Wunderland(24)

All of Germany, Ilse thinks, with the same shiver she’d felt upon realizing that millions might soon be reading her poem. But it’s more than simply the thrill of it she’s feeling. She is also, she suddenly realizes, so profoundly grateful. Not just that this man—this marvelous, miraculous man!—is saving Germany from enemies both beyond and within its borders, but that he’s offering her, Ilse, a role in this all-important battle. And as the Hitlerjugend line up before their namesake in scores of straight-edged blocks of two hundred, and as the surrounding stadiumgoers—thousands of men, women, and children, packed like sardines but clearly not minding it one whit—stand on tiptoe to cheer on the marchers and marvel, their chant (“One People! One Führer! One Reich! Germany!”) seems to be picked up by her own pounding pulse.

Someone gasps aloud behind her, and twisting in her seat Ilse sees that District Leader Meindel is unabashedly weeping.

M?delschaftsführerin Meindel is one of Ilse’s favorite BDM leaders. Slight, dark-haired, and pretty, and still only in her midtwenties, she comes from a working-class background: her father, a fruit vendor, lost literally everything after the war. She’s told Ilse stories that make Ilse’s own childhood seem unspeakably luxurious: about being turned onto the street after the banks took her family’s flat. About having to move from house to house for over a year. About leaving primary school even though she loved reading and art and going to work in a factory, since her family needed the money.

Since Hitler took over, however, M?delschaftsführerin Meindel not only has been able to resume her studies but has a steady income from doing what she loves most: working with girls like Ilse. Even better, her father has not only climbed out of debt but been able to open up his own little grocery shop. Last autumn he even bought a car. “You can’t understand what the Führer means to us,” she said to Ilse over coffee once, “unless you understand what it’s like to live without hope. To wake up hungry. To constantly be running away from creditors.” She’d shaken her head. “To have all that gone! It’s like being brought back from the dead.”

Ilse turns back to the screen. Now the sun is setting in Nuremberg; torches illume a thousand black-and-red flags carried in concert in the evening’s rally. Hovering over it all is an enormous gleaming eagle, wings outstretched. And in the center, on the podium, the great man stands alone. On his face Ilse sees something she’s never noticed before: a kind of sorrow, mingled with another emotion that at first she can’t quite put words to, until she recognizes that it is love. Hitler’s face, she suddenly realizes, is the face of a prophet. And even as she understands this she finds herself leaning forward, as though to bring herself as physically close to him as she can.

“A year ago,” he begins, “we met for the first time upon this field of the political leaders of the National Socialist Party. They were brought here by nothing other than the call of their hearts. They were brought here by nothing other than their loyalty. It was the need of our people which moved us…and which brought us together. We wrestled and struggled together.” Around her, she senses the older members of the audience nodding; hears faint grunts of assent and agreement. One people, thinks Ilse. One Führer. One Reich. It’s like an incantation; a magic spell that makes them all as invincible as any righteous fairy-tale prince she has dreamt up for Renate in her stories. (A faint pang: she so wishes Renate were here to see this. But soon, she thinks. I’ll see it again with her soon.)

Around the theater some people are starting to stand now: wave upon wave of them rising from their cushioned seats to join the thousands standing before them on the screen.

“This is our vow tonight,” Hitler intones, his voice echoing in every corner of the vast hall. “Every hour, every day, think only of Germany. The people, the Reich, the German nation, and the German people!”

And then: “Sieg Heil!”

And from all around him and all around her the cry comes thundering back, each incantation louder and more potent than the last:

“Sieg Heil!”

“Sieg Heil!”

“SIEG HEIL!”

Ilse has also leapt to her feet, along with every other person in the room, so instinctively that she didn’t realize she was doing it. As she flings her hand toward the screen her voice joins the endless, reverberating chant that seems to somehow be filling the entire world; the words at once losing their meaning with repetition—SIEG-HEIL-SIEG-HEIL-SIEG-HEIL—and yet gaining something much deeper than mere words could ever embody. As the chorus reaches its crescendo she is almost physically lifted by its power: as though it, and not her own strength, is what is truly holding her up. It feels dizzying, but also exhilarating. As though she’s learning to escape earth’s gravity; to launch herself like a comet toward the sky, and fly.





5.


    Renate


1935

“Can you speed up?” says Ilse. “You’re moving like my grandmother.”

They have just emerged from the Wittenbergerplatz U-Bahn station and are standing on the street by its steps. Rather than speeding up, however, Renate stops altogether. “I’m sorry,” she says, and leans against one of the railings. “I didn’t sleep well last night. I kept worrying about the letter.”

“I keep telling you. They probably won’t even ask for it.”