March Battalion (13 page)

When he had come to his senses he had snatched the girl into his arms and sat rocking to and fro, crying over her, as her head lolled back and forth like that of a puppet. There seemed to be broken glass and congealing blood all about him, and he was frightened and wondered what had happened. He had called to Else to help him, but she had not replied. Slowly it had come upon him that she was dead.

'You're playing games with me!' he shouted, and he shook her broken body to and fro. 'You're pretending! You can't be dead! You're not dead!'

But she was. And he had run from the room, half naked and covered in blood, and rushed blindly about the streets until they picked him up.

Heavy boots along the corridor. The Lieutenant sat rigid and strained, the sweat pouring off his forehead. Was this it? Were they coming for him?

Someone swearing. More footsteps. Silence.

The Lieutenant ran across to the door and tried to see out. He put his finger on the bell. Would they object if he rang it? Just to see what was going on? Surely a man condemned to death had a right to know what was going on? But did he really want to know? He hesitated, his finger trembling. If he rang, who would come? One of the guards. A corporal, or some other lowly person. Was not he a lieutenant in an artillery regiment, and therefore above associating with such people?

He heard the sound of something heavy being dragged past his door, A body? Perhaps they had come to fetch some other poor devil for his last journey and he had fainted through sheer terror? Would he himself faint when they came to fetch him? He imagined them with their rifles and their steel helmets and he knew for a certainty that he would not be able to face them with any show of courage. They would have to drag him, as they were dragging this one...

More footsteps. Lt. Heinz Berner huddled shivering against the wall and called for his mother, His heart almost stopped beating as the footsteps stopped. A key turned in the door. This was it, at last. This was how it felt. They had come for him...

An immense Obergefreiter stood in the doorway. He was wearing the black uniform of the tank regiments, with the death's head insignia. He surveyed the Lieutenant pityingly for a moment or two, then shrugged his shoulders and closed the door behind him.

'Things not going so well, eh? Not so hot being an officer at a time like this? Personally I'd sooner be an ordinary soldier and have my freedom than a lieutenant and locked up in a prison cell.'

The young Heinz Berner watched in amazement as the Obergefreiter sat casually on the wooden bench that served as a bed and gestured to the prisoner to do likewise. A conversation between an officer and an ordinary soldier? Unimaginable. Where was the respect due to his uniform? The respect he had been taught about in the military school at Potsdam? He stared down at himself, as if to check that he was, indeed, wearing the uniform of a lieutenant of artillery. And this great oaf of an Obergefreiter lolling nonchalantly before him ... For the first time in his life, Heinz Berner began to doubt the truth of all he had been taught.

'Listen to me, laddie,' said the Obergefreiter, turning his head and spitting on the cell floor.

Laddie! And him a lieutenant! He was about to remonstrate with the man, but just in time he recalled his unhappy situation and kept his mouth closed. He collapsed on to the bench, all strength gone. The Obergefreiter was still talking. Berner had no idea what he was on about. He stared numbly ahead, and slowly, very slowly, the realization came to him that barely a foot away and within easy reach was the Obergefreiter's revolver. Just hanging there, in its holster. Hanging there unnoticed. Waiting to be snatched up and used. Not to mention the bunch of keys attached to his belt... Visions of freedom rose up before Heinz Berner and almost blinded him in their intensity. The Obergefreiter was a large man. A giant of a man. Such people, it was commonly acknowledged, were always slow in their reactions. Slow physically, probably slow mentally as well. One well-placed blow on the head from the butt of the revolver and that would be the end of the Obergefreiter. And no great loss to anyone. Heinz Berner's breath came and went in quick gasps of excitement. The Obergefreiter went on talking-

'The thing is, laddie, you just got to find courage somewhere. You get in a panic, you make it worse for yourself. I mean, once they got you out there, it's all over before you know where you are. Nothing messy, no hanging about, no pain, nothing like that... Mind you, you get on good terms with the medico, he might be persuaded to give you a little jab of something beforehand. Put you out, like. That's what he did yesterday for the major who was going. You can nearly always get these little extra perks if you set about it the right way. Like if you need anything particular, you just ask me and I'll see what I can do for you - only not a word to anyone, mind.'

He turned and spat on the floor once again. In that moment, Heinz Berner had seized the revolver and sprang to his feet, covering the guard.

'Hands up!'

