Hans Kirst - The Night of the Generals

Kahlenberge slowly shook his gleaming pate. “What unadulterated idiocy,” he said. He spoke like a man who was shouldering a burden which no one else cared to take on. The fact that he did so willingly was beside the point.

“It’s the truth, sir, every word of it,” protested Lance-Corporal Hartmann.

“No doubt,” said Kahlenberge wearily. “The truth as seen by one Lance-Corporal Hartmann, but not the whole truth as we are compelled to see it. All this happened on December 5th, 1941. On December 10th it was announced that one of our units, to wit yours, comprising six men and a sergeant, had fallen into Russian hands. According to official reports you were brutally murdered—eyes gouged out, balls cut off, bellies slit open, etcetera, etcetera. None of you escaped. The Propaganda Ministry gave the case the full treatment and played it for all it was worth.”

“It’s true,” Otto interposed. “Thanks to some first-class public relations work by various propaganda units and the S. D., the so-called neutral press flocked to the scene of the crime in droves. You should have seen the ink flow! They really went to town when they saw the bodies. There was nothing but mincemeat left.”

“As the details suggest,” Kahlenberge went on, “the Propaganda Ministry got weeks of material out of this piece of butchery. They even published a ‘Red Book’ on the subject, full of the most blood-curdling details. What’s more, our historian Captain Kahlert has collected a whole filing cabinet of data on the case.”

Otto the Fat nodded. “There’s no doubt about it, Hartmann. Officially, you’re dead.”

Kahlenberge excavated his right ear with his index finger. “And now you’ve turned up again. You’re alive, and that’s your personal bad luck. Unfortunately for you, you’re living proof that our Propaganda Ministry published a pack of lies.”

“How can I help it?” Hartmann asked helplessly. “I only did what anyone would have done. I don’t see how anyone can blame me for that.”

“What a dangerous attitude to take, Hartmann.” Kahlenberge eased himself back into his chair and raised his chin as though surrendering himself to the attentions of an invisible barber. “Are you seriously asking me how you can help being still alive? How can a man help being born a Jew or a Pole or a Prussian? Why does a human being happen to be on the receiving end of a bomb? Why do some people die in bed while others end their lives in a ditch or on the field of honour? The only valid question at this moment is: how can we decently save your neck?”

Lance-Corporal Rainer Hartmann looked bewildered. Otto the Fat regarded this demonstration of resentful incomprehension with growing disillusionment. “Heavens alive, man,” he exclaimed. “Can’t you get it through your thick head? You’re in the shit up to your neck.”

Kahlenberge massaged his hairless skull until it shone like a billiard ball. “Listen, my lad,” he said kindly. “You’ve escaped death by the skin of your teeth and it’s obviously proved too much for you. The very fact that you’re still alive is enough to hang you. You’re alive contrary to official instructions and in defiance of widely published reports. People will be wondering how you managed to survive. Don’t you get it? According to official information you’re dead—mutilated past recognition. A couple of dozen newspapers say so. But since you still exist, Hartmann, that makes you perfect material for every conceivable kind of enemy counter-propaganda. Don’t you see that?”

“I shall be happy to follow any advice I’m given, sir,” said Hartmann, trying unsuccessfully to brush a leaf of hair off his forehead. “But I’m still not clear what’s expected of me.”

“In the view of the S. D.,” said Kahlenberge, “there can be only one explanation for your survival. These people are convinced that only a man who had sold himself to the Russians could have survived. Therefore, you betrayed your companions and let them be slaughtered. Your fellow-soldiers’ appalling death was the price you paid to save your own miserable neck. Q. E. D.”

“But that’s not so!” exclaimed Hartmann, visibly shattered. “Really not, I swear it!”

“For the present, Hartmann, I’m only interested in useful facts, nothing more. That being so, you’ll have to make some fundamental changes in this statement of yours. Otto will help you—he knows the ropes. If you’re to convince them, your only possible line is that you purposely misled the Russians. Purposely, do you hear! No twaddle about fainting-fits or temporary loss of memory and voices or other doubtful jokes of that sort. Make a note of that, Otto. People only believe what they want to believe. Hartmann fought for his life methodically. He outwitted the Russians and waged a dangerous and determined battle for continued existence. He was a hero, not a victim. There’s no other way of explaining things. Are we agreed?”

“All clear, sir,” declared Otto vigorously. “Isn’t that right, Hartmann?”

“Why not?” Hartmann’s voice was resigned. “I want to live, after all.”

“That’s the ticket!” Kahlenberge pushed the papers back decisively and dealt them a playful slap with his hand. There was something final about the gesture. “We all want to live—as long as we can, that is. Ours is a heroic age.”

The room was cold and smooth as a metal box. The predominant colour was a chalky white against which the wall-maps stood out like blemishes. Even the few pieces of furniture dotted round the room failed to alleviate its depressing monotony.

The harsh light illuminated a bottle and two tumblers, and, just beyond the immediate radius of the lamp’s glare, the faces of Sergeant Engel and Major Grau. Engel was slumped wearily in his chair, while Grau smilingly studied the light through his glass.

Engel grinned discreetly. “You wouldn’t put anything past those generals, would you, Major?”

There was a rustle of silk as Major Grau leant forward slightly, but his expression betrayed no identifiable emotion. His elegance had an irritating quality. No one who saw him would have believed that he was associated with one of the dirtier aspects of war.

“Impatience is not one of my vices, as you know, Engel,” Grau said blandly, “but I should be interested to hear if you’ve managed to verify any details.”

“Of course, sir, as far as I was able. From all that has come out so far it really seems on the cards that a general was responsible.”

“And why shouldn’t it have been a general?” asked Grau with a disarming smile. “After all, someone must have done it.”

Engel played a scale on his knuckles. “All the same, Major, it’s a case of brutal murder.”

“Experience tells us that murder is far from being a prerogative of the insane—or even of the lower classes, so why shouldn’t a general join the club for once?” Major Grau smiled pensively. “To the gaping mob, a Prussian or a German general is much the same as a national monument, but compared with some of the specimens I’ve met any village schoolmaster’s a genius and any tramp’s a gentleman.”

“Oh yes,” said Engel, “that’s all very true. I’ve caught a general with a male tart before now on a raid. But surely, sir, the real question is—who’s going to believe us?”

Grau’s voice took on the deliberate tones of a don delivering an important lecture. “Don’t you see, Engel? We can beat these lads at their own game: history. We can wrap their past round their necks until it chokes them. We can take it for granted that these inflated idiots who enjoy sounding off about honour and tradition whenever it serves their purpose are really poor whipped curs. We can also take it for granted that they’ve always run off with their tails between their legs whenever they’ve been treated accordingly. We can tell ourselves that they were better at their job in the days of the Great Elector. Frederick the Great made marionettes out of them. In 1848 they let themselves be cut to pieces in Berlin by a handful of comparatively harmless revolutionaries. Under William the Second they became tailor’s dummies. During the Weimar Republic their sole remaining wish was to survive. And when Adolf Hitler arrived on the scene they crawled to him on their bellies and licked his hand.”