by A G Mogan
The race that fails to come through the test will simply die out and its place will be taken by the healthier and stronger races, which will be able to endure greater hardships. As this problem primarily concerns posterity, it belongs to that category of which it is said with terrible justification that the sins of the fathers are visited on their offspring unto the tenth generation. This is a consequence which follows on an infringement of the laws of blood and race.
Marriage also cannot be an end in itself, but has to serve the one greater aim, the propagation and preservation of the species and the race. Only this is its meaning and its task. Who will wonder, therefore, that even in the circles of this age syphilis begins to seek its victims? And is it not a misery to see how so many physically weak, and also mentally corrupt, young men receive their initiation into marriage by a whore of the big cities?”
In the final analysis who is able to say whether he has been infected or not?
Are there not innumerable cases on record where an apparently cured person has a relapse and does untold harm without knowing it?
I am forced to pause, as sad memories torture my psyche again and threaten to ruin my shabby equilibrium.
But, not only that.
The conspicuous smile of a young woman standing on the other side of the bars also interrupts my dictation. Her smile is so wide, her eyes … she smiles with her eyes. I have never seen her before, yet she seems strangely familiar. I wonder where …
“Uncle Alf!” she shouts in a cheerful voice, clasping the cold iron bars in her youthful hands. I step reluctantly toward her, digging deep into my mind for memories of her.
“Geli?” I whisper skeptically, looking dumbfounded at the astonishingly beautiful girl. Could she be?
She bursts into a fit of giggles.
“Yes, Geli! Your niece!”
“My niece!” I coo, clasping my face with my hands. “Unbelievable! Geli, you were this little the last time a saw you!” Squatting, I point my finger at the floor to show her how tiny she was almost two decades ago. She gives a bewitching laugh.
“Aren’t you going to come and give me a hug?” she asks with a pout, faking discontent. I drag my painful leg toward her, trying hard not to grimace. Grabbing her full cheeks in my hands, I kiss her forehead through the bars, feeling the cold iron on my own flesh. Then I pull back and stare at her, still in disbelief.
“You are so silly, Uncle Alf!” she jokes in a lively voice. I look at my cellmates frowning at her, clearly disapproving such familiarity. “Are you planning on keeping me here? Tell your men to open these ugly gates.”
It is my turn to burst into laughter and I signal the guard to open the cell door. As soon as he does, this beautiful young creature, my niece, runs to me and locks me in a suffocating embrace.
“I wanted to meet you … so so much … ,” she whispers in my ear, hugging me even tighter. Embarrassment invades my body and makes me blush.
I push her back gently and invite her to take my seat. As she sits, I introduce her to my comrades and tell them she is the daughter of my half-sister, Angela. Hess nods his head, but Maurice stands up and kisses her hand. That makes her giggle again.
“Enough with the introductions!” I order, whipping Maurice’s grin off his face. He retreats to his seat and I turn my face toward my niece again. “Geli, Geli … how did you find me? I must tell you … your visit … astonishes me!”
“But Uncle, you are all over the newspapers! You are a celebrity! My very own sweet Uncle is a celebrity! It was not at all hard to find you. The papers are tracking all your moves. I kept showing them to mommy, pledging that we must come to visit you! She is always reluctant when I speak about you, Uncle, so what I did, I took the matter in my own hands. And here I am!” she bubbles breathlessly.
“What do you mean you took the matter in your own hands? Where is Angela?”
She chuckles. “Reluctant, back in Vienna!”
This girl is nothing but giggles.
I start pacing the room. “But no, Geli! What have you done? Are you out of your mind? You cannot travel alone. It is not safe for you, especially here! How old are you?? You must be … what? Fifteen?”
“I will be seventeen pretty soon, Uncle!” She raises he chin in a gesture of self-confidence.
“But still, underage! How in the world did you manage to travel alone?”
“I lied. About my age, I lied,” she says with a wide grin.
