by Leo Kessler
It took the others nearly an hour to free him and bring him round again, with Pastor Mueller trying to soothe then-rattled nerves with one of his mild theological jokes, saying as Otto finally sat up and cleared the rest of the earth from his eyes, ‘They do say that the “meek shall inherit the earth”.’
‘Well, I inherited my share of it for tonight,’ Otto gasped grimly.
‘Yes, I suppose, you have. All of us have,’ the fat priest agreed, looking at his wrist-watch. ‘It is about time that we all packed up for the night. We can clear the fall tomorrow evening.’
Thus it was that Otto returned to his hut earlier than usual. Physically and emotionally exhausted, he flopped down on his bunk, not noticing the couple locked in each other’s arms in the silver gloom. A minute later he was fast asleep and snoring softly, while the air-gunner, in need of a pre-sleep pee, prized himself away from his personal sleeping beauty and tiptoed past. Pushing Otto's discarded boots to one side in the latrine, a soft whistle escaped his lips. Mud was falling from the soles, a completely different colour to that found outside in the compound: a light yellow instead of the dark-brown of the soot-dirtied soil found everywhere in York. Well, Kurt you old cock, he told himself, one doesn’t need to be particularly clever to know why. So that was what his fellow prisoner had been doing out so late at night!
‘It’s Renate the Red-Hot Mama from Milano,’ Staff-Sergeant Dicks announced softly. ‘She, er, he’s got something to tell you sir.’
Captain Hawkins, standing at the window of his office staring outside at the first soft snowflakes of the winter falling on the roofs of York Camp, turned round swiftly and said, ‘Wheel it in, Dicksey.’
A moment later the Italian came swishing in, trailing the long gown he was going to wear at the Christmas concert behind him with affected elegance, face heavy with powder, two hectic spots of rouge at the cheeks, as if he were suffering from an advanced stage of consumption.
‘Comniandante, que dice?’ he simpered, rolling his mascaraed eyes provocatively. ‘Querido,’ he pursed his lips and blew the wizened little ex-quartermaster a wet kiss.
‘Oh come on, don’t screw about,’ Hawkins said testily although he was always amused by Capaldi’s performance. ‘You know we’ve got to get you in and out of here smartish.’
‘Gimme a quick pint, and I’ll tell you,’ the Italian said in a broad West Yorkshire accent and plumped down heavily on Hawkins’s chair, ‘I’m fair clem!’
Hawkins nodded to Dicks, who was guarding the door, as he always did when their own private stool-pigeon came to make his weekly report. Hurriedly he opened the steel drawer marked ‘entertainment’ and finding a bottle of Bass Ale handed it to the Italian.
Capaldi bit off the cap with his teeth, spat it out and drunk deep of the warmish beer, then belched with pleasure and said, ‘Drop o’ grand stuff that. God knows how those wops can drink all that red wine muck!’
‘Well?’ Hawkins said expectantly. ‘Come on Capaldi, cough it up, lad.’
Capaldi, the son of an ice-cream dealer in Bradford, who had gone for a holiday back to Italy in 1939, had been called up for the Italian Army and had been captured in Libya the following year, said, his made-up face serious now:
‘They’ve got a tunnel somewhere, the Squareheads. Anyway that’s what my boyfriend Kurt thinks. He doesn’t know where exactly or who’s in the escape team, but they’ve definitely got one.’ He drained the rest of the beer and, hitching up his skirt, added, ‘And tell my old man to send over a crate of ale for Boxing Day, ’cos I’m really gonna get pissed then.’
‘I will,’ Captain Hawkins promised, ‘and watch out for yerself, laddie.’
‘That I will, Signor Commandante,’ the little Italian queer trilled. ‘But who’d want to harm me – with my beautiful behind? Ciao.’
He sailed out back to the compound, leaving Dicks and Hawkins staring at each other in gloomy silence. Their safety relied on keeping these prisoners inside that fence.
‘What cheek,’ the Commandant exclaimed. ‘After everything we've done for the buggers! Giving them leniency, allowing their late night parties, their music... And still they want to leave. Are they mad? And just when Christmas is coming up, Dicksey. I thought they liked it here.’ He slumped back in his wooden office chair. ‘It's time to stop playing the benevolent father.’
