(2005) Rat Run

by Gerald Seymour

  The chocolate made his stomach growl with hunger, but the bus came in the early thin light and the man travelled on through empty streets, past concrete tower blocks and by old factories, resumed his journey to the north and the coast.

  When the torments came worst, when he could not sleep, Oskar Netzer would give up the fight. He sat on the sandbank, the first beat of the low sun on his back, and watched the strand across the channel between Baltrum and the greater island of Norderney.

  For the dawning of those days when he was

  persecuted by memories, he dressed in the gloom of his house, kicked his feet into his boots, and searched for salvation. The torments that afflicted him had killed her, his Gertrud, as surely as if he had bent over her while she slept and smothered her with a pillow.

  She was dead, buried in the cemetery at Ostdorf, because of him, as if by his hand.

  The water in the channel rippled and dazzled and sunbeams danced on the waves. On the strand

  beyond, uncovered and wide because the tide was out, lay an old wreck whose hull was rusty dark and had sunk into the windblown sand. Near it were the seals, bulls and cows, who had not yet produced pups. After his love of the eider ducks, Oskar revered most the seals, Phoca vitulina, great gentle creatures.

  The island still slept and the visitors had not yet come, and watching the seals at dawn gave him slight respite from the agonies of the past. The words written on the sheet of paper by his uncle, Rolf, stayed with him, as clear as they had been on the day he had heard them read in the lawyer's office - and the pain he had run from, had not escaped.

  The Deposition of Rolf Hegner - the story of my guilt for which I expect to burn in hell. Those who have given me undeserved love should know the truth of me.

  In 1941 joined the Schutzstaffel. Because of the problem of fallen arches in my feet I was not sent to a combat unit, but was posted to the concentration camp at Neuengamme. I worked there as a driver. I took prisoners, many of them foreign resistance fighters from France, Holland and Scandinavia, to work on building projects outside the camp and to dig from the clay pits for the lining of canals. After the firestorm raids of the British and Americans on Hamburg, I drove prisoners to the city for clearance and for the excavation of the mass graves for citizens at Ohlsdorf cemetery.

  At Neuengamme, medical experiments were

  carried out on Russian prisoners and on Jewish children who were inoculated with live tubercle bacilli.

  On 20 April 1945, when the British military

  forces were near to Neuengamme, I received

  orders to prepare two lorries to drive to Hamburg.

  That day was the Fuhrer's birthday. Late at night, the twenty children, with two Dutch persons who cared for them and two French doctors who knew of the experiments and twenty-four Russians, were brought out of their quarters and loaded on the lorries. Pedersen drove the lorry with the children, Dreimann brought the ropes, Speck guarded

  the children. I drove the lorry that transported the Russians. We went in convoy, with high camp

  officials in cars, to the school at Bullenhuser Damm in the Rothenburgsort district. The Jewish children were taken inside, then down into the cellars where there was a hook embedded in the ceiling.

  While the Russians, the Dutch and the French doctors were kept in the yard, the children were hanged one at a time in the cellar after being given injections of morphine while they waited their turn in an outer corridor. Trzebinski, the camp medical chief, supervised the executions. The noose was put round the children's necks by Frahm who then pulled on their legs.

  After all the children were dead, their bodies were brought back to the lorries, but the Russians, Dutch and French were taken inside and hanged or shot. Before morning, all the bodies had been cremated at Neuengamme.

  We were the only witnesses who lived.

  After they had made investigations, the British authorities tried Trzebinski, and Thurman who had commanded the prisoner compound and

  Pauly who had been commandant at

  Neuengamme. They were executed by hanging at Hameln. Many others, myself among them, were not prosecuted but were left free to follow our lives in the aftermath of war.

  I see the children today, as I write, I see them every day - I see them every night.

  We did not stay to clear up the school's cellar.

  Where the children had been until they were called forward, we left behind clothes, shoes, toys. A little carved wood car was on the floor.

  I acknowledge that I have shamed my family by my actions on the night of 20 April 1945, and have contaminated the blood strain of my relatives.

