KRIEG (War)

by Ludwig Renn

  ——————————

  “Herr Leutnant!” said a voice in the door. “The company is to be ready to march in half an hour.”

  I got up. It was still night. I was very hungry.

  The field kitchen was standing outside.

  “Have you still got anything to eat?” I asked the cooks.

  “No, there is nothing left now. Why didn’t you want to get up in the night?”

  “Is there not even any bread again?” asked someone calmly.

  “Last night a bread car came, but the bread is bad.”

  “Just give it here,” I said.

  I bit into the bread. It was bitter and inside was like runny cheese. I held it up to the lantern. Outside it was green and inside white. It was completely molded. I threw it away.

  We marched off. To the front there was the heavy thunder of cannons. The twilight came pale and calm.

  We lay down behind a fir-covered overhang. The sun rose over the high road and brewed resin out of the needles.

  The field kitchen came and prepared to feed. There was fatty meat with onions on it.

  Halfway up the bank Weiss sat leaning against the trunk of a fir tree. I climbed up to him and began eating.

  “Listen,” I said. “The lieutenant is sick and delirious.”

  He didn’t answer.

  “You have to help me if he gets worse.” He looked at me with surprise and nodded.

  I went back to my group, lay against the overhang, and soon went to sleep.

  Around midday we marched off again. I felt open and fresh. Fabian, despite the burning sun, had on two coats and shivered with cold. We moved forward under cover of patches of woods and took positions again beside the road in the woods. Ahead of us thundered the cannons. Also there must have been howitzers in the woods to our left.

  All of a sudden a shell came roaring in and struck close beside the street. Two more heavy rounds followed.

  We moved farther forward.

  “Herr Leutnant, do you know what the situation is?” asked Ernst.

  “I only know that we are the last reserves of the army. Ahead of us they have already been fighting since yesterday.”

  We moved over a flat area with solitary juniper bushes. A hussar came from the front: “There are two French squadrons on our right flank.”

  Ahead there was lively rifle fire.

  We continued into a hollow. Ahead on a raised street lay a couple of officers.

  Zing! Zing! Shrapnel passed over us.

  Ahead stood a large, fat officer and waved us to the ground, but he himself remained standing.

  “Are you the army reserve?” he asked.

  He stood openly in the street with fluttering cloak. From the other side a machine gun began firing: tack, tack, tack, tack.

  “How they shoot!” he laughed. “I believe they are shooting at me.” He came slowly down from the street.

  Our company laughed. Some of them stood up, unbuttoned their pants and squatted down.

  Whoosh—Bam! One landed in the middle of them. A smoke cloud lay between them. A couple of them jerked their pants up and walked like that back to the company. Only one man stayed sitting, his wide rear end turned toward us. And his head was turned backwards like an owl as he glared at the smoke cloud.

  “Max, you didn’t expect that one!” called someone.

  The General came striding along and looked at the man and the smoke cloud.

  Ssss—Wham! A shell exploded to the left of us. Ahead a number of machine guns were shooting. Medics came back across the street with litters.

  On the left came some people from up forward. Most of them appeared to be wounded. Now some of them came over the street. They walked uncertainly.

  “Over here!” called Fabian.

  Wham! A shell burst.

  “I’m wounded, Herr Leutnant!” called one of them reproachfully.

  “I mean just those not wounded!”

  It was people from our second battalion.

  An officer—it was Lieutenant von Boehm—stormed at Fabian. “The swine!”

  “What’s the matter, then?” laughed Fabian.

  “The swine stole my cigarettes.”

  “The people from your company? That’s rather coarse!”

  “Ah, no, the swine, the French!”

  “But how did they get at your cigarettes?”

  “Well, I was carrying Hesse back because he was shot in the stomach. But the French were so close behind that I had to throw my pack away. And there were one hundred cigarettes in it. Now they have them, the swine!”

  “But where is Hesse then?”

  “I had to leave him lying in order to escape myself.”

  Wham! Ahead of us.

  “But how did that all happen?”

  “Ah, abominable! We went forward into the woods. Suddenly it exploded on all sides. Captain Martin caught one in the head. The Major is also dead and Bender too.—And the swine are now smoking my cigarettes!”

  He divided the returning men into new squads.

  Ahead the machine gun had almost stopped firing. It began to grow dark.

  Two officers appeared on the street. One of them hobbled along. It was our regimental commander. His adjutant had him around the waist.

  “What’s the situation up ahead?” asked the General.

  “We have occupied the edge of the woods here forward and are digging in. The French are reportedly on the right.”

  We marched in the depression toward the right. The sliver of moon had gained more light.

  We came to a path. A Frenchman lay stretched out.

  “See if he is dead.”

  I felt his hand. It was stiff. A cold shiver ran through my body.

  Not far from there we halted at a half-open shed around which bushes stood.

  “Platoon leaders!” called the Lieutenant softly, “We belong to the right flank cover. Two companies lie ahead of us.—You can hear them digging in.—We lie behind them as the reserve. Naturally we can show no light. The second platoon will post guards around the barn.”

