Pale Horse Riding

by Chris Petit

  Schlegel said his genes were not of the best. ‘Indecisive, backsliding, cowardly.’

  ‘Better that than what they teach here.’

  It was the right time of the month, she said.

  They reached the allotments, plots of tamed earth with their own little sheds, some converted into summer huts. She said the gardening craze had started the year before, with everyone confined to camp. A lot was an excuse to bury treasure.

  Schulze struck Schlegel as easy and far-sighted. He asked if she was serious about getting out.

  ‘Yes. If there is an afterwards, we will all be held guilty. I don’t know if there will be but I want to start building a life far from here. I have put in for transfers but they are reluctant to move administrative staff. Some are starting to say soon no one will be allowed to leave. For the moment, having a child is the only loophole. That is why everyone is being so careless about birth control. You will have to vouch for it but that is all. Everything afterwards is taken care of by the state.’

  ‘I can’t promise anything. I am a mess since hospital.’

  They sat in Schulze’s shed, a wooden hut not much bigger than a cell. She said she liked it there. It was about the only place she did.

  Sunflowers were popular. They sat surrounded by the tall stalks of that summer’s crop. Most people had stopped growing vegetables because they got stolen.

  Schulze sat with her hands clasped around her knees. Schlegel knew he should be getting on but it was his first relaxed time since being there. The hut’s boards were warm from the day. Trying to feel useful, he went in search of something to lie on. Most huts were open because they were empty. Under a water barrel he found some dry sacking, dusty but clean, and wondered about a child he had never thought of having.

  Later, Schulze said, ‘We should have done this a long time ago.’ Schlegel agreed. She was one of very few he wanted to know better. His head wasn’t giving him trouble for once. He even stopped coughing. Given the impossibility of everything else, there was only the moment, a sense of connection, a future perhaps, and curiosity, when it had otherwise been eradicated, and plain lust, as though he had been hot-wired. They were all over each other, laughing. This had better be good, she said, because it will be the only time. It was easy. Everything worked without thinking, when usually he found sex questionable in its physical negotiation and what was left unsaid.

  He fell asleep and when he awoke she was gone, and as with the time in the inn he was left wondering if he had dreamed it all.

  Schlegel went back to the office. He was down to his last four packets of cigarettes. He went in search of Broad and this time found him standing around in the contraband store, as lackadaisical as ever.

  ‘I hear your pal is on his way home, and I am asking why didn’t the big man chuck out the pair of you while he was at it? How long have you got?’

  ‘Twenty-four hours.’

  ‘For what?’ asked Broad enigmatically.

  Schlegel ignored the troubling question and said Morgen had subpoenaed the seamstress and he understood Broad had her safe.

  ‘I need you to hand her over as I will be taking her out this evening.’

  Broad gave him an incredulous look and suggested they step outside. A back door took them into a grass arena.

  ‘I am continuing to bet very long odds on you.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  Schlegel was back to feeling like he was swimming through treacle.

  ‘It’s too late to talk to me. Your seamstress is no longer in the block.’

  Schlegel sensed Pohl closing everything down. He supposed the conversation was about Broad being willing to trade.

  ‘Can I find out where she is?’

  ‘A little birdie is saying.’

  It took 35 cigarettes for the birdie to tell. Schlegel suspected he was being robbed blind.

  Sybil had been transferred to Dr Wirths’ cancer treatment ward, across from the punishment block. The inference was obvious. Bock the dentist had made the same move just before his death. Schlegel had a flash of Sybil already laid out in a morgue bath.

  Wheels were starting to turn as the machine cranked into action. The Gestapo man had said the ward would be cleared as a final act of spite against Wirths. Fuck, thought Schlegel. Had Pohl not turned up and were Morgen still there, he suspected the Gestapo would have held off. He asked Broad if Pohl was now in control.

  Broad hummed and hawed. Five more cigarettes and he said, ‘Word is the woman causing all the trouble has to go.’

  Two packs of cigarettes left.

  Schlegel ran to the medical block, in as much as his enfeebled state let him.

  If the in-fighting at the top was Pohl against Kammler, then Morgen, he and Sybil could all be counted as Kammler’s agents and, after letting them dance a while, Pohl was now making his sweep.

  Two idling trucks stood outside the medical block. Women were already milling around, downcast and resigned. The first truck was being loaded, supervised by a couple of guards. The Gestapo men were all inside.

  Schlegel checked the first truck: a dozen or so women sitting on opposite benches; none was Sybil.

  Another batch was brought out. Two Gestapo men handed them over and rushed back into the building. About thirty women were waiting, with one guard splitting them, making some stay for the second truck while the first was filled. Schlegel was surprised by the lack of urgency, even with lives hanging in the balance. No one protested or cried. It had all the inevitably of a transport going to market.

  Schlegel spotted Sybil at the back of the group. He ordered her to come over, shouting brusquely like she was in trouble. She stood opposite him, looking nervous and uncertain. He muttered, ‘Stay with me and say nothing.’

  He walked over to the guard that looked more amenable. The comparison was meaningless; both appeared as shifty and unpleasant as the other. The guard, indifferent, said, ‘Once they are for the truck they are for the truck.’

