The Crest

by Jerena Tobiasen

  A fine mist now hung in the October sky, sparkling like diamonds in the blinding morning light. A skiff of snow had fallen during the night, and the frozen ground crunched under their feet.

  Mothers shed tears freely, mopping them with white lace handkerchiefs. Fathers tried to be stoic, but occasionally swiped a damp eye. Younger siblings, bundled against the chill in woollen coats, scarves, and mittens, looked on in awe at their handsome, uniformed brothers.

  Gerhard’s father had ensured that each young man received a sturdy pair of hobnail boots with horseshoe heels to complete their kits. They had been delivered the day before with a note that read:

  Take good care of yourself, and

  treat your boots as your best friends.

  Replacing them will be impossible.

  Boots issued by the military were no longer made in the sturdy manner of previous years. Since South American raw materials had been blockaded as a consequence of the war, access to quality leather had become complicated. However, Michael had used his connections, and soon acquired the necessary material.

  The boots made for Gerhard and his friends were fashioned in the military style, embellished with a small sheath on the inside of the right boot in which they could conceal their boot blades. The embellishment was not military issue, and the young men were cautioned not to draw attention to the sheath.

  “Others might covet them,” Michael cautioned later that day, “especially yours, Otto. Since you’re left-handed, I had the sheath put in your left boot.”

  The others turned their gaze toward Otto, who blushed at the unexpected attention.

  Together with their kit, each young man carried orders to meet at the train station in Liegnitz by 1300 that day. From Liegnitz, they would travel to Dresden to join the King Wilhelm the First Regiment. They were given no information about their ultimate destination, and no details of their return. In the throes of war, any suggestion of furlough was vague.

  The brakes of a military transport truck screeched as it came to a rumbling halt in front of the Ersatz District Office. Inscribed on the driver’s door was the same insignia as the envelope Gerhard had opened not so long ago.

  “All right boys,” a sergeant bellowed as he alighted from the truck, “say good-bye to your families and get on board. Right smart now! We have a train to catch.”

  To a person, the small group jumped, startled by the boom of the sergeant’s voice. Then they laughed together, breaking the tension of their emotional farewells, when they recognized the sergeant as being the same fellow who had greeted them on registration day several years prior.

  The sergeant saluted some of the fathers, acknowledging their prior or current service to their country, and walked to the rear of the truck. He lifted a flap and ushered the young men aboard.

  Hugs, kisses, and instructions for staying safe followed the young men as they tossed their gear into the truck and climbed in. They each took a seat on one of the wooden benches and tucked their duffle bags between their feet.

  Those left behind watched the truck roll away, hastened with the current raised by a multitude of waving hands. As the truck vanished from sight, the families turned away quietly and made their way home, their shadows dissipating into the diamond light.

  CHAPTER THREE

  THE FOLLOWING TWO years passed quickly for some: not so quickly for those who tromped through mud, snow, rain, and heat; who fought insects, starvation, loneliness, and fear; who saw dismemberment; who smelled the rot of humanity, vomit, and gun powder. It passed not at all for those whose death arrived sooner than expected.

  Gerhard’s determination to survive was strengthened each time the lifeless form of one of his mates returned home without him. One died during a battle in Flanders, four died during the battle for Verdun, and, in the spring of 1917, one was taken prisoner. Two others sustained injuries at Vimy that resulted in their removal to field hospitals, where they later died.

  After Vimy, Gerhard and Otto moved with the Regiment from one bloody battlefield to another, ferociously leading their men into each confrontation. They proved to be the leaders they were trained to be, and their prowess earned them promotions: first to lieutenant and then to captain.

  Despite the chaos around them, Gerhard and Otto managed to keep their heads and guide the companies under their command. They had a twin-sense awareness of where the other was, no matter that they might be positioned kilometres apart.

  Late in the spring of 1918, their companies fought side-by-side in several battles along the Lys River, the head-count reduced to a mere shadow of their former glory.

