Assignment Gestapo (22 page)

‘Oh, yes,’ she said to him. ‘I did say that and I’d say it again. I think this war is a piece of sheer folly.’

And then, to her bewilderment they had all laughed heartily and the one man had written down her words on a sheet of paper.

‘You see, Frau Dreyer, it’s just as we said . . . you called the Führer a fool.’

She had been taken aback, then. Assured them that by saying the war was a foolish action, she had not intended to imply that the Führer was a fool. She wouldn’t – hadn’t – couldn’t—’

‘But surely,’ Bielert had insisted, ‘anyone who commits a foolish action is a foolish person, and hence a fool?’

She had to admit the logic of it.

‘But, as I told him, I wasn’t the only person who said such things. Everyone was saying them. I was only repeating what I’d heard . . .’

Of course, Bielert had at once jumped in to ask who, and where, and when.

‘Well, there’s Herr Gelbenschneid, the station master, for a start. I have frequently heard him say that this war is the worst thing that’s ever happened to Germany . . . And then there’s Frau Dietrich, the nurse at the chiropodist’s. She told me only the other day she wished the war had never been started and the sooner we were defeated the better as far as she was concerned. And then—’

In her ignorance, she had dictated a whole list of names to Bielert’s avid note-taking companion, who had promptly passed them on to the Oberscharführer – presumably for immediate action.

‘And then,’ said Frau Dreyer, wonderingly, ‘they wanted to know if I’d ever been in a mental home . . .’

‘As a matter of interest,’ said Porta turning round, ‘have you?’

‘Well, no, I haven’t, and it seemed such an odd question that I quite took fright and began to cry . . . To tell you the truth,’ confessed Frau Dreyer, confidentially, ‘I was scared they were going to fine me. For saying things I shouldn’t have, you know. Even though I didn’t realize they were wrong . . . I asked them if I mightn’t apologize rather than pay a fine, because all I have is my widow’s pension, you see, and I simply couldn’t afford it . . . Well, they were really very nice about it all. They said I shouldn’t have to pay a fine, so not to worry about it, and they would accept my apologies on behalf of the Führer . . . And then, I remember, they grew very friendly and began asking me questions about my boys. They were so interested in them, it quite took my mind off everything else! And we talked of this and that, and it turned out that Herr Bielert was a good friend of Bent, who used to be my Kurt’s closest companion in the old days. He became an SS Obersturmführer, and quite often he used to come round and visit when Kurt was on leave. Now, he was a brave boy, such a row of medals on his chest, and yet, you know, he didn’t believe in the war, either. I remember once, it was just before Kurt’s birthday, just before the battalion was sent to the front, I remember Bent telling me that the Führer was only a man, not a god, and that like all men he sometimes made mistakes . . . And as for Himmler! I can’t tell you how angry he and Kurt became whenever one mentioned Himmler! You would have thought the poor man had done them some personal injury! Why, I remember—’

‘Hang on, a second,’ said the Old Man, frowning. you didn’t tell him all this, did you? You didn’t tell Bielert?’

‘Oh, yes,’ she said, blithely. ‘They were so interested, you see, and Herr Bielert told me that Bent had always been an intelligent boy and that he was wasted at the front, so they were going to call him back to Hamburg and promote him. I wanted to write and let him know straight away, but they said not to, because they wanted it to be a surprise for him.’

‘Of course,’ agreed the Old Man, solemnly. ‘And what else did you talk about while you were there?’

Well, now—’ She gathered up the wrinkles in her forehead, trying to remember. ‘We spoke of my nephew, Dietrich. He’s a student of theology, you know. For some reason Herr Bielert seemed to think that he might have said bad things about the Führer. He asked me to tell them what Dietrich had said, and I told them, I can’t recall that he ever said anything . . . And then Herr Bielert grew quite angry and shouted at me, couldn’t understand what it was that I’d done to displease him, and the other man kept shaking his head at me and I grew so confused I really don’t know what I should have done if Herr Bielerfs telephone had started to ring. And they all ran out with their revolvers and I was left alone for some while until another man came and took me away.’

‘Brought you down here?’ asked the Legionnaire.

