“Hmm hum hmm hum hmm hmm hmm…”
Hans was humming irritatingly, and Dieter was reading in a chair in the sitting room, being irritated. Though he wasn’t allowed to perform magic without supervision or formal training, Dieter nonetheless read through his new spellbooks, trying to learn all he could before magic school began.
“Hmm hmm hmm… Flag high, ranks closed, The SA marches with silent solid steps… hmm hum…”
Dieter looked up from Defensive Magic for Beginners and noticed Hans in the entryway, inspecting his reflection in the wall mirror. His older brother was busy combing his blond hair and fiddling with the buttons on his Hitler Youth uniform, which had an unusually large number of medals pinned to it.
That was odd. The Deutsches Jungvolk did everything with its senior branch, the Hitler Jugend, but Dieter hadn’t heard of any meetings for that evening. “We don’t have an assembly tonight, do we?” Dieter asked, slightly worried. What would happen if he missed a meeting? Had he been so busy reading his Durmstrang books that he lost track of his Muggle duties? He got out of the chair and prepared to bolt to his room upstairs to retrieve his uniform if he had to.
Hans looked at him from across the room and smiled evilly. “Of course we do, little idiot brother. Why do you think I’m getting dressed?”
There was something a little amiss about Hans’ tone of voice “ one that said that that speaker was not to be trusted or taken seriously, and after eleven years Dieter had learned to spot that. The tension of missing an imagined meeting unravelled, and he walked closer to his older brother and spied the cluster of medals on his chest. Everyone knew that Hans was a bit of a slacker, and there was no way that Hans could have earned all the awards adorning his right breast pocket by himself.
“What are you doing?” Dieter said accusingly.
“What does it look like? I’m standing here, looking thoroughly attractive.” Hans then turned his attention back to the mirror.
Attractive? Dieter couldn’t see the appeal in Hans “ from a female point of view, in a strictly heterosexual sense, of course. He was irresponsible, annoying, arrogant… what was there to like?
But Hans seemed to consider his deviancy an asset, and unfortunately, girls thought likewise. Or at least Hans said they did, since Dieter never bothered to check. Judging by his older brother’s very upbeat mood and wide grin, he was about to embark on a so-called ‘hunting expedition.’
“…to capture a certain blonde prey with a magnificent pair of legs,” Hans was saying, somewhat to himself. “Should I leave my shirt buttoned entirely to look refined, or should I loosen it up a little to emphasise my rugged good looks?” he asked.
Dieter didn’t have an answer, and instead asked, “But why do you have to go out in your Hitler Youth uniform?”
Hans looked down and said condescendingly, “Because, Dieter, it is one of the fundamental laws of the universe. Girls are magnetically attracted to men in uniforms, especially handsome and charming ones with lots of shiny medals, like myself. They will not be able to resist me!”
Dieter had a sudden desire to vomit on his older brother, but nothing so dramatic happened. “Why are you so weird?” Dieter asked his brother instead.
“You’re asking me why I’m weird?” Hans retorted with mock affront. “You’re the wizard boy, Dieter, remember?”
“That I am,” Dieter stated with a hint of smugness. Not only was he more intelligent, responsible, and modest than his older brother, but he could also do magic. Well, not yet…
He added, “Being a wizard doesn’t make me weird. It just gives me unique capabilities“”
“Exactly,” Hans said, “and you’re wasting them. Why do you bother reading spellbooks on how to turn things blue or change needles into matchsticks, when you could instead be doing something useful, like discovering how to make undergarments evaporate? You’re mad to not see all the endless possibilities!”
“I have better things to do, Hans,” Dieter said flatly. “Unlike you, I have some ambition in life that goes beyond chasing skirts.”
Indignantly, Hans replied, “Hey! Don’t you mock the noble profession of gynaecology “ don’t say I don’t have ambition.”
A year ago upon Dieter’s discovery of his older brother’s ambition, Vati had choked on his coffee when Dieter asked him what a gynaecologist did for a living. The lecture Hans later received did nothing to dampen his spirits, since he was perfectly qualified in the perversion department. However, his medical expertise (or rather, complete lack thereof) could not measure up to his peculiar ambition.
