The Cross of Iron (23 page)

He made up his mind to kill Stransky.

LATE IN THE afternoon they came upon the Russians. They had just skirted a sizeable patch of swamp when the horse led by Dietz suddenly broke loose and galloped wildly off between the trees. The men stopped and looked accusingly at Dietz, who was staring in a daze at the place where the horse had last been. Since it was carrying part of their rations on its back, they felt the loss keenly. ‘Idiot!’ Krüger exclaimed in a fury.

Steiner came striding toward them. ‘Can’t you keep hold of a rope?’ he shouted at Dietz. ‘You get that horse back or I’ll show you something.’

Dietz stared for a second at his enraged face. Then he turned and dashed after the runaway horse. His feet were covered with blisters; for the past few hours he had only barely managed to keep going. But now he forgot his pain and exhaustion. He must make good his carelessness, he felt, and bring back the horse. He ran on among the trees and underbrush, stumbling, falling, picking himself up, scratching his face and hands on thorns and twigs till the blood ran. Still he panted on. Then he could no longer keep going. He leaned against a tree and dug his clenched fists into his heaving chest, while tears streamed down his face.

It was beginning to grow dark among the trees, and the woods were formidably silent. Turning his head a little, Dietz suddenly caught sight of the Russians. They were standing about a dozen yards away from him, not moving, just staring at him. There were five men in long overcoats, with sheepskin-banded caps, their tommy-guns pointing at him. Dietz gaped. But he felt no fear, nothing but a vast astonishment that gradually seeped throughout his entire body and transformed his legs into wooden posts buried deep in the earth. Movement was impossible. Then he suddenly remembered the platoon. He must tell Steiner about the Russians at once, must warn the men. How surprised they would be. They would certainly forgive him the loss of the horse. This thought so comforted him that he almost forgot the menace of the Russians. When they began coming slowly toward him, he pulled his numbed legs out of the ground and rushed away blindly. At his back he heard a shout and he hunched his head between his shoulders. How surprised the others will be, how surprised they’ll be, he thought. His face was contorted, but he smiled expectantly at the thought of the impression his news would make. The shouting behind him grew louder. It bothered him, made it hard to think but did not seem to mean very much. Suddenly something hit hint in the back and threw him forward on his face. Above his head sounded the hysterical hammering of several sub-machine-guns at once. At first he thought someone had thrown a rock at him, and he remained lying where he was, startled. Above him the bullets hissed, slapped into the trees, hummed through the air as they ricocheted. Why are they firing like crazy lunatics? Dietz thought. He tried to get up. Then he realized that his body no longer obeyed him. His arms felt dead, and there was a dull, painful pressure against his back. With great effort he managed to slip his hand underneath his pack, but he could feel nothing in particular. When he tried to turn on his side, a fiery pain shot through his chest. He let his face sink to the ground and began to whimper.

After Dietz ran off in pursuit of the horse, the men sat down on the ground, their heads bent with weariness. Steiner remained standing near the other horses, pondering. It would soon be dark, and the end of the forest was nowhere in sight yet. During the march he had discovered that the horses were a hindrance rather than a help; their obstinacy constantly made for delay. He would long ago have released them and chased them off if he had not been worried about the condition of the men. They had been marching almost without interruption, and were completely exhausted. Under normal conditions they should have covered three times the distance they had managed to march. But the ever-recurring barricades of thorny undergrowth, the miles of swampy ground, the many narrow streams, had forced them to swing in countless wide detours, and eaten up their strength. Their original intention to use the road had to be abandoned, since the Russian’s escape meant it would be guarded. They had followed it only for a few hundred yards beyond the brook, then struck out by compass in a south-westerly direction, straight across the woods. Since the road wound and turned, they had quickly diverged from it and were now somewhere in the heart of the pathless forest.

Cursing under his breath, Steiner glanced at his watch. Three minutes had passed since Dietz had rushed off after the horse, and Steiner suddenly felt an intense uneasiness. He turned to the men: ‘I’ll see how he’s getting along,’ he said. As he struck out in the direction Dietz had taken he reflected that his order had been idiotic. Once a horse started running a man could not catch up with it, anyway. He increased his pace. Since orientation was impossible in these dense woods, he relied on instinct. He had gone no more than 300 yards when off to the right he heard voices calling. He stopped as abruptly as if he had run head-on into a tree, and raised his head to listen. The calls became a furore of shouts, but he could distinctly hear single words. Russians, he thought with a stab of alarm. He peered into the darkening woods.

