Wheels of Terror (39 page)

The general eyed von Luders coldly. Then without acknowledging the salute he turned to Colonel Hinka.

'Pay attention, Colonel, here's another one of your gangs. No discipline, no order. It looks more like an errand-boys' outfit than a military formation. A lieutenant reports to his corps commander with an escort straight from swimming in the ditch, smacking their lips like over-fed cows: Swine! A lot of filthy swine!' He pointed to Luders who stood stiff as a tree in front of him.

'Where's your gas-mask? Where's your steel-helmet? Don't you know that you should carry your steel-helmet at all times when on active service? And you let yourself run round in a forage-cap!' He became dark-red in the face. Wild words poured out of his mouth. There was a trace of tears in his stuttering, excited voice. He pointed to Porta's and Tiny's head-gear. 'That bowler - and that top-hat! What's that for? What in the name of heaven have you got on your head?'

Porta straightened up very slowly. Leaning on his carbine he said:

'A cylinder, Herr Generaloberst.'

'So that's what it is, a cylinder! Throw it away! Take it off! Punish that man!' he shouted at Hinka. Then he turned to Tiny chewing a blade of grass and with the bowler-hat on the back of his head.

'And what is this kind of head-wear you've allowed yourself to be dressed up in?'

Startled, Tiny jumped up, tripped over his feet and dropped his light machine-gun. With much noise he found his feet and stood up.

'Herr Generaloberst, it's an elephant's pessary!'

(I'd better mention here that Tiny did not know what a pessary was. He truly believed it was the proper name for a bowler-hat.)

The general bared his teeth. The blood rushed to his puffy face. He turned to Hinka.

'That fellow will be court-martialled as soon as the regiment has returned from the front-line. I'll teach them to make fun of me!'

The Old Un whispered in prayer:

'Dear little Ivan, please bang a little! Only a teeny weeny little bang from your "organ"!'

But Ivan had no direct telepathic communication with The Old Un. Nothing happened.

Cursing and swearing the general ordered that he should be shown the battle positions. He jeered at a lieutenant of his staff who jumped for cover when a 7.5-cm. shell crashed on to the road.

'Did you drop something, Herr Lieutenant, since you're lying there?'

Red in the face, the lieutenant stood up and trudged confused after his great boss.

When the general had seen the positions, which he criticized severely, he started to cross a piece of open land where Ivan had a nice field of fire.

The heavy machine-gun on the hill immediately started firing. Three officers were wounded, but the general marched stiffly across the open space without even a glance at the wounded.

The road was hit by several shells. One tore out von Luder's stomach and he died in a few minutes. Another officer lost his foot.

A few days later we were withdrawn from the line and to our delight Lieutenant Harder was appointed to be our new company commander. He had recently returned from hospital.

We were to rest for a fortnight, but on the very first night we had to turn out.

We had landed in a small village which had served as a recreation-centre for Russian commissars and later for German air force personnel. A dozen beautiful villas were sites for our heavy infantry guns.

In one room, which must have been occupied by women for it retained their female fragrance, Stege and I put up a machine-gun in a window embrasure to cover the railway line. In the attic Porta, the Little Legionnaire and Tiny put up another machine-gun.

Lieutenant Harder with the rest of the commando-group sat underneath us.

Tiny came down with a couple of bottles of vodka and a few herrings. He threw himself on the bed and rolled about with his nose to the sheet, like a retriever on the scent.

'Hell and damnation!' he shouted. 'It stinks of crumpet!'

He slid to the floor. Then he shouted wildly and disappeared under the bed. To our astonishment we heard women's voices, and bedlam followed.

Tiny's voice sounded as if he were speaking through an eiderdown.

'I've caught a couple of tarts!'

There was a violent feminine protest. Simultaneously two female legs appeared from under the bed.

Stege bent down and hauled out a kicking girl. Now Tiny dragged himself out with a second girl in his arms.

'Stupid swine!' she raged at Tiny who was showing off his catch with great delight.

Both girls were dressed partly in civvies. They could not disguise, however, that they were Blitzmadels from the air force.

Stege stood for a moment looking thoughtfully at them.