“…Anyway, what do you have against girls, Dieter? Why don’t you like them?”
“I don’t see why I should,” Dieter answered. “They’re annoying, impossible to understand, and worst of all, they turn people like you into complete idiots.”
“Idiots, huh? Well… what about Mother and your sisters? They’re girls, aren’t they?”
Dieter was getting tired of this conversation. He muttered, “Of course they are, but they’re family “ it’s different.”
“So that means you prefer boys?”
He was about to answer “yes,” but then he caught himself before any damage was done. Trust Hans to take that route again... Dieter replied, “I’m not a homosexual, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“But if you don’t like girls, then you have to be,” Hans teased mischievously. “I’m sure the GESTAPO will find this interesting news!”
Dieter was not amused, and Hans laughed at his younger brother’s vexed expression.
“You can’t fight it, Dieter. You may want nothing to do with girls at your tender young age, but one day you will go just as insane as I am over them; I guarantee it.”
Dieter neither wanted nor expected that to happen to him: obviously, only unbalanced individuals with no self-discipline or common sense like his older brother would act in such a manner. Besides, Dieter saw plenty of girls at school or on Deutches Jungvolk outings, and they were little more than background scenery (or snowball fight targets, he thought ruefully). He couldn’t see how they could possibly exert such a bad influence on his brother, but they did it somehow.
“…Now, if we’re done discussing your confused emotional state, Dieter, I have important business to attend to,” Hans announced. “How do I look?”
Dieter would have liked to simply ignore his brother and return to reading his spellbook, but he dutifully looked at Hans’ uniform, particularly the medals on his shirt. Some most definitely were not from the Hitler Youth. One of them happened to be a black cross with flared arms of equal length, attached to a short ribbon.
“Why, you…”
“Yes, they’re Father’s,” Hans said casually, looking down at the fruit salad of medals on his uniform. “Do you like this one? It’s some sort of labour award and see, it features a muscular, bare-chested man with a sledgehammer. And the best part is, he looks just like me!”
Dieter could care less about the labour medal “ what angered him the most was the Iron Cross, Second Class he was wearing. It had belonged to Father’s late brother, who was killed in the war. Hans hadn’t earned it. Hans didn’t deserve it. “You can’t wear that “ it’s not yours!” Dieter said, pointing.
“I know it isn’t, but it looks good on me.” He stated with swagger, grinning broadly. “Don’t you agree?”
Dieter didn’t offer his opinion. “If Father sees you wearing that…” He finished the sentence by miming the slashing of a throat with his hand and making an unpleasant sound “ queeek!
“What? He’ll turn me into a duck?” Hans joked, totally unconcerned. “But that’s your job, being the wizard boy. Anyway, since Father won’t be home for another few hours, I’ll stop wasting my time on you and leave. Goodbye.”
Hans made for the door, but Dieter impulsively decided to get in the way. Nimbly, he darted past his brother and put himself between him and the exit.
“Get out of the way, Dieter,” Hans demanded.
“No,” Dieter declared. “I can’t help your inane obsession with girls, but what you’re doing wearing medals you didn’t earn, including some of mine…” he added, spying the offending tinnies adorning Hans’ chest, “…is dishonest and irresponsible. Now you take those medals off!”
“Or else what?” Hans asked.
Dieter didn’t have an answer. He didn’t just want to report his brother to his father, not wanting his parents to solve all his problems for him. Using force wasn’t an option either “ he didn’t know any spells so his new wand might have just been a useless stick, and his brother was too big to tackle on his own.
“Just as I thought,” Hans said in casual triumph, with Dieter unable to retort. Hans reached for the doorknob with his hand, but incredibly, the door opened on its own accord.
Hans froze at the sight of Father entering the house. “Thank heavens I’m out of the cold,” he said to nobody in particular while removing his snow-covered coat. Noticing two of his sons in the entryway, he explained, “We finished the meeting early, so the Gemeinschaftsleiter let us go home.”
Noticing his eldest son’s elaborate choice of dress, he added, “Are you going anywhere tonight, Hans? I thought the HJ didn’t have a meeting until tomorrow.”
