A Season of Secrets

by Margaret Pemberton

  ‘And the coronation?’ Olivia’s eyes glowed. ‘Wasn’t it wonderful? I was in the Abbey with Papa, and I kept having to pinch myself to make sure I was awake and not dreaming. Even now I find it hard to believe that Bertie’s now King, and that Edward is the Duke of Windsor and doesn’t even live in England any more.’

  Rozalind’s amusement was vast. ‘But you were heartbroken at the thought of Edward giving up his throne for love of Wallis. When did the sea-change take place?’

  There was a giggle in Olivia’s voice. ‘When I realized that if Bertie was King, then my friend, Elizabeth, would be Queen.’

  Dieter finished off his brandy and, making no attempt to refill his glass, said, ‘Thea still being in Spain when Edward married Wallis must have been as big a blow to you professionally as when she wasn’t around at the time of the abdication.’

  ‘Oh, bigger,’ Roz said with deep feeling. ‘Far bigger. If Thea had been around when the wedding at Candé took place, she would most certainly have been one of the handful of guests who risked the Palace’s displeasure by attending it – and just as certainly she would have suggested to Edward that I take the wedding photographs. If I had, it would have been the most spectacular photographic coup of my career.’

  ‘I might be able to put another coup your way, Roz. Perhaps not quite so historic, but a coup nevertheless.’ Dieter put his now-empty brandy balloon down on the small table next to his armchair and rose to his feet.

  He crossed to the fireplace and leaned against the corner of it, his arms folded, his head down, as if debating whether or not to continue with what he’d begun to say.

  Olivia, too, was suddenly tense, her hands clasped tightly in her lap.

  ‘What is it?’ Roz asked, intrigued. ‘What’s bugging you both?’

  ‘Hitler is what is bugging us both,’ Dieter said tautly. ‘Things have become even grimmer in Germany than they were the last time you were here. The Security Police take the law into their own hands without going through the courts. Anyone can be arrested for nearly anything at all. And there are informers on every street and in every block of flats. Informing on people has become a way of repaying old grudges. As for the poor benighted Jews . . . There are so many laws now prohibiting their movements and personal freedoms that it’s virtually impossible for them to breathe without being marched off to a camp.’

  ‘A forced-labour camp?’

  ‘We don’t have any of those now,’ said Olivia quietly. ‘And there are no more detention camps. Everything has been centralized into larger camps, called concentration camps.’

  ‘And there are four of them.’ A lock of pale-blond hair fell low over Dieter’s forehead. ‘Dachau, north-west of Munich. Buchenwald, near Weimar. Lichtenburg – which is solely for female prisoners – in Saxony. And Sachsenhausen, on the outskirts of Berlin.’

  Roz, vastly relieved at hearing Dieter speak in a way that was no longer admiring of what was going on in Germany, said drily, ‘So you’re no longer a fan, Dieter?’

  ‘Of the Nazi creed and the Führer? No, I’m not. In the beginning I thought Hitler was the best thing that had happened to Germany in a long time. You have to remember the state Germany was in when he began his rise to power, Roz. The country was in such a mess, and in two, three, years all the things that had made it a mess were there no longer. There were no more communist agitators; no more street fighting. There was no more unemployment – even Britain and America were envious of that. There was no more inflation. We began to feel proud of ourselves as Germans once again, after all the indignities of Versailles. We even dared to begin feeling moderately prosperous again. I never liked everything about Hitler’s regime, but for a time it seemed a great improvement on what had gone before, and Hitler spoke of bringing the Kaiser back from Holland – of restoring the monarchy.’

  ‘And now?’ Roz asked.

  ‘And now?’ Dieter opened his arms in a gesture of despair. ‘Now I know Hitler never had the slightest intention of restoring the monarchy. It was simply part of his plan to be everything to everybody, until he had sufficient power not to have to please those he didn’t want to please. And we Germans, God help us, gave him that power. So much power that we are now living in a country where no one dares publicly express any criticism of him; where even making fun of him can end in the perpetrator facing a death-sentence. Telephones are tapped. The mail is no longer sacrosanct. For the slightest infringement of any one of the scores of new laws constantly being brought into being, all citizens – Aryan as well as Jewish – face arrest and imprisonment without the benefit of a trial.’

