Brandt doesn’t reply. Instead, his eyes are on the narrows of the English Channel. From the afterdeck he can clearly make out both the hilly French coast and the stark-white cliffs of England.
“Hell Fire Corner,” says Tregowan, struggling to light his pipe in the wind. “God alone knows how many good ships lie below us,” he taps the deck with his foot, “here right under our feet.” His tobacco smells of cherries, like a Black Forest Kirsch cake . He stares at England and then at France, and takes another puff. “I suppose if you wanted to, you could swim out to either of them from here; I bet I could’ve done that when I was your age.” He pauses, looks down at the water and smiles. “Mind you, the Channel never warms up – even in high summer, the exposure would’ve killed me.”
To Brandt, the distance between the two shores is almost laughable, how can it be that – despite Göring’s much vaunted Luftwaffe, Doenitz’s fleet, and the Wehrmacht’s eight million battle trained troops and eighty thousand paratroopers – the Führer was denied his invasion because of a moat hardly more than thirty kilometres across?
Brandt finds the sea mesmeric. He sees its colours change from cobalt blue to Payne’s grey, from ultramarine to raw sienna, and then a blend of indigo and dark umber; it’s like the complexities of the human mind: it has its deeps, its shallows and its capricious sands.
*
The gentle tremor of the metal bulkheads ceases as the Syrenia docks at Southampton, but no one is allowed ashore. It is rumoured that the British are suspicious of the migrants who boarded at Bremerhaven, but, in any case, there are only two gangways and the crew have enough to do managing the embarkation of all the new passengers. On every deck the languages of continental Europe are drowned in the torrent of English voices: overexcited children with their bustling parents, and young women, perhaps secretaries, shop assistants, teachers and nurses? Most of the men look like artisans, but he can see in their bearing the stamp of military service and, as they form up smartly at the hatches, their shoes have that same telltale ingrained shine. With all these British people on board, Brandt must keep up his guard, for he is not among friends.
He observes that few of them have pure Aryan features, and, to Brandt, even the hair of the natural ‘blonde’ women looks to him more the colour of trampled farmyard straw. From what he can remember of Himmler’s Racial Classification Chart, Brandt estimates that about fifty percent of the arrivals are vaguely Nordic; another twenty have the prominent brows of the Celtic Aryans; ten percent are shorter and stockier, probably Alpines; another ten look like Mediterranean Honorary Aryans; and the rest are probably of Slavic descent, though others he would swear are Jews. There are no Black people or Asians, but that’s not surprising; in his Blue Guide, the Australian government makes it clear that all new settlers must be of ‘pure European descent’ and that British migrants are preferred. It is true that in the same book are some photographs of Dutch and Scandinavians, but people with olive skins are rare. To an ex-SS officer, the racial message could not be plainer.
Only a few of the emigrants resemble the English academics he knew at the chalet. Those had been taller, they wore more elegant clothes and spoke with butter-smooth voices. Yet, he would have to admit that nearly all the British passengers seem jubilant to be leaving their homeland, and that the eyes of their children are full of wonder and expectancy as if they have no doubt at all that the Syrenia will convey them to an antipodean paradise in the sun.
As he turns to go back in, Brandt notices a formidable-looking Roman Catholic priest and three religious brothers arranging some pallid, nervous-looking boys for a group photograph. Another brother stands guard over a row of identical brown suitcases. All the boys are in jackets and ties, and the oldest are wearing English flat caps.
“They must be those orphan lads from Liverpool,” he hears a woman murmur to her husband. “Poor little tykes.”
“I wonder if they were given any choice to leave Blighty?” says her husband.
“I don’t s’pose they were, but what an adventure anyway. Oh John, just look at that one with glasses, he must be barely eight years old – and their suitcases are so tiny. Lord knows what they can be bringing with them, not much.”
Brandt wonders what the Führer would have thought of banishing English boys to the furthest end of the world; yet, he would’ve known that Britain is a crowded country – more crowded than Germany. These emigration schemes must be the British version of Lebensraum, and Australia is part of the British Empire; so, too, are Canada, South Africa and New Zealand. If Germany had possessed colonies like these, the Führer would surely have done the same.
