Walter Kempowski - All for Nothing

First to reach Uncle Josef in Albertsdorf. Then they’d see. Everything could be discussed with Josef. Rather a strange man, but on the whole his heart was in the right place. He didn’t have an easy time of it, with his wife’s bad hip.

Auntie had a plan; she would first go in the direction of Elbing and then turn north to the Frisches Haff, the zone of brackish water just inland of the Bay of Danzig. She was going to discuss that with Josef. Hanni had a good head on her shoulders too.

But weren’t the Russians already in Elbing?

Hour after hour they drove on at an easy pace. It began to snow in thick flakes that drifted back and forth in the wind like a curtain, ruffling up as they fell to the ground. The ditches beside the road were full of snow, and you could hardly make out where they began and the road ended. It was a strain, keeping your eyes fixed on the cart in front. Peter joined Auntie on the box, and when the gelding slipped he shouted, ‘Gee up!’

Sometimes a vehicle came towards them; a truck with dipped headlights, a motorbike, once even a tank. To make room for the tank, the cart ahead of them moved a little way aside, and then it slipped into the ditch.

Should they stop and help?

Peter was going to jump down, but Auntie said, ‘No, we must keep going. We don’t have time to stop now.’

Peter saw small figures crawling out of the cart, their shadows enormous in the light of their electric torches, and then it was all dark again.

Vladimir stopped to help the people in the ditch and stayed behind for a while. Auntie drove slowly on and finally stopped. Johannsen’s old mill should be somewhere near here. In clear weather you could see it from the Georgenhof, so they would be able to see the Georgenhof from the mill.

Soon Vladimir was behind them again, having helped the other cart back on the road.

The longer they drove, the more carts joined the road from left and right. Auntie was now following a trailer with rubber tyres on its wheels and cat’s eyes at the back of it. If you briefly flashed a torch at them, they shone red in the darkness.

The first light of dawn was showing; Vladimir closed the distance between their two vehicles so that no one else could come in between them. If they were separated they might never find each other again.

A solitary aircraft flew overhead. Did the pilot have a light on in his plane? Was his thumb hovering over the button to release his bombs? Was his machine gun trained on the road below?

Around now, Katharina was lying on her straw mattress in a cold police cell. She couldn’t sleep; she had spread her coat and two blankets over her. A guard was doing his rounds in the yard. He shone a light on the windows, and when it reached her cell the shadow of the bars fell on the wall. She thought of a film in which there was a woman in prison, like her, with barred shadows cast on the walls.

But this wasn’t a film. The key turned in the lock, and she had to get up and go with the man who came to fetch her. Flights of iron steps, barred doors. Then she was sitting on a hard chair in a warm interrogation room. The officer there sat at his desk signing files.

At last he turned to her. She was asked whether it was true that she had given shelter to a Jew, and was shown the drawing with the arrow on it saying Georgenhof, and the instructions to the man to climb the fence. She had admitted all this already, and it had been written down.

The police officer said that this was very, very serious, and he would like to know whether the man had made approaches to her in her room. Had she known he was a Jew? Then he delivered a long lecture about the children of Israel, describing them as filthy blowflies and a pack of criminals.

She couldn’t deny anything, and making excuses seemed a bad idea. She said she hadn’t guessed that; she hadn’t known anything about a Jew. She’d thought, oh, she didn’t know what. And she wondered, she said, whether she would have given the man shelter if she had known he was a Jew. Yes, she said that, and she asked the police officer if he really thought that she would have sheltered a Jew if she’d known who was being sent to her?

‘Well, who did you think he could be? A deserter, perhaps? Or an enemy of the state?’ He didn’t quite like to say that that would have been even worse.

She thought of Pastor Brahms and his persuasions. He had made her do it, she said. Would she have thought of such a thing of her own accord? With her husband at the front …

‘At the front?’ said the police officer. ‘Sitting in a cushy job in Italy, that’s where he is.’ Then he became insistent, and wanted to know whether matters had gone any further up in her room. Had there been anything in the way of racial defilement? ‘Did you drink alcohol? You had quite a nice little stock of it … Did he touch you? Did he make advances? Stand up!’

At last another officer came into the room. It was the man who had brought her here. He was taking her back to her cell. There was coffee that had gone cold in the cell, and a piece of bread. She longed to say, ‘Stay here, stay here with me for a little while.’ But he had already closed and locked the door.

The two vehicles from the Georgenhof went on. Hours later, they passed a crossroads. The signpost said ALBERTSDORF 7 KILOMETRES. So they turned right. They could rest once they reached Uncle Josef ’s house, they’d be at home there. Maybe news from Katharina had already reached Albertsdorf? They could discuss it all with Josef, and then they’d decide what to do next. We’ll go on to the Frisches Haff, thought Auntie. First we’ll go towards Elbing and then turn off for the Frisches Haff.

Uncle Josef had always spoken brusquely to her; well, that was just his way. When he came to the Georgenhof, alone on business, or on a Sunday with his whole family, he used to say hello to her, but that was all.

They reached Albertsdorf when the sun had risen. There was a heavy chain on the gate of the yard. Even though they had said they were coming, the whole place seemed to be locked up. The family must be sleeping late.

Vladimir got out of the blankets in which he had wrapped himself and opened the gate. The farmyard dog immediately went for him, but he used his whip and soon made it respect him.

The whole yard was full of other people’s carts. Some of them were being made ready to go on.

‘There’s no room left here,’ said the strangers, who didn’t know that the newcomers were part of the family.

Finally they left the two vehicles beside the silo, one to the right and one to the left of it. The stables were already full of horses, but there was just enough space for the gelding and the two bays to fit in. Vladimir mixed oats and chaff, and gave the animals water.

Then he fetched Vera, and the two of them settled down in the hay along with some French POWs. It was very romantic in there by the light of the lantern. Vladimir got a bottle of vermouth that didn’t really belong to him out of the cart, and pulled the tarpaulin covering it tightly over the contents again. Then they all drank vermouth, even the man guarding the POWs. After all, he was only human.

Auntie knocked at the front door of the house. Peter walked all round it, but everything was locked up. It was some time before anyone came to let them in. And no one welcomed them with open arms … ‘There you are at last, my dears!’ Nor was there a fire crackling in the hearth and a table laid for them. All the reception they got was a basic shrug of the shoulders.

Yes, the whole family had already left, they heard. Even though they’d said they were staying, they had left! It was lucky that Frau Schneidereit, staying behind to look after the house, even recognized Auntie. A visitor so early in the morning?