In mid-August, they departed on a ship bound for Hamburg, dispirited and doubtful that Arvid’s warnings would be heeded by the United States, apprehensive about what awaited them back in Germany. They were together, Mildred reminded herself, and that would be enough to get her through whatever might come next.
Chapter Forty-five
August–September 1939
Greta
Late one August night while Adam worked on a screenplay in the living room, Greta put Ule to bed, tidied the kitchen, folded the laundry, answered her son’s plea for a drink of water, soothed him back to sleep again, and then—only then, exhausted and tempted to give up and go to bed—settled down at the kitchen table to the work she had set out hours before.
It was not recent, the speech she intended to translate for a flyer to distribute around Neukölln, the universities, and perhaps the ghetto too, if she could scrounge up enough paper. President Roosevelt had delivered the speech the previous October, but she had received the transcript only recently from a friend in the foreign press corps. And yet, with the Gestapo squeezing Berlin’s Jews into a few overcrowded, dilapidated blocks and the Wehrmacht going through maneuvers along the border with Poland, Mr. Roosevelt’s words remained sharply relevant. The Ministry of Propaganda controlled the flow of information within the Reich so absolutely that most Germans had no idea what the leaders of other nations said about their country. Most Germans probably did not care, content to believe whatever Goebbels told them to think. But for those people like herself who hated fascism, loved democracy, and longed for reassurance that the free world had not forgotten them, an inspiring speech from a leader like President Roosevelt could make the difference between sustaining hope and succumbing to despair.
“It is becoming increasingly clear that peace by fear has no higher or more enduring quality than peace by the sword,” she murmured aloud, tapping her knee with her pencil, searching for the perfect German phrases to capture Mr. Roosevelt’s eloquent balance of authority and compassion. “There can be no peace if the reign of law is to be replaced by a recurrent sanctification of sheer force.”
The American president did not need to mention Hitler by name for the subject of his speech to be perfectly clear. Greta firmly believed that the German people needed to know that not every Western leader had been duped by Hitler’s hollow claims that he wanted peace. Some Germans would find that a heartening revelation, others an existential threat.
Greta wrote steadily, translating the phrases, referring to her well-worn German-English dictionary, circling a word she knew was not quite right to remind herself to choose a better synonym later. Mildred would know, but the Harnacks had no telephone, and at that hour she was probably asleep anyway.
“‘There can be no peace if national policy adopts as a deliberate instrument the threat of war,’” Greta read aloud, carrying the transcript in one hand as she went to put the kettle on, yawning until her eyes watered. She ought to go to bed, but Ule was so busy and bright and curious all day long that late nights and early mornings were the only times she could get any work done. “‘There can be no peace if national policy adopts as a deliberate instrument the dispersion all over the world of millions of helpless and persecuted wanderers with no place to lay their heads.’”
“Greta?” Adam called from the living room.
Sighing, she set the kettle on the burner, tossed the transcript on the table next to her notes, and went to the living room, where she found Adam turning up the volume on the radio.
“Are you deliberately trying to wake up Ule?” she asked wearily, wiping perspiration from her forehead with the back of her hand. Despite the late hour, the heat of the day had barely diminished with the sunset.
“Come listen,” he urged, without turning away from the radio.
An announcer had interrupted the scheduled classical music program with a news bulletin, but since Greta had missed the beginning, at first she did not understand what he was saying. Sickening dread filled her when she realized that the German minister for foreign affairs was en route to Moscow to sign a nonaggression pact with the Soviet Union.
“How can this be?” asked Greta. “Fascists and Communists, allies? They’re on opposite sides of the political spectrum. The Nazis have been persecuting German Communists for years. How could Stalin form an alliance with their tormentor?”
“Think of poor Poland, trapped between them in a pincer grip.” Adam ran a hand over his jaw, grimacing. “Just a few days ago, Harnack was trying to convince me that Hitler would eventually attack the Soviet Union, that he’d send the Wehrmacht toward the Caucasus to secure a steady supply of oil for the Reich. Now he won’t have to. He just gained access to the Soviet Union’s raw materials without firing a shot.”
“But what does Stalin get out of it?”
“I don’t know. Maybe he’s buying time. Maybe he and Hitler have agreed to divide up Poland between them.”
To Greta that seemed all too likely. Apparently Hitler had fooled Stalin as easily as he had Chamberlain and Daladier.
They stayed up for another hour, hoping to learn more, but the music resumed without interruption. Greta went off to bed shortly after midnight, but Adam decided to stay up another hour, just in case.
In the morning, Adam told her that nothing more had been announced before he had come to bed at two o’clock. The Nazi press had been busy overnight, though, for all the major papers had put out extra editions hailing the German-Soviet Nonaggression Pact as a tremendous diplomatic victory over Great Britain, shattering their ongoing negotiations with France and Russia for an alliance that would have left Germany encircled by its rivals. Jubilant editorials proclaimed that a resolution of the matter of Poland would soon follow. “The world stands before a towering fact,” enthusedDer Angriff, the Nazi paper Goebbels had founded when Hitler was just beginning to ascend to power. “Two peoples have placed themselves on the basis of a common foreign policy which during a long and traditional friendship produced a foundation for a common understanding.”
“Long and traditional friendship,” retorted Adam, giving the paper a shake. “It’s ten hours old and as abnormal a friendship as the world has ever known.”
Later that morning, when Adam phoned Arvid at his office and suggested they meet, Arvid invited him and Greta for supper that evening. The Kuckhoffs brought food and wine, Mildred provided dessert and coffee, and while little Ule played at their feet or tumbled from lap to lap, squealing and giggling, they pooled their information, which was frustratingly meager.
Arvid was adamant that the friendship between Hitler and Stalin would be short-lived. “It’s absolutely clear that Hitler will now prepare even more determinedly for war against the Soviet Union,” he said.
“You’ve seen a draft of a declaration of war?” Greta asked archly, annoyed by his didactic certainty.
“Economically, he’s not yet prepared,” Arvid replied, ignoring her tone. “He’ll try to gain control of other countries’ raw materials and production facilities as quickly as possible.”
“Poland will be the first,” said Mildred.
“But not the last. The longer this fragile pact between Germany and Russia lasts, the more of Europe Hitler will consume.”
“Maybe Stalin is smarter than you give him credit for,” said Adam. “I know you despise him, and you have good reason. He killed your friends. But hear me out. What if Hitlerintendsto provoke a war between Germany and the West? In the resulting chaos, the Bolsheviks could step in and impose communism upon the countries involved—”
