by Chris Petit
Blinded by the light, he told himself. If he was so afraid of what he had seen why did he not look back to have his fear confirmed?
The commandant watched the garrison doctor with his medical bag and shiny boots crossing the lawn. He had told him to take the short cut through the garden. Just a quick check nothing was broken. A tall man, he thought sourly, a careerist, seduced by the elegance of the uniform, who likened membership to that of a good club. The commandant’s patience was tested by this new breed of soft-soapers that hesitated before knocking.
He answered the door himself, in shirtsleeves, braces hanging. He took the doctor through to his study. The doctor rubbed his hands as though it were chilly.
Arms raised, fingers and toes waggled, head turned from side to side, collarbones checked, a stethoscope produced, blood pressure taken. The doctor’s hands were clammy and the commandant understood why he had rubbed them.
No mention of what he had seen, or thought he had seen. Delirium tremens; would the doctor tell him that? No mention either of the black spots that still danced before his eyes. He wished he could confess he was on the verge of nervous collapse, however unthinkable. He’d had to go right to the top to get his medical history removed from the military record. His greatest fear was that they – for all his friends in high places – would stop at nothing to get rid of him. It was his camp; he its creator, however foul and broken-backed, the ugly child he was bound to love. He knew himself well enough to say: I may not be clever but I am smart enough to know this place would be nothing without me and I nothing without it.
The doctor lectured the commandant on high blood pressure, correct diet, alcohol intake and lack of exercise.
The commandant protested he had just fallen off his horse. What was riding if not exercise? As for drinking, they all drank like fish and smoked like chimneys, except no one said that any more. Three cigarettes smoked during the consultation, stubbed out in the wrought-iron ashtray made for him by prisoners, as had the rest of the furniture, including the huge desk, in whose locked drawer he kept his schnapps. He thought better of offering the doctor one, knowing he didn’t drink, as an excuse to help himself.
The doctor told him to rest as much as he could.
‘With my workload!’
The house sounded busy. Sometimes the commandant felt he could barely move for girls sewing away, in the attic and downstairs too, maids running around, cooks, nannies, gardeners, shoe cleaners, not to mention the regular service orderly. His wife employed beyond the point of generosity. He asked the doctor if he wanted a cup of anything, thinking the answer would be indicative of whether the visit had an ulterior motive. The doctor asked for tea. The commandant, on guard, rang the bell on his desk and a skivvy hurried in with an awkward bob and a curtsey.
While they waited to be served the doctor made a show of admiring the furniture, particularly the desk whose entire surface was covered with family photographs, held in place by a sheet of Plexiglass whose size alone was a statement of his powers of acquisition.
The commandant suspected the doctor was fishing. He was having his house done and no furniture was available in store. Everything that could be confiscated had been. To have it made you needed connections the doctor could only dream of.
‘I could get you an appointment with Erich Groenke.’
The doctor had heard stories about the man’s legendary capabilities. He suspected the offer was a bribe, disguised as a favour.
The commandant said, ‘Big Erich has access to designers with swatches of material, from which garrison wives choose their curtains.’
At home the doctor had a single camp bed, a wooden chair and an improvised table. His architect had taken months to come up with the piping for the plumbing, and the promised taps, due weeks ago, were still in mysterious transit; and the place was supposed to be nearly ready for his wife and children to move in.
The maid returned.
‘This is good tea!’ exclaimed the commandant, as though it was an exception to be served the best. He had taken off his shirt for the doctor’s inspection and not put it back on. He slurped his tea, holding the saucer under the cup. A cigarette burned in the ashtray.
They were interrupted by the commandant’s wife. The doctor stood, took her hand and made to kiss it but restricted himself to a bow. She smelled overpoweringly of violets.
The commandant suspected she fancied the doctor for his gentleman’s manners.
Strange woman, the doctor thought. Her main expression with him was a fixed grin. Stately in manner if not appearance, she dressed down in styles too young for her, including white ankle socks. Such dowdiness was at variance with her main interest, which he knew was fashion. She made a point of false modesty and charitable works, was keen on culture, which her husband was not. She was off that evening to Kattowice to see the Vienna State Opera perform with Elisabeth Höngen.
The commandant continued to sit in his vest, dragging on another cigarette. The doctor counted six in the ashtray. The commandant said to his wife, ‘The doctor is having trouble finding furniture. I suggest he talks to Big Erich.’
They discussed the matter until the commandant asked his wife, ‘Shall you be staying in Kattowice?’
‘It gets late otherwise. There’s talk of dinner with Höngen and Böhm.’ Böhm was conducting. The doctor considered her far more socially assured than her husband.
‘Talking of furnishing,’ she said, and went to the door and called upstairs, then told her husband to put his shirt on.
They were joined by a young woman, who stood on the threshold, eyes downcast, demeanour modest. For all that, there was no denying her beauty. The commandant was staring.
‘The most exquisite seamstress,’ announced his wife. ‘She has already made the most wonderful tapestry. You must commission one for when your wife comes.’
The commandant continued to gawp. His wife told the young woman to fetch a sample.
