An Honorable German (47 page)

Returning to his hut alone after breakfast one morning, Max found three of Lehmann’s toadies waiting at the door, blocking
his way. The three men stood blinking into the sun, saying nothing. Max stopped in front of them.

“Excuse me,” he said.

“Yes, excuse you,” said the man in the middle—hardly a man, even: tall and burly, but still young enough to have a tight cluster
of acne on each cheek.

“You’re in my way,” Max said.

“Oh—oh, excuse
me
, then. I hadn’t realized.” The young man grinned and stepped aside.

Max felt for the handle of the knife tucked into his belt but didn’t draw it yet. He moved forward, up the two steps to the
doorway. A blow struck the back of his head, and a hand caught his ankle, sprawling him face first into the hut. He flipped
over in a panic and yanked the knife out—muscles taut, pulse racing—but Lehmann’s men were already walking away. Max could
hear them laughing.

“Careful there,” the tall one called back over his shoulder. “Watch that last step up.”

Max sat on the floor with the knife in his hand, watching the three men amble across the yard. Finally he stood, brushing
himself off, wiping the sweat from his eyes. They were just trying to scare him. And he was scared.

He thought again about writing Admiral Dönitz in Code Irland, the secret code all U-boat crews learned so they might communicate
useful information if captured, explaining Lehmann’s insubordination, the circumstances of his surrender of
U-114
, of asking the admiral to issue a coded command for his protection. But Lehmann was unlikely to obey orders from anyone.
And truth be told, Dönitz would agree that Max should die for surrendering his boat. Max buried his face in his hands. His
mind was fixed on hopeless alternatives out of bare desperation, but the truth was that nobody could help him.

Certainly not Mareth, though he badly wanted to unburden himself to her. But the American censors would read whatever he wrote,
and if they began questioning the other prisoners it would only make matters worse for him. He was convinced of that. Besides,
why send Mareth into a panic when there was nothing she could do?

He took the bundle of her letters out from under his mattress and unfolded the latest one to read through the first line again,
as he did four or five times a day.

July 27

Dearest Max,

How can I complain? How can I complain when you are safe and I am safe and when this war finally ends we will be together.

Max pictured Mareth crying as she wrote these letters on the veranda of her temporary home in Mexico City, taking refuge from
the merciless sun. She would be tan now, her blond hair gone almost to platinum. He would never see her again.

Max sat alone in his room for the rest of the day, sometimes smoking, mostly staring at nothing. The next day was more of
the same, as was the day after that. He skipped most meals and appeared only for mandatory roll call in the morning. Carls
smuggled food out of the mess hall—apples once, bread another time, and then a few of the miniature cereal boxes that served
as breakfast for the prisoners. Max liked Kellogg’s Corn Flakes the best. Luckily, he found that sitting all day on his bunk
without moving reduced his appetite even more: he was never hungry, he ate only because Carls told him to.

Nights were the worst. He tried to sleep but was too anxious, lying there gripping his knife, waiting to be set upon in the
dark, listening to the men snoring around him, his body going tense at the slightest sound. It seemed impossible to control
his nerves once the sun went down. But after three such nights, nobody had come for him, and Max knew he couldn’t keep living
this way. In the morning he went to the mess hall with Carls and Heinz and bolted three boxes of Corn Flakes.

Coming out of the latrine after the meal, Max found Lehmann waiting in the hall. He was alone, smoking, his back against the
wall. He smiled and said, “Guten Morgen, Maximilian. I haven’t seen you in these last few days. Thought maybe something had
happened to you.”

Max fixed his best parade-ground stare on Lehmann. “Thank you, Leutnant. I find such sentiment on your part heartwarming.”

Lehmann scowled, pointed the end of his cigarette at Max. “You’re a traitor, Maximilian. You ruined my navy career and betrayed
me—me and the crew and the Führer as well. You’re a traitor to the Fatherland, you swine, and the men in this camp know it.”

“The men in this camp have no respect for the proper discipline of the Wehrmacht. You are a traitor to the German navy, Leutnant
Lehmann. You and your friends should all be court-martialed for insubordination.”

Max had the knife secured beneath his uniform. He could slit Lehmann’s throat right now and maybe it would be better that
way. He stared at the young man without saying anything.