  ‘But for the Jews it’s much worse.’ It was a flat statement of fact that Roz wanted to hear Dieter admit.

  He flushed. ‘Yes, for the Jews it’s much worse. In the beginning I thought the Jew-baiting and Jew-hating were a craziness that would come to an end when Hitler gained control of the hooligan elements amongst his followers. Only slowly did I realize that he was always in control of them; that Jew-hating wasn’t an aberration, but a policy.’

  For a long moment the room was silent, and then Roz said, ‘What will you do? You’re in the Foreign Office. You must be aware, as the British government is, that despite all his avowals to the contrary, Hitler is intent on war. What are you, and anyone who thinks like you, going to do when that time arrives?’

  It was a rhetorical question. She was certain that neither he nor anyone else could do anything.

  Dieter crossed the room, checked that the door was firmly closed and then said, ‘Because there is no freedom of speech or action in Germany now, only the army has any power – and there are certain high-ranking figures in the army who feel the same way I do, and the same way many other high-ranking Foreign Office officials feel.’

  Roz felt her heart almost cease to beat. ‘You’re part of a secret opposition group?’

  He nodded.

  She knew better than to ask for any more details. The less she knew, the safer it would be for both of them – and for Olivia. Instead she said, ‘Can I tell Gilbert?’

  ‘Yes. The British government needs to know – and Gilbert will know how much to say, and what not to say.’

  ‘I’m assuming that because of her liaisons with men like Göring and Goebbels, Violet knows nothing about this?’

  ‘God, no!’

  The mere suggestion had robbed Dieter’s face of blood and, judging that it was time the subject was changed, Roz said, ‘When you started this conversation, Dieter, you began it by saying that you could put a photographic coup my way. How does that connect to anything that’s just been said?’

  ‘The Führer likes to present the image of being so totally committed to Germany that romantic relationships never intrude upon his time. It isn’t strictly true, though the term “romantic” may be a little excessive.’

  Olivia said, speaking Violet’s name for the first time that evening, ‘Violet met Hitler not long after she first came to Berlin. She said he was a neuter – and, when it comes to masculine sexuality, if anyone’s instincts can be trusted, Violet’s can.’

  She was looking at Dieter as she spoke and he flushed, saying, ‘Rumour has it that several years ago Hitler was inordinately fond of his half-niece, Geli Raubal.’

  ‘Geli shot herself,’ Olivia said, in a tone indicating that in such a situation any woman in her right mind would have done the same thing.

  ‘And now?’ Roz asked, intrigued.

  ‘And now, for more than six years, a young woman named Eva Braun has been Hitler’s companion, though he doesn’t publicly acknowledge her as such. She lives with him at the Berghof, his private residence at Berchtesgaden, on the Austrian frontier, though when he entertains there she only rarely makes an appearance. When he comes back from Berchtesgaden to Berlin in two days’ time for the mammoth rally at the Field of May, he’s bringing Eva with him – but she won’t be one of the million or so people in the Olympic Stadium. She will be out of sight, as usual; and, because Olivia is one of the few
people Eva has met socially, and because she and Eva got on so well together, she’s asked if Olivia will keep her company that evening in her suite at the Adlon Hotel.’

  ‘And you’re suggesting that I go along with my camera?’

  ‘I’m suggesting that if you are in the hotel at the same time, and if Olivia mentions this fact to Eva, Eva is certainly going to want to meet you.’

  Roz hesitated. ‘I came here to take photographs of Hitler and Mussolini together on the same platform. Why should I forgo photographs that my agency will certainly place for photographs of a young woman that no one in America or Britain has heard of?’

