Hitler's Last Secretary by Traudl Junge Page A

flowed in many winding curves, and the houses on its banks looked like little matchboxes. There was also a view from here between the mountains all the way to Salzburg, blocked only on the left-hand side by the Steinernes Meer, the ‘Stone Sea’. But that mighty colossus of rock was worth seeing for its own sake. In fine weather those to arrive first waited outside on a wooden bench until the whole party had assembled.
Usually Eva Braun brought her camera or cine-camera and tried to get the Führer in front of her lens. Admittedly she was the only person who could photograph him whenever she liked, but it was very difficult to get a good snapshot of him. He liked photos to be taken without any fuss or bother. But in fine weather, when the sun was shining, he always had his cap on, so that his face was in shadow, and he couldn’t be induced to take it off because bright light dazzled him. He might even be wearing sunglasses. However, Eva put so much cunning and patience into her passion for photography that she often got good shots -better photos, in fact, than those taken by her former teacher and employer Heinrich Hoffmann. 38
The tea-house was a round, stone building and looked ugly from the outside, rather like a silo or an electricity station. Inside, apart from the kitchen, a guardroom and the necessary anteroom and adjoining small offices, there was just one large, round room that you could enter either direct from outside or through a pretty entrance hall leading there from the kitchen quarters. There were some comfortable armchairs with flowered upholstery in this entrance hall, and little tables. A telephone stood here too.
This big, round room was an architectural masterpiece. The ceiling was slightly vaulted, the walls were made of marble picked out in gilt contrasts. Half of the wall had six large windows with a view of the beautiful landscape. On the western side of the room lay the big, open hearth and the entrance door. A huge, low, round table filled the middle of the room. Around it were about twenty deep armchairs, upholstered in alternating beige and terracotta. On the hearth side of the room were four very large chairs with high backs for the Führer and his guests of honour. The staff would have been told in advance of the Führer’s arrival, and the aroma of coffee already filled the house. The table was laid, and coffee was served as soon as we came in. Hitler would seat himself in his armchair right in front of the hearth, with Eva Braun to his left. There was no strict seating plan here either, and Hitler might invite Frau Schneider to sit on his right. The others spread out as they liked around the table. Usually there were several empty places.
Most of us enjoyed a cup of coffee after our walk. Some people drank black tea. Hitler himself would have apple-peel tea or sometimes caraway tea, never anything else. He ate freshly baked apple cake with it, and perhaps a couple of biscuits. The rest of us were given pastries bought in Berchtesgaden, and some of them could be stale and hard to chew.
It was difficult to get a general conversation going here. Every discussion had to be either conducted loud enough for everyone to hear it, or be between groups or couples, leaving silence on the other side of the table.
Eva Braun would try to strike up some interesting, relaxing subject. She talked about the cinema and the theatre, and sometimes tried to persuade Hitler to watch some particularly good movie. ‘You see, you can have it screened in the hall so easily, and this film is art too, it’s not light, it’s a very serious film. I mean, you listen to gramophone records, and I’m sure the German people would have no objection if their Führer saw a movie for once. In fact I’m sure the people would like your colleagues to go to the movies more instead of driving around in big, important-looking cars getting drunk.’ Hitler would always reply, ‘I can’t watch films while the war is on, when the