The Tower: A Novel (90 page)

The exercise yard
. For their
free hour
in the mornings they go out at the double (keeping one metre away from the guard) and run at the double. There was a square asphalt yard bounded by a cobbled path and high concrete walls with barbed wire sloping inwards. The sky above the yard was patterned by a grid of bars. In the middle of the grid was a gap through which the trunk of a lime tree towered up. The lime gave off an overpowering scent, but there were no flowers on the ground; there was a net under the top of the tree that collected the leaves and flowers that fell; there were also birds’ nests in it from which came contented twittering. There was a bench round the tree trunk, but no one ever sat on it. The detainees ran round in a circle, always to the left, at the double, without talking. Tobacco changed hands and one day Christian managed to pay his debt of one cigarette when the man from the tram suddenly but unobtrusively appeared behind him. Sometimes the guards would bellow. They were bored.

The knives they were given to eat with were blunt. The stapler Christian had to use to keep documents together was so made that the slot where the staples were inserted could only be opened by a little key the guard kept. When all the staples were used up Christian had to wait until the spyhole was opened and he could make a sign. The waiting time did not count towards the time allowed.

Visits
. Christian received a letter. Sperber, the lawyer, wrote that, at his parents’ request, he would take over his defence.

Visits. A visitor for Kurtchen. Kurtchen had a girlfriend. His girlfriend was making difficulties. She wanted to be screwed, Kurtchen explained, and he wasn’t there, of course. Kurtchen had had an idea and asked Christian’s advice, for he had been to senior high and had imagination. Christian didn’t want to advise him, he was sick of the evenings when Kurtchen used the word ‘imagination’. At that Kurtchen frowned and explained that he didn’t want to get angry.

‘Should I let her get laid by my best friend, what d’you think?

Christian avoided a direct answer. ‘Perhaps … but there must be other possibilities to consider first.’

‘Nah, not any more. She has a dildo, from over there. But now she wants a guy on the end of it, an’ there aren’t any batteries for it either. An’ just using her imagination’s not enough any more, she says.’

‘Well, if it’s your best friend –’

‘Keeps it in the family, yeh. ’s what I thought too. Then I’ll tell her that, since you say so. You get a tube for that. Should I give her your best wishes?’

Lawyer’s visit
. Sperber was well dressed, shiny suit, lilac-coloured shirt, slim gold wristwatch that he wore with the face on the inside of his wrist and now and then shook round to the outside. The ‘sweet’ was in the buttonhole of his left lapel. Limp handshake, it felt to Christian as if he’d squeezed a raw chop instead of a hand. Sperber gave Christian some cigarettes. He’d been told by his father, he said, that he didn’t smoke, but they were the common currency in there. Christian wasn’t paying close attention. He was fascinated by the lawyer’s smell. It came from outside. He hadn’t realized that the world outside had a smell that was clearly different from the one inside the jail. After all, it was the same air that came in through the window and at night sometimes even the scent of the lime tree. But that belonged in there – its smell was so strong it mocked them.

Sperber
had
examined
Christian’s files but at the moment, he said, apart from the cigarettes there was nothing he could do for him.

‘We must wait for the indictment. You will be indicted, young man. And until then you will continue to be remanded in custody. – Your parents are very worried.’ His tone changed to one of fatherly concern, then of mild reproach. ‘They know where you are. How could you get carried away like that? Your father taught you how to avoid that. Remember Herr Orré’s lessons. Are they to have been so much wasted effort?’ So the lawyer knew about that. Now he was smiling, anticipating Christian’s question. ‘Word gets round, Herr Hoffmann. But you’ve done something very stupid. In fact you quite often, so it seems to me, do stupid things.’

‘I didn’t mean it like that.’

‘How you meant it is neither here nor there. What matters is what is in the files and you signed the transcript.’

‘But the situation –’

‘Courts don’t concern themselves with situations,’ Sperber broke in, giving his arm a friendly pat, ‘but with verifiable facts. I feel sympathy for you, certainly, but sympathy gets us nowhere.’

