The Train Was On Time (8 page)

“Aaah,” he yawned, “I’m glad there’s some grub.” His beer had got a bit tepid, but he gulped it down thirstily and began to eat while the other two smoked and very slowly, without the least hurry, drank vodka, crystal-clear, wonderful vodka unpacked by Willi.

“Yes,” laughed Willi, but he broke off so abruptly that the other two looked at him in alarm; Willi blushed, looked at the ground, and took a big gulp of vodka.

“What was that?” Andreas asked quietly. “What were you going to say?”

Willi spoke in a very low voice. “I was going to say that I’m now drinking up our mortgage, literally our mortgage. You see, there was a mortgage on the house my wife owned when we got married, a small one of four thousand, and I had been meaning to pay it off now … but come on, let’s drink, prost!”

The blond fellow also didn’t feel like going into town to some barber, or to a washroom in one of those army huts. They tucked towels and soap under their arms, and off they went.

“And make sure your boots are nice and clean too, boys!” Willi called after them. His own boots were indeed shining with fresh polish.

Somewhere down at the end of a track there was a big water pump for the locomotives. It dripped constantly, slowly; a steady trickle of water flowed from it, and the sand all around
was one large puddle. It was true, it did feel good to have a wash. If only the soap would lather properly. Andreas took his shaving soap. I shan’t be needing it any more, he thought. Although it’s enough for three months, of course, and it was only “issued” to me a month ago, but I shan’t be needing it any more, and the partisans can have what’s left. The partisans need soap too, Poles love shaving. Shaving and shoeshining are their specialties. But just as they were about to start shaving, they saw Willi in the distance calling and waving, and his gestures were so emphatic, so dramatic you might say, that they packed up their things and dried themselves off as they ran back.

“Boys!” called Willi. “There’s a leave-train for Kovel just come in, it’s running late, we’ll be in Lvov in four hours, you can get a shave in Lvov.…” They slipped their tunics and coats back on again, put on their caps, and carried their luggage over to the platform where the delayed train for Kovel was standing. Not many got out at Przemysl, but Willi found a compartment from which a whole group of Panzer soldiers emerged, young fellows, boys in new uniforms that filled the air with the smell of army stores. A whole corridor became empty, and they quickly boarded the train before the ones who had stayed on it had a chance to spread themselves out with their luggage.

“Four o’clock!” cried Willi triumphantly. “That means we’ll be in Lvov by ten at the very latest. That’s great. Couldn’t have made better time, this glorious delayed train! A whole night to ourselves, a whole night!”

They quickly installed themselves in such a way that they could at least sit back to back.

As he sat there Andreas finally managed to dry his wet ears properly; then he took everything out of his pack and neatly rearranged all the things he had hastily stuffed into it. Now there were a soiled shirt and soiled underpants and a pair of clean socks, the remains of the sausage, the remains of the
butter in its container. Monday’s sausage and half Monday’s butter and Sunday’s and Monday’s candy, and cigarettes, to which he was even entitled, and even some bread left over from Sunday noon; and his prayer book, he had lugged his prayer book around all through the war and never used it. He always said his prayers just as they came to him, but he could never go on a trip without it. How strange, he thought, how strange it all is, and he lit a cigarette, one to which he was still entitled, a Saturday’s cigarette, for the ration period from Friday noon to Saturday noon.…

The blond fellow was playing his mouth organ, and the two of them smoked in silence while the train got under way. The blond fellow was playing properly now, improvising, it seemed; soft, moving, amorphous forms that made you think of swampland.

That’s it, thought Andreas, the Sivash marshes, I wonder what they’re doing there now beside their cannon. He shuddered. Maybe they’ve killed each other off, maybe they’ve finished off the sergeant major, maybe they’ve been relieved. Let’s hope they’ve been relieved. Tonight I’ll say a prayer for the men beside the cannon in the Sivash marshes, and also for the man who fell for Greater Germany because he didn’t want, because he didn’t want … to get that way; that’s truly a hero’s death. His bones are lying somewhere up there in a marsh in the Crimea, no one knows where his grave is, no one’s going to dig him up and take him to a heroes’ cemetery, no one’s ever going to think of it again, and one day he’ll rise again, way up there out of the Sivash marshes, the father of two kids with a wife living in Germany, and the local Nazi leader, with a terribly sad expression, took her the letter, in Bremen or in Cologne, or in Leverkusen, maybe his wife lives in Leverkusen. He will rise again, way up there out of the Sivash marshes, and it will be revealed that he did not fall for Greater Germany at
all, nor because he mutinied and attacked the sergeant major, but because he didn’t want to get that way.

