by John Lawton
‘. . . After much thought I have reached a conclusion I cannot reconcile with any of my arguments . . . consciousness is the central problem of modern philosophy . . . yet, and I hesitate to say this, I fear that consciousness itself seems to be an illusion.’
A ripple of applause. The dozy awoke. Hummel looked at them all waiting for questions. There always were questions, even though, as now, there was prolonged and cogitative silence.
Rod thought a bit. He’d missed something vital daydreaming. There’d been a seven-league leap in Hummel’s argument. Rod spoke, ‘An illusion of what? Without consciousness there can be neither certainty nor illusion. You say “seems”, seems to whom or what? What or who is the entity so deluded or deceived?’
Hummel smiled, and said, ‘I wish you hadn’t asked me that.’
§ 140
It had come together in an unexpected if intended way. The British had turned out for the Viennese, the Berliners . . . the odd Italian . . . in their re-creation of Red Vienna. The enlisted men sat at the back, ordered to a concert and as uneasy as if they’d been invited to a nudist camp, Lieutenant Jenkins sat up front, as though representing the absent commandant, Major Trench.
It had come together. Rod was pleased. He knew he wasn’t a great or even a good second violin, but he was capable and felt he had shown it. Kornfeld was ecstatic, Herr Schnitzler wept tears of joy, and the audience belted out the applause and demanded an encore. Kornfeld apologised that they had none of them had enough vanity ever to think they would require an encore and hence had not prepared one – and they left the stage to a second round of clapping.
They were to be followed by Schwitters. Rod took his seat next to Billy Jacks.
‘It’s nothin’ to do with porridge, I ’ope.’
‘The programme says a sonata. That’s a piece for solo instrument.’
‘How do you know he hasn’t found a way of playin’ a tune on porridge?’
Schwitters strode onto the stage. He’d wetted his hair to stick down his errant wisps, and Rod could have sworn he’d concealed the holes in his increasingly tatty black jacket by dabbing ink onto the shirt underneath. Dignity it seemed, was the vital setting for the absurd.
‘I shall now perform for you ze presto, foursz movement of my Ursonate, originally composed in ze late 1920s, but wiz furzer additions in later years.’
Rod couldn’t see what instrument Schwitters had in mind. Was he going to walk over to the piano? Was he suddenly going to whip out a Jew’s harp from his trouser pocket and start twanging away?
Schwitters did not move. He stood stock still, almost as though at attention, opened his mouth and began to babble.
It sounded to Rod like . . .
‘grim
blim
bim’
and
‘bnim
bim
bum’.
Or was it? No, it was ‘bum’ it was definitely ‘bum’. And it went on for several minutes, perhaps the best part of quarter of an hour, via . . .
‘oo
bee
oo
bee’,
‘lula
lula
lula’
and . . .
‘rinza
kette
bee’
to end up pretty well where he’d started at . . .
‘grim
blim
bim.’
Rod wondered, in view of Schwitters’ statement about the piece being ‘composed’, whether he had memorised all this gibberish or simply made it up as he went along. It had a certain rhythm to it, a generous mind might even say a certain music. Jacks did not have a generous mind. As the too-polite applause died down he whispered, ‘What the bleeding ’ell was that?’
Rod said, ‘I’m sorry, I haven’t a clue. But remember he’s an artist.’
‘Artist, my arse! It was a load of Chipping Campden, that’s what it was.’
Chipping Campden had proved such an emotive phrase for Billy, it had all but replaced both ‘fuck’ and ‘bollocks’ in his vocabulary since he had first heard Herr Rosen utter it. It was the compression of all his contempt for England into four syllables – deploying the name of a quaint Cotswold village as an obscenity had a poetry to it that Schwitters might appreciate.
‘I’ve heard more sense out of any o’ my kids while they was still in the pram. He should stick to carvin’ porridge.’
‘Well . . . he’s down for another number in the second half. I suggest you put your fingers in your ears, or nip out for a fag.’