“You should be more at ease,” Lehmann said. “When we want you, we shall come for you. There is little you can do to stop us,
so don’t lose your rest over it.” He dropped the cigarette butt and crushed it with his shoe, smiled again, then walked away.

“Worst of it is,” Heinz said over a cigarette later that night, “the filthy pig might be right. We’ll do our best to keep
you safe, Herr Kaleu, but there’s nowhere to hide in this camp.”

Max nodded. What Heinz said was true. And because it was true, he let Carls and Heinz convince him to go with them to the
movie being shown that night. “We’ll be on either side of you, Herr Kaleu,” Carls assured him. “There will be American guards
everywhere, Lehmann won’t go for you there.”

“What are they showing?”

“
The Thin Man
.”

Max smiled. Myrna Loy. She would be worth seeing again. And
The Thin Man
was a favorite. He’d seen it twice with Mareth in Berlin before the war. He smiled, something Carls and Heinz hadn’t seen
in a while. “Then let us go, gentlemen.”

“Jawohl,” said Carls, “all ahead full.”

Smoke filled the brightly lit mess hall. Everyone seemed to be smoking; it was almost like a hobby in the camp. The Americans
gave the men as many cigarettes as they wanted. Max, Heinz, and Carls sat on the floor at the back of the hall, not far from
the door. Hardly anyone seemed to have noticed them come in. Even if they had, it would take a brave soul to jump him with
Heinz and Carls on either side.

The men began to stomp their feet around 2000 hours. They did it in unison, like participants at a Nazi rally, and the American
guards took the cue. They cut the lights and started the projector, beginning the show with a newsreel about the war. Allied
progress in France was steady, unstoppable. Caen had indeed fallen; the newsreel showed Allied tanks rolling through the burnt-out
city. The men booed vociferously, throwing cigarette butts at the screen. They went on booing as the footage shifted to Italy,
to the American troops now in Rome, and the Pacific, where the first American bombs had begun raining down on Tokyo.

Finally the movie itself began, the prisoners shouting and catcalling at any woman who walked through the frame. They erupted
when Myrna Loy finally came on screen, one man in front jumping up to rub his crotch in her direction as the others howled.
The Americans hadn’t added German subtitles but this hardly seemed to bother the men, who followed along as best as they could.

Max was able to lose himself in the laughter for a few minutes. American movies were the best in the world. Max whispered
translations of the dialogue to Heinz and Carls at crucial moments. The men went on smoking, laughing loudly when they sensed
the slightest joke; they were eager to laugh. Max had noticed this in the movies at Camp Taylor, too. It was as if they were
all trying to prove to themselves that they hadn’t lost the ability.

Halfway through the movie, the screen went dark. The men hooted but the lights did not come back on. Max realized the building’s
electricity had been cut. No one moved because it was too dark to see and they wanted to watch the rest of the movie. But
Max’s battle instincts had him rising to his feet before his mind had even consciously registered the danger. A hand clapped
over his mouth. He drew the knife and plunged it blindly at whoever was behind him. The knife cut into flesh but something
metal slammed against the back of Max’s head, staggering him, and he dropped the blade. A burlap sack dropped over his face
and he heard Carls and Heinz struggling beside him. Bodies hit the floor but he couldn’t tell whose. Men in the audience were
getting to their feet, some of them beginning to shout for the movie to come back on. Max had gone groggy from the blow to
the head. His joints went loose as they dragged him to the door.

Outside now. Max felt the cool night air on his skin. He was being carried by three men, maybe four, walking quickly across
the dark compound. Nobody said anything. They passed through another door, dropped Max into a hard wooden chair. Someone yanked
the bag off his head.

They were in one of the outbuildings. Max couldn’t tell which. The room was not large, just a small hut made of thin plywood.
Six men were seated at a rectangular table in front of him—Lehmann, Bekker, and four of their comrades, all noncommissioned
Nazi extremists. A soldier stood at parade rest on either side of Max; he recognized one of them as the burly young acne sufferer
who had harassed him the week before. The man’s uniform was torn and blood dripped from a shallow knife wound below his ribcage,
but he seemed unfazed.

