by Sven Hassel
‘No, I don’t suppose you are. It’s only good people as are religious, an’ you just ain’t good says Tiny, tapping him on the back of the neck with the cold barrel of the sawn-off shotgun.
‘You pray for him, then!’ shouts Porta, locking the door behind Egon’s playmates.
‘Our Father who art in Heaven,’ intones Tiny, with eyes turned up towards the ceiling, ‘stay where Thou art an’ leave us down ’ere to fix up this little job ourselves so it won’t ’urt Thy reputation!’
‘Come on then, Egon, let’s go for a little stroll together,’ says Porta, throwing a raincoat at him. ‘Put it on! We can’t have you running around in ladies underwear on the streets of Berlin. We’d have the Vice Squad after us!’
‘No screamin’ mind,’ says Tiny, severely, as they descend the stairs. ‘Not if you don’t want your prick an’ balls chopped off an’ pushed down your throat!’
With Egon between them, they walk down Friedrichs Strasse to a War Ministry amphibian, which Oberfeldwebel Sally has provided.
A Schupo watches, interestedly, as they push Egon into the vehicle.
‘Deserter?’ he asks, looking at Egon with inquisitive contempt.
‘Right you are,’ answers Porta. ‘Due for a squad, this sod is. That’s the way of it. The bastards who’re scared of the enemy shootin’ ’em, we do it!’
‘That’s the way it should be,’ nods the Schupo importantly. He inserts his thumbs behind his highly-polished belt.
‘They’re going to murder me,’ shouts Egon, desperately, thinking he might still have a chance.
‘Execute’s the word,’ the Schupo corrects him, sharply. He pats his pistol holster, with a speaking gesture. ‘I hope they beat you up proper before they turn you off, too! You traitorous bastard!’
‘No,’ smiles Porta, falsely, ‘no! We don’t do that in the army. We’re humane. We aim at the forehead. And bang!’ He lifts his hand to the brim of his cap, in a nonchalant gesture. The Schupo returns the salute, in regimental fashion.
They move off down Friedrichs Strasse at top speed.
‘I can promise you a quite unique experience,’ says Porta, as they turn down Charlottenburg Chaussée. ‘You’re going to be the first person in the world to fall off Siegessäule!
‘Let’s talk it over,’ whispers Egon, faintly. ‘You don’t know the worrying time I’ve had. You’ve only got the war to worry about, and that’s going as bad as can be!’
‘And don’t we know it,’ says Porta, slapping the steering wheel with one hand. ‘It’s worrying makes this rotten, lousy world totter, and take all the miserable worriers down into the black hole with it. Optimistic blokes like me, we just cruise along on top of all that shit. From the first day I came into the German world I’ve been a respectable business-man, dealing honestly in all the goods everybody else wanted.’
‘For example,’ Tiny puts in, knowledgeably, ‘cunt! And you’ve never, ever asked more’n a very reasonable 80% on top!’
‘You must be nuts, Egon,’ continues Porta. ‘Even if you have got a civilian haircut, don’t imagine you can pull the carpet out from under my feet!’
‘Barmy, that’s what ’e is,’ cries Tiny, angrily. ‘Thought ’e could tip the ‘ole bleedin’ shit-bucket over, an’ take us for a ride!’
‘Bit of a shock for you, I suppose? Us comin’ back to Berlin!’ says Porta, shaking his head sadly.
‘I’ve always been a good pal to my friends,’ whines Egon, miserably. ‘Be nice, now, fellows, let’s drive back to “The Hen”. All your 80%’s are lying there in bundles waiting for you. They’re all in the account books. Maybe there’s a little error here and there in the addition, but that’s understandable enough in this terrible time of war. Don’t believe everything they say about me. Down inside I’m a good person. I deserve thanks for what I’ve done for people, but I never hear a word of it!’
‘What you deserve is to be knocked on the head by the great globe of the world, time and time again,’ declares Porta, slapping the wheel. ‘I know, for example, that it was you who whopped “the Bike-Stealer,” and it was you was the cause of “Charlotte the Whore” getting her nut blown off.’
‘It’s a wicked, wicked lie!’ protests Egon, clapping his hands to his face. ‘My hands have never, never been stained by blood.’ He holds both his hands in front of Porta’s face, in proof of his statement, with the result that Porta barely avoids hitting a newspaper-woman in a blue dress. She sends a volley of Goethe’s vulgarisms after him.
