by Michael Dean
This was it. The Jewish traders’ livelihoods, if not their lives, depended on Hirschfeld winning this: ‘Do you know how much we make in licence-fees from Jewish traders, meneer van Tonningen?’
Silence.
‘Well, do you?’
‘No,’ van Tonningen ground out
‘300,000 guilders per year. So we would lose that. And you can double that loss, because if we withdrew trading licences from the Jews, they would become liable to unemployment benefit.’
Hirschfeld stared at van Tonningen, who shot him a venomous look, clenching his fists. But there was no reply. The Secretary General let out a barely discernible sigh. He had just saved the two Jewish markets.
‘So this is what we do, as a first step to Aryanization,’ Hirschfeld said, breezily. ‘We declare all old licences invalid. We print new licences. As they are collected, we form two queues, a separate one for the Jews. Jews get the new licence marked with a J. Simple. Two officials could do it in a day.’
‘What stops the Jews joining the Aryan queue?’ Rauter asked.
Hirschfeld hesitated. Rauter had hit the weak point of his plan. He did not want to tell the Obergruppenführer this, but there was now no alternative: ‘The Public Records Office has details on everybody in Amsterdam. It includes their religion. The officials can check on the list.’ At least it would be Dutch officials, he would make sure of that. The Nazis could still be kept away from the information – with any luck.
‘We could put a J on the Jews’ identity card at the same time,’ van Tonningen said.
‘Too laborious,’ Hirschfeld rejoined, with a touch of well-prepared indignation. ‘It would take hours. It would also increase resentment of the authorities among the non-Jewish population, which we are trying to avoid.’
‘That’s ridiculous, Hirschfeld! ’ Van Tonningen shouted. He turned to Rauter. ‘Jewish trading licences are fine. But Jewish identity cards increase resentment. Hirschfeld’s just playing for time, trying to shield his Jew friends.’
Hirschfeld couldn’t have put it better himself. He turned in his seat, ostentatiously addressing Rauter only. ‘We have a proverb, here in the Netherlands, Herr Rauter. “Easy does it.” Let’s go with the grain, eh? We’ll issue the new trading licences first.
We’ll discuss new identity cards later. Step by step.’ Delay by delay.
Rauter gave him a long, shrewd look. Hirschfeld met his gaze. There was a rapping at the door. A Sipo/SD officer came in. ‘Excuse me, Herr Obergruppenführer, may I speak with you in private?’
Rauter shook his head. ‘No. Here. What is it?’
‘I regret to report, there has been a cowardly attack on an NSB group in uniform. On the edge of the Jews’ area. Several NSB have been hurt. But there is worse news, Herr Obergruppenführer. Some of our Orpos intervened. It is my sad duty to inform you that one of them has been killed.’
‘What? Who is responsible?’ Rauter ground out.
‘A gang of Jewish rabble, Herr Obergruppenführer.’
‘That’s intolerable!’ shouted Rost van Tonningen, his tiny features contorting.
‘The idiots!’ Hirschfeld shouted, nearly as loudly. All the tension from the meeting exploded out of him. He was shaking with anger.
‘Jews?’ Rauter said. ‘Jews killing a German policeman? Is that possible?‘
‘I’m afraid so, Herr Obergruppenführer.’
‘I shall deal with this.’ Rauter stood and put his cap on, pulling the peak straight, with deliberation. ‘Conclusion of the meeting: We re-licence all the market traders, giving the Jews licences marked with a J. Identity cards can wait. Further measures against the Jews will be announced shortly, as soon as I have consulted my superiors.’
Rauter stalked out of the room.
Rost van Tonningen glared at Hirschfeld. ‘ I know what you’re doing, Hirschfeld. I see through you!’ He wagged a finger at the Secretary General. ‘Eventually Rauter will have no further use for you. You mark my words. You’ll be on a one-way train out of here with the rest of the Hebrews.’ Van Tonningen tapped his nose. ‘Maxie!’
4
The black Mercedes limousine purred past Paderborn and pulled off the Autobahn. The SS driver turned the car south-west towards Büren. He switched the headlights on; two butter-yellow cones of light pushed into the dusk ahead of them.