  He wasn’t putting himself out for anyone.

  Schlegel tried the other soldier, who said, ‘The numbers have to match. We can’t let people be taken off or we get into trouble.’

  Schlegel was desperate to avoid bargaining with the Gestapo, who had no doubt been told to clear the lot.

  He took the guard aside, out of Sybil’s hearing, and showed him a packet of cigarettes, saying the prisoner was his woman and he wasn’t done with her yet. Gambling everything, he produced his last packet of cigarettes and said, ‘For your friend,’ knowing the creep would pocket both packs.

  The guard nodded as if to say it was a lot to pay for a woman and he hoped she was worth it. He jerked his head and told them to make themselves scarce before the Gestapo came out again.

  Schlegel sensed some of the other women starting to stare at Sybil and for a terrible moment he thought they might turn on her. He roughly grabbed her arm and dragged her off, trying to make it look as though her fate was as unquestionable as theirs. He frogmarched her fast until they were out of sight, let go of her arm and said they had to get out that night, somehow, and Morgen was no longer there to help.

  Morgen sat in the station waiting room under armed escort, watching Juppe strut. Someone had at least packed his case, which was waiting. Because of his guard, people stared, as much as they dared.

  Morgen thought: piles of bodies, piles of money. He could broadcast it as much as he liked, no one would listen, even if he commandeered the station’s loudspeaker system. Truth eradicated all hope.

  He worked out he had three moves left and the third would probably cost him his life.

  He feared for Schlegel’s safety; the boy probably should not even be up. Sybil he had given his word to, now as good as useless. He supposed she would be auctioned off to the highest bidder, if matters got as far as that.

  Once more unto the wilderness.

  Morgen’s attention was caught by a woman walking into the waiting room. He couldn’t see properly because he was cleaning his s
pectacles. There were almost no women waiting that weren’t passengers but this one had no luggage. She was also casting around anxiously.

  Morgen put his spectacles back on and saw Schulze, sitting down now on the other side of the room. Juppe didn’t recognise her and Morgen supposed he didn’t know her. He was slow to realise she might be looking for him; at first he had thought it chance. When Juppe’s attention was elsewhere she gestured that she would see him on the train, stood up and left. Morgen could see her through the waiting-room window, pacing the platform. He supposed she could only be the bringer of bad news.

  The train arrived half an hour late. Juppe said no sleeping berth was available but the compartment for garrison use was empty with no other passengers expected. Juppe gave a sarcastic wave, said, ‘Bye-bye,’ and repeated Pohl’s warning that he would be shot on sight if he came back.

  Morgen pulled the blinds down, having no wish to watch his departure.

  He was joined by Schulze as the train left.

  She said, ‘I think I have worked out how it was done.’

  The missing piece: the secret chamber of which there was no trace.

  Morgen had no doubt of its existence. Palitsch said all business came down to housekeeping, and the one thing of which there was always a surfeit: the unwanted. And in the background always the bureaucratic machine sorting and justifying the reason for existence. Somewhere must have served to demonstrate what the garrison was capable of before the commission of the death factories; to enable them. Cost and economics. Such a huge new build could only be justified if shown to be worth it. Its temporary predecessor would have had to continue operating through that winter until the first of the new builds opened in the spring.

  Morgen was in no hurry to know the answer. In some ways he would rather not. The problem with a secret of that magnitude was there was nowhere to take it. As an accessory, such knowledge became contagious. Now he had in effect been cashiered there was nothing he could do except let it fester in his head.

  He asked Schulze what she remembered of the mood at the time. She said the same questions were being asked in the bar every night. What were they supposed to do with all these newcomers turning up in droves? They remembered how the Old Man had begged from the start they stop sending more prisoners and got turned down flat, and now they had to take everyone sent, and the Ministry of Food sent fewer supplies.

  ‘There must have been stories.’

  ‘Yes, but knowing not to ask was something we had all learned by then.’

  She confirmed that the construction of any temporary disposal site would have required carpenters, masons, plasterers, surveyors and draughtsmen. She had checked again and said, ‘Nothing was built or worked on near the burning pits that the record shows, apart from the prefabricated huts we discussed.’

  Morgen thought: The record always shows, one way or another.

  Schulze said, ‘However, there are some clues. I told you about the surveyor’s report on narrow-gauge tracks, which we laid, and brushwood fencing from the landscaping department, which we were contracted to assemble. What I didn’t know was the exact same order was repeated later that summer.’

  ‘Would you not have known?’

  ‘Not necessarily. The department had expanded and several of us were dealing with labour allocation.’

  ‘Then you are saying there were two sites not one.’

  It confirmed his theory of demonstrating capability.

  ‘What have you worked out?’ he asked reluctantly.

  ‘Kammler.’

  She had no proof but it was the only possible explanation for what she was about to say.

  ‘What would a second site add?’

  The answer was obvious, but that was not what he meant. The time-consuming part of the job would be clearing up and disposal. Unless extractor fans were used, the gas would have to disperse naturally before bodies were removed, a lengthy process before everything could be cleaned and prepared for the next unsuspecting batch. A single site would by default spend time idle.

