Five Past Midnight - James Thayer [107]
"It is just as well you did notjoin the Party, Inspector. Asking what refreshment is being served is not the proper protocol, and indicates a dangerous independence."
Was Hitler making ajoke? Humor was a characteristic Dietrich had never before associated with the Reich's leader. And it was ghastly.
Hitler returned the teapot to the stand, grabbed his left hand in his right to hold it close to his body then with a slight groan sat in a leather chair behind a cluttered desk. Near a lamp with a green glass shade was Schopenhauer's The World as Will and Representation. Hitler's eyes found Dietrich.
Found him with the force of a blow. Despite Hitler's appearance of age and infirmity, the eyes were blue, a milky blue, penetrating, yet at the same time warm and guileless. So powerful was the gaze that it was a presence entirely apart from the decrepit, ailing man sitting across from Dietrich. The detective felt pushed back into the chair by the eyes, and laid bare.
"You never joined the Party, Inspector." Hitler's right leg trembled so violently that his boot danced on the rug. "You would have done better at the Berlin police had you been one of us, had been one of the Old Fighters."
"Yes, sir." Was that all Dietrich could say? Didn't Hitler's comment deserve some caustic retort, an observation that the Old Fighters had caused Berlin to be plowed up and turned over? The words would not come. Something to do with Hitler's eyes.
"You noticed my leg." Hitler patted it with his good hand. "It shakes a little."
"Yes, sir."
"It's not from the bomb at my field headquarters, like everybody thinks. My doctor says I have a touch of the grippe."
Dietrich had never heard of a bomb at a headquarters.
"But I don't suppose I need to apologize for my health to a Berlin policeman."
"No, sir." Dietrich's face warmed with anger. At himself. Hitler was deliberately charming the detective, and it was working. Two decades resisting the National Socialists, and now to be enchanted in sixty seconds by their leader. Dietrich fought it, and stared at the Iron Cross on Hitler's coat rather than into the eyes.
"You have been assigned to search for the American killer." Hitler spoke with his Lower Bavaria accent.
"Yes, sir."
"You missed him earlier this evening."
"I didn't miss him. That was the Gestapo. Apparently they are running an operation entirely apart from my own. And, if I may say, they are interfering with mine."
"It's apple-peel tea, by the way," Hitler said. "You should never drink real tea or coffee. They'll kill you."
"I'll keep that in mind," Dietrich cleared his throat. "I wasn't informed that the American had been spotted again walking with the woman, and had been seen entering that physician's office. The information went to the Gestapo, instead of to me."
"Well, they can be a bit aggressive."
Dietrich again brought his gaze up to Hitler's face. Was this more humor? Dietrich quickly surveyed the small room. It was spartan. Little more than the desk and sofa and dresser and bed. A photograph of Hitler's mother was on the desk, and two telephones.
"You expected something more grand," Hitler said, lifting a hand to indicate the room.
"I heard a rumor you believed in the occult, sir." Had Dietrich ever said anything more foolish? "I expected Tarot cards and an astrology chart." He smiled weakly.
"I allow rumors to spread if they are useful. If my enemies think the phases of the moon affect my decisions, all the better."
"May I ask why I was summoned here, sir?"
"Goring sees things as an officer. But I see them as an enlisted man." Hitler brought up a finger, indicating the silver service. "I forgot my tea. Would you mind?"
Dietrich rose quickly, poured tea into a cup, and handed it to the leader.
"It's a little difficult for me to move about, with the grippe and all." Hitler sipped the drink, holding the silver cup under his nose for a long moment. "As I say, I see things as an enlisted man."
"Sir?"
"Goring and many of the others want me to flee Berlin. I could never do that."
"Because enlisted men expect their