They were both startled when the blond fellow abruptly broke off playing; they had been swathed, wreathed about, in those soft gentle misty melodies, and now the web was torn. “Look,” said the blond fellow, pointing to the arm of a soldier standing by the window and smoking a pipe, “that’s what we used to make back home. Funny thing, you see so few of them, yet we used to make thousands.” They didn’t know what he was talking about. The blond fellow looked confused, and he blushed as he faced their puzzled eyes. “Crimea badges,” he said impatiently. “We used to make lots of Crimea badges. Now they’re making Kuban badges, they’ll soon be handing those out. We used to make the medals for blowing up tanks too, and years ago the Sudeten medals with the tiny shield showing Hradshin Castle. In ’thirty-eight.” They continued to look at him as if he were talking Greek, their eyes were still puzzled, and he reddened still further.

“For God’s sake,” he almost shouted, “we had a factory back home!”

“Oh,” said the two others.

“Yes, a patriotic-flag factory.”

“A flag factory?” Willi asked.

“Yes, that’s what they called it, of course we made flags too. Truckloads of flags, I’m telling you, years ago … let’s see … in ’thirty-three, I think it was. Of course, that’s when it must have been. But mostly we made medals and trophies and badges for clubs, you know the sort of thing, little shields saying: ‘Club Champion 1934,’ or some such thing. And badges for athletic clubs and swastika pins and those little enamel flags to pin on. Red-white-and-blue, or the French vertical blue-white-and-red. We exported a lot. But since the war we’ve only made for ourselves. Wound badges too, huge
quantities of those. Black, silver, and gold. But black, huge quantities of black. We made a lot of money. And old medals from World War I, we made those too, and combat badges, and the little ribbons you wear with civilian dress. Yes …” he sighed, broke off, glanced once more at the Crimea badge of the soldier who was leaning on the window and still smoking his pipe, and then he started to play again. Slowly, slowly the light bgean to fade … and suddenly, without transition, twilight was there, welling up stronger and darker until evening swiftly came, and you could sense the cool night on the threshold. The blond fellow went on playing his swampy melodies that wafted dreamily into them like drugs … Sivash, Andreas thought, I must pray for the men beside the cannon in the Sivash marshes before I go to sleep. He realized he was beginning to doze off again, his last night but one. He prayed … prayed … but the words got mixed up, everything became blurred.… Willie’s wife in her red pajamas … the eyes … the smug little Frenchman … the blond fellow, and the one who had said: Practically speaking, practically speaking we’ve already won the war.

This time he woke up because the train stopped for a long time. At a railway station it was different, you turned over with a yawn and could feel the impatience in the wheels, and you knew the train would soon be under way. But this time the train stopped for so long that the wheels seemed frozen to the rails. The train was at a standstill. Not at a station, not on a siding. Half-asleep, Andreas groped his way to his feet and saw everyone crowding around the windows. He felt rather forlorn, all by himself like that in the dark corridor, especially since he couldn’t spot Willi and the blond fellow right away. They must be up front by the windows. It was dark outside and cold, and he guessed it was at least one or two in the morning. He heard railroad cars rumbling past outside, and he heard soldiers singing in them … their stale, stupid, fatuous songs that were so
deeply buried in their guts that they had worn a groove like a tune in a record, and as soon as they opened their mouths they sang, sang those songs: Heidemarie and Jolly Huntsman.… He had sung them too sometimes, without knowing or wanting to, those songs that had been sunk into them, buried in them, drilled into them so as to kill their thoughts. These were the songs they were now shouting into the dark, somber, sorrowful Polish night, and it seemed to Andreas that far off, somewhere far away he would be able to hear an echo, beyond the somber invisible horizon, a mocking, diminutive, and very distinct echo … Jolly Huntsman … Jolly Huntsman … Heidemarie. A lot of cars must have passed, then no more, and everyone left the windows and went back to their places. Including Willi and the blond fellow.

“The S.S.,” said Willi. “They’re being thrown in around Cherkassy. There’s another pocket there or something. Pickpockets!”

