Garden of Beasts

Socialist government, a telephone call at an odd hour was a matter of concern.
    “Reinie,” Gertrud called. “Someone has telephoned for you.”
    He pulled on his shirt and, not bothering with stockings or shoes, walked down the stairs. He took the receiver from his wife.
    “Yes? This is Ernst.”
    “Colonel.”
    He recognized the voice of one of Hitler’s secretaries. “Miss Lauer. Good morning.”
    “And to you. I am asked to tell you that your presence is required by the Leader at the chancellory immediately. If you have any other plans I’m asked to tell you to alter them.”
    “Please tell Chancellor Hitler that I will leave at once. In his office?”
    “That is correct.”
    “Who else will be attending?”
    There was a moment’s hesitation then she said, “That’s all the information I have, Colonel. Hail Hitler.”
    “Hail Hitler.”
    He hung up and stared at the phone, his hand on the receiver.
    “Opa, you have no shoes on!” Rudy had come up beside Ernst, still clutching his drawing. He laughed, looking at his grandfather’s bare feet.
    “I know, Rudy. I must finish dressing.” He looked for a long moment at the telephone.
    “What is it, Opa? Something is wrong?”
    “Nothing, Rudy.”
    “Mutti says your breakfast is getting cold.”
    “You ate all your egg, did you?”
    “Yes, Opa.”
    “Good fellow. Tell your grandmother and your mutti that I’ll be downstairs in a few moments. But tell them to begin their breakfast without me.”
    Ernst started up the stairs to shave, observing that his desire for his wife and his hunger for the breakfast awaiting him had both vanished completely.
    •   •   •
    Forty minutes later Reinhard Ernst was walking through the corridors of the State Chancellory building on Wilhelm Street at Voss Street in central Berlin, dodging construction workers. The building was old—parts of it dated to the eighteenth century—and had been the home of German leaders since Bismarck. Hitler would fly into tirades occasionally about the shabbiness of the structure and—since the new chancellory was not close to being finished—was constantly ordering renovations to the old one.
    But construction and architecture were of no interest to Ernst at the moment. The one thought in his mind was this: What will the consequences of my mistake be? How bad was my miscalculation?
    He lifted his arm and gave a perfunctory “Hail Hitler” to a guard, who had enthusiastically saluted the plenipotentiary for domestic stability, a title as heavy and embarrassingto wear as a wet, threadbare coat. Ernst continued down the corridor, his face emotionless, revealing nothing of the turbulent thoughts about the crime he had committed.
    And what was that crime?
    The infraction of not sharing all with the Leader.
    This would be a minor matter in other countries, perhaps, but here it could be a capital offense. Yet sometimes you couldn’t share all. If you did give Hitler all the details of an idea, his mind might snag on its most insignificant aspect and that would be the end of it, shot dead with one word. Never mind that you had no personal gain at stake and were thinking only of the good of the fatherland.
    But if you didn’t tell him . . . Ach, that could be far worse. In his paranoia he might decide that you were withholding information for a reason. And then the great piercing eye of the Party’s security mechanism would turn toward you and your loved ones . . . sometimes with deadly consequences. As, Reinhard Ernst was convinced, had now occurred, given the mysterious and peremptory summons to an early, unscheduled meeting. The Third Empire was order and structure and regularity personified. Anything out of the ordinary was cause for alarm.
    Ach, he should have told the man something about the Waltham Study when Ernst had first conceived it this past March. Yet the Leader, Defense Minister von Blomberg, and Ernst himself had been so occupied with retaking the Rhineland that the study had paled beside the monumental risk of reclaiming a portion of their country stolen away by the Allies at Versailles. And, truth be told, much of the study was based on academic work that Hitler would find suspect, if not inflammatory; Ernst simply hadn’t wanted to bring the matter up.
    And now he was going to pay for that oversight.
    He announced himself to Hitler’s secretary and was admitted.
    Ernst walked inside the large ante-office and found himself standing before