chauffeur Wilhelm Schulz driving, they all set out in the Mer-
cedes from Berlin, but by the time they arrived at the wind-
swept, bleak churchyard at Lövo near Drottningholm, the coffin
was already in the ground. It was the last time that Carin’s em-
bittered father, Baron Carl von Fock, would ever seen his five
daughters together, because on the following night, at the
Grand Hotel, Carin collapsed with a heart attack.
Once more Hermann was told that these were her last
hours. She had no will to live on, now that her mother had
gone, but for several days she lingered, while Göring sat at her
bedside clad in a red silk dressing gown, or crept away to shave
or snatch a meal. Once her eyes fluttered and she whispered, “I
did so hope I was going to join Mama.”
Occasionally Hermann turned to Thomas, sitting bleakly in
a darkened comer of the room, and tears were glistening in his
eyes.
And then the telegram came recalling him to Berlin. With
unemployment now topping five million, the Nazi clamor to
take over from the hapless Brüning had become too loud for
President Hindenburg to ignore. He wanted to see the Nazi
leadership about forming a new government. Herr Göring was
required to return at once.
For five more days he stayed at Carin’s bedside, his con-
science torn between duty and desire. The nurse, Märta Mag-
nuson, would recall years later that his hands were soft and
feminine on first glimpsing him with his head bowed and
long hair hanging down she had thought it was a woman. The
couple barely spoke. Once Carin asked for the bed to be moved
so she could look across the water to the palace where she had
been presented at court in and had danced at the royal
balls.
“I am so tired,” she whispered to her son when Hermann