Now I’m four years old.

Everyone says I’m very good-looking. I’m willing to believe it because people always turn around to stare at me when they pass by. I’m especially attractive to the mothers.

My racial assessment is looking good, even if it’s not definitive yet. A lot of physical characteristics are not yet evident in a child as young as I am, but I’m hopeful.

I’m tall for my age, slim, skinny even, without it being an issue. Quite the reverse. (I’m not deficient in anything. We’ve got everything we want at the Home: semolina, rice, oatmeal, cocoa, fresh fruit, vegetables, even though the war began a year ago and they’re handing out ration cards everywhere else.) Being thin means my little muscles—in my arms, thighs, calves—are well defined and guarantee an athletic body. My hair is not just blond, it’s almost white, and contrasts strikingly with the blue of my eyes—two turquoise wells breaching a snowy expanse. When my gaze lands on a mother it’s fatal: her heart melts. I was dolichocephalic at birth and I still am now. My complexion is pale, ever so slightly pink, as if someone had delicately powdered my cheeks. My ears don’t stick out—thank God for that!—they’re small, nicely shaped, like shells. I have a narrow face, delicate lips and a high forehead. My nose is thin and long, creating an uninterrupted line down to my chin.

I look like an angel. An Aryan angel.

You wouldn’t guess from looking at me that I almost died. I don’t remember a single thing about the horrific ordeal I endured, but Josefa never stops telling me, along with the new mothers in the Home, all the ghastly details about this shocking time. I was captured by a bitch of a dissident who tortured and starved me. She tried to kill me, but, despite my extreme youth, I was stronger than she was, and it was I who survived! I was the incarnation of one of our Führer’s most important theories: ‘It is not by the principles of humanity that man lives or is able to preserve himself above the animal world, but solely by means of the most brutal struggle.’

Josefa maintains that I’ve been avenged, because a very important event occurred on the night of the 9th to the 10th of November, 1938—that is, a year and a half after I was kidnapped by that bitch. That night became known as Kristallnacht, ‘Crystal Night’. Throughout the whole country, several hundred synagogues were destroyed, as well as thousands of Jewish businesses. A hundred-odd Jews were killed, hundreds of others committed suicide or died from their wounds, and almost thirty thousand more were deported to concentration camps. So now, Josefa told me, no German woman would be tempted to have sex with a Jew. She assured me that henceforth I would be safe, that I’d never be exposed to danger like that again.

In any case, because this exploit of my young life has been told over and over, and spread around, it’s become legendary in the Home. I’ve become some sort of mascot.

So they decided that I shouldn’t be adopted. It’s a bit like being in a shop window: I’m the perfect sample product, a piece of jewellery you can look at but not touch, and especially not wear. I’m the model that pregnant women and new mothers can study: here’s the future of the foetus in your belly, or here’s how your baby will turn out. It’s good for morale anyway, especially if they’re having doubts. Same for the adoptive mothers visiting the Home. They swoon when they see my little angel’s face and then burst into tears when Josefa tells them my story, how I overcame the trauma inflicted on me. They instantly want to take me in their arms, cuddle me, kiss me, but…No touching! Forbidden! And if they’re sorry they can’t take me away with them, they’re more than happy to choose another baby, reassured that it will look like me in the future.

Good. That’s great. I’m proud.

But the downside is that I’m bored. Having women worship me, fuss over me, cluck over me, none of that is ideal for my Draufgängertum. I haven’t forgotten my secret wish. I’d like to have friends endowed with my toughness. What can I do, stuck here among all these wailing babies who only think about feeding and sleeping? The Home is like a cocoon that’s got too cramped. I’m stifled. I need air. I need to move. Get out, see the world!

Especially because, outside the Home, all hell has broken loose. After the annexing of the Sudetenland, Czechoslovakia and Austria, last year’s invasion of Poland really cranked up the conflict: the English and the French have declared war. Our allies are the Russians, who helped us crush Poland. But, even without their help, our army is clearly superior: France is about to capitulate. We’ve already invaded Belgium, Denmark and Norway as well. We’re on the rampage! As for the English, they’ve tried a bit of strategic bombing in response to our air raids over London, but nothing to worry about. I’ve heard that the Berliners, far from being traumatised by the bombs, are getting together and having fun in the areas supposedly damaged by the enemy.