Over the coming days, Brandt finds the British emigrants puzzling. They are polite and self-effacing, not one of them has been hostile to him and if they are proud of their nation’s vast overseas possessions, they show no signs of it. When they talk about Australia, it’s about a paradise of sunshine and oranges, a golden land of spacious bungalows, with no post-war rationing and everyone swimming in warm seas; a young nation with a larrikin disdain for the old world of snobbery and privilege. “It’s a country where Jack is every bit as good as his master,” they liked to tell each other.
Brandt wonders if it’s true, but for now it doesn’t matter. They are on the sea, which is not really a place at all; it is a restlessness.
*
Five of the new passengers now share his cabin. In the bunk directly below him is an Irish horsebreaker. The rest are English tradesmen, two bringing their wives and children who reside in the women’s part of the ship.
The voyage is making Brandt claustrophobic. After Southampton, he encounters people in every corner of the ship. The Syrenia is a small floating island, and he feels trapped and vulnerable; his only refuge is his cabin in those rare, merciful times when the other men are not there.
The sedulous Brandt makes a point of keeping his bunk trimmer than his cabin mates do. He squares off his pillows, and folds the blanket and sheets at sharp right angles in strict alignment with the bulkheads. Often, he stops and gazes at the sea through the porthole and watches the higher crests whipped to stern. Each time one breaks on the ship’s hull, he feels the shock and waits like a boy for the sea smoke to spray the glass.
The sleeping quarters are cramped, but they could be worse. It is a mercy that his cabin is a safe distance from the Poles, Yugoslavs and other Slavs who embarked from Bremerhaven. Some of these may be more than ready to settle old scores with a German travelling on his own, although Brandt, who was well trained in unarmed combat, would be a deadly adversary.
He also feels it wise to avoid fellow Germans, especially the four young mechanics who were the last passengers to embark at Bremerhaven. He remembers at the docks how they carried identical grey rucksacks on their shoulders and stormed up the gangway like invading pirates, shouting at each other in the Slavic-German of eastern Europe.. These men were too young to have served in the Wehrmacht, so they must have been with the Hitler Youth Auxiliaries. In the last year of the war, this was an organisation more merciless than his own Einsatzgruppen. God help any partisans, Jews or Soviet POWs who fell into the hands of the Auxiliaries. Now that they are loosed from the restraints and discipline once drilled into them by the Nazis, Brandt suspects they’ll be entirely out of control.
But he is much more concerned by the nagging inquisitiveness of Mieszko Kowalski, a Polish journalist who, with his long hair, looks like Jesus, except for his bitter cobalt eyes. Kowalski seeks him out constantly and won’t leave him alone. He tells Brandt he’s been offered a position on the Melbourne Age, but a Polish journalist seeking the company of a German emigrant? All too suspicious.
*
Gibraltar is now behind them, it’s a warm evening, and the bar is filling up with married couples and singles in their twenties.
“It must be hard for you,” says Kowalski who has twisted his way through the crowd over to Brandt, who, arme
d with a cocktail stick, is trying to extricate the mildly saline ice cubes from a glass of neat vodka.
Brandt abandons the ice cubes and stares at him. “I do not see why anything should be especially hard for me,” he says.
But true to form, Kowalski slices to the jugular of Brandt’s sensibilities. “Well, what I mean is, how old are you?”
“Thirty-four.”
“Thirty-four? Oh my, and all the single women on board are much too young for you – and, of course, most of them are English while you are…”
“A German?”
“Yes.” And now he is smiling. He stares Brandt up and down like a tailor about to measure him up for a suit. “With your physique and looks, I am surprised you were not recruited for the SS.”
Brandt’s deflected lie is too quick. “I could not prove my ancestry.”
Kowalski jumps on the indiscretion. “Ah, but then of course you would certainly have enlisted, yes?” He smiles once more, but his eyes are glacial.