Little John very slowly pulled his immense body off the bench. He stared at the Lieutenant, his mouth gaping open. With one hand, he groped for his revolver and found the case empty. The Lieutenant snapped his fingers nervously.

'Keys,' he demanded.

Little John shook his head, rather sadly. He unhooked the bunch of keys and held them out. At the same time, with a swift and agile movement that directly contradicted all the Lieutenant's surmises, be brought down his right hand in a vicious chopping motion. Little John never needed to hit people twice. The inexperienced artillery officer fell heavily to the floor and Little John stepped over the inanimate body and picked up his revolver.

'Stupid bugger,' he said, without rancour. He slammed the door of the cell behind him and crashed his way back along the corridor. Meeting up with Porta, he stood for some time watching a group of prisoners in ragged grey uniforms rinsing out their mess tins under a cold water tap.

'839 just had ago at me,' remarked Little John, idly. 'Didn't get him anywhere.'

'Ah-huh.' Porta grunted, then jerked his thumb over his shoulder. 'Fancy a game of pontoon?'

They made their way to the lavatories, the only place where they could reasonably be assured of privacy, thanks to a mirror set at an angle opposite the door, which allowed them to see in good time who might be approaching. Porta pulled out a pack of dogeared cards and a couple of cigarettes cut down to a size that could conveniently be held inside the mouth should a superior officer come upon them. Oberstleutnant Vogel, the Prison Governor, had long ago decided that smoking should be one of a long list of 'strictly forbidden' activities. Any soldier caught indulging was subject to severe punishment. Vogel not only enjoyed meting out severe punishment, he had a positive psychological need to do so, and this was one method by which he could assure himself of a constant supply of offenders.

The pontoon session continued uninterrupted for perhaps twenty minutes and was brought to a hasty finish only by the arrival of the prison Chaplain, von Gerdesheim.

'Peace be with you.'

He nodded amiably at Porta and Little John. There was no trace, now, of either cards or cigarettes. Little John bent his head, unctuously. In fact he hated priests.

'And with you, Father. I hope the world's treating you well.'

The Chaplain frowned, evidently suspicious of Little

John's sudden and new-found piety. Little John smiled and folded his hands in a priestly way. The Chaplain cleared his throat.

'Tell me, my son. Do you - ah - believe in God?'

Little John opened wide his eyes and did his best to register shocked indignation that such a question should be thought necessary.

'I should just hope I do, Father!'

'I confess I find it a pleasant surprise to come across a believer in the ranks - particularly in a regiment such as yours. It is, to say the least, unusual.'

Little John stared heavenwards with a saintly smile on his lips.

'I - ah - I don't seem to recall seeing you at communion, however?'

The Chaplain's tone was hesitant, almost apologetic; as if Little John had surely been there and it was simply that he had missed him. Little John withdrew his gaze from heaven and directed a bland stare at the priest.

'I assure you, Father, I attend church regularly every 15th August'

'Indeed? May I ask what special significance is attached to 15th August?'

'It's the Holy Virgin,' exclaimed Little John, earnestly. 'Every 15th August, regular as clockwork, I go to church in her honour, don't I?'

The Chaplain shook his head.

'My dear fellow, I'm sorry, but I simply don't see the connection!'

'Well, put it this way,' said Little John, in reasonable tones. 'Do you or do you not believe in the Holy Virgin? Because frankly that's what it all boils down to.'

The Chaplain grew slowly crimson.

'I beg your pardon?' he said.

'Herod was a shit,' affirmed Little John, with stout irrelevance. 'And St. Bernard used to get pissed as a newt drinking holy schnaps in the snow.'

It was, perhaps, the sum total of Little John's religious knowledge, and he displayed it proudly.

'Have you gone mad?' demanded the Chaplain.

He controlled himself with a very obvious effort, and his voice once again took on its smooth, benevolent, coaxing tone.

'Why do you say such things, my son? What pleasure does it give you?'

Little John was all smiles. 'Look, Father, it's like this, isn't it? Let me tell you. When I was a little kid about so high I had this crazy urge to go into the Ursuline Convent at Eger. You know why? Because I'd once heard someone say they'd got several litres of the Holy Virgin's milk stashed away there. Well, the way I reckoned it, what with Jesus having kicked the bucket a few centuries back, this milk should be in a pretty high old state by now. Know what I mean? Well--'

That's quite enough.' The Chaplain stepped away from Little John as if he might be contaminated. 'What is your name, Obergefreiter?'