‘Herr Doktor Sperber.’ Christian found he suddenly had to fight back the tears, which seemed to embarrass the lawyer, his expression cooled. ‘What’s going to happen to me?’

‘We’ll have to wait and see. It doesn’t look that bad. Don’t worry about that for now. – Have you always wanted to study medicine?’

‘N-no,’ Christian said, surprised.

‘Good. So you do have alternatives. It’s better not to get too set on one thing. Well, chin up, young man. Things will sort themselves out, I’m doing my best.’

Waiting
. Christian was getting fatter, his skin was pale and puffy.

‘That’s the food and the lack of exercise,’ Kurtchen said. At some
point Christian stopped being bothered at using the toilet in the cell. It did bother him if the door was flung open at the moment when he was squatting down on the seat and the PO ordered a room count. In the evening Christian sometimes recited poems, Once more the valley quietly fills / with your misty glow … Twilight spreads its wings once more. Korbinian leant against the window and recited psalms. Kurtchen would stay silent then. If Korbinian became too loud the key would crash in the lock and the guard take Korbinian out of the cell: ‘At the double!’

The trial
was set for 6 June 1986. It was a sunny day. After breakfast Christian was given a food bag.

‘We’ll see each other again,’ Kurtchen said.

‘You think so?’

‘You’re not going to get out of here,’ Korbinian said cheerfully. ‘The Lord be with you. Farewell and forgive us.’

‘Farewell and forgive us,’ Kurtchen cried as Christian went out of the cell door. He was taken to Transport, but first to Effects. Christian was shown his possessions, had to check them, sign that they were all there.

Handcuffs. The long corridors lit by bare bulbs and smelling of floor polish. The light outside hit Christian like a blow in the face. He lifted up his hands, the movement alarmed the accompanying officer, who immediately drew his pistol. The Black Maria drew up.

The Black Maria
was grey. The door was opened, Christian pushed in. A guard took over. There were little cells inside the Black Maria, each with room for one delinquent. Tip-up seats, no windows. The Black Maria set off, cell bolts clanking; Christian listened to the slow resolution of the clink-clank of the bolts that were outside the basic rhythm, after a while all the bolts were in time with each other, a
vigorous metallic ringing, comforting and oddly full of the joy of living; then it dissolved again, in a mirror image of the synchronization, into individual rhythms.

‘Get out.’

Remanded in custody
. Once more he was taken down long subterranean passages. The walls were sweating, damp had left patches on the ceilings, some looked like the clouds of smoke at the mouths of cannons that had just been fired. Christian and the other detainees from the Black Maria went ‘yoked’, their handcuffs had been chained together.

‘Halt!’ They waited by the wall in a corridor, hands raised. Christian was put in a custody room in the basement. There were six bunks, four already taken. The door slammed shut. The toilet was under a barred window.

‘Welcome to Ascania,’ one of the detainees muttered. ‘What are you in for, then?’ By now the answer came automatically to Christian’s lips.

‘Food for the national economy,’ the detainee replied with a grin. His front teeth were missing. No questions, that was something Christian had learnt by this time. It wasn’t his place to ask questions, the others, the older ones did that, not him.

During the night he heard shouts. At first he thought he’d been dreaming but the man on the bunk next to his was restless, grunting, perhaps in his sleep. The air was cold, the cell bathed in the bluish glow of the nightlight. Christian lay there, motionless, arms along his body, under the blanket. He suddenly sensed that no one else was asleep. The light sleep of prisoners … That wasn’t true. In the tram in the first detention centre, on Coal Island, most had slept a deep, snoring sleep. Even Kurtchen had slept well and wasn’t so easily disturbed. Not even by the shouts, which had always woken Christian, or so he thought.

‘Quasimodo,’
one of them in a more distant corner of the room said.

‘Yes, on his rounds again.’

‘Could be on the fourth, above us, from the echo.’

‘He’s got a dimpled cosh.’

‘How d’you know that?’

‘My arse tells me.’

‘Pull the other one! You’re just having us on.’

‘Italian job, he showed it me, very proud of it he was, before using it. ’s got little bobbles on it – doesn’t leave any blue marks.’