Hans avoided eye contact and stuttered a drawn out “Errrr…” Dieter smiled in anticipation for the inevitable fireworks.
Father frowned. Soon enough, he examined the crop of medals pinned to his son’s chest. “What are you doing?” Dieter’s father demanded. He didn’t raise his voice, but it was intimidating nonetheless.
There was no way out “ Hans was stuck between a hammer and a hard place. With nothing to lose, he answered, “Looking handsome?”
Dieter suppressed a laugh. His father looked at him and gave him a look that said, Go. Leave him to me.
He was disappointed. Dieter wanted to see his older brother (who had impossibly become more irritating after Dieter discovered he was a wizard) verbally dismembered, but not one to disobey, he left the entryway for his room upstairs. As he closed his bedroom door, he heard shouts from the sitting room.
Paul was on his bed opposite of Dieter’s, and reading the dragon book he had purchased at Gellert Grindelwald Platz two weeks before. “Is Hans in trouble again?” Paul asked without looking up from the book.
He answered yes, and his younger brother by two years was not at all surprised. “Do you like the book?” Dieter then asked.
“Oh yes, I love it,” Paul said enthusiastically, tearing his eyes off the pages to look at his older brother. “There’s a LOT of information and it can be hard to read, but the best part is the pictures. They actually move!”
He flipped the book around and showed Dieter an illustration of a black dragon with ridges on the back of its spine. The reptilian beast didn’t move much since it was currently sleeping, but its sides’ slow rise and fall with its breathing was noticeable. Naturally, Dieter was already acquainted with the fact that pictures in the wizarding world moved, but he still found that fact bizarre and fascinating. He had even tried a horrible attempt at drawing a moving picture, but no amount of prodding with his wand could make it work. There was probably some spell he needed to know to do that.
“…And look at this picture,” Paul said excitedly, pointing to an illustration of a dragon skeleton on a different page. “Tell me what is odd about this skeleton.”
Dieter examined the picture for a moment and didn’t have an answer. Paul’s face seemed to glow as he proudly proclaimed, “It’s a dinosaur!”
“What?”
“Dragons are dinosaurs,” Paul repeated. “Look at this pelvis bone “ it’s the same shape as one found on a Tyrannosaurus Rex, or other big meat-eaters.”
Dieter had no idea what a Tyrannosaur pelvis looked like, so he readily accepted his brother’s conclusion. Just like how he had extensive knowledge of the war machines of the Wehrmacht, Paul similarly memorised everything there was to know about dinosaurs.
“Don’t you see what this means?” Paul asked, only to receive a blank look from his older brother. “This means that dinosaurs never went extinct! They evolved to be able to fly and breath fire!”
“Oh,” Dieter said simply. He plopped himself on his bed and opened his spellbook on defensive magic.
Paul ignored Dieter’s lack of enthusiasm and continued, “Think about it “ real live dinosaurs… After I go to Durmstrang, I want to study dragons!”
Now Paul had Dieter’s full attention. “Durmstrang?” he queried, “But you can’t go to Durmstrang, Paul. You’re not a wizard.”
“Yes, I am.”
“No you’re not.”
“Yes, I am,” Paul insisted, causing Dieter to roll his eyes. “I’ll teach myself and read all of your spellbooks if I have to, but I will be going to Durmstrang too in two years.”
“How do you know you’ll be accepted to Durmstrang?” Dieter reasoned. “Even I didn’t know until two weeks ago.”
Nothing Dieter said could convince Paul that he wouldn’t know whether he was a wizard or not until his eleventh birthday. His younger brother was completely and erroneously certain that he was a wizard just by his say so, and he ignored Dieter’s insistence that wizards were born, not made.
Paul buried himself in the dragon book and darkly muttered something that distinctly sounded like, just you wait and see…
Dieter returned to his own book and practiced wand movements. With his new wand in hand, he copied the hand and wrist motions illustrated in Defensive Magic for Beginners. He badly wanted to accompany the flicks and jabs with some actual incantations, but he suppressed the urge to do so “ he didn’t want to jeopardise his spot at Durmstrang by performing unauthorised magic.