“That doesn’t follow in the least.” Brandt’s mind is a steaming cauldron. To control himself he focuses his eyes over Kowalski’s shoulder onto the art deco figurine of a crystal mermaid reclining between two whisky bottles on a shelf above the bar.
“So, you joined the Wehrmacht? Then you do have a war history.”
“We all have war histories.” His mermaid shines like a fixed star.
“Well, perhaps, but not like you, and, anyway, being a German must be…”
“A liability? A handicap? Say what you damn well mean.” Brandt grasps his vodka so tightly that he nearly breaks the glass. He slaps two of the heavy British coins on the bar and storms off to his cabin.
On his way down, his sense of confinement is unrelenting. The bulkheads are implacably hostile to fresh air; they are like the inner walls of a coffin sealed for eternity, not by nails but by rows of steel rivets. The overheads, a spaghetti of pipes and cables, and the metal stairs, which the crew for some reason call ‘ladders’, are moist and slippery. In the labyrinth of lower passageways, along with the smell of diesel, a hint of vomit still lingers from the Bay of Biscay when half the passengers were seasick. Worse for the fugitive Brandt is the flash of mutual scrutiny when giving way to passengers coming in the opposite direction.
Finally reaching the door of his cabin, he hears voices within; they’re friendly enough – the men are probably playing cards – but the thought of their presence in such a restricted space only worsens his claustrophobia, so he turns about and goes back up to seek refuge on one of the weather decks.
*
Brandt feels out of sorts as an idle passenger. He misses the hard physical work of the chalet, especially sawing and splitting wood for the long winters, lifting potatoes from the heavy soils, and the summer hay bailing. Here on the Syrenia, he envies the crewmen dangling out over the sea to scrub the fresh salt off the boat hoists, lowering themselves down the hull to clean the larger portholes on A and B Decks. Brandt notes that, like himself, these labouring seamen have tight stomachs and strong biceps.
As usual, the female sunbathers stare at him as he strolls past them on the deck. He knows he is worth a woman’s glance; they think they can hide behind their sunglasses, but he can feel their scrutiny.
Brandt settles into a vacant deckchair and closes his eyes. Somewhere nearby he hears voices and listens in on a one-sided conversation between Kowalski and a homeward-bound official on leave from Australia House in London.
The Pole is a reckless fool, doesn’t he realise how his voice carries?
“All four of them are Nazis,” Kowalski insists. “Why do you Australians allow Nazis into your country?” Brandt guesses he must be referring to the brash young mechanics.
The official responds in a tone that should leave Kowalski in no doubt that he wants to be left in peace. “Nazis, you say? I s’pose you’re entitled to your opinion, mate.” He pulls the brim of his sun hat down over his eyes.
The Pole’s voice rises. “Of course they’re Nazis, I can tell: murderous ex-Hitler Youth from the Eastern Front. You wait, as soon as I get to Port Said, I’m going to see your consul. Nazis should not be aboard this ship.”
The Australian sits up, tips back his sun hat and stares at Kowalski. “You better watch what you’re saying, mate. Those boys got through their interviews, right? All of them are skilled mechanics for heavy machines. They can fix trucks, cranes and bulldozers, and, come to think of it, they can fix tanks too. Australia needs ’em – more, I daresay, than it needs you. If they fought for Hitler, so what? That’s all past now; at least they’ve learnt some discipline and they’ll know something about hard work. I’d much rather have this lot coming over to Australia than bloody Commos like you. You are a Commo, aren’t you, mate?”
Kowalski ignores the jibe and presses his attack. “Then what about the SS man?” At this the eavesdropping Brandt sucks his lower lip.
The Australian whistles softly. “No mate, we don’t touch that mob. We screen them out right from the start.”
Kowalski becomes more earnest. “Just listen to me and give me your full attention. I am convinced we have a former SS officer on board. When you know what to look for, even the way they—”
“If you say so, mate. We’ll leave it at that, eh?” The Australian readjusts his hat, slumps back into his deckchair and closes his eyes.