“They’ll manage it somehow,” said a voice.…

Willi sat down beside Andreas and said it was two o’clock. “Shit, we’ll miss the train at Lvov if we don’t get moving right away. It’s still another two hours. We’ll have to leave Sunday morning.…”

“But we’ll be starting up any minute,” said the blond fellow, who was standing at the window again.

“Maybe,” said Willi, “but then we won’t have any time in Lvov. Half an hour is the craps for Lvov. Lvov!” He laughed.

“Me?” they suddenly heard the blond fellow call.

“Yes, you!” shouted a voice outside. “Get ready to take up your post.” Grumbling, the blond fellow came back, and outside someone in a steel helmet stood on the step and stuck his face in through the train window. It was a heavy, thick skull, and they saw dark eyes and an official-looking forehead, the blond fellow having lit a match to find his belt and steel helmet.

“Any noncoms in there?” shouted the voice under the steel helmet. It was a voice that could only shout. No one spoke up. “Are there any noncoms in there, I said!”

No one spoke up. Willi gave Andreas a derisive nudge.

“Don’t make me come and look for myself; if I find a noncom in there it’s going to be tough for him!”

For a further second nobody spoke up, although Andreas could see that the place was swarming with noncoms. Suddenly someone quite near Andreas said: “Here!”

“Fast asleep, eh?” shouted the voice under the steel helmet.

“Yessir,” said the voice, and Andreas now saw it was the man with the Crimea badge.

A few of the men laughed.

“What’s your name?” shouted the voice under the steel helmet.

“Corporal Schneider.”

“You’ll be in charge for as long as we stop here, understand?”

“Yessir!”

“Good. You there—” he pointed to the blond fellow—“what’s your name?”

“Private Siebental.”

“Okay: Private Siebental will stand guard outside this car until four o’clock. If we’re still here by then, have him relieved. Also, place a sentry outside the car on the other side and have him relieved too if necessary. There may be partisans in the area.”

“Yessir!”

The face under the steel helmet vanished, muttering to itself: “Corporal Schneider.”

Andreas was trembling. I hope to God I don’t have to stand guard, he thought. I’m sitting right next to him, and he’ll grab my sleeve and put me on duty. Corporal Schneider had switched on his flashlight and was shining it along the corridor. First he shone it on the collars of those who were lying down and pretending to be asleep, then he grabbed one of them by
the collar, saying with a laugh: “Come on, take your gun and stand out there, and don’t blame me!”

The one who had been picked swore as he got ready. I hope to God they don’t find out I’ve no rifle, no weapon at all, that my rifle’s standing propped up in Paul’s closet behind his raincoat. What’s Paul going to do with the rifle anyway? A chaplain with a rifle, the Gestapo’ll just love that. He can’t report it, because then he’d have to give my name and he would worry that they might write to my platoon. How awful that on top of everything else I had to leave my rifle behind at Paul’s.…

“Come on, man, it’s only till we get going again,” said the corporal to the soldier who was cursing as he groped his way to the door and flung it open. It seemed strange that the train didn’t move on; a quarter of an hour passed, they were too tense to sleep. Maybe there really were partisans in the area, and it was no joke being attacked in a train. Maybe it would be the same tomorrow night. Strange … strange. Maybe that’s how it would be between Lvov and … no, not even Kolomyya. Twenty-four hours to go, twenty-four or at most twenty-six. It’s already Saturday, it’s actually Saturday. How utterly thoughtless I’ve been … I’ve known since Wednesday … and I’ve done nothing, I know it with absolute certainty, and I’ve hardly prayed any more than usual. I played cards. I drank. I ate and really enjoyed my food, and I slept. I slept too much, and time has leaped forward, time always leaps forward, and now here I am only twenty-four hours away from it. I’ve done nothing: after all, when you know you’re going to die you have all kinds of things to settle, to regret, prayers to say, many prayers to say, and I’ve prayed hardly any more than I usually do. And yet I know for sure. I know for sure. Saturday morning. Sunday morning. Literally one more day. I must pray, pray.…

“Got a drink? It’s lousy cold out here.” The blond fellow stuck his head in through the window, and under the steel helmet his effete grayhound-head looked terrible. Willi held the
bottle to the man’s mouth and let him have a long drink. He also held the bottle out to Andreas.