Her Hidden Life

by V. S. Alexander

  Karl looked about in every direction and didn’t speak until he was satisfied no one was near. ‘The success of this action depends on one outcome – Hitler’s death. Everyone has finally come to an agreement. He must die now.’

  ‘What about the others?’ I asked.

  ‘Time’s running out. If we don’t act now we may never have the chance. There’ve been so many attempts. Something is always wrong. Hitler has left the room unexpectedly or hasn’t shown up for an appointment. Himmler and Göring aren’t there. No more excuses. We can’t wait any longer.

  ‘A new government will be established by those who have conceived the plan. The Wehrmacht will have no choice but to follow the orders of the new leaders. We expect resistance, but Göring and the others will be arrested and Germany will surrender to the Allies for the sake of the people. If Valkyrie fails for any reason, you must look out for yourself, Magda.’

  A wash of emotions filled me. I saw the face of an avenging angel, one who would be destroyed or fly away after the plot had been launched. I was frightened by Karl’s words, happy and sad at the same time. Happy that these terrible times would come to an end; sad that we had so little time together before the world might come crashing down upon us. I touched his face, thrilled to see his smile and the life in his hazel eyes, which shredded the gloom around us.

  ‘You must save yourself no matter what happens to me,’ he continued. ‘If I die, you must go on. If we are separated, we must contact each other only if it’s safe. We have no say in these matters until Hitler is dead or the Reich is defeated.’

  ‘Where will I go without you?’ I asked, my voice catching.

  He grabbed my shoulders and looked fiercely at me. ‘Listen to yourself. You are strong, Magda – I knew that from the moment I met you, even when I saw your pictures. You will know where to go, what to do. Perhaps you’ll have more than one life to save.’ He reached down and rubbed his hand over my belly.

  My throat tightened and a jolt coursed through my body. ‘A baby? How can I?—’

  ‘—You must go on. We will find out soon enough whether fate rips us apart.’ He picked up our suitcases and we started again toward the residence.

  ‘How do you know – about a baby?’ I asked.

  ‘As we stood talking. It came to me.’

  I sobbed for a few moments and then composed myself as best I could. I took my suitcase from his hand. ‘I’m not an invalid.’

  We entered our small room, which contained nothing more than a bed, a small desk and a chair. It did have a window, which looked east through the forest. I couldn’t see the Führer’s bunker, the mess hall, the theater, or any of the other buildings, the surroundings were so well hidden by the deep green of the trees. I could only look into that wash of deep emerald and wonder what was to become of us.

  On July 20, the bomb exploded.

  The blast shook the camp. I was sitting with Else and a few of the other girls on a wooden bench outside the mess hall after the breakfast tasting, but before the afternoon lunch. The day was pleasant, if not a little hot. At first we thought the explosion might be from one of the thousands of land mines surrounding the Wolf’s Lair, but this sound was different. We’d heard the mines explode at all hours of the day and night when a poor animal accidentally stepped upon them. This blast sounded heavier and closer.

  It was followed by frantic shouts – not screams – none of them from women. A plume of smoke ballooned in the west, pushing its grayish veil in the air. My heart jumped and I clutched the bench’s rim. I thought of Karl and whether he might be dead. I knew the conspirators had launched Valkyrie.

  Else sprang from the bench and ran toward the smoke. I wanted to follow, but I couldn’t. I remained locked upon the bench. She ran several meters toward the sound and then motioned to me and the other girls. ‘My God, I think someone has killed the Führer,’ she shouted over the chaotic din.

  Cries of help filled the air. People ran blindly in all directions, toward the blast and away from it. I imagined the worst: Karl torn limb from limb, lying dead upon the grass, or crumpled in a bloody heap with other bodies. We didn’t know where the blast occurred. ‘Führer, Führer,’ soldiers cried out in voices choked with emotion.

