than a statement.

"He just said, basically, I need to go out and start playing like - really, just start playing, period," Montross recalled afterward.

Only one or two sentries or guards saw anything amiss, and they never afterward recalled having done so.

She laughed, in the ironic and musical way that Mykel could only recall for the instant afterward.

And he would recall for years afterward that had he known he would never have gone that night to the concert.

Though he was usually observant, his fascination with the current proceedings rendered the favor anonymous; he could not afterward recall whose deck he had borrowed.

"By the time she was 7 and 8, she hit the ball perfectly," the mother recalled afterward.

The room, Schmidt recalled afterward, was deadly still.

"The questions hailed down upon Hitler," Schmidt afterward recalled.