By mid-August, Adam had spun out a thread of strong steel to Adolf Grimme, the former prominent Social Democratic politician who had served as the minister of science, art, and education for Prussia until July 1932, when he had been thrown out of office after Chancellor Papen dissolved the Prussian government. Adam and Grimme, who had been friends since their student days, agreed that their network should focus on gathering intelligence and inciting civil disobedience to destabilize the Reich from within. This would unsettle the Nazis and hearten their opponents by proving that Hitler’s control was not absolute.
Greta urged Adam to invite his friend and occasional collaborator Günther Weisenborn to join their group, but the gifted playwright had plunged into a deep depression after his plays and novel were thrown onto the pyres during theVerbrennungstakttwo years before. “I don’t think he’s in any condition to help us,” said Adam. “He’s still writing under pseudonyms, but I’m not sure how long he can persist.”
“What a loss to German literature it would be if he set down his pen,” said Greta. But would anyone beyond the arts community even notice? So much brilliance had already been snuffed out. What was one more fading ember when the hearth was buried in ashes?
“When I last spoke with him,” said Adam, “he mentioned that he might go to America.”
“If it’s the only way he can continue to work, perhaps he should.”
Adam thrust his hands into his pockets and scowled. Greta muffled a sigh, stretched out her hand to him, and held it there until he took it and she could pull him close and soothe him with a kiss. He had no patience for anyone who left Germany unless their life was in immediate danger. For Adam, the only courage that mattered was the courage to stay and fight.
All the while, the Harnacks too were expanding their resistance network. Arvid’s family connections infiltrated nearly every university and government ministry, although for security reasons, Mildred and Arvid divulged very little regarding who was involved and what they were doing. Arvid also strengthened his ties with the Soviets and cautiously sought out allies within the Ministry of Economics. Mildred had her contacts within the American embassy and the expatriate community, and she recruited students from the Abendgymnasium and her study group. These members included Sara Weitz, who in turn brought in her brother. Greta knew that Natan Weitz was extending threads of the web to other antifascist journalists and editors, but like John Sieg, Natan did not disclose their identities. They were all safer if each of them knew no one beyond their own immediate circle, unless they themselves were the link to another group.
One morning in the last week of August, Greta arrived at the Tiergarten to meet Mildred for their usual walk and conference, only to find that her friend was not alone. Studying the stranger at Mildred’s side, Greta fixed a benign expression in place to conceal a sudden pang of wariness. Something about the woman struck Greta as familiar—her straight, wheat-brown hair cut short beneath a small, fashionable hat, her slim figure and assured stance—
“Clara,” she said, scarcely believing her eyes. “Clara Leiser.”
Beaming, Clara laughed and embraced her. “Greta, it’s so good to see you,” she said in English, her midwestern vowels startlingly delightful, like a fresh breeze off Lake Mendota. “You look exactly as you did back in Madison.”
“And you’re just as full of flattery,” said Greta, smiling back. She knew worry had chiseled her face too thin and had etched fine lines around her mouth and between her eyebrows. “How have you been all these years? What are you doing in Berlin?”
Clara’s elation dimmed. “I’m working for the New York court system now. I’m here as an official observer of these mass trials the Nazis are so fond of.”
“They know about them in America?” said Greta.
“Oh, yes,” said Clara. “They’re a matter of grave concern.”
Greta and Mildred exchanged a look, and Greta saw her own muted hope reflected in her friend’s eyes. “That’s encouraging,” said Mildred, as if she hardly dared believe it. “Sometimes it seems as if the United States is determined to ignore all the terrible things happening here, despite the warnings we send, despite the evidence they ought to see clearly even an ocean away.”
“Most Americans remain firmly isolationist,” Clara admitted, “but there’s been enough public outcry in New York over reports of injustices that the authorities decided they must gather more information. Sometimes local governments can get involved when it would be impolitic for the federal government to do so.”
“If you want to see injustice, you came to the right place,” said Greta.
“I’ve been granted permission to witness two mass trials and to tour two prisons,” said Clara. “I’ll ask to see more, but it wasn’t easy to wring even that much out of the Nazis. They’ll probably turn me down.”
“I know someone who was recently released from KZ Oranienburg,” said Mildred. “A Jewish journalist arrested for violating the Editors Law. He was sentenced in a sham trial to eighteen months, and he suffered horribly. His imprisonment was an egregious violation of his civil rights.”
“And of basic human decency,” Greta broke in, instinctively lowering her voice and glancing over her shoulder for eavesdroppers. “We’ve heard his story only secondhand, through his sister. I can only imagine how harrowing the full truth would be, offered to an impartial third party.”
“Do you think he would speak with me?” asked Clara. “I could withhold his name from the official record if he’s afraid of repercussions.”
Greta shook her head. “You’d have to withhold more than that, or I’m sure the Gestapo would be able to identify him.”
“I think he would speak to you anyway,” said Mildred. “He’s very brave, and as a journalist, he would want the truth to be told.”
Greta had misgivings, but she trusted that her two American friends understood their judicial system better than she did. If they believed Natan Weitz would not find himself thrown back into a prison camp for speaking with a representative of the New York courts, she would not protest. There was always a chance the Gestapo would never know.
Mildred set up a meeting through Sara. Natan agreed to speak to Clara alone, as long as his name and all other identifying details were omitted from the record so that he would not put his family at risk. After they met, all Clara would reveal to Greta and Mildred was that his story had been a revelation and his experience a nightmare.
The rest of Clara’s mission brought mixed results. For the two prisons she was permitted to tour, the Gestapo had chosen institutions for citizens convicted of ordinary crimes—theft, forgery, murder—not for political prisoners like Natan and the countless thousands of others arrested simply for being Communists, Social Democrats, or Jews. Clara’s Nazi escorts refused to allow her to speak alone with prisoners and rejected her requests to inspect Oranienburg and Dachau. They would not allow her even to approach the front gate of Plötzensee, where a female political prisoner of particular interest to the New York courts awaited execution.
When the time came for Clara to observe the two trials, she invited Greta and Mildred to accompany her, passing them off as her assistant and translator. The first trial was for eight Communists charged with manslaughter for allegedly shooting a restaurateur four years before. That the man had died was certain, but the entire proceeding reeked of artifice, and Greta had to carefully arrange her features to conceal her profound skepticism. There had been one gun, one shot, no eyewitness testimony, and yet eight men, who all happened to be Communists, were found guilty and sentenced to five years at Dachau.
The second trial was for seventeen men and boys accused of high treason for distributing literature critical of the Reich and for organizing meetings where “subversive sentiments” were expressed. Greta sat almost motionless through the hours of testimony, scarcely able to breathe, feeling as if a rough hand were tightening around her throat. The men and boys in the dock—pale, defiant, tearful, angry—had done nothing she, Adam, Mildred, and Arvid had not also done. When the defendants were sentenced to die for their crimes, Mildred seized her hand. They clutched each other so tightly that Greta’s fingertips went numb.
In the days that followed, Greta and Mildred helped Clara acquire more information that they hoped would be useful to the New York courts. What they might do with the information back in the States, Greta could only guess, but if it helped shake the Americans out of their complacency, the effort would be time well spent.
The day before Clara departed Berlin, the three friends met at the Palast-Café for a farewell lunch and one last walk through the Tiergarten. “You should leave Germany, both of you,” Clara urged as they were parting at the Brandenburg Gate. “It’s too dangerous here. You’ve gotten used to it so maybe you don’t see just how horrifying it is.”
