The Generals (13 page)

Colonel Orbal
: Oh, God, now he’s started shouting again.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: And how did you carry out this order?
How
, I’m asking you. Stand up straight, man!

Velder
: Yes, sir.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: What do you mean by ‘yes, sir’? Do you
mean the fact that you not only passed on a state secret to what you called your family and several other people, but you also reported the matter to a foreign journalist whom you visited?

Velder
: Yes …

Lieutenant Bratianu
: Shut up, you swine. Don’t take liberties. You offended against the secrets act and were guilty of illicit intelligence activity. You gave information on the armed forces to a person who was probably an agent for a foreign power. This you have admitted.

Velder
: Yes, s …

Lieutenant Bratianu
: Shut up, I said. I appeal to the presidium to exhort the Defending Officer to discipline his … client.

Major von Peters
: Endicott, I’ve already pointed out that you are responsible for the accused’s behaviour and discipline before his superiors.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: You realised, Velder, that the General already suspected that the helicopter had been sabotaged and that it was vital to the security of the nation that the espionage that lay behind this deed should be put an end to. It is tempting to go once again into the question of why you were standing on the highest point between Marbella and the lighthouse, with the lighthouse within view. Thus it is also tempting to go into the question of who it was who committed sabotage. But I’ll desist.

Colonel Pigafetta
: Yes, Endicott. What do you want to say?

Captain Endicott
: I would like to say that the wreck was raised and that the notes from the technical investigation by the Wrecks Commission have been kept. These point to the helicopter having crashed because of a faulty manoeuvre.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: With all due respect to the presidium, I must say you surprise me, Captain Endicott? The Wrecks Commission? Appointed by whom? Technical investigation? Carried out by whom and under whose direction? By the nation’s most dangerous enemies, Captain Endicott. By the traitors.

Captain Endicott
: And it wasn’t Velder who visited the foreign newspaperman, but the other way round.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: You’re probably wrong, but that detail is of no importance. Velder? So you confess to offending against the secrets act and carrying out illicit intelligence activities?

Velder
: Yes, sir. I confess.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: And with that you consider that you’ve come off lightly, I suppose. But you’re deceiving yourself. Honoured members of the presidium, I will now proceed to the amplification of the charge, a point which in my opinion has been unsatisfactorily accounted for in the preliminary investigations. I maintain that even at this time Erwin Velder was conspiring against General Oswald and thus also against the security of the State; that his offence against the secrets act and his illicit intelligence activities in actual fact were only a small part of a far more serious crime: preparation for high treason. I am sure that the accused will deny this, but I do not accept that.

Major von Peters
: This looks like coming to something. Go on.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: Velder, do you admit that even at this time you had already decided in your own mind to deceive General Oswald in every way and that you were seeking to take his life?

Colonel Orbal
: At first he was shouting, and now he’s whispering. What did you say, Bratianu?

Lieutenant Bratianu
: That Velder was planning high treason and wished the General’s death. I asked the accused if he admitted it. Well, Velder, do you admit it?

Velder
: Yes, sir.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: What? What? It’s not that simple, Velder. Expound on your confession.

Velder
: Perhaps I hadn’t realised it before, mostly because the matter wasn’t taken up during the interrogations. But you must be right, sir. I’m convinced that already then I had lost confidence in Oswald and his ideas, which grew more and more clear to me and seemed more and more frightening.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: What … what do you mean by the expression ‘I’m convinced that’, and what do you mean by not saying General Oswald, anyhow?

Velder
: I beg your pardon, sir. I confess without reservations. I knew already then that I was going to turn against General Oswald.

Colonel Pigafetta
: What’s the matter with you, Bratianu? Don’t you feel well? The charge can be laid before the court now, can’t it?

Lieutenant Bratianu
: Pray forgive me, sir. A temporary giddiness.
Probably from an old wound. It is over now.

Commander Kampenmann
: The accused has confessed. Are you laying the charge before the court?

Colonel Orbal
: It can’t ever be a good thing to shout like that.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: There is just one more detail. Velder, do you regret anything? Do you realise how appalling your actions were? How base and treacherous? How vile you were?

Velder
: Yes, sir.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: Turn towards the President of the Court and explain what you feel.

Velder
: I regret my crimes and realise how appalling, base and treacherous my actions were. I also realise my vileness.

Major von Peters
: Fine. Lay the charge before the court now, Bratianu.

Colonel Orbal
: Yes, do that.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: I request to be allowed to lay the charge before this special court martial.

Major von Peters
: Granted. This is going along fine. We can more or less finish for today, Mateo.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: Already?

Colonel Orbal
: What? Yes, of coarse.

Major von Peters
: Short working day, Bratianu. The fruits of a good job done.

Colonel Orbal
: The parties may leave.

*   *   *

Lieutenant Brown
: The parties have left the hall. Does the court now wish to go over to internal deliberations?

Colonel Orbal
: On what?

Major von Peters
: Didn’t I tell you that things would be quite different when Bratianu took over? Excellent Prosecuting Officer. He’s taken things as far in one day as Schmidt did in five.

Colonel Orbal
: Good lad, but he shouts too much.

Major von Peters
: Nonsense, Mateo. He’s giving Velder the gruelling he thoroughly deserves.

Commander Kampenmann
: He surprised me a bit. I wonder what he’s after?

Colonel Pigafetta
: Funny that you should say that. I also got the impression that he was trying to press the session to a certain point.

Commander Kampenmann
: In that case, he hasn’t much time. Captain Schmidt will be back the day after tomorrow.

Major von Peters
: Do you know that for certain?