“No! Don’t smile! What you did was stupid! You foolishly placed yourself in great danger! This is unacceptable!”
“Calm down, Uncle Alf, I am here already, aren’t I?”
“What a brave young woman you are!” Maurice says admiringly, daring to speak in my stead. “Half our men aren’t as courageous as you are!”
“Why, thank you, Herr Maurice! That’s quite a compliment! I don’t even think I deserve it, but ─”
My blood throbs in my temples and I begin gesticulating angrily.
“Shut your mouths, both of you! Those blasted civil servants! So easy to lie to, given their basic capacity for discernment! They must be removed, brought in for questioning, then sent to training facilities I, myself, shall build! Or dispose of them altogether, these … these retarded blockheads! One day, soon enough, they will answer for their feeble actions, I shall see to it myself!”
The prison cell is dead quiet. I look at Geli, whose red face stares at the floor. Maurice averts his own face, afraid of my anger. The silence helps me calm down and I look at Geli again. She is quite tall, strange thing for a female relative, and not as slender as are the women in our family. She must have taken after her father, the insufferable Raubal. Dark-brown hair, flowing in chocolate waves to her waist, remind me of Mother. A sudden urge to hug her invades me, my own flesh and blood. Her presence here makes me feel quite strange; I should say it makes me … happy. Geli Raubal … who escaped and lied to meet me.
My face must be betraying my thoughts, as she tries a shy smile again.
“You mentioned Vienna,” I blurt out, embarrassed. “Are you living there with your mother?”
“Yes. I love Vienna! Mother said you also lived there. Is it true, Uncle?” she demands, plunging me into hateful memories.
“It is. But I am afraid I have nothing worth recounting of that place.”
“How come? Mommy said you studied painting at the University there. That is something worth recounting, isn’t it?”
“No!” I shout, startling her again.
“Well, if you ask me, I am happy you gave up painting. Look at you now! My darling Uncle, a celebrity! The papers say you were almost killed in November. Is that the reason you are dragging your leg?” she bubbles again, standing up from the chair.
So, she has noticed it. I turn away from her, trying to avoid another hug, but she is already behind me, grappling me from behind and resting her head on my back.
“Poor you, I wish I could take it all away … ”
This is uncomfortable beyond words, and I look again at my cellmates, embarrassed by this closeness. Their faces look surprised, slightly amused. It embarrasses me further and I pull away again.
“How do you get by? You and your mother?” I ask, retreating into one of the corners.
“Very well, if you ask. We moved to Vienna after the Great War and it was a pretty harsh time. Mommy worked in a restaurant’s kitchen for a while, cleaning dishes. But you know her; she is not the settling type, especially when it comes to money.”
“That, I know!” I burst out laughing. “After the war, it was hard for most of us. And now?”
“Now, she works for a boarding house for students, Mensa Academia Judaica, I believe it is called. And she has recently been promoted to a managing position, can you believe it?”
“What?” I ask, blood rushing up my cheeks.
“A managing position, Uncle. You know … she gives orders and such.”
“I know what a managing position is, silly head! What I don’t know is w
hy my own sister chooses to work for the bloody fungus!” I shout, hitting the cell wall with my palm.
She looks at me quizzically. “What do you mean … fungus?”
“It is preposterous! Inadmissible! I won’t have it! Do you hear me? I will not have it!” I shout further, shaking her by the shoulders.
“Uncle, stop!”
“My own relatives! Never! You hear me? My own flesh and blood will never serve the Jew!”
“Let go of me!” she yells, struggling away from my grasp. The terrified look on her face forces me to collect myself.
“I need a car here immediately,” I order Maurice. “And two of your men. They will escort my niece back to Vienna.”
Her terrified look turns to a weeping one in a millisecond. “But I want to stay! I want to live here, with you, Uncle!” she pleads, tears falling down her face.
This girl shakes me to the core. Her beauty, her familiarity, indeed her instant attachment, moves my very soul. The way she embarrasses me is quite a foreign feeling, rarely experienced before, but for some reason, it does not bother me.