  Rolf Hegner

  He watched the seals roll on the sandspit and heave their bulk towards the water. They basked, they dived, and had innocence.

  He had sat beside the bed in the clinic, had held his uncle's hand and comforted him. He had believed him to be a good man. His own innocence had gone inside the lawyer's office. A week afterwards he and Gertrud had fled the city where the school was and he had set up home on the island, hoping to distance himself from the torments . . . His family, his blood, his guilt, which lit a fierce fury in him.

  'How long have you been here?' A harsh voice rang in Alicia's ear.

  It was her aunt - her housekeeper and minder.

  The refuge for Timo Rahman's wife was the summer-house among the tall oaks at the back of the house.

  When self-esteem fled her, when she lay on her back and he slept beside her, snoring through his open mouth, when the isolation of her life seemed to crush her, she came to the summer-house. He never did.

  Everything inside the main house had been

  changed after he had purchased it: new kitchen, new decoration, new carpets and curtains, new furniture, all in the style that he believed was suitable. Outside, the flowerbeds had been uprooted, then turfed over: an ornamental garden would require continuous attention, would need maintenance from strangers or would become a wilderness. Only the summer-house was hers. Built of old, untreated timbers and planking, nearly waterproof, it was set against the fence and the hedge - and the security wire on stanchions, the alarm sensors - and was masked by trees from the rear windows of the house. It was hers because he had no interest in it. He never sat, relaxed. He never idled, and the clock was an enemy to him.

  The dawn light was behind her aunt, silhouetting her stout peasant hips and shoulders.

  'I could not sleep,' Alicia said feebly.

  All areas of her life had been arranged. The marriage in the mountains of Albania had been arranged by her father and his father. The timing of her two daughters' conception had been arranged by Timo and a gynaecologist in the city. The fitting out of her home in Blankenese had been arranged by Timo and her aunt. The schools for the girls had been arranged by Timo and a lawyer who lived four streets away. Her clothes were chosen by her aunt, and the food for the family meals . . . Everything arranged, everything chosen. She was decorative, expected to stay attractive and keep her waist narrow, but she was not required to make any contribution to her husband's life. Beyond the hedge, the fence and the wire were the gardens of German women - smart, chic professionals - whose names she barely knew, whose lives she could hardly imagine, whose

  language she did not speak. Only in the summer-house could she find peace. The aunt had travelled with her from Albania, but the woman's loyalty was first to Timo Rahman.

  'You could catch a chill out here.'

  'I needed the air,' Alicia said limply.

  'You want for nothing.'

  'There is nothing I want.'

  The aunt bored on: 'You have the love of your husband and your children.'

  'I do.'

  'You have a home to be in, and a bed.'

  'Yes.'

  'And a husband you should please.' The aunt

  leered.

  What she knew of sex, how to 'please' and where her hands should go, had been taught her by the aunt, a demonstration with the woman's coarse hand
s guiding her fingers over the body flab - but what she had learned had been used to conceive the daughters, then to try for a son. When the boy-child had not come

  - as if it were understood between them - Timo no longer pulled her over and hoisted up her nightdress.

  He had no other woman, she knew that. She thought he had no more interest in fucking her, doing what dogs did in the village high up in the mountains, or goats or sheep. He had no need of her. She had love of a sort and children and a home, and emptiness.

  She pushed herself up from the cushions on the bench, and followed her aunt back to the house.

  The cold fanned her skin, and thin sunlight fell on her.

  Malachy stepped off the train. He had walked through the night and believed he had defeated the cameras. Instead of taking a train from Pluckley or Ashford, he had gone north to Wye, hammering out the miles on country lanes. He had taken the first service of the morning, wool hat still down and collar still up, that meandered off towards Canterbury. He had walked out of the station there, as if that was his destination, had headed for a car park, had pocketed his hat and folded his coat, then kept it under his arm, unrecognizable, when he had gone back to the ticket office. The London train staggered into the city. All that told of his night's work was the faint smell of petrol on his sweater and the scorch in his trousers where the first flames had lashed back through the broken window of the living room.