  I rose slowly from the bench and walked toward the commotion. My legs took me forward, in a trance, like a somnambulist. I picked up speed as I stumbled along the path, past the cinema, the rail tracks and the garages. I could go no farther because the SS kept me away; they forced all who came to turn back. We stood as outsiders, as if we were prisoners looking through a fence. The acrid air smelled unlike any I had ever breathed; it was bloated, thick with chemicals and the signature of fire. I parted the smoke with my hands and tried to see past the fence.

  Images manifested before me in visions similar to walking into a darkened room. Black-and-white spots appeared before my eyes; blurred shapes formed out of nothingness. As I looked through the smoke, my eyes beheld a nightmare.

  Officers, coughing and hacking, streamed from the conference room where the bomb had exploded. Some leaned on each other, while others hobbled on one leg. Their clothes were bloody and shredded and hung like rags from their bodies. Two men dragged another man from the room. They held the body by its arms and legs while it swung limply like a hammock between them. They dropped him on the ground.

  Karl appeared in the doorway, a cloth over his mouth.

  I collapsed against a tree, relieved that he had not been killed. But I was unable to tell if he had been injured as he stepped out of the building. There was no blood on his clothes. He ran to the man on the ground, ripped away part of his shirt and swabbed the fabric over the man’s face. The gesture was redolent with pity and pain, from one soldier to another. I could see it in Karl’s arched form, the sway of his back over the body. Why did this have to happen? Why did you have to die? These were the questions I knew he was asking himself.

  ‘The Führer is alive,’ a soldier shouted. Those standing around me moaned and cried out with joy. Karl looked away from his merciful task when he heard the words. His wide eyes caught mine and I gasped. His mouth was pulled back in an expression of terror and disbelief – one I never imagined I would see from him or would ever want to see again.

  The message he sent was clear. The Führer was alive.

  Karl’s life was in grave danger.

  Then I saw Hitler! He was surrounded by a swarm of officers with only the top of his head visible. When the crowd broke, I knew he had been injured. He cradled his right arm with his left and instead of walking in his usual firm manner he staggered. His pants were in tatters. The men whisked him away through the crowd. I didn’t see him again that day.

  Cook wandered up to me with tears in her eyes. ‘Is it true the Führer is dead?’

  I shook my head.

  Cook wiped away her tears and smiled. ‘Thank God. Heaven has again smiled upon us. Germany will live another day.’

  I found out later that four hours after the explosion Hitler toured the shattered conference room with Mussolini. He promised to destroy the conspirators.

  I could hardly look at Karl that evening after tasting. We took a walk to get away from our tiny room. The camp was quiet, deathly still. The energy that usually lingered in the Wolf’s Lair air had disappeared. No one talked except in whispers. There were no smiles at the dinner table. When Karl and I looked at each other, we knew a hurt, a loss greater than we could ever have imagined, was about to rip us apart.

  ‘He must know by now,’ Karl whispered as we walked on the path near the railroad car siding. Hitler’s ornate train sat on the rails, dark, silent. He slammed his hand into his palm. ‘Von Stauffenberg must know Hitler’s alive. Surely he heard the radio address. If he’s initiated the coup, he and the others will be rounded up like cattle.’ Karl’s voice contorted in agony. ‘It will only be a matter of time before the Gestapo comes for me. Things could not have gone worse. The conference room was destroyed by the blast. No one should have lived.
The stenographer dead. Brandt, Korten, Schmundt, almost. But Hitler survived. Perhaps providence is on his side.’

  I wanted to crumble at his feet or, better yet, pretend that none of this was happening. Perhaps it was all a bad dream and Karl would awaken me with a kiss. If I drifted away I no longer had to face the truth. In order to pull myself back, I had to face the fear needling me. I had to be strong for Karl’s sake.

  ‘Do you think they will come for me?’ I asked.

  ‘I’ve kept your name out of it. No one knows. Von Stauffenberg met you the day I was going to …’ He was afraid to speak the words. ‘He was intrigued by your courage, but I made him swear never to involve you in the plot. I can only pray he keeps his word.’

  ‘Then I believe I’m safe.’

  ‘But I’m not.’