‘Nah . . . I’ll stick with it. If I catch him actually making sense or using real words I could maybe ask for me money back.’
‘You know, I think you might just have invented a new parlour game. First person in a bollocks-talking contest to accidentally make sense loses.’
After the interval, Rod sat between Drax and Jacks, the big man book-ended by two little men . . . half a dozen blokes recited poetry in German – chunks of Schiller, snippets of Goethe – another bloke did indeed get on stage, pull out a Jew’s Harp and twang away tunelessly pretty much like a cockney dad bashing away on a pair of spoons under the fond delusion that it was music, a counter-tenor sang something obscure and excruciating . . . and that left only Schwitters’ second number, whatever that might turn out to be, and the finale, Viktor Rosen playing Beethoven’s ‘Pathétique’ sonata on a Bechstein abandoned by the girls’ school upon their departure, and personally retuned by Rosen himself.
Schwitters took the stage again to an apprehensive silence. All Rod could hear was Drax wheezing, but then Drax seemed to be wheezing a lot lately. Either Schwitters was clutching what appeared to be a rifle carved out of wood or he’d found a way to set porridge rigid.
‘I sing for you now ze smash hit of 1912, lyrics by George Norton, music by Ernie Burnett.’
Rod hadn’t a clue what to expect. Jacks whispered, ‘I know this one. My old dad used to sing this. Da de da de da da da de dada.’
Schwitters sloped arms and began to sing, his left hand upheld in a ‘Heil Hitler’ salute:
‘Komm to me mein melancholy babeeeee . . .’
And as he sang he turned his head slowly, mechanically, almost as though on a ratchet and gazed a gorgon gaze upon his audience, unflinching, unsmiling, bone-chilling. Rod found the sentimentality of the words evaporating like Manx will-o’-the-wisp under Schwitters’ withering gaze. For the second verse he held his torso rigid and goose-stepped up and down the stage. For the third, he unslung his rifle, and aimed it at individuals in the audience, stamping his foot after each phrase to simulate a gunshot.
‘Cuddle up!’
Bang!
‘Und don’t be!’
Bang!
‘Shy!’
Bang!
On ‘shy’, Rod rather thought the wooden rifle was pointing at him or Drax. It was a chillingly effective little stunt. He doubted there’d be two hands put together to clap at the end of it. On ‘bang’ Drax slumped forward, chin on chest. Rod was amazed. He’d never have thought Drax willing to play along with a piece of Chipping Campden like this – but as Schwitters left the stage to a gobsmacked silence Drax did not move, and when Rod gently grasped a shoulder and asked, ‘Are you OK, old man?’ he slumped to the floor.
§ 141
Rosen was approaching the end of the second movement when Drax came to. Rod had laid him out on a sofa in a small room next to the concert hall. He’d been light as a feather. Rod realised he so rarely saw the man without his Bud Flanagan fur coat that he’d an utterly false idea of his size. He doubted he weighed more than eight and a half stone.
‘How long?’ Drax asked.
‘About ten minutes,’ Rod said.
Drax swung his feet off the sofa.
‘Ach, for twenty years I wanted to hear Viktor Rosen play . . .’
He lost his balance. Rod caught his head and laid him gently down again.
‘Not so fast.’
‘Ach .
. . It is only a cold. It has been coming on for days.’
Hummel peered down, spoke up.
‘No, Max. It is longer than that, you have coughed and wheezed almost since we met.’
‘Can you be surprised? We have had some terrible rain this summer. I have caught a cold. No more than that.’
Rod said, ‘Colds don’t cause you to pass out.’
Drax said nothing to this, looked back as though silently imploring Rod to change the subject.
‘I think you should see the MO.’
Kornfeld said, ‘Medical Officer? What Medical Officer? We don’t have a Medical Officer.’
Rod got Jenkins out of the concert.
‘’Fraid he’s right, old man. We’ve no resident MO.’
‘What? For a hundred men?’
‘Are there a hundred? I’ve never really been able to count. But no, it sort of never got organised.’
