Armageddon_ A Novel of Berlin - Leon Uris [180]
“Do you know what happened to us at Stalingrad?”
“A strategic blunder.”
“Do you know what happened to Berlin in the last hundred days?”
“It won’t happen again.”
“Gerd! Hilde and mother and I were violated by Russian soldiers. We have all had enough.”
Gerd’s lips narrowed. “That is why there will be a next time. Only we will choose better allies than those sniveling Italian bastards. The Amis will be on our side. They are strong but they are also naive. We will control the alliance.”
“Gerd! Germans have to change their ways!”
“How, Erna? Do you believe a doddering old fool like Uncle Ulrich can lead the German people? Do you believe the German people will be kept down? We have energy and brains. We are not nigger slaves or wailing Jews.” He laughed with irony. “Even this destruction will have its compensations. Homes and factories have to be built and we need machinery and guns. This will bring Germany jobs and prosperity. Total destruction means total reconstruction.”
“For God’s sake! Don’t you know about Auschwitz?”
“Of course. In the prison camp the Amis held classes called reorientation to democracy. We were told at great length about our wicked ways. It was a joke among the prisoners.”
“You feel no shame?”
“Why should I? What did I do? Besides, let us not pretend we suddenly love the Jews because we lost the war. I think it’s a pity we didn’t kill all of them.”
Ernestine jumped off the boulder. Gerd reached for her. She stiffened at his touch. “Dietrich Rascher always told me you took things too seriously.”
Hilde was getting more nervous around Elke Handfest. Elke’s hand was constantly touching her, squeezing her leg, brushing her bosom. One night she asked Fritz Stumpf not to give her any more dates with Elke.
But she was no longer in a position to make demands. Her day as queen bee was over. Berlin swarmed with beehives and queen bees. Women came in too many varieties and men were too fickle. It was an echo of the orgy running wild all over Germany.
Hilde began to suspect that Fritz Stumpf was deliberately withholding dates from her. Evening after evening now she sat alone in a booth at the Paris Cabaret. She looked bitterly at the new girls, listened to the same tired songs, heard the same complaints. Her dates were with lower-ranking officers and enlisted men, fewer Amis, more Russians. She became fearful that she was losing her beauty. She needed a drink to keep her composure.
When a good date came it always was double with Elke. That made her nervous and she needed a few drinks before leaving the Cabaret.
Hilde toyed with the idea of leaving the Paris. But she knew that all similar places with good connections cooperated with each other. And what if she went out on her own and contracted gonorrhea again. Only someone like Stumpf would be able to supply penicillin.
Trying to leave could bring the risk of blackmail against Uncle Ulrich, or worse, physical harm to herself. Fritz Stumpf had a few more around like the ex-pug, Hippold. There was talk that Hippold had a specialty of using a knife to scar a girl’s face and body. The thought of mutilation of her beautiful body began to bring her to nightmares like Ernestine used to have. In these dreams glass cut her and animals’ teeth ripped her.
She knew now about the velvet room in Stumpf s apartment. The war wound had left him impotent. His pleasure was watching women with each other in the velvet room while a trio played Bach and an ancient actor read the poetry of Schiller and Heine. She cringed with fear now, as Stumpf would often summon a half-dozen girls without dates to come to his apartment.
Gerd’s homecoming set off problems. She remembered Ernestine’s warnings that she was killing a chance for a normal life with a German boy. Chances were slipping that an Ami would have her.
In the days after Gerd’s arrival Hilde began drinking heavily. Sometimes her date found her angry and other times found her remorseful and complaining about her terrible situation. She had started along the path that Elke had warned her against in the very beginning.