Prisoner of Night and Fog (29 page)

There was no mistaking the measuring look in his gaze. She recognized the way his eyes swept up and down her body. Her face burned with embarrassment.

“Herr Hitler—Uncle Dolf,” she corrected quickly, “I have known you for many years. Since I was a young child—”

“Yes, yes,” he interrupted. “You shall keep me company tonight and distract me from my worries.” He led her to the red upholstered chairs lining the wall.

What if this was all an elaborate trap? How he would enjoy toying with her, watching her wonder if he suspected the truth. The muscles in her arms tensed, ready to yank her hand free from his.

She glanced at his chest. Through the brown jacket, she saw the unmistakable ridges of a cartridge belt. If he wanted to shoot her, he wouldn’t miss. He was one of the best marksmen in Munich. Her fingers, still wrapped in Hitler’s, convulsed.

He squeezed hers back. Shock froze her in place. He thought she was
flirting
with him.

There was almost a laugh in his voice when he said, “You have saved me from listening to Hess’s interminable complaints about his health. Once he was
mein Rudi, mein Hessrl
, but now spending time with the man is torture. Yet,” he went on, sounding almost shy, “I cannot bear solitude. I prefer the company of a pretty woman over a thousand men, but . . .”

He lifted his free hand helplessly. “A man in my position cannot choose the little pleasures that make life bearable. I must think only of the good of the Fatherland.”

Hitler’s knee brushed hers, but for once he didn’t spring back as though the unexpected contact repulsed him. He began to talk, a steady stream of words that widened and deepened to a river. The upcoming presidential elections; the campaign trip throughout Bavaria he would commence in a few days with Hess and Hoffmann; filthy Communist swine; beloved president Paul von Hindenburg who was slowly turning to dust and would surely die before the year was out; and the tremendous burden that lay on his, Adolf Hitler’s, shoulders, for he had such a mighty task ahead of him to right all the wrongs . . .

“Do you see why I summoned you tonight?” he asked suddenly. His eyes met hers with such force that she nearly lost her breath. The bright blue reminded her of snapping live electrical wires, downed in a storm, sizzling in the darkness. “In the midst of all this, I find I am alone, quite alone. A yawning chasm seems to greet me at the end of the day, and the only thing that draws it closed is the company of a pretty young girl.”

It was clear what was expected of her. Unconsciously, she had been filling this role for Hitler for years, and she saw that now—the giggling, cheerful child who had demanded nothing more from him than an occasional kindness, indulgent smiles, presents of chocolates at Christmas, cheap jewelry at birthdays, praise over her school marks. Easy and meaningless.

His fingers slipped from hers. He wiped his hand on his jacket, as though scrubbing away her touch.
Thank God
. Maybe he had grown tired of her company and would send her back to the boardinghouse.

But he leaned so close, she saw the tiny flakes of dandruff dusting his shoulders. “Cheer me with your chatter, my child.”

“Your home on the Obersalzburg is so lovely,” she began haltingly, and he nodded eagerly, encouraging her to go on. She prattled about the beautiful mountains and the long hikes and his sister’s delicious cooking, and underneath the chatter, she heard the steady ticking of the desk clock.

Her mind worked furiously. Herr Doktor Whitestone had been wrong. Hitler and Reinhard were not alike. Reinhard could never comprehend loneliness, and Hitler seemed to ache from it.

Bewilderment caused her to stumble over her words and drop the string of what she had been saying, but Uncle Dolf reminded her gently about Charlemagne sleeping within the mountain, and she went on, talking about the snow that never melted. About the cold that never disappeared into warmth, so the ice and snow always remained.

Herr Doktor Whitestone had said psychopaths could not experience loneliness, because they could not feel love or yearn for companionship. Was it possible he had been so deeply mistaken about Hitler? Or did Uncle Dolf have a new kind of mental disease, one that doctors hadn’t encountered before?

Hitler rose, and she stopped in mid-sentence, afraid she had somehow angered him. She stood, too, mentally counting the steps to the door. Sixteen. She could make it, but she might not get past Hess.

The room fell into blackness.