  ‘Karl …’ I could go no further and I collapsed against him. He remained strong and firm. He never moved while I cried against him. I could not cry out for fear of raising an alarm, although I wanted to shriek to the heavens.

  ‘Hush,’ he said. ‘It’ll be all right.’ He stroked my hair. ‘But you know I must leave tonight.’

  I looked into his eyes.

  ‘I will find you,’ he said. ‘I will search every city in Germany if I have to. Go about your work, protect your father and, if I’m right – our baby.’

  I sobbed against his chest.

  ‘We’ve said our vows and we have our rings,’ he said. ‘One day we’ll meet again. I promise.’

  He took me by the hand and led me back to our room. We turned off the light and lay next to each other on the bed, holding and caressing each other until blessed sleep took away my fears.

  A few hours later, my nerves startled me awake and I shot up in bed. The room was as dark as a cave and I could see nothing but dim shapes. I ran my hands over the sheets and found the bed empty. Karl had vanished like a whisper. I switched on the lamp. Nothing was taken from our room; it was as if he were already dead. His clothes hung in the closet; his toiletries still sat on the shelf. A note lay at the foot of the bed. It read: I love you.

  I held it to my chest and sobbed until the night dragged me away again.

  THE FÜHRER BUNKER

  BERLIN

  CHAPTER 15

  A knock awakened me from a fitful sleep.

  Karl had been gone for less than four hours.

  I opened the door to find the Colonel staring at me. His uniform was bedraggled and a cigarette hung from his parched lips. He looked as if he had been up most of the night. I fought back the fear that jumped inside me. Karl had warned me to be strong.

  I suspected the Gestapo and SS were already rounding up suspects in the bombing plot. Perhaps Karl had been far enough down on the list they hadn’t gotten to him until now.

  The Colonel sat stiffly in a chair and smoked his cigarette while I sat on the bed in my dressing gown.

  ‘Where is he?’ he asked.

  I looked him in the eye and said, ‘I don’t know.’

  He tapped his fingers against his thigh and smirked. ‘You know where he is – you must. You will tell me or—’ He broke off his sentence, as if a fresh way to torture me had come into his mind.

  ‘Or what?’ I asked casually. I was not afraid because the Colonel, with his first question, confirmed that Karl had escaped the Wolf’s Lair. Then I remembered my father in Berlin and Karl’s prediction of a child. I had only been thinking of myself. A spike of fear shot down my back. I wondered whether the Colonel sensed my discomfort.

  He puffed on his cigarette and blew the smoke toward me. ‘You put on a brave face, but you must be terrified.’ He paused and looked at me as no man had ever looked at me before, with eyes that bored through my skin to my soul. His gaze was unearthly, chilling in its feverish intensity. ‘You will be more terrified once you see the severity of your circumstances, because I control your fate.’ His mouth distorted the words so they became powerful and cruel.

  ‘Would you have me tortured? Killed? The woman who saved the Führer from being poisoned?’

  He laughed, assured and confident. ‘You can only play that hand so long, Frau Weber. The cards become torn and dirty. The Führer tends to forget good deeds when you are a traitor to the Reich.’ He leaned back in the chair and crossed his legs. ‘You’re a very attractive woman. No wonder Captain Weber was taken by you. But you’re different. I can’t put my finger on it, but I will.’

  ‘I’ve done nothing wrong. I don’t know where my husband is, but I’m sure he would never be involved in a plot against the Führer.’

  ‘I’m not so certain. We have reports that numerous officers were involved in this vile assassination attempt. Von Stauffenberg and several others have already been executed, unfortunately against the Führer’s orders.’

  I suppressed a gasp. ‘I met the Colonel once. He seemed a loyal man.’

  ‘He was anything but. The Wehrmacht is filled with traitors. You only have to ask the Führer his opinion about the fools who are aiding the enemy, filling our soldiers with lies and sabotaging the war effort. We have idiots for generals. But, in time, all the traitors will be eradicated. That is my job. I can tell you these things because your words against me will never be heard.’

  I got up from the bed. ‘I have work to do. Cook is expecting me.’