Here, the landscape of the Alma Valley flattened. The crops were not only visible but audible, as they rattled and rustled in the stiff late evening breeze. The sound formed a permanent back drop – like wireless interference – to the non-stop chatter of Rost van Tonningen.
The NSBer habitually spoke as if addressing a meeting, even when speaking to only one person, in this case Obergruppenführer Hanns Albin Rauter, who was next to him on the back seat. Rauter regretted the necessity of bringing him along to meet Himmler. But Himmler himself had insisted on it.
The Obergruppenführer looked out the window, enjoying the last of the scenery before the gloom enveloped it. The area reminded him of Austria, of his native Carinthia. The woods made him think of the woodcraft skills his father, the forester, had taught him as a boy. Hanns Albin Rauter lovingly caressed his scar – his past.
Being a country boy had done him no harm at all with Himmler. And neither had the Munich connection – he had been sent to Munich in 1933 to build up the Fighting Group of German Austrians in the Reich. He had met Himmler then; visited his home and the chicken farm. Since then he had been Himmler’s man. Himmler had arranged his promotion to Brigadeführer SS, at the outbreak of war. Himmler had him sent to Holland at the same time as Seyss-Inquart, and made sure he had more power – as well as a higher SS rank - than the puppet Reichskommissar.
Van Tonningen was droning on. The subject of his monologue, unvarying since they had left Amsterdam, was Hans-Max Hirschfeld. For all his supposed intellectual brilliance, in Rauter’s view, van Tonningen was as rigid mentally as he was physically – sitting bolt upright, no part of his back touching the car’s leather seat.
‘I intend to raise the matter of Hirschfeld with Reichsführer-SS Himmler,’ van Tonningen was saying, for the fourth or fifth time.
Rauter nodded. ‘Go ahead.’
His tone implied a confidence he did not feel. Himmler was unpredictable, especially on race issues. If van Tonningen succeeded in getting rid of Hirschfeld, much of the resultant instability in Holland would land on him. He flicked a speck of dust from the front of his SD uniform, imagining the speck was Rost van Tonningen.
*
Passing through the Niederhagen Forest, they glimpsed the barbed wire and low brick buildings of the KZ. This particular concentration camp existed solely to provide slave labour to rebuild their destination, Wewelsburg Castle, to Himmler’s specifications. Rauter had heard there were no Jews at this particular camp; they were considered too lowly for the elevated work of building Himmler’s headquarters of the Aryan people. Most of the inmates were Jehovah’s Witnesses, transferred from KZ Sachsenhausen.
Suddenly, dramatically, high on a wooded hill, Wewelsburg Castle presented the long base of its triangular shape to the occupants of the approaching limousine. Van Tonningen, craning forward to peer out the driver’s side-window, like a schoolboy, glimpsed a solid round tower at one corner and a slimmer tower, topped by a cupola, at the other. He knew the castle was seventeenth century - he had read up on it. He understood and approved of the Nazi mission to re-align the past to fit their vision of the present. Indeed, he wished to be a part of this process; he wanted Holland to be a part of it.
Passing the guard-post, the car rolled to a halt in a cobbled courtyard. To Rauter’s barely concealed pleasure, Walther Schellenberg emerged from a stone archway and strode across to them, leaving two baggage-flunkeys struggling to keep up. He had left a heavy oak iron-studded door open behind him. Rauter uncoiled his long body and legs from the car, into the arc of light coming from the doorway. As they greeted each other, Rauter’s eyes were drawn to Schellenberg’s scar - bizarrely,
it ran across his chin in exactly the same place as Rauter’s own.
Schellenberg’s Heil Hitler greeting was cut short by a hacking cough. He had an SS-Totenkopf cap-badge, though Rauter knew him as a skilled and subtle Intelligence Officer, specialising in foreign affairs. Heading the SS troops at Wewelsburg’s attached KZ was just a sideline. Schellenberg mastered his coughing fit. His breath was just visible in the cold evening air.
As Rost van Tonningen, ignored so far, came round the side of the car, Schellenberg gave him a quick appraising glance, head-to-foot, so obvious it was almost insolent. He was placing him on axes of racial purity and significance - and it looked like it.
Van Tonningen stared back, his face a mix of Dutch intellectual arrogance and awe at his surroundings. Unlike Rauter, he had no idea who Schellenberg was, and was underestimating him because he was supervising the transfer of the baggage from the car boot to the castle. Rauter noticed van Tonningen’s attitude to Schellenberg, and hoped it would not be the last mistake the NSBer made during their stay.
