McSweeney's Mammoth Treasury of Thrilling Tales

by Michael Chabon

  “Even to political meetings?” asked Begg, making a note.

  “Even to those. His career had begun to prosper. The SA were glad to see him with a girl from time to time. He paid for the singing lessons, because she had a talent for operetta, which Adolf loves. Of course there were more puritanical party comrades, such as Heinrich Himmler, who disapproved of this relationship. Himmler felt it detracted from Hitler’s seriousness, and it made him vulnerable to the anti-Nazi press. There were vile rumors, of course, but those are always attached to successful politicans.

  “Geli caused the odd scene in public, and Alf seemed unable to control her. Alf knew how Himmler felt, but he ignored him. Geli fired his political engine, he told Himmler. Without Geli he could not give the speeches which swayed the crowds.

  “But it was not only Himmler who noticed,” Hess said, “how much less the rich ladies would give to party funds when they saw their beloved Herr Hitler, who on other occasions had laid his head in their laps, with his niece. They had influence over their husbands. And the industrialists Adolf wanted to win over were not too sure about a man who took his niece everywhere he went.

  “I know there were strong arguments in this very room. Once Adolf became so incensed by what he said was interference in his private life that he fell to the floor and began to tear at the carpet with his teeth. He can be very wearing sometimes. That is why few of us ever wish to upset him. . . .”

  “The carpet?” declared Sinclair. “With his teeth?”

  “I wasn’t there on that occasion, but Röhm, Strasser, and Doctor Göbbels were, as I recall.”

  “You have told us about Captain Röhm, but have not explained about Herr Strasser and Doctor Göbbels.”

  “Personally, I prefer Röhm, for all his predilections. He is at least an honest soldier and as loyal to Hitler as I am. Gregor Strasser is the leader of our party in the Reichstag. He’s a bit of a left-winger. A very distinguished man, but rather at odds with Adolf over the direction of the party. Strasser is more socialist than nationalist. Doctor Göbbels is the intellectual of the party. A frail little man with a club-foot. He represents what I call ‘the Berlin faction’—those who have more recently attached themselves to our party’s destiny.”

  “And would any of these think the death of Geli Raubal would benefit Herr Hitler and the party?” Begg enquired, staring out at the construction in what had once been a rather pretty garden.

  “Oh, all of them would probably say something like it.” Hess nodded absently, looking about the room, its sparse furniture, rather as if he saw it for the first time. “But saying and doing are very different things. I can’t see Röhm, who thought Geli a bit of a doxy, or Strasser, who was the last one to want scandal, or Göbbels, who is our chief propagandist, threatening either Hitler’s career or the party’s prospects by killing Geli. And Captain Göring has no interest in such things. Göbbels might have made her an offer she couldn’t refuse. Röhm might have frightened her away. Strasser would have told her to keep her nose clean and not embarrass the Führer.”

  “And this Herr Himmler?”

  “He’s a cold fish. He has Hitler’s ear. He has wheedled his way into the Führer’s confidences in recent years. I thought he might have been behind that sniper’s assassination attempt. They tried to kill me, you know. But I heard the rifle shot in time and flung myself flat. I still live in fear in case the sniper should try again—”

  “You were telling us about Herr Himmler.”

  “Head of Hitler’s personal bodyguard. Big rival of Röhm, who runs the SA, our storm troopers. He did hate the relationship. But he, too, knows that the party is on the very brink of sweeping the country. As far as I know he is in Berlin. Why would he jeopardize his own career? You see, there are no real suspects within the party. This is the work of communists and their backers. Our self-interest would not be served by scandal.”

  “True,” agreed Begg. “So you believe there was perhaps a political motive for her death. And what about a personal one?”

  “You will have to ask others about that.” Hess was suddenly very subdued.

  Under Begg’s clever prompting, Hess revealed all he knew of the Geli Raubal murder case.

  Hitler was becoming increasingly jealous of Geli, who grew steadily bored with his prolonged absences from the flat. His political career took him farther and farther from Munich for longer periods. She, being a young, spirited woman, had wanted more gaiety in her life and eventually had asked her uncle Alf if he would pay for her to go to Vienna, where she had more friends and where she could get far better voice lessons than in Munich.

