Court Martial (32 page)

The officers are shocked by what they have seen already, and there have been several clashes between them and the Old Man. But they can do nothing about it. Oberst Hinka has told them, in no uncertain fashion, that the Old Man is in command and that Barcelona Blom is next after him, irrespective of what happens.

Grumpily we collect our equipment. Porta is ready to fight Unteroffizier Stolp over the murdered prisoner and the Old Man has to speak plainly to Leutnant Schnelle. For no apparent reason Tiny knocks Feldwebel Scluider down.

'Don't follow the road,' shouts the Old Man to Tiny, who is marching in the lead.

'Why not?' shouts Tiny, in a voice which raises echoes in the forest.

'Because we'll run straight into the enemy if we follow the road,' hisses the Old Man, irritably.

'Ain't that what we're lookin' for?' grins Tiny, pleased. 'If we keep on avoidin' one another the bleedin' war'll
never
be over!'

'Do as I say!' shouts the Old Man, gruffly.

'I'd court-martial that man,' cries Leutnant Schnelle, angrily, and has notebook and pencil out already.

'Leave that to me,' says the Old Man, passing the Leutnant quickly.

'The whole of the neighbour's fucking army's on its way towards us!' shouts Gregor, rushing out of the forest in a cloud of snow.

'I thought as much,' sighs Leutnant Schnelle, resignedly. 'Here it goes! That's what happens when they give a Feldwebel too much authority!'

The Old Man looks at him for a moment with stony eyes.

'You can report me, when we get back, Herr Leutnant, but until then I must ask you to refrain from criticising my orders. To put it quite bluntly, I am in command here!'

Leutnant Schnelle exchanges a glance with the Finnish captain, who merely shrugs his shoulders and wishes he was back in Helsinki and had never got himself mixed up with these operations behind the enemy lines.

Tiny is lying in the snow with his ear pressed to the ground, listening intently.

'How many?' asks the Old Man, brusquely, throwing himself down alongside him.

'By the noise the sods are makin' they could be a battalion at least! But if you ask me I don't think there's more'n a lousy company! They're probably out lookin' for snowdrops!'

'How far away?' hisses the Old Man.

"Ard to say,' answers Tiny, trying to look wise. 'These Commie forests can play tricks on you!'

'On your feet,' orders the Old Man, 'out of the marsh and down along the slope! At the double and no firing without my express orders! If we have to fight it'll be with knives and spades!'

Leumant Schnelle has already his pistol in his hand and is looking very warlike.

'Put that iron away!' snarls the Old Man, irritably. 'If it goes off they'll hear it in Moscow!'

Looking insulted the Leutnant puts his pistol back in the holster, and assumes the look of a boy who has been sent to bed early.

We can hear them a long time before they come into sight. Arguing noisily, they turn the corner by the group of firs. Two lieutenants, with Mpis slung across their chests in the Russian manner, are in the lead. Behind them the company follows in a disorderly mob.

We lie silently in the snow and watch them over our sights. It would be an easy matter to knock them over, but they are not important. We are not interested in killing them. Our mission is of much greater importance.

The enemy,' whispers Fahnrich Tamm, excitedly. 'Why do we not shoot them?'

'Violence is not always the best way,' Porta rejects the suggestion, scoffingly.

But it's the
enemy
,' whispers Tamm, loudly, pressing the butt of the LMG into his shoulder.

'Mind you don't bend that finger too far,' Porta warns him, jovially, 'or you'll be a dead hero!'

Tamm loosens his grip on the LMG, and looks around in a lost manner.

'The Fuhrer has ordered it that the enemy is to be destroyed wherever he is met with!'

'Why don't you report to Fihrer HQ, and spit an' polish his boots a bit for him,' suggests Gregor, with a broad grin. 'Just be the thing for you! You might even get some of Adolf's foot-sweat up under your nails!'

The noise from the departing Russian company dies away gradually. A long, grating peal of laughter is the last we hear of them.

The whole of the day and most of the night we continue marching. The wind cuts like sharp knives. Face masks are of little use when the thermometer is down to minus 50 degrees C.

The steely clouds hang low and move faster and faster. A storm is on its way. One of the feared polar storms which can blow an elk along over the snow as if it were a snowflake.

