Sept. 29, 1938
Munich, Germany
Six months had passed since the Anschluss and once again the eyes of the world were fixed upon Germany. The leaders of the great European powers had come to the city of Munich to discuss the Sudetenland crisis that threatened to once again bring war to Europe only twenty years after the horrors of the Great War. Hitler wanted the Sudetenland and the Allies wanted peace. It was a time of great significance, and the world held it's breath.
What does and does not qualify as significant, however, is often very relative. To Helmut Wolf, seated at a small table in a Munich restaurant, the only thing of great significance right then was the young woman seated across from him. His eyes were for her only and his breath caught in his chest when she smiled. The world might be looking to the great statesmen in Munich, but he was looking to her and she was the world. Since meeting her after the Fuhrer's birthday celebration back in April, he had found himself inexplicably drawn to her and had begun to spend much of his free time meeting up with this fascinating and beautiful young woman.
Free time that I have now in ample amount, he thought.
The bitterness of that thought crashed into the bliss he had thus far been experiencing. While he sat here miles away, the Whermacht had taken up positions on the Czech border. Included in this force were elements of the Brandenburgers Battalion, specifically those who were Sudeten Volksdeutsch. Helmut had been by turns crushed and outraged when he had heard that he was to be left behind while his comrades marched off to what could be war.
Thoughts of friends in harms way led his mind back to the letter he had in his pocket from his brother Otto whose unit was positioned somewhere outside of Breslau in preparation of a possible war with Czechoslovakia. In it his brother had sounded somewhat upbeat (for him) and had proudly stated that he was in command of one of two heavy panzer companies attached to his division. He commanded a total of thirty-six of the Whermacht's brand new heavy panzer design a sketch of which had been included in the letter. Helmut had simultaneously marveled at Private Lorenz's drawing ability as well as the fact that the letter had made it through the censors. The subject of the drawing, however, did not impress Helmut in the least. To him, it looked as if someone had dropped a box onto a panzer chassis and had then jammed a long tube into one side of the box.
But then, thought Helmut,
Otto seems really excited about it and he would know more than me right?
Private Lorenz's drawing of the Sturer Emil VK3001 Heavy Panzer
Helmut had puzzled over what appeared to be a heart with the letter M in the center of it on the forward section of the turret, but found an explanation in the postscript. They had decided to call their panzer
Marlene, after a waitress in a Berlin bar that Corporal Schneider fancied and had many a time drunkenly proclaimed that he would marry someday. Helmut smiled at the thought just as the lilting voice of his dinner companion broke into his reverie.
"I'm sorry my dear, were you saying something? I'm afraid that I was miles away."
"Is my company so boring to you Helmut?"
Helmut put on what he hoped was his most charming smile and replied, "Sophie, the last thing I would be in your presence is bored."
She smiled,
God, what a smile Helmut thought, and said, "Alright, I shall let you off this time. What I was saying was, that it's getting late and you should take me home."
Helmut frowned as he payed the check, unable to believe that the day had passed them by so quickly. Helmut opened the door out of the restaurant for her and walked arm in arm with her back to her apartment. When they reached the door to her building she turned to him and gave him a smile that made his stomach knot and his knees weak.
"Thank you for a lovely day Helmut.", she said.
"It was my pleasure. Goodnight.", he replied as he leaned in and gently kissed her cheek.
As she said goodnight and turned to open her door, Helmut touched her arm and said, "Sophie wait, I..." She turned back to him and gazed up with an expectant look in her eyes. It was that look and those eyes that robbed Helmut of whatever strength had led him to begin that sentence and he finished by saying simply, "I... will miss you."
"Well, then don't take too long coming back."
"I won't. I'll see you again as soon as I am able."
After she had closed the door behind her, Helmut walked to a nearby hotel at which he had gotten a room for his brief stay in Munich. Once inside, he got into his nightclothes and into bed. As he lay gazing at the ceiling in the darkness, he marveled at how badly you could miss someone that you had just spent an entire day with.
Sept. 30, 1938
Munich, Germany
Helmut sat sipping a cup of coffee while waiting at the station for the train that would carry him back to Brandenburg and his duties as a soldier of the Reich, and opened the newspaper that he had purchased from a young boy on the way in. As he took in the headline, he jumped from his seat at the unbelievable news that he was reading... Britain and France had agreed to German sovereignty over the Sudetenland. That territory and the three million ethnic Germans who lived within, were now part of the Greater German Reich. Helmut crushed the paper as he pounded a fist into his other hand in sheer joy. Hitler had won! The Allies had caved in! Germany, only twenty years removed from the humiliation of Versailles, had truly asserted itself on the world stage. It was a new world, he told himself, the start of a Golden Age.
German troops march into the Sudetenland in Sept. 1938
OK, so that's my last post for awhile. I hope it was good enough to keep everyone satisfied while I'm away. As I said in an earlier post, starting Monday I'm embarking on a new career and will be away from home (and my computer) for much of the time. I'll try to update on weekends, but cannot make any promises as to how soon.
Hope to see you all real soon! (Figuratively speaking of course
)