It was getting late, and Dieter decided to go to bed. He placed his spellbook on top of his bedside table, covering his incomplete and neglected homework due the next day. He then examined the calendar he had mounted on his wall.
Christmas was in a few days, but oddly, Dieter felt no sensation of anxious anticipation. All of his excitement was reserved for the first of September, 1939, when he started school at Durmstrang.
That was in nine months. Dieter cursed his bad luck in having been born in the winter, and fervently wished his birthday was in the summer so he could have been spared the agony of waiting. He would have to wait day after day, week after week, and month after month before he could finally learn to do magic “ it was the greatest injustice in all the world.
He picked up a pen from his bedside table and crossed out another day with an X. Just one day closer.
Dieter pulled the blankets over himself and went to sleep, eager to put those unpleasant thoughts out of his mind…
“First Officer Heydrich!” Captain Otto von Von shouted with urgency. “There’s a dragon two thousand metres to starboard, approaching us quickly! This is your area of expertise “ you must protect the airship!”
The Valkyrie cruised one thousand metres above the endless Serengeti plain, and was on a collision course with the incoming reptilian beast. Just one burst of fire from the dragon, and the airship and the crew would be done for, one of the hazards of serving aboard a craft lifted by a big silvery cigar of very flammable hydrogen.
“We’re counting on you, First Officer,” the Captain said. “You’ve never failed us yet!”
Dieter saluted, smiled broadly, and shouted, “And I don’t intend to start!”
The officers in the cabin nodded approvingly. “Contact in one minute!” a lieutenant stated tensely.
There was no time to lose. Dieter left the cabin and scaled the long ladder through the gas bag to the very top of the zeppelin’s frame. The view from the top was magnificent and unobstructed, but to starboard was an angry flying reptile (a dinosaur, actually), closing in at alarming speed.
Dieter rolled up his sleeves and unsheathed his wand like a sword. He aimed the wand at the dragon and shouted, “NodragonissomethinginLatinus!”
The dream fell apart after that, since Dieter didn’t know any actual combat spells. His adventures on the Valkyrie gave way to some other confused fantasies, and he didn’t remember any of them the next morning.
Upon the realisation that Dieter was a wizard, his siblings had become obsessed with magic “ they badgered him day and night to show him tricks with his wand, asked for stories about his adventure in Gellert Grindelwald Platz, and searched for magical creatures in the forest. On this particular snow-covered Saturday, the two Heydrich girls had left the warmth of the house to look for fairies, the theory being they would be easier to catch when it was cold.
Privately, Dieter found the idea of fairies repulsive. When he thought of magical creatures, he thought of dragons. He thought of huge, scaly reptilian beasts with razor claws and immolating breath. They were terrible, living engines of doom, and a thousand times more powerful than his younger brother’s beloved Tyrannosaurus Rex. The very thought that tiny, annoying, girly little fairies could share the same magical world with dragons was… disturbing.
Dieter was perfectly content to let his sisters go on their fruitless search in the snow, while he enjoyed the warmth of the indoors. He was in the sitting room, curled up in a padded chair and reading another one of his textbooks for Durmstrang. He had finished Defensive Magic for Beginners and was now starting on Introduction to Transfiguration “ however, the next spellbook gave every indication that it would not be an enjoyable read. It was dense, overly technical, and just plain boring. Perhaps he could just skim through it and move on to the next book…
Wrapped in a thick coat and scarf, Vati entered the house and spotted Dieter sitting in the chair. “Put on something warm, Dieter,” he said. “There’s work to do.”
Whether a statement or a command, Dieter obeyed anyway. He privately grumbled as he set the book down on the coffee table and retrieved his coat from the rack in the entryway.
The front door of Number 23, Erdnuss-Straße opened inwards “ when Dieter twisted the doorknob and pulled the door ajar, he was presented with a wall of snow half a metre high on the other side.
Dieter stepped outside onto the platform of snow. His father had two snow shovels in hand, and gave one of the pair to him. The task was obvious and needed no explanation.