‘Oh, no,’ she said. ‘They shut me up in a little room, and then they came for me again and took me back to see Herr Bielert. And that was when they wrote down everything I’d told them and I had to sign it for them.’ She smiled. ‘When I’d done that they were pleased with me again. They gave me coffee and cakes and told me I should be taken care of.’

We looked at her, silently. It was incredible that anyone could be so naïve.

‘I wonder if my car will be here soon?’

She addressed her appeal to the Old Man, who made vague noises of encouragement and looked across at the rest of us. We shuffled our feet and stared at the floor.

‘One day when you can spare the time,’ said Frau Dreyer, graciously, ‘you must drop round to visit me. Let me know beforehand and I’ll see if I can’t make one of my fruit cakes for you. All the boys like my fruit cake . . .’

We mumbled our thanks and she smiled upon us and nodded her head up and down on its frail neck, and then, to our unspeakable relief, her eyelids drooped and she drifted off into an exhausted sleep, snoring gently and rhythmically.

Porta had finished stacking his marked cards. He suggested a game and we agreed, provided we play with Barcelona’s pack.

Two hours later we were still playing, so engrossed in the game that we could hardly bear to leave the table for long enough even to stagger across to the handbasin for a piss. Frau Dreyer slept on.

We were disturbed by an impatient rapping at the door. Barcelona went across to answer it and found himself confronted by two SD men earring sub MGs.

‘Heil Hitler!’ they greeted him, severely. ‘You got an Emilie Dreyer down here?’

At the sound of her name, the old lady woke up. She stumbled across the room, heavy with sleep.

‘Is that my car?’

‘That’s it, lady. Your car . . . Get your things together and come with us. We’re taking you to Fuhlsbüttel.’

‘Fublsbüttel?’ She hesitated. ‘But I don’t want to go to Fuhlsbüttel, I want to go home.’

The SD man laughed.

‘Don’t we all?’

‘But Herr Bielert said—’

‘Herr Bielert said he’d lay on a car for you, and he has. And we’re all going off in it together for a nice little ride to Fuhlsbüttel. So be a good lady and hurry along, I don’t want to have to get rough with someone old enough to be my grandmother.’

For the first time, Frau Dreyer began dimly to perceive something of the truth. She turned, trembling, to the Old Man and held out her hands.

‘Herr Feldwebel—’

‘God will protect you,’ said the Old Man, very low and almost as if he were ashamed of himself. ‘Go with them, Frau Dreyer. It’s all you can do. All any of us can do . . .’

‘Yes, of course,’she said, doubtfully.

She stood a moment, helpless, her old lined face quivering. We handed her her bag and her coat and silently she pattered after the SD men. One of her shoe laces was undone and both her thick wool stockings were crumpling round her ankles. The heavy door slammed behind her. We heard the other doors slamming, as well, as the prisoners were taken from their cells. They were led into the courtyard, packed into the big green vans that would transport them to Fuhlsbüttel.

In one of them sat a little old lady who even now could not understand the crime she had committed.

In the guard room, no one spoke and we avoided looking at each other. We were ashamed of ourselves and the uniforms we wore.

After a while, Tiny left the room. Still without a word. We returned half-heartedly to our cards, but before we could deal out another hand Tiny was back again.

‘Krug’s still in his cell!’ he panted, excitedly. ‘Hanged himself with his braces!’

The tension was now broken. We crowded out of the room and along the passage to witness the scene. Krug swung from the ceiling like a misshapen rag doll. His face was blue and bloated, and his protruding eyes looked glassily upon us. His neck seemed quite incredibly long. Beneath him, on the floor, lay his kepi.

‘Best thing he could have done, really,’ said Barcelona.

We looked up dispassionately at the swaying body.

‘No need to feel sorry for that rat,’ declared Tiny.

I don’t think any of us did. Not even Stege attempted to speak up in his defence.

‘We’ll have to put it in the report,’ said the Old Man. ‘There’ll only be repercussions if we don’t.’

We trooped back up the passage to the guard room. While the Old Man seated himself at his desk and took up a pen, the rest of us now quite happily returned to our interrupted game of cards.