  Hitler had objected to this. He had not wanted her to go to Vienna. He had not wanted her to leave their flat. He was becoming even more suspicious of her. He threatened and wheedled, and it seemed she calmed down. Then, on the morning he was due to leave for an important speaking tour, there was another row. “It was to involve some crucial secret meetings, for there are those in our party who do not believe Alf should be courting the rich at all. Yet without them, we are nothing.” Hess paused, his voice taking on an increasingly retrospective tone.

  “That same morning, Geli had found one of her pet canaries dead on the floor of its cage. She had become hysterical. She threatened Hitler. She said that if he did not let her go to Vienna she would kill herself. Then she threatened to spill the beans about ‘everything.’ ”

  “Everything?” Begg lifted an eyebrow.

  Hess did not know what “everything” was, he said. But Sinclair recognized Begg’s sudden alertness.

  “Well, Hitler’s car was to call for him early that morning, after breakfast. He could not cancel his engagements. But Geli demanded that he either stay with her or let her go to Vienna. Again Hitler refused. Even as he got into the car, Geli appeared on the balcony above. ‘So you won’t let me go to Vienna?’ she had shouted.

  “Hitler’s reply had been a terse ‘No.’ Then the automobile had driven away.”

  Hours later Hitler was meeting his new backers. He stayed overnight at the Deutscherhof in Nuremberg. There were many witnesses. At eight-thirty the next morning, the housekeeper, Annie Winter, arrived at Prinzregensburgstrasse to begin work. The flat was silent. Frau Winter knocked several times, without getting a response. Eventually she sent for her butler husband, to force it. They found Geli.

  “She appeared to have shot herself. Beside her lay the dead canary, spattered with her blood. She was shot in the heart.”

  Hitler’s Walther 9.5 mm automatic pistol lay near her hand. She had been dead for some hours. Hess had been called. Eventually, he called the police.

  “You have to be certain who you call, Sir Seaton. The Munich police have a decided anti-Nazi bias and would love to use something like this against the Führer.”

  The police had soon decided Fräulein Raubal could not easily have shot herself at that angle and that she had probably been murdered. Nobody believed it was suicide.

  “And it could not have been Alf, Sir Seaton, however it seems. Alf was miles away, in Nuremberg, when the crime occurred. You can see how easy it will be, perhaps, to prove he paid someone to kill her. But he loved Geli, Sir Seaton. He lived for her. He is too gentle. Too idealistic. I fear that if the case isn’t cleared up rapidly, by one such as yourself, it will mean the end of Alf’s career and, because he is our most important spokesman, the dissolution of the Nazi Party. Please stop this from happening, Sir Seaton. Please say you will help us!”

  Begg’s features were hidden from Hess and the astonished Sinclair as he spoke reassuringly.

  “Of course I will, Mr. Hess. It’s not the sort of problem one solves every day. And we do love a challenge—don’t we, Taffy?”

  The pathologist was taken aback. “If you say so, old boy.”

  Sometimes even Taffy Sinclair found his friend’s game very hard to follow.

  CHAPTER THREE

  LEADING THE MASTER RACE

  Begg’s first stop after lunch was to the murde
r scene itself. Prinzre-gensburgstrasse was the smart area where “Führer” Hitler now lived. On the way, Hess explained how the Winters had called him and he in turn had tried to telephone Hitler in Nuremberg. But Hitler had already left Nuremberg and was traveling to his next appointment. Apparently he was singing snatches of song, entertaining the other occupants of the car with jokes, impressions of people they had just met.

  “Many people, Sir Seaton, have no idea what a marvelous entertainer Alf is. He used to keep us in fits of laughter on those long tours. He could impersonate anyone. Pompous innkeepers, party officials, intense old maids, famous politicians! He could have gone onstage as a comedian if he had not been chosen to lead his people.”

  Hess recollected the question. “Well, the hotel sent a boy after Herr Hitler’s car, and when he got the message Alf almost collapsed. Everyone says it was completely unexpected. Indeed the first words from his lips, I understand, were ‘Who has done this?’ He had the car turned, his appointments canceled, telephoned me the first chance he got, and came back at once to Munich. It was my suggestion I next call the Munich Police Headquarters and he assented. And then I sent you a telegram. My staff arranged your tickets and so on.”