Two spades bit chunks out of the snow, and gradually the path to the entryway was cleared. Despite the cold air that numbed his fingertips and toes, Dieter felt hot in his coat from the exertion.
“Thank you for helping,” Vati mentioned when the job was done, and Dieter acknowledged his father’s gratitude with a wordless gesture. Father continued, “Now, I hope you don’t mind, but I’d like to have a word with you.”
Dieter suddenly realised that he had helped his father shovel the path just so he could be out of the house and away from prying ears. His father motioned to Dieter to follow, and led him from the street to a deserted nearby wood behind the rows of homes. What needed to be said that Father didn’t want to discuss inside?
“We’re not going to talk about… girls,” Dieter asked worriedly, dropping his voice to a whisper.
Vati smiled. “Do you want to?” he asked, very amused.
“Not particularly,” Dieter answered truthfully.
His father nodded with understanding. “Of course. I wasn’t going to talk about that anyway, but just so you know, don’t worry about them. One day, your attitude will simply change, and that will be all.”
Dieter was not reassured. That was exactly what Hans had said, and Dieter didn’t want to be like him if he could avoid it.
Vati noticed Dieter’s expression and sighed, “No, what I’d like to talk to you about is something a little unpleasant. I’d like you to explain this.”
He reached into his coat, pulled out a sheet of paper from his shirt pocket, and presented a folded sheet of paper. Dieter took the sheet and unfolded it, and read.
It was a list of his homework and quiz scores from his teachers at school. The scores at the beginning of the year were consistently good, but in the last two weeks, he hadn’t scored anything higher than a seventy percent.
“Explain to me why you haven’t been putting any effort into your assignments, or studying for tests.” Father said sternly.
Dieter was speechless for a moment. He glanced down at the score sheet. There were sixties, seventies, even a fifty percent “ a drastic slump from his own standards and his father’s expectations. His only answer was short and inadequate “ “I’ve been… busy.”
“I’ve noticed,” Father said unpleasantly. “You are a wizard, Dieter, but with the ability to do magic comes extra responsibilities, the least of which is to succeed in… ‘Muggle’ school. Now tell me why.”
When Dieter was unable to provide an answer, Herr Heydrich asked, “Do you remember our cover story for you going to a school of magic?”
“Yes,” Dieter replied with a nod. “I will be attending a Napola school, NPEA Stuhm, East Prussia “ an elite boarding institution for exceptional and promising…” He didn’t finish the sentence, recognising the seriousness of the situation.
“You see the problem now, Dieter? We cannot “ CANNOT “ give anybody any reason to investigate your disappearance from this town next year. The Napolas are very selective and they only admit the brightest students and best youth leaders, and until recently you have met those criteria. If you continue to perform poorly in school, then people might not believe us, and if anyone decides to probe into this matter, then we are in serious, serious trouble.”
“You see, I’ve done several… less than honest things to create this façade, all to ensure that you get the best education you can get. Do not let me down, but most importantly, please don’t let yourself down. This is your future, Dieter. You cannot let it go to waste by failing now. Do you understand?”
Dieter nodded, feeling gloomy.
“Now, do you think you can excel with your schoolwork without requiring me to lock away all your spellbooks?”
“Yes Father,” Dieter answered. “I’ll stop being distracted with my Durmstrang textbooks, but I don’t know about my siblings. They’ve been pestering me ever since they found out I was a wizard, demanding that I show them magic tricks. Marie is quite persistent, but Hans is the worst “ I think he’s jealous and just wants to harass me.”
“Then I shall speak to them about this and have them leave you to your studies. And speaking of Hans, that was a commendable thing you did the other day, confronting him,” Father said with sincerity “ he was even smiling. Dieter, who had spent the last few minutes facing the brunt of his father’s disappointment, welcomed the change in tone.
“You didn’t have to do it “ you could have let Hans take credit for things he neither earned nor deserved, but you tried to stop him, because you understand that those awards are no mere ribbons or pieces of metal. They are recognitions of someone’s hard work, sacrifice, and integrity “ Blood and Honour,” he added for effect. Those principles were the rock of the National Socialist movement.
