In The Presence Of My Enemies

Lise glanced over at Heinrich. Whatever he'd been waiting for, that wasn't it. She knew a certain amount of relief. She would have worried if he'd got that excited about a plane crash.

Then the picture shifted to Adolf Hitler Platz. Heinrich stiffened. This was it, all right. But why? There was Rolf Stolle, making one of his usual rabble-rousing speeches. And the rabble were indeed roused, as their cheers and shouts showed. But some oom-pah music kept coming close to drowning out the Gauleiter of Berlin. What was that all about?

Then Horst Witzleben said, "Despite attempted interference from an SS marching band,Gauleiter Rolf

Stolle delivered another strong statement supporting the Fuhrer 's reform program this afternoon in central Berlin. His large audience received him favorably, and showed their displeasure at the band's not at all coincidental presence in the square."

His voice cut off. Lise heard people shouting. For a moment, it was just rising and falling noise. Then she made out words: "SS go home! SS go home!"

Ice and fire rivered through her, both together. They'd saidthat? Nothing had happened to them? And now the authorities were showing the pictures on the evening news?

Heinrich grabbed her hand. His voice quivering with excitement, he said, "I wasthere, out in the platz. I was listening to Stolle. And I was shouting for the SS to leave along with everybody else. And theydid!"

"You?" Lise said in amazement. Heinrich nodded. "Was that safe?" she asked.

"I don't know. I think so. I hope so," he answered. "So many people were there, I don't see how they can grab everybody." But he hesitated a little before he said that. Was he trying to convince her or himself or both of them?

"Well, it's done. I hope it turns out all right," she said, and then, "I didn't see you anywhere on the tape."

"Good. I didn't, either," Heinrich said. He'd been watching for himself, then, which meant he was more worried than he let on. Lise sent him a look half affectionate, half exasperated. Hewould try to play down whatever bothered him, because he didn't want her to worry. Once in a great while, that worked. The rest of the time, it only made her worry more.

An advertisement for a breakfast cereal tried to show that eating the stuff would make you rich, athletic, and beautiful. Lise remained unconvinced. "It tastes like library paste," she said.

"I wouldn't be surprised," Heinrich replied, "but how do you know what library paste tastes like?"

"How? I'm the one who helps the girls put school projects together, that's how," Lise said. "I eat the paste, I breathe it, I damn near bathe in it. Last week,Frau Koch wanted everybody in class to make a model of one of the forts the Reich uses to protect German farmers in the Ukraine from bandits. Do you have any idea how much fun it is to glue three strands of tinsel barbed wire to toothpick stakes?"

"As a matter of fact, no," Heinrich admitted. "Is that why you were in such a lousy mood last-when was it?-Wednesday night?"

"You bet it is," Lise said. "And there had to bethree strands of barbed wire, too, by God, or Francesca would have lost points.Frau Koch said so. She really is a beast, if you ask me. Everything else about the project was like that, too: do it exactly this way, or else. How are they supposed to learn anything?"

"I'll tell you what they learn," Heinrich said. "They learn to obey."

Lise hadn't thought of that. But as soon as her husband pointed it out to her, she saw that he was right. School taught more than the multiplication tables and the capital of Manchukuo and how Bismarck unified the Reich. It taught children how to be good Germans, how to be good Nazis. One of the things they needed to know was how to blindly obey anyone set over them. The fortress needs to have three strands of tinsel barbed wire?Jawohl, Frau Koch! Three strands of tinsel barbed wire it shall have! And why does it need to have them? Because Frau Koch says so. No other reason needed.

But Germans-some of them Nazis, no doubt-had stood out there in Adolf Hitler Platz shouting, "SS go home!" They really had. And here was Horst Witzleben, showing them to the whole Reich, to much of the Germanic Empire, with every sign of approval. Would people be chanting the same thing in Oslo tomorrow? In London? Even in Omaha? What would happen if they did?

Horst Witzleben said, "Today, the Fuhrer met with a delegation from the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia to discuss that region's future relationship with the Greater German Reich. At the close of the meeting, a spokesman for the Fuhrer said that while Bohemia and Moravia, which have been part of the Reich since 1939, cannot reasonably expect to regain their former independence, a larger degree of autonomy within the German federal structure is not beyond the realm of possibility."