As a consequence of all these annexations, the Home is right now completely topsy-turvy: we’re expecting an exceptionally good delivery of women from Norway and Denmark. There’s no need for them to go through the selection process—we already know that women from these countries fit the criteria of the Nordic race perfectly. So our SS officers are under orders to carry out a ‘soft occupation’ in those places, which means they’re not allowed to make arrests or engage in mass executions (like in Smolensk, for example, where thousands of Jews were executed with a bullet to the head). Instead, their duty is to seduce the Norwegian women, invite them to the movies, out to dinner, to a museum or a concert, and bingo! Intercourse, then delivery of the baby, here in Germany, whether they like it or not. There’s no doubt that the babies born from these encounters will be harmonisch. They’ll be a wonderful gift for the Führer and for the German nation. (Whether they’re a willing or unwilling gift will depend; even though they’re beautiful, are the Norwegian women intelligent enough to understand how vital their sacrifice is?) Tall, blond, dolichocephalic, these Norwegian babies will be endowed with everything a child of the future requires and will include very few ‘rabbits’, I imagine. In fact, now that I think about it, I’m a tiny bit jealous. What if one of them deposes me?

God forbid that should happen.

While they decide about my future, I keep busy, running around, climbing, jumping, yelling. Whenever I can, I charge into the nursery and create havoc. I pretend the cradles lined up are enemy soldiers I’m fighting. I bombard them with nappies and bottles, whatever I can lay my little hands on. If I’m told to leave my buddies alone, I’m stuck with my toys, which are pretty amazing—the war requisitioning means we’ve got a continuous supply. With my toy planes and tin soldiers, I pretend I’m a Luftwaffe pilot. Nneeaooww! Nneeaooww! I trace parabolas in the sky and then, boom! I drop a bomb on London! I also get to play with a magnificent toy castle and pretend I’m a mediaeval lord ruling over his subjects. But my favourite toy is a little wooden hammer. In my hands it transforms into Thor’s hammer, the most powerful weapon of the ancient Nordic race, my ancestors. Either I’m one of the two dwarves who made this fabulous weapon, or, better still, I’m Thor himself, god of Thunder and Lightning. I’m wearing metal gauntlets when I launch my hammer at my enemy and, a few seconds later, the hammer is back in my hands (it’s magic). I’m doing battle with the giants of the frozen north and I’m invincible!

They say there’s a strong chance this myth might become reality, that Thor’s hammer will be reconstituted. This is one of the tasks Reichsführer Himmler has set himself. He has sent research teams to Finland to analyse ancient sorcerer songs that hold the secret of the hammer’s creation.

At other times, my wooden toy turns into the sacred sword of King Arthur, who was a child king like me, a child warrior. I leap onto my steed and off I go to find the Holy Grail. And I find the goblet of immortality and I drink it and become immortal!

Woops! My Thor’s-hammer-King-Arthur’s-sacred-sword just landed on Josefa’s head. She’ll get angry and send me to my room. I know I annoy her, careering around the Home like this. Even though I’m the mascot, she’d probably like to belt me one. Just let her try, hey!

But Josefa doesn’t lose her temper; on the contrary, she gives me a huge smile, the one she saves for special occasions and official visits. She tells me to gather up my toys so she can pack them in a suitcase with my other belongings. Because…because…

’Guess what?’ she asks me, her grimacing smile getting wider.

Because…I’M LEAVING TOMORROW. I’m going away, far away.

‘On a mission,’ she adds in a whisper.

Where on earth? Germany, or a foreign country? Who am I going with? With her? How am I getting there? By plane? In a Mercedes? What’s my mission? To find Thor’s hammer? The Holy Grail? I can’t ask her all these questions properly and it’s making me furious. I’m hopping up and down with impatience. But there’s no point. The conspiratorial look on her face as she takes my hand, the way she’s whispering and casting furtive glances to make sure no one has heard her talking about suitcases and trips, all makes me realise that my mission is a matter of secrecy.

Top secret!

Who cares if I’m not sure what’s expected of me. I like surprises. The main thing is that I’m finally leaving the Home to begin a new stage in my life.

So I’ll catch up with you soon, in some new place, to tell you what happens next.