CHAPTER 9
It happened on the day when the preparations for Christmas were reaching their high point. In the primitive kitchens, the prisoners, who had saved their raisins and sugar rations for weeks, were busy making ‘raisin wine’.
For days they had been boiling the raisins and sugar in the issue cauldrons, draining the sludge through towels until now they were slowly achieving the final product: raisin wine with a fantastic alcoholic kick.
In the recreation hut, ten Italians, dressed as can-can girls, complete with padded brassieres, black stockings and suspenders, were practising the climax of their act – the splits – with disastrous results on their precious silken knickers, while in the other comer a grim-faced disapproving group of tunnellers were going through ‘Stille Nachte, Heilige Nacht,’ once again with ponderous Germanic thoroughness. Everywhere there was hustle and bustle, the sound of sawing and hammering, interspersed by excited little cries from the Southern Italians every time fresh snowflakes came tumbling down, for most of them had never seen snow before. Crying ‘que bella,’ some of them even applauded, as if God himself was putting on a special act to entertain them this Christmas so far from their Sicilian homeland.
Abruptly the main gate was flung open. Whistles shrilled. On their towers the sentries swung round their Bren guns to train them directly on the compound. Three heavy lorries came roaring into the compound at low gear and started careering around between the huts, their backs laden with bricks. Captain Hawkins, followed by a dozen guards, helmeted and with fixed bayonets, came running through the snow at the double. In a flash they were inside the nearly empty huts, flinging aside bedding, poking their bayonets into gaps in the wooden walls, throwing down the prisoners’ pathetic bits and pieces of kit from the cupboards and rummaging through them like jostling housewives fighting to find a bargain at a jumble sale.
In an instant all was angry, excited confusion, all thoughts of Christmas gone, as the choir, the can-can chorus, the wine-makers were herded into the snow for a personal search, which left the Germans sullen and angry, the queers who formed the can-can group flashing-eyed and excited, and the Tommies who had searched them red faced with embarrassment. One of the Italians even had the audacity to blow a kiss at the Commandant, who promptly ordered him seven days in the Hole.
‘Bloody saucy bugger,’ he snapped, as the unrepentant Italian was led away roughly, his right suspender broken and his black stocking drooping around his ankle. ‘There’s no plum duff for that dago this Christmas!’
The search continued for another two hours, with soldiers in khaki overalls who wore the cap badge of the Royal Engineers and didn’t belong to the Camp’s establishment, crawling beneath the huts, listening to the floors with stethoscopes like crazy doctors and running long metal rods through the snow and into the ground below to withdraw and examine the ends excitedly.
Just before midday, they gave up, for they could already hear the rattle of the dixies over at their own cookhouse and the scent of fried bully was flooding the compound by now. It was Friday and there was rice pudding for ‘afters’ on Fridays; it was the culinary treat of the week. The Brits' enthusiasm waned rapidly. Sour-faced and still angry, Captain Hawkins put his revolver back into his holster.
‘All right Staff Sergeant Dicks,’ he snapped, ‘withdraw the jaiwans, there’s nothing doing here!’
‘Withdraw the what, sir?’
‘The soldiers – squaddies,’ Hawkins cried angrily, frustrated by the fact they had found nothing in spite of his well-laid plan to surprise the POWs. ‘Christ man, don’t you speak English?’
And with that he strode off out of the co
mpound, muttering terrible oaths to himself in Urdu, leaving an offended Staff Sergeant Dicks to withdraw the hungry jaiwans.
That afternoon Pastor Mueller held a ‘special pre-Christmas service’ in his own quarters, but there was nothing festive or Christian about it. Mueller was white-faced with anger, while the mood of the other ‘worshippers’ varied from sadistic to homicidal.
‘It all adds up, comrades,’ he launched straight into his own analysis. ‘They know we’ve got a tunnel going. Why else would they need those heavy trucks?’
‘Yer,’ Hans agreed, ‘and loads of bricks on the back to make them even heavier. They were trying to cave in any tunnel they’d run over.’ He gave a short, sour grunt. ‘Those buck-teethed Tommies’ll have to get up earlier in the morning, if they’re gonna find our tunnel – ’
‘Yer and those other Tommies with their probes and stupid rubber hearing-aids,’ Todt said. ‘They were after our tunnel too!’