When the firing began, he doubled over, leaped behind a tree and raised his tommy-gun. The air was suddenly filled with a wicked hissing; ricochets slapped into the tree trunks, buzzed by his head like humming-birds and landed with a dull patter on the soft forest floor. It might be too late if he waited to fetch the men, he thought. If Dietz were still alive—and the Russians wouldn’t be shooting if he weren’t—there was not a second to loose. Scurrying from tree to tree, he covered about fifty feet. Then he began firing at random, holding the muzzle of the gun high. Once he thought he glimpsed a dark form among the trees. But since it might be Dietz, he did not dare fire at it. Then he realized that the fire of the invisible enemy was concentrating upon him. Bullets hissed over his head. Cursing, he darted behind a tree. He was in a bit of a fix. If the Russians realized they had only a single man to deal with, they would surround him quickly. Even as he thought this his fears were confirmed. From the right side a sub-machine-gun began hammering away, breathtakingly close. He swung round and began answering the fire—disregarding all caution, exposing himself to his previous opponents and blazing away blindly between the trees. Then he tumbled rapidly a few yards to one side, behind the next tree, and raised his head. The flanking fire had stopped; perhaps he had hit someone by chance. The rattling of the guns was continuing only from in front, where a strip of dense underbrush cut across the woods. He tried in vain to make out the flash from the hidden enemy guns, but it was still too light. For a while he lay motionless, watching the cone of fire high above his head. They’ll strip the leaves from the trees, if they keep firing like this, he thought, and rolled a few yards away.

His excitement began to subside. He had survived worse situations, after all. Had he not been worried about the platoon he would have felt almost serene. In another ten minutes it would be too dark for the Russians to do anything. Flattening out behind the shaggy trunk of a black birch, he looked around alertly. The random fire of the Russians continued to lash through the leaves high up. He did not answer it. What could have happened to Dietz? He hoped the boy had not been hit. It didn’t seem likely, since his uniform would have confused the Russians momentarily. Undoubtedly he was crouching somewhere among the trees, waiting for full darkness to come. Where could the others be? Even as he thought this, hell broke loose behind him.

When the din of the skirmish started, the men had leaped to their feet and looked about them in shocked surprise. Krüger stammered, ‘Steiner,’ and looked at Schnurrbart. Schnurrbart silently took the tommy-gun from his shoulder, his hands shaking. ‘Bring the horses with you,’ he said to Pasternack. ‘Take the ammunition off them.’ He began pulling boxes of ammunition from the horses and issuing curt orders which the men obeyed in feverish haste. A few seconds later they rushed forward toward the increasing clatter of rifles and sub-machine-guns. When the first bullets began whistling over their heads, they scattered and began answering the firing.

Suddenly they came upon Steiner, who had sat up facing in their direction. Maag noticed him first and shouted. The men stopped firing and Steiner came dashing toward them. As soon as they recognized him, they felt an enormous relief. ‘Have you been lucky!’ Krüger bellowed. He slammed Steiner on the shoulder. ‘What’ll we do?’ he asked hastily. ‘Where’s Dietz?’

‘We’ll have to look for him,’ Steiner said. The firing from the other side had stopped abruptly.

‘They’ve cleared out,’ Anselm declared. ‘How many were there?’ he asked Steiner.

‘I don’t know.’ For a moment they stood inconclusively, until Schnurrbart grunted with impatience. ‘Think we should follow them?’ he asked.

Steiner shook his head. ‘What for? We’ll look for Dietz and then get out of here as fast as possible. Where are the horses?’

Schnurrbart jerked his thumb back, where Pasternack had just appeared, leading the horses.

‘Let’s start,’ Steiner said. ‘He must be somewhere nearby.’

They scattered among the trees and began searching the ground. Since the Russians might still be lurking in the vicinity, they moved with extreme caution. After a while they risked calling. It had grown much darker, and the search became increasingly difficult. Once or twice Steiner thought of sending up a flare, but it seemed to him too dangerous. His foreboding mounted. If Dietz were anywhere nearby he should have heard them calling. Perhaps it would be better to spend the night in this vicinity and continue the search next morning. Suddenly he heard his own name called. He recognized the Professor’s voice and hurried toward it. As he approached he made out the rest of the men, gathered in a cluster and watching him.

‘What is it?’ he asked hoarsely.