Jesus'n Mary, but it's piss cold,' moans Tiny, knocking his hands together. 'What the hell's Adolf
want
in this bleedin' country? We're only doin' the neighbours a favour by pinchin' it from 'em!'

Just before dawn the Old Man allows them a short break for a cold meal.

'Why the pace?' groans Leutnant Schnelle, worn out and throwing himself flat on the snow.

'Because we have to get to the lakes before the supply planes,' answers the Old Man, grouchily. 'We have a very tight time schedule. If you are not able to keep up, Herr Leutnant, you can stay here! You are not assigned to my section, but only with us as an observer!'

'Ready to move,' shouts the Old Man and turns his back contemptuously on the Leutnant.

From the top of the heights they can see out across the White Sea where great waves lift towards the gloomy heavens. On the horizon they can just make out a dark line, resembling a distant coastline.

'Think it's America?' asks Tiny, interestedly.

An animated discussion commences immediately. Only the two observer officers keep out of it.

'Holy Agnes,' cries Gregor, hoarsely, 'it's no further off'n we could piss over there, an' if that's America I'd say let's shit on Adolf and move on out of his shitty war!'

We lie on our stomachs in the snow, and stare dreamily at the dark shadows, while we try to outdo one another in fantasy. Tiny imagines he has met the furrier's boy, David, in New York, where he is passing the time waiting for Hitler's defeat.

On the fourth day, late in the afternoon, we reach the lakes, and have only just stretched out the long red cloth marker for the planes when the first JU 52 roars through the clouds. It swoops low over the snow and we almost think for a moment that it is going to land.

The Old Man sends up a flare, and containers begin to fall from the machine.

Two other aeroplanes come roaring out of the snow-haze, circle for a moment above us, and literally shovel their containers out one after the other.

'They seem in a hurry to get away again,' says Porta, sarcastically, banging the inside of his elbow.

The last of the planes swings about uncertainly. One of its motors splutters and backfires. The next moment it hits the earth, ploughs through the snow and turns a somersault. One of the wings flies off and flames spring up from the wreck.

'Leave it,' says the Old Man, shortly. 'We couldn't get 'em out anyway!'

A huge explosion drowns his voice, and pieces of the wreck are thrown far and wide.

'That bang must've made 'em get up off their arses far away as Murmansk, says Tiny, shocked. He throws a piece of the wing away from him across the lake.

We have just managed to finish collecting the dropped material together when a volley of shots comes from the forest. We rush to take cover and get ready to fight.

The shots go off in volleys, but oddly enough we do not hear the whistle of the bullets.

'It's only the frost,' grins Porta, 'cracking the trees.' He gets to his feet. 'Adolf wouldn't like seeing his heroes get frightened at such a little thing!'

The Old Man chases us and shares the heavy stores between us. The officer guests accept their burdens unwillingly.

Suddenly we stop and look in fear towards the north, where the whole of the horizon seems to be on fire. Thin streaks of flame shoot in bunches across the sky and change in a moment to green, red, white tongues of light, which die out and then grow up again. Each second we expect to hear the roar of explosions but not a sound reaches us.

Even Porta's reindeer snuffles in surprise and looks, blinking, towards the northern sky.

In slow-motion the lances of light change to long, gleaming, glassy rods, like those which hang from an antique chandelier.

The glittering rods dance all around the horizon, turning slowly from white to red-gold, then change suddenly to waves of fire which chase one another across the heavens. Far out over the White Sea new lightnings flash. It seems as if the whole world is coming to an end in a volcanic explosion of colour. Around us it is as light as on the brightest of sunny days.

Suddenly everything goes black. It is as if a black velvet cloak had been thrown over us.

The reindeer snuffles and stamps the ground with its forefeet.

The lights come
rushing
across the sky, even more violently than before, and directly towards us.

Quickly we take cover in the snow. The strange phenomenon wheels away from us and disappears out over the sea. The snow gleams and glitters as if strewn with millions of diamonds,

'Fantastic,' mumbles the Old Man, fascinated.

'What's doin' it?' asks Tiny, with respect in his voice.

'It's quite natural,' says Heide, who, as always, knows all about it.

'If that's God playin' games, a man could easy go and get religious,' mumbles Tiny, uncertainly.