Hitler stood at the wall, his hand on the light switch. Moonlight spilling through the long windows painted his face silver. He watched her quietly, then said, “Aren’t you going to come to me, Gretchen?”

She couldn’t move.
My God
. He couldn’t want from her what she suspected. . . .

A floorboard creaked. Hess. He was still out there. Listening, perhaps, or waiting for her to come out. There was nowhere for her to go.

Like a swimmer walking underwater, she crossed the room. The darkness was so complete that she stumbled into a side table, even though she knew the location of every stick of furniture, since she had been in here so often. A tiny gasp of pain burst from her lips, but Hitler didn’t ask if she was hurt. Unmoving, he continued to watch her.

When she reached for a lamp, Hitler caught her wrist.

“No,” he said. “I prefer the dark.”

Slowly, almost hesitantly, his hand brushed the side of her face. He smelled like toothpaste and sugar. “You are so lovely, Gretchen.”

He moved closer now, a collection of shadows that somehow combined to form a man, arms and legs and head made up of wispy darkness. She couldn’t see him at all, but heard his breath, loud and ragged.

“Gretchen,” he said, “may I kiss you?”

Everything within her recoiled at the words.
No
. She couldn’t do it. She stumbled backward. In the darkness, she saw the whites of his eyes, which were following her. Fear shot through her veins like adrenaline; she was terrified to say no but unwilling to live with herself if she said yes.

They stared at each other. His expression did not change, remaining impassive. She could not guess what he was thinking. Even now, he had retreated within himself, keeping his thoughts hidden from her.

The silence stretched between them, broken only by his harsh breathing. Then he reached for the leather whip tucked into his belt. It whined through the air as he drew it free.

Her heart lurched. He was going to beat her, here, while Hess waited right outside. Fear locked her in place.

But the whip smacked into his open palm, so loudly that she shuddered.

Agony flashed across his face. Gretchen took a shaky step back, her hands curling into fists. She would fight him. She might not stop him, but she would rake her nails across his face and blacken his eyes, so everywhere he went everyone would wonder what had happened to him. They would whisper about him, and she knew nothing wounded him as deeply as stares and snickers. He would feel punished.

He stepped closer, clutching his injured hand in his other hand. Blood, black in the darkness, trickled through his fingers. The whip had sliced into his skin. The pain must have been excruciating, but his expression had become calm, detached. Revulsion coursed up her throat. He had hurt himself on purpose, and he didn’t seem to care.

With slow, measured movements, he tucked the whip into his belt.

“Good night,” he said, and walked away.

When he opened the office door, lamplight from the anteroom illuminated him for an instant, the bloody hand gripped in the other, the shoulders hunched with pain, the face placid.

And then he was gone, and her legs softened to water.

There was no way out except through the anteroom, and she felt herself stumbling forward. Hitler and Hess glanced at her when she came in, Hitler looking vaguely annoyed.

She heard her voice whispering good evening and felt her hands gripping her suitcase handle, and then she was hurtling down the staircase and into the front hall. It was empty now. For an instant, she wondered if Reinhard and Kurt were waiting for her outside, but then remembered they had been dismissed and were surely gone for the night.

She pushed the heavy doors open. The street was deserted. She took off at a run, the suitcase bumping against her leg, glancing back at the Braunes Haus growing smaller and smaller behind her, shrinking from a mansion to a house to a speck. Finally, she whipped her head around and concentrated on the street ahead. She was free.

33

THREE FLIGHTS UP, TWO WINDOWS FROM THE
left. Gretchen counted before flinging the pebble. It hit the glass with a solid
clink
. A face pressed against the pane, and her insides slowly loosened with relief.
Daniel
. She hadn’t realized how desperately she needed him until she saw him now.

He held up a staying hand, and she nodded. For a moment, she stood in the street, listening to the far-off purr of an automobile. The front door opened, and Daniel stood in the entrance—dark hair mussed, suit jacket tossed on haphazardly over a white shirt, scuffed leather shoes on his feet—so reassuringly solid and normal, and yet not normal at all, but talented and clever and open-eyed and determined, and so wonderfully unlike the shadowy men she had known all her life that she felt grateful tears well up.