  Dieter smoothed his hair back, away from his forehead. ‘Because one day Hitler will marry her – and when he does, photographs taken by you, when the bride was totally unknown to the world, will be photographs that are unique. There’s only one proviso. Even if the press should show an interest, the photographs can’t be published now. Hitler’s fury would be so great that you would never be allowed into the country again. And, for her part in it, Olivia would most likely find herself in Lichtenburg.’

  Roz hesitated, but she didn’t hesitate for long. She had always trusted her instincts and was going to trust them now. She was going to forgo the shots of Hitler with Mussolini for photographs of Eva, not because she felt any certainty about such photographs one day being of any value, but because of curiosity.

  She wanted to meet the woman who, for several years, had been – and still was – Adolf Hitler’s mistress.

  She wanted to know what kind of a woman Eva Braun was.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  APRIL 1938

  It was early evening as Thea walked down La Rambla, Barcelona’s main thoroughfare. She had just finished a long shift at one of the local clinics and was en route to the small room she rented above a tobacconist’s. Her thoughts were on Hal, who was a hundred miles or so further down the coast, where Franco’s troops had succeeded in driving a wedge through what had once been Republican-held territory. All the reports reaching Barcelona indicated that the fighting had been desperate, and Thea, who knew Hal would have been in the thick of it, still had no news of him.

  She came to a halt in the middle of the broad pavement, not wanting to reach her room, where she would only have grim thoughts for company. La Rambla was lined with cafes and she sat down at the first outdoor table she came to.

  ‘Una cerveza, por favor,’ she said when a waiter came up to her.

  Her grey trousers and grey blouse – the blouse sporting a Red Cross badge on one shoulder – ensured that she was as much a part of the street scene as everyone else. Once, fashionable clothes were de rigueur in the La Rambla cafes. Now people who possessed fashionable clothes no longer chose to wear them. Barcelona had become a city of workers. The streets were a sea of proudly worn militia uniforms and blue overalls. And there were other, very obvious signs of the revolution. Nearly all private cars had been commandeered and people got around the city by tram and taxi. The words ‘Señor’ and ‘Señorita’ were no longer uttered – everyone called everyone else ‘Comrade’. Service workers, such as her waiter, were no longer deferential, for everyone was equal. Tipping was forbidden by law.

  It was the kind of classlessness of which Thea had always dreamed. Nothing else, though, was as either she or Hal had imagined it would be. Within Republican ranks there was unity between members of the International Brigades, no matter what country they came from, but that was as far as the unity went. Elsewhere in Republican ranks communists, Marxists and anarchists were as deeply divided between themselves as they were from the Nationalists. The sense of solidarity that she and Hal had believed they would find was totally lacking. Marxists said the anarchists were undisciplined and would not obey orders. Stalinists refused to supply arms received from Russia to any units but their own. Republican government forces were at loggerheads with voluntary militia units. Orders were given, countermanded and then given again. Chaos and confusion reigned.

  It was a nightmare that both she and Hal fervently hoped would be resolved when Franco and fascism were finally defeated. At the moment, though, it was Franco and his Nationalists who looked to be winning the war.

  She sipped her beer, staring at a wall on the other side of the wide boulevard, on which a giant hammer and sickle had been painted. By driving a wedge between Republican forces on the coast, General Franco had successfully split Republican Spain in two. There were rumours that the government was trying to sue for peace; that Franco was now turning his attention once more to Madrid and that the Republican cause was lost. There were further rumours that the International Brigades were about to be recalled, in the hope that this would encourage the Italians and Germans fighting for the Nationalists to withdraw also.

  Thea’s hand tightened around her glass. Many men from Barcelona militias who had fought to try and stop the Nationalist push to the coast had managed to somehow make their way back to the city – but so far not Hal. As she absolutely refused to consider him either dead or captured, where was he? Was he now fighting somewhere else? Or was he too injured to make the attempt to return to Barcelona, and was he lying low with fellow Republicans until fit enough to make what would, she knew, be a difficult and dangerous journey through Nationalist-held country?

