Eleven Eleven (6 page)

Axel had gone to church that Sunday with his family and Otto’s fiancée, Rosa, and special prayers had been said for his brother. They walked back home in silence to find an army motorbike messenger waiting for them. There had been a mistake. Otto was still alive. Rosa and the Meyers were so delighted they did not fully take in the rest of the courier’s message.

Otto was in the maxillofacial unit at Berlin’s Charité Hospital. Herr Meyer and Rosa went to visit and returned in a state of blank despair. Otto had been caught in the face by shrapnel. His top lip was missing along with most of his upper teeth and there was severe scarring on both cheeks. Although talking was possible, if you listened very carefully, Otto was not of lucid mind.
Temporary mental derangement
, the doctor had written on his record.

‘Two hours’ rest,’ said the
Feldwebel
, when he was sure the bombardment had ceased. ‘Then we dig in.’

The barn was full of soldiers but Axel and Erich managed to find a hay bale to lean against and fell asleep in seconds, resting against each other’s shoulders. Barely an instant later, it seemed, there was shouting and whistle-blowing, as the
Feldwebel
roused his men. The sky was much lighter. It was almost dawn. They must have been asleep longer than they realised.

The
Feldwebel
called for silence. ‘This morning we are expecting an American attack in the area. They are thousands of miles from home. They are wondering why they are here. They are soft. They have not been hardened by war. They will be easily discouraged.
You
are fighting for your Fatherland. I am sure you will defend your positions bravely.’

Then he turned to the two boys. Axel flinched, expecting to be hit for something he didn’t know he’d done. ‘You two, you have keen eyesight, don’t you? Up the tower. Break the door down if you have to. Shout down if you see anything coming towards us.’

As they hurried to the church, Axel read the words on a wooden noticeboard by the main door. Paint was peeling off rotten wood, but he could still see
Church of St Nicholas, Aulnois
in Gothic script. So Aulnois was the name of this village. If he was to die, he at least knew where he was.

The church interior was almost as dank as the outside. There were holes in the roof and a few restless pigeons fluttered around the nave. The wooden pews had long gone. There was only a stone altar beneath a large stained-glass window, which was miraculously still intact. They tried a couple of doors before they discovered the one that led to the top of the tower.

Axel’s legs ached from his night’s marching as he climbed. Flat farmland stretched out before them, with a dense wood a kilometre to the north. The field in front of them was untouched by the war, aside from one large shell hole just to the right of their position. Off to the west were small villages and woods almost certainly occupied by the Tommies or the Yanks. As the day grew lighter, a thin mist began to rise. The boys peered through. ‘Perfect cover, isn’t it,’ said Erich, then, suddenly anxious, he asked, ‘Or is it gas?’ They had all seen the gas casualties back home. Men with horrible blister scars on their faces or arms, and wheezing terribly, every breath bubbling in corrupted lungs.

Axel felt a kind of dizzy fear as he stared across open land into enemy territory. There in the middle and far distance, further than the eye could see, were fields and towns and towers and factories full of men and women who wanted him dead. Closer, perhaps just beyond a hedgerow, were men with bayonets and hand grenades.

‘Have you been in combat before?’ asked Erich.

Axel wondered whether to lie to him, to try to seem tougher than he was. But he realised there was no point. As soon as they started fighting together, he would be found out.

‘No. Have you?’

Erich shook his head. Then he said, ‘I had three brothers. But all of them are gone. I am the last. The last of the Beckers.’

Axel felt a stab of pity for his new friend. ‘I’ll look out for you,’ he said, trying to sound braver than he felt.

‘Do you miss home?’ said Erich.

Axel paused to think. ‘I miss my bed and three hot meals a day. I miss Falken – our
Schäferhund
– and I miss my brother and sister, I suppose. I don’t know if I miss Wansdorf though. Do you miss Kreuzberg?’

‘Yes, of course. We live in a little apartment there. My mother and father are both teachers. What about your parents?’

