Magda teaches me much about lust, how desire sneaks up capturing the skin. On visiting a hospital a year after the war started, I was embraced by a major with no arms who had sulfanilamides dusted over his entire body along with greasy unguents. His doctor told him he could do anything any man could do… go down on a woman… stand shoulder to shoulder with the Luftwaffe… smoke a cigar. Having never met Adi, the major had been on the Führer’s Autobahnen so much he felt personally close to him. Looking at this poor wounded warrior, I remembered Adi telling me about Napoleon who placed his hand on the plague-stricken sick in a hospital at Jaffa. So I patted the major and put a single white carnation behind his ear so touched by how neatly his empty sleeves were folded. To thank me he used his shoulders as limbs and gave me a mystical clasp. It’s strange, but I suddenly felt the sensation of the scalpel that entered his wounds, wounds he said that were washed in wine on the battlefield because wine was all they had. In that mystical hug, I experienced his open flesh as it received the knife. That armless embrace was so spiritual and yet so full of appetite that I had to rush home to ease myself. Taking off the white “sulfur dress,” I rubbed it back and forth between my legs as I do with a Mauser. I have my own Mauser just like soldiers on leave are required to carry all the time (though it wasn’t until General Krebs’ pistol practice that I learned its proper use).

That “sulfur dress” reminds me of silly Saint Catherine of Sienna who the nuns talked about when I was in school, the saint who saved pus from the lesions of dying women and kept it in bowls all around her. To show humility, Catherine drank the drainage. Even as a child, I’ve always thought this really proved nothing as humility is of no value, certainly not in times of war. Rubbing against a dress drenched in sulphur makes more sense.

Springing up from the table, Adi tires of the children and returns to the map room. The baby cries for him as he leaves. General Krebs has just arrived, and there will soon be heated arguments. I will record everything carefully as I always do though Goebbels continually tells me that my scribblings are not my duty as he is recording everything in a journal that’s been photographed onto glass plates and carefully stored away.

“Are you writing in third person… like Caesar?” Goebbels asks.

“I’m writing in intimate person… like me.”

“You can’t achieve distance that way.”

“I achieve tenderness that way.”

I know my memoir has emotions in it as well as loving details. Only I can record all the many sensitive qualities of the Führer. But I do wonder… what will happen to these pages?

A small sandbox Magda made for the children is under the staircase. Nobody knows this, but when the children are sleeping, I go there and draw what I’ve heard to visualize rearguard movement, group formations, the taking of bridges, mountain attacks. Battle strategy doesn’t bore me at all. And I focus on Germany’s great victories. I wouldn’t want Adi to find out I wasn’t respectful of his triumphs.

Finally wrenching his eyes away from Magda’s crotch, Hans stands. “I have wounded to fly out. Please, consider this last chance when we’re still able to reach the Pichelsdorf bridge.”

Magda waves him off with her soft glossy hand. Drenched in cream, she’s taken time to moisten her hands sometime between Hans’ entrance and her children’s napping. With so much rationing, Magda never has trouble finding lotion. She directs Josef’s orderlies (she calls them coat-carriers) to go out and look for any line to stand in telling them it’s not important what might be at the other end. Hopefully there’s perfume. One captain brought in some gold dust he found, and Magda ate it with her morning bowl of millet. She expected golden stools. The gold dust only gave her diarrhea and stunk up the place. Circulation is not always good, and we in the Bunker are mad for perfume. I usually rub against a block of wild juniper for a more natural scent that Adi appreciates.

“I have five Fieseler-Storch airplanes,” Hans announces.

“Are those the ones with open cockpits? Josef would never approve. Not for the children.” Magda pulls the baby close to her breast.

“There’s room for two children on your lap. Me in front. Two on Fräulein Braun’s lap in another plane. Two with my aide Colonel Beetz in another. Three planes for the Führer, his clothing, paintings…”

“The Führer has given orders that high ranking personnel are only to fly in aircraft with at least three engines.” Hair frizzy from the Bunker dampness frames Magda’s face. Frizzy hair makes her cheeks look puffed. I notice thin little squint lines by her eyes.

“But my planes can take off and land in meadows, if need be.”

“How safe can that be?” Magda moves so that her large crotch no longer shows. Hans is bereft.

“My full concern is for Mein Führer, you, the children, Fräulein Braun…”

“My husband?” Her lips turn down in that taunting way she uses to be coy.

“Herr Bormann, too.”

“Herr Bormann?” Magda chuckles. “He can carry the Führer’s Iron Cross on his lap.”

“Talk to her,” Hans says to me in a desperate tone. The crotch that just disappeared could possibly disappear forever. He holds a list of all the Bunker people who will fly to the Berghof as soon as the Führer orders a breakout.

“The children will be quite safe here,” I answer, almost believing it.

“We’re surrounded. If the Ivans find such women as yourselves…”

“What will they do to me?” Magda teases.

Hans looks at her tenderly, his lust momentarily forgotten. “They will instruct beauty.”

“You’re such a silly poet. And just when I wanted something more… graphic.”

“At the Weisser Krug Inn, women were raped by the Russians and nailed through their breasts to the walls. At the Roter Krug Inn in Gumbinnen, the same thing. Frau Goebbels, I’ve ordered a barge near your island estate. With plenty of food. Go there and hide. I’ll come and fly you out to Switzerland.”

Helmut jumps up and down in a pair of German boots that have springs in the soles for leaping over trenches. Two children are naked and jumping in water wiggles seeping from the scabby walls. They begin to fight. Separating them, Hans bounces Heidi on his back galloping to Magda’s side.

