Otto's Phoney War

by Leo Kessler

  Slowly, of their own volition, the underpants unfurled to reveal an eagle, holding a small swastika, with the letters ‘W’ and ‘H’ on each side of it, stencilled on the bottom.

  ‘W … H …’ van Dongeren said slowly, almost menacingly, ‘Property of the German Wehrmacht!’ He stared at the pale-faced countess hard, trying to keep his gaze from her naked breast. They had agreed to save any unclothing until the Queen approved their marriage. ‘Madame,’ he said severely, ‘I think you have some explaining to do.’

  ‘Rape,’ she said simply. ‘What else? After all, I am a van Elst!’

  ‘Oh, my God!’ he groaned, his face ashen. Shocked beyond measure he let the sword, with Otto’s underpants attached, sink slowly, as if he were lowering a flag in surrender. ‘In God’s name! Think of my position at Court! What will the Queen say?’

  ‘Exactly,’ she agreed in a tiny voice, her gaze fixed on the floor, her shoulders shaking with suppressed laughter.

  ‘Which of the swine was it?’ van Dongeren demanded fiercely, glaring at the trembling, unhappy German prisoners lined up against the wall of the Great Hall, hands raised, and surrounded by grim-faced Grenadiers, who prodded them at regular intervals with their bayonets like a hungry man might prod a frying sausage to test whether it was ready for eating.

  She lowered her gaze, as if in embarrassment. ‘I really didn’t see his face, Dirk,’ she whispered in a little girl’s voice.

  ‘Oh, my darling,’ with his free hand he pressed hers reassuringly, ‘how you must have suffered.’

  ‘Yes, I did.’

  ‘But you must have some means of identifying the perverted criminal?’ he persisted.

  ‘Well, yes, there is one thing I remember about him,’ she agreed hesitantly.

  ‘What was it?’ he asked eagerly.

  ‘Oh, I couldn’t say it aloud, Dirk. That would be too much.’ She crooked her finger at him to indicate he should come closer. Stiffly he bent his shaven head and she whispered something in his ear.

  Van Dongeren flushed a bright crimson and began spluttering meaningless words through his toothless gums like a drowning man going down for the third and last time. Finally he roared, ‘In the name of all that is holy, fancy threatening a mere, innocent girl like you with that! All the same it’s one way of apprehending the monster.’ He lowered his voice. ‘Do you think you’d recognise – it?’

  ‘Oh yes, I’m sure I would,’ she said.

  Van Dongeren shot her a searching look out of the corner of his eyes. Suddenly she seemed very eager. Next instant he dismissed the thought as absurd and unworthy. Obviously she was simply overwrought, that was it. It was very understandable after the ordeal she had been through at the hands of that perverted Moffen swine.

  ‘Do you think you could go through with it, darling?’ he asked anxiously.

  ‘Yes, I’ll … try,’ she answered demurely.

  ‘My God, what a brave little woman you are.’ Van Dongeren pressed her hand hard, overcome with an emotion of sentimentality, which was unusual in a man who normally only became emotional about the slaughter of partridges and pheasants. He made his decision.

  ‘Mulder,’ he snapped.

  The elderly butler clicked rustily to attention. For some reason, he was wearing a fireman’s brass helmet and carrying a broom handle as if it were a rifle. ‘Sir!’ he barked.

  ‘Dismiss the female servants.’

  ‘Sir!’ Mulder sprang round and bellowed, as if he were on some monstrous parade-ground and the servants were standing a thousand metres and not ten away from him. ‘Female servants … female servants, dis – miss.’

  Reluctantly, muttering angrily to themselves, obviously aware that they were going to miss something that would provide a source of gossip for days to come, the female servants left the Great Hall.

  Van Dongeren waited impatiently till they had gone. When the door had closed behind them, he turned to the Germans. ‘Hosen turner!’ he commanded severely in German.

  The Brandenburger prisoners stared back at the crimson faced Dutch officer, as if he had suddenly gone crazy. Opposite them the countess licked her lips.

  Furiously the Baron waved his sword and the NCO in charge of the prisoners pulled back the bolt of his rifle significantly. The prisoners’ faces turned with fear. Reluctantly they started to lower their hands.

  Van Dongeren repeated his order.

