Assignment Gestapo (3 page)

We roared our appreciation, and Tiny roared louder than any of us.

‘So now you’re the only one left?’ I said, when the laughter had died down.

‘That’s it,’ agreed Tiny, proudly. ‘Eleven down, one to go . . . The Gestapo nabbed some of ’em. Three got drowned at sea. The two youngest kids, they was burnt alive in an RAF raid. Their own stupid fault, mind you. Refused to go into the shelter, didn’t they? Wanted to stay up top and see the bleeding planes go by . . . well, they saw ’em all right!’ He nodded, owlishly. ‘So anyway, there’s only me and the old lady left now. And that’s some doing.’ He looked round at the rest of us, studying each in turn. ‘I bet there ain’t many of us have, sacrificed what we have. Eleven at a blow, and all for Adolf . . .’ He gnawed hungrily at his sausage and took a turn at the vodka bottle. ‘Sod the lot of ’em!’ he decided, defiantly. ‘So long as I get out of it alive, I don’t care no more . . . and something tells me that I’m still going to be here at the end.’

‘That wouldn’t surprise me in the least,’ murmured the Old Man.

The Legionnaire was crouched over a cooking pot, absorbed in stirring the contents. Porta craned over his shoulder, stuffed one or two fairly dry logs into the fire. The thick, globulous mass in the pot heaved itself up in a series of miniature geysers, which exploded and left craters behind them. It smelt rather strong, but that was hardly surprising: we had carted that mess everywhere with us for days past, each of us transporting a share in his water bottle.

‘It has to ferment,’ explained Barcelona, when some of us began to show signs of rebelling.

It had now, it appeared, duly fermented and was ready for distilling. The Legionnaire fixed a tight lid over the cooking pot and Porta set up the distilling apparatus. We sat round in a circle, waiting breathlessly for something to happen.

Our meditations were interrupted by some half-hearted cries of ‘Sieg heil!’ coming from the assembled ranks of the reserve troops.

The visiting lieutenant drove away in an amphibious VW, and Lt. Ohlsen, losing no time, took the newcomers in hand and delivered one of his special pep talks. When at last they were told to fall out they did so almost literally, collapsing to the ground, huddling together beneath the trees in wet, miserable groups. They threw down their equipment and some of them even stretched full length on the soaking grass. I noticed they kept a respectful distance from the rest of us. It was plain that we intimidated them in some way.

Oberfeldwebel Huhn walked across to us and straight through our midst, his step heavy and confident. As he passed by the cooking pot, he caught it with the side of his boot and the whole thing rocked. The Legionnaire managed to set it upright, but not before a few precious drops of liquid had spilled over the side. Huhn glanced down and went on his way without a word of apology. We smelt the newness of his equipment, heard the creaking of his unbroken leather boots as he passed.

The Legionnaire pursed his lips together. He gazed thoughtfully after the retreating Huhn for a few seconds, then turned towards Tiny. Not a word passed between them. But the Legionnaire turned down a thumb, and Tiny nodded.

With his sausage still in his hand, he heaved himself to his feet and marched purposefully after the Oberfeldwebel. His waterproof billowed out behind him, so that he looked rather like a walking barrage balloon.

‘Hey, you!’ he called. ‘You spilt some of our schnaps!’

At the first cry of ‘Hey, you!’, Huhn had gone on walking – evidently never dreaming that anyone of lower rank could dare to address an Oberfeldwebel as ‘Hey you’. But at the mention of the word schnaps he must have realized that it was, indeed, himself that Tiny was accusing. He turned, slowly and incredulously. At the sight of Tiny his jaw sagged and his eyeballs strained at their sockets.

‘What’s got into you?’ he roared. ‘Didn’t anyone ever teach you the right way to address your superiors?’

‘Yes, yes,’ said Tiny, impatiently. ‘I know all that crap. But that’s not what I wanted to talk to you about’

Huhn’s cheeks grew slowly mottled.

‘Have you gone stark starving raving bloody mad?’ he demanded. ‘Do you want me to put you under arrest? Because if not, I advise you to watch your bleeding language! And just try to remember, in future, what it says about it in the HDV.’
³

‘I know what it says in the HDV,’ retorted Tiny, imperturbably. ‘I told you once, that’s not what I want to talk about We can discuss it afterwards if it really interests you. But right now I want to talk about our schnaps what you knocked over.’

