The Berkut (7 page)

Fifteen meters underground, the bunker's five-meter-thick concrete walls shuddered from the rain of artillery shells above. Less than sixteen square meters of Berlin remained under German control, and even in this final German pocket, Russian snipers were on the rooftops while larger bodies of Soviet infantry smashed relentlessly toward the Chancellery, fighting the battle one building at a time.

Outside the steel door, Sturmbannführer Heinz Linge and Otto Gunsche stood guard silently, their faces impassive. They had their orders from their chief and they knew their duty. Nobody was to be admitted for ten minutes-what the Führer had described as a "decent interval." Joseph Goebbels hovered nearby, a deformed gnome who had masterminded the Nazi propaganda machine and helped perpetuate the Aryan myth, the apotheosis of himself. He smoked nervously, his birdlike head twitching with every inhalation. Martin Bormann, the Reichsleiter who served as secretary of the party, stood steadfast, his arms crossed, a sinister scowl on his face.

Linge checked his watch and nodded to his fellow servant. Gunsche opened the steel door, and Goebbels immediately pushed by them into Hitler's anteroom, where he stopped dead in his tracks. Bormann, Linge and Giinsche passed by him into the tiny living room beyond. Reichsjugendführer Artur Axmann had arrived too late for the farewells, but now he rushed into the scene with the others, his face flushed from having been above ground amid the Russian artillery barrage. His arm stump waved in small circles as he tried to comprehend what had happened.

The two bodies were on the sofa near the back wall. A vase of flowers was on the floor, its water seeping into the carpet. Hitler was at one end of the couch, his body tilted slightly forward, his right hand hanging down over the armrest. His Walther 7.65 was on the floor near his hand. Eva Braun was at the opposite end of the love seat, reclining peacefully, her legs tucked underneath her as she did when
ever she napped in front of the fireplace at the Berghof. There was blood streaming from Hitler's mouth, and a smaller wound in the right temple. The couch was soaking up his blood, and none of the survivors cared to look too closely. Eva's black dress was wet, her eyes wide open. There was no apparent wound, but they could smell the odor of almonds, and there was a slight bluish-gray discoloration around her lips. Cyanide. Her soft brown leather pumps had been placed together under the couch.

Bormann and Goebbels gagged from the fumes left by the cyanide capsules, and covered the
ir faces with handkerchiefs. Gü
nsche stared at the bodies, then wheeled and strode away. He met Erich Kempka, Hitler's tiny chauffeur, in the conference area. Earlier
Gü
nsche had ordered Kempka to collect two hundred liters of petrol in jerricans and bring them to the bunker entrance in the Chancellery garden. Kempka had argued with him over the phone. He wasn't going to risk his life trying to get to their fuel cache; it was too dangerous. They'd have to wait until later in the day, when the Russian gunners paused to eat or piss or do whatever it was they did in the late afternoon when the firing
stopped. As an alternative, Gü
nsche suggested to Kempka that he try siphoning what he could from the vehicles in their underground garage. The streets were so clogged that staff cars couldn't get through any longer, and there was no need for the petrol in them.

"What the hell is going on?" Kempka demanded when he saw the SS man.

"Der Fü
hrer ist tot,"
Gü
nsche said solemnly.

Kempka went immediately to see for himself, but met Linge, who demanded to know where the petrol was.

"In the garden. One hundred and seventy liters
. All we could find." Brigadefü
hrer Johann Rattenhuber, head of the Reich Security Police detachment for the bunker, arrived after Kempka. Others filtered in and out of the death room, taking quick looks at the bodies, too disconcerted or too frightened to look closely or for long. It was the end.

After some time, Rattenhuber, a practical man with a flair for decision-making, took over. He instructed the others to take the bodies up to the garden. Hitler's body was wrapped in a gray army blanket, leaving the top part of his head visible, but not his face. T
he Fü
hrer's left arm and legs hung down; his black trousers were the ones he normally wore with his uniform jacket. One of the bearers wiped blood from one of his black shoes.

Bormann easily hefted Eva Braun's small body. Her blond hair was in disarray, but she looked more asleep than dead. Linge and Ludwig Stumplegger, the SS colonel and surgeon, carried Hitler's corpse, with the doctor doing most of the work.

At the foot of the concrete stairs, the tiny Kempka stepped into Bormann's path, blocking his way upward. "I'll take her," he said. Kempka knew that Eva had loathed and feared the Reichsleiter; remembering this, he couldn't stand seeing the man touch her. But she was too heavy for him, and when he stumbled on the stairs, almost dropping her, Günsche and another 55 man came to his aid.

The two bodies were taken into the Chancellery garden and placed in a shell hole three meters from the bunker entrance. Günsche folded Eva's arms across her chest and helped douse the bodies with petrol. Kempka moved Hitler's left arm closer to his body. Artillery shells suddenly began to zero in on the area and forced the spectators to withdraw quickly to the protection afforded by the bunker's superstructure. They smoked and fidgeted nervously as they waited for a pause in the shelling. When it came, they continued dumping fuel on the bodies, trying to soak them thoroughly. Eventually the job was completed; the shell hole containing the corpses was afloat in flammable liquid.

They discussed the best way to ignite the funeral pyre. "A grenade," Günsche suggested. But Kempka objected loudly; it would be too bruta
l and disrespectful of their Fü
hrer. As he finished his argument Kempka noticed a rag near an unfolded fire hose. He fetched it for Günsche, who soaked it with petrol. Goebbels, the chain-smoker, produced a book of matches, which he gave to Kempka, who then used them to ignite the rag for Günsche; they all stood back as he lofted it toward the shell hole with a flick of his wrist.