  We laid our baggage in the large room. There was but little straw spread on the floor. I gathered some for the lieutenant and Ernst.

  Outside I heard the field kitchen coming. We went to it. The company sergeant was there and took papers out of his leather bag. “Where is the lieutenant?” he asked.

  I looked around.

  The orderly came with the company commander’s horse: “I’ve brought the sleeping bag and the blanket. Where should I place them?”

  “The lieutenant is always present when meals are served,” said Ernst.

  I was seized by a peculiar fear. I walked to the barn. Nobody was inside. However, there was someone leaning in the dark.

  “Herr Leutnant?” I asked softly.

  “Yes, what’s up?”

  “Should I bring the Herr Leutnant his meal?”

  “Yes, I can’t go properly; I am so dizzy.”

  I walked to the field kitchen.

  “Bring the lieutenant’s things into the barn,” I said to the orderly.

  Ernst looked at me.

  I brought an aluminum plate that was very hot and kneeled down in front of him. He ate little. The company sergeant lit a candle and had a cup of red wine. Fabian appeared feverish.

  I went to the field kitchen to look for Weiss.

  “Listen,” I said. “Where is our battalion doctor?”

  “I don’t know.” He looked at me fearfully.

  I considered it. At night and in the wooded terrain, no one could find him.

  I went back to the barn. The company sergeant presented some papers for his signature and then Ernst covered him up.

  “I thank you,” he said and then lay very still. The men were very still also. I lay down. What should become of us?

  The damp night air filtered through the barn. How terrible that must be, with such a fever! I shuddered and felt sick myself. I had never imagined war to be like this. The pe
ople become so terribly close. It is so terrible, because one cannot hold on to them. They are all torn away again.

  The lieutenant was already asleep.

  ——————————

  “Herr Leutnant!”—It was early morning twilight.—“The company is to occupy the wood ahead and dig in.”

  We moved forward a couple of hundred meters. The ground descended ahead to uneven patches of woods.

  I began to dig in with a short spade. Beneath the top layer I came on a hard, dark layer. We had only one pick ax for the squad, with which someone was hacking on the left. I tried to get my hole deeper with the edge of the spade.

  After just a few minutes sweat already ran over my brow. In the meantime it had become light and the sun struck the top of an oak tree, which reached above the woods.

  The hard, colored layer was thin and underneath was yellow sand so that I soon had my hole deep enough to be able to shoot from a half kneeling, half lying position.

  Behind us Fabian, along with his runner and Weiss, had lain down under a spruce tree.

  A rifle shot from the front!

  I jerked around, but couldn’t see anything. The digging in had stopped. Everything was as still as death.

  Another shot!

  Ahead a section of woods came toward us like a wedge to about two hundred fifty meters. From the left of that the wood turned back and from there it came at an angle close to our line, its left wing lying hidden behind a small rise.

  From the left there were a couple of rifle shots at some distance. A German machine gun rattled. Braaaap. My squad and I were at the farther-most right wing. I looked to the right. Beside me lay Ziesche, then Lehmann, and behind a pile of stones a little further, Hartmann. The guy appeared to be sleeping!

  I walked over to him.

  “Psst!” went Hartmann and continued to lie perfectly still.

  I lay down beside him.

  “Listen,” he whispered, “there is something moving down at the corner of the wood.”

  “On which one, the right or the left?”

  “On the left.”

  “Listen, on no account are the French to get from their woods into ours. It’s only about twenty steps from one point to the other. We have to shoot them down in the intervening space. If more come you take the right and I the left.”

  Hartmann nodded.

  “There!” he whispered and pushed his rifle forward.

  In the left corner of the woods someone was moving. Suddenly, he ran with large steps to the right.

  “Careful!” said Hartmann.

  It must have been lieutenant von Boehm. There came another and a third. A shot rang out. They disappeared into the right point of the woods.

  From the left there were two shots close together.

  “Individual fire!” growled Ernst.

  “You worry only about your little bit of woods!” I screamed into Hartmann’s ear.

  On the left a couple of Frenchmen stepped out of the angled edge of the woods. One fell down, one ran back.

  From the forest wedge some men appeared on the right. The French had, for some time, been attacking our position. I turned my attention to the next one. The shots splattered.

  I squeezed the trigger. He fell. I reloaded.

  Hartmann was shooting.

  Some men came running from behind us.

  At the corner of the woods two men ran to the right. I stopped just short of the last one. Two threw themselves down beside Hartmann, next to me, the lieutenant.

  I fired.

  Three more men appeared in the break.

  There were two shots beside me!

  One of them walked back. A shot from there! He collapsed. Boehm’s patrol was probably still there.

  A rifle shot from the left passed close over us.

  “Herr Leutnant, come down from that pile!” I screamed, but it was completely calm.

  At that moment I looked at the lieutenant and him at me, empty and with a somber stare.

  He looked around calmly. Way out on the left flank another shot sounded. He stood up calmly: “Orderly!” and slowly went back to his spruce tree.

  “He is unflappable,” said Hartman without feeling.

  After a time I noticed that the sun on my back was uncomfortably warm.

  The hours passed. The sun burned down. A couple of times I almost went to sleep.

