Child of the Light (28 page)

Using both hands, he swirled it around. Then, red in the face, he poured the remaining tea onto the flagstones. The Gypsy started as the hot tea splashed her, but she took the pot from his outstretched hand. Tipping it slightly, she examined its interior from this angle and that.

"Well?"

Motioning him forward, the woman placed her lips near his ear and murmured words unintelligible to anyone but the Chancellor.

He lurched upright and, rigid with rage, grabbed the ends of her shawl. "How dare you!" He crossed the corners of the shawl as if choking her would force her words back down her throat. "My Reich shall live a millennium!" Face fiery red and jugular engorged, he released her.

Coughing, the Gypsy started to rise. At once, the silver- haired second lieutenant glided from his table and seized her from behind, his forearms across the front and back of her neck in a choke hold. As he forced her head up, she gagged in pain.

Looking down into her fear-filled eyes, he blew her a kiss.

"Gypsies and the Jews, they are one and the same," Helga said loudly. "They give us nothing and take all we have in return."

Hitler's eyes were shut, his face drawn tight with wrath as he raised a fist above the table. Sol waited for the hand to bang down, sealing the Gypsy's fate, but the Chancellor unclenched his fist and, fingers quivering with fury, pressed his palm against the table. "Let her go. And I thank you for your trouble."

"No trouble." Hempel released her. "I live to serve."

Hitler peered down at the Gypsy, his eyes little more than slits. "We shall begin again."

He looked up in the direction of the waitress, who hurried indoors. She emerged almost at once, carrying a fresh pot of tea. The Chancellor took it from her. "This time," he said, "no mistakes. Speak the truth, and in specifics."

Slowly and deliberately he tilted the teapot and poured the searing hot tea onto the flagstones directly beneath the Gypsy's dress, scalding her bare feet and ankles. She screamed in pain and backed away--into the arms of Otto Hempel. Without a moment's hesitation, he yanked her into an empty chair and gripped her arms so she could not clutch at her scalded flesh.

The onlookers gasped and Sol felt his stomach clench. Achilles gained her feet and Taurus moved up under Erich's arm. An angry sound began in Taurus' throat. Erich, his face scarlet, did not seem to sense the danger. Sol tugged at his friend's shirt. Erich glanced at him and patted Taurus, who immediately quieted.

Absorbed by the drama, the audience pressed closer. Several of them rose from their chairs, apparently more eager than afraid, more participant than spectator.

The Führer held up a hand and smiled reassuringly.

Like a master magician, he looked down at the woman through eyes that seemed capable of mesmerizing stone. "Think
past
the pain," he told her. "Be German, not Gypsy. Love your land and your Führer so much that human frailty ceases to exist." He held the teapot, slightly tipped, over the woman's lap. "Concentrate."

Hitler tipped the teapot further. The woman stopped moaning and set her face hard.

"You will see your way to the truth? Remember there is always more tea."

The Gypsy nodded. "No more lies," she said hoarsely.

He swiveled the pot around and handed it to her. Eyes bright with tears, she examined the contents. Her face went vapid. She looked from the teapot to the Führer, her chin trembling, her eyes filled with terror. When she spoke, her words were incoherent.

"Tell me!"

The woman's breathing became raw and rapid. She peered back into the teapot, squinted up at Hitler and, quivering, shook her head. "Mein Führer...." Her voice trailed off.

"Say it!" Hempel put his arms across her throat and tilted up her head. She nodded and he released her, shoving down her shoulders in his disgust.

"I saw...power." She was bent over. Gasping. "Your power." Sobs punctuated her words. "Two...Berlins. One here...in the east. One...in the west."

"A Berlin in the Americas!" Hitler's eyes gleamed. He waved off Hempel when the Gypsy, shaking her head and attempting to stand, sagged to the flagstones. "And why should it be otherwise?" the Führer asked his audience. "Did English religious fanatics carve a nation from that wilderness? No!
German
brains and
German
backs! A Berlin in each hemisphere. It is," he formed a fist, "our destiny! A world made whole by German blood!"