  Morgen suspected the revolutionary moment was realising the addition of a second chamber would enable work to continue around the clock. He presumed such a structure had only two requirements: being airtight and an unthreatening appearance to deceive those about to enter.

  ‘Tell me what you know.’

  Schulze said the key was how Kammler had transformed all camp bureaucracy through technology. This particularly related to the workforce, with the introduction of a new central register, which let him control everything from Berlin.

  ‘How?’ asked Morgen. The logistics would be mind-boggling.

  ‘It’s an automated system. It’s what I did my course on in Berlin.’

  ‘Then why were you working with us if you are trained to do that?’

  ‘I suspect I offended my immediate boss. He was not happy about me doing the course in the first place. There is so much in-fighting.’

  ‘How did you get chosen?’

  Schulze looked away. ‘Dr Kammler recommended me.’

  He still wondered if she was Kammler’s spy. One thing he had learned was most of the time you didn’t find the answer.

  ‘What are the advantages of an automated system?’

  ‘Centralisation. It’s the same numerical system they used for the census. It lets you see exactly how many workers are deployed where, throughout the whole camp network, and if there is a shortage or surplus then transfers can be made immediately.’

  ‘But how does it work?’

  ‘A punch-card system allows individual data to be sorted automatically.’

  Morgen had never heard of such a thing.

  ‘And before Kammler?’

  ‘Most camps hardly knew what its workforce was. The record-keeping was appalling.’

  ‘How does this have a bearing on what you are talking about?’

  ‘Immediately after Kammler’s February 1942 inspection there was one other significant change.’

  In a move no one foresaw, all prison labour was transferred to Kammler’s command.

  ‘Once he had control, he could siphon off the cream, for what became known as mobile brigades, which answered directly to him. We lost our best people. Kammler just took them.’

  ‘How did they work?’

  ‘Outside the camp system. He was interested in the private sector. Specialist teams to be moved around as he saw fit.’

  Morgen saw what she was saying.

  Creating his own independent workforce made complete sense if Kammler’s immediate business involved the secret future of the garrison. With his own people to hand as early as March, he would have brought them in to live and work on site, bypassing the construction office and the garrison, and nobody would have known they were there.

  It also placed Kammler, like Wirths, with his hands firmly on the death machine.

  Morgen thanked Schulze and asked why had she told him.

  She said she didn’t know, other than prove to herself she hadn’t known. Morgen said she needn’t speak of it again.

  The garrison war now took on another dimension, as part of Kammler’s modernising revolution. Nevertheless, Morgen’s instinct told him that Wirths’ denunciation of the crematoria as follies wasn’t altogether wrong. Any interim sites probably disposed of many more than their replacements. By then the bulk of the job was already done and they were white elephants.

  The journey to Kattowice took little more than an hour. Schulze said she would take the milk train back and be in time for work. She asked what he would do.

  ‘Go to Breslau, I think, and try and look at a mine.’

  He wondered whether to tell her. The confounded business of secrets. There was no beast worse than man. If he were an ox he would be wailing from the burden he carried.

  Schulze surprised him by asking if he would be a good father.

  ‘Certainly not. Why ever do you ask?’

  ‘Can you see yourself as one?’

  ‘I hav
e no wish to add to the misery of existence.’

  He couldn’t tell if he meant it. Personal questions made him uncomfortable. From most people he would have dismissed Schulze’s asking as sentimental but sensed with her it was not.

  He told her about the mine instead. She said it sounded like another of those stories.

  He said even the most grandiose dreams came down to little more than the grubby reflections of the beholders.

  He asked if she knew anything of Schlegel.

  ‘He’s not in great shape.’

  Morgen tried to make light of that, saying, ‘It’s often when he does his best work.’

  After a silence she said, ‘He may have helped me get out of the place too.’

  ‘How?’ Morgen didn’t understand.

  ‘It’s too early to say yet.’

  ‘I haven’t got a clue what you are talking about.’

  Schulze’s laugh was so carefree that Morgen felt forced to laugh too.

  He slept after that in the pit of exhaustion and was briefly aware of her departure at Kattowice, kissing him on the cheek and wishing him good luck.

  Schlegel’s only thought was to find a safe place for Sybil. He was thinking of the tunnel from the commandant’s house whose exit lay outside the garrison, close to the road and hidden by trees. Sybil seemed barely aware of him explaining. Why should she believe him any more than all the rest?

  Where he felt like he was on a collapsing bridge over a raging torrent, she seemed like marble. Only when he stumbled and unthinkingly put his hand on her shoulder did she flinch, and after that he dared not touch her. They crossed the main street and went down the path through the glade that led to the door to the commandant’s garden. It was locked, the wall too high to climb. He asked if she knew how to get in. Her face was ethereally pale, almost featureless, in the gathering night. Would they just stand there spellbound?

  A breeze came up, rustling the trees, after a day of heat and humidity like a wet flannel.

  He kicked the lock to the gate. On the third attempt it gave.

  He led them across the lawn to the house. The entrance under the stairs was open as before.