'Run away from the party?' he said, lifting an eyebrow.

'No, we haven't,' the blonde one said shortly.

'No?' Stege said. 'Well then we better get the OC. Tiny, call Harder!'

Tiny looked at him in astonishment.

'You must have caught an inflammation of the brain. Let's taste the roast first. Let the bloody officers come after. To hell with fetching them!'

The blonde dealt him a hefty blow on the face.

'We're not at all what you think! We're decent girls!'

'You're deserters,' Stege corrected. 'If we get Lieutenant Harder up here and he does his duty you'll be a couple of very long-necked girls!'

'You'd give us up?' gasped the dark girl, who was the younger.

'So you
have
left the treadmill,' Stege said and grinned.

'Yes, we stayed behind when the others left.'

'Left? That's a good one.' Stege laughed. 'We call it running away. Did they catch the express or the plane?'

'This is no time for cheap jokes,' the blonde said.

Stege shrugged his shoulders.

'What are your names?'

'My name's Grethe. My friend's Trude,' answered the blonde.

Tiny could not contain himself any longer. He almost fell on top of Grethe, but she cleverly avoided him.

'You're a good lay,' he shouted and ran after her. 'Just Tiny's number. I'll let you be my very own little tart!'

Stege grabbed him and said sharply:

'Let the girl alone, Tiny. She's no tart.'

'By God, she is!' Tiny cried and caught hold of her skirt. He nearly tugged it off. Frightened, she shouted wildly.

Now we heard thundering boots coming up the stairs.

'Get them away,' Stege snapped and the girls dived under the big bed.

The door opened.

Porta and the Little Legionnaire stood surveying the scene.

Tiny was sitting on the edge of the bed looking up at the ceiling in such a way that even a child would have detected he was hiding something.

Porta gave a long low whistle. He marched across to Tiny and lifted up his chin.

'Now be a good boy and tell Uncle Joseph where you've hidden her.'

'I don't know what you're talking about,' Tiny said.

Porta laughed and kicked a female shoe in front of Tiny.

'Do you know what this is?'

'Yes, a tart-sandal,' Tiny added piously: 'This is a disused whore-house we've landed in.'

'Where are they?' Porta suddenly shouted at Tiny making him fall backwards on the bed in fright.

'Under the bed,' Tiny gasped.

A minute later the girls were revealed. Tiny raged and swore that Grethe was his property.

How it might have ended is hard to tell. But just then a hostile machine-gun started to fire into the roof making the plaster drop on us.

We ran to our machine-gun and saw that the Russians were about to cross the railway line.

'The heavy mortar!' Lieutenant Harder shouted from the lavatory window.

Three men worked feverishly at bringing the large mortar into position. The rest of us tried to keep the Reds at bay with our machine-guns. But more and more Russians massed there.

Shells from a Soviet field-battery began to land on the houses round about and on the road. Harder desperately called the battalion asking for permission to withdraw; but we were ordered to stay put.

'We'll be surrounded!' Harder shouted down the receiver.

'Makes no difference,' replied von Barring. 'Corps HQ have ordered the position to be held. The other companies in the battalion are no better off than you. No. 3 is destroyed. Over.'

A corporal came running from the railway station. A shell hit the ground close by and whirled him upwards.

'Now we're trapped,' Stege shouted. 'Our colleagues have brought up heavy infantry-guns.'

The first shell was already with us. Stones, clods of earth, dust, plaster and shrapnel flew through the air.

We threw ourselves behind the wall for cover, but before the dust had subsided we were at our machine-gun again. Above us we heard Porta shouting and next we saw him sliding like an acrobat down the waste-pipe. He raced across to the station buildings, swiped a 'stove-pipe', knelt down covered by a wall and sent a rocket flying at the attacking Russians.

The effect at this short range was fantastic. Human limbs and firearms were blown into the air. The attack faltered, but a few Russian officers whipped their troops on with slogans from good old Ilya Ehrenburg. They gathered for a fresh attack.

The next rocket crashed with a howl and a smack into the tightly packed troops and scattered them.

Porta grinned up at us, removed his top-hat and bowed like a circus-performer. Then he tore back to the house.

