Woman in the Shadows

by Jane Thynne

  “Frightfully good fun, your sister is. It’s a shame she couldn’t have come in time for the rally. It was terrifically impressive. Did you make it down to Nuremberg?”

  “Not this year, I’m afraid.”

  So far, Clara had managed to avoid attending any of the Party rallies, though she guessed sooner or later she might have to accept an invitation. The talking point of that year’s Party congress in Nuremberg had been the “Cathedral of Light” designed by Albert Speer, in which a hundred and fifty searchlights reached up into the night sky, like the pillars of a holy building.

  “It was awfully naughty of you to miss it, Clara.” Unity butted in. “It was just the best Parteitag ever. The Führer was thrilled with it. I can’t believe you’ve never been. All the rallies and the marches are absolute heaven, and the Hitler Youth boys look like angels.”

  Clara laughed lightly. “There are plenty of marches in Berlin to be going on with.”

  “Maybe. But I think it’s a crime to miss it. You’ve never seen so many people all in one place. It culminates in the procession of the Blood Flag—that’s the flag held by the young Nazi struck down in the Putsch—and all the other flags are consecrated by touching the Blood Flag. It’s the most sacred moment. You can’t really describe it. You have to see it for yourself. It’s monumental.”

  “Not as monumental as the Herr Doktor’s speech,” teased Diana. “Fifty pages on the evils of Bolshevism!”

  Magda laughed uneasily at this joke at her husband’s expense, but any further embarrassment was prevented by the entrance of three tiny Goebbels children, five-year-old Helga, three-year-old Hilde, and two-year-old Helmut, who were ushered in to dance to a tinkling piece of Strauss on a music box. The girls, in white pin-tucked party dresses and ankle socks, shepherded the toddler Helmut between them around the floor. The adults gazed on their performance in silence, then broke into a ripple of applause as the three children ended with tiny Heil Hitler salutes and posed obediently for Hoffmann to take photographs. The solemnity was broken only when Hilde kicked up her leg and yelled, “Look! I have new shoes!” prompting a ripple of benevolent laughter.

  “Heini Hoffmann,” hissed a voice in Clara’s ear. “The Führer’s own photographer. We are honored.”

  Clara turned to see Annelies von Ribbentrop, wife of Germany’s Ambassador to the Court of St. James’s. The Ribbentrops, it was said, were returning to Germany, with hopes that he would be made Foreign Minister. Holding her cigarette to one side, Annelies proffered Clara her cheek for an air kiss.

  “Frau von Ribbentrop. You’re back from Britain!”

  “At last. Though I don’t know for how long.”

  Annelies von Ribbentrop’s square face was framed by dark hair, severely disciplined in tight braids, and her formidable form was upholstered in a type of bottle-green woolen jacket that suggested hunting, though without any of the fresh air or exercise that went with it.

  She sniffed. “I do admire you British for coping with such dreadful weather. The damp affects me badly, I’m afraid. I’m sensitive to atmospheric depressions.”

  It had to be the only sensitive thing about her, Clara thought.

  “But how are you?”

  The force with which Frau von Ribbentrop inquired into Clara’s well-being was always in inverse proportion to her actual interest.

  “Very well, thank you.”

  “Your father threw a delightful dinner for us in London.” Clara had heard about this occasion. The Anglo-German Fellowship had taken the Grosvenor House hotel ballroom for a dinner to honor Hitler’s ambassador. “They had all the tables decorated with swastikas. So touching! You must thank him for us. He’s a wonderful man. Though I must say it’s a relief to be back in Berlin.” Her eyes flickered around the assembled company. “I’ve been catching up on all the goings-on. What unexpected joy for Frau Goering! I suppose you heard the news?”

  Everyone in Germany had heard the news. Emmy Goering, at the ripe age of forty-four, had become pregnant with her first child. The event was considered a near miracle. Many people believed the baby could not possibly have been fathered by the Reichsminister, who was said to be impotent, from his morphine use or his war wounds or his enormous bulk. The whole country was gossiping. Everyone had their own favorite joke about it, and the nightclub artiste Werner Fincke had been arrested for telling his.