‘It’ll have to be organised,’ Rod whispered. ‘It looks more like pneumonia than a common cold to me.’
Jenkins knelt down next to Drax.
‘Max, old chap, how are you feeling?’
Drax responded with a fit of wet-coughing, drenching his handkercief in sputum.
‘I shall be fine,’ he lied.
Jenkins took Rod into a corner.
‘I think you’re right. I’ll find the major. Something will have to be done.’
‘Tonight?’
‘I do hope so. But you know as well as I how elusive the good major can be. Hasn’t been to roll call for a week. Hasn’t set foot in the mess for longer. And written on the wall in the enlisted men’s latrine is “What’s the difference between God and Trench?”’
Rod looked blank.
‘Sorry, it’s an old gag – I thought you might have heard it. It goes . . . ‘God is everywhere, Trench is everywhere but here”. But, I’ll find him.’
§ 142
Trench was blunt.
‘I know your sort. You’re a rabble-rouser, Mr Troy. You’re the thing the Army hates most. A barrack-room lawyer.’
‘I’m not in the Army and neither is Professor Drax.’
‘I’m so glad we agree on that because I have no provision for medical treatment of civilians.’
Even now Rod had only half of Trench’s attention. He was standing behind his desk, rifling through piles of paperwork.
‘There’s surely an MO for your men?’
‘In Douglas, yes. If one of my chaps gets ill I’d have to send to Douglas.’
‘Then send for him for Drax. He’s ill. Quite seriously ill. I think it might be pneumonia.’
‘No can do.’
‘Then send for a GP from one of the villages.’
Trench banged a fist down on the pile of paper.
‘You see this lot? Army regulations. Army bumf. Comes in by the barrowload every day.’
His other hand lay flat on a second smaller pile.
‘You see this lot? Home Office bumf. Right now jurisdiction over your raggle-taggle bunch of Germans and Jews is with the War Office. Any day now it shifts to the Home Office. Don’t ask me why. All I know is the transition means twice the bloody bumf, and it gets bigger every day. If I have power to summon a civilian GP . . . if . . . who knows, the regulation might be in this lot somewhere. But right now I don’t have that power.’
§ 143
Rod said, ‘Isn’t there a doctor in camp? All these degrees and diplomas, surely one of us knows something about medicine?’
Siebert said, ‘You may recall I mentioned that there is one remaining Nazi?’
‘Vaguely,’ Rod said.
‘Massmann.’
‘Eh?’
‘Massmann, he’s the Nazi. He’s also a doctor.’
‘Oh bugger. Have I met him? I don’t think I’ve met him.’
‘Takes his meals in his room since they shipped out all the others. You and Billy might pay him a call. The rest of us are known to him, most of us have clashed with him at some time. He has a room to himself on the top floor.’
‘A room to himself?’
‘Did you think any of us would share with him?’
Massmann’s room was in the attic, high in the gable. Enough room for a palliasse, a constantly hissing cold water tank, a washbasin and little else. Rod and Billy peered in through the open door. The room was higher than it was wide or long. Just as well – Massmann appeared to Rod to be close to six foot six and as skinny as Hummel. He was stretched out on the palliasse, one hand behind his head, the other clutching a book. Rod tapped politely on the door. The eyes flickered up to look at him, but Rod could swear not another muscle in his body moved – the eyes were the enviable Aryan blue, the skin taut across his forehead, the cheekbones high and his skin pale.
‘What is this? A delegation?’
‘After a fashion. Doctor Massmann . . .’
‘When a Jew comes to me, things must be in a sorry state on the lower floors.’
‘Actually I’m not Jewish.’
‘But your little friend is, and while you are hell-bent on sticking to your English manners and your Queensberry rules, your friend would like to strangle me. I can see it in his eyes.’
Rod was utterly thrown by this. Almost speechless.
‘Come, little Jew. Say what you are thinking – spit it out. Tell me to my face. You would like to strangle me, would you not?’