“I will see you soon, silly head,” I say, softening my voice. “I shall come and rescue you … from the Jew and all … you and your stupid mother. But, for now, I need rescuing myself. Have patience, my child, it is the foundation of everything,” I continue, and blot her tears with my fingers.
She hugs me for the last time and heads toward the cell’s door. As she leaves, I grab the biggest flower bouquet from the corner of the room and hand it to her.
I bow slightly and softly kiss her hand. “I shall come to save you … I swear it to you.”
She smiles her bewitching smile again, and then disappears from my sight.
“Ring her mother, she must be worried,” I order Maurice again. “Tell her you will deliver her daughter safely by dusk.”
Returned to my lonely thoughts, I reflect deeply on the event.
Geli’s visit served to reconnect me to my roots. For sure, the Goddess of Faith has sent her to breathe new strength in me, to renew my faith in my purpose and to show me that I am not alone. I bring back her image in my mind’s eye ─ her innocent smiling face, the purity of her bubbling personality, her childishness. It makes me smile.
Yet in light of what will soon follow, this bloody, cursed day should have never happened.
The imprisonment at Landsberg serves to deny me only two things. The first, obviously, is my freedom of movement; hence, my freedom of spreading my ideology through public speeches. But it does not keep me from writing—or better yet—dictating my ideology, which soon becomes the official Bible of all German people. Mein Kampf advances well and we are about to finish the first volume.
The second annoyance of being held in these damp walls is the poor environment, unfit for decent health. The mold, the very damp walls, and the cold in this fortress, serve to increase my afflictions. The pain in my shoulder and leg is considerably mellowed by a low dose of morphine. But the rash never disappears, and my stomach troubles and headaches willfully persist.
Besides these annoying restrictions, I am not a usual inmate, as my failed putsch has rendered me a most popular prisoner. Instead of the filthy clothes worn by the true criminals, I am allowed to wear my uniform, and under the same routine used outside of prison. I read, talk, or work on my book until midnight, an unheard of thing for the others. All this might seem that I would easily attract the envy or even the hatred of the other inmates, but this is not the case. It is they, or the guards, who take turns serving me food or delivering the daily newspapers. I am allowed to sleep until late in the morning without any outright objections, and participating in daily exercises is optional. Of course, I never partake in such ridiculous physical pursuits, as it would be bad for discipline. A leader cannot afford to be beaten at games.
With Christmas Eve quickly approaching, a gloomy, intensifying feeling of despondency threatens to shake my equilibrium. Even here, the fear of an impending disaster follows me.
My thoughts revert to the on-stand-by trial to follow in a couple of months. I imagine a terrible sentence, maybe life in prison, or even deportation to my home country of Austria. I do not know which of the two would prove worse, but the fear of both is definitely enough to make me hate the coming festivities, enough to make me sense disaster.
The guard marching the second floor hallway, where my cell is located, announces a visitor. Pushing my gloomy thoughts aside, I raise my head to face this mysterious visitor. A short thin man stares at me from behind the bars. I signal the guard to open the cell gate to allow this unfamiliar fellow to enter.
“Sieg Heil!” he shouts as he enters. He is the dark type, with dark hair and dark eyes. He resembles a Jew. “Der Chef, I have come here today solely as a messenger.”
I encourage him to take a seat at my small table. “What is your name, good friend?”
“Joseph Goebbels, Der Chef,” he replies with a glow in his eyes, extending his hand to shake mine. I analyze his hands and fingers and decide he is not a Jew. I vigorously shake his hand, then wipe off my own hand with a handkerchief I pull from my uniform’s pocket. While he is heading toward the table, I notice he is dragging his foot.
“Don’t tell me you were also injured in the putsch? How come I haven’t seen you before?”
“Oh! What a great honor it would have been to fight next to you, Der Chef, on that cursed November day!”
“But?”