  “Such wonderful news,” said Clara, neutrally.

  Outside, there was the scatter of gravel on the drive and the purr of an engine. Clara looked out to see a figure jump from a gleaming, low-slung Bugatti. Then the front door closed and a minute later the late guest appeared. He was a tall, sandy-haired man in his forties wearing the expression of someone who has left a casino to attend a meeting of the parish council.

  “Sorry I’m late,” he said in English.

  “Goodness, Ralph,” said Diana, plucking imperiously at his sleeve. “That hat makes you look like a Jewish bookmaker. Do come in. It’s very naughty of you to keep us waiting.”

  As the maid took his hat and coat and Magda drew him aside, the newcomer’s gaze lingered fractionally on Clara, though no one thought to introduce them.

  Clara was finding it hard to focus on the party. For the past seventy-two hours Archie Dyson’s words had rung ominously in her head.

  We had a hint that you might have aroused suspicions.

  His remark had frightened her more deeply than she expected. She knew—she had known for years—that she would be watched. Someone like her, who was half English, mixing with the Nazi elite, couldn’t hope to go unremarked. She was ready for it. She had always been prepared to accept the consequences of what she did. Yet the absolute confirmation that she was being spied on produced a continuous, dull tension, which knotted her stomach and dragged her mind relentlessly through the same questions. Again and again she had run through her acquaintances, trying to work out which of them might have confided their suspicions about her to the occupants of Prinz-Albrecht-Strasse. But she could think of nothing she had done recently that was out of the ordinary. No revealing conversations that might have been overheard, no meetings with anyone hostile to the regime.

  At that moment, standing amid the crowd, she detected a scent that brought her attention sharply back to the present. An astringent citrus fragrance. Scherk’s Tarr aftershave.

  “Fräulein Vine. What a pleasant surprise.”

  No matter how often she saw him from afar at the studios, hurrying along the corridors with his jerky crippled gait, an actual encounter with Joseph Goebbels, archpersecutor of the Jews and the man charged by Hitler with responsibility for “the spiritual direction of the nation,” still made Clara shudder. His skin was stretched tightly over a pinched, clever face, and his shrunken frame dared you to look down at his deformed foot. His smile was as dazzling and intermittent as a prison searchlight, and he crackled with nervous energy. Tonight he was dapper as usual, wearing a well-cut light serge suit and navy tie. He dipped his head swiftly and kissed Clara’s hand, then took out a cigarette case and offered her a cigarette.

  “I saw you at Babelsberg the other day, I think, Fräulein Vine. With Generaloberst Udet?”

  “He’s starring in our new film. He’s agreed to perform a stunt.”

  “Has he? I saw him in The Miracle of Flight. A miracle he was able to make the flight, was what I heard.”

  It didn’t surprise Clara that Goebbels should be fully briefed on Udet’s love of alcohol. It was his job to know the weaknesses and peccadilloes of all senior Nazis. No doubt the Gestapo, too, had a stack of notes filed away in the great bank of records that they kept in Prinz-Albrecht-Strasse, ready to use against Udet at a moment’s notice.

  Clara smiled politely. “Actually, I’m hoping he will let me fly with him.”

  “Then you’re a braver person than I. Perhaps you have a taste for danger, Fräulein Vine.”

  “I’m sure it’ll be perfectly safe.”

  “I suppose. So long as you make sure it�
��s before lunchtime!”

  Out of the corner of her eye, Clara was aware of being scrutinized. It was the latecomer, the Englishman called Ralph, who was standing between Magda and the Mitford girls, or rather towering over them, a good six foot two. He had a broad-featured face and a bump in his nose that suggested a break on some distant playing field. His hair receded over a high brow, and he cupped one elbow in his hand as he smoked. Clara noted the clean ovals of his fingernails and the gold signet ring on the little finger of his left hand. For a split second, as their eyes met, a spark of connection flickered across the distance between them.

  Diana called over to Goebbels. “We’re playing a game, Herr Doktor, and you must join in. We’re talking about the deadly sins. I think the old ones are all terribly passé. There should be new deadly sins. Or perhaps we should have deadly virtues instead!”

  “How about chastity?” suggested the Englishman.