'No more sweeties,' he shouted and started scrambling up the waste-pipe.

Tiny leaned out of the lavatory window:

'Did you notice if my tyres have got enough air? I'm going home by bike, I think.'

'I'll lend you my cycle clips,' the Little Legionnaire said, and laughed hollowly.

Ivan retreated behind the railway line. We loaded our ammunition belts to be ready for a new attack.

A little later a fierce firing came from the other end of the village where the Russians had launched another assault.

Both the girls had crawled under the bed when the fighting started. Now they came out, shaken and shocked.

'What do we do if the Russians come?' Grethe wanted to know.

Stege laughed without much amusement.

'You should have thought of that before you left the party.'

'All right, but what do we do?' Grethe asked.

'Get your pants off ready!' Porta cried as he entered the room.

'Cheeky fellow, you're worse than the Russians,' Grethe screeched.

'Sure, my little pet,' Porta laughed. 'But you'll soon have a chance of judging. Uncle Ivan's preparing his victory.'

He threw a piece of sausage at the girls who were now sitting miserably on the bed.

Tiny sat cross-legged on the floor, drinking vodka. He spat and wiped his mouth. Then he turned to the girls.

'Which of you'll play wild animals with Tiny? I'll pay of course,' he added and threw a 100-mark note on the bed.

'Get yourself some stockings or rose-water.'

The girls eyed him furiously. Porta laughed.

'You're warming up, Tiny!'

Tiny nodded.

'That's right. It's not every day we're fighting in a love-nest. Are you ready, girls, for Tiny? You can be served next.' He motioned to Porta and braced himself.

He bent over Grethe and tried to kiss her. She broke loose and cried hysterically.

'Just like the Russians!'

'Not quite,' Stege said, smiling cynically. 'It lacks a little something.'

'I prefer the Russians to this nasty animal!' she cried.

'You'll get your wish granted!' Stege shouted and flung a hand-grenade out of the window. 'Here they come!'

Ferocious gunfire broke out. The Russians had now almost reached the house. The mortar we had sited had been overrun by Russian infantry.

'Tanks!' The alarm came from the road, and across the railway line appeared the broad snout of a T34.

Lieutenant Harder shouted from downstairs:

'Come on, let's try to reach the cliff behind us. We'll take up a new position there. Bring along the wounded!'

'Now girls, go downstairs and give Ivan a nice kiss,' said Porta. 'Or else get your track-shoes on because we're going to run so fast the water will be pouring from us!'

Covered by the Little Legionnaire's machine-gun we withdrew from the house. As the wounded were hoisted from the lavatory window we were splashed with their blood.

Stege turned to the girls standing lost in the middle of the floor.

'What are you going to do?'

'We'll come,' they said.

They were quickly helped and received by The Old Un and Heide who stood in the back-yard.

'What the hell!' The Old Un burst out. 'Have you got girls up there!'

'Yes, they've been playing hide-and-seek with the head-hunters,' Stege shouted.

Porta and Tiny ran straight into three Russians but after a short scrap the Russians gave up and were taken prisoners.

One of them, a sergeant-major, said with feeling:

'
Waina nix karosch!
'

'Didn't you know that before,' Porta retorted. 'We've known it a long time.'

'
Nom d'un chien
,' the Little Legionnaire said and scuttled off bent under the weight of his machine-gun. The bullets were whining all around him.

Grethe gave a sudden scream. A thick column of blood spurted out of an open hole in her throat.

Tiny half-turned.

'She's eaten something that didn't agree with her.' He grabbed Trude, flung her up on his shoulder and ran off raising the dust with his enormous boots.

'
Quel malheur!
' cursed the Little Legionnaire and started to climb the cliff like a monkey. It towered almost vertically above the rest-camp.

The Russians stormed forward from both sides wildly shouting their '
Uhra!
'

Porta was half-way up the cliff supporting a wounded corporal, helped by the SS man. The Russian fire forced them to drop the wounded man. He fell with a hollow thump on the road.

Stege and I were firing our light machine-guns for all we were worth to keep the Russians at bay until the Little Legionnaire could place his heavier gun in position on top of the cliff.