Harry Turtledove - In The Presence Of My Enemies

Hearing Stolle's name mentioned in the same breath as the Fuhrer 's was new since the failed Putsch. The Gauleiter 's status had risen as Buckliger's fell. The one was a hero, the other a victim. Even in the Reich, it turned out, there was such a thing as moral authority.

A map of Germany appeared in gray on the screen. Here and there, it was measled with green spots. There were also red spots, but far fewer of them. "Green shows pro-reform candidates with substantial leads in their districts," Witzleben said. "Red shows candidates of the other sort who are in the lead. If we look more closely at Berlin"-the map changed as he spoke-"we see that every district but one in the capital of the Reich supports reform. Rolf Stolle himself is being sent to the Reichstag by a margin of better than six to one over his foe, building contractor Engelbert Hackmann."

"Good," Susanna murmured. That wasn't a surprise, but it was a relief.

The map went back to coverage of the whole Reich. More of it had turned green. Some more had turned red, too, but not nearly so much. Then it shifted again, this time to a detailed look at the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. Most of that area was green, except for a few red patches in the former Sudetenland.

Horst Witzleben continued, "Along with electing delegates to the Reichstag, the people of the Protectorate are also voting on a nonbinding referendum concerning their relationship with the Reich. Latest returns show that seventy-seven percent favor the declaration of independence proclaimed by the Unity organization in the wake of the Putsch, while only twenty-three percent wish to continue as a Reichs protectorate-in effect, a province of the Reich. Most of the delegates elected are pledged to bring this issue to the attention of the new Reichstag, and to seek relief."

That was pretty dizzying, too. True, the referendum had no official weight, any more than the declaration had. But it wouldn't have been on the ballot if those things didn't count for something. And the Czechs had shown a lot of nerve in reminding the world they hadn't forgotten the freedom they'd known between the first two World Wars. How could a Reichstag chosen on the basis of self-determination ignore it once in office?

Maybe they'll say the Czechs are only Slavs, and too ignorant to know what they're talking about, Susanna thought cynically. But in that case, why give them the chance to speak their minds? Susanna had yet to hear anyone, no matter how radical a reformer, speak up for letting Poles or Ukrainians or Russians tell the world what they wanted. Their opinions didn't matter. Why else had God put them on earth except to be worked to death?

And no one had spoken up for keeping Heinrich Gimpel and his daughters alive when they were arrested. Had the authorities decided he was a Jew and they first-degree Mischlingen, they would have been killed, and that would have been that. The Reich had come further in the past year than in the previous lifetime. It still had a long way to go. Susanna suspected neither Buckliger nor Stolle realized how far.

Maybe Charlie Lynton did, over in London. He had the British Union of Fascists out several steps in front of the German National Socialists. That took special nerve in a subject ally. And the white-haired Czech playwright who led Unity seemed to have a good understanding of where the Reich needed to go. Whether it would go there was another question.

More and more of the map filled in. There were spots where red predominated over green: Bavaria, parts of Prussia, rural Austria (Vienna was a different story). But it looked as if reformers would have a solid majority. How solid would it have been had Prutzmann not tried his Putsch? Susanna feared it would have been much less so, but nobody would ever know now.

Then the camera cut away from the map, away from the studio. There was Heinz Buckliger, walking through the little square in front of the Gauleiter 's residence with Rolf Stolle. Stolle was pointing to the makeshift memorials that had sprung up where SS panzers crushed Berliners: flowers, candles, notes tothe dead, and one big sign that said,FREIHEIT UBER ALLES!

"The two chief architects of this remarkable day confer," Horst said quietly.

It didn't look like a conference to Susanna. It looked as if the Gauleiter was lecturing the Fuhrer. And it looked as if Heinz Buckliger was taking it. He would nod whenever Stolle stuck out a finger and made a point. Once, Stolle laughed at something and slapped him on the back, hard enough to stagger him. Buckliger took that, too, though it was anything but the gesture of a subordinate to a superior. Despite their titles, it didn't seem as if the Gauleiter were the Fuhrer 's subordinate.

Stolle pointed to the FREIHEIT UBER ALLES! sign. Buckliger earnestly nodded again. Stolle didn't really understand what the sign meant, either. Susanna had already realized that. But if you said the words often enough, didn't you sooner or later have to go where they led you?

Didn't you?We'll find out, Susanna thought.

Francesca came bounding up to Alicia at lunchtime. "Guess what!" she cried.

"I don't know," Alicia said. "What?"

"Frau Koch is gone!" her sister caroled. "Gone, gone, gone! We've got a new teacher. His name is Herr Mistele. He smiles at people like he means it. Smiles! The Beast is gone. Gone, gone, gone!"

"That's wonderful. Too bad it didn't happen sooner," Alicia said, and Francesca's head bounced up and down in unreserved agreement. Alicia asked, "Did he say why the Beast left?" With Frau Koch not there, Alicia came out with the nickname without looking over her shoulder first to see whether any other teachers could hear.

Francesca frowned. "He said…" She paused, trying to make sure she got the words just right. "He said, with the political something the way it was-"

"The situation?" Alicia broke in.

"That's right. That's the word I couldn't come up with." Francesca started over: "He said, with the political sit-u-a-tion the way it was, it was better if Frau Koch did something else for a while. As far as I'm concerned, she can do something else forever."

"Maybe she will," Alicia said. "She liked Lothar Prutzmann a lot, didn't she?" Francesca nodded again. Alicia continued, "Well, with Prutzmann dead and gone and with the Putsch down the drain, naturally they're going to get rid of people like that. She's probably lucky she's not in jail. Or maybe she is."

"Ooh!" her sister said. "Ooh! Ihope she is. She said Daddy deserved to be, back when they grabbed him and us. I hope she finds out what it's like." Francesca liked revenge.

"It could happen." Alicia didn't mind the idea of the Beast behind bars, either-far from it. And when one side won a political fight, the other side suffered. That had been true in the Reich ever since the Night of the Long Knives. Sooner or later, though, didn't revenge have to stop, or at least slow down? If it didn't, who'd be left after a while? That made more sense than Alicia wished it did. All the same, she couldn't help hoping vengeance wouldn't stop till Frau Koch got what was coming to her. She waved and called, "Hey, Trudi! Listen!"

"What's up?" Trudi Krebs called.

Alicia nudged her sister. "Tell her."

Francesca did. Trudi's eyes widened. "Really?" she whispered. Francesca crossed her heart.I don't think Jews are supposed to do that, went through Alicia's mind.She hadn't done it since she found out what she was. Then she stopped worrying about it. Trudi put one arm around her and the other around Francesca and started dancing both of them around in a circle, whooping while she danced.

"What's going on?" another girl called. Trudi and Francesca both shouted out the news. The other girl jumped straight up in the air. Then she ran over and started dancing, too. More girls heard the news, too, and joined the circle. It got bigger and bigger, spinning dizzily around the playground. A few boys even danced with them, mostly ones who'd had the Beast and knew what Francesca's class was escaping.