  Mystified and scared, the Brandenburgers started to fumble with their braces and buttons.

  A minute later they stood there unhappily, trousers around their ankles to reveal long droopy underpants that hung over skinny, pale legs.

  Van Dongeren hesitated.

  The countess beat him to it. ‘The other things will have to go too, Dirk, if I am to identify the culprit correctly.’

  ‘Of course, you brave little woman,’ he said. ‘All right, now your underpants!’

  There was a murmur of rebellion from the prisoners and Mulder brought up his broom handle smartly, crying, ‘One false move and you’re dead!’

  Miserably the prisoners dropped their underpants and stood there, slightly crouched, with their hands spread across their genitals protectively.

  ‘Nasty business this,’ van Dongeren muttered to himself and strode closer to the unhappy Germans.

  ‘Now listen, you wretches, on the command “one”,’ he barked, ‘you will remove your hands from your … err … things. On the command “two”, you will replace them! There will be no lewd remarks, nor obscene looks. Is that clear?’ He swung his sword through the air dangerously close to the first man and there was a frightened, hasty chorus of, ‘Yes’.

  ‘Good.’ He swung round. Countess van Elst’s eyes were glittering strangely, he couldn’t help thinking. ‘Are you ready, my dear?’ he asked.

  She nodded, apparently too affected to be able to speak.

  A little embarrassed by having to do such a thing in public, he took her in his arms tenderly and gave her a little hug, before releasing her, face flushed and confused. ‘If you feel faint, my dear,’ he said huskily, ‘just close your eyes for a moment and think of our dear Queen. It will help you to do your duty, as she has always done.’

  ‘I understand,’ she replied, finding her voice at last.

  ‘Noblesse oblige.’

  They advanced to the first unhappy prisoner, a tall skinny fellow with bad breath. ‘One!’ van Dongeren commanded.

  The German raised his hands.

  CHAPTER 7

  ‘Hold tight, Sonderführer!’ Kurt sang out. ‘Here we go.’

  He put his foot down hard on the gas pedal and thrust the two control sticks forward.

  With a roar, the tank started to crawl up the high ornamental staircase that led to the main door of the castle, while Otto hung on grimly to the breech of the 37mm cannon, praying that they would make it.

  With a great metallic slap the tracks surmounted the top step and hit the stone once more.

  Kurt revved the engine madly. ‘Now for the door,’ he whooped, obviously delighted with his performance. ‘At it like Marshal Blucher!’

  The tank shot forward, hit the door with a loud rending sound, and next instant was careering through a mess of flying wood straight into the broad corridor that led to the Great Hall. Infected by the South Africans’ enthusiasm, Otto pulled wildly at the firing bar and wished the next instant he hadn’t. The gun exploded with a tremendous roar and in that confined space it sounded as if the very world was coming to an end. The pictures of the nineteenth century worthies slithered to the floor, pewter plates and ornamental jugs came raining down crazily and, to their front, the door of the Great Hall disintegrated, peppering the tank’s steep glacis plate with flying wood splinters.

  ‘Whoopee!’ his South African driver yelled exuberantly. ‘That’s the stuff to give the troops, Sonderführer!’ Churning the remnants of priceless Ming vases under the tank’s flailing tracks, window after window exploding outwards with that tremendous noise as they rattled by, t
he driver swung into the Great Hall and braked the tank to a surprised stop.

  ‘What in three devils –’ Otto began and stopped short. He opened the hatch and looked out.

  No wonder the driver had braked so abruptly!

  On the floor, hugging the carpet, lay their comrades, naked rumps exposed, save for a dwarf like fellow, grinning all over his owlish face standing there in the middle of the Hall displaying himself for the benefit of a dreamy-faced Countess, while the Dutch Grenadiers scattered for cover.

  ‘Jesus wept,’ he gasped, ‘what’s been going on here?’

  ‘Looks to me, as if they were playing some sort of a game,’ the driver replied cheerfully, recovered from his shock now. ‘Touch and Tell, or something like that.’

  ‘Touch that thing once and she’d be able to tell all right,’ Otto said grimly, noting just how excitedly the countess was breathing, so dazed as to be oblivious to the dramatic arrival of the tank, her cheeks flushed hectically, her whole being concentrated on that one ugly thing.