  “A sin or a virtue?”

  “It’s pretty deadly either way.”

  A burst of laughter filled the room. “Well, if you can’t decide, Ralph, you’ll have to think of another,” Diana persisted. “What do you suggest?”

  “Secrecy.”

  “A sin or a virtue?”

  “A virtue, definitely.”

  While Diana’s bright laugh glittered out, Goebbels was glowering. He was refusing to join in the joke. It might be that he detested this kind of English party game, but more likely he suspected in his guests’ banter some humorous reference to his love affair with Lida Baarová. What had Albert said?

  He’s really smitten. They say he’s…going to ask Magda for a divorce.

  His expression stony, Goebbels turned his attention to the Englishman.

  “On the subject of virtue, Captain Sommers, I have a complaint to make about your English newspapers. They are constantly handing out lectures on our morality, like some dried-up old governess scolding away at our young Reich. Tell me, are you happy for them to continue spouting their lies? Or are you going to put them right?”

  “I’m afraid you overestimate my influence on the denizens of Fleet Street, Herr Doktor,” Sommers replied pleasantly. “Though I’m surprised you find them uncongenial. Surely many British newspapers are supportive of the National Socialists? Wasn’t Lord Rothermere insisting just the other day that Adolf the Great will soon be as popular in England as Frederick the Great? And as far as I’m concerned, the faster England realizes her interests lie in a close association with the German Reich, the better.”

  He nodded to Clara and extended a hand. A small silver swastika glinted in his lapel.

  “Ralph Sommers.” At the touch of his hand a shiver ran through her.

  Goebbels waved grandly in Clara’s direction. “Captain Sommers, this is Fräulein Clara Vine. She represents the perfect union of our two great nations. Her father, Sir Ronald Vine, is English, and her mother was German. Fräulein Vine may look a little English on the outside, but I think we have won the battle for her heart.”

  Sommers’s eyes swept over her again speculatively. “I’m pleased to hear it. I only wish some of the people back home would follow her example. Stop talking about war and start thinking more about what our two people have in common.” He nodded at Clara. “Don’t you agree, Fräulein?”

  “Of course.”

  “We are two ancient Aryan races, who should be united in friendship. We stem from the same blood. Our royal family speaks German as a mother tongue. We have a common enemy in the Bolshevik. There seems to me no reason why England and Germany should not form one of the great alliances of the modern world.”

  Clara didn’t need to ask what a man like Captain Sommers was doing in Berlin. The city was full of people like him. English socialites enamored of the new regime, infatuated with the marches and the banners and the upstanding ranks of the Hitler Youth. Though his eyes were a little tired and his face shadowed with stubble, Ralph Sommers exuded the same unmistakable confidence she recognized instantly from the men her sister knew, men from the most privileged ranks of society, the sleek products of public schools who felt the world was at their feet. Given his mention of Lord Rothermere, Sommers was no doubt another of the press baron’s associates, determined to befriend Hitler and bent on an alliance with Germany. She wondered what Sommers assumed of her. That she was one of those girls who hung around Nazis because they liked the uniforms and the proximity to power? Clara reminded herself how important it was to be careful with other English people. They could spot mistakes that the Germans ignored. They could sense falsity.

  “So what brings you here, Captain Sommers?”

  “I run a small aeronautical research and sales company. Offices in Conduit Street. Here…” He reached into his pocket and drew out a gold business card holder. “Take my card. I’m over on business actually, but I took the opportunity to motor down to Nuremberg for the Parteitag, and I have to agree, it was an absolutely tremendous show. It quite takes the breath away. While I was there, the Frau Doktor very kindly invited me to this evening. She really does spoil me.”

  Goebbels saw his empty glass. “It seems we’re not looking after you so well tonight, Sommers. You have no champagne.”

  He gave his wide smile, the one that chilled Clara to the core, and signaled to a young woman holding a bottle of Henkell champagne wrapped in a white napkin. Clara recognized her as the girl who had served tea the other day. The girl from the Bride School. Her cheeks were flushed and a drop of sweat trickled down the side of her brow. At the minister’s summons, she approached and grappled with the bottle, managing to spill champagne on Ralph Sommers’s sleeve.