The Old Man orders an igloo to be built. Nobody protests. Everybody is looking forward to getting under cover and having a few hours' rest. The moon hangs in the sky like a huge glowing disc in the midst of all the green and red. Its light is pale, but bright as an acetylene lamp which is about to explode. On the horizon clouds appear. At first they are the steely blue of icebergs then, suddenly, they light up as if studded with sapphires. The snow becomes a sheet of crackling silver foil, completely blinding us.

'This on its own's worth the whole trip,' cries Barcelona in amazement.

'It's the Northern Lights,' explains Heide, instructively.

'Makes me think of a pub in Davidsstrasse called "The Northern Lights",' says Tiny. 'The nobs used to come there to take a gander at the natives. Part of the round trip they used to call
"Hamburg bei Nacht
". Me 'n' old "Bannister Monkey" ran into three 'igh-class bints as was sittin' waitin' for a real good Reeperbahn bang. We squeezed down between 'em an' begun to feel 'em up, the way we always used to in "The Northern Lights".'

'Can't you talk
anything
but filth?' hisses Heide, scandalised.

'Stick your fingers in your ears an' keep your mouth shut,' advises Tiny. 'It's accordin' to the spirit of your Fuhrer! The one I'd fished up was named Gloria and she looked it too. On the way out to Blankenese we fell out with the taxi-driver, a spaghetti-German from Innsbruck, who didn't like us throwin' bottles out of the window. As we turned the corner into Fischermarkt we thought it was time 'e took a bath so we threw 'im into the Elbe. To save 'im the trouble of walkin', over on the other side, we pushed the taxi after 'im, after settin' the meter back to zero so's the ride was free.

The last part of the trip we done in a police car a couple of Schupo's 'ad left parked in a side street. We give it the lot, siren, blue lights an' all. The bints was crazy with it. It was the first time they'd ever been for a ride in a police car.

'Gloria 'ad a smashin' place with a lovely big lawn with cows on it to keep down the grass. She said the cows was English and was more racially pure'n most Germans was. One of 'em tried to 'ook me, so I grabbed it by the 'andlebars and swung it round as if it wasn't no more'n a consumptive goat. Gloria goes into a Wagner act and sets a vicious, bleedin' Dobermann on me, but I got a 'old of 'im an' sent '
im
on the longest airtrip 'e'd ever 'ad. Then
she
bit me. 'Avin' no dog any more, I suppose she felt she'd better do the job 'erself. Well after a bit we got 'er quietened down and nipped into 'er monkey's nest.

'We struggled up a spiral staircase an' down a long passage like the tunnels under an old fort. All over the place there was pictures of 'ungry-lookin' skeletons fuckin' away so 'ard steam was coming out o' their arseholes!

'"Classical reproductions from Pompeii," explained Gloria, as if it was the Kaiser's bollocks preserved in spirit she was showin' off.

'"Gawdl 'Ow long was you there?" I asked 'er, thinkin' it was some sort of a brothel where perversions was their speciality.

'"Dope," she snarled, with the charm of an adder. "They're from the time of the Romans!"

'"Did they used to fuck then, too?" asks "Monk", showin' what a dumb shit 'e was.

'They started pourin' glasses o' port 'n' sherry, but me an' "Monk" didn't fancy it so we nipped down to the Elbe and got us a box o' Lowenbrau, and then we got goin'.

'Gloria was whinin', with passion tannin' out of 'er ear'oles, but just as I'm goin' to throw meself on to 'er she's over an' up the other end o' the bed like a shot. That bed was big enough to've took drivin' lessons on it in a lorry.

'"Why are you so
primitive
?" she sighed, slingin' down 'alf a port. Then she started takin' off 'er clothes bit by bit, like they do in Cafe Lausen when the peasants come in from the marshes of a Saturday. When she'd finished she pointed 'er legs at the ceilin' and started wagglin"er flamin' toes.

'I was on me way into 'er old gondola when she kicked me straight out o' bed and started givin' me a lecture on 'ow us Germans was a cultured people. It was that solemn I come near to standin' up an' givin' the Fihrer's salute with me prick.'

Well did she hit you in the balls with a hammer? Or pour vitriol on your cock?' asks Porta, with a lascivious grin.

'No, better'n that,' answers Tiny, bursting into a roar of laughter. 'One of 'er eyes was a glass 'un, an' she could pop it right out so's you could see inside 'er 'ead.'

'"Like me to blink it off for you?" she asked, pullin' at me old pud.'