Helga's feverish applause broke the ensuing silence, and soon the other watchers joined in. Everyone except Solomon and Erich, who sat with one hand on the head of each dog, staring blankly toward his Führer.

Papa was right, Sol thought. The Chancellor was deranged and dangerous not only because of his delusions, but because he believed the myth he had created.

Helga believed it. So, it seemed, did Erich. More dangerous yet, Hitler placed people in the power structure who believed it, too. Goebbels was a perfect example, which, of course, was why Hitler had elevated him to Gauleiter of Berlin. He had been nothing but a scrawny government clerk and failed novelist with a penchant for pornography shops and sleazy cabarets; now he was making speeches from the Reichstag steps. Sol himself had heard the man call the Rathenau assassination a blessing, had seen someone walk from the crowd and slap the Gauleiter's face with a black glove, shouting, "It isn't for garbage like you that we murdered him!"

Since then the assassins had been granted sainthood in the Nazi hagiography.

Only the Jews and the Gypsies remained sinners.

Sol touched Erich's sleeve, but his friend shrugged off the hand. "The man's nothing but a bully," Sol whispered.

Here was a man who, within four months of taking power, had managed to eradicate virtually every vestige of democracy in Germany, including the Nationalist Party that had supported his candidacy. In less than a year, Hitler had gone from losing an election by six million votes to gaining over fifty percent of the Reichstag seats. Bully or no, it would be nothing short of insanity to take him on alone. One did not, after all, use stones to fight tanks. Not unless one happened to be David.

"It makes me sick to see him act that way," Erich said bitterly. "But as long as Germans demand a scapegoat for the war and the Depression, as long as the SA and SS hold the reins of power, Hitler must play the brute."

Solomon dabbed beer from his lips and set the wadded napkin on the table. "Are you so sure it's an act?"

Erich sadly shook his head. "God, I hope so."

The emotion in Erich's eyes told of a need to talk things out, but this was hardly the place. "I have to get back to the shop," Sol said. "You coming? We've seen almost nothing of you since you moved into your flat."

"I...I can't." Erich's lips tightened. "That damn Goebbels stepped up the time schedule for the headquarters' move. The estate's still being renovated. We moved Goebbels' office furniture yesterday. Tonight I move in the dogs."

He paused, as if he had just thought of something. "Listen, Sol. I'm not giving up my flat, but I won't be able to use it much now that Goebbels has stepped up security. It's yours if you want to--"

"Use it for assignations? Thanks anyway," Sol said. In a way, he envied Erich being out on his own. There was no way he could leave; his parents needed him too much.

"It's incredible, the tensions I'm under, Solomon," Erich said. "Hurry up and wait, hurry up and wait. We don't even have kennels. There are no documents to guard, no personnel...
nothing!
Why must we start before we're really prepared?"

He put a hand on Sol's forearm. The momentary look of need in his eyes caused Sol a passing moment of guilt at his constant examinations of Erich's motives.

"I asked you here because I needed to have a drink with someone
real.
And to relax, just for a minute." Erich downed his beer and raised his hand to signal the waitress. "Let's have another."

"I'm sorry, truly I am," Sol said quietly, "but the urge to throw something at that man--preferably my fist, for all the good it would do--is just too strong."

Sol felt very conspicuous, and very Jewish.
 
What was he doing here? It was Friday afternoon, and
Shabbas
would soon begin. His place was at home with his family. He stood up. "I have to leave."

"Wir folgen Dir! Wir folgen Dir!"

The cry rang out, punctuated by cheers as the SS man, noticing the Gypsy trying to crawl away, used his shoe to push her past the fence. The Chancellor's terrier growled and scampered over to tug at the hem of her dress.

"Careful with her." Hitler grinned. "I may need her again ...in a millennium."