‘My mother died,’ said Axel plainly. He had learned that was the best response when he didn’t want to talk about it. ‘My father works on the estate – Schloss Wansdorf. He is an estate manager for the baron.’

‘And you?’ asked Erich. ‘What did you do before this?’

‘Still at school,’ said Axel sheepishly. ‘Like you, I imagine.’

Axel’s great ambition was to be a musician – but it seemed so preposterous that he never told anyone. He wondered whether to share it with Erich now. Only his younger sister, Gretl, knew. She often listened to Axel as he played the piano. He could read music well enough, but he could also play by ear – something that Gretl seemed to think was an almost magic art.

The two boys settled into a companionable silence. Then Axel began to feel bored. He turned to Erich to ask him more about his parents, but he had gone to sleep. That was OK. The
Feldwebel
couldn’t see them up here, and Axel was sure they would hear him if he came up the stairs to check on them. Besides, he could keep watch perfectly well on his own.

He tried to remember what Wansdorf was like before the war. The great celebrations every year at Christmas, Easter and the harvest festival . . . when they all feasted on delicious food. That came to an abrupt end when the war began. It was meat he missed the most. Roast pork, a succulent lamb chop, beef stew. In his last meal at home, before he left for basic training, they had eaten boiled rice pressed into a chop shape. It had a stick of wood at the side to imitate a bone, and had been fried in mutton tallow. Axel knew how difficult it was to obtain even meat substitutes like this, so he told his father it was just like eating the real thing. When the war was over, he told himself, he was going to eat lamb chops every day for a month.

He had been twelve when they heard the momentous news about the Austrian archduke – gunned down in Sarajevo by a Serbian anarchist. Barely a month later the whole of Europe was at war. Germany and Austria-Hungary against France and Russia. Even the British and their Empire had waded in against them.

There was a service in the village church before the men in the army reserve left to join the battle. The reservists stood at the front of the congregation, each wearing a special bouquet. Otto was there in the front row. Axel found it difficult singing the Bach chorale the choirmaster had chosen to see them off. A great lump had risen in his throat. He wondered if Otto would be one of the ones who wouldn’t come back.

Back then, everyone seemed so excited, so Axel kept his thoughts to himself. This was a war of national survival, he was told, forced upon them by powers jealous of their superior culture. Germany had a chance to prove herself. What had the Kaiser told them? They would win a ‘place under the sun’ – colonies like the ones the British and French were so proud of. And it would all be over by the time the leaves fell from the trees. It wasn’t of course, although the first few months had gone well, with great victories against the Russians in the East.

Back then, Axel was still young enough to play with the war toys his father brought home. The model Zeppelin, the submarine, the fighter plane, the machine gun – marvels of modern technology to guarantee a German victory. He’d long grown out of playing with those toys.

Then the ration cards had arrived, the constant feeling of hunger, the cold in winter when there was no coal for the fire. Then came the news of the terrible casualties from Verdun, Ypres, the Somme, that touched every family they knew. They had given so much – even the clothes on their back – to ensure victory. At home now some people wore tatty garments made with fabric fashioned from paper and nettles and reeds. And that victory had almost arrived. Hadn’t they defeated the Russians? Hadn’t they won tremendous battles in Italy and Greece and Serbia? Axel couldn’t understand why they were still fighting for their lives.

There was a noise behind the tower. The unmistakable sound of a body of men approaching. Axel shouted down as quietly as he could, ‘
Feldwebel!
There are people coming behind us!’

The
Feldwebel
sent a soldier to investigate. The man arrived back a few moments later with a small squad of German soldiers. Caked in filth, they looked as hard as nails and had obviously been in combat for several days.

That was good, Axel supposed. More combat soldiers to help out all these new recruits. But something else worried him now. He looked down. It was quite a distance – much higher than the houses around them, even the manor, which had a grand roof with windows in the eaves. He turned to his new friend and shook him awake.