Dieter thanked Vati for the compliments, and his father acknowledged them with a wave of his hand. He continued, “As for your other brothers and sisters, I suppose their hysteria about magic will just die down eventually.”
Dieter wasn’t so sure. Paul had recently revealed that he was convinced he was magical. Did Marie and Lena think the same thing, too? He told Vati his concerns.
“Well, as you said, we won’t know for sure whether they’re witches or wizards or not until their eleventh birthdays,” Father agreed. “Unless there’s a way to test for magic before that time, they’ll just have to accept that.”
“Well, there is a way to tell if they’re magical, Vati,” Dieter confessed.
Father asked, “Does this test involve jumping off the roof of the house to see if you magically escape injury, like Lena tried last week?”
“No, it’s different,” Dieter said. He then explained to his father about the house in Kartoffel-Straße, that was invisible to non-magical eyes. Dieter had avoided telling anyone about his visit to the deranged Herr Strichleiter’s mysterious house during the pogrom of November ninth, but now he decided that his father should know about it.
“So if we take the rest of the children to Kartoffel-Straße, we’ll be able to determine whether they are magical or not based on whether they can see Herr Strichleiter’s house?” Father proposed.
“Yes,” Dieter affirmed. “But I think we should make sure Paul and Marie and Lena and Albert stay as far away from that place as possible. I’d hate to imagine their disappointment if one turned out to be magical and the rest didn’t.”
Vati nodded. “I quite agree “ besides, it is still not safe for your siblings to venture there. And I don’t like the sound of Herr Strichleiter. You’re saying he did not differentiate between Jews and Aryans when identifying his personal enemies?”
When Dieter confirmed this, his father decided to meet the old wizard for himself. “If he is in fact dangerous and not just mad, it would be best if we know immediately. Take the snow shovels back to the house, and we’ll go.”
Within a minute, they were off, and Dieter described his encounter with the wizard in detail as they walked. They went down the snow-covered Erdnuss-Straße to Adolf Hitler Platz, and within a few minutes they made it to the street of the Jews.
The town of Gemüsestadt had been unfortunate enough to be the home of a settlement of about one hundred Hebrews. They were rootless wanderers with no love of home or country, and settled in one town or another for several generations before leaving to move their infestation elsewhere. Ever since the townspeople had exacted justice upon the Jews for burning down the Schwalbe household, fewer and fewer of the Jews remained “ many left the town, but where had they gone? Had they simply infested another nearby town, or had they fled to a less strong-willed country where the populace did not understand the degeneracy of their race?
Dieter and his father walked down Kartoffel-Straße. Apart from the boarded up windows, there was another feature that set the street apart from every other in the town, and that was the very noticeable lack of any national flags. The red banners of the NSDAP and Reich were a familiar sight in Gemüsestadt (and common enough to just be part of the scenery), and their absence gave the street a naked, empty feeling.
Spotting the magical house of Herr Strichleiter was easy “ it was the only edifice that was completely intact amongst the rows of broken homes and shops. “There,” Dieter said, pointing.
“Where?” Vati questioned, peering in the general direction of Dieter’s hand.
“Between that house and the bakery, right… there!”
Father shook his head. “I take your word for it,” he said. Dieter walked up to the house and his father followed closely behind.
Dieter knocked. For the first time, he noticed that the door had a number, which he hadn’t spotted during that night a month ago. After a few moments, the door of number 22/7 swung open to reveal Strichleiter “ tall, thin, and wearing an eccentric and very purple robe of some sort.
“Hello, little boy. Is this your father, I presume?”
Herr Heydrich answered for Dieter. “Yes I am,” he said, looking at a section of brick wall beside the door and not Strichleiter’s face. Dieter realised that his father still couldn’t see anything.
“Well, please come in,” the old man invited. Dieter took his father by the hand and pulled him through the door.
“WHOA!” he yelped in alarm. Being pulled through a solid brick wall to arrive in a room that mysteriously materialised in front of him must have been a very odd sensation indeed.
