The Commissar (26 page)

‘“They’re mistaken, those dressed-up dummies at Führer HQ,” shouted my general. “I’ll teach ’em! I give the orders here! Nobody’s going to move any of my division as long as
I’m
in command!”

‘The Chief-of-Staff danced round as if he’d pissed himself and was now goin’ on shittin’ himself. Without saying a word he handed a nicely folded and creased letter over, signed by Adolf in person. My general’s face looked like Mayday. His chin dropped right down over his Knight’s Cross. The Chief-of-Staff shrugged his shoulders sadly, and stared out of the window.

‘“Relieved of command,” stammered my general, spelling his way through the letter again. He wouldn’t believe it really said what he’d read in it.

‘“Those whom the Gods will destroy they first strike with blindness.” he thundered. “Now the Bohemian corporal’s
gone too far. The dice are thrown!”

‘Keitel came on the phone a bit later. He got a few home truths to pass on to “the man from Brunau”.

‘We’d hardly got our night uniform on before the telephone started to ring fit to break all records.

‘“Must be important,” said my general, straightening his regimental nightcap so the gold-embroidered bird and the cockade sat in line with his eagle nose.

‘It was
General der Infanterie
Burgdorff, head of personnel, who wanted a little chat with us. In the hierarchy he was known as “the Black Eminence”.

‘My general’s face changed colour several times, and his beaky nose turned quite cobalt blue during that “little chat”.

‘I was in no doubt what was goin’ on. The shithouse was flaming a way madly, and my general was goin’ to get all the fine little delicate hairs round his arse singed off. After General Burgdorff had put down the phone we sat there for a long time, quietly, thinking things over, I could almost hear the crackin’ noises comin’ out of my general’s skull. Whatever, it seemed to have come over him that it wasn’t always very clever to go round saying out aloud what you were thinking. There’s a lot of Germans’ve died of doing that since 1933,

‘Before we marched into the land of dreams, we changed back into our light duty uniform, and we wrote letters.

‘When the sun popped up to see what had happened to good old Germany in the course of the night, we’d signed the last letter, and everything was laid out straight in the middle of the blotter, which is the Prussian cavalry’s way of doin’ things.

‘“My service pistol.” said my general in a severe voice.

‘I chased off after the hand artillery, wiped it off quickly with a polishing-cloth, loaded it and took off the safety catch. Then I handed it to my general.

‘“Goodbye then. Unteroffizier Martin.” he snarled, and extended his hand to me for the first time. “Do your duty by
our beloved Fatherland! I will follow your progress!”

‘“
Zu befehl
, Herr General,” I replied, clicking my slippers twice. “May our honourable monocle remain unsullied!”

‘Then he put the gun to his forehead, while I stood off out of the line of fire at the salute, and we shot ourselves. The
way
my general could carry it off! He was fantotic, he was. But he was also my general. Three bullets went through his field commander’s cranium, and only
then
he dropped our monocle. Oh, but it was dignified. If I hadn’t been a little bit stinko from tasting our cognac I think I would have cried.

‘I arranged him nicely, an’ put his cap on him, and, after a lot of trouble, got our monocle in place regimentally. After that I alarmed the staff.

‘They came along, clicked their heels and saluted and arranged their faces in regulation folds of sadness. Even the Adjutant, the wicked sod, shook his head so sorrowfully all the
mensur
scars on his jowls wriggled like eels in jelly.

‘The following days were taken up with the arrangements for my general and our monocle’s funeral. We inspected the goodbye-boxes, and picked out a heavy block of a coffin in ancient German oak with a long row of iron crosses cut into it all round. I had to search half Germany for a scarlet velvet cushion to lay out my general’s fruit salad on. He’d done all right in the two world wars, and hadn’t been backward in coming forward in peacetime either.

‘The company clerk spent five hours polishin’ up our parade sabre before the Adjutant was satisfied with it. It was a hell of a fine sabre we’d got. A sword of honour from the
Leibhusaren
. I often thought about swoppin’ it for a cheap Solingen steel job. Some crazy collector’d certain sure pay a pretty penny for it.

