Armageddon - Leon Uris

“It was disgusting ... unbearable,” Marla said, “forcing us to walk around in the middle of those corpses as though it were our doing.”

Ludwig set his pipe aside. “The fact is, the family is in a grave crisis. In all likelihood your Uncle Sigmund and I will have to serve prison terms.”

“But whatever on earth for, Father?”

“My pet, justice belongs to the winning side. The winners may judge the losers on any set of rules they wish. You can be assured that the Russians will never be brought to justice for their hideous crimes. Only we Germans must answer.”

“Dear God, what has Hitler brought us to.”

“Marla, I am completely prepared to accept a prison term. You know full well that Felix is incapable of heading the family. We do not know when your husband will be released from Russia, if ever. It is up to you, Marla.”

What a delicious moment! Up to me. Up to me and my sons. Me ... the woman!

“Insofar as politics is concerned,” her father continued, “as a woman you are above suspect. Americans are terribly fair about that sort of thing. You know of course that sufficient funds have been transferred to Switzerland.”

Marla nodded.

“Unless you are driven out you are to stay here and keep up the fight for the estate and the Machine Works.”

“Yes, Father.”

“Marla, the great strength of the Von Romstein family is the willingness of its members to sacrifice for our name. Your Uncle Kurt and your brother Johann have given their lives. Your Uncle Sigmund and I are ready to go to prison. Throughout our history Von Romstein women have cemented invaluable alliances for the sake of the family.”

She knew her marriage was no different. Wilhelm Frick was palatable but never desirable. From time to time she enjoyed him, but those times were seldom and only after long periods of lonely frustration.

In their public life Wilhelm Frick was always proper. The union was important to the family. It had produced the desired heirs. It protected the estates, the castle, and the Machine Works. She had known that this was to be the way of things since she was a little girl. Now was the moment of reward. Her sons alone would keep the name alive and her cunning alone would save the family.

Once she had loved someone. He was a student at the Medical College. It was the only time she remembered her father beating her. She was sixteen. Despite her rigid training, despite the fact she despised those people, she had fallen in love with a boy who was half Jew. The penance, discipline, and training that followed was cruel. There were times, of course, on a holiday away from the family when she was able to indulge in a lover. Secretly she looked for a Jew. Perhaps a Jew could help her recapture that one single moment when she was young and giving.

“Marla,” her father continued, “the Americans are building a case against the family. In a way we are fortunate that legality is an obsession with them. Had the Russians come here we would no doubt all be dead. Their concept of justice is as crude as the Slavic people. With the Americans we stand somewhat of a chance. Much of what finally comes to court will be based on the results of the interrogation by this young officer, Arosa.”

She nodded.

“Having been interrogated by him I am convinced that his thinking can be made flexible. I believe the case could be made much less severe.”

Marla spared only a fleeting thought for her husband somewhere in a Russian prison camp. Certainly, if and when he returned from Russia he would want the Machine Works restored and would endorse the urgency of the situation. Besides that, Marla had been without a man for many months. She was hungry for sex. The young American officer was not without appeal.

“They seem to be quite serious about this nonfraternization, Father.”

Ludwig smiled. “Just so much more of their impractical unworkable schoolboy nonsense. I am quite certain, Marla, that you could be quite convincing to Arosa. In fact, I’d bet a fortune on it.”

Chapter Twenty

IT WAS CURFEW. POLISH slave laborers, liberated from Schwabenwald, staggered over the pontoon bridge to the south bank, where Lieutenant Bolinski had set up a displaced persons center in the spas, hotels, and Kurhaus.

Shenandoah Blessing watched them from his jeep and whistled the tune the Poles sang. The last half dozen of them over the square gathered about the jeep to bum cigarettes. One Pole, who wore a Bavarian hunting hat and leather pants, was not content with merely shaking Blessing’s hand. He threw this arm about the fat policeman and thrice blessed America. After that he began to weep with drunken joy and insisted that Blessing should have his green velour hat with the big bushy feather and the hunting pins. Blessing tolerated this all with endless patience.

“Now come on, fellers. Let’s get over to the south bank. Tomorrow is another day.”

The weeping one kissed Blessing’s apple cheeks. They wove off to the pontoon bridge with a dozen farewells.

Blessing looked around the square for any late arrivals. There were none. He tucked his belly under the steering wheel, then U-turned in the direction of the jail while pondering the immediate problems of setting out night patrols.

The whole Rombaden police force had to be disbanded. So far he could find but a half-dozen whitelisted Germans trustworthy enough to augment his meager crew. There was only one company of American infantry to guard the whole Landkreis, the POW’s, and the interned SS in Schwabenwald. If there was any real trouble, he’d be in a bad fix.

He’d press Major O’Sullivan and Bolinski to let him have a few hundred Poles to put into uniform. Could he trust the Poles with weapons? In his own anger after seeing Schwabenwald, Blessing had beaten up some of the SS when they were taken out of the gas chambers. Sean let them out after three days when they began fainting from hunger, thirst, fright, and suffocation and put them under arrest

He wheeled out of the square into a narrow street His thoughts were halted by the sight of someone sitting atop a brick pile between two bombed-out houses. He pulled up and switched off the motor. An older man just sat and stared vacantly into space.

“Say there, old-timer,” he called, “it’s curfew.”

The man didn’t answer.

“Speaken sie English? Say there. It’s schwartz in the himmel. You got to get to your haus.”

“I speaken sie perfect English!”

“It’s curfew.”

“To hell with curfew, sir!”

The man did not budge. Blessing climbed up the brick pile with a deftness that belied his size. The man was not as old as he first appeared. An empty wine bottle lay at his feet. Blessing puffed to a halt before him.

“Now where in the hell do you live?”

“In Berlin, you idiot”

“Don’t you go getting me riled up. Where do you live in Rombaden!”

“Nowhere!”

“You drunk?”

“Of course I’m drunk. Are you stupid?”

The policeman grabbed the man’s collar with a fast reflexive move, jerked him to his feet, and had him in an arm lock. The man offered no resistance, in fact dangled loosely. In this closeness Blessing smelled the unwashed body. He knew the smell. He shoved back the sleeve on the man’s left arm. The arm was engraved with the tattoo number of a prisoner of Schwabenwald. Blessing released his grip.

“Why didn’t you tell me you were from the concentration camp?”

“Why didn’t you ask me?” the man said, sitting down again. And then he began to babble. “I didn’t drink very much. Haven’t drunk in long time. It has made me drunk.”

He helped the man up, but he sat down again.