him out of the Gestapo’s clutches and bring him straight to
Carinhall. He waved a jocular hand at his wall fresco. “Well,
Schmidt,” he said, “got your own wall map now?” In a two-hour
conversation with the perspiring, nervous ex-minister on Mon-
day morning, Göring promised him sanctuary if ever he needed
it. Once, their talk was interrupted by the phone it was Sir
Nevile Henderson. Göring mischievously mentioned that he
had Guido Schmidt right next to him “I’m thinking of giving
him a diplomatic post!” and was gratified to hear an indignant
gasp at the other hand. (“Talk of Judas!” the ambassador wrote,
most unfairly, to London about Schmidt. “He has lost no time
in coming for his thirty pieces of silver.”)
To Austrian legation official Hans Schwarzenberg, who had
driven Guido Schmidt out to Carinhall that morning, it was
plain that Göring was baffled at the sudden twist that events in
Austria had taken the day before. “We had all been of one mind
with Hitler,” the field marshal remarked as they rejoined their
car, “that Austria should be allowed to retain her autonomy.”
Göring shrugged. The people of Linz had knitted the
rope, and Hitler had merely jerked it tight.
Years later, this letter from Göring’s sister Paula was found
tucked away in his desk, describing her feelings in the first days
of post-Anschluss Austria:
Wels, March ,
My truly beloved brother!
For three days now I’ve been going about in a
dream, I just can’t believe this gigantic and wonderful
event! I’m so deeply moved I can’t do anything but sit
for hours glued to the radio while the tears stream
down and my eyes just won’t dry! I would have dearly
loved to write you on Friday night, but I couldn’t
even have held a pen! Bursting with gratitude, I