‘No, you’re too cowardly, and too clever to do it yourself,’ smiles Porta. ‘The dwarf looks after that part of the business for you. He was up there with Charlotte, and the Stork was with him. They told her they were going to throw her two kids out of the window head-first if she didn’t fork out 60% of her earnings at “The Owl”. When she didn’t pay up, they came back and minced her face up a bit. That didn’t help either, because she thought Bike-Stealer could fix your arse, you little shit, you. So both her and the nippers went out of the window headfirst.’
‘You don’t really believe I could do anything that wicked?’ asks Egon, in a shaky voice. ‘Find Bike-Stealer, and he’ll tell you it’s all a lie!’
‘That’s a great comic act you’ve got there,’ Porta jeers. ‘If anybody sees Bike-Stealer outside Moabitt ever again, after what they sentenced that boy for, he’ll be wearing a long white beard and be past 97. From what they tell me he already looks like a cross between Frankenstein’n the Mummy.’
‘You must listen to me,’ shouts Egon, anxiously. ‘What’ve you got going with Stealer? He was a terrible man and tortured ladies!’
‘ ’Ow you do talk,’ Tiny cuts him off, irritably. ‘Be a bleedin’ German man for once. Look death bravely in the eyes. You’re one of the Führer’s old SA lot, as used to go round wavin’ clubs in ’33.’
‘No hanging around in the corridors, as the executioner said when he marched number ten in,’ grins Porta, noisily, whipping the vehicle round and into the park.
‘Don’t make yourselves into contemptible murderers for my miserable sake,’ babbles Egon. ‘I was only joking when I said you were out. Ain’t you got any sense of humour, man? You must have a good laugh now and then, in these horrible times!’
‘Laugh, then,’ suggests Porta, laughing heartily himself. ‘That’s just the reason why we’re on our way to Siegessäule, so we can have a good laugh on a miserable day. Tiny and me, we’ve seen all kinds of quick death in our time, but we never did see anybody go off the top of Siegessäule. I seem to remember once you told me your greatest wish was to learn how to glide. Well, now you’re going to get your wish. Don’t forget to spread your arms out wide, and do like the gulls. All we’re going to do is get you started, and I can promise you you’re going to get a good send-off!’
‘It’ll be a lovely sight,’ cries Tiny, jubilantly. ‘67 mettes up, and when you land it’ll be in the middle of a bed of roses!’
‘67½ metres,’ Porta corrects him, ‘but don’t forget to waggle your feet Egon, or you’ll nosedive, and I don’t think that softened-up head of yours can take that!’
‘Yes, flatten out, the way they say in the glider clubs,’ Tiny advises him. ‘Use the risin’ air currents!’
A crash drowns out his voice. Porta leaves the amphibian abruptly and goes through the air in a great arc, ending well out in the lake. Ducks and swans flutter wildly into the air, wings flapping madly. Tiny rolls across the asphalt in a ball, but is quickly on his feet again. He rushes across the grass, attempting to get away from the amphibian, which comes rattling and crashing after him.
Flames rise above the tree-tops as the vehicle bursts into flames.
Cursing and swearing louder than the protesting babble of the ducks and swans, Porta arrives back on land.
‘That blasted little worm,’ he rages. ‘He tricked us. Where’d he go?’
‘ ’E got in the taxi that banged into us,’ explains Tiny, waving, his arms about wildly. ‘I seen it be
fore. It was over there, waiting for us like a bleedin’ grave-snatcher. I thought it was just standin’ waitin’ for a fare. Then I saw it was the dwarf at the wheel, but too late to do anythin’ about it.’
‘In a way he was waitin’ for a fare,’ snarls Porta, wringing the water from his cap. ‘Not an ordinary fare though!’
‘If you want my opinion,’ says Tiny, in an outraged tone, ‘’e’s got a bleedin’ nerve, deliberately runnin’ into a peaceful vehicle from Adolf’s Army right in the middle of the park! Maximum speed 20 it says on all the signs, an’ ’ere that little pig comes at 100! Where’s the bleedin’ traffic police when you want ’em? Never there!’