They waited in silence. The sound of a vacuum cleaner came from the next room.
The commandant’s wife eventually said to the doctor, ‘Next time we have a social you must come.’
She turned away before he could answer and announced the young woman’s return. The tapestry was of a mill.
‘It’s called “Autumn Landscape”.’
The doctor made polite noises. It was ghastly and he was a long way from needing anything like it. Compared to his standard of living, the commandant’s was luxurious, frivolous even, if his wife could employ people to produce such inessentials.
The commandant looked on proudly. ‘Exquisite,’ he said, which earned him a look from his wife.
The doctor addressed the young woman. ‘Yes, I should like you to make us something once I have the house in a more presentable state for such fine craftsmanship as yours.’
How awkward he sounded. The seamstress bowed her head. The doctor was aware of the commandant glaring with what he was astonished to realise was jealousy.
The women left together. The vacuum cleaner was in the hall now. The doctor smelled furniture polish, a relief after the cloying perfume. He wondered whether the woman was having an affair. Nearly everyone was. The commandant was clearly smitten by the seamstress, and the doctor wondered if that could be used against him somehow, except he was not one to whom intrigue came naturally. Nor was the commandant, he suspected, but he had swum in murky waters for so long.
Before leaving, the doctor drew himself to his full height and formally restated his case.
‘May I bring to your attention again that the garrison security police’s opposition to my reforms involves criminal acts. I officially request – again – that an outside judicial commission come in to review and end these despicable practices.’
‘Yes, yes,’ the commandant said testily.
‘A prosecuting judge has gone into a garrison near Weimar—’
‘Enough!’ said the commandant. ‘You have just told me to get plenty of rest.’ He smirked. ‘Go and s
ee Erich,’ he said, picking up the telephone.
Erich Groenke did not look like a convicted rapist, though the garrison doctor had no idea what one should look like. Don’t let him bore you, the commandant had said. ‘He likes to go on but get him on your side and he will do anything for you.’
The leather factory, which Groenke ran, stood between the garrison and the station, in a restricted area, a mixture of staff quarters and commercial buildings, including the dairy and garrison abattoir, and the grocery store which the doctor had never been inside because his Polish skiv fetched what little he needed.
Groenke wore a corduroy jacket with lots of pockets, a leather waistcoat and fine boots which he pointed out he had made himself. He was considered one of the camp’s success stories, the reformed lag, one of the original gang of thirty – tough jailbirds hand-selected by the commandant to come from home to crack Polish heads and get the place on its feet.
‘Not easy when you are bottom of everyone’s list. The Old Man was always complaining they would give a refugee camp more.’
The doctor could see he was expected to ask what methods existed for advancing work on his house. Groenke implied that access to the pharmacy was a potential point of discussion, but the doctor refused to be drawn. He wasn’t entirely naïve.
He left empty-handed; almost. Everyone had a dog, Groenke said; man’s best friend and that. The doctor’s children would not be able to resist. The dam was a Belgian shepherd and the doctor would get first pick of the litter. The cost struck him as exorbitant and he said he was hard up. Groenke dropped his price and the doctor realised it was more a test of his negotiating skills, and he probably hadn’t heard the last of the pharmacy.
Perhaps a dog would not be so bad. He missed the lack of affection. Garrison men made themselves out to be tough. Social occasions were brittle. The women were as bad as the men when it came to drink. No one seemed much interested in their children. He had heard of parties where couples paired up and went off together.
He constantly reminded his wife in his letters that her love and support were of inestimable value. He tried to keep the tone breezy – he wrote most days – but it was hard to find cheerful news. He knew she read the letters to the children and had to find coded ways of expressing his physical longing. He took an optimistic view on the progress on the house. He made no mention of the ghastly stench and wondered how she would cope. At least she would never have to see the state of the prisoner infirmaries or conditions in the new camp.
That morning the Polish girl produced a plate of bread with chopped egg and gherkin and stood waiting to see what he made of it. He was in the middle of writing but too polite to refuse. ‘Good,’ he said, making a show of appreciation.
She was a plain, bold creature. He had given her some cream for her acne and it seemed to make no difference to her skin or their awkward relationship. He knew he gave her too little to do. She cleaned his boots and shoes, not well enough for him not to have to do them again, and did shopping and housework and took his laundry and dry-cleaning to the outlet in the garrison, which meant she didn’t have to wash or iron.
He continued to write while eating. ‘Still I remain in good spirits, as do we all. The job we have is not easy as I keep telling you, my angel. We try and perform a humane task but half of it is trying to educate everyone into keeping proper records. Seeing themselves as pioneers, living on “the wild frontier”, they are impatient of what they call bumph, and see the likes of me as fusspots. I sit in our new house picturing our future, you sitting here (and lying with me upstairs) and the children running around (or asleep!). As for anyone who tried to take away my house, my happiness or my beloved, I would bash in his skull!’
She had written back more than once sensing he was under great strain. Wanting to avoid misunderstanding, he added, ‘I am not serious, of course, but you know what I mean. There is much to be done in teaching people about eliminating disease. For all the attention they pay, I might as well be up the Limpopo River 150 years ago! But I reserve my greatest frustration for your absence and count the days.’
