A Woman of War: A new voice in historical fiction for 2018, for fans of The Tattooist of Auschwitz. Mandy Robotham
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and genetics was too much to fathom.
I struggled to react, to absorb such news. Captain Stenz only looked at me with those deep blue eyes, as seconds ticked slowly by. Searching, enquiring.
‘Fräulein Hoff?’
‘Yes?’
‘Are you quite well?’ He said it with a note of true concern, and then a hint of a smile. ‘We can’t have you falling ill, not on your first day, can we?’
‘No, no,’ I said. ‘It’s just … the change of circumstance, so quickly. It’s hard to take in.’
I wanted to test his reactions by referring to my other life, to see if he masked them in the same automatic way as the others, empathy sucked from his psyche. His eyes dropped, and he moved to pick up his gloves.
‘Yes,’ he said flatly. So, a complete Nazi – one of them. Inevitable. But then, the quickest flick of his blond lashes towards me, a rich, blue spark. In that second I caught some doubt, some recognition. And he caught me catching it. Over the past two years I had barely looked at any man without feeling hatred or disgust, since most were guards infected with a profound disdain for humanity. Yet the man before me caused an unexpected reaction deep inside; a tweak low into my being. Did I recognise it as attraction? I rebuked myself for such shallow and immediate feelings.
He needed to leave soon – a car was waiting – so we covered my duties swiftly. I would remain at the Berghof for the duration of the pregnancy, and for at least four to six weeks afterwards, helping my charge to adjust to motherhood. The baby would be born at home, but transport and a doctor would be available at all times should I need them, and would reside in the complex for a month or so before the birth. A small room would be set aside for anaesthetics, ready to be transformed into an operating theatre if necessary.
It was elaborate and excessive, and clearly they were keen to avoid a trip to the hospital, however private, at all costs – the true nature of the Reich’s propaganda machine was laid bare. Appearances were a good portion of this war, and I was to be known as a companion to all but the inner circle. This baby must remain hidden until it was prudent to reveal to the world, under the Führer’s terms. I almost felt sorry for Eva Braun already.
‘I have arranged all the equipment necessary,’ Captain Stenz went on, in officer-speak. ‘Should you need anything else, please contact my office. While I am absent, you can refer to my under-secretary, Sergeant Meier. He will see to your day-to-day needs, and report to me directly. We expect you to keep regular and detailed notes of all care.’
‘I understand,’ I said. All too well. I would be reported on, scrutinised under a microscope, from now until the birth. Charged with bringing a live Aryan specimen into the world. The Aryan. The responsibility of life had never fazed me, in all my years working with mothers and babies, but this life … this poor, unsuspecting child might prove to be something different. No less, no more precious than any I’d seen, but with the potential to create unrelenting shock waves throughout Europe and the world. Throughout history. I almost craved to be back in the camps, among my own kind, where I could make a difference, save lives, instead of merely pandering to rich Nazi handmaidens. Then, hot with shame at even wishing such degradation on any living being, even myself, I reminded myself I’d been lucky to walk out.
The abrupt heels of Captain Stenz brought me back.
‘I will say good day then, Fräulein,’ he said, bowing his head briefly, then adding, ‘Um, Fräulein Braun, she knows nothing of your …’
‘History?’ I helped him.
‘Yes – history,’ he said with a mixture of embarrassment and relief, a slight curl to his lip.
He was one, I decided then, who had coveted his mother, climbed on her lap for bedtime hugs and kisses, been real, individual, accepted and returned love. I looked into his turquoise eyes and wondered what the Reich had done to him.
After the Captain left, I was alone for some time among the clutter of the housekeeper’s personal world, the room obviously doubling as her office and private sitting room, the obligatory Führer icon placed altar-like above an unlit fireplace. My stomach growled noisily, having soon become accustomed to food again, and I realised it was nearing lunchtime. I waited, since no one had issued any other instruction, and I realised how quickly I had fallen into a servile role. In the camp, it had become second nature to obey the guards as the basic rule of survival, but then to find methods of defiance in between our ‘yes, sir; no, sir’ reactions. We, none of us, ever thought of ourselves as second-class citizens, merely captives of the weapons wielded against us. Each and every day it was a fight to remind ourselves of it, but we saw it as vital, a way to avoid sinking into the mire.
Eventually, Frau Grunders entered, bringing a tray of bread, cheese and meats with her, a small glass of beer on the side. I hadn’t seen or tasted ale in over two years, and the rays of midday light created a globe of nectar in her hands. I could hardly concentrate for wanting my lips to touch the chalice and breathe in the heady hops. I had never been a connoisseur of beer, but my father would have a glass at night while listening to the wireless, and he’d let me have a sip every evening as a child, to make me ‘grow big and strong’. He was that smell, was in that glass, ready and waiting.
The housekeeper crackled as she moved, irritation sparking from her thin limbs and her crown of plaited hair as she put the tray to one side. Her mouse-like features set in a wrinkle before she spoke.
‘You will reside in one of the small annexes next to the main house,’ she began, indicating I was neither servant nor equal. ‘Unless Fräulein Braun requests that you be nearer, in which case we can arrange a cot in her room. Your meals will be in the servants’ dining room, unless Fräulein Braun wishes you to eat with her. If you need anything else, please come to me.’
I was unperturbed by her attempt at ranking; servant or not, it was about staying alive, and maintaining my own personal measure of dignity. Still, I understood that for Frau Grunders, her own self-respect lay in creating order in this strange little planet on the crest of the world, a tidy top to the chaos. With one beady eye on that beer glass, I had no reaction except a ‘Thank you,’ and she turned to leave.
‘Fräulein Braun will see you for tea at three o’clock in the drawing room,’ she said on parting. The beer was the nectar it promised to be, sweet and bitter in unison, and I choked pitifully on the third mouthful, partly through greed, but largely because I couldn’t stop the tears cascading down my cheeks, or fighting their way noisily up and through my throat.
In the camp, I had resisted dwelling on the horrors my family might be facing: whether my father’s asthma was slowly killing him; whether my mother’s arthritis had become crippling in the cold; if Franz had been shot as he stood, for that flash of dissidence his hot temper was capable of; if Ilse’s innocence was making her a target for the hungry guards. Now, amid the quiet, the comfort, the relative normality of where I sat, it cascaded from me, sobbing for the life that I, and the world, would never have again.
I felt dry as I forced down some of the bread and cheese, still not cured of camp conditioning that dictated where there was food, it must be eaten, right then and there. I gazed longingly at Frau Grunders’ bookshelves for a time, unable to move with a stretched belly and a wave of overwhelming fatigue. I yearned to finger the pages of some other world, a historical drama perhaps, to take me out of where I was. But the next thing I knew there was a gentle knocking on the door, and I opened my eyes to a young maid in her full skirt and pinafore of red and green, telling me it was past two o’clock, and enquiring whether I wanted to go to my room before meeting Fräulein Braun.
We moved on the same level from Frau Grunders’ room, through a servants’ parlour, out of a side door and onto a short gravel incline, bringing