Frau Beyme felt that such memories, unlike those the soldiers had, led to much estrangement between German men and women. "At home, one experiences very grave things, upsetting things, unusual things. And the other [person] lives in Russia or France or somewhere in captivity and experiences things with which the woman could not empathize. Then suddenly he comes back. For everybody, that certainly was very difficult, and for many, it simply was impossible to be together again. The woman had learned how to forge ahead and help in emergencies and protect her children and earn money and get food or even steal it, if she couldn't find anything else to eat. She could no longer be the true devoted wife who only did what the man wants."
Frau Beyme thought the war affected her first marriage, too. "Less my independence, maybe, than the completely different experiences. I kept evolving more to the anti–National Socialist side. And my husband, oddly enough, did not. I know he didn't take part in the worst aspects of the war. He saw no action. He wasn't in any battle. He always had plenty to eat. He was always somewhat"—she paused—"to the rear."
She continued, haltingly. "Perhaps it sounds perverse, but I sometimes wished [. . .] that he [would] experience something completely horrible. I did wish that on him. So that he really understood it, that it [would] really make an impression on his innermost being and not remain on the surface.
"Oh, he brought back nice things," she added, rather scornfully. "First of all, something to eat and also clothes. I do believe he bought it all. I mean, as an officer, he got paid and could buy things. Nonetheless, it wasn't very nice. We were momentarily happy for something to eat, that's obvious. Or if I had something for the children to wear. But I always felt terrible we had invaded the countries and also took something away from them."
When her husband was home on leave, however, their political differences were not that great, she said. "He was no Nazi. It was a sense of duty. 'Everyone's doing it, and so do I.'"
The couple's main differences were not political, but personal. Yet the political were great enough to involve the personal. "I wasn't a member of anything except in 1944, at the end, when I wanted to divorce my husband. He did not want a divorce. I was very scared he'd do something to me politically. And there I'd stand with really nothing to prove I'd done anything for the Third Reich. I thought, what in God's name can I do to show proof of something? So I went into the lowest-level organization there was. [. . .] It was some do-good undertaking." The organization, she later confirmed, was the Nationalsozialistische Volkswohlfahrt (NSV) [National Socialist People's Welfare Organization]. (It was the same organization that furthered Frau Fischer's career.) About the process of joining, Frau Beyme said, "It all went so fast, I don't know now if I even paid something, but I had some receipt in my hand."
Whatever else her act proved, it also proved pointless. "He didn't try to do anything to me politically. I didn't need it. But I wasn't sure, and I was worried about my children. My fear of him wasn't that I thought he's such a big Nazi, but that he's so furious at me for wanting to leave, he might do whatever he wanted, in order to harm me."
Toward war's end, the divorce still pending, she made a gesture in the opposite direction. "Three or four weeks before the war was over, he was here on leave. And I knew, clearly, like anyone who could think, observe a little, it was ending. That we'd lost the war or would soon lose it. And I said to him, 'Stay here. Hide yourself here. Don't go back.' I'd have hidden him."
The offer was significant. The crime of desertion or hiding a deserter was treasonous.
"He said, 'I cannot do that' and went away on a bicycle. No more trains were running, there was chaos everywhere, and he left on a bicycle just so he could get [to his unit]. Then he was taken prisoner. I didn't know where he was. He could have stayed here, but that sense of duty said 'No, I may not. Keep going.'"
What did he think of her suggestion? That it was sweet of a woman?
She laughed. "I don't think he found it so sweet, but completely impossible. 'A woman does not know a man's duty.'"
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