  ‘Look out!’ the driver cried in sudden alarm.

  Otto swung his gaze from the strange couple in the centre of the Hall. Coming from the cover of an armchair behind which he had hidden in the first fright of the tank’s bursting through the door, was Dirk van Dongeren, waving his sword again, scarred face livid with rage, meaningless phrases tumbling out of his toothless mouth.

  ‘Oh balls,’ Otto moaned, dropping down inside the tank and locking the hatch. ‘not Douglas Fairbanks again!’

  The Dutchman grabbed hold of the front of the glacis plate and prepared to haul himself up. Otto reacted quickly. He pressed the button which activated the turret mechanism. With a soft hiss the turret swung round. Van Dongeren howled with pain as the gun barrel hit him in the midriff and swept him over the side. He fell to the floor arms and legs flailing.

  ‘Good for you, Otto!’ Kurt yelled with delight. ‘You don’t mind if I use your first name, I hope?’ he added hastily.

  ‘This is supposed to be a war, not a bloody dancing school! Call me what you like.’

  Dirk was up on his feet again, slashing and hacking at the tank’s steel side in crazed fury, cursing horribly now.

  ‘Now we're fighting on equal terms,’ Otto yelled, sick of the big fool of a cheese head. He jerked the lever which depressed the cannon and in the next instant had pressed the turret button once more. Down below the red-faced Dong continued to cut away, the blade of his sword jagged like a carving knife now, crying to himself, ‘I’ll get into you! By God I will, if it’s the last thing I do … You can’t hide in there for ever – ’

  The gun hit him a relatively gentle blow on the side of his shaven head – that is, if one can call a tap from twenty-two hundredweight of milled steel ‘gentle’. His eyes crossed abruptly and his legs began to give way beneath him like those of a newly born foal. Slowly the sword slipped from his suddenly nerveless fingers and rattled to the floor. A moment later he followed it down.

  Mulder, the butler, was the first to recover from the shock of that strange little battle. Marching smartly across the room, he picked up the Dutchman’s ruined sword and reached it up hilt-first to Otto, out of the hatch once again.

  He bowed stiffly from the waist and said in that solemn voice of his, ‘Herr Leutnant, herewith I hand you the blade of Major, the Baron van Dongeren. It is my unpleasant duty to inform you that by this act the Queen’s Grenadiers have surrendered.’ He gave another bow and started walking backwards awkwardly, as if he were in the presence of royalty, while Otto watched him open-mouthed, sword clutched in his hand.

  On all sides the Grenadiers started to crawl from their hiding-places behind the furniture and the wall carpets and began to pile their weapons in a neat heap as the Brandenburgers, red-faced and still awed by that strange short-arm inspection, started to draw up their trousers in silence, avoiding each other’s gazes.

  Still the dwarf like chap and the countess continued to stare at each other, until finally Otto called, ‘All right, young lovers. It’s all over for today … Hey you,’ he bellowed angrily, when the little man still hadn’t moved, ‘get that horrible thing covered up, or I swear by the Great Whore of Buxtehude, I’ll saw it off personally with this!’ He waved the sword menacingly.

  That threat finally did the trick. Hurriedly the little man ripped up his pants and started to fasten his flies with thick clumsy fingers.

  ‘I'm coming, Sonderführer he cried nervously. I’m coming … ’

  It was a baking hot morning when the Brandenburgers led by Otto in the tank and their prisoners of the Queen’s Grenadiers reached the German front line. They were greeted with cheers by the infantry dug in along the burnished golden crest of a Dutch field. Powering down the tank's engine, the column stopped, while infantryman after infantryman clapped them on the back and shook their hands. Cries rang out.

  ‘It's the Brandenburgers returning!’

  ‘They're alive!

  ‘And look what they've brought us: prisoners!’

  A young infantry captain jostled his way to the front and generously offered to take over their prisoners for them so that the weary Brandenburgers could get some sleep there and then. But after ascertaining the Gennep Bridge was well behind the German front line now, Otto declined politely. He wasn’t spending another day anywhere near the front; you could never be sure what new missions the Brandenburgers would be enlisted for.