‘Pity he couldn’t have had the decency to wait till he got to Fuhlsbüttel!,’ said Porta, rapidly shuffling the pack while the rest of us watched him like hawks. ‘Still, some people just naturally have bad taste . . .’

9
See WHEELS OF TERROR

¹⁰
FGA-Feldgefangenabteilung (Disciplinary Company)

They were black marketeers, the pair of them. Born to get themselves constantly into trouble and always to get themselves out of it again, respecting each other’s treachery and cunning even as they sought to outdo one another. They stole everything they could lay hands on, sold everything that came their may, from women to spent cartridges
.

The SS driver weighed the cigarette in the palm of his hand a moment, regarding it thoughtfully. He then raised to to his nostrils and gave a suspicious sniff
.

‘I think you’re a filthy liar,’ he declared, at last. ‘Take it to pieces and let me see for myself
.’

‘Do you doubt my word?’ demanded Porta, arrogantly. ‘If I tell you there’s opium in each fag, then there is opium in each fag
.’

He spat contemptuously at the SS pennant flying from the big grey Mercedes. The driver at once returned the compliment of those soldiers who had given their lives in the first world war
.

With these exchanges of formalities complete, they returned to business
.

‘I’ve got a nice little haul of car tyres’ offered the SS man. ‘Just do you . . . Only trouble is, they’re a bit hot at the moment
.’

‘You’ll be a bit hot,’ said Porta, ‘if ever they lay their hands on you . . . Bet you a pound to a pinch of pig shit you’ll end up with us one of these fine days
!’

The SS man hunched an indifferent shoulder
.

‘Chance you take,’he said, laconically. ‘If you’re interested, I can let you have the address of a good strip show
.’

‘I know plenty of strip shows
.’

‘Not like this one. Not round here. Not with stark naked lovelies in it
.’

Porta licked his lips. A hot splash of colour fell across his cheek bones
.

‘Completely naked
?’

‘Near as damn it. Shoes, stockings, suspender belts . . . just enough to titillate. Can’t complain of that, can you
?’

Porta scraped his throat a few times
.

‘Can you hire ’em out for an evening, like
?’

Why not
?’

They put their heads close together and began to discuss terms
.

CHAPTER FIVE

Porta and the SS

O
NE
day, quite suddenly and with no warning, Lt. Ohlsen was arrested. He was accused of having associated with a group of officers who had come under suspicion and of having himself uttered defamatory words against the Führer. We later discovered it was his wife who had denounced him.

They came for him one morning, two military police and a lieutenant, slinking silently into camp in a manner so furtive that they at once drew attention to themselves. Doubtless their aim was to pick him up with the minimum of fuss and smuggle him out before too many questions could be asked, but fortunately we had wind of their presence and were able to alert Colonel Hinka. Not that there was much anyone could do, but at least we could put up a good fight. Some officers we should gladly have seen arrested, but Lt. Ohlsen was not one of them. He had been two years with the Company and had served with the Regiment since 1938, and we had no mind to stand by and watch as they marched him off.

On hearing the news, Colonel Hinka at once sent his Adjutant to arrest the two MPs as they left Company Headquarters. The guards were alerted and all exits closed. No one was to leave the building.

The Adjutant smiled suavely upon the officer who was with the police.

‘Colonel Hinka would like to have a few words with you, Lieutenant . . . If you’d care to come with me, ‘I’ll take you to his office.’

The Lieutenant and the two policemen followed him, stubbornly dragging Ohlsen along with them. He was the prey that they had been sent to fetch, and they had no intention of letting him go at this stage of the proceedings.

In Hinka’s office, the storm burst. Hinka, furious that any upstart policemen should try arresting one of his officers without first asking his permission, swore that no one should leave the premises until the matter had been sorted out to his own satisfaction. He picked up the telephone and rang through to the Kommandantur in Hamburg. They swiftly denied all responsibility. He tried Hanover, with no success. He tried the Abwehr (Counter Espionnage), who wanted nothing to do with it. Finally, in desperation, he got through to the Army Personnel Bureau in Berlin and demanded to speak with General Rudolph Schmudt.

Needless to say, such an abnormal amount of activity on what should have been a morning like any other morning did not escape the ever-watchful eyes of the Gestapo.