  “The police weren’t suspicious concerning the time you waited before telephoning them?”

  “I explained that I myself had been in a state of some shock after seeing poor Geli’s body.” He paused and then looked with a strange, new innocence into Begg’s face. “I know I am a suspect, Sir Seaton, but I seek peace and security and pride from the Nazi Party, not violence. This is what most of us in Germany want. The thought of killing a mouse makes me sick. The thought of killing some poor, foolish creature who had been flattered and cajoled into waters well above her natural depth, that is abominable. You must not judge us all by those who ‘goose-step’ through the main streets of our towns with banners and bludgeons. Yet remember those poor lads were boys when they went to war, and what they saw in the trenches and learned to do in the trenches never left them, especially when they found they had no jobs. . . .”

  Rudolf Hess continued this apologia all the way to the flat in Prinzregensburgstrasse, an imposing modern classical building built on the corner of a broad, quiet avenue. Hitler’s flat was on the second floor. It was light, airy, and luxurious in a subdued, up-to-date way. Doors led in several directions from the main vestibule, suggesting servants’ quarters and guest apartments. Certainly there was every way in which Hitler, his half sister, and niece could live together in such a flat very respectably indeed.

  Minutes later, Sir Seaton was interviewing Herr and Frau Winter themselves. The couple had found Geli on the carpet in her bedroom, only partially dressed, as if she had been disturbed at her toilet.

  The Winters were clearly shaken by what had happened. At that moment Frau Winter resembled a bewildered mole, in her gray cardigan, gray blouse, skirt, and stockings. This dour appearance was not, Begg guessed, natural to her. Herr Winter’s features, on the other hand, seemed habitually surly, yet his voice was agreeable enough. Neither man nor woman was of very high intelligence. They both confirmed, under Begg’s questioning, that Hitler and his niece had quarreled increasingly as his political career made demands on his time. But the party needed Hitler.

  “Even I have fallen under his oratorical spell,” said Winter seriously. “It is almost impossible to escape his charm when he wants something from you. Crowds love him. Without him the party would be lost. But as a result, he spent even less time with Geli. You couldn’t really blame her. She grew restless; he grew jealous.”

  “He had plenty to be jealous about, too,” Frau Winter interjected with an angry twitter. “She was not a good girl, Sir Seaton.”

  Herr Winter reluctantly conceded. “I think she had plenty of company when Herr Hitler was gone. In particular that tall, blond SS man who wanted her to run off to Vienna with him . . . Himmler’s chap.”

  “You saw them?” Begg demanded.

  “Just as we saw the whips and the blood after one of Herr Hitler’s ‘sessions,’ ” she said primly.

  “Whips?” asked a startled Begg. “Blood?”

  Herr Winter interrupted hastily, too late to silence his wife. “It was Herr Hitler’s way of relaxing. He carries heavy responsibilities. It is often the way with important men, not so? We are people of the world here. We all know what goes on in Berlin.”

  Having verified with the Winters the events of the recent past, Sir Seaton Begg thanked them gravely and made to leave. Taffy Sinclair in particular seemed glad of some fresh air.

  Back in the Duesenberg, Begg asked a further question of Hess.

  “Tell me, old boy, did Herr Hitler ever have his niece watched? And was he ever blackmailed?”

  “Aha! I knew I had approached the right detective. You realized. Unfortunately, since the blackmail, he’s grown suspicious of everyone. Yes, he did have a couple of SA men in plainclothes keeping an eye on her, but they were incompetent. Himmler wanted to use SS people. He thinks they’re more efficient. So yes, he watched her, but you can’t really blame him for that.”

  “Blackmail?” said Sinclair from the shadows in the back, unable to contain himself. “Your leader was being blackmailed?”

  “A couple of years ago. That’s not what the blackmailer called it, of course, Herr Sinclair. But Putzi, Hitler’s foreign-press secretary, handled the details of that. Putzi’s half-American, a great source of vitality, you know. We all love him. Only his jokes and piano playing can cheer Alf up when he’s really depressed. . . .”