  After a hasty breakfast of pea soup from the unit’s goulash-cannon and borrowing some diesel for the tank, they set off again into the new day's dazzling sunshine with the captain’s final admiring words ringing in their ears. ‘By all that is holy, you grand fellows of the Brandenburg never know when to give up. Right on to the bitter end. Nothing can go wrong for the Fatherland as long as it produces brave chaps like you. You are heroes!’

  Two hours later they arrived at the Gennep Bridge guarded by what was left of the Count’s force. Reinforcements had reached the bridge under the command of Maps, who was now armed with a large disinfectant spray, his back bowed under an enormous pack, containing white powder.

  Again their welcome was tremendous and the Count immediately made an emotional impromptu speech, tears running down his plump cheeks as he did so, praising their spirit of self-sacrifice and ‘excessive devotion to duty’. He expanded at great length on his heartfelt relief that their lives had been spared for ‘Folk, Fatherland and Führer’, while an anxious Maps hovered around the new arrivals making excited little pumping gestures.

  ‘Christ, this hero thing. I’m almost beginning to believe these guys myself,’ Otto whispered in disgust to a grinning Kurt.

  ‘Oh, I don’t know,’ he said. ‘It sounds real enough to me. Can’t harm anyone when the truth is bent a bit like that. Anyway, a medal's just a lump of tin.’

  Otto looked at him in surprise. This medal was going to be his ticket into a relaxed retirement. Was Kurt crazy enough to go back and fight?

  Finally the Count was finished and a delighted Maps was allowed to execute his new office.

  ‘Delousing officer,’ the Count explained, striding over to Otto. He embraced the young man possessively as Maps poked his spray first in the new arrivals’ sleeves and then in their flies, bravely pumping so that coughing men were soon wreathed in clouds of white powder. ‘I knew you had the potential to astound on the field of battle,’ he beamed. Otto noticed the smile didn't fully reach his eyes. ‘This war's started off pretty well. Even Maps has an official job now. Apparently our people in England have reported the English have been experimenting with poisoned lice. A sort of venereal crab or something like that. Gives you VD without intercourse. Very frightening, if it’s true. Anyway,’ he shrugged, ‘it keeps him out of mischief and it’s better than those little green men with the metallic antennae, eh?’

  Otto laughed and for a moment or two they were silent, as they watched the Grenadiers file into a barbed wire cage, led by a dejected van Dongeren, a great green-and-black bruise decorati
ng his sullen scarred face now.

  ‘Must have put up a terrific fight, Otto,’ the Count commented. ‘But the best man won, eh, as the English say.’

  Otto gave a non-committal grunt. Van Dongeren had almost sliced him into pieces in their duel. That's the last time I'm ever playing fair, vowed Otto.

  ‘Cheer up,’ the Count urged, mistaking his silence for dejection, ‘the whole front is abuzz with your exploits now. How you took on the elite of the Dutch Army and beat it and warded off the counter-attack. Everyone knows how you saved the bridgehead, perhaps even the whole invasion of Holland.’ He beamed at Otto. ‘My boy, don’t you understand – you’re a hero!’

  Otto yawned. Did the Count really believe all this? ‘All I know, Meadow, is that I’m damn well falling asleep on my feet. Hardly got a wink last night. I could sleep for a month!’

  The Count was immediately solicitous. ‘Of course, Otto. I understand you very well. The strain must have been tremendous, fighting off the enemy like that all night!’

  ‘They weren't all enemies,’ Otto said cautiously.

  The Count beamed. ‘That’s the spirit, Otto! Now we’ve won we can afford to be generous to them, can’t we?’ He indicated the Grenadiers, now locked up inside the wire cage, seemingly doing some sort of ceremonial drill under the watchful one-eye of van Dongeren.

  Otto yawned and stared at the Dutchmen without enthusiasm, his eyelids feeling as if there were heavy weights attached to them.

  Just at that moment the howl of a klaxon horn at the other side of the stretch of stagnant water roused soldiers everywhere out of the hazy morning lethargy.

  Otto turned to stare with the rest. An armoured car, its gun moving suspiciously from left to right like the snout of some predatory monster was coming slowly up the approach road to the bridge. Behind came six motorcycle outriders in black uniform, sitting proudly on their gleaming machines, one white-gloved hand on their hips, posing affectedly.