Mueller held up his hands for silence. ‘Let me say this fast, comrades. From now onwards we no longer speak of tunnels. The word will no longer be used even among ourselves. I have a code word for it which we will from this moment on employ in reference to it. Now it will be called Adolf.’ He gave them a little smile. ‘The name of our beloved Führer, of course.’
There was a slight round of applause and someone said, ‘I don’t know, Herr Pfarrer, but you certainly do come up with some brilliant ideas.’
Oh shit on the shingle, Otto cursed to himself at the sudden looks of delight on the faces of his companions. Brilliant, my arse! But he said nothing, waiting for what Mueller would have to say next.
The priest’s smile vanished. ‘Comrades, the situation is serious, very serious.’ He wet his bottom lip and now for the first time, Otto noticed just how thick and very red it was – it was the lip of a sensualist. ‘It is clear that the Tommies didn’t just come in here by chance. Not in the morning, they didn’t. We all know the Tommies never really get started until they’ve read their Daily Mirror properly and had their mid-morning tea-break.’
There was a rumble of agreement from the others.
‘No, comrades, never, unless it was something serious. And this was serious enough to get them moving early. They knew the tunnel – excuse me – Adolf is there. How?’ He paused dramatically. ‘Because Adolf was betrayed!’
The effect was that of an 88mm shell exploding. Men jumped to their feet. Others struck their temples like characters in a Greek tragedy miming utter despair. Others gasped, as if they had been punched in the solar plexis. Only Otto showed no emotion whatsoever, for he noticed with a chill feeling that Pastor Mueller was staring directly at him, seemingly unaffected by the impact of his own announcement.
The noise and confusion seemed to go on for a long time until finally Pastor Mueller raised his hands high like a boxing referee declaring a knock-out, and said, ‘Comrades... comrades! Please, we mustn’t be carried away.’
Slowly, order was restored and everyone looked expectantly at the fat priest, while outside the snowflakes fell sadly and the Italian accordionist attempted to play Jingle Bells, but failed miserably, the Christmas song sounding very much like the tangoes he usually played.
‘In the hours since the search, comrades, I have done a great deal of thinking,’ the pastor continued. ‘Who? I have asked myself, “Who,” time and time again, comrades. Who. Who would... could betray Adolf in such a dastardly fashion?’ He raised his gaze to the ceiling, drunk on his own evangelising. ‘Who?’
Oh, get on with it, you stupid shit, Otto said to himself, in an aggressive outburst brought on by the rising tide of fear in his stomach. And now, as had happened so awkwardly before, he could feel a bulging of his pants down below. ‘Goddamit!’ he cursed under his breath.
‘I have considered every one of you, comrades, I must admit that,’ Mueller added over the shocked intakes of breath from the congregation. ‘After all we are but Mortal Men, exposed to the Temptations of the Flesh – even more than normally in the case of this hellish camp. All of us have experienced the Dark Night of the Soul at one time or other, in which we could well have strayed from the Straight and Narrow Path, save for the assistance of our Maker Himself.’ Automatically he bowed his balding head and clasped his hands together, as if in prayer. Otto could have sworn he heard him mutter ‘Amen’.
‘However, comrades,’ now there was nothing sanctimonious about Mueller’s voice when he resumed speaking, ‘we’re not that kind of swine. None of us here would indulge in that form of swinery.’ His eyes flashed angrily.
‘Then who was it?’ Hans asked.
‘One of the new men,’ Mueller declared flatly. ‘The Macaronis are fools. They know nothing. But our own so-called German comrades,’ he emphasized the word with a sneer, ‘they know everything, or think they do.’
‘Which one of them?’ Kraemer growled, and Otto sat transfixed by the strangling movements he was making with his great hairy paws. ‘Just tell me and I’ll see he passes on right quick.’ He guffawed at his own attempt at humour. ‘Get that Herr Pfarrer – passes on?’
‘Yes, yes,’ Mueller said hastily. ‘In all there are four of them, Otto here who has worked hard with us on Adolf for the last few weeks, the Bible student, the cook from Hamburg, and Kurt the air-gunner.’ He paused significantly while the others waited expectantly. ‘I have thought about them and have come to this conclusion,’ he continued finally.