Huhn breathed deeply and carefully, right down to the bottom of his lungs. And then he breathed out again, with a prolonged whistling sound. Doubtless, in all his seven years of Army service, he had never had a parallel experience. We knew that he had just come from the harsh military camp of Heuberg. Certainly if anyone there had dared to address him as Tiny had just done, he would have shot them out of hand. From the way he kept twitching at his holster, I guessed that he had half a mind to shoot Tiny out of hand. But it was not so easy to get away with it, in front of so many witnesses. A silence had come upon us, and we were all leaning forward, craning our necks for a first-hand view of the affair.

Tiny stood his ground, the sausage still absurdly clenched in his huge paw.

‘You knocked over our schnaps,’ he repeated, obstinately. The least you could have done was apologize, I should’ve thought.’

Huhn opened his mouth. It remained open for several seconds. Then his Adam’s apple bobbed up and down a few times and he closed it again without a word. In its way, the whole scene was quite ludicrous. Even if he hauled Tiny before a court martial, they would almost certainly never believe a word of the indictment. Yet something had to be done. An Oberfeldwebel couldn’t allow a cretinous great oaf of a Stabsgefreiter to stand there insulting him and get away with it.

Tiny jabbed his sausage into Huhn’s chest.

‘Look at it this way,’ he suggested. ‘We’ve been carting that stuff around with us for days now. It’s been everywhere with us. And not a drop wasted, until you came along with your clumsy bleeding boots and went bashing into it. And not so much as a by your leave or a word of apology!’ He shook his head. ‘I don’t know what
you’re
complaining about, I’m sure. Seems to me it’s us what ought to be complaining, not you. Here we are, minding our own business, brewing up our schnaps—’

Huhn brushed the sausage to one side and took a step towards Tiny, his hand clutching the butt of his automatic.

‘All right, that’ll do! That’s quite enough of that! I’m a patient man, but I’ve had as much as I can take . . . What’s your name? You’ve asked for trouble, and believe me I’m going to see that you get it!’

He pulled out a notebook and pencil and waited expectantly, Tiny just raised two fingers in an unmistakable sign.

‘Get knotted! Your threats don’t mean a damn thing out here. You’re at the front now, remember? And we’re the boys that have survived . . . And you know why we’ve survived? Because we know how to look after ourselves, that’s why . . . And I’m not at all sure that I can say the same for you. In fact, I got a very funny feeling that you ain’t going to see out this particular spell of duty . . . You need a very strong head to survive out here, and I just don’t think you got it . . .’

God knows what would have happened next if Lt. Ohlsen hadn’t intervened and spoilt the fun. It was just getting to the really interesting part when he walked up to Tiny and jerked his thumb over his shoulder.

‘Get lost, Creutzfeldt. At the double, if you don’t want to end up under arrest.’

‘Yes, sir!’

Tiny gave a quick salute, smacked his heels sharply together and left the scene of combat. He came slowly back to the rest of us.

‘I’m going to get that bastard one of these days!’

‘I told you,’ said Heide. ‘I told you we’d have trouble with him.’

‘Don’t you worry.’ Tiny nodded significantly and closed one eye. ‘I got his number. It’s only a matter of time—’

‘For God’s sake!’ burst out the Old Man. ‘You’re going to find yourself in real trouble one of these days if you keep bumping off every NCO you take a dislike to.’

Tiny opened his mouth to reply, but before he could do so there was a wild cry of triumph from the Legionnaire.

‘She blows! Quick, give me the connection! Get a bottle!’

We were at once thrown into a hectic activity. I thrust the rubber tube into the Legionnaire’s outstretched hand, Porta shoved a bottle next to the cooking pot. The apparatus was connected and we watched breathlessly, like children, for the first miraculous signs of distillation. The vapour was already turning into precious drops of liquid.

‘She’s coming!’ yelled Porta.

The excitement was almost unbearable. I felt the saliva collect in my mouth; I suddenly knew a thirst such as I had never known before. Heide ran his tongue round his lips. Tiny swallowed convulsively. Slowly, the bottle began to fill.

All night long we maintained our watch. Bottle after bottle was taken away full of home-brewed schnaps. We forgot all desire for sleep. Lt Ohlsen watched us for a bit, his expression decidedly sceptical.

‘You must be nuts,’ he declared, at last. ‘You’re surely never going to try drinking the vile looking muck?’