After the briefest of periods to unpack and refresh themselves, Schellenberg appeared again, to lead them to the north wing of the castle for dinner. The panelled dining-room was one of the few parts of Wewelsburg which looked finished. The dining-chairs had high backs made of pigskin. The oak table had places laid for twelve. The guests were told that it was always laid for twelve, after the twelve knights of the Arthurian Round table, even when, as now, fewer than twelve were eating.
Himmler appeared while the guests were still standing, waiting to be told where to sit:
‘Heil Hitler, die Herrschaften! Herzlich Willkommen in Schloss Wewelsburg!’
There was a volley of heel-clicking; Hitler salutes punched the air.
‘Everything in order?’ Himmler peered at them. ‘Schellenberg has seen you well-settled, I trust?’
Schellenberg smiled.
‘Jawohl, Herr Reichsführer!’ said Rauter.
Van Tonningen, not trusting himself to speak, just nodded.
They all sat down. Himmler was flanked by Schellenberg, on his right, and Rauter on his left. Rost van Tonningen was next to Schellenberg.
A swarm of male waiters, all blonde, blue-eyed and good-looking, dressed in snow-white jackets, black trousers and white gloves, served a first course of watery vegetable soup. As they did so, Himmler explained the runic symbols on the oak shields hanging from the panelled walls.
The swastika itself was a runic symbol, Himmler informed them, nodding at the example on the shield opposite him. The rune in the next panel was the Wheel of the Sun. Others were the Rune of Sacrifice, the Rune of Life, with its bars pointing upward from the stem, the Rune of Death, with its bars at the base of the stem, pointing downward.
‘Beneath us, on the floor below,’ Himmler went on, ‘is a crypt, a realm of the dead. I will show it to you tomorrow, before you leave. There, the heads of my glorious dead SS officers are placed, to help us to communicate with the ancestors whose blood yet runs in our veins. I myself carry the blood of an ancient German King. His name was Heinrich, the same name as me. He defended Teutonic civilisation against the Slavic hordes. I am his reincarnation.’
This news was received in polite silence by the two guests.
‘Our proximity to our ancestors, here in this part of the world, helps us to imbibe their spirit,’ Himmler continued, spooning up soup with a vigorous elbowing motion.
Van Tonningen fought down the disappointment welling up inside him. He forced himself to feign interest in what he would normally have considered obscurantist tripe.
‘We are close to the site of the battle of the Teutoburg Forest, where our great Germanic ancestor, Hermann, defeated the Romans. And I have given much thought to how the SS Knightly Order being trained here, in this castle, can best drink from their holy blood and essence. And I believe … I believe I have found a way.’
The empty soup plates were being removed. Himmler was going through a vegetarian phase, so the next course was a Macaroni cheese, served with leeks.
‘And what way is that, Herr Reichsführer?’ prompted Rauter.
Schellenberg allowed himself a faint smile. It was interrupted by another spasm of chesty coughing. ‘Excuse me,’ he murmured. ‘My health is poor.’
Himmler ignored him. ‘Babies conceived in cemeteries will inherit the spirit of whoever is buried there,’ the Reichsführer-SS informed the company. ‘I have compiled a list of suitable cemeteries. Girls of pure blood from the BDM will be brought to my SS elite guards there, late at night, for breeding on the graves. This programme, together with the elimination of those of corrupted blood, especially the Jews, will, in time, usher in a new era peopled by the Teutonic heroes of the past, made flesh again.’
‘Bravo,’ said Schellenberg.
Himmler was nodding to himself, as coffee was served. Van Tonningen, used to Dutch coffee, grimaced at its grainy bitterness. But a subtle shift in Himmler’s manner warned him they were about to get down to business.
*
‘Outline the situation in the Low Countries, if you please,’ Himmler said, waving at Rauter, as if introducing him on stage. ‘We believe the Dutch are a cognate Aryan race,’ he added, generously, to van Tonningen, who nodded in acknowledgement.
Rauter took a deep breathe. ‘I shall speak about the general situation in the Netherlands, Herr Reichsführer,’ he said, ‘and then Herr van Tonningen will report on the atrocity which is the immediate cause of our visit to you, at this time.’