The strange brass instruments were still scattered throughout the room, clustered on tabletops and on the floor. They were invited to sit in some leather chairs, and Herr Strichleiter left for a few minutes. He returned with a kettle and some cups.
“Turnip Tea?” he offered, pouring himself a cup.
“Excuse me?” Vati said, wondering if he had heard correctly.
The old wizard repeated his offer for the turnip tea. Dieter wondered if it was even possible to make tea from turnips, but he suspected his father had other thoughts running through his mind. Anyone of his generation who had lived through the war hated turnips with a loathing. Dieter remembered his parents’ horror stories of ersatz coffee made from turnips, ersatz turnip bread (with sawdust for consistency), ersatz turnip meat, and every imaginable food substitute that had to be eaten during those years thanks to the Entente blockade.
Vati politely refused the turnip tea, but Dieter decided to give it a try “ it was quite watery and very bland, and Dieter wondered if wizards regularly drank such an uninspired beverage.
“So, was there anything you needed to discuss, Herr Georg Heydrich?” the old wizard asked while taking a sip of his tea.
Father was about to say something, but he stopped with his mouth open in surprise. Dieter was puzzled by his father’s reaction, and after a pause, Father said, “I don’t recall ever telling you my name.”
“I’m sorry.” Strichleiter explained, “It’s just that your son Dieter introduced himself the last time we met and mentioned you at one point. I hope I didn’t alarm you.”
Father gave Dieter a questioning look. Dieter’s expression was blank. He was dumbfounded and horribly confused. He was disturbed that the old wizard knew who they were, and Dieter was… reasonably certain that he had never told the man who he was. Or had he? He strained his memory, trying desperately to prove to himself that he hadn’t been that stupid.
Dieter’s mind eventually returned to reality. He heard his father making careful conversation with the old wizard.
“When you moved to this town, were you aware of the kind of company you have in this neighbourhood?”
“Oh no, not at all. Your son mentioned something about ‘Joos’ last month, but I admit I know nothing about your strange Muggle customs. Could you enlighten me?”
They talked for about ten minutes, and Dieter was under the impression that the wizard did not understand anything Father was saying and was only nodded and muttering things like, “I see,” just to be polite. Father steered the conversation this way and that, and discovered for himself how utterly clueless the old man was when it came to the world around him.
Dieter noticed that his father hadn’t brought up the delicate issue of Strichleiter’s opinion on ‘Muggles,’ and the wizard had likewise avoided the subject. Feeling reckless, Dieter waited for a pause in the conversation and asked, “Herr Strichleiter, what do think about Muggles? When we met last month, you said that they were enemies of wizards, and I want to know why.”
The old wizard took another sip of his turnip tea and stroked his thin, pointy beard (proving it was indeed flexible and incapable of impaling anyone, as Dieter once suspected), and said, “Meaning no offence to you, Herr Heydrich, but I’ll be frank with my answer: you Muggles are very strange. Though your culture, habits, and use of technological substitutes for magic are intriguing, I find your irrational barbarism towards other members of your race quite disturbing. As far as I can tell, those ‘Joos’ were Muggles just like you “ I don’t think I can trust Muggles if you are so blind.”
Herr Strichleiter was either completely insane, knew nothing about the wider world outside of his magical house, or both. He smiled broadly at Dieter and Father’s stony faces and asked kindly, “Do you want any more turnip tea? You should try some, Herr Heydrich.”
Father shook his head and stood up. As politely as he could, he announced, “Sorry, I don’t particularly like turnips. Now, it was a pleasure to meet you, but we really must be off.”
“And it was a pleasure to meet you,” Strichleiter replied. “If you ever want to stop for tea, don’t hesitate to drop by.”
Dieter followed his father’s lead and quickly left 22/7 Kartoffel-Straße. Herr Strichleiter watched the Heydrichs disappear down the street through his window.
Strichleiter sighed and shook his head slowly. He walked to his office, seated himself in front of a handsome desk, reached into a drawer, and extracted a stack of parchment. The top of the stack had the crossed-out names, Wilhelm and Gerda Schwalbe. He flipped to a new file labelled Dieter Eckhard Heydrich, dipped his quill into an inkwell, and began to write.