Little John came to attention.

'Wolfgang Creutzfeld, 27th Tank Regiment. 1st Battalion, Fifth Company. At present doing guard duties at the Military Prison at Torgau, Section C ... And if you find it any easier, Padre, all my pals call me Little John.'

Little John leaned forward, interested to see what it was the Chaplain was writing in his notebook.

'You shall hear more of this.'

The Chaplain closed the notebook with an irritable bang. It turned out to be a book of psalms, which he had used for writing down Little John's particulars. Little John looked suitably impressed.

As a result of the Chaplain's confusion following upon this incident a certain Stabswachtmeister Kraus, of the Schutzpolizei, was executed without receiving the blessing of the church - not that he had asked for it, nor would have accepted had it been offered. His last words were a defiant, 'Death to Hitler!'

As a further result, Little John was sentenced to eight days' solitary confinement. Three days after his release, he and Porta became ingloriously and incapably drunk and beat up the Chaplain. Shortly afterwards, suffering from almost total amnesia, the Chaplain was transferred to the Military Prison at Glatz. It was there that the Russians arrested him, in May 1945, and there that he subsequently hanged himself.

Gustav Durer had been in the army for thirty-one years and Head Warder at the military prison of Torgau for twenty-eight years. According to Hauptfeldwebel Dorn, who thought highly of him, he and men like him were the very backbone of invincible German Army.

But, alas for the German Army, there came a day when Gustav Durer was assassinated. And as if this in itself were not disgrace enough, the assassin was one of the very prisoners he was guarding. The name of Gustav Durer became, overnight, anathema to Hauptfeldwebel Dorn. He had his name removed from the Roll of Honour of the Prison, he had a bonfire made of all the deceased's belongings, and he did his best to forget that the cretin had ever existed. The backbone of the German Army would do better without such men as Gustav Durer.

The only mementoes he kept of his ex-Head Warder were two bottles of vodka and four of cognac. He confiscated these as being property of the state and he locked them away in his drawer beneath the copies of the "Volkischer Beobachter" which no one ever read. They were, so to speak, a proof of Gustav Durer's unworthiness: it was quite obvious the man could never have come by them honestly.

I
T
was a cold, grey morning. The air was heavy with mist and the stones of the courtyard were damp and icy. Alte stood huddled in a doorway, the prisoners shuffled about in groups, their lips blue with cold. Those who still had the energy, or the will power, ran up and down in an effort to keep fit and warm. One or two had cigarettes carefully hidden in the palms of their hands. Alte always allowed the men to smoke during their short periods of exercise, 'strictly forbidden' though it was.

Standing apart from the others, his shoulders hunched up, his eyes fixed in a blank stare, was Feldwebel Lindenberg. A wavering trail of smoke from his right hand betrayed the presence of a cigarette, given to him by Porta. It was a present which would earn the donor sixty days' solitary if anyone discovered.

The rest of the prisoners respectfully left Lindenberg alone with his thoughts. Word had already spread that his execution had been fixed for the following morning. It was known throughout the prison that the Chaplain had visited him the previous day, and the roster of guard duties included a command that the first section, second group, should present themselves at the armoury at 4.15 on Friday morning. They knew what that meant: they would be issued with two bullets each; two bullets of the old, round-headed type. No one ever knew why it was that round-headed bullets should be used for executions. That was just the way it was.

Lieutenant Heinz Berner looked across at Lindenberg and wondered how it felt to know that your hour was fixed. He shivered, with cold and with fear. He had been at Torgau for four weeks now, and still he lived in the daily expectation that today would be THE day, the day when he received his visit from the angel of death and knew that within thirty-six hours he would be no more. Time did not dull the sharp edge of fear. Each day brought him nearer to his ultimate fate, and each day was predictably worse than the one before. The young lieutenant had learnt much in four weeks. He knew what it meant when the Chaplain came to see you in your cell. He knew all about the pink files, with their signed and countersigned execution orders, that arrived from headquarters and found their way to the desk in Hauptfeldwebel Dorn's office. He knew where the executions took place, and he knew that they were carried out by the tank regiment who were on guard duty at the prison. He knew more about executions in general, and executions at Torgau in particular, than ever they had taught him at the military school.