“But, I am afraid my leg injury has nothing so honorable attached to its story. It was simply caused by a botched operation for a bacterial infection … osteomyelitis.” His face flushes in embarrassment.
“Bacterial infection, you say? Just like the Jew!” I spit out and analyze his expression.
“I couldn’t have put it better myself.”
We both burst into laughter and I instantly take a liking to him. I know he already adores me by the flashes in his eyes. I know he hates the Jew, and I know we both have deformities. I predict a long friendship.
“So, why weren’t you with us on the streets, Goebbels?” I ask, feigning admonishment.
“Because then, I wasn’t yet a Nazi. I joined the party only a short while ago, two weeks at the most.”
“Nothing to worry. Good we have you now, Goebbels, isn’t it?”
“Indeed, I am most happy to be at your side.”
“Good. Then I am happy also. In which department do you function?”
“All of them,” he replies amusedly. “I am a sort of Jack of all trades, as the Americans would put it.”
“They all are in the beginning, but prove yourself and … who knows … ”
“You can count on me and on my determination to be all that you need me to be, Der Chef.”
“Good. I like that, your devotion. So! You said you came here today as a messenger, one of your many trades.” I smile, yet his face turns as cold as death, and I suddenly know.
“Why, of course!” I exclaim, and drop into my chair. “It’s Christmas time and you are here as a messenger. I could kill you right now, you know, before you even manage to pass on to me that dreadful news you have on you!” I look at him, expecting to see terror in his eyes, yet see only … astonishment.
“How did you know I was about to give you bad news?”
“No matter … ” I whisper, the feeling of the impending disaster grabbing me again. “Just spit it out. No use to prolong what is called the inevitable.”
“It’s Eckart. He passed away two days ago, at Berchtesgaden. From a heart attack.”
I pause, clenching my jaw in grief. Then, uncontrolled anger replaces my grief and I hit the table with my palm.
“A heart attack? Heart attack!? Morphine, drugs and booze! That’s what gave him a heart attack! God damn it! Not my Eckart! No! Why Eckart, of all of them, why? No!”
I howl like a wounded animal and drop my head into my hands. Tears stream from my eyes and I smear them across my face. They are all staring at me. “Get out!
All of you! Out!”
“We found this next to him … he must have written it shortly before he died,” says Goebbels, placing an opened envelope on the small table. As he walks out, he adds, “It is addressed to you, Der Chef.”
Left alone in my cell, I restrain my tears no longer. Like a little baby, I let them fall unbridled down my cheeks. And then, like a mature man, I curse Christmas again. Gliding my fingers over the white envelope, I think of how he died thinking of me, of how I was the last person in his thoughts. I wipe off my face and with shaking hands, pull out the letter.
My Son,
Do you mind me calling you as such? Most certainly not, for many times I have had the feeling that you considered me as much more than a mentor, the feeling that you, indeed, perceived me as a father figure, which made me happy beyond words. I, too, my dearest fellow, always perceived you as my true son, and so much more than that.
I wrote these following verses a few years before I had the honor of meeting you, not knowing that I, indeed, was writing them about you!
Father in Heaven, resolved to the death
Kneel we before Thee, Oh answer us, then!
Does aught other people Thine awful command
More loyally follow than we Germans do?
Is there one such? Then, Eternal One, send
Laurel and victory to it, mighty with fate.
Father, Thou smilest? Oh, joy without end!
Up! And onward, onward to the holy crusade.
Yes. When I first heard you speak, I knew you were the one sent to us. I knew I had been writing of Your coming all along and I wept with joy that God had granted me the chance of meeting you in this life. You are my son, you are more than my son, you are our Savior. And then again, in Auf gut Deutsch I wrote: “A Cincinnatus was called from his plow to save his Fatherland…a man who can stand the sound of a machine gun; whether it will be a soldier or a farmer or a worker who will come to lead us does not matter. All he needs is a soul – a bold, selfless, German soul. Do not ask where: Believe!”