Уильям Макгиверн - Soldiers of ’44

He spoke in French and smiled at her, but she was frightened by the tension in his bright, unfocused eyes.

“Yes, I’m alone, colonel.”

“You recognize my rank? Good.” Jaeger spoke in German now. “Can I assume from that you’ve been friendly with my comrades-in-arms, fräulein?”

“There were times when I had no choice.”

“So if you were friendly, it wasn’t a matter of choice.” He glanced about the room. “You’re the schoolteacher here?”

“Did someone tell you that?”

“What is there to be evasive about, fräulein? You speak French and German, the look of your hands hardly indicates you spend much time in the barnyard.”

“I didn’t mean to be evasive. I was surprised.”

He smiled as if accepting an apology and walked about the room, glancing at the mirror over the mantelpiece, then at a sewing basket on the floor. Stopping, he removed his gloves and studied the solid wall, the central panel decorated with a brightly painted angel’s head.

He looked at the schoolteacher, the smile leaving his face. “In my case, fräulein, I’ve never been a teacher. A student, of course, and not too bad, some of my instructors were kind enough to tell me. But perhaps they were just trying to get rid of me, give me good marks so they could pass me on to someone else.”

He removed the briar pipe from his overcoat and stared at it with a puzzled frown, wondering what he had planned to do with it. His words made no sense to him. “... but perhaps they were just trying to get rid of me...” What did that mean, they wanted to get rid of Rudi, not Karl Jaeger...?

“At the Berlin Academy I studied fortifications, fräulein,” he said. “This involved mathematics, engineering, that sort of thing.” With one hand, he made a gesture of dismissal. “Of course, I couldn’t build a cathedral or a château, I wasn’t trained as an architect, but I think I could put up a little house like this... yes, I’m quite sure of it...”

He rapped the wall above the gaily decorated angel’s head and glanced at the schoolteacher, found he was unable to bring her pale features into focus. He blinked his eyes, but failed to clear away the strange veil between them... her dark hair continued to float like a cloud about her face... He rapped again on the wall and began to pound the middle panel heavily and rhythmically with his fist. “But if I built a house, I wouldn’t make the mistake of blocking off a stairway—”

“It was done to save heat.”

“How do you get down to the cellar?”

“There’s no need to, colonel.”

“What about storage? What about vegetables and firewood?”

“There’s nothing left to store. The firewood is in a shed in the garden.”

“You sound as if you’ve memorized those answers, fräulein. Which you probably have. I know you’re lying.” Jaeger pounded his fist for emphasis against the wall. “I’ve talked to the priest here. Father Juneau. He’s been very helpful. He’s the one who told me that you’re the schoolteacher here, and that you have a Jewish child living with you.”

The alarm that drummed on her nerves sent a involuntary shudder through her body.

“No, that’s not true.”

“Why would the priest lie to me?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know why he’s lying, which amounts to saying that he is lying. Correct, fräulein?”

“Perhaps he thought it was the truth. Or the truth as he knows it.”

Denise was beginning to realize, and with a sense of exquisite relief, that she had nothing to fear from this German officer. Her first shock of panic had been like a racial memory of terror, a nervous spasm that had made her forget for an instant that Margret was safe with the nuns. Now there was only herself, and while this man might hurt her or even kill her, she felt that if he did, he would be damaging something renewed and valuable.

“Colonel, Father Juneau’s truth has a way of changing, depending on whether he’s talking to members of the Resistance or German soldiers.”

“Why would he lie when the truth is so easily proven?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know. Why would a priest lie when a lie is a sin against God and everything he professes to believe? Didn’t you ever discuss such things at your school in Berlin?”

“Those matters have nothing to do with warfare... I was taught to use guns and tanks, and to obey orders. But I learned what lies sound like, and I know Father Juneau was telling the truth.” He studied the briar pipe, then put it away in a pocket of his greatcoat. “Do you deny there’s a Jewish child here?”

“Yes, I do.”

“She’s your brother’s daughter. Was Father Juneau lying when he told me that?”

“As you said, the truth can be easily proven. Why not smash this house down and see for yourself?” She savored the reckless anger in her voice. “And if you find a Jewish child here, will it save your world and your soul to stand her up in front of a firing squad and kill her?”

“You can’t say things like that to me.” A tightness in the muscles of his throat made it difficult for him to speak. He began to pound his fist against the wall. “You can’t pretend you’re all saints and angels. Too late for that—”

The panel shattered under his blows. He hammered at the carved angel’s head and when the bolts broke free the tiny figure fell to the floor and rolled onto the hearthstone, where it rocked back and forth, its blank eyes glittering in the firelight.

Jaeger was so agitated he felt beads of sweat gathering on his forehead, prickling the backs of his hands... “Who betrayed you, fräulein? And the Americans and the Jewish child? It was the priest who wants to be safe and comfortable, with a warm fire on winter nights. Those are his eternal verities, a good meal and a bottle of wine, not the truth of God he pretends to live with. Yet you accuse me of being a monster, of lusting to execute a helpless child. I have children of my own, did you know that? Two little daughters in Dresden...” The constriction in his throat worsened; his voice was high and straining, as if the words were being squeezed past his corded neck muscles. “I’ve disobeyed my orders, fräulein. Do you think that’s easy for a soldier? I was told to destroy every member of the American gun crew on your Mont Reynard. Instead I’ve offered them honorable terms of surrender. But will they accept? Will they trust me? No, because their sergeant is a madman, too stubborn and stupid to distinguish between reality and appearance.”... Jaeger raised a booted foot and slammed it against the wall, and the boards broke and fell with a crash into the stairwell leading to the cellar. Taking a flashlight from his overcoat pocket, he snapped it on and went quickly down the narrow flight of stairs.

As he did so Denise ran to the wooden bureau on the opposite side of the room, jerked open the top drawer and lifted out the bolstered automatic. She tried to open the holster flap, but her fingers were too cold and stiff as they tugged clumsily against the leather strap locked in a metal clasp. She could hear the German in the cellar shouting something she couldn’t understand, but the wildness in his voice intensified her fear. Somehow, the strap did come free and she pulled the gun from the holster, trying to remember what the American sergeant had told her... “Move the safety lever toward the red metal dot.” She tried to do that now but the lever was jammed or broken and would not budge. When she heard him clattering up the wooden stairs, she put the gun behind her back and turned quickly to face him.

“Where is she?”

“I told you, I’m alone here.”

“That’s not what I asked you. She was here, the child was here.” He thrust a sheaf of papers in front of her and pointed at them with an accusing finger. “Look! Pictures of birds, a child’s drawings. Where is she?”