‘Why not?’ demanded Tiny, belligerently.

The Lieutenant just looked at him and shook his head.

Lt. Spät also took a fatherly interest in our brewing activities.

‘Aren’t you going to filter it?’ he asked, anxiously.

‘Not worth the trouble,’ said the Legionnaire.

‘But my God, you drink it in that state and you’ll be bowling about the ground in hoops!’

‘So long as it’s alcoholic,’ said the Legionnaire, calmly. ‘That’s all that matters.’

Lt. Ohlsen shook his head again and retired with Spät. Clearly they did not give much for our chances.

The following day found us still at peace beneath the apple trees. For the moment, the war seemed to have passed us by. We continued our brewing, only by now we had outworn our first mad rapture and had split ourselves up into groups to spread the work load.

All day long and well into the evening we tended our schnaps. Shortly after midnight we heard the sound of a vehicle screaming down the mountain road towards us. It came to a halt nearby and an NCO jumped out, covered in mud and in a fearful lather.

‘Where’s your commanding officer?’ he shouted.

Lt. Ohlsen was woken up. He took the message and the man went chasing off again at full speed. We watched with foreboding.

‘Hell and damnation,’ muttered the Legionnaire. ‘That’s put the cat among the flaming pigeons.’

He went off to see how the brewing operation was progressing.

‘Step it up,’ he ordered. ‘If we’re quick about it we’ll manage to get another bottle or so before we’re moved on.’

‘We already got thirty-one,’ announced Porta, triumphantly. ‘I been counting them!’

Tiny seemed agitated about something.

‘What I want to know is, when are we going to get stuck into it?.’

‘When I say so, and not before.’ The Legionnaire glared at him. ‘I find anyone dipping his fingers in before I give the O.K. and there’s going to be trouble!’

Tiny shrugged a sullen shoulder and walked off, muttering to himself. At that moment, Lt. Ohlsen’s whistle blasted shrilly through the darkness. It was a most unwelcome sound.

‘Fifth Company, get ready to move! And don’t take all night about it!’

Reluctantly, we set about dismantling our still. While we were at work, Oberfeldwebel Huhn came busying up to us, shouting as usual at the top of his voice.

‘Come on, you lazy bastards! Get a move on! What’s the matter with you? You deaf or something?’

‘You’ll be deaf in a minute,’ muttered the Legionnaire, threateningly.

Huhn swung round on him, but at that point the Old Man rather surprisingly stepped into the fray. He walked up to Huhn, standing so close to him that their steel helmets were almost touching.

‘Oberfeldwebel Huhn,’ he began, calmly, respectfully, but with menacing overtones, ‘there is something I have to say to you. Something I feel you ought to know . . . I am in command of this section, these are my men and it’s up to me to see that they carry out orders. I don’t quite remember what the procedure is back home in the barracks, but I do know what it is at the front . . . which apparently you have yet to learn. And all I’m saying is, either you keep your nose out of my territory or I shall give my men full permission to go ahead and teach you a thing or two . . . and they could, believe you me!’

Porta gave a loud, annoying bray of laughter.

‘Might as well talk to the cows in the field for all the good that’ll have done!’

Huhn took a step towards him, then stopped sharp at the look from the Old Man. He contented himself with a tight-throated cry of, ‘You needn’t think you’ll get away with this!’ flung over his shoulder as he went running off to complain.

We saw him buttonhole Lt. Spät, who listened with half an ear for the first few minutes and then walked off leaving him in full flood. Lt. Ohlsen called impatiently from the road. Porta and Tiny picked up the heavy cooking pot between them and took their place in the column a short way ahead of the Lieutenant, who pretended not to have seen their extra item of equipment.

The new troops came up at a panic-stricken run, disorganized and uncertain. One of them banged into Porta and sprang back, terrified.

‘You do that again and you’ll get your teeth rammed right down the back of your flaming throat!’

The man grew pale, but sensibly kept quiet.

‘Bleeding amateurs,’ growled Tiny.

Lt. Ohlsen shouted a command and we came smartly to attention. Section leaders relayed his orders as we did a half turn to the right.

‘Porta, where’s your flaming helmet, for God’s sake?’ The Lieutenant’s voice came ringing irritably towards us. ‘What the devil is that monstrosity you’ve got on your head?’

Porta reached up a hand to his old yellow hat.