I can’t breathe, and my head reels.
“In you, my youth,” he says as he looks at me, “there must be no weakness. I want a brutal, domineering, fearless, cruel youth. A youth before which the world will tremble. It must bear pain. There must be nothing weak or gentle about it.”
Why does he talk directly to me? I can’t hear his words anymore because there is a strange roar in my ears and a mist comes down over my eyes. I watch his mouth move and his hands gesticulate; a little section of hair comes loose and flops over his forehead.
He isn’t looking at me anymore, he is gazing out over the thousands down there, but that stare, that connection has lit a white-hot fire in my soul. He singled me out.
He saw that I am special. I can be someone great.
“That is how I will create the New Order,” the Führer is saying, a fountain of spit spraying from his mouth, his body reverberating with the force of his words. “That is how victory will be claimed!”
Words pour from his mouth, building like a thundering wave around the square. He speaks of a brilliant future with no more poverty, no more class divisions. Just one great, unified nation that will be the envy of all the world.
“A world that will one day be ruled by you, my German youth,” and he points at the formation of HJ boys.
He is a magnet, impossible to resist, pulling me toward him. When he finally finishes his speech, my eyes, too, are filled with tears.
We stand together, we Germans.
Us against the world.
I am floating. High above the platform and the crowds. High over Augustusplatz and the great city of Leipzig. High over Germany itself. Higher and higher until I can see the great planet Earth as God sees it, spinning through space and time among the planets around the sun, and there in the center of it all, this blessed land, with its swaths of deep forests, rich farmland, and lakes teeming with fish. Its factories and coal mines and its army. I can see its people: good, honest, and hardworking, cruelly downtrodden for so long, rising together and turning to face the outside world. To show them who we truly are and to take back what is rightfully ours. It is a power; a force, like gravity, which cannot be resisted.
The band strikes up again, only this time the drumbeat is like that of an ancient warrior dance. It beats and pulses through my body as the mighty Führer leaves the square, standing in his car like a victorious Roman emperor in his chariot. Behind him marches an army of torchbearers. The lights in the square are dimmed, and through the sudden darkness the flames appear to flow like a river of fire through the center of Augustusplatz.
MUTTI AND I walk home from the city center in the dark, freezing night. Vati had to return to his office, and Karl stayed with his new group, his Hitler Jugend schar.
“When can I join the Hitler Jugend, Mutti?” I ask, my breath dense as smoke in the light of the streetlamps. The ceremony has burned an impression on my soul, like a footprint. I feel that Hitler has called to me and I must answer. He wants me to play a role in Germany’s great and glorious future.
“Don’t be silly, the HJ is for boys.”
“But there is a girls’ section, the Jungmädelbund.”
“Vati doesn’t approve of that sort of thing for girls.”
“Why not?”
“Because girls should concentrate on home things.”
“But I don’t like home things. I want to go camping and play games and sing songs and march, like Karl will get to do. Besides, I’m twelve!”
“And Vati would say that is even more reason why not.”
“But it’s not fair! All my friends are joining the Jungmädelbund. What will they think if I don’t?”
“Don’t exaggerate.” Mutti hunches her narrow shoulders. “Many people don’t think it is right for girls. Even Herr Himmler himself doesn’t agree with it. He says the idea of girls marching about in uniform with backpacks is ludicrous and it makes him sick. Oh, do come along, Hetty.”
Trailing behind, I say no more the rest of the way home.
You can’t stop me. I’ll find a way.
I climb the stairs and get ready for bed.
My limbs ache with weariness as I lie there, but sleep won’t come. I hear Karl arrive home and Mutti’s muffled voice from the hallway.
“My darling! How proud we are . . . The very best of boys . . . Will go far in this life, I know it . . .”
Karl’s bedroom door bangs shut, and I hear Mutti’s soft step on her way to bed. A heaviness settles over the house, but my bed becomes an unbearable mess of twisted sheets and blankets. I wrap a warm shawl around my shoulders and creep into my window seat, gazing out over the dark street.
All is quiet and still, the limbs of the cherry tree etched motionless against the night sky. A few wispy clouds scud in front of the moon. Soothed, I lean back against the wooden shutters and turn to peer through the dark at Hitler’s portrait above my mantelpiece. Mutti’s mutterings about enemies just make me afraid but He gives me courage. Whether I join the Hitler Jugend or not, I’m certain I have a part to play in this great new Reich. He doesn’t mind that I’m a girl, and nobody, not Mutti, not Vati, not Karl, can stop me.
A little niggle eats away at the back of my mind. Until now, I’d been sure my destiny was to become a doctor. But what if Karl is right? I think back to the ceremony, to the moment I met the Führer’s eyes and he spoke his words, those incredible words directly to me. And then I know it. I know what I must do.
I run to my bookcase and retrieve the journal Karl gave me so long ago, and in the moonlight, I write:
My Hitler, I devote my life to you. Make your plan for me clear, because from now on, everything I do, it is for you and you alone. I will make you proud that I’m your child. Oh great, great Führer . . .
I wake up with a start, my legs curled and stiff beneath me. The shawl has dropped from my shoulders and cold seeps into my bones. The soft purr of an engine rises from the street below. I look out my window. Vati!
He climbs out of the car and I raise my hand to bang on the window, but pause, knowing he’d be angry I’m not asleep.
Vati walks around to the other side of the car and opens the door. Another figure climbs out, a woman, her face obscured by her hat. They stroll together along the pavement and stop just below the streetlamp. Vati turns to face the woman. Slowly he places his arms around her waist and draws her into an embrace. She tilts her face up and in the circular glow cast by the lamp I clearly see Hilda Müller’s pale, round face. She closes her eyes and opens her mouth, a thick, red circle of lips. Then Vati, my Vati, bends down and kisses that horrible mouth. A long, slow kiss.
Pinned to the window, I can’t tear my eyes away. When finally it’s over, Fräulein Müller climbs back into the car and it pulls away. Vati stands for a moment watching it travel down the road, his hands in his pockets. Then he turns toward the house. The iron gate creaks shut behind him.
MY HEAD THROBS as I wake to strong morning light. I’d forgotten to close my shutters last night before crawling into bed. Coming downstairs, I see that I’ve missed breakfast and Mutti has gone out. A new worry awakens. Should I tell Mutti what I saw? The thought sends a wave of horror through me. Bertha makes me some warm milk and hands me a plate of sausage and bread from the store cupboard.