He signed off, adding all his love (‘and more’) and looked at his desperately unfinished surroundings. The novelty of camping had long worn off and he was tired of the hotel where he kept a room to retain a degree of personal hygiene.
Yet most of the rest lived in acceptable accommodation, some little short of luxurious. He could try the housing office, he supposed, and insist on being put at the top of the list, or make a proper effort with Groenke, who probably had private access to furnished apartments more than suitable for his needs. Or they could camp out and make an adventure of it, doing the place up bit by bit.
Something the doctor had managed to scrounge was a stove. Winter was coming. The house had no chimney, being designed for central heating – yet to be installed, of course – but he thought it would be possible to put a flue in to take away the fumes even if he had to smash the hole in the wall himself.
After an irritable, restless morning, the commandant returned home for lunch; his every passage through the garden gate an entry into a different world where the doting father lavished affection on his children, in contrast to the stone mask he had to wear for work. He went in through the kitchen where the staff ate lunches prepared by his wife with her own hands. Why, he couldn’t understand. He had told her they had servants for that.
The seamstress wasn’t eating with the rest that day; he could hardly ask where she was. He recited to himself: ‘Thy neck is like the tower of David builded for an armoury, whereon there hang a thousand bucklers, all shields of mighty men. Thy two breasts are like two young roes that are twins, which feed among the lilies. Until the day break, and the shadows flee away, I will get me to the mountain of myrrh, and to the hill of frankincense. Thou art all fair, my love; there is no spot in thee.’
He felt compelled to cut his lunch short and ride out again. He hurried to the stables and took the western saddle. He and Groenke, who sometimes rode with him, were Karl May fans. Oh, to be cowboys, they lamented, eating around the campfire and sleeping under the stars.
He saw a distant work gang walking down the railway line in direct contravention of the bulletin his office had issued the previous week. The only other movement was a blur, half a kilometre away, which he supposed was the garrison psychiatrist on his fancy racing bike.
A garrison shrink! What were things coming to? The way it had always worked with anyone on the wobble was a couple of stiff drinks and being told to act like a man. Never had he thought that his world would include a shrink on a bike! Getting paid to worm his way inside people’s heads was not a proper job. No one was sure even why he was there.
The commandant didn’t like the way the man held his eye, as if to say, ‘I know what shadows lurk inside.’ Shadows lurked within them all; the commandant knew that as well as anyone. A soldier’s job was to manage his own mind rather than run bleating to a brainbox who made a point of not getting his hands dirty. As for himself, of course he would like to rest his head on the bosom of the seamstress and fiddle with her twat and not have a care in the world, but he wouldn’t because if he didn’t set an example who would?
He rode out in dread of what he had seen that morning existing only in his head, a vision, a portent or ill-omen, with dire personal meaning.
He went back the way he thought he had ridden. Like an Indian scout he attempted to read the ground from his earlier trail, but the prints could have been from any old ride. He dismounted to examine the turf for the freshness of its broken surface and hadn’t a clue what it was telling him.
He hadn’t realised there were so many telegraph poles. He saw guards, tiny specks in the outer watchtowers. Flat fields. He remembered splashing through water. It was all like that, miles and miles of it. The river boundary, with what little water there was, sluggish. He could not remember. Nothing there. Oh, dread vision! He had found no mention of any such incident in the endless arse paper that had crossed his
desk that morning, when he would have expected to be informed: Does anyone know who attached a crucified body to telegraph pole number such-and-such and to what purpose and on whose authority?
His days were like that: to what purpose and on whose authority?
The garrison psychiatrist often saw the commandant out riding. They shared the same preference for being up before the rest of the world. He thought nothing of doing fifty kilometres before his first appointment, pushing pedal, clearing the mind, then going out again for the midday break. Whenever they passed, the commandant was too busy talking to himself to notice.
Once, he had followed and watched the commandant dismount in a glade. He did so again that afternoon. All his actions were as before: he continued talking to himself while he removed his jacket, shirt and vest, tore branches from a sapling and thrashed his naked back, babbling on even when he pulled out his tool and vigorously masturbated while standing, and afterwards wiped his hand on the grass, watched by his mare.
The commandant stripped to his shirtsleeves and mucked out the stables. After that he went to Groenke’s and they chewed the fat and drank tea from Japan, which he supposed came via its Berlin embassy. Several dozen tins of Seville oranges stood on a table, earmarked for his wife. They sipped plum brandy with the tea as the afternoon sun moved across the skylight.
The commandant went home to find his wife about to leave for the opera. She was standing in the kitchen, wearing a magnificent fur-collared evening coat, issuing instructions to staff.
‘When I come back we’ll all make jam, which will be fun!’ she promised.
The commandant was rewarded with a brief glimpse of the seamstress passing through the hall. He failed to catch her eye.
He did what he could to turn his confusion into safe, concrete gestures. What nerve it took on his part to raise the subject with his wife, about how they could improve the young woman’s conditions, by taking it upon themselves perhaps to help furnish her room.