Schellenberg motioned to two of the waiters. ‘Obersturmbahnführer Sanne and Dr Brandt are needed,’ he murmured. ‘One moment, please,’ Schellenberg added to Rauter, who obediently paused.
The two officials had obviously been waiting nearby, as they arrived in the dining-room instantly and together. Sanne, Schellenberg’s deputy, was in SS uniform; Brandt, Himmler’s personal secretary, wore a black suit, with a wing-collared white shirt. Both were carrying a pile of bulky files. At Himmler’s nod, they sat at two of the laid places near the foot of the table.
‘As you know, Herr Reichsführer, we have three areas of priority,’ Rauter began. ‘The re-directing of Dutch industry to help our war economy, the transfer of Dutch labour to the Reich, and the expulsion of Holland’s Jews to the east. Until now, it has been thought that all three would be best achieved by engaging the co-operation, as far as possible, of the Dutch civilian population.’ Rauter looked at van Tonningen, who nodded support.
‘Of the three,’ Rauter continued. ‘The re-directing of Dutch industry to support the war effort is the most significant. We would greatly prefer to build warships in Dutch shipyards, both because of their productive capacities, which exceeds even what we have in Hamburg and Bremen, and for geographical reasons.’
‘And that is where Hirschfeld is so important,’ Himmler said.
Van Tonningen was so surprised at the mention of the hated name, here at the very epicentre of Aryanism, that he choked on his coffee.
‘Indeed,’ Rauter said.
‘Dr Brandt, the background, if you would be so kind,’ Himmler said.
Brandt opened a file, but did not refer to it. ‘Hirschfeld has been important to us since the earliest days of the incorporation of the Netherlands into the Reich,’ he began, as if quoting a well-known saying. ‘His liaison with Oberst Nagel had our troops included in the central distribution of petrol supplies, which was vital for the war effort, in the early days. He was also a key figure in countermanding General Winkelman’s instructions that no help was to be given to the German war effort.’
‘What!’ Van Tonningen said, louder than he intended. ‘Hirschfeld formally protested at the overriding of the League of Nations Guidelines for occupied countries. I was there when he did it.’
‘We know that,’ Schellenberg said.
‘We let him do it,’ Sanne put in, in a conciliatory manner, smiling at van Tonningen. ‘We knew that the General Instructions …’ he used the Dutch word, Aanwijzingen, �
�… were of great significance to the Dutch. We had to let them let off steam. And anyway, Hirschfeld is more use to us if he is not seen as completely our creature.’
Schellenberg took up the story. ‘What really mattered was his co-operation with the Rüstingsinspektion Niederlande – the so-called Armament Inspection Group, under Thomas von Schrötter. With Hirschfeld’s help, von Schrötter got Fokker, Aviolanda and De Schelde making components, aircraft and flying-boats as well as re-tooling for the production of U boats and cruisers in the docks. It would not have happened anywhere near so quickly without him.’
‘Hirschfeld’s own nephew is involved in sabotaging the construction of German warships as we speak,’ van Tonningen shouted, his tiny features tense with strain.
Schellenberg glanced at his assistant. The information was clearly new to both of them.
‘We got Hirschfeld to publicly condemn sabotage,’ Schellenberg said.
‘So what?’ van Tonningen shouted. ‘You do know Hirschfeld is a Jew?’ He forgot himself as far as to yell this at Himmler.
It was received with indulgent smiles round the table.
‘Your feelings are understandable, Herr van Tonningen,’ Himmler said. ‘But …’ he gave a flickering smile. ‘Hirschfeld is a useful Jew. And the usefulness is more important than the Jewishness. For now.’
Schellenberg was smiling broadly. ‘I tell you what,’ he said to van Tonningen. ‘I’ll play you a tape of Hirschfeld in action. That will cheer you up.’
Everyone except van Tonningen seemed to know what that meant. Everyone else was laughing, though Rauter’s laughter was forced.
Schellenberg took one of Sanne’s files and opened it. ‘Yes, here we are. In … when was it? … 1933, Hirschfeld was part of a Dutch trade delegation to the Reich. For his evening’s entertainment we took him to Salon Kitty. We have him on tape.’