‘The Bible student,’ he ticked him off on one fat finger. ‘A dreamer, a fool, but an honest fool, who can’t see beyond the end of his long, sharp nose. For him the world ended two thousand years ago.’ Otto frowned. It seemed a strange statement to be coming from a parson, he told himself.
‘The cook!’ Mueller continued.
‘Oh that fat sod!’ Todt said contemptuously. ‘He can’t see anything but the end of his own greasy guts.’
‘Agreed, Todt. His sole interest in this life is food and food yet once again. So that leaves Otto here – and the air-gunner.’
Suddenly Otto was aware they were all staring at him and that their eyes were heavy with menace. He moved his left hand to cover the towering erection he couldn't control. He raised his right, as if he were about to push them away physically.
‘Now come off it,’ he said with a shaky laugh. ‘I’m not your traitor. I want to get out as much as you lot do. Honest!’
The priest let Otto suffer, obviously enjoying his discomfiture in that somewhat threatening atmosphere. Otto glanced around at the group of wild-eyed, Nazi-loving nutcases. Shifty-looking Todt had taken out a shiv and was fingering the blade. The bulging eyes of Kraemer belied barely-controlled aggression. Hans looked like he was imagining pummelling something other than the bellows for once.
And then Mueller said, ‘Don’t worry, Otto. It’s not you! It’s the air-gunner.’
Another round of gasps and cries from the assembled.
‘The swine!’ Hans declared hotly, his anger immediately directed away from Otto, who could feel a great weight lifting off his chest, and pressure relieving itself below. Hans was talking: ‘But how do you know, Herr Pfarrer?’
‘Intuition, Hans,’ Mueller declared and tapped the side of his long nose knowingly. ‘Intuition.’
‘So when do we kill the little shit?’ Kraemer growled.
Otto gasped. ‘Kill him – in the camp?’ he exclaimed. ‘But we’re prisoners, aren’t we?’
Mueller looked at him coldly. ‘Are we?’ he asked. ‘Who is the prisoner and who is the guard, eh?’ He turned to the others. ‘But first of all, he must have a trial – and then we kill him.’
‘Democracy in action,’ Otto commented sardonically. But no one was listening to Otto any more.
‘When – where?’ several voices demanded hastily, drowning Otto’s words.
‘Tomorrow night.’
‘But that’s Christmas Eve,’ Todt objected.
‘So?’ Mueller said and then smiled, though there was no humorous light in his fa
ded eyes behind the gold-rimmed glasses. ‘It'll be a Christmas present for him to remember.’
The others laughed uproariously, save Otto, whose mind was racing wildly. What was he going to do?
CHAPTER 10
‘Jesus bloody wept!’ Captain Hawkins moaned, rubbing his thinning hair in despair, ‘I’m going to the dogs, right stoically; knocking back the sherab as if it were water, smoking a bloody ration of coffin-nails a day and not even able to get the old John Thomas up at night!’
‘Is it the tunnel, sir?’ Staff-Sergeant Dicks asked a little helplessly, while outside the office the snow fell in solid white sheets, and some sentry or other sang in a monotonous, mournful voice, ‘Kiss me goodnight, Sar’nt-Major. Tuck me in my little wooden bed. We all love you, Sar’nt-Major.’
‘I’ll have that janker-wallah out there in the nick if he doesn’t stop that bleeding howling in half a mo,’ Hawkins groaned. ‘Of course it’s the tunnel, you silly sod!’
‘But we did try,’ Dicks said.
‘Ay, but not hard enough, that’s the trouble. At this very moment, the squarehead buggers might well be burying their way through the earth right beneath our plates of meat! God, it gets right up my nose! I’ve tried to pump their mullah, that Parson Mueller, but the fat old sky pilot’s not letting on, if he knows anything. I’ve even offered them bribes, but those sods know nothing, and even Capaldi, the fairy-queen, hasn’t come up with anything new from his boyfriend, the silly pouf!’
As if on cue the unknown singer outside broke off his mournful account of his love for the ‘Sar’nt-Major’ and launched into a lively rendition of ‘Tight as a drum, never been done, queen of all the fairies. She’s only one titty to feed the baby on!’
Exasperated beyond all measure Captain Hawkins opened the window with a curse and bellowed into the snowstorm, ‘That man out there! Stop that sodding howling down there or I’ll have you on jankers from now to the day yer get yer old-aged pension!’