  At the end of April, they were pinned down by heavy artillery fire. With heads close together discussing strategies, a sniper’s bullet hit Otto’s left knee, shattering it.

  Gerhard grabbed him as he fell and rolled them both toward shelter in a crater created by a mortar that morning.

  While Gerhard assessed the damage to Otto’s knee, mortars began falling around them again.

  Time seemed to stand still. Kneeling next to his unconscious friend, Gerhard tried to staunch the blood flow by applying a tourniquet.

  Stray shrapnel from a nearby explosion peppered Gerhard’s right side. The percussion sent him flying forward, across Otto’s chest. His head smashed into a chunk of mortar debris, and his world went dark.

  When the mortar salvo ended a short time later, stretcher-bearers found them where they had fallen, and concluded they were both dead. Their bodies were put onto stretchers and carried unceremoniously to a waiting wagon, where the dead were being loaded.

  Two men working together each grabbed an arm and a leg to heft Gerhard’s body off the stretcher and into the wagon. Gerhard cried out when uncaring fingers dug into a bloody gash in his arm. The startled bearers almost dropped him.

  “Check the other one, while I examine this one.” One of them nodded toward Otto. “He may be alive, too.”

  Fingers pressed into Otto’s neck. “I have a weak pulse here,” the second bearer said.

  Gerhard and Otto were moved to a wagon used to evacuate injured soldiers, and were taken to a nearby field dressing station. An orderly told Gerhard that as soon as their injuries were stabilized, they would be taken from the holding tent to one of the hospitals.

  “Then what?” Gerhard asked, struggling to his feet.

  “I’ve heard that any wounded remaining in hospitals when opposing armies take control are being taken away as prisoners,” the orderly answered.

  Otto stirred as if in response to the orderly’s words. “Nein! I won’t be a prisoner! I must go home!” Otto exclaimed.

  “Enough protesting from you, sir,” the orderly said as he jabbed a syringe in Otto’s shoulder. Otto immediately quieted.

  Gerhard swayed.

  “Sir,” the orderly cautioned, “you really should lie down. You have a nasty gash on your forehead, and you’re bleeding from several other injuries.”

  Gerhard collapsed back onto the stretcher, raising a hand to test the injury to his forehead. He winced, and his hand dropped heavily onto the stretcher.

  “I’m going to get some equipment, and see what I can do to clean you two up before the doc comes,” the orderly said. “You both look like you’ve been in the muck for weeks!”

  “We have,” Gerhard mumbled, lifting his head to scrutinize Otto’s injuries. He dropped his head to the cot when he realized the repair was beyond his ability.

  As Gerhard rested, awaiting the orderly’s return, two events occurred.

  Two more orderlies rushed into the tent, carrying a stretcher on which his commanding officer lay groaning. The orderlies dropped the stretcher next to Gerhard’s cot and departed briskly.

  Gerhard rose to support himself on his elbow. “Sir, how are you injured?” he asked.

  The commander rolled his head toward Gerhard, seeming to struggle with recall for a moment. “Ah! Captain Lange! I wondered where you and Captain Schmidt disappeared to. It’s not like you to wander off in th
e midst of a battle. Where’s Captain Schmidt?”

  “There, sir,” Gerhard said, thumbing in the direction of his unconscious friend. No movement came from Otto’s cot.

  “What’s happened to him?”

  “Took a sniper shot in the knee. The orderly says he’ll never bend it again—if he’s lucky.” Gerhard shook his head as he gazed upon his friend. “He’ll likely lose his leg.”

  Before the commander could respond, the flap of the tent burst open and a senior surgeon strutted in, bringing with him a gust of chilled wind.

  “Colonel,” the doctor said as he probed the officer’s blood-stained shirt, “where do you hurt?”

  The colonel gasped and provided the doctor with details as he breathed through the pain.

  “Superficial wounds, sir. I’m certain we can have you patched up and back to your command quickly. Now, what about you two?” the doctor said, turning toward Gerhard.

  “I’ve taken shrapnel here and here,” Gerhard said, “but Captain Schmidt has the more serious injury. Can you help him? Save his leg?”

