CHAPTER 297: THEN SAY SO. CALL ME YOUR ENEMY.

The snow had begun early in Berlin, brushing across the Reich Chancellery windows.

General Werner von Fritsch stood at his office window, arms behind his back, watching the snow fall.

He turned when he heard the door.

His aide, Major Ebeling, entered with a file in hand. "This was delivered from the Chancellery this morning, General. Marked urgent."

Fritsch nodded and accepted it without a word.

The man waited a moment too long. "Is there anything..?"

"No. That will be all."

When he was alone again, Fritsch opened the file.

His face remained still, but his hands stopped midway through turning the first page.

There it was, allegations of moral indecency.

Specifically, homosexual activity.

Names.

A statement from an informant in police custody.

Dated two weeks ago.

Typed by someone he didn’t know.

He didn’t finish reading.

He didn’t need to.

He knew what it meant.

This wasn’t about scandal.

It was about control.

He folded the file carefully, as if it were a flag, and set it down on his desk.

Later that morning, he walked the short distance through Tiergarten’s icy paths to meet General Ludwig Beck, Chief of the General Staff.

Beck greeted him with a nod, the two men settling into a small back office near the War Ministry’s west wing.

No guards nearby.

No stenographers.

No eyes but their own.

"It’s begun," Fritsch said.

Beck didn’t ask for an explanation. "I heard."

"Accusations. Manufactured, of course. From a criminal informant they dug up out of the Berlin gutters."

Beck sat forward. "They’re going to make it stick?"

"They don’t have to. They just have to say it loud enough."

Neither man spoke for a moment.

"They’ve chosen today for it," Beck said quietly. "There’s a Cabinet meeting. No War Minister present. No warning."

"They’re not warning. They’re removing."

Beck shook his head. "You’ve been loyal."

"So was Blomberg."

They both knew what that meant.

Field Marshal Werner von Blomberg, the War Minister, had just resigned days earlier under pressure accused of marrying a woman with a criminal past.

Another scandal.

Another cleansing.

"They’re replacing the War Ministry entirely," Beck said. "I’ve heard the name already Oberkommando der Wehrmacht. High Command of the Armed Forces. Hitler’s creation."

"And Keitel?" Fritsch asked.

"Likely to be promoted. He won’t question it."

Fritsch let out a low breath, almost a laugh. "Keitel never questions."

"You should be careful."

"I am already gone, Ludwig. You know it. I’m just walking the path to the end."

By mid-afternoon, the summons came.

A car from the Reich Chancellery arrived at Fritsch’s residence.

No military driver.

Just a man in civilian clothes.

Fritsch stepped in without hesitation.

They drove in silence.

At the Chancellery, the halls were strangely empty.

No aides brushing past with clipped greetings.

No staffers whispering schedules or salutes.

Fritsch was led into a small meeting room not the main hall, not the council chamber.

A square table.

A single lamp.

One man seated.

Adolf Hitler did not stand when Fritsch entered.

"General," he said simply.

Fritsch nodded, remaining standing. "Mein Führer."

There was no file on the table.

No paperwork.

No court, no hearing.

Hitler looked at him with flat eyes. "You are relieved of command, effective immediately. An investigation will be conducted."

"I see."

"The allegations speak for themselves."

"They speak for someone. Not for me."

"This is not a matter for debate."

"Then what am I here for?"

Hitler paused. "To be dismissed quietly. You have served the Reich. There is no need for disgrace. Unless you force it."

Fritsch stared at him, then slowly sat. "I’ve led the German Army with honor. I have not conspired. I have not lied. I have not committed the act you accuse me of. And you know it."

Hitler said nothing.

Fritsch leaned in slightly. "I have followed orders. I have accepted policies I did not author. I have swallowed my doubts for the sake of unity. And still, this."

"You hesitated," Hitler said, finally. "You questioned rearmament schedules. You resisted the integration of the SA. You hesitated on Austria. These are facts."

"My hesitation was caution, not betrayal."

"Caution is the language of enemies."

Fritsch stood. "Then say so. Call me your enemy."

Hitler remained seated, unmoving. "Leave the Reich with your dignity intact, General. Or I will remove that too."

Fritsch looked at him for a long moment.

Not with hatred just recognition.

Then he turned and walked out without a salute.

In the corridor, a young army officer waited awkwardly near the exit.

He stepped aside quickly when he saw Fritsch approach, but didn’t speak.

He didn’t meet his eyes.

Outside, the snow had turned to a wet slush.

The car was gone.

There was no driver.

Fritsch walked.

He crossed Wilhelmstraße with slow steps.

The air felt too cild.

Berlin, for all its buildings and flags and headlines, seemed like a stage that had gone quiet between acts.

By the time he reached Unter den Linden, his boots were soaked through.

No one recognized him.

Or pretended not to.

He passed a newsstand.

A copy of the Völkischer Beobachter was folded, half-wet, headlined with a story about agricultural reforms.

Nothing about the army.

Nothing about him.

Maybe from now on he doesn’t exist.

In the War Ministry, Wilhelm Keitel signed his promotion letter that evening.

He was calm.

He didn’t ask questions.

He was not a man who asked questions.

When someone in the hallway congratulated him, he nodded and said, "I serve the Reich."

No more. No less.

Fritsch returned home just past nine.

His coat was soaked.

He undressed slowly, without speaking.

His housekeeper had left the lights on.

There was stew on the stove.

Cold now.

He sat at the kitchen table without eating.

Eventually, he lit a cigarette and opened a blank sheet of paper.

He began to write, but not a letter. Not yet.

He wrote a date.

January 5, 1938.

Then he underlined it once.

Slowly.

Precisely.

And above it, two words.

It begins.