There was a moment of silence. Then Krüger spoke up: ‘Here he is.’ A dark bundle lay on the ground. In spite of the gloom Steiner recognized Dietz at once. He knelt down beside him, removed his pack and turned him over on his back. Krüger switched on a shielded flashlight and Steiner unbuttoned Dietz’ coat. The men leaned forward as Steiner opened the little fellow’s shirt. There was a low sigh of relief as they saw no sign of a wound on chest or stomach. Then their features froze, mouths open. Steiner had turned Dietz over and was staring incredulously at two holes the size of hazel-nuts below the right shoulder-blade. There was no trace of blood, just a pink circle around the edges of the wounds. ‘Damn it all,’ Krüger whispered. The flashlight in his hand shook.

‘Is he dead?’ Anselm asked.

Steiner did not answer. He placed his arm around Dietz’ waist and raised him up. Then he began rapidly bandaging the wounds. Dietz’ heart was still beating, though rapidly and irregularly.

‘Bring the horses,’ he said curtly.

They tied the two horses close together, made a litter of groundsheets, and cautiously raised Dietz to the backs of the horses. Not a word was spoken all the while.

'We must get out of here,’ Steiner declared. He turned to Krüger.

‘You and Schnurrbart follow at a distance. Make sure the Russians aren’t following us.’ He slung his gun over his shoulder and started back in the direction from which they had come. Pasternack and Dorn led the horses; the others walked behind to guard against Dietz falling off. It was pitch dark. Stars shone now and then through the leafy roof. The crack of dried branches under their boots sounded alarmingly loud. Schnurrbart and Krüger followed at a considerable distance, stopping now and then to look back. The woods appeared deserted. ‘They’ve cleared out,’ Krüger murmured. He sighed. ‘It would be Dietz; that’s all we needed.’ Schnurrbart nodded. ‘That’s only the beginning,’ he said. ‘The Ivans have picked up our trail now; just wait till daylight comes.’ 

‘The devil,’ Krüger said. He suddenly thought of Zoll. 'That dirty bastard,’ he growled. ‘If only I could lay hands on him.’ 

‘Who?’

‘Who do you think—Zoll, of course.’

‘Oh, him.’ Schnurrbart fell silent for a moment. ‘He got his, don’t worry.’

‘How come?’

Schnurrbart shrugged.

‘The whole forest must be swarming with patrols by now,’ Krüger murmured. ‘And when we get out of the forest, what a reception they’re going to give us.’

Schnurrbart sighed.

Dietz was walking last in line, leading the horse by the reins and suffering terribly from thirst. Suddenly the horse pulled loose and Steiner came raging toward him. From that menacing face Dietz fled into the woods, running behind the horse. Often it was so close he thought he could reach out and grasp it. But it was always faster than he and escaped each time. He stretched out his arms, called and sobbed. Suddenly the horse stood still. But as he approached he was horrified to see that it had turned into a Russian with five heads, glaring at him with ten fiery eyes. He began to scream and the five-headed Russian began to scream, and as he stared at those malignant faces they merged into a single huge face with gaping maw, shouting at him, and suddenly he recognized it as the foreman stooping to pick up a monstrous brick. He turned and ran as fast as he could, making off among the trees, and the screams behind him grew worse, until something hard struck him in the back and threw him to the ground where he lay sobbing.

Then it seemed to him he was being lifted up. Somewhere sweet voices were singing a song of unearthly beauty. He raised his head, incredulous, and a happy smile passed over his face. Someone told him he must sing also. He opened his mouth and sang: ‘Oh, the mountains, oh, the valleys.’ Tears streamed down his cheeks; he could no longer sing because he was sobbing so hard. But he closed his eyes and listened, deeply stirred, until the song faded away. When he opened his eyes again, his first impression was of a gentle rocking motion that lulled him and aroused pleasant memories. He saw himself at home in Eger, walking through the streets of the older part of the city, going on down to the river bank and skipping flat stones over the water. He got into a boat and rowed upstream until he tired. While he let the current carry him back, he gazed dreamily at the green woods of the Fichtelgebirge and saw himself hiking among the quiet valleys and out-of-the-way villages. The boat rocked over the still water and the sun shone warm and pleasant upon him. But suddenly his mother’s harsh, complaining voice rang out, scolding him, calling him a good-for-nothing for loafing around instead of working. Now he felt sad again; bitterness wrapped him in a black mantle that grew heavier and heavier, dragging him down to the ground, burying him.