A Woman of War. Mandy Robotham
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and warm,’ she said, beaming, and for a split second the atmosphere was almost sisterly, as if we’d been swapping gossip for hours, teasing each other’s hair into the latest style.
Eva donned her sunglasses against the bright, white sun beating out to warm the icy air. Our breaths left brief trails as we headed down the frosty path, followed at a discreet distance by an armed guard, with the dogs gambolling on ahead. Conversation was stilted at first, given that there were few topics on which we could share, and many off limits. In the circles she mixed, she had picked up a certain amount of tact in chattering diplomatically, almost about nothing. We talked about some of our favourite films, our school days, and she told me a little about her family, whom she clearly missed. Her sister, Gretl, was often at the Berghof, since she was engaged to a senior officer in the SS, but she rarely saw her older sister, Ilse. When I revealed I had a sister of the same name, she smiled and seemed genuinely pleased we had a small thing in common. She stopped short of asking where my own Ilse was, and how she fared.
‘So, tell me about when you were working in Berlin, and the babies you delivered,’ she said, eager to know. ‘I often think it must be a lovely job. I think, if things had been different, I might have been drawn into nursing, or something like that.’ That was as far she came to alluding to the war and its catastrophic effect on the entire world below us, and not for the first time it made me question her true knowledge, or her willingness to ask.
I told her some of the positive stories about birth, of the quirkier events, but nothing of the downsides, the times when it could go wrong, and the emergencies we might have to deal with. The bitter part of me might have hinted at those, but it was an unspoken rule among midwives that we didn’t dwell on the negative side. After all, what was the point? Pregnant women were set on a journey, through the winding hours of labour and into motherhood, with no option of taking a shortcut. Why would I reveal it was potentially fraught with danger, reaffirming the old German view of childbirth as infected with jeopardy? As midwives, we knew intense fear could stop a labour in its tracks, with resulting consequences. We needed mothers to welcome it into their bodies, as much as anyone could invite pain and discomfort. Over endless hours of watching and waiting with women in labour, I was a firm believer that anxiety was our enemy, a generous dose of humour being the best medicine.
It took us half an hour to reach a turning point, a little clearing cut into the trees with a rectangular building on one end, part brick and part wood, becoming circular at the other end. Windows looked out onto the expanse below, across the border and into Austria. The dogs barked our arrival.
‘Quiet, you rascals!’ Eva chided them playfully.
The building was one main room, with the circular ante-room visible through an open door. Comfortable chairs were dotted around the walls and the wood floors covered with expensive rugs.
‘We call this the Teehaus,’ said Fräulein Braun, as the dogs flopped onto their embroidered cushions. She was pleased to be playing the hostess. ‘Isn’t it lovely?’
She beamed as she offered me tea from a little stove, pre-lit and set for her trip – making her regular morning walks anything but arduous – and talked as she filled the cups.
‘We come here and take tea on some afternoons. On a clear day you can see for ten miles or so. The view is breath-taking.’ She didn’t look at me but the ‘we’ was heavily weighted for my benefit.
‘It’s lovely,’ I said, as if I was in some kind of fairy tale myself.
‘Goodness!’ she said suddenly, as we finished our tea. ‘Time to head back. Frau Grunders will be calling for lunch and wondering where we are.’
I mused on what might be calling her away – to my knowledge, she hadn’t left the house in weeks. I’d overheard some of the maids gossiping about how full the Berghof used to be with a constant stream of guests. The social whirl, however, had stopped abruptly, no doubt at the Goebbels’ bidding. Eva flashed a naughty child’s grin, inviting me to be complicit in her mild mockery of the housekeeper, and I smiled back as a reflex. Unwittingly, Frau Grunders had helped us forge a small alliance.
A week later, Eva asked me to walk with her again. The day was crisp, but the air heavier with mist and her mood was dampened, though she made an effort to keep the conversation flowing.
‘So, do you think you will ever have children, Fräulein Hoff? I mean, your position – seeing what you do – it hasn’t put you off?’
I was slightly taken aback at her frankness, as we hadn’t broached anything so personal before. She might have known from my files that I was only a year younger than she, and still capable of having a baby, assuming camp life hadn’t rotted my insides – I hadn’t had a monthly cycle in over a year.
‘I hope one day to have a baby,’ I said. ‘I’m certainly not put off, or frightened, of it. Far from it. I think – I hope – I would relish it, welcome the experience. My work has taught me to have great faith in women. Mother Nature seems to get it right most times.’
‘I hope she’ll be kind to me,’ Eva Braun countered in a wistful voice. ‘I really do.’
I couldn’t tell if she was talking of the birth, the baby or both; the pressure on her to produce a consummate heir must have been sitting heavily even then. Nothing less than perfection would be tolerated.
‘And of course, the reward for a hard labour is always the baby,’ I said to lighten the mood, but as the words emerged, I thought instantly of the mothers who hadn’t been allowed to keep their prize, and I was ashamed of coating this dirty business with an acceptable sheen. How could I have forgotten so quickly? So easily? I was hit squarely by a swell of contrition and I coloured with the shame.
Eva Braun, however, heard only the gloss. ‘Oh! I’m so glad to hear that. My mother talked of childbirth being so positive, “powerful” she once said. I hope I feel that way when the time comes.’
‘And your family, are they excited?’
The pause in her step told me I’d gone too far, but Eva’s Reich standing did not turn on me. Instead, she pulled up her shoulders and assumed the facade.
‘Gretl is very excited. In fact, she’s coming in a few days, so you’ll get to meet her. I’m hoping she’ll be there at the birth.’
Her false chirpiness spoke volumes. The shroud of secrecy meant only her closest relatives would know – parents and siblings – and if they were enthusiastic Nazis, they would be proud beyond words. But if they were going through the motions of Third Reich belief, as I knew many families in Berlin had been, well versed in etiquette as a survival technique, they would fear for their daughter as well as themselves. I had heard some of the servants talking about Eva as if she weren’t worthy of her place at the Berghof, questioning what or who her family were – I put that down to envy and jealousy, since almost all seemed loyal supporters of their master. I wondered then if her parents regretted their daughter’s place in the inner circle.
Fräulein Braun cut short our walk, saying she urgently needed to write some letters before lunch.
‘I expect you do, too?’ she said.
I toyed with letting it go, but the lack of contact with my family rankled, especially since news of their wellbeing had appeared to be part of the agreement. And yet Sergeant Meier was always terribly busy whenever I tried asking him.
‘I’m afraid I’m not allowed letters, either in or out,’ I said flatly.
‘Oh … I hadn’t realised. I’m sorry.’ She flushed red, embarrassed, and turned in to the house.
After a minute or so, I went in through the servants’ entrance, and made my way to Frau Grunders’