‘Erich, you know this tower will be the first target for artillery, as soon as the Tommies or the Yanks realise we’re here?’

Chapter 8

7.00 a.m.

William Franklin woke up toying with the fibre red-and-grey identity discs around his neck. He hated wearing them and remembered the fear he’d felt when he first placed them over his head. Although no one had explained it to him, it was fairly obvious that one was to remain with him if he was killed and the other was to be removed by the burial party as proof of death. Will couldn’t remember which one got taken and which got left behind. But having them separated would be the start of a process that would end with a telegram to his parents. The other would stay there round his neck for the rest of eternity, unless he was blown to fragments by a high-explosive shell. Whenever he found himself thinking like that, he tried to stop it. Think of something nice, he’d say to himself, like his mum’s cooking or Alice.

It was almost light now. Will had such a terrible ache in his stomach. He felt so tight and tense he could barely walk. It was like those dreams where you tried to move but found yourself paralysed. He always felt like this before combat. But then the whistle would blow and the one thing he feared more than being shot by the Germans – being shot by the Military Police – would drive him out on to the battlefield.

The rain had started in earnest. Will began his day soaked and freezing. No wonder they called them ‘the poor bloody infantry’. Things usually got worse around first light when Fritz sent over a few shells. It was all part of the daily routine.

‘Start the day with the prospect of dismemberment,’ said Moorhouse, one of the older soldiers. ‘Set the tone.’ He winked when he said it though. Will was always a bit taken aback by these comments. They called it ‘gallows humour’ apparently.

One or two shells coming over was something he had got used to. But prolonged barrages still frightened him to death. The noise went on for ever, like perpetual thunder. Then your ears would ring for hours afterwards – you could barely hear what people said. This is what it must be like to be deaf, Will realised. He thought of his old grandad. If he ever got back to Lancaster, Will decided, he was going to be a lot more patient with him.

He reached into his pocket for his mother’s latest letter. Although he was pleased to hear from her, what she wrote slightly bored him. He had been mildly interested to know that their Essex Redcomb hens, Sarah, Beth and Caitlin, had been producing at least three eggs a week. But he didn’t really care how much grease his mum had managed to collect from washing-up water to give to the rag-and-bone men for use in the manufacture of explosives. And he gave even less of a fig about the patriotic parish pageant his mum and younger sister were organising for the coming Christmas celebrations. This would be the fifth wartime Christmas. When the war began, they were convinced it would be over by Christmas. Still, at least she hadn’t put any nonsense in about trying to contact their Stanley with that medium she knew down the street. Lillie Franklin had been to see that woman three or four times since Stan died – wanting to know if he was ‘at peace’. It made Will and Jim angry when they heard about it; the woman charged sixpence a sitting, bringing messages from ‘the other side’ – a day’s wages for a load of waffle. Maybe his mum was still going but just kept quiet about it now.

What Will really wanted was a letter from Alice. He had written to her at least three weeks ago and that was more than enough time for her to get his letter and write back. Her last letter had been rather formal too. A lifeless description of a play they had put on for wounded men, which stopped abruptly when she reached the bottom of the page. Maybe the post was having difficulty keeping up with the army.

A couple of runners came up from the rear with flasks of tea and porridge. Just as they plonked the heavy cauldrons down, there came the first unmistakable whine of incoming shells. The men all dropped to the ground, sheltering in the ridges. Will heard the shells land but there were no great earth-shifting explosions – no tearing of the air. Instead, there was a series of jolting thuds that shook the ground, and then the eerie sound of hissing.

‘Gas!’ someone shouted, and the men were thrown into panic. Everyone fumbled for their respirators. The Huns had not sent gas shells over for a few weeks. Will’s unit had got careless. A pair of horses were harnessed close by and their minder was desperately rummaging in two sacks on their backs, unpacking the masks the animals had to wear. In the panic, one of the men knocked over a pail of porridge. It spread over the ground like a great grey steaming cowpat.