Jackie French - Hitler's Daughter

Heidi always wanted to walk faster than Fräulein Gelber did. Fräulein Gelber didn’t even have a limp, but she never walked quite fast enough.

There were so many things that Heidi would have liked to do. She would have liked to join the Bund Deutsche Mädel, the girl’s association, like Frau Mundt’s eldest daughter, Lotte. Frau Mundt told her lots of stories about Lotte. Heidi would have liked to meet her, but of course she never could. Heidi never met anyone at all.

If she joined the BDM she would do sports (Heidi had to ask Frau Mundt what sports were, but they sounded fun), and folk dancing. They would all sing songs together and, sometimes, go to the movies together.

But Heidi was not allowed.

She would have liked to go to school, to play with other girls. But that was not permitted either.

But she was a lucky girl. Everybody told her she was lucky. She had such pretty things: all the pretty things a girl could want.

She had her lovely home and such good food and Fräulein Gelber to look after her, and she had Duffi, who loved her, just as he loved all his German children.

Heidi hoped that one day Duffi would tell her that of all his German children he loved her best.

An engine sounded in the distance. A rumble coming closer, closer. Mark peered out of the shelter. Surely it was too early for the bus.

It was only Johnny Talbot on his motorbike, roaring up to town. He raised his hand briefly at the kids as he passed the shelter, and Mark half raised his hand to wave.

Anna sat still with her hands in her pockets.

‘What?’ Mark broke off and tried to choose his words carefully. ‘How could she want someone like that to love her? Someone who did such horrible things.’

‘He was her father,’ said Anna simply.

‘But what about the concentration camps? What about all the Jews he killed and the war and how he invaded Poland and all that?’

‘She didn’t know,’ said Anna.

‘But she must have!’

Anna shook her head. ‘The concentration camps were secret. I mean what they did there was secret. They were just supposed to be work camps. That’s what it said in the papers. And Heidi didn’t even see the papers. No one showed them to her. Only sometimes, when her father made a speech, and Fräulein Gelber would cut out his photo for her to pin on the wall.

‘How would she know what was happening? She didn’t even go to school so she couldn’t listen to other people talk.’

‘But she was there—in Hitler’s house—in the middle of everything,’ objected Mark.

Anna nodded slowly. ‘She was in the middle of everything, but she knew less than anyone outside.’

Anna put her hands in her lap, and her face got its story-telling look again. ‘She knew there was war. People talked about the war. But no one said that it was Hitler’s fault. The people in the household worked for Hitler. They thought that he was wonderful and that’s what they told Heidi.

‘Hitler was the leader who was going to save Germany, who would bring about The Third Reich. Germany would reign over the world and all the shame of World War One would be wiped out. Why would Heidi think any differently?’

Mark shook his head. ‘But… but she must just have KNOWN. If she’d just started to think about it all…’

‘Would you know if your parents were doing something wrong?’ asked Anna softly.

‘Of course I would. But they wouldn’t do anything really wrong anyway.’

‘Are you sure?’ persisted Anna. Her eyes were bright. ‘All the things your mum and dad believe in—have you ever really wondered if they are right or wrong? Or do you just think they’re right because that’s what your mum and dad think, so it has to be right?’

‘Well, I…’ Mark stopped.

No, he’d never thought maybe Mum and Dad were wrong, really wrong, about something. Something big—not just like Mum always wanting to be early and Dad barracking for Carlton even though he could see that they were losers (that’s what Mum said at any rate).

But that was different. Mum and Dad weren’t evil.

‘It’s not the same,’ he said at last.

Anna shrugged.

Little Tracey drummed her feet impatiently, ‘Go on with the story,’ she insisted. ‘PLEASE, Anna.’

Anna glanced at Mark. ‘Okay,’ she said.

‘Sometimes, just sometimes, Heidi felt that maybe…maybe things weren’t always right.’

It was the day after her birthday party. Duffi couldn’t be there—Duffi came so rarely nowadays. He had all of Germany to look after, and the war. But she had had a cake, in spite of the war, though she’d heard one of the guards mutter how much butter it had used.

It seemed other people didn’t have butter or cakes like that any more.

‘So there were guards?’ asked Mark.

‘Yes,’ said Anna. ‘There were always guards.’

Duffi sent a doll from Paris. It had dark hair like her own, so Heidi liked it better than her other dolls, but it still didn’t have a mark on its face and anyway she was much too old for dolls.

The doll was dressed in velvet and lace. The dress had proper buttons so she undid them and took the dress off, just to see what was underneath, then put it back on again and sat the doll on the shelf above her bed with all the others and went to find Fräulein Gelber. It was time for Heidi’s lessons. Fräulein Gelber had never been late before.

Fräulein Gelber was in the garden, sitting on the wrought-iron seat under the plum tree. She had a letter in her hand. She was crying. Her face was all scrunched up like a mouse’s.

Heidi approached timidly. She didn’t know what to do when someone cried.

‘Fräulein Gelber?’ she asked at last. ‘What’s the matter?’

Fräulein Gelber thrust her handkerchief back into her pocket and tried to make her face look normal. ‘It’s my brother,’ she said. ‘They’re sending him to the Russian front. Oh, Heidi, it is insane, insane. He will die there, I know he will. We can never win this war now.’

Then suddenly she looked frightened, her eyes red in her swollen face. She looked up at Heidi as though she had remembered who she was. She tried to smile.

‘I’m being so silly,’ she said. ‘Please forget I said that, Heidi. Please forget I said anything at all. I am just worried for my brother—who would not be? But of course he will come back safely. Of course Germany will win the war.’

Fräulein Gelber fumbled the letter into the pocket of her jacket. ‘It’s time for lessons,’ she said. ‘You are a very lucky girl, you know that? All these wonderful things that you’re learning.’

‘Yes,’ said Heidi. ‘I know that I’m lucky.’

Anna stopped.

‘Go on,’ said Mark after a while.

‘There was another time, another time that Heidi realised something was wrong.’

It was one of the women in the kitchen. A big woman, who came to do the scrubbing. Her bottom looked as wide as a table and she had lots of hair, bits of which stuck out in spite of being tied back.

She was crying, and the others were all comforting her.

‘I didn’t know,’ she kept saying. ‘I didn’t know. They took her away. They said it was for the best, she would be cared for.’

Frau Mundt saw Heidi listening and ran across the kitchen to her, and took her hand. ‘Freya isn’t well. Come on, I’ll take you upstairs.’

Frau Mundt led her up the stairs, away from the sobbing below.

‘Frau Mundt, what’s wrong with her?’

Frau Mundt hesitated. ‘She has just found out that her sister is dead.’

‘When did she die? In the air raids?’ Even Heidi knew about the air raids.

‘Not in the air raids. She has been dead, oh, six months maybe.’

‘I didn’t know she had a sister,’ said Heidi.