Lehmann presided. He sat at the center of the table, holding a ceremonial Nazi dagger. Max wondered how he’d gotten his hands
on one of those—it was among the first items American soldiers looked for to take as a souvenir. The British fought for empire
it was said, the French for glory, the Americans for souvenirs. The table was draped with a homemade banner: a mildly warped
swastika in a white circle on a field of red that looked more like burnt orange. The room was lit with candles stuck in empty
Coke bottles. All the men at the table stared directly, severely at Max, with the exception of Bekker, who seemed to have
his eyes fixed on a point on the wall above Max’s head.

Lehmann cleared his throat. “This Kriegsmarine Court of Honor is convened to hear evidence and pronounce judgment on the conduct
of a certain Maximilian Brekendorf, who is charged with disloyalty to the Führer and German Reich and cowardice in the face
of the enemy.”

Max raised his voice. “You will address me as Herr Kapitän-Leutnant,” he announced, but none of the men paid him any attention.
His head was still ringing but he felt calm—the suspense was over. War was an endless series of absurdities, any one of which
might prove fatal. “And for which of these do you suppose I was awarded the Iron Cross First and Second Class, Leutnant?”
he said. “Did I receive those for my disloyalty, or for my cowardice? And the black wound badge, and the auxiliary cruiser
badge? And the German Cross in gold for bringing my U-boat safely back to port after being rammed by a British destroyer?
Was that awarded to me in the name of the Führer for betraying the Führer, Leutnant? Are you mad?”

Lehmann frowned. “You will have an opportunity to defend yourself once the evidence has been heard, Herr Brekendorf.”

“And you will have an opportunity to be court-martialed for violating the Military Law of the German Wehrmacht with these
illegal and irregular proceedings if I ever get out of here, Leutnant.”

“If, Herr Brekendorf. Shall we begin?” He turned to Bekker. “Our first witness is Rudolph Bekker, former radioman aboard
U-114
under the command of Herr Brekendorf.”

The man to Lehmann’s right began writing dutifully in a small black notebook, as if this might lend the trial some official
flair.

“Herr Bekker,” Lehmann started in, “please tell the court your position before posting to the fleet.”

Bekker was the oldest man in the room. Gray streaks ran through his hair. He glanced briefly at Max before looking up again
at his chosen point on the wall. “I served as a personnel clerk in the Naval Records Office in Kiel.”

“I see. And did this position allow you access to any pertinent information regarding Herr Brekendorf’s background?”

“Yes. When I was posted to
U-114
, I read the file on the Kommandant so I might know something about the man under whom I would serve. Naturally I was curious.”
Several of the other men at the table nodded in understanding. “To my dismay, I discovered that the Kommandant had been taken
in for questioning by the Gestapo in Paris after helping an Allied spy escape capture.”

Lehmann lifted his eyebrows and swept the room with a significant look.

“That is a specious allegation,” Max said. “It was a misunderstanding. They never would have given me my own boat if there
was anything to it.”

“Silence,” Lehmann ordered. “You will be allowed to present your case in due time, Herr Brekendorf, but the court will look
on your behavior with severe disapproval if you continue to speak out of turn.”

“Enough,” Max said. He began to rise from his chair but the two soldiers forced him back down.

“Continue, Herr Bekker. You said he had been arrested by the Gestapo on suspicion of assisting an Allied spy ring?”

“That is correct, Herr Lehmann.”

Max shook his head.

Lehmann looked to the other members of his kangaroo court. “Questions?”

The man with the notebook leaned forward. “So you are telling us that Herr Brekendorf’s treasonous activity against the Reich
predates the surrender of
U-114
?”

“Jawohl.”

Max stared at Bekker, and now Bekker stared back. His eyes had a hollow look in them. Looking through classified personnel
records was illegal, a court-martial offense in its own right, and Bekker must have known as much. If Max ever got back to
Germany… but that was a moot point.

Lehmann picked up the ceremonial dagger and began twirling it in his right hand. “Our second charge is cowardice in the face
of the enemy. Herr Bekker, did
U-114
in fact torpedo and sink the Royal Mail Ship
Dundee
while that ship was sailing alone and unescorted off the southern coast of Florida?”