  He stepped out of the carriage and was carried on by the wave of the London workforce that hit the platform. He felt no elation, no excitement, no pride -

  but knew he climbed the ladder. If the garage had not been empty, if the house had not been silent and all windows closed, if the stable with the restless pony had not been well distanced from the house, would he still have broken the window and splashed the contents of the canister inside against curtains, down on to carpets and lit the coil of paper?

  'I don't have to answer that,' Malachy murmured to himself. 'I take what I find.'

  Chapter Nine

  Voices from the darkness of the parking bay, his and the one from the masked mouth inside the car.

  'You did well, you don't have to do more.'

  'You don't know what I have to do.'

  'You've been as far as you can go.'

  'Wrong. You cannot understand.'

  'I know about you, read it in files. I have the picture of it.'

  'Wrong. Paper doesn't tell it.'

  'Three strikes, all well done. It's enough.'

  'Wrong. Doesn't purge it.'

  'The next step is too far, Malachy. It's what I'm telling you, too bloody far.'

  'Wrong. Nothing's too far if you've been where I have.'

  'Walk away. You've done all that was asked of you, and some. Forget it.'

  The darkness of the parking bay swamped him and around him was the new quiet of the Amersham. In the afternoon he had heard the same voice, now muffled by a face covering, then by a thin adjoining wall. He had unlocked his door, closed it after him, gone fast down the steps and waited at the bottom of the stairwell. He'd heard, faint and far above him,

  'You look after yourself, Millie, you take care. I'll see you.' He had waited. The heavy shoes had clipped down the steps and when the detective had stepped off the last, Malachy had stood in front of him. 'Call me, please call me,' Malachy had said, and the detective had walked by him, no response on his face, as if nothing had been said. He had gone to his car and had not looked back, and Malachy had climbed the steps, put the bolt back, turned the key and waited.

  Three rings late in the night, then silence, then three more rings pealing in the room.

  'What is the next level?'

  'The next level, pal, would put you way out of your depth. For sure, you'd sink.'

  'I sank once.'

  'At the next level, they kill. Last one was dumped over a cliff, went down into the sea, but he didn't drown . . . Was dead already, tortured and then dead.

  Late on his payments - only this isn't being late on a credit agreement for a living-room suite and getting a rap from the finance company. The repossession order is a sentence of death. Every bone in his body was broken, and that was before he went over the cliff.

  Scrub it out of your head.'

  'When I sank I hadn't the courage to end it. They took everything from me. Any self-respect and I'd have put myself away. They didn't leave me

  anything.'

  'I helped you, Malachy. Don't look for more.'

  'A dealer feeds the pushers. A supplier feeds a dealer. Who's next up the ladder?'

  'We know who the corpse over the cliff defaulted on.

  Know who killed him, having tortured him. I know, my inspector knows, my superintendent knows.'

  'Who feeds the supplier?'

  'We know the name, but we don't know where to look for evidence. What I said, forget it. It's big league, beyond your reach. Be satisfied.'

  'I'm going up your pyramid. Who sold to George Wright?'

  'Tell me, old friend, what is it you need to lose?'

  'Disgust, what you can't imagine, shame. All of them queuing up to belt me ...'

  'Just self-pity, like a jerk-off.'

  'You weren't there - you only read it in the file.'

  'Then tell me, Malachy, what it is you need to get?'

  'Ability to live, to walk, to laugh. Something of that.

  You started me, put the ladder there. Don't take it from me. Please, I'm asking you - who sells to the supplier? It's not to do with Millie Johnson, it's for myself . . . please.'

  From deep in the car there was a long, hissed sigh.

  A ballpoint clicked. He heard the scribbled writing. A sheet was torn off a pad. Through the open top of the window a gloved hand passed the scrap of paper. He took it. A thin torchbeam shone on the scrap. He read a name and an address. Then the gloved hand

  snatched back the paper and the torchbeam was cut, replaced by the flash of a cigarette lighter and a little guttering flame.

