Hitler's Last Secretary (14 page)

The first and most important foreign guest was Mussolini. Hitler was in a particularly good mood on the day before his visit. ‘The Duce is an outstanding statesman. He knows the way his people’s minds work, and considering how lazy the Italians are it’s amazing what he’s made of the country in this short time. But he’s not in an easy position, standing between the Church and the royal family. The King may be a fool, but he has many supporters. Victor Emanuel is the smallest king I know. When I went to Rome in 1938 in my special train I warned my companions just before we came into the station. I told them we were now arriving, and if they saw a man with a lot of gold braid on his uniform apparently kneeling down on the platform they mustn’t laugh, because he was the King of Italy and had never grown any taller. Of course that really amused my own tall fellows, and I oughtn’t to have said anything about it in advance. It was a funny sight to see the King at table sitting next to the Queen, who was two heads taller. As long as they were seated they looked much the same height, but as soon as they got up the King seemed to slip down lower and the Queen grew even taller. It was wonderful in Rome, though. Italy is an enchanting country, but its people are very idle.’

Then Hitler spoke enthusiastically of the great events and magnificent occasions the Duce had organized in honour of his guest. The Fascist population had given the statesman who was their ally endless ovations with unheard-of enthusiasm. Later Hitler described all this enthusiasm as nothing but a flash in the pan, and said the Italians had no strength of character. On that occasion he had been to a grand opera with Mussolini and was horrified by the audience’s lack of attention to the performance. ‘People were sitting in the boxes and the stalls dressed in fine clothes, gossiping on about their personal concerns, while the singers were doing their best. We didn’t arrive until the middle of the second act, and I couldn’t believe my ears when suddenly the opera broke off to play the Italian national anthem, the German national anthem and the Horst Wessel song. I felt very awkward and embarrassed for the singers and musicians.’

Apparently Hitler was good friends with the Duce personally too, for I had a feeling he was really looking forward to Mussolini’s visit. But it may be that he was expecting material support and aid from his friend, and that was why he was in such a good mood. At any rate, he really knew how to play on human feelings. Mussolini was to be received at the Berghof too, and eat with Hitler. The kitchen was kept very busy trying to satisfy the guest’s pampered palate.

The great day of the reception was lucky enough to have real ‘propaganda weather’ again, as so often both before and afterwards. The sun, the snow and the clear blue sky looked so festive that they made a wonderful setting for the magnificence of Schloss Klessheim. I can’t say anything about Mussolini’s visit itself, because I stayed behind at the deserted Berghof with several other people and was in the office, catching up with my work without feeling rushed for once. Another big batch of air reports from the Rhineland and North Germany had arrived. Eva Braun had set out before lunch to walk to the Königsee with Herta Schneider, Frau Brandt and Frau von Below, and wouldn’t be back until late in the afternoon. She was making the most of a free day to stretch her legs properly at last. Usually she had to be back for lunch, and after those late evenings by the hearth she had to sleep in late next day.

Fräulein Schroeder was not feeling well and had gone to bed, and I was on duty alone. When I had finished my work in the office I felt very bored. The fine weather made me want to go for a walk too, but I couldn’t leave the telephone unattended. I felt as if I were in a golden cage when I went to sit on the terrace with a book and looked at the mountains. At this time I felt curiously restless when I was alone; it was a sense of discomfort that I couldn’t explain to myself. It wasn’t the mountains that oppressed my spirits but the whole weight of the machinery into which I had found my way, and which was now holding me tightly in its thousand arms.

At last a phone call came. ‘The Führer has just left Klessheim. He wants to take his guests to the tea-house.’ I changed my clothes. The Berghof began coming to life again. The yapping of the Scotties announced that the mistress of the house was home. Twenty minutes later cars came roaring up the road, the whole house was soon full of uniforms, and a little later the Führer set out with a small company to walk to the tea-house.

I had assumed that on days like this, when there were demanding, important talks to be held, the Führer would be tired and go to bed earlier. Exactly the opposite was the case. The Führer was excited and talkative, and the tea-party went on for ever.