‘A rubber truncheon that doesn’t leave any weals, did you ever hear the like of it?’

‘Just arrived.’

‘And they pay hard currency for that …’

‘Have you ever seen his daughter?’

‘They say she’s in a wheelchair. Our PO told me he’s supposed to be a good father. Looks after her, that kind of thing.’

‘He gives his wife flowers on her birthday and International Women’s Day.’

‘Hey, sonny!’ That was Christian. ‘If he gives you flowers as well – keep your back to the wall.’

‘Otherwise those cyclamen – might turn into a lily wreath, haha.’

‘And your mother gets a telegram …’

‘Exactly!’

‘But you can bribe him.’

‘Nah, y’can’t. I’ve tried it. Thought, even a PO needs winter tyres. Was against his honour … He refused to go along with it.’

‘And?’

‘Well, cyclamen.’

‘We ought to do him in. Just a little bit.’

‘What with? All you’ve got here’s the toilet chain and the plastic stuff would break. And blunt knives.’

‘If I ever meet him outside …’

‘Then
you’ve got a long wait.’

Shut it! Saw some logs.’

Lance Corporal Christian Hoffmann

8051 Dresden, Heinrichstrasse 11

 

SUMMONS

 

In the criminal proceedings against you, you are required to attend the

Dresden Military Court on

Friday, 6 June 1986, 8.00 a.m.

Also invited to the proceedings are:

Dr Sperber, Lawyer, Dresden and Berlin.

Representative of the Collective … Witnesses …

Ascanian Island
. Handcuffed, Christian and Pancake were taken into a round domed room. It bore some resemblance to a lecture hall, there was even a blackboard. Christian saw his parents and Meno; his parents were pale; he avoided looking at them. The guard pushed him and Pancake into the front row of the benches that had been set up facing the table with a red cloth over it. On either side of a grooved column, from which the ormolu was flaking off, there were windows with pot plants on the window ledges. Hung high up on the column was the coat of arms of the German Democratic Republic. Sperber gave Christian’s parents an encouraging smile.

The court entered. Christian and Pancake were jabbed in the back: Up! They got up, Christian stood there even though he couldn’t put his weight on his right leg and, clearly visible to the court (a colonel, an assessor with the rank of captain, a clerk), was wobbling to and fro. The colonel nodded to those present. The representative of the Collective – it was the taciturn goldsmith, who, Christian now realized, was a member of the Socialist Unity Party – read out an assessment
of the two accused: Lance Corporal Hoffmann was a suspiciously taciturn member of the army who, despite that, could argue eloquently once he had been drawn out; he liked reading in his free time, once poems by Wolf Biermann. Several times he had described the practice of sealing up the cassette compartment on the radios as ‘daft’; several times he had swept the copies of
Junge Welt
put out in the day-room off the table in a manner suggesting contempt. As far as performance of his duties was concerned, he had done nothing to draw attention to himself apart from the two incidents during the last military exercise. The judge waved this away impatiently: these were not a matter for the court, would the Comrade Lance Corporal please stick to the matter in hand! Nip was called and took Ina’s letter from Cuba out of his briefcase. Hoffmann had been stubborn, they had frequently had to take
corrective measures
. Next the evidence was heard. The witnesses stepped forward: Musca, Wanda, the driving instructor who had passed on the company commander’s order to Christian. They were asked about the precise wording of the things Christian and Pancake were supposed to have said. Every one remembered something different. The judge became annoyed. He ordered the interrogation transcripts that the witnesses were to confirm to be read out.

Then the accused were called up to
state their case
. First Christian, then Pancake. Christian apologized, he’d been confused, in an exceptional situation. Most of all he would have liked to scream, to mow down the whole lousy lot of them (he had to be careful not to let that expression slip out) with a machine gun, if he’d had one with him. Out of the corner of his eye he saw that Sperber was unhappy with this. Pancake spoke, head bowed, in a low, halting voice. Just like his comrade, he too had not meant it like that. He bitterly regretted his misdemeanour and wanted to make up for it. There was no one there for Pancake, it looked as if he had no relations or, if he did, they didn’t care. The court ordered a recess.