Michel Déon - The Foundling Boy

Our young German is, therefore, an occasional character. It would certainly be enjoyable to imagine that during the great upheaval that will, by its end, have whittled Europe away to almost nothing, he will again meet, at some bend in the road or the bottom of some shell-hole, his French friend from the summer of 1936. What a marvellous scene one could write, recounting their reunion in enemy uniforms! I can already see them shaking hands instead of murdering each other as the rules of war demand, recalling to each other their happy hours on the Lombardy plain, their climb up to the Passo della Futa between Bologna and Florence, their arrival in Rome browned by the sun. Unfortunately the war, so potentially fertile in coincidences, will not supply that opportunity, and each of them will pursue his destiny without influencing the other. I can even tell you at once Ernst’s fate in the great cataclysm to come: enlisted in a tank regiment in September 1939 for the invasion of Poland, sergeant during the French campaign, in which he and his unit will reach Bordeaux, lieutenant by spring 1941, as Panzer divisions flatten the Soviet wheatfields. Attached to the Legion of French Volunteers as an interpreter, he will glimpse, along with his French mercenaries posted to the vanguard by Hitler in memory of Napoleon, a signpost indicating ‘Moscow 12 kilometres’, before retreating with his comrades and being promoted to captain outside Stalingrad. In 1943 we shall find him in Italy again, a tank officer without a tank, first fighting an infantry battle against General Juin’s Moroccans at Monte Cassino, then against partisans in the Abruzzi. In 1945, at twenty-five, he will be a major, Iron Cross first class, wounded three times, never seriously, and will return home, boots full of holes and uniform in tatters, to discover that his home in Cologne no longer exists, that his father, mother and sister were all killed in a bombing raid. He will commit suicide by biting a cyanide capsule as two members of the British Military Police arrive to arrest him in the cellar, where he has taken up residence with the rats.

This devastating future of fire, blood, glory and desolation did not yet weigh on the young man who leant his bike next to Jean’s and thrust his blond head into the fountain. When he straightened up with his eyelashes glued together and hair, suddenly less blond, plastered to his head, he burst out laughing.

‘You’re French?’ he asked.

‘Yes. How do you know?’

Ernst burst out laughing a second time, pointing at the maker’s name on Jean’s bicycle.

‘I know everything!’ he said. ‘Except whether you’re heading north or south.’

‘South.’

‘Like me. Shall we ride together?’

‘With pleasure. I’d like to stop at Parma this afternoon.’

‘There’s nothing to see at Parma,’ Ernst said.

‘Yes, there is. Some Correggios, especially a fresco of a Madonna blessed by Jesus in the library, which moved Stendhal to tears.’

‘Stendhal? That sounds like a German name.’

‘No, he was from the Dauphiné. His real name was Henri Beyle.’

‘Is he your god?’

‘I don’t have a god yet. To be honest, I’m utterly ignorant, as I discover every day. Three months ago I didn’t even know Stendhal’s name.’

‘I didn’t know it two minutes ago.’

‘You’ve got an excuse. What’s your name?’

‘Ernst. In French it’s Ernst. What’s yours?’

‘Jean. How do you say it in German?’

‘Hans. If you like I’ll call you Hans and you can call me Ernst.’

‘Okay. Shall we make a start?’

Riding with Ernst was a pleasure. He kept up a steady pace without the slightest exertion and produced an unbroken stream of conversation. Very soon Jean knew that his father was a philosophy professor at Cologne, and that as he was on the point of leaving, his father had played a rotten trick on him.

‘As it happens, I’d packed a copy of Mein Kampf in my satchel—’

‘What’s Mein Kampf?’

‘What? Don’t you know? I can see you really are an ignoramus. Have you ever heard of Adolf Hitler?’

‘A bit. My father says he’s a warmonger, and Léon Blum says at the next elections the socialists will cut him down to size.’

Ernst again burst into laughter. His cheerfulness appeared to be indestructible.

‘Is your father a socialist?’ he asked.

‘Yes. A pacifist socialist. He fought in the last war and lost a leg.’

‘That’s uncanny! My father fought in the last war too, he’s a social democrat and he lost his left arm in the forest of Argonne. Maybe they both shot each other? Who knows.’

‘Yes, who knows. What about your Mein Kampf?’

‘In a book that he wrote in prison, Hitler spelt out his whole programme step by step: how he’ll annex Austria, take back Dantzig, remake Poland’s borders, and gather into one great Reich the German minorities who have been oppressed since the Treaty of Versailles. And he will do it, I guarantee it. Your Léon Blum can’t have read Mein Kampf .’

‘And I urge you to notice that your Hitler hasn’t yet accomplished his programme.’

‘Yes, he has. The first point. And only this year — France has a short memory — he remilitarised the Rhineland.’

‘That’s true, I’d forgotten. Well, let’s see what happens next. It’s nothing to gloat about, nobody tried to stop him. So what about this Mein Kampf?’

‘Well, I was sure I’d packed it in my satchel. But my father took it out and replaced it with a copy of Goethe’s Italian Journey . I was beside myself with fury. I almost rode back to Cologne, but on the endpaper Papa had written, “To my dear boy, for him to dream now and then.” So I said to myself, All right, this is my holiday. When I get back from Italy I’ll have plenty of time to study Mein Kampf in the evenings at my Hitler Youth meetings.’

‘You’re a Nazi?’

‘Of course, like every boy my age. What about you?’

‘Me? I’m not anything. I don’t care and I don’t understand their blasted politics. I sit my exams and when I have a few hours free I row at Dieppe Rowing Club.’

‘Rowing? I’d like that. But you French weren’t all that brilliant this year at the Olympics, were you? What’s wrong with you?’

‘I don’t know what you want. In cycling the medals all went our way: road race, team road race, team pursuit, 1000 metres time trial, sprint and tandem sprint.’

‘All right, all right. Don’t get cross, Hans. Cycling’s a great sport. What about rowing?’

‘Only two bronzes.’

In the middle of the day they stopped at a small trattoria in a village that dozed at the side of the main road. Three steps led down to a low, vaulted room invaded by flies. Workers, their chins stuck out pugnaciously, sucked large forkfuls of spaghetti in tomato sauce, wiping their mouths with pieces of bread they then chewed slowly, with dreamy expressions on their faces.

‘Watch how they do it!’ Ernst whispered. ‘It’s a special technique. When we’ve worked it out, we can order some. It’s not expensive and it’s nourishing. Before we do, we can try some polenta. It fills you up, and I’m famished.’

They devoured two portions of polenta each. Jean thought he might choke and asked for some wine. He was served with a red Bardolino that was as thick as shoe cream. When they had finished eating, they staggered outside and wobbled several kilometres down the road before stopping next to a field.

‘I suggest we have a lie-down,’ Ernst said.

‘I think that may be preferable. My legs feel like cotton wool.’

They fell asleep in the shade of a hedge and were woken up by an elderly farm labourer with his dog, cursing them. Ernst could only laugh. The man had a stick, which he raised. Jean grabbed it from him and threw it over the hedge. The old man picked up a stone. The dog barked furiously. Ernst pulled out a flick knife.