Арнольд Цвейг - Outside Verdun

‘Well,’ said Private Halezinsky in a quavering voice to his nearby friend, Karl Lebehde, ‘another successful strike.’

‘Think so? asked Lebehde, lighting a night-time cigarette with remarkable sangfroid. ‘I’d venture to suggest they were after the railway station, August, which did take one hit. They’ll sort us out next time.’

It was tempting to wander over there now. There would be hot shell splinters and fuses in the fresh bomb holes, and they could be sold for a good price. By early the next morning, the railwaymen would have nabbed them all. But the sergeants were ushering their men back to bed.

The barracks had been aired in the meantime and had cooled down. It was half past one, so they could still easily grab four hours’ sleep. Halezinsky went to his bed and shone a light to check for rats. The electric light fell on the bed to the left of his. Someone was actually lying there sleeping. ‘Karl,’ he called quietly in utter astonishment, ‘look at this. He must be a sound sleeper.’

The two men looked at Bertin’s sleeping form almost reverently. He’d slept through the alarm, the attack and the bomb explosions that had destroyed a railway track and the fields 70 or 80 metres across the road. The next morning, he would be the only one who didn’t believe the reports of the night before, who thought he was being taken for a ride. He would sacrifice some of his lunch break to go and see the bomb holes that had appeared overnight in the green fields and were big enough to accommodate a telephone box. He would bend over to touch the rails that had been blasted apart and check for freshly filled shell holes between the two rods. That was how completely his sleeping self had pushed aside the world of war, where a demise such as that of Kroysing was possible. A couple of kilometres ahead, machine guns were sweeping the ripped up ground under the limelight of flares; several thousand men, covered in earth, riddled with shell splinters, mangled by direct hits and poisoned by gas, huddled in bomb holes or behind ramparts to escape the fire bursts as the guns picked off flying shells. But only a mile and half away, a man of around 30 with good hearing had been able to sleep through a bomb attack, plunged into the deepest sanctuary and safety known to man, akin to the oblivion of the grave.

THE GERMANS WERE using all the smaller and larger settlements in the Meuse area as bases and had made themselves at home there. Of course, they admired the men at the front and the way they endured privations under fire in the mud, but they didn’t let that dent their self-esteem. The further behind the lines you went, the more obviously the war metamorphosed into a system of administration and supply. A bunch of bureaucrats in uniform held absolute sway here. They didn’t like to hear talk of later restitution. They requisitioned what they needed and paid with stamped paper, which France was supposed to redeem later. To them cleanliness, staunch service and the military for its own sake were the highest virtues. That they lived in primitive rustic stone cottages, without comforts such as warm water, tiled baths and leather armchairs, was to them a sacrifice for which the people and the Fatherland would one day have to compensate them; such was their war.

Damvillers, a modest village on the provincial railway line called Le Meusien, was one of hundreds with no influence on the fate of the wider area. That hobnailed German soldiers and distinguished officers in shiny boots now scraped across the paving stones and floorboards instead of farmers in blue jackets and clogs hadn’t changed that one iota. Some were quartered permanently in Damvillers, some temporarily, while others went there for the day to relieve the tedium or get provisions for their units. Major Jansch was in the former category, Captain Niggl in the latter.

The tedium— the German state relied on officers: active soldiers and yeomen from the Landwehr, and behind the lines men from the military Reserve and reservists from the Landsturm, important gentlemen with dirks on their belts and helmets on their heads. The shiny spike on their helmets pretty much embodied the pinnacle of human existence for them. Neither Niggl, a retired civil servant from Weilheim, nor Psalter, a head teacher from Neuruppin, nor Jansch, Berlin-Steglitz, an editor, could imagine a higher peak, although Jansch was in a special position because he had played soldiers in civilian life too as editor of Army and Fleet Weekly . In peacetime, they’d drawn a monthly income of about 300 Marks. Now, for as long as the war lasted, the paymaster handed them three times that on the first of each month, besides which eating, drinking and smoking cost very little, and accommodation and letters home nothing at all. A man could certainly manage on that. And this was how it was for hundreds of gentlemen in Crépion, Vavrille, Romagne, Chaumont, in Jamez and Vitarville; everywhere that was occupied. As far as they were concerned, the war couldn’t last long enough, even if they were often bored or required to do tedious, detailed work.

Where the lines of communication began with the field police sentries at the crossroads, a desolation descended on the men born of daily duty unrelieved by intellectual life or women and children, a struggle for existence with no science or art, gramophone music, cinema or theatre, and with almost no politics. The lines of communication were as indispensable to the front lines as a mother’s bloodstream to her unborn child, feeding them, helping them to grow and continually supplying their every need. ‘Supplies’ was the magic word in the communications zone. Everything – from hay bales for the horses to ammunition, leave trains and bread rations – rested on its absolute reliability. Without it, the men at the front wouldn’t have lasted a week. And so the staff in the communications zone bathed in the sunshine of their immeasurable importance. It radiated from every orderly and staff sergeant, but most especially from the officers. They did their duty, ate reasonably well, drank good local wine, conspired against each other and performed small reciprocal favours.

And so it was that Major Jansch, commander of the X/20 ASC battalion, came to clink his spurs on Lieutenant Psalter’s steps. A major visiting a lieutenant. And not just any major, the Great Jansch. And not just any lieutenant – flat-nosed Lieutenant Psalter from the transport depot, with his close-cropped black hair, scarred face and myopic eyes. Was it the end of the world? Not at all. A lieutenant in the transport corps has access to vehicles. Ordinarily, an off-duty ASC major would take nothing to do with him, but if that major needed a favour, he had to ask nicely. The railway transport officer at Damvillers belonged to the Moirey park officers’ drinking club, which was not on good terms with Major Jansch. The commander was in a position to question the whys and wherefores of every case of wine that Major Jansch sent home – if indeed it contained wine. This could potentially open up a great pit into which the major might quietly disappear. (The officers had agreed with Herr Graßnick to shelve the unpleasant water tap incident simply in order to get one over on Major Jansch.) Major Jansch’s goods therefore had to leave from other railway stations. And so even a newborn child could understand why Major Jansch was now affably pulling up a chair at his comrade Psalter’s desk for a chat, or, as Herr Jansch put it, a chinwag.

Herr Jansch was a gaunt man of about 50 with a long, thin moustache, who in profile looked rather like a raven. On the other armchair in Lieutenant Psalter’s rustic room sat a chubby-cheeked man with sly, watery eyes and a little beard that made him look quite friendly: Captain Niggl from the Bavarian labour company stationed on the other side of the Romagne ridge. He had come to Lieutenant Psalter with a concern of his own. As he was only passing through Damvillers, he wanted to make the most of his time and had asked to be dealt with quickly. His problem was one of the utmost importance to any soldier. It concerned beer, four barrels of Münchner Hornschuh-Bräu, which had been delivered into Captain Niggl’s hands for his four companies by way of his brother-in-law, although they were actually meant for the infantry of the two Bavarian divisions at the front. However, the high-ups had eventually realised that the ASC men must have their turn too, and the four barrels had been lying at Dun train station since the previous day. If the infantry got wind of it, it would be farewell, amber nectar. A barrel of beer was worth a little thievery. Captain Niggl indicated that if Lieutenant Psalter’s trusty lorry drivers successfully delivered the precious goods to battalion headquarters, there would be a drinking party and all the gentlemen from Damvillers would be most welcome. The beer could be watered down a tad for the ASC men. No harm in that.