‘Yeah,’ Billy blurted out. ‘Right on all counts, Jerry. I’m a Jew, I would like to strangle you but I’ve come to ask a favour.’
Massmann laid the book face down on his chest.
‘So, the air is cleared. And now such honesty must surely be rewarded. Ask away, little Jew. Your Englishman is clearly still tongue-tied.’
‘We got this mate – been taken sick he has. We reckon it’s pneumonia. He says he’s always been prone to a touch of bronchitis – but now it looks worse. You’re the only doctor in camp. We’d like you to take a look.’
‘Another Jew?’
Billy looked at Rod, Rod looked back.
‘Well? Yes or no? Another stinking Jew?’
‘Yes,’ Rod said at last. ‘Another stinking Jew.’
Massmann stood up, stood at the end of his bed, turned on the tap above the basin, not speaking until the groaning in the pipes had shivered to a stop.
To Rod’s surprise he switched to German.
‘“Da aber Pilatus sah, daß er nichts schaffte, sondern daß ein viel größer Getümmel ward, nahm er Wasser und wusch die Hände vor dem Volk und sprach: Ich bin unschuldig an dem Blut dieses Gerechten, sehet ihr zu!’ Die, die in Ubereinstimmung mit Juden stehen, sterben als Juden. Laß ihn kreuzigen! Laß ihn kreuzigen!’
All the way back down the stairs Rod could hear ‘Laß ihn kreuzigen!’ ringing in his ears. He had almost to drag Billy with him, kicking and screaming, ‘Bastard, you complete fuckin’ bastard.’
Only at the bottom of the stairs, shrugging off Rod’s hand did he ask, ‘What was that about? What did he say?’
‘He was quoting the bible. New Testament. Matthew, I think.’
‘I ain’t never read it. Come to think of it, I ain’t read much of the old one neither.’
‘Pontius Pilate was the Roman Governor of Judaea who condemned Christ to death – literally washed his hands of him.’
‘Yeah well – I don’t need that bit spelled out. I could see that for meself You don’t need to be no scholar to work out he was washing his hands of old Drax. What was he sayin’ about Jews? I know he said something – I definitely heard “Juden”.’
‘If you – and I think he meant me – line up with Jews you can expect to die as one.’
Billy thought for a moment but the best he could come up with was ‘Fuckim’.
Then Rod said, ‘Stinking Jews’ as much to himself as to Billy.
‘Yeah. Why did you say that? Have you gone stark starin’ bonkers or what, ’Ampstead?’
‘He’s right. We’re all stinking Jews now. Wir sind die stinkenden Juden.’
‘Oh . . . Chippin fuckin Campden!’
Billy stomped off, uncomprehending, unforgiving.
Half an hour later Jenkins found Billy and Siebert in the gardens, cutting nettles.
‘I heard you were asking for me,’ he said. ‘What are you doing?’
‘Cuttin’ nettles for nettle soup.’
‘Do you really think the rations are that bad?’
‘It ain’t for us. It’s for old Drax. Best thing for lung trouble, nettle soup. My old man used to swear by it. When I was not much more than a kid, during the last war, I used to raid disused gardens for nettles. My mum must have poured nettle soup down dozens of people. You won’t remember that flu epidemic, last year of the war, will you?’
‘I’m not that young, Billy. I’d be four or five – I heard about it.’
Billy seemed to think they had cut enough, stopped swinging the bread knife and wrapped what he and Siebert had cut in a towel.
‘You heard that Nazi won’t treat Drax?’
‘No – but I can’t say I’m surprised.’
‘Ever occur to you to wonder why he’s here?’
‘He makes that obvious, he wears his politics next to his heartlessness, on his sleeve.’
‘I mean – why he’s still here?’
‘I don’t follow.’
‘Oskar here reckons all the Nazis was shipped out just before I got here. Every last one, ’cept for Massmann. So . . . why not him, why is he here and not on his way to Canada or Australia or at the bottom of the ocean like some poor buggers?’