  'It's big boys' league. The importer sells to the supplier. Malachy, you watch yourself. Don't do anything if you haven't looked it over good and proper.

  Take time.'

  'Thank you.'

  'Was it that bad, what was done to you?'

  'It was bad.'

  14 January 2004

  When the sun was up, past eight, Dogsy limped to the lorry.

  Fran, his friend, who was going to ride shotgun, reached down from the back to give him a hand up. Dogsy milked the moment, all his weight on his right boot and none on his bandaged left foot, and let out a little groan, not stifled, as he came on board.

  He settled at the tail end of the bench, opposite Fran.

  Inside the lorry, under the canvas, it would get to be rotten hot on the journey, but by the tailgate there would be air. He stretched out his left foot. Fran made a play of kicking it and Dogsy gave him a finger. The dust swirled, and the convoy moved off from Bravo.

  It was because of personal hygiene that Dogsy had a seat on the lorry, and a bandaged left foot. The previous night, the stink of his boots had caused enough aggravation for them to be chucked out of the room where 2 Section of Salamanca platoon slept. In the morning, when they'd dressed for the lift operation, he'd gone in his socks, cursing, to retrieve them, and had stepped on a feckin' scorpion.

  Little bugger had a bloody great sting in its tail. Dogsy had missed the lift: the corporal medic had bandaged him, and he had the ride back to Battalion and a look-over from the medical officer.

  They had armour, Warriors, in front and behind for fire power. No chopper available. The lorry whined for power and the personnel carrier behind them gave a sort of comfort. It was a feckin' awful road back to Battalion - a sniper alley, and RPG-missile alley, a buried-bomb-at-the-end-of-a-control-wire alley. But the heat, feckin' awful, calmed him.

  It was the smell, worse than his feckin' boots would have been. He looked inside the lorry. 'You know what, Fran?

  One of them's shat hi
mself.'

  'Which one?'

  He looked up the line of men, five of them, on the bench opposite, beyond Fran. Each had his ankles roped to the bench stanchions, wrists manacled behind them, and each was blindfolded with sticking tape. How would Dogsy decide which of them had fouled himself? He leaned forward so that he could check the men on his bench. Four more men with ropes, manacles and tape blindfolds - and another. At the lorry's bulkhead, up against the driver's cab, without restraints, was an officer.

  'Hey, Fran, is that him?' he whispered.

  'What you say, Dogsy? You got to shout. What?'

  He did. 'Is that the Rupert?' he yelled.

  'That's him.'

  'The Rupert that Baz said was feckin'yellow?'

  'Bottled out. That's him, Dogsy.'

  'How could a guy do that, Fran - an officer?'

  'Couldn't hack it. The section had a good fight, used up juice like no tomorrow, did slots, but the Rupert didn't stay around to see it.'

  'What'll they do to him?'

  'God knows .. . Who cares? I don't, you shouldn't.'

  He stared up the swaying length of the lorry. They had been shouting questions, yelling answers. The officer's head shook against the bulkhead and he did not seem to feel pain, as if he was in deep sleep, and his body moved with the lorry's lurch when the wheels hit potholes . .. Poor bastard.

  Not that, to Fran, Dogsy would have uttered sympathy for the man called a coward. He looked away, back at the nose of the following Warrior. •k * *

  Polly did lunch with Ludvik. She had booked

  the table at the restaurant over the Vltava from the embassy. It would not come cheap but would be on expenses, authorized by Justin Braithwaite. 'I want to take you out and show you my thanks, up close and personal, for the co-operation and professionalism at Kostecna,' she'd said, when she'd rung him - and, like an afterthought, 'Oh, by the by, something that's been hanging around on my desk for weeks. I'm sure it's not important, but I've a phone number. I need to know whose it is, what they do. Got a pencil?' She'd let him order - grilled carp and salad, after local soup, and fine beer. She'd waited, made small-talk, rolled her eyes at him and played at being fascinated by what he said.