There is a dryness in Brandt’s throat. If any formal accusation is made to the Australian Consulate, he’ll be arrested in Port Said, interrogated by the British in Cairo and thereafter…
Ten feet away, he notices a man lying on a bath towel. As he turns over onto his back to tan his chest, Brandt recognises one of the young mechanics. Like himself, he must have caught every word the annoying little Pole had said.
*
After three days, there is still no sign of Kowalski. Perhaps the captain thinks that either he fell overboard while drunk or that he committed suicide, but Brandt is certain that the young Germans murdered him and heaved his body over the side. As Kowalski always drank a lot and kept late hours, it probably happened after the stewards had closed the saloon and the Pole was staggering along the unlit deck back to his cabin.
Brandt can even guess the night it happened. He recalls a morning when the mechanics ate their entire breakfast together without saying a word to each other. Brandt had been sitting at an adjacent table and he felt that silence. It brought back to him the stultification of the Einsatzgruppen executioners after the Aktion; that same terrifying silence.
*
It is noon off Tripolitania, and Brandt doesn’t need to put on his sunglasses because the sun is too high for the sea to dazzle. Still dripping water from the pool, he stares over the rails to starboard. He is striving to remember from his schooldays what he learnt about the Barbary Coast.
“Mister, please can you teach us to swim like you?”
Brandt swings around sharply and recognises Bert, one of the Liverpool orphans. Bert is known to all the passengers because he was chosen by the brothers to be head boy. When the priest had announced it at table, Bert was given an impromptu round of applause. Today, he is wearing old man’s braces over a shirt miles too big for him.
Bert is not alone. Brandt had been so engrossed in the distant shoreline that he hadn’t noticed that the whole group of Liverpool boys have made a loose semi-circle behind him. When he turns around, he finds himself facing them like an officer inspecting new recruits.
There’s already a difference in their appearance from when he first saw them in Southampton. It must be the ship’s meals; obviously, these lads have never been so well fed in their lives and all their faces have lost that cavernous look. He recognises the apprehensive little boy wearing the cheap wire spectacles: the one singled out by the couple in Southampton and whom the others call Alan. The boy gives Brandt an unwavering stare, which makes him feel uncomfortable.
Their swimming teacher? They have no idea what they are asking of him, but Brandt sees the glint of an opportunity to either grasp or let slip away. The English boys are silent, hanging on his reply. Under Brandt’s bare feet, even the deck planks feel as though they too are sentient, waiting for what he will say next, while the ship herself hangs in timelessness. His habitual anonymity cannot hold under the burning scrutiny of twenty English boys.
“Can’t any of you swim at all?” he asks.
Bert shakes his head. “None of us can swim, mister, but we want to learn how. They told us in Liverpool that, when we get to Sydney, we’ll be surfing on Bondi Beach.”
The request is as disarming as it is understandable. The temperature is over eighty degrees and the boys are desperate to cool off, but, being non-swimmers, they are barred from the pool.
“What about the brothers?” Brandt asks them. “Can’t they teach you swimming?” At this, the older boys laugh in derision. “They’d go down like stones, mister. Have you seen any of ’em get into the water?” Now all of them are laughing, even the nervous Alan.
Acting on a newly found solicitude, Brandt’s voice is almost fatherly. “Very well, Bert. You go and fetch one of the brothers. If he says it is all right, I’ll teach you. But if I do, there will be no, what do you English call it, ‘playing silly buggers’? So, if you do play silly buggers, you’ll need to be tough, a lot tougher than me, and, boy, that’s tough.” He tries to look stern, but they all start laughing and Brandt realises they’ve already decided that their prospective swimming coach is quite capable of playing silly buggers himself.
The man who comes back with Bert isn’t a brother at all; it’s their priest, Father Brendan Coffey. He is delighted that Brandt has agreed to teach the boys to swim. He shakes his hand warmly, but he stipulates his conditions: at least two of the brothers must be present at every lesson and the boys must never be late for morning Mass.
Orphaned Leaves Page 4
