‘Seldom clap eyes on them,’ muttered Süßmann.
‘We sometimes do,’ said Bertin. ‘Our company held a Whitsun service about half a year ago before Verdun, and we were all ordered to attend. There was the priest preaching about the Outpouring of the Holy Spirit in our cartridge tent and all around were baskets with yellow and green crosses on the labels.’
‘Brilliant,’ said Süßmann. Bertin didn’t need to tell him that yellow and green crosses denoted two of the three poisonous gases used in shells.
‘In his defence, I believe he was short-sighted,’ said Bertin, not joking.
‘Why?’ retorted Süßmann. ‘Surely the Prussians believe anything that serves the Fatherland pleases God. And we Jews should keep quiet,’ he added in a more serious tone. ‘Our Old God fits right in with this war.’
‘Yes,’ quipped Bertin. ‘I depart in my wrath, and my shadow falleth towards midnight upon Assur, so that the people crawl into caves and Rezin, King of Syria, laments in his palace of Damascus, and I strike the first born of Mizraim in the south, and shake my spear and lance, and like the hooves of the wild ass I trample down the seed of Ammon and the walls of Moab, saith the Lord.’
‘Nice sort of God,’ said Süßmann. ‘Where’s that from?’
‘From my heart,’ answered Bertin. ‘But I could just as easily have made it up.’
‘This is what happens when you hang about with poets,’ said Süßmann absently. He was watching a spider, a large, black female, who’d spun her web across a ventilator in the corner and was now dashing back and forth, irritated by the cigar smoke.
‘Poets…’ Bertin continued, thinking aloud. ‘No, not poets. Witnesses, writers. The hallmark of a poet is that he uses the full palette of his imagination – inventiveness and artistry. No scrimping on gods and goddesses, and a plausible fiction is better than the truth. But what is needed today in our situation is truth, not plausibility. Think about it, Süßmann. Our company toiled away at Steinbergquell depot for four months and nothing really happened. Then I was sent up to the front, I met young Kroysing on my first day there and he asked for my help. Is that plausible? Could I put that in a fictional story? No. But it’s true. And the truth goes on in that vein. The very next day, no sooner, no later, the lad is killed. The day after that, I go to look for him again so I can take his letter and help him out of the mess he’s in. He’s already dead, and his battalion has got what it wanted. But my eyes have been ripped open, and I’ve been galvanised into action. No, it’s not about poets – for now. As long as the effects of this war continue to shake the world, the survivors will need true accounts. Those who don’t survive will already have given everything humanly possible.’
‘What about me?’ a voice boomed from above, echoing off the ceiling. ‘I’ve already given everything humanly possible. I was actually dead. Shell splinters from our own hand grenades were whistling past my ears. It’s a miracle I survived. Shouldn’t I be able to call it a day?’
‘My dear Süßmann,’ said Bertin soothingly, ‘no-one expects any more of you.’
‘Thanks for the get-out,’ the thin, boyish voice snapped in the gloom. ‘That’s not what I was asking. I was asking if the whole business makes any sense. Is it worth it? That’s what I want to know. Will we at least get a decent new society out of all this appalling fumbling and fidgeting – a cosier home than the old Prussian one? A boy starts to think a bit when he reaches 16. By 17 he begins to imagine he knows how his future might turn out. I keep asking myself what the point of it is. How did it start, where will it lead and who’s benefiting from it?’
Bertin lay there, shocked. Shouldn’t he be the one asking these questions? But he’d given himself over entirely to the present now. He took what came, lived with it, abandoned himself to it. The devil only knows why I was naïve enough to confuse what is with what should be, he thought. I never used to do that; now I do. Perhaps I’ll understand later.
‘If my thoughts were all as harmless as that, things would be fine,’ Süßmann continued. ‘But there are a couple of things I haven’t been able to get out of my mind since I told you my story about the explosion. I picked your Sergeant Schulz’s brains about it yesterday. He maintains that secured shells, even French ones, only explode in certain special circumstances. But that explosion was a really big deal. Floors split down to the drains. Windows ripped out. That impact that threw us all against the walls. If it wasn’t the shells in the empty gun position, what was it?’ He became introspective for a moment, like someone who is turning a debatable point over and over in his head and therefore can’t converse. ‘Don’t think I’m just wallowing in my exciting past. Perhaps the vigilant French concealed a stack of mines so they could blow their own fort to bits if need be? And then our doughty Bavarians touched one off with flame thrower oil, flares and hand grenades. Brr,’ he shuddered and got down suddenly from his bed, appearing pale-faced at Bertin’s side. ‘I wouldn’t want to go through that again. What if we’re walking on a loaded mine and any idiot could accidentally make the contact and blow us to bits?’
Bertin sat up and looked into the desperate eyes of this 19-year-old with a man’s strength of judgement and suddenly shivered. ‘Sit down, Süßmann,’ he said soothingly. ‘Assuming that’s true, then you’re just as much at risk when you’re asleep as when you’re awake. You and your comrades at the front whom we’ll be crawling over to later. Does it really change your situation? I don’t see that it does. It makes it a shade worse, but what does that matter to a man like you?’
‘Hmm,’ said Süßmann, eyes to the ground, searching for caches of explosives under the layers of concrete. ‘Nicely put, but you’re just a visitor here.’
‘That’s not the point,’ countered Bertin, ‘I get the feeling I’m meant to record something of your sufferings and great deeds for the coming generation. It’s not just by chance that we met, you with your story to tell and the Kroysings with theirs. There’ll be more lies told about this war than about any other international conflict. It’ll be up to the survivors to tell the truth, and some of those who’ve something to say will survive. Why not you? Why not me? Why not Kroysing? Whether there’s a stack of explosives or not, Süßmann, you’ve already been through enough. Death never calls twice.’
Süßmann stuck his lip out defiantly. Then he laughed and clapped Bertin on the shoulder. ‘And I thought we didn’t have any decent field rabbis. You’re wearing the wrong gear, Bertin.’
Bertin laughed too. ‘My parents would gladly have made a rabbi out of me, but I read too much and had too many doubts. A clergyman must believe the way that priest in there with the lieutenant believes in his cross. And I don’t believe.’
Süßmann breathed more easily. ‘And yet you talk about destiny and being in good hands. You’re not much of a sceptic, Reverend Bertin,’ he said almost tenderly. ‘It’s amazing what words can do. Now I almost believe too, by which I mean believe it’s worth battling on here and that the men we’re going to visit at the front aren’t completely mad.’
CHAPTER FIVE
‘…will sign.’
ENTHRONED ON HIS hard, low-backed wooden stool, Father Lochner no longer looked as happy and confident as he had. ‘Tell me what you want, Lieutenant,’ he said quietly, ‘and I’ll do my best to get Captain Niggl to agree to it.’
Lieutenant Kroysing took a second piece of paper from the table, a small square sheet, and read: ‘The undersigned confesses that, in order to protect the reputation of the Third Company of his battalion and avoid court martial proceedings, he did, in conjunction with the heads of the company, intentionally and systematically precipitate the death of Sergeant Christoph Kroysing. Douaumont, 1916— the date, month and signature to be added.’