Hitler's Niece

She laughed at the incongruousness of the statement, but Helene Bechstein forged ahead with, “Who is this Jewish boyfriend?”

“We’ve heard,” her husband added.

Geli was shocked. “There’s no one.”

“Are you pregnant?” Helene Bechstein asked.

“Isn’t it obligatory to have a male contribution?”

The old woman turned away. “Don’t be vulgar.”

“Wasn’t he a pianist?” Direktor Bechstein asked his wife.

With certainty, she said, “An art teacher in Linz.”

“I do hope he was good-looking,” Geli said. “I hate being linked with toads.”

Helene Bechstein stared. “Wolf urged us to bring you. To heal the wounds. Don’t you see that he desperately wants a détente?”

But the Wagner Festival filled Bayreuth with Germany’s rich and famous, and under those circumstances Hitler seemed to have qualms about associating himself with the scandal of his niece. She was avoided that afternoon as he waded through crowds, shaking hands and soliciting contributions. And so she visited Wahnfried just before the opera in a stunning red evening gown and red shoes and was told he was changing into his tails until finally she was told he was leaving. She was forced to share a box with the Bechsteins in the Festspielhaus for a flamboyant version of Die Götterdämmerung while she watched Winifred’s faraway opera box as Hitler swooned with the music and flattered Richard Wagner’s thirty-four-year-old daughter-in-law with affectionate hand pats, juvenile whispering, and the self-congratulatory talk that, for him, was flirtation. And then a message was sent to Geli’s room in the Goldener Anker Hotel that she was to go back to Obersalzberg by railway car in the morning.

She was in the flat at Prinzregentenplatz in September when she finally saw her uncle again. Three weeks had passed. She was just leaving the breakfast room as he came down the hallway in his jackboots and Brownshirt uniform, and he bowed forward from the waist as he asked, “And how was your summer?”

“Quite calm,” she said.

“Fully rested?”

“I slept well. And you?”

“Anni!” he called, and walked by her.

Anni Winter brought out his tea and biscuit tray from the kitchen.

There was a formality to their chance meetings in the flat, as if they were acquaintances who found they shared a floor in a grand luxe hotel. She still overheard him interrogating the Winters about what she’d done that day, and she noticed men she took to be SS who’d loiter for hours outside the Drogerie on Grillparzerstrasse, or walk a hundred meters behind her as she strolled along the River Isar to Müller’s Public Baths.

A friend from the university named Elfi Samthaber telephoned her one noontime and Geli told Frau Reichert she’d take the call in Hitler’s office. She sat in his chair as she chatted, and then she found in his wastebasket a handwritten note on orchid-scented Wedgwood blue paper that was just like the stationery she’d been given for her birthday. She read:

Dear Herr Hitler,

Thank you again for the wonderful invitation to the theater. It was a memorable evening. I am most grateful to you for your kindness. I am counting the hours until I may have the joy of another meeting.

Yours,

Eva

She tore the note into four pieces and in spite left it on the ink blotter. She continued her conversation.

She felt a flow of cold air river over her as she fitfully slept that night, and she reached for a fallen blanket until frustration woke her. And she saw that her uncle was kneeling on the floor beside her, fully dressed, and that it was he who’d folded the covers back, who’d softly worked the nightgown up to her waist. His hand found her mouth and held it shut as he bristled the skin of her buttock with smacking kisses.

“She means nothing to me,” he whispered. “You do.” His free hand forced itself between her clenched thighs and she felt chilled as he fluttered her sex. Worming his face into her flesh, he asked in the hushed voice of a lover, “Tell me what you want, Geli.” And he lifted the hand that was quieting her.

She felt the hot slide of tears on her cheeks. She told him, “To get away from you.”

Hitler halted for a second, and she was afraid he’d hit her, but then he continued as if she’d encouraged him. “Would you like to go to Wien?”

She felt like a child given a choice of presents. She said yes.

“Will you let me do what I want?”