Chapter 35 Aftermath
AFTERMATH
“So what happened after that?” Alix asked. “Did Grandpa write to you, or what?”
“No,” I said. “How could he? You must understand—he was moving with the Army, and the German post was functioning not very well at all. Life was very—very muddled at that time. The Germans had been defeated in Fürth, and in Nuremberg, too, but not everywhere, not yet. There was a great deal of fighting yet to come, but in the bakery the next day, Frau Adelberg’s customers were queueing for bread again—it was a good thing I knew how to make potato bread, because that was the only way I could produce anything decent, that and the Pumpernickel—and she was taking their ration coupons along with their money, all as usual, but with no idea whether the coupons were still necessary.
Who was in charge now? Nobody seemed to know. ”
“About two weeks more before the war ended, right?” Sebastian asked.
“And much longer before the order of things became clear,” I said.
“I know Dr. Becker regretted having had to tell Frau Adelberg he was Jewish, for she had a wagging tongue, and our customers’ sentiments were decidedly mixed.
Andrea helped in the shop instead, but what she heard— Oh, the arguments!
One man had always been against Hitler, while another argued that he’d been misled by his advisors, and really, Himmler had been running the country.
A woman would have it that the Nazis had merely overreached, that they had wanted too much, and, oh yes, the atrocities—really too bad!
But the Führer probably knew nothing about it.
And always, there was to be war between the Americans and the Soviets once they met, ‘And then,’ a man said, ‘who knows?’”
“They seriously thought that?” Sebastian said. “That’s some world-class delusion.”
“Or some world-class propaganda,” I said.
“Only a few days after Joe left, the front page of the newspaper gave us ‘The Führer’s orders of the day for the Eastern Front.’ The Jewish-Bolshevist enemy had begun his assault ‘for the last time,’ he said.
This sounded, of course, like the end, but he went on to tell us once more that we must resist to the death, for the enemy wished only to exterminate us.
If we survived, it would be to watch old men and children murdered, women and girls forced into prostitution, and anybody left marched off to Siberia and enslavement.
I’m not saying people believed it, exactly, but they didn’t not believe it, either, especially when Hitler specifically told us that soldiers must disobey any order to retreat, no matter from whom it came, but must instead arrest or shoot any officer who ordered such a thing.
If an army is not allowed to retreat and is not allowed to surrender …
well, what are they to do? But most people, you know, even soldiers, are not so fanatical. ”
“Every accusation a confession,” Sebastian said.
“Very good,” Matti said. “You have it correctly. Such men cannot see that others are not as themselves. What they would do, they think others will also do.”
“So you just went back to, like, baking bread?” Ben asked. “You didn’t think, ‘Hey, let’s go get my palace back,’ even when it was all over?”
“No,” I said. “How would I have done so? First, as I’ve told you, it belonged to the state now. Second, the Russians were not yet in Dresden, but they would come soon, and all my family did own personally would surely be confiscated. No, that avenue was closed to me, and my old life was gone.”
“Bummer,” Ben said.
“Wait,” Matti said. “What palace is this?”
“Oh, yes,” I said, “you won’t know. I came from Dresden, yes, that was true, and my home was destroyed.
But my name wasn’t really Daisy Glücksburg, or that was only part of my name.
My name was actually Marguerite von Sachsen, and although, as you will know, all noble titles had been abolished after the Great War, my parents were nominally the King and Queen Consort of Saxony, and our home was the Residenzschloss in Dresden. ”
Matti stared. “No. How did I not know that? How did my mother not know that? How thrilled she would have been to know her baker was a—what? A princess? A queen? She was a bit of a snob, you know.”
I laughed. “You know—I actually have no idea of my theoretical title. How many of my father’s relations survived the war?
Was there a male heir? I could only have inherited the title had there been no male to do so.
But of course there is no real title, so it doesn’t matter.
Just as there seemed no point in proclaiming my royal descent, and as my documents were false anyway …
” I shrugged. “I was like everybody else. I’d lost everything, but most people had lost everything, or nearly so.
We were all starting over, I along with the rest. It was a … a difficult time.”
“And what was happening to Grandpa at that point?” Alix asked. “I always wanted to know, and he never told me.”