‘Now I really have heard everything,’ rages Sally, when they get back to the War Ministry, and report the taxi incident. ‘Never heard of dynamite? Stuff a couple of sticks up that skinny little bugger’s backside, why don’t you? One thing’s certain, now! You’ve got to kill that little rat if you want to stay alive yourselves! His jailbirds’ll be all over the place now, waiting to blow your heads offl And here you sit like a pair of soaking-wet alley cats, drying off on my government radiators! Oh, I ought to-to-to-to spit on you!’
‘This case is going to end in a stiff sentence,’ growls Porta, with a nasty look in his eyes. He wrings some more water out of his great-coat. ‘The Poofs gonna suffer for this! When I’ve decided he’s goin’ to take a header off the Siegessäule, he can’t get away with taking off in a taxi!’
‘I can’t understand ’ow they knew we were goin’ to the park?’ wonders Tiny, with a thoughtful look on his face.
‘The two you locked in the cupboard,’ explains Sally, throwing his arms out in disgust. ‘They heard everything you said, and where you were taking him. Doesn’t need Einstein to work out your clown of a plan. The dwarfs little grey cells began rattling round in that big head of his, and you know the rest. Come on, get your arses out of here, and fix this job once and for all. Egon’ll be sitting in “The Owl”, shooting his mouth off. Go through the yard and get in by the cellar window, so you can take him from the rear. It’s easier from behind. That’s why Stalin’s commissars always neck-shoot people when they’re to be liquidated!’
Porta puts his favourite Nagan into his shoulder holster. He puts ten clips of ammunition in his pocket.
‘Think it’d be better to take a “piano” with us?’ he asks, putting his P-38 in another pocket where it will be easy to get at, if problems become acute.
‘Don’t,’ says Sally, drily. ‘You’re in civilized Berlin now, where they don’t like people to go around with machine-guns smashing the windows!’
‘Let’s go,’ decides Porta, his face hard. ‘This time we keep it simple. We’ll string him up the way they do with horse-thieves in Texas!’
‘Be careful, now,’ warns Sally, as they leave the room. ‘Expect surprises. Egon’s not some peasant from Schleswig, remember! He’s a real Berliner, and knows what’s needed here to stay alivel’
When they crawl through the cellar window, to come up on Egon from behind, Tiny gets stuck in the frame. Porta has to use a jemmy to get him loose.
They tiptoe carefully up the stairs to the first floor, from which loud voices can be heard. The first two rooms they come to are empty, but the third is packed with people.
Egon is behind a huge desk, which makes him look even smaller than usual. He is dressed all in black, with a blindingly white shirt which he believes looks well against his artificial sun-tan. He believes that a sun-tan gives a man a look of power and success. On each side of his chair stands a broad-shouldered bodyguard, staring alertly about the room. In the shaded lighting, two other goons can just be seen, standing guard on the door leading to the restaurant. The sound of drums and saxophones can be heard in the distance.
‘Bow-wow!’ barks Tiny, bending over Egon, ‘you look as if you’d been mixin’ it with a fleet o’ wasps, but maybe you’ve only been ’avin’ a little taxi-ride round the Zoo?’
‘You boys were going to kill me,’ drawls Egon, slowly. He blows smoke in Tiny’s face, in approved American film gangster manner.
Tiny laughs long and loud. He thinks he has to do this to save face.
Suddenly a lot of things start happening all at once. Porta said later it was the nearest he had seen to a really big earthquake. The whole gang goes at them. The goon closest to Tiny hits him across the face with a plank, so hard that the plank breaks across the middle.
’Kill ’em!’ howls Egon, happily, launching a murderous kick at Tiny.
The two guards at the door get hold of Porta, and start trying to tear his head off. Knuckle-dusters flash, and land on his face. He twists and kicks upwards, connecting with something soft. One of the guards jumps away screaming, both hands pressed between his legs.
Tiny rolls like a ball, and is back up on his feet in a flash. He grabs a chair and brings it down on the neck of the nearest of his attackers. It shatters to pieces and the man goes down with a weary grant.
The remaining goon rushes at Tiny waving a blackjack. Tiny goes at him head-on with all his 260 pounds. He hooks a foot behind one of the man’s legs, and they go down, with a crash like a ship’s boiler falling down through the house. Tiny hammers a blow into the killer’s throat, which crushes his larynx like an eggshell. He makes a horrible, inhuman sound and falls to the floor, the blackjack falling from his hand.
Porta grabs it and showers blows on his two attackers.