Other visitors were Marshal Antonescu of Romania, Reich Regent Horthy of Hungary, President Tiso of Slovakia, and King Boris of Bulgaria. For days on end we didn’t set eyes on Hitler until the evening. Only Boris of Bulgaria was asked to the Berghof too. As I was wandering around the kitchen I happened to see the King drive up to the main entrance. Planning to reach my room unseen, I quickly ran across the yard behind the house so as to use the back door. I burst right into the ceremonious procession in which the Führer was leading the King through the living room to the Great Hall. I was holding an apple I’d just bitten into in my right hand, and two ping-pong bats in my other hand. My mouth was full too, so there was nothing I could say or do. Hitler and his guest looked at me in some surprise, but not unkindly, and I hurried off to my room feeling embarrassed. When the Führer greeted me before dinner that evening, I apologized and he said, in very friendly tones, ‘Don’t worry, child, kings are only human too.’

The state receptions were over, but another great day was coming closer: 20 April, the Führer’s birthday. Whole laundry baskets full of birthday cards and presents had been arriving at the Berghof for weeks beforehand. Boxes, parcels and packages were stacked up in Bormann’s office and the adjutancy office. And this was only a small fraction of the presents. Most of them went to Berlin. Business firms and companies, local Party offices, organizations, children’s homes, schools, societies and private persons all sent good wishes and presents. The gifts included all sorts of things, from toothbrushes and complete children’s outfits to the finest ladies’ underwear and valuable porcelain or museum pieces. Most of them were meant not for Hitler’s personal use, but to be given to whatever needy recipients he thought fit. Some of the presents were from simple folk, which was very moving. An old woman had made a pair of slippers and tastelessly but laboriously embroidered the swastika against the setting sun on each slipper. Another lady sent a hand-made handkerchief with a head embroidered in each corner, showing Hitler, Hindenburg, Bismarck and Frederick the Great, all united to help you blow your nose! Cakes, tarts, biscuits, sweetmeats and fruit from all over Germany arrived, carefully and lovinglypackaged. The adjutancy office looked like a department store these days. Presents and letters from Hitler’s personal acquaintances were taken to his study unopened.

On the evening of 19 April we were sitting by the hearth. For once everyone was there. It was all the same as usual. Hitler talked at length about his beloved Blondi. She was allowed to join the company, and as a dog-lover myself I was really delighted to see how clever she was. Hitler played all kinds of little games with her. He got her to beg, and ‘be a schoolgirl’, which meant getting up on her hind legs and putting both front paws on the arm of Hitler’s chair, like a good little school pupil. Her best turn was singing. Hitler would tell her, in his kindest, most coaxing voice, ‘Sing, Blondi!’ and then he struck up a long-drawn-out howl himself. She joined in the high notes, and the more Hitler praised her the louder she sang. Sometimes her voice rose too high, and then Hitler said, ‘Sing lower, Blondi, sing like Zara Leander!’ Then she gave a long, low howl like the wolf who was certainly among her ancestors. She was given three little pieces of cake every evening, and when Hitler raised three fingers of his hand she knew at once that she was about to get her evening treat.

We talked about the dog almost all that evening, as if it were going to be
her
birthday. ‘She really is the cleverest dog I know. I sometimes play ball with her over there in my study,’ Hitler told us. ‘Now and then she knocks her toy under the cupboard, and then I have to go to the hearth for the poker and fish the ball out with it. The other day she was with me while I was sitting at my desk. She was very restless, walking up and down. Finally she stopped by the hearth and whined until I got up. Then she went to the cupboard and back to the hearth until I picked up the poker and fetched her ball out from under the cupboard. I’d forgotten about this game, but she still remembered just how I had helped her. But I’m afraid she might break her leg on the smooth parquet floor, so I’ve stopped playing with her in there.’

At last the big hand of the clock came round to twelve. At twelve precisely the doors opened and a row of servants and orderlies marched in with trays full of glasses and champagne. Everyone had a glass of bubbly except Hitler, who had some very sweet white wine poured into his glass. On the last stroke of twelve we clinked glasses. Everyone said, ‘All the best, my Führer,’ or, ‘Happy birthday, my Führer.’ Some made a rather longer speech, hoping that the Führer would remain in good health so that his powers would long remain at their height to help the German people, and so on.