  I was very hungry. I unhooked my canteen and made a small pile of rocks under it in order to cool the coffee.

  Ka-wham! A shell came and landed between us and the lieutenant.

  Zing-zing-zip! The splinters whined.

  I looked around. The orderly and Weiss were looking at the shell burst. The lieutenant lay and appeared not even to have noticed it.

  Wham! Two steps behind my earlier hole.

  The bursts wandered toward the middle of the company. All were too wide. Most of them went blindly into the ground. Only every third or fourth round burst.

  Suddenly a shell sounded differently. I looked around. I couldn’t see where it had gone. Probably it had landed near the barn in which we had spent the night.

  I became apathetic. The noise was constant.

  The sun was already at an angle and shone in our faces. For some time now the shells had been falling close to us.

  “Medic!” That was Lehmann in the next hole. Weiss came walking from the rear. He appeared pale.

  The explosions were in the area of the tree under which Fabian was lying.

  Wham! I jumped. That was very close. Weiss wiped something reddish white out of his face. Then he wiped his hand in the grass. Lehmann screamed and became indistinct.

  “What happened?” I asked.

  “It sprayed me with Lehmann’s brains.”

  “Did it do anything to you?”

  “I don’t know. My sleeve is ripped open.”

  I crawled over to him. Lehmann had already become still. The back of his head was mangled, with black hair. The sleeve on Weiss’s upper arm was sliced open.

  “Give me your knife!”

  I cut his coat sleeve off. There was a spot of blood on his shirt sleeve. I cut his sleeve away. On the bicep he had a scratch from which blood was flowing.

  “Does that hurt a lot?”

  “I don’t know,” he answered miserably. I wrapped a bandage around it.

  “Help! Medic!” came a call from the left.

  Weiss looked at me fearfully.

  “Help! Medic!”

  “Get over there!” I said severely. However, I didn’t know if it was right.

  Weiss stood up without looking at me and in a crouch, walked over.

  I took his coat sleeve and stuck it in my pocket. I had to take Lehmann’s personal effects. I reached in his pockets. There were only a handkerchief, a small mirror and his wallet. For his identification tag and watch I had to turn him over and that without showing myself unnecessarily. I braced myself against his shoulder and rolled him on to his back. His head fell, with the open wound, in the sand.

  I unbuttoned his coat and shirt and cut the band of the identification tag. His breast was still warm. Then I pulled the watch with the silver chain from the small pocket in front, stuck it in my pocket and crawled back to Hartmann.

  The runner, Eckold, called from the rear, “Sergeant Ernst to the lieutenant!”

  Ernst walked bent over to the rear and kneeled by the lieutenant, who had just raised his head slightly. Then he came walking forward and lay down beside me. What did he want from me? He appeared disturbed.

  “The lieutenant transferred command of the company to me and told me that right here is the most important point of the company. Be especially watchful here!”

  “Herr Feldwebel, do you know anything about the overall situation?”

  “Early today the French attacked our army on a broad front, but have been thrown back everywhere.”

  He walked away crouching toward the left.

  The firing had stopped. What would become of us without
the lieutenant?

  Sch—wham! It came blindly into our lines. Sch—boom! Someone screamed again. That must be Haeusler from my squad. From way across the way came Weiss with the bandage around his upper arm.

  The sun waned. To the left the quarter moon stood over the forest. It became very quiet. On the left Weiss was bandaging. The sun disappeared. The moon made sharp shadows.

  I stood up and went over to Weiss. He had stood up.

  “I have brought your sleeve with me. How is it going with your arm?”

  “It hurts, but that doesn’t matter,” he replied, unnaturally free and fresh. However, he appeared very pale.

  I stuck his sleeve back on.

  Eckold came walking up.

  “What’s going on?”

  “The company is moving out.” He didn’t look at me and walked quickly away. That was usually not his way.—Was it a retreat?

  Ernst gathered the company and sent out a rear guard and a patrol as protection on the flank.

  “It’s a retreat,” murmured someone.

  “Where is Fabian?” Liebold asked me.

  “I don’t know,” I said and turned away.

  We moved to the rear between two sections of forest. To the left I could hear entrenching tools clanking. There were troops marching away. No one spoke a word.

  We halted. The regiment assembled here. Some companies hardly had forty men left.

  Ernst stood mute before the company.

  “Herr Feldwebel, where is the lieutenant?” I asked him quietly.

  “In the closest field hospital.”

  “Does the Feldwebel know what’s wrong with him?”

  “Probably typhus.”

  We moved along the road to the rear. I felt miserable and couldn’t speak. My misery wasn’t physical although I was very hungry. But the thought that we were retreating!—How far? They were brooding all around me.

  We marched. The moon went down. If we could at least meet the field kitchen!

  We halted on an elevated street.

  “Who is lying there?” asked Ernst and pointed toward the incline.

  “An officer,” I said and climbed down. He had completely wrapped himself in his cape. I was startled.

  “Herr Leutnant!”

  He unwrapped himself from the cape and looked around.

  “How did the Herr Leutnant get here in the wet meadow?”