For a moment, time was suspended. They were transfixed by the sight of the burning rag floating slowly up, then fluttering downward. Then the trench ignited with a quiet thump and a plume of black smoke rolled upward like a snake uncoiling.

They watched in silence until Günsche called them to attention.

He raised his right arm stiffly and the others followed his lead.
"Heil Hitler,"
they said in unison for the final time.

It was done. Adolf Hitler was dead. Ten days after his fifty-sixth birthday, the Führer of the thousand-year Reich smoldered in a makeshift funeral pyre in the war's final battleground.

Well into the evening, Rattenhuber and his men continued to add petrol to the fire. At approximately ten o'clock, the head of the Reich Security Police told his aide, Captain Schedle, to pick three men he could trust and to bury what remained of the two blackened corpses.

Russian shells were still dropping on the Chancellery area. Schedle and his small detail wrapped the remains in canvas shelter halves and buried them in a nearby shell hole. After they had filled the grave with dirt and mud, the men pounded the earth flat with shovels. Throughout the process they and their officer, like those below in the bunker, had only one thought: escape
.

11 – April 30, 1945, 4:50 P.M.

They stayed in place fo
r a full hour before moving. Br
u
mm wanted to be sure the sounds had ceased in the bunker below them. When he was satisfied that it was safe, he led his charge slowly through the metal tube to where their equipment waited for them. Hitler looked tired.
"From here we hav
e to make a bit of a climb," Br
u
mm said. "I designed it," Hitler reminded
him.

Br
u
mm pushed a pair of scuffed black boots toward the older man. "Put them on." Quickly and succinctly, he explained how they would make the vertical ascent ahead. "I'll lead," he added, and moved into the darkness, his flashlight carving a jiggling path ahead of them.

The climb required a great deal of effort. Though Hitler's condition had been in large part a well-planned act, it had taken a toll. During recent weeks in the bunker he'd had virtually no exerci
se and his stamina was gone. Br
u
mm was forced to pull him up the vertical wall. When they finally reached the upper level, they settled in at the widened inters
ection of the blind tunnels. Br
u
mm chewed hard bread as he spread the contents of his kit bag on a small linen towel. Lighting two tallow candles, he held them horizontally to drip wax onto the metal and set them in their drippings. They would give him enough light to work with; he would save the flashlight for more important needs.

The first task was to alter his companion's appearance. The changes had been worke
d out by Hitler; he reminded Br
u
mm repeatedly that as "Europe's greatest actor" a change in appearance would be an easy
matter. He had studied the mysteries and techniques of theatrical makeup and had made numerous sketches to depict how he might look, given different cosmetic modifications. Brumm thought the sketches all looked alike and paid little attention to Hitler's long-winded dissertation on the use of costumes and makeup in Wagnerian opera.

"My hand's still not right," Hitler observed as he held the left arm near a candle. "I've only been off the drugs for a short while. It's getting stronger, but there's been atrophy; in time it will be stronger."

Bru
mm nodded. "Hold the light," he said. Hitler accepted the flashlight with his right hand and held it under his chin, casting an eerie glow; deep shadows magnified the depressio
ns and wrinkles in his face. Bru
mm uncapped a small container of concentrated soap, poured a small amount onto the palm of his hand, spit in it, mixed it with his forefinger and rubbed it into Hitler's mustache. When it was properly lathered, he shaved the upper lip clean with a straight razor. Hitler kept his eyes shut while the colonel worked.

The elimination of the m
ustache produced a surprise. Bri
mm stared at Hitler's nose; he had never noticed its massive size before. The mustache, a subtle addition that dramatically altered the face, had drawn attenti
on away from it. Perhaps the Fü
hrer knew what he was talking about.

Next he rubbed the soap into Hitler
's hair. "Trim it back," the Fü
hrer instructed.

"No," Bru
mm said firmly. "We're going to shave it off-all of it."

Hitler stared hard at the officer. His shoulders tensed; he seemed to be on the verge of losing his temper, but after a moment he sighed and shrugged, his shoulders relaxing. "You have the razor," he said.

When the job was done, the old Adolf Hitler was nearly gone.

Brumm handed him heavy glasses with gray metal frames, the lenses ground to his precise prescription. The new spectacles made the leader of the Third Reich look like some kind of bird.

There remained other changes to be made. Brumm extracted a thick rolled bandage from his kit and unrolled it. "Go ahead," Hitler commanded, accepting the bandage.

Brumm hesitated.

"What has to be done has to be done," the Führer said. "Delay doesn't change the inevitable. Besides, you have the easy part." He turned his back to Brumm and sat back so that his head was in the colonel's lap. Brumm took a deep breath, tensed his hand, lifted it and drove the stiffened heel of his hand down onto the bridge of the man's nose, crushing the cartilage loudly. Hitler grunted under the blow, and tears streamed from his eyes.

Brumm quickly used the bandage to stern the flow of blood, and within minutes Hitler's face began to swell. Both eyes would blacken and eventually shut. The damage to the nose was extensive. At the point between the eyes, the tissue was flat and broken so that the nose now hung downward at an acute angle and seemed to taper to a point. Had he aimed the blo
w in an upward direction, the Fü
hrer would have been dead, and for a moment he pictured a dead Hitler in his lap.

"How's your breathing?"

"Blood inside. Need to sit up. Hurts," Hitler muttered.

Brumm was worried. Pain was not something his companion was used to, and it looked as if he might have some trouble coping. He was accustomed to having drugs for even the slightest discomfort, and in this situation there could be no drugs. Determination would have to serve as his opiate.

"One task remains," Brumm said.

"Don't do anything else," Hitler said, his voice rattling.

"It may help us later." The colonel pushed up his own sleeve to reveal the underside of his forearm. There was a tattoo, a series of numbers.