That brought the official part of the birthday to a close as far as I was concerned. The company sat down again, the conversation continued, and later many other people came in with birthday wishes: all the servants, the guards, chauffeurs, the entire kitchen and domestic staff, all the children of the Führer’s set of friends and acquaintances. Hitler’s birthday was celebrated everywhere, in the kitchen, the garages, the guardrooms, the press office, the orderlies’ room. Today as much alcohol as anyone wanted flowed at the Berghof. I took advantage of the general celebrations to go to bed earlier than usual for once. There were plenty of people around to entertain Hitler, and I wasn’t needed any more for work.

On the morning of 20 April Hitler came down earlier than usual. Smiling, half shaking his head, he looked at the presents on the table and piled up in the office. He kept a few small things: a very pretty sculpture of a young girl, a handsome wooden bowl that a fourteen-year-old boy had made himself, and some children’s drawings that he wanted to show Eva. Everything else would go to hospitals, children’s homes, old folk’s homes and welfare organizations. Presents of food were really supposed to be disposed of because of the risk that they might be poisoned. But I did my bit in helping to dispose of these delicacies by using them for their proper purpose.

At lunch Himmler and Sepp Dietrich,
⁴⁹
Goebbels and Esser, Ribbentrop and Chief of Staff Werlin
⁵⁰
were the guests of honour. There were so many people that there wasn’t an empty seat left even at the round table in the bay window. I sat next to Himmler. It was the first time I had seen this powerful, much feared man at close quarters. I didn’t like him at all, not for any sense of brutality about him but because he seemed so ordinary and insincere, rather like a civil servant. That was the surprising thing about his character: he would greet you by kissing your hand, he spoke in a quiet voice with a slight Bavarian accent, always had a smile around the corners of his eyes and mouth, and seemed friendly and polite, almost cordial! When you heard him telling innocuous stories, chatting away pleasantly, who would associate him with mass shootings, concentration camps and so on? I think he was very subtle. He told us how splendidly the concentration camps were organized. ‘I give people their work to do individually, and by using that method I’ve achieved not only total security but also efficiency, peace and quiet, and good order in the camps. For instance, we made an incorrigible arsonist fire-watcher in one camp. He’s responsible for seeing that no fire breaks out, and I made sure he knew that he would be the prime suspect the moment there was any fire at all. You should just see how reliable and conscientious that man is now, my Führer.’ So saying, he smiled happily, and we were bound to get the impression that as a humanitarian psychologist he didn’t just imprison the inmates of the camps, he trained and educated them too. Hitler nodded his approval of Himmler’s remarks, and no one had anything else to add to the subject.

Ribbentrop was a very odd man. The impression he made on me was of someone absent-minded and slightly dreamy, and if I hadn’t known that he was Foreign Minister I’d have said he was a cranky eccentric leading a strange life of his own. In the middle of the conversation he suddenly asked, abruptly, why the Führer didn’t drink sparkling wine. ‘It’s extremely refreshing, my Führer, and very digestible too.’ Hitler looked at him in some surprise and told him firmly that he hated champagne. ‘It’s much too acid for me, and if I want something sparkling to drink I prefer Fachinger or Apollinaris water. I’m sure they’re healthier.’ Probably the Foreign Minister had temporarily forgotten that he was no longer a champagne manufacturer but a diplomat now. He always cut a good figure, but I like him a lot less when I remember how, on visiting London for the Coronation, he greeted the King of England by raising his arm and announcing, ‘Heil Hitler!’

Goebbels brought verve and wit into the conversation. He wasn’t at all handsome, but I could see why the girls in the Reich Chancellery ran to the windows to see the Propaganda Minister leave his Ministry, but took hardly any notice of Hitler. ‘Oh, if you only knew what eyes Goebbels has, and what an enchanting smile!’ they gushed, as I looked blankly at them. The ladies at the Berghof positively flirted with Hitler’s Minister too. He really did have a delightfully entertaining manner, and his shafts of wit were well aimed, although mostly at other people’s expense. No one around the Führer’s table could stand up to his sharp tongue, least of all the Reich press chief, who made the slightly improper remark that he got his best ideas in the bathtub, to which Goebbels, of course, promptly replied, ‘You should take a bath more often, Dr Dietrich!’ The press chief went pale and said no more.