  The doctor lifted the blanket, revealing Otto’s damaged knee. “This looks nasty,” he said, probing the muddy knee.

  Otto groaned, but seemed to remain unconscious.

  “I don’t have time to dwell on this type of injury,” the doctor stated. “The way the French are cleaning out hospitals and taking patients as prisoners right now, he’ll likely be treated by one of their doctors. My orders are to repair the able-bodied first, then get them out of here and back to the field.”

  Otto groaned again. “Nein!” he mumbled. “Home!”

  Gerhard turned his focus from the doctor to his commander. “We can’t leave him to die, or be captured, Colonel!” he pleaded.

  The colonel thought for a moment, then reached toward the doctor. “Give me a pen and paper, Doctor.”

  The doctor withdrew a notepad from his pocket and handed it and a pen to the colonel.

  “Here, take this,” he said, thrusting the paper toward Gerhard. “If you think you can get Schmidt to a better facility, do it! He’s too good a man to lose, and you’re no use to us with your injuries, anyway!” The colonel waved his arm.

  “Get as far away as you can, as fast as you can,” the doctor said. “At the rate the French are advancing, you might have to keep going all the way to Belgium!”

  The chaos of battle bled into the field dressing stations. Injured bodies flowed into holding tents, waiting for medical attention. Triaged bodies and the dead were transported elsewhere. There was no time for niceties and social etiquette. Everyone focussed on the body or the task in front of them.

  A short while later, Captain Lange staggered out of the holding tent, limping off in search of some way to get Otto to safety: away from the lines and the possibility of capture. It took no little effort on his part to hitch up a bedraggled mule to a small utility cart and urge the mule back to the holding tent.

  When he returned, Otto was alone in the tent. He half carried, half dragged Otto’s deadweight body from the tent to the cart, stopping twice to allow a wave of nausea to pass.

  Ignoring the blood oozing from his own wounds and a blinding headache from the gash on his forehead, Gerhard searched until he found an overlooked medical kit, a heel of stale bread, a few tins of army rations, and a bunch of rubbery carrots. He threw them all in the cart under the seat. He took one last look around the holding tent and found two worn, woollen blankets, which he spread carefully over Otto, tucking their rifles and ammunition next to him.

  Satisfied he could do no more, he led the mule into the dark night.

  Their journey was a long one. Gerhard sought shelter and rested by day. At night, under bright flares of distant explosions and the glare of flash fires, he limped ahead of the mule and cart. The earth rumbled beneath them with the impact of each explosion.

  Travel during the dark had its risks, but travelling during the day left Gerhard feeling uneasy: exposed and vulnerable. Too many wagons, trucks, men, and artillery, all in constant motion. The roads were impassable. Gerhard found movement at night less obstructed.

  Before he rested each morning, Gerhard searched until he found fodder and water for the mule, and then tended to Otto’s injury, cleaning the wound and re-dressing it. His own wounds were no longer bleeding, although the goose-egg bump on his forehead throbbed, and the shrapnel was irritating, restricting his movement. If not for the injury to his buttock, he would have walked longer, would have found help sooner for Otto. As it was, he was glad for the mule and the load it pulled.

  Curious that no one challenges me. No one asks for papers. No one asks about the wagon, the mule, or the body on the cart. No one offers assistance. No one cares! Structure is lost in chaos.

  Gerhard needed food and water. As he passed through towns, he found water and filled the canteens. At dusk and dawn, if the mule plodded past cratered farm fields, he searched for overlooked food—vegetables and berries. It helped to have grown up in a farming community. He knew where to look.

  Some days, at sunset, he found tart early berries timidly ripening on the tips of sun-exposed branches. He plucked them carefully and wrapped them in a soiled remnant of cloth to share later with Otto.

  On other occasions, he found small potatoes—possibly seed potatoes from the year before—broken carrots—mostly feathered green tops, but the odd one with a small carrot growing beneath the soil—and sometimes a cluster of mushrooms. In a barn, he found dried cabbage leaves and ears of corn in a pigsty long abandoned by its previous tenants. He scrounged it all, wishing for a pot of hot water to cook them in.