  ‘You are no longer a taster until we get to the bottom of this treasonous mystery. I’m removing you from the Wolf’s Lair.’

  I stared at him and said harshly, ‘I want to speak to Cook. In fact, I demand to speak to the Führer. He blessed my union with Karl. He won’t stand for such an action against me.’

  The Colonel puffed on his cigarette and then crushed it out on the floor. ‘The Führer has given me full rein in this investigation. He and the cook know where you’ll be going. They agree it’s for the best.’

  ‘I don’t believe you.’

  ‘It makes no difference what you believe. Be ready in one hour. Pack a few things – only the necessities. Don’t try to sneak anything out. My men will check your bag.’ He rose from the chair and bowed slightly. ‘Oh, another matter. Give me your papers and your Party pin. You won’t be needing them anymore.’

  He was taking the two items that ensured my security in the Reich – both given to me on orders from Hitler. I took them from their place on the desk and handed them to him.

  The Colonel saluted and said, ‘Heil Hitler.’ I watched as he closed the door and wondered what was going to happen. An armed SS man stood outside the door blocking any way I had of getting out.

  An hour later, I was escorted out of headquarters by two men, who walked beside me holding my arms. They whisked me away so secretively no one saw me when they put me in a car. Shortly, I was on a train at Rastenburg Station accompanied by members of Hitler’s security forces. My importance as a prisoner was assured, at least in the Colonel’s eyes. I had no idea where I was going. I was allowed to take one suitcase and a coat. That was all. Any personal possessions I cared about, photographs of my family and those taken at my wedding were left behind. I assumed they would be destroyed. I hid the stuffed monkey my father had given me as a child under my bed. If the photographs and other personal items were lost, there would be little on earth to confirm my existence. It would be easy for the Gestapo or the SS to eliminate me without a trace.

  The train headed west, toward Germany. After several hours, we arrived at parallel train tracks in the flat, wooded countryside of Eastern Poland. A second train sat next to ours, filled with people. Their faces, pressed against the windows, watched me as I departed my train. A deep and vacant sadness filled their eyes.

  One of the security men handed me a paper and spoke, the only words he said during our journey together. ‘Keep this with you. It shows your destination.’

  The day was sultry and hot and I slipped on the greasy tracks as I walked between the guards. The man who’d spoken to me caught me by the arm and helped me to the steps leading to the second train. I turned from my perch on the
steps and looked at him. He smiled and brought his hand up as if to wave. Then he walked back to the train with another guard.

  Armed soldiers stood on the couplings between the cars. They looked at me as if I were their property. One directed me to the right with the barrel of his rifle. I walked into a car crammed with men, women and children. The men were dressed in rumpled suits; the women, in summer dresses. Still, the smell of unwashed bodies filled the car and I reached for a handkerchief in my coat. I placed it over my nose and looked about for a seat. None was to be found. A young man, with black hair and glasses, sitting on a bench saw me. He stood and offered me his seat next to a young woman, whom I supposed to be his girlfriend or wife. I thanked him and collapsed in the narrow space between the woman and a metal partition.

  The train jerked into motion and chugged slowly down the tracks. The young man stared at me. I felt uncomfortable under his scrutiny. He spoke to me in Polish, and not knowing much of the language, I answered in German that I didn’t speak Polish. He immediately switched to German. The woman, whose feet rested on two brown leather suitcases, peered at me. She wore a plain gray dress. Despite her drab clothing, she was handsome, with dark hair and eyes.

  ‘Where are you headed?’ he asked.

  I still held the paper the security man had given me. I opened it and peered at the official document emblazoned with the Nazi insignia and signed by the Colonel. ‘It says, “Bromberg-Ost.’’’ The name meant nothing to me.

  ‘My wife is headed there as well.’ He loosened his tie, unbuttoned his jacket and sat on the floor in front of us. His body swayed with the erratic movements of the train. ‘Perhaps you can be friends.’

  The woman spoke up with sudden intensity. ‘I want to be with you,’ she said in broken German.