Egon soon sees the turn events are taking, and, since he is not the kind of person who feels comfortable as the centre of a scene of violent action, he grabs his well-cut -black overcoat, and rushes out of the door.
‘After him,’ shouts Porta, cracking the blackjack down on the head of one of the goons, in almost friendly fashion.
‘You’re breaking my ’eart,’ shouts Tiny, swinging his pistol from side to side. ‘We’re lettin’ you off this time, but someday I’m gonna blow you lot away! We don’t usually murder people except by agreement. Up against the wall! Spread your legs and lean your ’ands on it! Get your paws up ’igher! Anybody can see you shits’ve never been to ’Amburg!’ He runs practised hands over them, emptying everything, keys, coins, cigarettes, wallets, pistols, out of their pockets. The wallets he stuffs in his own pocket. The rest goes out of the window. He goes backwards out of the door, locks it after him, and pushes a chair up under the handle.
Porta spurts through the restaurant, knocking over a waiter in passing, and out into the street. He starts off down it, then stops, realising Egon has most probably gone the other way, and runs back the way he Game.
Tiny rushes out of the gate, his pistol still in his hand, and looks round him in confusion.
A crash comes from behind him.
‘I’m gonna get you,’ rages one of the body-guards, August, who has broken out, and taken up the pursuit. ‘I’ll smash you!’ he howls, and waves the blackjack Porta has dropped, to show he means what he says.
A bullet comes screaming from the darkness. It whirls him round and throws him against the door, which crashes inwards in a rain of broken glass and wood splinters. For a moment he has the look of a man thinking of stepping to one side, and then he sinks down slowly like a sack of grain with a hole in it.
‘Watch out,’ screams Porta, more sensing than seeing a dark figure step out from behind some garbage-cans. It points something large and black at him. In a flash of light he notices that the hand holding the menacing object is grimed with dirt. He throws himself behind a pile of potato-sacks, together with Tiny. A volley of shots sounds, murderously. Bullets whine over their heads. Their own pistols are ready in their hands. The dark figure has vanished. All is quiet. Dangerously quiet. Cautiously they rise to their feet.
‘Hell, hell, hell!’ curses Porta. ‘Everything we try goes wrong on us! Who the devil was that sneaking Nazi pig who took a shot at legally-inducted army personnel?’
‘Couldn’t of been Egon,’ considers Tiny. ‘ ’E’d break in two if a gun of that size went o
ff in is ’and. They’re only for old soldiers’n real men!’
They move along, close to the house walls, with well-trained caution. Tiny is just about to peer round a corner, when a terrific explosion splits the night. The roar of it echoes, from wall to wall, along the blacked-out streets, but not a corner of a curtain is lifted for an inquisitive peep. Every Berliner knows that unnecessary inquisitiveness can shorten people’s lives considerably. If it was not the Gestapo out for scalps, it could be something even worse, and, in any case, not in the least healthy to witness.
Cat-footing, and with pistols at the ready, Porta and Tiny step lightly on down the street. They look into, under and behind every parked car, and lift the lid of every refuse-bin.
It is Tiny who first picks up the sound of footsteps, moving fast in the darkness of the night. Soon after, they catch sight of a figure flitting across the street.
‘Goddam!’ shouts Porta happily, squatting and holding the Nagan out in front of him with both hands, in approved New York Police fashion. He sends off five shots, so fast that they sound almost like one. None of them find the target, which surprises him considerably since the shots the New York Police fire always do! ‘An Mpi would’ve done the job,’ he rages. ‘That pig’s got away without a scratch. Just wait, you. . . .’
‘That boy’s shit-scared,’ says Tiny, with a sneer. ‘’E’s runnin’ like a rabbit with its balls cut off. ’Ere an’ there an’ not gettin’ anywhere. We’ve got ’im. We’ll soon’ve put a ’ole in ’im! Take ’em one at a time’n you can knock off an entire army without gettin’ a scratch.’
‘Step the light fantastic over on to the other pavement,’ orders Porta, ‘and I’ll waltz along this one. Soon as we see that wicked monkey, then bang, bang, and off the map of Berlin he goes!’
‘Neither that boy, nor nobody else neither’s ever gonna blow me away. Not even with dynamite and pincers,’ says Tiny, grinding his teeth. ‘By all the dirty ’eathen devils and the ’oly body of Christ at the same time, I’ll give that bleedin’, atheist sod what for!’