“Daniel—” she began, and suddenly they were embracing, his arms warm around her.

“Are you all right?” he asked. His voice was muffled against her hair.

“Yes, I’m fine.”

But that wasn’t true.

“I didn’t think you were due back in the city for another two days,” Daniel said as they stepped apart. Over his shoulder, she saw a suitcase at the foot of the stairs.

“Are you going somewhere?”

Now he smiled. “A lot has happened in the past couple of days. I can’t take time to explain or I’ll miss the night express to Berlin, so I’ll ask instead—do you trust me?”

She had never trusted anyone more. “Yes.”

He kissed her, hard and quick. “Then come with me now, and I’ll explain everything on the ride.”

She didn’t hesitate, but interlaced her fingers with his, and together they stepped into the night.

The central train station stretched out its metal tracks like an octopus spreading its tentacles. At this late hour, the place was nearly empty except for a few bleary-eyed travelers, and Gretchen and Daniel had a third-class compartment to themselves. As the train gathered speed, the lights of Munich fell away, turning first into a twinkling necklace, then into shimmering dots in the distance.

They talked late into the night. Gretchen told Daniel everything that had happened in the mountains. When she spoke of meeting Hitler in his office, she stared out the glass, watching the darkened fields rushing past, too embarrassed to look at Daniel.

He took her hand in his. How different his touch felt from Hitler’s, strong and warm, not hesitant and cool.

“I don’t know what Herr Hitler is, exactly,” she said. “A different sort of psychopath from Reinhard, that’s clear. My brother thinks only of himself, and feels nothing. But Hitler . . . It’s as though he feels
too much
. And he yearns so deeply to touch the mind of everyone he meets.”

She blinked back tears. She wouldn’t cry for their splintered friendship. She wouldn’t cry for Hitler ever again.

After they ordered tea in the dining car, Daniel told her quietly what he had accomplished in the past three days. He had tracked down Herr Doktor Edmund Forster, the neurologist who had treated her father and Hitler at the end of the Great War. Forster now served as the clinic head and psychiatry department chair at Greifswald University, in a small city by the sea, hundreds of miles from Munich.

Gretchen gripped the teacup with freezing fingers. They could switch trains at Berlin, she supposed, but she couldn’t imagine how long it would take them to reach Greifswald, or even if the trains left regularly for such a remote location. “It’s so far. . . .”

Daniel grinned. “He’s already responded to my telegram. He’s staying at the Hotel Adlon in Berlin through the end of the week for a medical conference. He’s agreed to meet with me.”

Gretchen exhaled in relief. A piece of luck, at last.

The
Munich Post
, Daniel told her, had made good headway with its investigation into the National Socialists’ plans for the Jews. Their SA source had supplied additional information, and they hoped to break the story soon.

Finally, Gretchen and Daniel turned to her father’s murder. He had been killed at about noon on November 9. The leaders had decided to march through Munich at eleven thirty. Barely a half hour had elapsed between that decision and her father’s death, but somehow, during those thirty minutes, someone had lured Klaus Müller into the front line and murdered him.

She pictured the men in the front line during the march. Papa hadn’t really known the Munich SA head, or the army colonel. Hermann Göring had been too far away. Hitler’s bodyguard had been intent on protecting his employer, and had been nearly killed. The army general had walked upright through the whizzing bullets, too proud to hit the ground; he was such a famous war hero that many of the bystanders never took their eyes off him. None had had the chance to kill her father.

Neither had Max Scheubner-Richter. He’d been shot through the lung and died instantly. Minutes before the shooting started, he’d linked arms with Hitler, and when he collapsed, he dragged his leader down to the ground with such force that Hitler’s shoulder was wrenched from its socket. That was the story she’d always heard.

Her eyes narrowed. “Herr Scheubner-Richter stood on Uncle Dolf’s right, didn’t he?”

Daniel’s forehead wrinkled in concentration. “Yes.”

Gretchen shot him a swift, searching look. “Then why was Hitler’s
left
shoulder dislocated?”

Comprehension flashed over Daniel’s face. “Someone else grabbed him. But who? And why?”

“That,” Gretchen said, “is one of the things we must find out.”