  Gerhard and Otto ate their food raw, and sometimes so fast that they promptly spat it out again. Otto ate little. The pain and infection made him feverish. Gerhard forced water down Otto’s parched throat and mopped his brow. His words of encouragement were often lost in Otto’s feverish mind.

  The roads were pockmarked with their own injuries caused by battle and bad weather. The wagon rocked roughly from side-to-side and bounced over gouges and ruts. The gaunt mule dug every step into the drying mud. Each jostle aggravated Otto’s damaged knee, aggravating his agony.

  Gerhard encouraged Otto when he was coherent. “Hold on, Otto; we’re almost there. Your injuries are your ticket home. You should be there by the fall harvest. Hold on, my brother.”

  He was grateful when Otto slept, relieved that his friend was beyond pain for a time.

  The jostling lessened when they approached towns. Sometimes, Gerhard found small stretches of undamaged road. On those occasions, Otto rested easier.

  After five days, he seemed to settle a bit. Gerhard saw, however, that the advancing infection was making Otto delirious. What was left of Otto’s knee swelled. The tissue burnt red and crusted with pus seeping from the wound. Gerhard smelled the putrid rot and felt the urgency to find help for his friend.

  In towns and German encampments, he made enquiries about medical assistance. The field hospitals were overwhelmed, he was told, with injured and ill soldiers. So close to the battlefront, what few local hospitals existed had no capacity for two more patients, especially for the care that Otto required.

  Each time he was turned away, Gerhard wrapped his fingers around the mule’s halter and plodded on to the next source of medical aid to which he had been directed. He pressed the mule eastward, deeper into Belgium, toward the border of Deutschland and safety.

  When exhaustion overcame Gerhard and he could limp no further, he would take respite on the cart’s bench. Otherwise, he preferred to walk ahead of the mule and not waste its energy by having to pull the extra weight. The shrapnel in his right buttock and lower back made sitting uncomfortable, and he was grateful that his injuries remained free of infection.

  “Surely someone must help us! I can’t let Otto die!” Gerhard pleaded, raising his eyes toward the heavens. “Help me help him!”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  AS THE SUN rose on the morning of the sixth day, Gerhard conclu
ded that Otto would not survive without immediate attention. The odour of infection emanating from the damaged knee was potent. Raw tissue had started to turn black.

  Nearing Brussels, he found shelter in an abandoned house and released the mule to graze in the yard behind. He left Otto shivering under a mound of blankets on one of the beds, hid the wagon under debris, and set off in search of medical aid.

  A few blocks away, he found a hospital, but was dismayed at the traffic of medical staff, military medics, and injured soldiers shuffling in and out. He watched the pattern of the traffic and soon realized that a change of staff was underway.

  Watching the retiring staff dissipate for the day, he noticed a young couple stepping together with locked arms, smiling and chatting easily.

  He waited as they walked toward him and, when they turned the corner, he stepped in front of them, his Mauser revolver raised and threatening. Their hands jerked up in surrender and surprise.

  “Are you a doctor?” demanded Gerhard.

  The young man in a fitted grey-striped suit nodded, waving the black bag he carried in his left hand.

  “And you?” he turned the muzzle of the revolver toward the young woman.

  She stood unmoving but for the fluttering of the hem of her floral dress. In his angst, Gerhard failed to notice how her straw hat framed her face, its ribbons a corn-flower blue that reflected her eyes.

  She responded in German, “I am his cousin. I am a nurse. You are injured. Can we help you?”

  Waving the muzzle, Gerhard motioned them to walk ahead of him, guiding them into the house where Otto lay shivering and delirious.

  The doctor tossed his hat on a nearby chair and knelt to Otto’s aid, placing his bag on the floor next to the bed. “Your friend needs medical attention. Immediately. If he doesn’t have that knee removed now, he will be dead before sunrise tomorrow.”