Commander Kampenmann
: Yes, with absolute certainty.

Tadeusz Haller
: I think I know.

Colonel Orbal
: Know what?

Tadeusz Haller
: What Lieutenant Bratianu is after.

Major von Peters
: It’s all the same to me, really. The main thing is that we’ve got a move on. Is there anything left in the mess, Mateo?

Colonel Orbal
: Think so. Though no females as Pigafetta has. We should introduce that. Something to feast the eyes on is necessary for a man, as General Winckelman used to say. He never went into action without his books.

Major von Peters
: Anyhow, it would be a good thing if the ban were lifted. Finish this off now, Mateo.

Colonel Orbal
: Thank you, gentlemen. This session of the extraordinary court martial is adjourned until eleven o’clock tomorrow.

Lieutenant Brown
: Those present: Colonel Orbal, Colonel Pigafetta, Major von Peters, Commander Kampenmann and Justice Tadeusz Haller. Officer presenting the case, Lieutenant Brown. Captain Schmidt has reported his absence, but has telegraphed a message to say he will be presenting the case for the prosecution tomorrow. Prosecuting Officer at today’s session will be Lieutenant Bratianu.

Major von Peters
: Excellent. Call in the parties.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: Sir, honoured members of the presidium, I request to be allowed to continue the case of the Armed Forces versus Corporal Erwin Velder from the point at which yesterday’s session was adjourned.

Colonel Orbal
: Of course. Granted.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: I exhort the accused to stand to attention and remain thus until the adjournment of this session. I request that the presidium points out to the accused that he is still bound by his oath when called as a witness.

Colonel Orbal
: Granted. Now those instructions are lost again. Oh, there they are, thank you. You are testifying under oath to tell the truth and I hereby remind you of the significance of the oath. I said all that to you, Velder. Yes, Bratianu, go on.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: Charge numbers sixty-six to and including seventy-six. Eleven charges of repudiation of God, atheism, blasphemy and the spreading of heresy. The offences did not occur in wholly chronological order if one places them in relation to the group of charges which have been gathered together in the last complex. This is for purely practical reasons. To avoid unnecessary waste of time and to facilitate a summary of jurisdiction, offences of a similar nature have been brought together in separate complexes.

Colonel Orbal
: That sounds all right, what?

Lieutenant Bratianu
: Briefly, I shall now express more precisely the different charges. Velder’s behaviour and attitudes towards spiritual and religious matters have been closely analysed in relation to a period of two years, to be more exact, the twenty-four months prior to his desertion from the Army. During all that time he was a member of General Oswald’s bodyguard and also held a position of special responsibility, which should have induced him to behave as an example to others. During that time, he committed innumerable indiscretions against Christian morality, he blasphemed, he profaned, and he spread infamous heresy. The general spirit of secularisation and irreligion created by the traitors Edner, Ludolf and Aranca Peterson are thoroughly described and documented in the preliminary investigation’s various appendices, but I shall not weary the presidium by taking these matters up at this particular moment.

Major von Peters
: Thank God for that.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: I request that this side of the case is left at that.

Major von Peters
: For Christ’s sake, yes. Granted.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: Of greater interest, of course, are the offences to which the accused has confessed. Complete statements and confessions in each separate case lie here before me. What we have now to establish is the accused’s attitude today, and to what extent he has acquired correction and wisdom. And also whether he feels due shame and regret.

Colonel Orbal
: This is all deadly dull.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: Velder, I will take a few samples from your register of sins. Stand to attention and listen carefully. You have on several occasions abused the name of God, the Holy Virgin and the Saviour. You have used expressions which an honest and righteous man is scarcely capable of uttering. It is with considerable reluctance and genuine anxiety that I now force myself to do so. The expressions ‘Jesus Christ and all the Demons in Hell’, ‘God’s Curses’, ‘Bloody Plastic Jesus’, ‘Christ in Heaven’, just to mention a few. Is that right?

Velder
: Yes, sir.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: You have also—according to your own
sworn statement—said to a certain named person: ‘I don’t care if there’s only one or there are a thousand gods. The question doesn’t interest me and it doesn’t interest anyone else either.’ This is an example of your criminal atheism and spreading of heresy. Do you admit to that too?

Velder
: Yes,’ sir. I admit that.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: You have also violated and grossly desecrated one of the two remaining churches which at the time existed in the country, you played cards on the altar, spat on the floor, washed yourself in the font, killed animals in the choirstalls, committed the most gross obscenity by fornicating in the sacristy and urinating on the church wall. Do you admit to this?

Captain Endicott
: In the name of exactitude, I must point out just one thing. The building to which the Prosecuting Officer is referring had not been used as a church for many years. It was derelict and functioned at first as a temporary school, then as a guard-post for the militia, and finally as a pig-sty and hen-house for the militia. It was during the latter time that Velder occasionally supervised the building.

Colonel Orbal
: Did he say on the floor of the sacristy?

Major von Peters
: Yes, Mateo.

Colonel Orbal
: Good God …

Lieutenant Bratianu
: I will not tolerate these quite unwarranted interruptions from the defence! Captain Endicott, think of whom you are ordered to defend. A monster of degeneration, debauchery and …

Colonel Orbal
: Oh, now he’s beginning to shout again.

Lieutenant Bratianu
: Should the anti-religiousness and infamous actions of a perverted régime rob a sacred place of its sacredness? Can human evil change the character of an institution ordained by God? You surprise, me, Captain Endicott. You should apologise to the presidium.

Captain Endicott
: Colonel Pigafetta?