Chapter 4

The person who collected a very sore and well-thrashed Hilda from the jet at the airfield in Germany was a girl. Not much older than herself, Hilda reckoned, with a look of Obergruppenfuhrer Heinz Lehmann about her. That, as it turned out, was hardly surprising: she was his own daughter though even at 15 she was alone and had access to a vehicle.

The girl had the same shape nose, the same yellow hair as the man who had taken Hilda, and indeed something of the same assuredness about her. She may have been born to rule others like her father yet she regarded Hilda with curiosity. “You are not what I expected,” she said in English; a fact that astonished the Hilda, who had thought as the conquerors of Europe her people would only be happy if everyone was speaking German, especially in their own country. “Healthier looking. Not thin. We were told you English were starving to death. You however look a mess.”

Hilda still had a gag in her mouth and hands cuffed behind her. She felt exhausted and still tearful. The journey in the jet aircraft may have been been relatively short, as Lehmann had told her it would be, but the English girl had little idea exactly how far they had travelled. As she had spent the whole journey fastened into a painful strappado and her rear burning from a lashing by one of the two women accompanying the prisoners, the whole flight had seemed like an agonising eternity. She had every right to be a mess, both physically and emotionally.

A few hours before it had promised to be just another day modelling underwear in the shop window of Brunhilda Und Tochter, doing what she could to earn a few Marks so she and her mother could eat. Now she had been taken from both her mother and her homeland, and while handcuffed and gagged the girl had been beaten mercilessly. The only consolation was witnessing a glimmer of resistance to the occupation of her country by the Nazis. Hope swelled a little in her heart.

The German girl walked round the prisoner she was collecting and having completed the circuit of the slip-clad youngster she spoke again. “I am Frida. Frida Lehmann. You have met my father, Obergruppenfuhrer Lehmann. I serve in the Jugend-Volkswehr. This is my uniform.” The girl indicated the field-grey uniform she was wearing, bearing a yellow zig-zag lightning flash on each sleeve with a swastika in the middle. She also had single white stripe below it. She saw Hilda staring at it and tapped it proudly. “I am Stabsgefreiter. Lance-corporal you would call it, ja? But I am too young to fight; my duties are to work in supplies here at home. That is why I have this truck to drive.” The girl then gestured at a dirty and rather old small truck, painted as everything was around them in the inevitable field-grey. “My orders are to take you to my father’s house. My grandmother is waiting to receive you.” Light rain had begun to fall and the German girl said they should go before anyone got soaked.

Hilda was pushed into the passenger seat in the truck and Frida clambered in behind the wheel. The engine spluttered before starting with a reluctant growl and Frida swung the vehicle in a wide arc towards the airfield exit. “When we are clear of the airfield, I will remove your gag. Better it stays while you are under the eyes of the guards,” said Frida above the noise of the engine. Hilda could nothing but nod and hope it was soon; she was sick of the taste of rubber in her mouth and the way her jaw was stretched.

As the vehicle turned the English girl was aware of the silver jet aircraft being pushed into a concrete bunker-type hangar, and she had a distinct feeling of undue haste about this. The airfield must have wanted it out of the way, fast. The other three women taken off the plane—themselves still cuffed and gagged and standing in the rain—were waiting for someone to collect them. They looked terrified, but more tellingly their guards appeared anxious. It was as if being out in the open wasn’t good, but Hilda got the feeling it wasn’t the weather that was the problem.

As she looked, Hilda could see the twisted wreckage of burned out planes at the edge of the airfield. Then she saw the anti-aircraft gun crews scanning the skies. It was as if they were expecting an attack. Yet surely that was unthinkable. They were in the heart of Germany; a country that had won many major battles and having conquered enemies now ran Europe. A nation that proudly celebrated victory after victory in different theatres of war. Germany should by rights be the safe haven, miles from any enemy, and the one enemy they had left was reported routinely in the news as being on its last legs, ready to surrender to the Third Reich. It should be the richest, most relaxed place for a thousand miles in any direction.

Somehow, the feeling in Hilda suggested it wasn’t.

The old truck was waved out of the airfield and Hilda perked up. The road was decent and not badly cracked as many in England and though her rear hurt terribly it would probably be a short journey if nothing else. It wasn’t long she had the chance to see some houses in a small village. Typical European houses, fronting the road, and she expected them to be brightly painted and though it was not yet summer, there was sure to be evidence of flowers in window boxes and people standing around talking and laughing. People drinking, European fashion, sat outside pubs and bars. That was what was featured repeatedly in newsreels back home. Life, it was said, was good in Germany. This was the model for all of Europe under the Fuhrer’s wise guidance; what the Germans had now all the other countries would have soon. The message was that the benefit of peace and co-operation was prosperity for all.

The war had long been over in more than dozen countries. More, the small amount of damage caused by the British and the French several years before had been repaired as if it had never happened. Berlin was shown to be a mass of new, grand buildings and in a way Hilda was looking forward to seeing it. Hopefully even full shops, too, for full shops might mean a full belly.

The village looked battered. A row of houses on the road in was little more than a shell, with burnt timbers jutting out like bones and the windows gone. Masonry was scattered in the road, hastily pushed aside to allow vehicles to pass. A bomb crater was at the other side, restricting the width of the road further. For a nation that hadn’t had an air-raid against it in five years the strangest sight was a thin wisp of smoke curling up from one of the buildings.

For a moment Hilda felt a tremendous confusion, but then the rational part of her said that maybe they hadn’t gone to Germany at all. They had flown, most probably, to another place such as Holland, and the damage she was seeing was because it was to help train soldiers. The visible sign of alert was just part of some training exercise.

When the gag came out, as Frida had promised having stopped the truck a kilometre or so further on, Hilda exercised her jaw and was relieved it still worked. She swallowed hard and was grateful that Frida offered her a drink of water from an army-issue canteen. The water tasted metallic but it was better than nothing.

“Thanks for the water. For letting me speak. I speak German, fraulein,” Hilda said as soon as she could, but not in English. “You do not have to speak German to me.”

“No, I do not. My father said however I should.” Frida’s response was in English. “I must learn, he said. For when I am sent to England as part of his staff. That is the plan. It is good for me to practice.”

“So I am here to help teach you?”

“No, you are here to be my father’s property. But for me to learn, then yes. It helps.”

“Your English seems good,” said Hilda. “Now, can you unlock these cuffs, please? My wrists are hurting.”

Frida shook her head. “I have no key. I am told to take you to the house, where my grandmother will discipline you. Along with Marlene, the other slave.”

“I haven’t done anything wrong,” objected Hilda. She felt angry matters had come to this, and she was uncomfortable sat as she was, leaning slightly forward. Sitting on the thin cushion of the passenger seat with her backside hurting from the thrashing she had received on the jet was becoming more painful, too.

“My father wants you as his. That is enough. He told me about you, when he called me. Before the telephone line between England and here was cut.”

“What? That’s not possible. No one would do that. You can get shot for such a thing.”

Frida did not say anything and started the truck engine. It spluttered and coughed, refusing to start. Frida cursed in German under her breath, complaining about watered-down fuel as she got out to check the engine under the bonnet. She came back after a few minutes with a frown on her young face, complete with a smear of oil. She wiped it away with her uniform sleeve. “The engine is kaputt,” she said, her voice resigned. “It was poor judgement stopping. I should have left you with gag until we reached the house.”