For as long as the Chancellor needed her, the Gypsy was safe from everything except his tantrums--and not for a moment longer. Would it be the same with the Jews, Sol wondered, or would hatred ultimately prove to be stronger than Hitler's need for what Walther Rathenau had called Jewish assets and abilities? The phrase was Rathenau's, the delusion Hitler's.

The Gypsy pulled herself away from the terrier and rose laboriously to her feet. As she limped toward the woods, a pianist in the main part of the restaurant struck up a
Lady Moon
medley from the recent Paul Lincke revival. Sol felt ashamed and embarrassed. He had desperately wanted to go to her aid earlier, but to do so would have been both foolish and dangerous.

As if a performance were over and the post-show party had begun, the milieu abruptly changed to cocktails and light laughter. Hitler sauntered among the crowd, making casual conversation and shaking hands. The terrier bounded from table to table, for scraps fed by people eager to please anything the Führer loved.

Without another word to Erich, who sat in the midst of the festivities unemotional as a corpse, Sol slipped away from the Biergarten. Taking the long way around Hitler, he headed for the trees to find the Gypsy and offer her what help he could. He had hardly gone beyond the first line of trees when he came upon her. She lay beneath an oak, sobbing, her head on a pile of leaves. Her dress was pulled up to her knee; he could see angry red patches on her calf.

Sol stooped and placed a consoling hand on her shoulder. "Those are ugly burns," he said. "You need medical attention."

Sitting up, she peeled a leaf from her cheek and looked at him through narrowed eyes. The tree's branches cast fingers of shadow across the blotches where her mascara had run. "I can help myself." Pulling down her dress, she turned her head and stared toward the Biergarten.

Sol followed her gaze and saw Erich approaching at a run, the dogs at his heels.

"What do
you
want with me?" she asked when he was near enough to hear her.

"I wish to get you medical assistance." Erich stooped as if to examine her.

She batted his hand away and, wincing, covered her legs with her skirt. "What you
wish
is to convince yourself that your beloved Hitler didn't hurt me."

"I didn't come here to be insulted," Erich said testily.

"I didn't invite you to come." She spat on the ground. "Leave! Go back to your idealism!"

Visibly fighting for self-control, Erich looked at his watch. "The dogs and I are due at the barracks in twenty minutes. Do you or don't you want my help?"

"No."

"Then that's how it will be." Erich shook Sol's hand with a kind of military stiffness. "Tell Recha and your parents I said hello. I hope your father feels better." He nodded toward the woman. "If he decides she needs help, I'll pay the bill."

Hand raised in farewell, he walked into the woods.

"I have perturbed your friend, Solomon," the Gypsy said.

A shock ran through Sol as the Gypsy spoke his name. Then he laughed at himself. How easily the simple was overlooked! She had obviously heard Erich call him by name.

He squatted beside her.

She squinted as she peered into his face. The scrutiny made him uncomfortable. "I know you, Solomon Freund," she said. "I am a dancer in the dwelling place of dreams."

She looked down at her leg, which had already begun to blister. Removing her shawl, she wrapped it loosely around the burn. Closing her eyes, she began to rock, as if to relieve the pain.

Sol bent closer.

Her eyes snapped open. "You will not escape your dreams, Solomon."

"It is one thing for you to know my name. But you seem to know all about me." Sol backed against the oak.

"Over the years, my sleep spoke." She lifted a painted brow. "My dreams divulged. You're older, stronger now, Solomon." Her voice was soft, vibrant, and when she reached out with trembling fingers and touched Sol's cheeks, her eyes were moist, though whether with joy or grief he wasn't sure. "When your visions return, respect them. Even fear them. But listen to them, Sol. Listen. And learn."

He was stunned by her words and the extent of her emotion.

"Listen and learn," she said again. Removing the shawl from her leg and, grunting in agony, she managed to stand. When he moved to steady her, she pushed him away. "Leave me now," she told him. "I have to go back alone."

"Go back? To the Biergarten? That's crazy!"