“Well, as it happens,” I said, “I have his letters here.” I opened my purse and took the bundle out of my bag, extracting the next one in sequence. “Read it aloud, if you will. I can’t quite remember what they say, it’s been so long.”
“Another beer first, perhaps?” Matti asked. “Or a glass of Schnapps? They’ve begun to sell a Birnenschnapps here that is rather fine. There is no fruit like the fruit of Bavaria, is there?”
“Pear Schnapps,” I said with delight. “Oh, I think so. I really do think so.”
Sebastian rose and said, “I think this is my cue.”
“I’ll help,” Ben said, “if I get some too.”
“And why not?” Matti said.
“Because,” Alix said, “he’s fifteen?”
Matti waved a hand. “A taste of Schnapps won’t harm him.”
“And it’s totally illegal?” Alix said.
“No,” I said. “Unless Germany has changed more than I know, a boy is free to drink a glass of Schnapps in the company of his family. Better, I’ve always thought, just as Alix had a small glass of wine at dinner along with the rest of us.
How else does one learn responsibility, and that alcohol is something to be savored, not to gulp down until one becomes stupid with it? ”
“Totally,” Ben said happily.
“Well, that’s one thought,” Sebastian said. “But OK. If you want to try it, we’ll get you a glass.”
Ben hated it, of course, and went back for a Limonade, a fizzy lemonade, and Matti finished his Schnapps.
But that was how we came to be sitting around in a sunny German Biergarten, surrounded by flowers and sipping the clear, sweet, fiery-strong spirit, as Alix read aloud and three generations learned anew of the horrors of war.
April 24, 1945
Dear Dad,
This is the first day I’ve been able to work on this letter.
Sorry it couldn’t be sooner—it’s been hard lying here, knowing how worried you and Mom must be and not being able to do anything about it.
I guess Western Union will have shown up at your door, and I can’t imagine you enjoyed that.
I hope you were relieved when you found out I was only wounded.
You should be, because I’m going to be fine.
A bullet to the shoulder, that’s all. Too bad it was my right arm!
I’m dictating this to another guy. Larry got it in the leg and is trussed up like a chicken, but his arms work fine. Between us, we make one useful soldier.
After I finished that last letter to you, things got hot again.
We were just west of Nuremberg when we saw our fiercest urban fighting yet, right here at what’s got to be nearly the end.
The Germans were badly outnumbered, and as always, it made no sense for them to fight so hard in a battle they had to know they’d already lost. It seems, though, that Hitler ordered an “unconditional defense” of all German cities a couple weeks back.
Easy for him to say! Supposedly he’s holed up in a bunker like a spider, safe and sound.
I know we’re taught not to hate, but how do you not hate the guy when you see all this waste?
I guess they gave civilians weapons, too, and told them it was their duty to fight, because fight they did.
It was supposed to be a sort of last stand, and I guess it was, because the town was full of German army units that had fallen back as we’d advanced, some thousands of men in all.
Stragglers, looters, SS units, 12-year-old boys …
a real mixed bag. The civilian authorities wanted to surrender from the start—shows you that they knew it was over—but the Army refused.
I keep thinking of those SS officers stringing those guys up for daring to say fighting was hopeless.
Apparently, the plan was to defend the town as hard as possible, then fall back to Nuremberg, but it turns out that Nuremberg was falling to our boys at the same time.
The beating heart of Nazism is in American hands now.
Happy thought! Now if we can only get Hitler, though nobody seems to be sure where he’s hiding.
I sure would hate to see him slip through the net.
That’s one recognizable face, you’d think, but with his mustache and head shaved?
Nobody’s ever called the guy a movie star.
He’d probably look like a clerk—or a corporal.
His ego’s likely too big to try it, though. At least I hope so.
2 P.M.
Here Larry and I are again. Writing’s hard work—it may take us a couple of days to get this off to you.
Anyway, the Germans in town didn’t have much artillery left—pretty hard to take it with you when you’re running away—but they had automatic weapons and plenty of ammunition. As far as I can tell, that’s the only thing this country is making anymore.
We got there to find a mess. Streetcars dragged off their tracks and blocking the roads, barriers made of logs and rubble—and there’s always plenty of rubble—and every bridge blown.