Джеффри Арчер - Tell Tale - Stories

Prepared for what? thought Oliver. Almost certain death, and not quickly like the hangman’s noose, but probably prolonged, in desperate agony. But he didn’t voice his opinion.

Once he was back in the trenches, Oliver quickly tried to get to know the young impressionable men who’d just arrived at the front line, and hadn’t yet heard a shot fired in anger. He couldn’t think of them as soldiers, just keen young lads who had responded to a poster of a moustachioed old man pointing a finger at them and declaring YOUR COUNTRY NEEDS YOU.

“Once you go over the top, you need only remember one thing,” Oliver instructed them. “If you don’t kill them, as sure as hell they’ll kill you. Think of it like a football match against your most bitter rivals. You’ve got to score every time you shoot.”

“But whose side is the ref on?” demanded a young, frightened voice.

Oliver didn’t reply, because he no longer believed God was the referee and that therefore they must surely win.

The colonel joined them just before the kickoff and blew a whistle to show the match could begin. Captain Jackson was first over the top, leading his company, who followed closely behind. On, on, on, he charged as his men fell like fairground soldiers beside him, the lucky ones dying quickly. He kept going, and was beginning to wonder if he was out there on his own, and then suddenly, without warning, he saw a lone figure running through the whirling smoke toward him. Like Oliver, the man had his bayonet fixed, ready for the kill. Oliver accepted that it would not be possible for both of them to survive, and probably neither would. He held his rifle steady, like a medieval jouster, determined to fell his opponent. He was prepared to thrust his bayonet, not this time into a horsehair bag while training, but into a petrified human being, but no more petrified than he was.

Don’t strike until you see can the whites of his eyes, his training sergeant had drilled into him at Sandhurst. You can’t be a moment too early, or a moment too late. Another oft repeated maxim. But when he saw the whites of his eyes, he couldn’t do it. He lowered his rifle, expecting to die, but to his surprise the German also dropped his rifle as they both came to a halt in the middle of no-man’s-land.

For some time they just stared at each other in disbelief. But it was Oliver who burst out laughing, if only to release his pent-up tension.

“What are you doing here, Jackson?”

“I might ask you the same question, sir.”

“Carrying out someone else’s orders,” said Gruber. “Me too.”

“But you’re a professional soldier.”

“Death doesn’t discriminate in these matters,” said Oliver. “I often recall your shrewd opinion of war, sir, and looking around the battlefield can only wonder how much talent has been squandered here.”

“On both sides,” said Gruber. “But it gives me no pleasure to have been proved right.”

“So what shall we do now, sir? We can’t just stand around philosophizing until peace is declared.”

“But equally, if we were to return meekly to our own side, we would probably be arrested, court-martialled, and shot at dawn.”

“Then one of us will have to take the other prisoner,” said Jackson, “and return in triumph.”

“Not a bad idea. But how shall we decide?” asked Gruber.

“The toss of a coin?”

“How very British,” declared Gruber. “Just a pity the whole war couldn’t have been decided that way,” added the schoolmaster as he took a Goldmark out of his pocket. “You call, Jackson,” he said. “After all, you’re the visiting team.”

Oliver watched as the coin spun high into the air and cried, “Tails,” only because he couldn’t bear the thought of the Kaiser’s image staring up at him in triumph.

Gruber groaned as he bent down to look at his emperor. Oliver quickly took off his tie, bound the prisoner’s wrists behind his back, and then began to march his old schoolmaster slowly back toward his own front line.

“What happened to Brooke?” asked Gruber as they squelched through the mud while stepping over the bodies of fallen men.

“He was attached to the Royal Naval Division when he last wrote to me.”

“I read his poem about Grantchester. Even attempted to translate it.”

“‘The Old Vicarage,’” said Jackson.

“That’s the one. Ironic that he wrote it while he was on a visit to Berlin. Such a rare talent. Let’s hope he survives this dreadful war,” Gruber said as the sun dipped below the horizon.

“Are you married, sir?” asked Oliver.

“Yes. Renate. And we have a son and two daughters. And you?”

“Rosemary. Just got married when the balloon went up.”

“Bad luck, old chap,” said Gruber, before taking his former pupil by surprise. “I don’t suppose you’d consider being a godfather to my youngest, Hans? You see, I consider it no more than my duty once the war is over to make sure this madness can never happen again.”

“I agree with you, Ernst, and I’d be honored. And perhaps in time...”

“May I suggest, Oliver, for both our sakes,” said Gruber as the British front line came into sight, “that when you hand me over, you don’t make it too obvious we’re old friends.”

“Good thinking, Ernst,” said Oliver, and grabbed his prisoner roughly by the elbow.

The next voice they heard demanded, “Who goes there?”

“Captain Jackson, Lancashire Fusiliers, with a German prisoner.”

“Advance and be recognized.” Oliver pushed his old schoolmaster forward. “Bloody good show,” said the lookout sergeant. “You can leave him to me, sir. And you can keep moving, you fucking Kraut.”

“Sergeant,” said Oliver sharply, “try to remember he’s an officer.”

The war was over by Christmas. Christmas 1918.

Captain Ernst Gruber spent two years in a prisoner of war camp on Anglesey. He passed the mornings teaching his fellow prisoners the local tongue as there might come a time when it would prove useful to speak a little English, he suggested, echoing Jackson’s words.

Oliver sent Gruber the collected works of Rupert Brooke, which he translated in the evenings while he waited for the war to end.

Ernst Gruber was shipped back to Frankfurt in November 1919, and within days he wrote to Oliver to ask if he was still willing to be a godfather to his son Hans. It was several weeks before he received a reply from Oliver’s wife, Rosemary, to say that her husband had been killed on the Western Front only days before the Armistice was signed. They also had a son, Arthur Oliver, and on her husband’s last furlough he’d told her that he hoped Ernst would agree to be one of Arthur’s godparents.

With the assistance of Oliver’s father, Herr Gruber was allowed to visit England to fulfill his role in the christening ceremony. As Ernst stood by the font alongside Oliver’s family, he couldn’t help wondering what would have happened if he had won the toss.

September 19, 1943

LIEUTENANT HANS OTTO GRUBER was blown up by a landmine while serving on the Western Front. He died three days later.

June 6, 1944

CAPTAIN ARTHUR OLIVER JACKSON MC was killed while leading his platoon on the beaches of Normandy.

November 15, 1944

PROFESSOR ERNST HELMUT GRUBER was executed by firing squad in Berlin for the role he played in the failed attempt to assassinate Adolf Hitler at Wolf’s Lair.

Coincidences are frowned upon in a novel, whereas in real life they regularly occur.

I had already read the proofs of Tell Tale and returned them to my publisher, when Reader’s Digest announced they would be relaunching their hundred-word short story competition later this year.