Simon Tolkien - Orders from Berlin

They walked on in silence and in only a few minutes came to the observation point with the extraordinary view across the Berchtesgaden valley towards the snow-capped mountains. Heydrich looked down at lakes and pine forests and green pastures and remembered the last time he had been here with Hitler, when he’d felt he held the future in the palm of his hand. And yet his dream of eliminating Churchill had turned out to be a fantasy, an intoxication of the giddy mountain air. Instead Heydrich thought now of the Roman emperor Tiberius, who had taken such pleasure in pushing unsuspecting victims off the steps leading down from his high palace at Capri and watching them break to pieces on the rocks below. Heydrich wondered whether he was about to suffer a similar fate. Was Hitler watching him from some hidden vantage point in the trees, waiting to see the soldiers manhandle him over to the railings and throw him off the precipice? Would he cry out as he fell that unimaginable distance to his death?

Heydrich trembled, but nothing happened. He walked on through the woods, turned the corner, and caught sight of the round white wall and turreted roof of the teahouse. And coming through the open door, Heydrich could hear music floating towards him on the cold autumn air. He recognized it almost immediately: Furtwangler’s recording of Siegfried’s funeral march from Wagner’s Gotterdammerung, Twilight of the Gods . It was Heydrich’s favourite movement in the Ring cycle . As always when he heard it, he felt the music transcend Siegfried’s individual death and look forward to a heroic human world purged of false gods; an Aryan paradise. He felt a surge of hope as he mounted the steps, flanked by the bodyguards, and went inside.

A manservant was standing motionless against the far wall, but otherwise Hitler was alone. He was sitting in the centre of a sofa upholstered with a floral pattern, with his head resting against the back and his eyes closed. He looked up when Heydrich came in, smiled, and with a gesture signalled to the servant to stop the gramophone.

‘Welcome, Reinhard,’ he said, looking hard at Heydrich as he sat in the chair opposite. ‘You see, I have not forgotten. I promised to bring you to my teahouse when you were last at the Berghof and I am true to my word.’

Heydrich didn’t know what to say. He remembered Hitler’s promise, but the invitation had been to discuss the plan to assassinate Churchill. He wondered whether the Fuhrer was making fun of him.

‘I am sorry,’ he began tentatively. ‘I have heard nothing from our agent in London …’

But Hitler forestalled him, holding up his hand. ‘It doesn’t matter, because Churchill doesn’t matter,’ he declared, sitting up straight as if to emphasize that he was stating a fact, not an opinion. ‘The fool can rattle his rusty sabre all he wants, but he cannot do us any harm. The British are broken and alone and defeated, and behind all his speechifying Churchill knows it. Let us leave them to Goering’s bombs. Sooner or later they will have to come to terms. We have other, more important things to think about, you and I. Do you remember what I told you before about our destiny?’

‘That we must go east to find Lebensraum ?’

‘Yes, and soon — before it is too late, before Stalin is ready for us.’

Heydrich nodded. He looked into the Fuhrer’s steel blue eyes and felt the same inspiration he’d experienced outside when he heard the music coming towards him through the pine trees. With Hitler’s leadership, anything was possible.

‘Well, the time has almost come,’ Hitler went on. ‘We will take the land we need to build the new Reich, and you will make it clean and fit to use. That will be your task, and it is one to which you are uniquely suited. You will do all that is necessary, and you will eliminate anyone who stands in your way. You will brew them a devil’s drink. Do you understand me, Reinhard? A devil’s drink?’

‘Yes,’ said Heydrich, keeping his eyes fixed on the Fuhrer’s. ‘Yes, I do.’

‘Good, I am glad to hear it. And now let us have some tea,’ said Hitler, beckoning to his manservant. He smiled, revealing his teeth in a wolflike grin.