Christopher Reich - The Runner

Legs stretched before her, hands brushing the cool grass, Ingrid remained motionless until her heartbeat calmed and the sweat ceased pouring from her forehead. Her eyelids grew heavy. She wanted to sleep. A lazy voice told her not to worry about the return trip up the mountain. She could get a lift with an American serviceman. They were everywhere these days. Though forbidden to fraternize with Germans, none paid the rule much heed. Besides, she’d never had a problem convincing men to bend the rules — or even to break them.

Drifting off, she entertained a vision of herself stumbling into Inzell in her torn blue work dress and stained apron, the silk foulard tied around her head dark with sweat. Her face was blotchy; her lips crusted with spittle. She looked more like a haggardhausfrau than a damsel in distress. The horniest GI in Germany wouldn’t give her a second look!

Shaking off her desire to sleep, she stood and walked to the wheelbarrow. Several bottles had shifted during the journey. She re-wrapped each and positioned them carefully on top of the pile. How easy it would be to drop one, she imagined. To lighten her load by a single, heavenly pound. Angered by her lingering lethargy, she dismissed the thought. Then what would she bring home to the children? Ingrid bent her knees and draped the harness around her neck. Taking firm hold of the wooden grips, she rose. For one excruciating moment, every muscle in her being screamed. Clenching her jaw, she allowed herself one deep breath, then began walking. The path was three miles, all downhill.

She had done it before. She could do it again.

The village of Inzell boasted a grocer, a butcher, a clothing store and a combination tobacconist and kiosk. The stores were evenly spaced along either side of a narrow road. All were identical two-storey buildings of burnished wood and whitewashed cement topped with dark shingle roofs. Running up the mountainside behind them were a host of chalets, cabins and huts. Window boxes blossoming with daisies and dandelions brightened every sill. To all appearances, the war had never ventured into this Alpine valley. At the far side of the village, a tall stone fountain shaped like Napoleon’s Obelisk shot water into a circular pool. Next to it stood a railway station, complete in every detail except one. No tracks passed before the passenger platform. Construction of the spur from Ruhpolding to Inzell had stopped in February 1943. After Stalingrad, every ingot of steel, every bar of iron and every cord of wood was diverted to the protection of the Reich.

Setting down the wheelbarrow next to the fountain, Ingrid lifted the harness from her neck, then peeled the foulard from her hair and dunked her head into the cold water. A shiver of pride and relief swept her body. After rinsing her hands, she pulled her hair back into a pony tail and smoothed her dress. Her damp fingers made sure it clung in all the right places. Now she could do business.

“Good morning, Frau Grafin,” chirped Ferdy Karlsberg as she entered his tiny store. “How are you this lovely day?”

Like every grocer she’d known, Karlsberg was short and fat and, if not a pincher, at least a leerer. He had ginger hair and bright blue eyes and cheeks so bloated she swore he must be caching a dozen acorns for the winter. As usual, he was having a great deal of trouble keeping his eyes from her dress. Today, though, she welcomed his interest.

“Good morning, Herr Karlsberg,” she answered, determined to match his good cheer. “I’m wonderful, thank you.” She didn’t dare say it was much too hot for trudging down the mountain with a thousand pound wheelbarrow. Instead, she chose her most vulnerable smile. “The usual, I’m afraid.”

She removed a yellow card from her dress and passed it across the counter. Her ration card entitled her to three loaves of bread, two hundred grams of meat, one hundred grams of butter, one hundred grams of sugar, a pound of flour and a pound of wheat each week. Theoretically, it was enough to insure a daily intake of 1,200 calories for three adults and one child. But theory died a quick death in the real world. The meat — sausage, actually — was often rancid; the butter, sour; the bread always black and stale. There was nothing wrong with the sugar, flour or wheat once one removed the rat droppings.

Karlsberg tore a square of brown paper from a dispenser on the wall and laid it on the counter. Turning his back to her, he ran a hand along his shelves collecting first the bread, then the sausage. Naturally, he chose the smallest ones. He measured out the flour and wheat, weighing them on a scale she was sure ran a few ounces heavy, then placed each in a paper sack. When she asked about her sugar and butter, he shrugged. “The food authority failed to provide any in the latest delivery. I am sorry.”

Ingrid offered Karlsberg her best smile. The food was hardly enough to feed a growing boy, let alone Papa, Herbert and herself. She’d spent hours figuring how she might get her hands on a ration card entitling her to more food. Miners in the Ruhr were receiving double rations, as were farmers and skilled laborers. A widow and her child were hardly vital to the nation’s reconstruction.

There was another way.

She recalled her visit from General Carswell, his kindly smile and flirtatious manner.

Would she be interested answering some questions about her father’s activities, say at the Casa Carioca in Garmisch? Eyeing the meager provisions set on the counter, she decided she’d been naive to decline so quickly.

Karlsberg wrapped the bread and sausage and, using both of his stubby hands, slid them across the counter. “Is there something else I can help you with?” His eyes were fixed on the only thing he found more appealing than her wet dress — the wheelbarrow outside his front window.

Ingrid smiled coyly, baiting him. “Are you sure you don’t have any sugar?” Karlsberg blushed, then grew angry at his shame. “Come around back and don’t make any trouble.”

Ingrid guided the wheelbarrow to the rear of the building where the grocer was already waiting. She found the charade ridiculous. Everyone in the valley knew Ferdy Karlsberg was a black marketeer. She supposed Herr Schnell, the local constable, had insisted he run his operations from the back of his store. It was just like a Nazi to condone an illegal activity as long as it didn’t soil the impression of legitimate business.

“What do you have to offer today?” Karlsberg asked, his smile back in place.

In the two months since the war had ended, Ingrid had become an expert in the workings of the black market. Reichsmarks were practically worthless, yet Germans were not permitted to own dollars. A new currency backed by a new government would not be introduced for a year or two. Still, people wanted something to eat, smoke, drink, and wear — in that order. The fiat of the new Germany was cigarettes, preferably American, preferably Lucky Strike. Want a pound of ham? Three cartons of Luckies. A bottle of White Horse scotch? Five cartons. A pair of hose? One carton. But most Germans did not have access to the American post exchange. For them — and Ingrid, who included herself in this number — any household item of value would do provided you had someone to sell it to. Cameras and binoculars were in particularly hot demand. Wine, unfortunately, less so. For her, men like Ferdy Karlsberg existed.

Ingrid handed him a bottle, gauging his reaction as he removed the linen cloth.

Karlsberg’s eyes glowed when he eyed the label—a 1921 Château Petrus. “Is it all this quality?”

She nodded. What did the fool expect Alfred Bach kept in his cellar? A few Rieslings and a Gewürztraminer?

For the next hour, Karlsberg examined the bottles one by one, making notations on a block of paper. Petrus, Latour, Lafitte-Rothschild, Eschezeau. Wines fit for a king. When he had finished, he tallied up his figures and pronounced, “Ten thousand Reichsmarks.”