“Do this horse a favor,” he pleads. “Let me fly you out.”

Magda pats his pony head. “You can trot the children to their room. It’s bath time.”

“All of you, on my back,” he calls. Giggling children squeeze on Der Chef Pilot’s back, one on his neck and little Helmut bouncing and holding the end of his uniform like a tail. Sitting in a corner staring in disgust is Helga.

As I help unbutton the children’s clothes, Hans carries water to a tub.

Helga sits on a chair with her legs tightly crossed.

“Is the half-wit pilot going to live here?” Helga asks.

“Of course not,” I say.

“Of course not,” Hans repeats, saluting the children playfully. “I have wounded to fly out of Berlin.”

“What kind of wounded,” Helga asks.

“Men who have fought bravely for their country.”

“What kind of wounds?”

“No need for that,” Magda says, straddling the baby on her ample hip.

“I want to know,” Helga says.

“No, dear. It’s unnecessary.” Magda puts the baby on a cot. The children have little cots just like soldiers.

“I have a right to know. I’m a woman now.”

“That you are,” Magda agrees proudly.

“Tell me, then!”

“What is it you wish to know, dear?”

“Do brains pop out when soldiers get shot?“

Magda signals for Hans to answer.

“Jawohl.”

“How far?”

“If a man is shot in the head…” Hans begins looking nervously at Magda.

“How do people look when they’re bombed,” Helga interrupts.

“They get roasted purple and shrink to half their size.” Hans is seized with an honesty sanctioned by truth. He hopes this morbid account will help his demands for a breakout.

“And little kids? Like my brother and sisters? How do they look when they’re bombed?”

“I saw a direct hit on a school, and the children were fried in water pouring from a blasted boiler.”

“Fried like sausages?“

“Often, that’s so.” Der Chef Pilot looks hesitantly at Magda, but she’s only smiling in complete acceptance.

“But the brains remain gooey?” Helga asks.

“How do you mean?”

“Like pudding. And don’t try to make things better.” Staring boldly, Helga only allows herself to blink in careful determination.

“Yes. It’s pudding,” Magda says in a patronizing voice. “But what else, dear, would you expect brains to be? Made of granite? Then how could you hold up your lovely head?”

“Or toss your pretty little curls back and forth,” Hans adds.

“That reminds me, I must fix your hair. It’s really out of control.” Magda moves towards her daughter.

“Only Uncle Führer knows how to fix my hair.”

“May your mother help, the mother who loves you so much?”

“A mother who is beautiful as well,” Hans adds.

“You’re both treating me like a baby. When does Uncle Führer get finished with his meeting?”

“You know he’s never really finished, Helga.” I place my arm on her thin shoulder.

“Can’t I help you, dear? Just this once?” asks Magda.

“Uncle Führer is the only one with any sense around here.”

“Is that the way to speak to your mother?” Hans asks.

“Stay out of this, please, Herr Baur.” Removing my arm from Helga’s shoulder, Magda brings the girl closer to her side.

“I don’t want to be babied, mother.” Helga pushes away and sits defiantly on her cot.

“Your mutter is only trying to assist you,” Hans offers.

“Der Chef Pilot should concern himself with propellers—not little girls.” Magda sits on the cot protectively next to her daughter.

“I’m not a little girl,” Helga shouts, jumping up. The children stop playing with a wooden car on the floor and gawk curiously at their sister.

“We know you’re not a little girl,” I say remembering how she took in everything at the shelter orgy.

“What do you know? You don’t even have any kids,” Helga shouts.

“Is that the way to speak to Fräulein Braun?” Hans asks.

“Der Chef Pilot should not be telling my daughter how and how not to speak.”

“I’m only attempting to help,” Hans offers. His tight lantern face lifts upward in authority.

“Help? You can’t even get my stupid mother on your silly airplane because my baby sister won’t eat her in your dumb contraption,” Helga says.

“Breast feeding is not eating your mother,” I correct.

“This little brat needs a spanking.” Hans is now angry.

“Don’t any of you touch me,” Helga screams. “Lay a hand on me, I’ll tell Uncle Führer.”

Suddenly, Adi is standing in the doorway. “What’s going on here?” he asks sternly.

“They’re a bunch of idiots.” Helga runs to Adi’s open arms.

“There, there,” Adi says, stroking her head and looking at the other children. He’s happy seeing his Nazikinder, his wonderful blond Nazi children.

“Morons. All of them.” Helga whines, her face buried in his tunic.

“There, there,” Adi whispers, looking at us with a knowing smile. “Perhaps you would like to take a little rest in Uncle Führer’s room, my schönheit. My beauty.”

“Can I?”

“Only during my situation briefing with General Krebs.”

“That old stink-pot!”

“Helga! Don’t talk like that in front of the Führer.” Magda is finally upset.

“She’s quite right. He’s a stink-pot,” says Adi.

“See. I told you so.”

“Still, you must wait until I finish with him,” Adi says.

“Will you come in and fix my hair? Like you always do?”

“Der Führer is much too busy for that,” I say.

“There are a few minutes here and there,” Adi offers. His patience and loving pats make me envious.

Holding Helga’s hand, Adi leaves. The hair net she wears to be grown up is tight and mashes down her golden curls so she appears bald. The little bald lady looks back at us smirking. Magda cherishes those smirks, her glory transparent as her daughter goes to the Führer’s room to lie on his bed and wait for him.

“Now there’s your answer,” Magda tells Der Chef Pilot. She picks up a popular children’s book titled Mama, Tell Me about Hitler to read to the children.