another roadblock, and the jackals from Himmler’s SS were searching for deserters. The slack body of a young man hung from a telephone pole, and she tried in vain to keep a wide-eyed Pauli from seeing it. The corpse’s eyes were open and his purple tongue stuck out.
A golden-haired and well-fed SS officer in his late twenties, clad in a shockingly clean black uniform, walked through the little crowd and sniffed at them in dissatisfaction. There were no deserters here. Only the old, the lame, a few women, and a couple of children. He stood in front of Elisabeth and stared, and she looked back at him although her eyes continued to have a hard time focusing. In her condition she was physically thin and shapeless and was wearing the clothing of a small man. She also probably looked quite mad.
“And what is this,” the officer sneered. “Male or female?”
A couple of soldiers snickered, and the officer ran his hand down the outside of her shirt, searching for breasts. Once she had had a nice petite figure. Now she was a shapeless stick.
“I can’t tell,” the SS man pronounced to his men in mock confusion. He laughed at his own joke and his men laughed along. Then he jammed his hand down Elisabeth’s slacks and grabbed her crotch so hard that she yelped in pain and shock. “Female!” the officer proclaimed triumphantly. “But so wasted she isn’t worth fucking.” He waved to the one-legged man who was glaring at him. “Cripple, get these people out of here. Heil Hitler!”
Elisabeth stood transfixed by the brutal actions of the SS officer until the one-legged man limped up to her. Steadying himself with his crutch, he patted her cheek with his hand. She was almost in shock from the incident.
“It’s all right, little girl. It is all a bad dream that will soon be ending.” He looked at her sunken cheeks and pale skin. “When did you last eat?” he asked.
“She feeds me,” Pauli chirped with the innocence of his six years.
“Ah,” the man said, understanding. The girl had been giving her scant supply of food to the boy. “What is your name?” he commanded her, and Elisabeth told him.
“Good,” he said. “I am Wolfgang von Schumann. Once I commanded a brigade of tanks. Now I shepherd this little flock. Do you understand me?” Elisabeth nodded dreamily. She was almost out of energy and the world was starting to revolve. Von Schumann continued. “In a few minutes, I am going to call a halt for the night. We will distribute what food we have. I will see that the boy has his share and you will eat yours and not give it away. Do you understand? If you love this boy, you will help yourself stay alive for him.”
Elisabeth blinked and started to cry. “Yes,” she whimpered. She saw that von Schumann was about the same age as her late father, maybe fifty. He had a stern face, but his eyes were sad, not cruel.
Von Schumann gestured for a couple of women to help Elisabeth, who was about to collapse. “Perhaps we can even find some extra food to help you regain your strength.”
As the women led Elisabeth and Pauli away, motion in the distance caught von Schumann’s eye. A line of military vehicles, including tanks, was driving on the autobahn a couple of miles away. His military experience and his excellent eyesight told him the tanks were not Panzers and the silhouette was not that of a Russian T34. It was too high. He sucked in his breath. Was it possible they were American Shermans? From this distance, he couldn’t be certain. But what if they were? God in heaven, what would happen now? The Russian army was on both sides and behind his group. In front of him was the once lovely city of Potsdam. When the two forces did link up, he wanted to be on the American side.
He felt a tug at his sleeve. “Sir, what’s wrong with Aunt Lis?”
Von Schumann sighed. The girl had fainted and was being half carried, half dragged into a building by the women who had been holding her up. She was young and presumably healthy. Some food, rest, and water would help immeasurably. He remembered that the boy’s name was Pauli.
“Pauli, I’m sure all she needs is a little rest and some food.”
“Was I bad for eating her food?” the boy asked.
Von Schumann laughed at the innocence of children. It felt good to laugh. “No, Pauli, your Aunt Lis was very good for sharing it with you.”
CHAPTER 4
Harry Truman finished reading his briefing papers and put his wire-rimmed glasses on the desk. He was exhausted, but no more so than the man in front of him.
“General Marshall, what about our boys and Berlin?”
“Mr. President, they are still making progress, although it is much slower than we had hoped.”
“They’re not taking heavy casualties, are they? I don’t want that. Certainly not at this stage.” Truman had been having second thoughts about the decision to send soldiers toward Berlin. The realization that he was solely responsible for whatever befell those men was a heavy one.
“Actually no, sir. While there have been some casualties, the rate has been quite light. They are simply moving slowly and cautiously, checking for mines and possible ambushes. Also, the roads and bridges have been pounded by the Air Corps, so there’s quite a bit of maintenance to perform as they move out. They are just about ready to move into the suburbs of Berlin.”
Truman snorted. He hated the term light casualties. To him it was an oxymoron. Casualties were light unless, of course, you were one of them, in which case casualties just became heavy. He’d seen casualties firsthand as an artillery officer in World War I and hated the thought of causing them, light or not. He thought it was a good thing that America’s new president was actually a combat veteran who understood the human cost. Too many presidents, FDR included, had never seen real combat.
“At which point,” Truman said, “if I read these maps correctly, they will be very close to the northern arm of the Russian army.”
“Correct.”
Truman put his glasses back on and stared at his secretary of state, Ed Stettinius. “Ed, what about Stalin? Has he responded yet to our note?”
“Not yet, sir.”
Truman scowled. “I certainly hope the man has received it and has given his generals notice of our intentions.”
Stettinius almost looked affronted. “Sir, I handed it to Ambassador Gromyko myself. We also directed several other copies through the Swiss and the Swedes. He has it, sir. Stalin is just being his usual mysterious self.”
Marshall thought that Stalin was a little more devious than mysterious but held his tongue. Stalin’s intentions would become evident soon enough. He hoped to God that Colonel Burke’s assessment of Stalin’s aggressive intentions would prove wrong.
T HE S OVIET EMBASSY was housed in a large, old, and grim building on 16th Street in Washington, and the party was in full and rowdy swing when Steve Burke arrived with Natalie Holt on his arm. He noticed with amusement the number of Marxist-Leninists who were goggle-eyed at the sight of Natalie’s off-the-shoulder green silk dress, which showed both a wonderful shoulder and the hint of well-rounded cleavage. Due to the cloth shortages that decreed shorter hemlines, it also showed a surprising amount of extremely lovely leg. He couldn’t decide whether he liked their overt attention or was jealous. And why would he be jealous in the first place? It wasn’t like he and Natalie were engaged or anything. He decided he was acting like an adolescent.
“Natalie, I think they would like to coexist peacefully with you.”
“How charming,” she said, smiling affably, not at all put off by the stares. With her looks, he thought it was doubtless something she had gotten used to. “But they can’t have me, and it’s all their fault for eliminating the aristocracy. Now they have nothing to strive for.”
Invitations to the Soviet reception had not been difficult to get. Several had been left with the Russian section of the War Plans department and it would not have surprised Burke if he saw some of his colleagues bellying up to the very large and crowded open bar.
The party’s ostensible purpose was to commemorate both the arrival of a new cultural attache, who was doubtless a spy, and to celebrate what everyone was referring to as the Allies’ mutual final push on Berlin. When Berlin was finally taken, it was said, Hitler would be displayed in a cage in the Kremlin where he could spend the
