The Hunt

“The devil spoke and they listened,” she said.

“You really believe that, don’t you? That Hitler’s the devil incarnate?”

“Yes,” she answered with a bitterness he had not heard in her voice before. “And Himmler, Goring, Goebbels. All of them.”

He took her in his arms and kissed her lightly on the lips, but she pressed harder as he started to draw away, clinging to him almost in desperation.

“Hey, what is it?” he asked softly.

“I love you, Francis. I love everything about you. You’re funny and tough and a little mysterious and you make me feel safe. And I know in my heart nobody has ever felt toward me the way you do. And I do love you so for that, too.”

“And I love you,” he answered. “For all time and beyond. I promise you, I’ll make your life the most dazzling adventure you can imagine. I’ll devote my whole life to making you happy.”

She brushed his lips with the fingertips of one hand.

“You already have,” she said.

The hawk shrieked as it swept past the domed tower of the Gothic fortress, startled by the rumbling, blazing torches flickering through the window slots. Inside the stone walls, Himmler stood apart from the others, watching the ritual unfold. Even he was stunned by the power of the play and its setting. Vierhaus watched from the side of the tower, jealous of Himmler’s moment of glory and yet awed by the power of the ritual. It was the first holy ceremony at the new secret SS headquarters at Wewelsberg. Beside him, etched in lurid flickering light, were Hess, Heydrich, Goebbels and Goring—the powers behind the throne.

This was Himmler’s night and he was indeed a genius. No place could be more perfect than this moss-covered, dank castle, its cold halls stalked by Teutonic ghosts who had died jousting for the pleasure of ancient kings or clashing broadswords on some forgotten battlefield.

Himmler’s cold, mouse-like features wavered in the yellow torchlight and his jaws twitched as he tried to control his emotions. He loved the night. It matched the darkness of his soul and the mad fantasy he had brought to life in this eerie fortress. His ghoulish imagination had created a nightmare Camelot, a flagitious Round Table whose homicidal knights now had a secret headquarters in which to swear allegiance to their new king, Adolf Hitler. Not to the Fatherland—to Hitler.

Thirty-six newly graduated SS officers stood in their black uniforms, eyes ablaze with hypnotic fervor, their passionate oath to defend Hitler to the death echoing in the silo-like stone tower while the wind soughed and whipped the torch flames into a frenzy. They stepped forth, four at a time, to touch the consecrated battle standard, the swastika, a perversion of the Sanskrit swastika, a religious symbol to the Hindus, its four points representing the animal and spirit worlds, hell and earth. The left- hand swastika adopted by the Nazis stood for darkness, for Kali, goddess of murder, for black magic and witchcraft. To simply touch the cloth of this flag was sexually stimulating to some of the initiates.

The new black knights of the Third Reich returned to their places on the winding stone staircase, raised their arms and cried out:

‘Heil Hitler! . Heil Hitler! . Heil Hitler!’

They had touched the consecrated flag and taken the oath of fealty to Hitler. Now Himmler walked up the steps followed by Heydrich, giving each of the initiates a sword and scabbard to be worn only at official ceremonies. And each was given the long knife, their dagger of authority.

What a moment for Himmler! Hitler had given him full responsibility for creating the Schutzstaffel and he had gone about it with a vengeance, combining the mission of the SS with his own fantasy, spending three million reichsmarks to renovate the ancient castle known as Wewelsberg outside Paderborn in the heart of Westphalia. Just as the Nazis had perverted the swastika, Himmler had perverted Christian holidays into SS holidays—pagan rituals to celebrate Hitler’s birthday, the anniversary of the Beer Hall Putsch, harvest and spring festivals; had created a funeral service straight out of the Dark Ages, a midnight, torch lit ritual climaxed by cremation; had combined witchcraft and mythology into a pseudo religious order. And he conscripted and nurtured men who disavowed Christianity in favor of darker spirits; who worshipped Ares and other gods of war; who were matched in marriage to Aryan maidens selected by their commanding officers; who dreamed chaos, murder and unspeakable atrocity, their psychoses nourished by the Third Reich and encouraged to flourish by the Fuhrer.

Thus the SS was born; a madhouse government within the government, bound by no laws, with awesome powers and its own secret police, the SD. Hitler’s private army created in the mind of Himmler. But if Himmler had created the machine, Hitler had given it its perverted soul. Racism, Hitler had written in Mein Kampf would give the Germans “blood” and “soul.” It would identify a common “enemy.” It would restore the self- confidence and enhance the ego of the German people. So, he had ordered Himmler to create the SS. It would enforce this Nazi tenet and Goebbels would publicize it. Hate, terror, lies, these were the spine of the Nazi Third Reich.

Vierhaus stared down at Himmler, standing at the base of the staircase, looking up at the new troopers spiraling up and around him. Himmler smiled smugly. Treachery begets treachery, Vierhaus thought to himself. The SS would become Hitler’s avenging army against his onetime friend Rohm, now turned traitor, and his maverick SA brownshirts.

“You are now members of the greatest order in history, Die Schutzstaffel,” Himmler said. “Tomorrow you will take part in a great adventure, one which will tell the world that our great leader, Adolf Hitler, is Germany. And we are the true knights of the Third Reich. We are his army. Sieg Heil!”

“Sieg heil!” They answered.

“Sieg heil!”

“Sieg heil!” They answered.

“Sieg heil!”