  Goebbels’s face twisted with anger. “Watch yourself, you clumsy woman!”

  Sommers brushed the flecks of champagne from his sleeve with a smile. “No harm done,” he said smoothly.

  Goebbels glowered after the retreating bride. “I’m sorry. She’s not one of our usual maids. She’s from the Bride School.”

  Diana Mosley pricked up her ears. “A Bride School, did you say? How awfully quaint! Perhaps I should attend one of those.”

  “You wouldn’t last long,” said Unity belligerently. “Given you were expelled from every school you ever attended.”

  Goebbels, however, was again not joining in the joke. “God help the wretched Schutzstaffel who have to marry these women.” With a visible effort he controlled himself. “Still. We have quite another wedding in mind right now. We are expecting a visit from some of your other countrymen. The Duke and Duchess of Windsor are arriving on honeymoon.”

  For a split second, from across the room, Clara locked eyes with Frau von Ribbentrop. There were rumors that von Ribbentrop, in his time in London, had conducted an affair with the former Wallis Simpson. After they were introduced by the society hostess Emerald Cunard, whose home in Grosvenor Square was the center of pro-Nazi London, it was said von Ribbentrop had sent seventeen red carnations to the duchess’s London home every day. His wife had handled this gossip with her habitual iron composure. Now, at the mention of Wallis, she assumed an expression that could set concrete.

  “The only shame for them is that they should be hounded from their own country for such a harmless misdemeanor,” continued Goebbels, turning to the Mitford sisters. “I cannot get over the disdain you English have for the idea of a divorced queen.”

  “Not all the English,” corrected Diana, who was, Goebbels scarcely needed reminding, divorced herself.

  “Perhaps not. But the fact remains you were fortunate enough to have a happy young king with a most attractive wife. Yet those dried-up prunes in the government could not tolerate it. And they were abetted by the repulsive hypocrites in the Church. I regret to say, to me that’s the mark of a nation on the decline.”

  “The duke feels it most awfully,” conceded Diana. “I think the idea of the tour is that Wallis should have a little taste of being queen. If they’re going to be so beastly as to deny her the Royal Highness status, the duke says she should jolly well exper
ience a royal tour with all the trimmings. Rolling out the red carpet and being greeted by the British ambassador when they arrive.”

  “Not the British ambassador,” said Clara, without thinking, and then cursed herself. How had that slipped out?

  “Indeed?” Sommers cocked his head. “And why not?”

  “I imagine it would be politically difficult,” she improvised.

  “Do you now?” He spoke with a slightly mocking air, his cigarette nonchalantly poised, one eyebrow raised. He seemed to be challenging her, maintaining eye contact for longer than was comfortable. “Why?”

  “I would have thought that was perfectly obvious, Captain. I do read the newspapers, you know.”

  “I’m sure.” His lips curved into a smile, but his cool green eyes continued probing her. “And with a father like yours, you must be well acquainted with politics.”

  “I don’t need my father to teach me about politics,” she snapped.

  At her terse reply his eyes widened slightly, but he continued to smile as though he found her amusing.

  “Of course not,” he agreed.

  Suddenly, Clara couldn’t stand any more. What kind of party was it, where you detested all the guests and couldn’t drink a drop? What a life this was, mixing with people whose views you loathed, associating with a regime that stood for everything you hated: intimidation, violence, brutality. Befriending people who represented a version of England you didn’t recognize. The strain of being constantly on her guard, of laughing and chatting and dissimulating, of never putting a foot wrong, was soul-killing. She had to escape, if only for a moment.

  She drifted onto the terrace as though in search of fresh air and moved away from the French windows so that the chatter of the party receded. After easing herself into the shadow at the edge of the house, she stood quietly, listening to the calls of the night birds in the woods and, farther off, the hum of traffic from the other side of the lake. Catching a faint, salty tang in the air, she pictured the muscular strength of the current combing the surface of the Wannsee. She had adored her time this summer on the beautiful lakes around Berlin, rowing and swimming and diving into the breathtaking crystal water of the Havel, though she had been warned that even the calmest surface concealed treacherous tides beneath.