‘The company’s Chief Mechanic paint-sprayed my general’s tin helmet, so’s it could reflect back the flames from the torches.

‘Two Staff Padres came from Berlin, with the Padre General in the lead. They were all glittering with phoney gold crucifixes and things to help to pilot my general up to
Valhalla. Everythin’ possible was done to make it a really lovely funeral. The only thing that went wrong was the buglers. Those bloody hussars were hiding out some place or other on the Eastern Front, letting themselves get shot to bits by the neighbours, and, worst of the lot, the kettledrum nag’d gone off an’ deserted to the enemy.
And
it’d taken the kettledrums with it. Well, a cavalry regimental band without kettledrums isn’t worth a shit! I really hope the MPs get hold of that rotten horse some time, so they can hang it up alongside all the rest of the lousy deserters. It could, at least, have left the kettledrums behind it. They’re German property. It ain’t fittin’, the neighbours banging away on ’em!

‘Every arm was represented by a Leutnant, standing guard of honour. Six they were. They stood there, stiff as statues, round my general, who was lying there enjoying himself in the Knights’ Banqueting Hall. He was in full dress uniform with all his orders.
Blaue Max
*
, and Iron Cross with “knife an’ fork”, and he was wearing fine patent leather boots with silver bar spurs. I can tell you he was the loveliest body you could ever imagine. Dressed like that, my general could fly straight up to Valhalla and start an alarm exercise going as’d make the floor of Heaven red-hot under the feet o’ the angels.

‘There was a hell of a row about his headgear. I wanted him to have his steel helmet on. That’s why I’d had it spray-painted. But the Adjutant wanted the garrison cap with gold oak leaves an’ everythin’.

‘“Steel helmets are out of place with dress uniform!” he screamed, wriggling all his
mensur
scars at me.

‘His chops were going like a runaway howitzer. He was that mad he could’ve cracked Brazil nuts with the cheeks of his arse and sucked the kernels up the wrong way. In between times he told me what he thought about me. I felt like giving him one in the kisser, but it wasn’t worth it. He was a Rittmeister and could’ve had me in the black hole without my feet touching if I’d hung one on him.

‘“May you be struck with every kind of pest we’ve got in this country,” he hissed. “If I saw you caught in a beartrap I’d leave you there to bleed to death. I can tell you, Martin, there’s a terrible fate waiting for you. As soon as the general’s in the ground, off you go, straight to the Eastern Front, so fast the dust and dirt’ll be spurting up in clouds from your boot-soles. And I’ll find the worst, stinking unit in existence to send you to! A unit that operates behind the enemy lines in
their
uniforms, and does all the things that are forbidden by the conventions of war, might
he just
the thing. Look forward to it Martin, even your sick mind couldn’t imagine what the Russians do to swine like you who hide behind their uniform!”

‘“Oh I know all about what they do, Herr Rittmeister, sir. First off the neighbours’ boys have a bash at your balls with a good, heavy hammer. Then they put an electric wire up your arse, so’s your worms are dancin’ a polka round your piles before you know it. I’ve had a dose of it before, sir, but I’ve got away with it every time so far. I would, however, like to thank the Herr Rittmeister, sir, for all his good wishes, and express the hope that we shall have a pleasant reunion in the heroes’ common grave.”

‘He wriggled his
mensur
scars at me then like a bag of snakes. He looked for all the world like a prematurely born wild boar. Lord, what a row he did make, until the Chief-of-Staff came in and told him to shut up.

‘“You’ll be waking the general again if you keep on like that.” he said, warningly.

‘My general lay there takin’ it easy, while the whole garrison came and said goodbye to him. They came from near and far, clicked their heels together, rattled their sabres and turned their sorrowing faces towards the ground. Some of ’em cried, so’s we could really understand how much they’d loved my general. Lies and falsehood all of it. There wasn’t one of ’em who wouldn’t have been glad to see my
general bubbling in his own fat in hell.

‘Then one morning along came the artillery, with a great rattling gun-carriage and six black horses. Commands were shouted, sabres pointed at the ground and standards sunk. Six officers strutted stiff-legged over to my general, who was lying there looking lovely and expensive in his vampire-box.

