“Why do you ask me?” Skinny said.
“Is it a sin not to want to die?” Estelle asked.
“Some decide to die with honour if they can’t live with honour. That’s why my father killed himself.”
“I know why you’re saying this to me. You probably know why I’m asking.”
“You too?” Skinny breathed.
It was out now. They had both betrayed themselves, simultaneously. Estelle bit her lips. A little drop of blood appeared, which she licked off in the dark. What would they do with this knowledge, now or tomorrow? What would it do to them?
The moon had risen to its highest point. In a while it would begin to go down. From the field kitchen, wafted by the wind, came smoke and the smell of pea soup with bacon and lard.
In the morning Long-Legs gave Skinny ten marks. “An interest-free loan from an Obersoldat.”
“If they caught you!”
“That takes two. It doesn’t matter whether you steal or not, just don’t get caught.”
While peeling potatoes in the kitchen Skinny had stolen a tin of Slovak chicken. She would share it with Beautiful. It was already cooked, all she had to do was let it thaw out. Had Beautiful heard her and Estelle talking during the night? She slept right next to them.
Twelve: Jürgen Henning, Werner Schlossberg, Erhardt Kassel-Kahdun, Heinz Fe si, Ifoel Schulte, Gerd Siemens, Franz Otto Schröder, Oskar Herder-Altmann, Helmuth Krantz, Otmar Bartelsmann, Kurt Biedenkopf, Reinhardt Eich-Ochmanek.
Seven
It was Saturday. Snow was falling. The yard was noisy with truck engines, German shouts and laughter. Piled on the rubbish heap in the corner were broken mugs, pieces of rusty metal and swept-up spent cartridges. All that would be tidied up and removed before the inspectors arrived from the Wehrkreis. Some infantrymen outside the brothel were whistling and calling to one another. Here the German army was not retreating but advancing towards its goals. The guards on the towers heard the same dirty jokes for the hundredth time.
“A little debauchery does no harm, no debauchery does a lot,” a lanky youngster shouted across the yard. A lock of pale hair showed under his cap. He could not be more than eighteen; this was his first visit to the brothel. He had already had his baptism of fire in battle. There was a new medal on his tunic.
“Everything in moderation,” muttered Oberführer Schimmelpfennig. Steam was rising from his mouth. He had no wish to act as a father figure. There was no point in cursing the frost. They would all get their full measure of winter.
The brothel was a long low building. The men leaving it were almost creeping along, some of them let their knees give way. They were greeted with jeers in the yard.
“I’ve been here before. You’ll read about it in the book on the descendants of the SS,” one S S man shouted.
The soldiers by the vehicles stood with their hands in their pockets. The Oberführer noted with chagrin that the sight of the army from here was grotesque. That morning he had received a report of a tactical withdrawal. If this batch of troops were thinking that No. 232 Ost was some Lusthaus in France they were mistaken. All they had to do was listen to the approaching artillery fire. The Oberführer would be glad if he was transferred. He was not sure where he would prefer to serve — one’s head was on the block wherever one went. But it was disagreeable to have the Russians at one’s heels. He had a vision of the devil, tongue sticking out and genitals exposed, approaching with giant strides. He had more than once considered applying for a transfer to the front. Here it was not as comfortable as they might think in Berlin.
It was as though from morning to evening he was fed on something distasteful. He was disgusted by his surroundings, by the animality of the soldiers who came here with an eagerness worthy of a better purpose. He was disgusted by the company of the prostitutes, by his collaboration with Madam Kulikowa. He looked down his nose at the guards, even though they belonged to the same élite unit as himself, the Waffen-SS. He watched them as he used to watch the birds, the wolves, and the rats. He found the Madam distasteful, even if she performed like a virtuoso. He did not care for her solos or recitals. He had not been to a concert for two and a half years, not even on his home leave in Berlin. Was finding himself among tarts really the pinnacle of his career as a medical officer? They were sending him suspect and unscreened girls. If it did not mean such a lot of administrative trouble he would have found out from the Gestapo at Auschwitz-Birkenau about the youngest whore. Was Kauders a German name or a Jewish one? His vigilance and concern were tearing his nerves but he had lost his zeal. He had made it a condition that he did not want anyone below 14 or over 20, and the Wehrkreis was complying. So why was he anxious? He liked to think that the machine was still functioning properly.
He had a feeling that he was not living well, but wouldn’t admit to himself that things were slipping through his fingers. He proceeded with an unshakeable conviction that man was basically evil just as animals were evil, and anyone good behaved calculatingly and was therefore suspect.
He glanced at the gilded tin eagle on the gate, its head and beak thrusting from a white collar, its thick rough neck and huge wings. He would have to replace the mouldy mattresses in the cubicles. They squeaked. But he couldn’t really complain. No. 232 Ost ran like clockwork. Yet, as far as his military and medical career was concerned, he was treading water. Gone were yesterday’s dreams of advance, by the army and by himself, collectively and individually. He had every right, when the inspectors from the Wehrkreis came, to liken No. 232 Ost to a railway station with sixteen tracks and a punctual timetable. That was something at least, if not everything.
On the walls, which were topped with concertinas of barbed wire, the ravens were perching. They seemed to him like vultures.
The guards standing behind their machine guns were watching the green Daimler of an Einsatzgruppen officer through their field glasses. It was moving cautiously, skidding in places. Obersturmführer Stefan Sarazin of the Einsatzkommando der Einsatzgruppen parked by the wall, in the same spot at which he had tied up his horse the last time that he had been here. With the assistance of two guards he covered his windscreen and rear window with tarpaulins to stop them from icing over. It was obvious that he knew his way around. He moved confidently, as if he had come to have breakfast here.
He’d been on an operation. Just as he was a passionate football player and driver, so he was a useful member of a Jagdkommando. Wherever he served, he did so without fear and with total enthusiasm. He felt that he was getting better with time. It was alchemy of age and experience, the two going hand in hand. And there was a growing sense of belonging. He was becoming part of the Einsatzgruppen just as the Einsatzgruppen were becoming part of him. It was something elemental, it inspired him and became the foundation of his self-assurance. He felt himself straightening and growing, secure in the knowledge that there was no blemish on his military character. As to his army profile, name and reputation, he had no doubts. It would be ideal if he were just a soldier. Nothing but the Einsatzgruppen.
Something provoked his irritation. Somebody had torn out the wall hook and ring to which he tethered his horse. Had they donated the metal to help make guns? Or had it been done to annoy him? He had his reservations about the administrative efficiency of No. 232 Ost. The army was getting too bureaucratic. Not so the Einsatzgruppen. For many Germans the organization was no longer what it should be. The era of comradeship between Wehrmacht and Waffen-S S was over. Somebody only had to tear a hook out of the wall and his good humour was extinguished. That was not what he had come here for. He had his own ideas about running things. What would he tether his horse to next time? He despised organizations and individuals who had a logical reason for everything, even the most trivial decisions. He would punish excuses by shooting. The army was full of pen prushers. He was glad to have joined the Einsatzgruppen, on whom no army regulations or laws were binding. He would not like to see the Herrenwaffe change from a company of the brave into a bureaucracy.