Werner’s killer.
He was about to kill again. Two men were kneeling in front of him, one protesting violently, the other looking down at the ground. The muzzle of the rifle was resting on the former’s forehead.
Behind them, a line of women with petrified faces were clutching all sorts of kitchen pots. The standpipe beside them was noisily splashing water into the dust.
The rifle cracked and the head almost seemed to explode, showering the victim’s companion with blood and brain. Several women screamed, and some began to sob. Paul started forward, pulling the machine pistol from his belt.
Some of the women noticed him, but none of them shouted out. The rifle cracked again, and the second man collapsed in a heap.
Paul was about ten metres away. Hearing footsteps behind him the Obersturmführer turned. Seeing a soldier in uniform he offered Paul a curt smile, as if to reassure him that everything was in hand.
He was still smiling when Paul put a bullet in his stomach. He tried to lift the rifle, but a second shot to the chest put him down on his knees. He looked up with lost puppy eyes, and Paul smashed the pistol across the side of his head with all the force he could muster.
The man slumped to the ground, blue eyes dead and open.
Paul dropped the pistol. He felt suddenly dizzy, and stood there, swaying slightly, only dimly aware of the world around him. A woman was saying something, but he couldn’t hear what. He could see something coming towards him, but had no idea what it was.
Someone was calling his name. ‘It’s me. Your Dad. Are you okay?’
‘Dad?’ He couldn’t believe it.
Russell put an arm around the boy’s shoulders. On his way to the standpipe for the second time that day, he’d been lucky enough to see the SS officer before the SS officer saw him, and had witnessed the whole scene from a corner fifty metres up the road. Unarmed, he had watched aghast as the executions took place, and only realised at the last moment that the lone soldier was his son. ‘It’s me. Are you okay?’
Paul had no idea what the answer to that was. ‘He killed my friend, Dad,’ was all that came to mind.
‘You knew one of those men?’
‘No, no. Not today. He killed my friend Werner. Two days ago, or three. Werner was only fourteen, and he hanged him as a deserter.’ Paul started to cry and Russell cradled him in his arms, or at least tried to. His son was now taller than he was.
‘We’ll go to Effi’s building,’ he told Paul. ‘It’s only a ten-minute walk, but I have to get some water first.’ He had left his containers further up the street, but those that belonged to the dead men were still sitting on the pavement, so he simply collected those and waited for his turn at the tap. Paul stood off to one side, staring blankly into the distance.
Water collected, they each took two containers and started up the street. But they’d hardly gone a hundred metres when two Panthers rumbled across the intersection with Bismarck Strasse, a surprisingly neat formation of troops following in their wake. Hitlerjugend, to judge by their size.
Another followed. They stopped and waited for the danger to pass, but eventually another tank slewed round the corner and headed towards them. Russell led Paul off into a side street, looking for somewhere to hide for a while. There was a small enclosed courtyard a little way down, with a full complement of surrounding walls, and they took up refuge inside, straining their ears for approaching men or armour.
Russell knew he should talk to his silent son, but couldn’t think where to begin. With what had just happened? With his mother’s death? What could he say that wouldn’t rub salt in wound after wound? Just what he felt, perhaps. ‘It’s so good to see you,’ he said simply. ‘I’ve missed you so much.’
Paul stared back at him, a solitary tear running down one cheek. ‘Yes,’ he said, the ghost of a smile forming on his lips.
‘It heals,’ Russell heard himself say, just as footsteps sounded in the street outside. A moment later a man put his head round the corner of the courtyard entrance. He was wearing a leather jacket and baggy trousers tucked into high felt boots. A star adorned the front of his hat.
Seeing the two of them sitting against the wall, he cal ed out to his comrades and ran quickly forward, rifle at the ready. Russell and Paul raised their hands high, and got to their feet. By this time two others had arrived. Both were wearing around a dozen wrist watches on the outside of their sleeves.
‘Comrade, I need to talk to your commanding officer,’ Russell told the soldier in his own language. How long had his father spoken Russian, Paul wondered.
The soldier looked surprised, but only for a second. ‘Come,’ he ordered, swinging his rifle in the requested direction.
They were hustled down the street. In a courtyard further down a Red Army sergeant with pale blue eyes was studying a street map in the front seat of an American jeep. He looked up with a bored expression.
‘Comrade, I have been working for the Soviet Union,’ Russell told him. ‘I have credentials from the NKVD inside my jacket. Will you look at them please?’
The eyes were more interested now, but also suspicious. ‘Give them to me.’
Russell handed over Nikoladze’s letter and watched the man read it. At that rate War and Peace would take the rest of his life.
‘Get in the jeep,’ the sergeant told him.
Russell stood his ground. ‘This is my son,’ he told the Russian.
‘This says nothing about a son,’ the sergeant said, waving the letter. ‘And he is a German soldier.’
‘Yes, but he is my son.’
‘Then you will meet again. Your son is prisoner. Don’t worry – he will not be shot. We are not like Germans.’
‘Please, don’t separate us,’ Russell pleaded.
‘Get in the jeep,’ the sergeant reiterated, a hand on his holstered pistol.
‘I’ll be all right, Dad,’ Paul managed to say.
Russell climbed in beside the driver, and another man climbed in behind them. ‘I’ll find you,’ Russell shouted above the revving engine, and was almost thrown from his seat as the jeep swung out of the courtyard. Looking back, he had a final glimpse of Paul standing among his captors, his face bereft of expression.
The jeep roared down Kant Strasse, where only a few wary-looking Soviet infantry were in evidence. As far as Russell could see the Russians were advancing eastward up this street while German troops headed west along the parallel Bismarck Strasse, like dogs chasing each other’s tails. The Soviets would eventually win through of course, but they might, for the moment, have over-extended themselves in this particular sector. It was hard to tell. It might take them days to reach Effi’s building. Or only hours.
He prayed she would be all right.
He prayed that Paul would be all right. He had believed the Russian’s promise not to shoot his son, but front-line troops were one thing – they tended to respect their opposite numbers – the men behind them something else. And there was always the chance that Paul would run into someone who was aching for revenge. At best he would end up in a poorly provisioned prison camp, with no prospect of an early release. The Soviets were slow at the best of times, and looking after German POWS would be nowhere on their list of priorities.
Russell found it hard to blame them. If he was Stalin, he’d probably keep his German prisoners until they’d rebuilt every last home and factory.
But the thought of another long separation was almost unbearable. On the last occasion he’d seen his son, Russell had left a fourteen-year-old boy to complete a U-Bahn journey on his own, and worried that something might go wrong. Today he had watched him stride up to an SS officer and shoot the man dead. How many shocks and blows had it taken to get from one to the other? Shocks and blows that a father might have managed to soften or deflect.