  No answer came to her and, heavy-hearted, she rose to her feet. All she could do was remain where Hal could find her, but inaction had always been difficult for Thea, and never more difficult than it was now.

  The evening was getting into its stride and the pavement cafes were packed with workers relaxing after a long day. The noise level was high, with music from cafe radios vying with loudspeakers bellowing revolutionary songs. A gale of laughter came from the table she was walking past and, not for the first time, Thea marvelled at the Barcelonians’ ability not to be crushed by the horrors hurled at them.

  Mussolini was Franco’s ally, and only a month ago Italian planes had conducted a non-stop three-day bombing raid on the city. There had been no attempt to single out military targets. Bombs had been dropped indiscriminately. Whole swathes of working-class areas had been decimated; schools had been hit. The images of the small children she had ferried, screaming and bleeding, between the schools and the city’s hospitals would, she knew, stay with her for as long as she lived.

  She turned off into another busy street, wondering whether to have some fresh sardines for her evening meal or make an onion-and-tomato omelette instead. Of necessity she lived cheaply. It didn’t trouble her. In comparison to the thousands made homeless and destitute by the war, she knew she lived well.

  She bit her lip hard, wondering what Hal would be eating that evening; where he would be eating. Far worse, she wondered if he would eating. The light had smoked to a spangled blue dusk. On a nearby balcony, laundry hung limply. From somewhere close at hand a baby cried.

  A tram rattled down the centre of the dusty street. Still deep in thoughts of Hal, she didn’t look towards it, barely registered it.

  There came an ear-splitting whistle.

  It was a whistle that, in Outhwaite, had called the cows in to be milked and the pigs to be fed. In London it had brought taxis to a screeching kerbside halt.

  Her heart slammed so hard in her chest that she thought it was going to stop. Her eyes flew in the direction the whistle had come from. The tram was now twenty yards or so past her and was travelling further away with every second. He was standing on its platform, a wide grin on a face that was bearded and as grimy as when he’d been tending the pigs and cows. His militia uniform was filthy and sweat-stained. His hair had grown so long that his thick tangle of curls was anchored at the nape of his neck by a red neckerchief that had originally been around his throat. A rifle was slung over one shoulder. There were no bandages in sight. No slings. No crutches.

  Careless of how fast the tram was moving, he leapt from it.

  With blazing joy on her face, she broke into a sprint, dodging around stray dogs and workers enjoying a
n early evening stroll, hurtling into his arms.

  ‘Hal! Hal! I’ve been worried out of my mind!’

  She didn’t get a chance to say any more. His lips came down hard and hot on hers in a fierce, deep kiss. Her arms were as tightly round him as a drowning man’s to a lifebelt. She never wanted to let him go. Since they had been in Spain every separation had been an agony, but this last one had been by far the worst. As their passionate embrace went on and on, no one stared at them. In a world where lovers were separated and reunited – often only to be separated again, and for good – such scenes were commonplace.

  When finally he raised his head from hers, Hal said thickly, ‘I need a bath and food, Thea love.’

  As she looked up into his face she saw how the face-splitting grin that he had shot her from the tram had hidden how truly exhausted he was.

  ‘Sardines on toast, or an onion-and-tomato omelette?’ she asked, wishing she’d made a stew the previous evening; wishing she’d bought fresh bread that morning.

  ‘Both,’ he said as, arms around each other’s waists, they turned off the street into the warren of smaller streets that made up the working-class area where, when Hal was in the city, the two of them lived together and where, when he wasn’t in the city, Thea lived alone.

  It was an area that had suffered badly in the March bombing and, with so many houses now uninhabitable, what had once been a bustling area was now near-deserted. The local church still stood, but as the Catholic Church was fiercely on the side of the Nationalists, it no longer had a congregation. With all priests being viewed as the enemy, it was rare in Barcelona to see one now, but a little way in front of them an elderly priest was heading towards the church, a shopping bag in either hand.