‘“Funeral procession! Slo-o-ow March!” screamed the Chief-of-Staff. An’ off we went towards the garrison church.

‘I went to get up in the staff-car, but there was some yokel sitting back of the wheel. I’d been relieved!

‘“I’ll get you for this, first chance I get!” I promised him, stupidly. He was a Feldwebel, even though he was only infantry.

‘“You can crawl,” said the Adjutant, “believe me you’ll get used to it!”

‘“Shit.” I thought. “We’ll meet again out East perhaps!”

‘In the garrison church, fat, six-foot-tall wax candles were burning, and the infantry band was playing sorrowful march music. Goethe or Chopin it was. I don’t know, but it was very sad. If it’d been me that was my general and had to go off to Valhalla, I’d have had hot rhythm and a black feller from America to howl out a solo. A blues, that’s a thing you can get your teeth into an’ understand. It’s something that can put some gunpowder up a body’s arse on its last trip!

‘There was a whole mob of people in uniforms and civilian clothes dancin’ a war-dance round my general’s wooden uniform. There was even Navy there. A couple of crooked-eyed Japs, too. If the war hadn’t been forced on us there’d have been British and Russians as well. They were all mates of my general.

‘The war flag was draped over the vampire-box. On top of it was the red velvet cushion. I’d got it from an old woman in Bielefeld. It was her cat’s bed. All the fruit salad lay glitterin’ on it. The sword of honour and the steel helmet shone like catshit in the moonlight of a spring night. My general’s horse, Magda, had also been invited to the party.’

‘In
Church
?’ the Old Man breaks in, in amazement.

‘No, damn it. She stood outside chattin’ with the six artillery horses.

‘Then it started up properly. An honour guard from the Panzer Grenadiers pointed their guns at the sky and loosed off a volley at Valhalla. The signal to open up the gates, I reckon, so’s there’d be plenty of room for my general when he got there. When the flags went down, off went the organ at top decibel level. It roared and groaned so that even the biggest dummy present must’ve understood that a general’s burial was a very solemn affair.

‘Then the Staff Padre spoke up. He talked about God, explained how God had always been a Prussian and that that was the reason He’d always been on our side. He got a bit mixed up and got the British God tangled up with our chap. There were some who growled a lot about that. In a world war it can be a very serious matter to go fraternizing with the other blokes’ God.’

‘Yes,’ puts in Porta,’ where the devil’d we all be if half us German dummies lay talkin’ in the night with the English God? And the Scots were prayin’ to the German bloke? What a mess it’d make of a world war where that sort of thing went on!’

‘The Staff Padre was getting close to high treason with all his nátterin’ about the English God,’ Gregor goes on. ‘Until the Padre General got the dope smartly away from the German God’s altar. I think he’s off somewhere on the East Front already, and has forgotten all about the British God.

‘This Army bishop really gave my general what he deserved. I’ve always known we were big, but I never thought we was as big as that Padre General made us out to be.

‘“May the general live in the memory of the German people as the brave and duty-loving leader in the field that he was.” brayed this top sky-pilot, bangin’ his fist down on the edge of the pulpit. “The general was loved by his men; they followed him through thick and thin, and died with a smile at his feet.”

‘I could have told him a bit different. Them
I
saw kick the bucket weren’t smiling. No, they were gnashin’ their teeth!

‘“The most beautiful death a mancan have,” crowed the high-flyin’ sky-pilot, “is to fall in battle for the Fatherland. The general, who is now leaving our ranks to march up and join the great army in the sky, was from his earliest cadet days a shining light for German youth, a fearless and undemanding warrior!”

‘For more’n half an’ hour he ranted on about beautiful, lovely death. Then the next Staff Padre came on. He was kind of a parson Hauptfeldwebel.

‘“Let us all pray,” he roared, in a voice that’d have blown the wings off half the Heavenly Host. “On your knees for
prayer
! Helmets
off
!”

‘So we knelt down with the neckpiece of our steel helmets placed regimentally alongside the third tunic button from the top. Exactly according to Army Regulations, military church service section. A Feldwebel and two Obergefreiters got put on orders by the Adjutant for laughin’ when in prayer position.