  Begg had begun to realize Hess had to be kept on course or he would wander off down all kinds of twists and turns in the story. He slowed the car behind a stopping tram, then indicated that he was going to pass. Slowly he increased pressure on the accelerator. “Putzi?”

  “A nickname, naturally. Putzi Hanfstaengl was at Harvard. He’s an art expert. Has a gallery in Munich. His firm publishes the official engraved portraits of Hitler, Strasser, Röhm, Göring, myself, and the other eminent Nazis. Anyway, Putzi took the money to the blackmailer—we weren’t rich in those days and it was hard to scrape together—and got the material back. Probably nothing especially bad. But, of course, Alf became much less trusting after that.”

  “Does Herr Hanfstaengl usually enjoy a drink at the Hotel Bavaria?”

  Hess’s enormous eyebrows almost met his hairline.

  “Mein Gott, Sir Seaton! You are indeed the genius they say you are. That is remarkable deduction. Putzi’s natural American vitality has been drained, it seems, by recent events. He has never really been at ease since we began to gain real power. A little bit of a playboy, I suppose, but a good fellow and a loyal friend.”

  After that, Begg asked no more questions. He darted Sinclair a vindicated glance, for he had gotten that information from one of his much-loved “gossip columns.” He told Hess he would like to drive around and think the case through for a while. Hess showed some impatience, but his admiration for the English detective soon reminded him of his manners. Heels were clicked as Hess was dropped off at the Brown House. Then Begg had touched the feather-light wheel of the superb roadster and turned her back toward central Munich.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  FEAR AND TREMBLING

  As usual, Sinclair was amazed at Begg’s extraordinary retentive memory, which had drawn itself a precise map of the town and was able to thread Dolly’s massive bonnet through the winding streets of old Munich as if the driver had lived there all his life. Soon they were leaving the Duesenberg in the safekeeping of the Hotel Bavaria’s garage and strolling into the plush and brass of the old-fashioned main bar. Clearly the Bavaria was more popular with those who preferred to be in bed with a good book by eight PM. The bar was large, but sparsely occupied, save for one middle-aged couple dancing to the strains of Franz Lehar played by an ancient orchestral ensemble half-hidden by palms and curtains on the distant dais. At a shadowed table two smart young men upon second glance turned out to be smart young
women. Against the walls leaned a couple of sleepy-eyed old waiters and at the bar sat two young couples from the local “cocktail set” who had lost their way to the latest jazz party. Slumped alone, as far away from the couples as possible, wearing a great, bulky English tweed overcoat, sat a giant of a man nursing a drink which seemed tiny in his monstrous hands.

  With his huge, pale head and irregular features, an expression of solemn gloom on his long face, the lone drinker looked almost comical. He glanced up in some curiosity as they entered. Begg wasted no time in introducing himself and his colleague. “You are Herr Hitler’s foreign-press secretary, I understand. Too often in Berlin, these days, I suppose. We’ve been hired to prove your boss’s innocence.”

  Herr “Putzi” Hanfstaengl did not seem greatly surprised that Begg knew his name. He lifted his hand in a salute before returning it to the glass. “You guys from the Times, are you?” He spoke in English with an educated American accent. He was clearly drunk. “I told your colleagues—when the Times turns up, that’ll be a sign this is actually an international story.” He let out an enormous sigh and drew himself to his full six and a half feet.

  “You’ve been trying to keep all this speculation out of the papers, I suppose.”

  “What do you think, sport?” Hanfstaengl tossed back his drink and snapped his fingers for a refill. “It’s not doing anyone much good, least of all Alf himself. He’s gone under the bed, as we say, and won’t come out. And I’m talking too much. Have a schnapps!” Again he snapped for the waiter, who disappeared through a door and a little later appeared behind the bar to serve them. Begg and Sinclair modified their orders to beers, but Hanfstaengl hardly noticed.

  “We’re not from the newspapers,” Begg told him before the drinks arrived. “We’re private detectives employed by Herr Hess. Anything you tell us we will use in the processes of justice.”