A Small Circus

by Hans Fallada

  ‘Another group of five are the snatch squad. Two are given the order to take the flag-bearer by each arm if he refuses to surrender the flag when I required him to. If the flag-bearer offers violence, they use their truncheons. No other weapon is appropriate.

  ‘The three other members of the squad intervene only if the flag-bearer’s associates actively become involved.

  ‘The rest of the men form a contingency reserve.

  ‘I will have booked a car earlier, with which the flag, once confiscated, quickly disappears from sight of the demonstrators.

  ‘As soon as I have the flag in my possession, I give orders to assemble. The cordon is withdrawn, and the march can continue.’

  That’s it. The end. All shuffle in their seats.

  Of course, that’s all very well, and everyone realizes it, but nothing would have happened in that textbook fashion. The judge asks pensively: ‘Is there always time for such detailed orders?’

  And the expert: ‘The marching route is long, almost an hour, which gives me the opportunity to pick my spot.’

  ‘One more question: Would you and your men go to meet the march, or would you wait for them to come to you?’

  And the expert: ‘Wait. Wait, no doubt about it. Rather intervene late, but with precise instructions.’

  The judge says: ‘I have no further questions for the expert.’

  Neither defence lawyer nor prosecutor makes a move. Retired Police Major Schadewald leaves the hall under the respectful gaze of many there.

  6

  The Judgment

  I

  The great day of closing speeches, and probably of the verdict, is come. The sports hall is packed to the rafters, there are even people standing in the passageways outside.

  And more people turning up all the time.

  ‘Nice and cosy here,’ says the typesetter Linke of the Bauernschaft to Party Secretary Nothmann, once they have found a couple of seats in the third row.

  ‘They’ve issued far too many tickets.’

  ‘And to whom? To those fat bourgeois.’

  ‘And they wonder that people don’t believe in fair and unbiased judges any more. They can’t even dole out tickets in an unpartisan way.’

  ‘You’re right, Comrade,’ says Linke.

  ‘Are they respectful to you when they question you?’

  ‘I don’t stand for any nonsense. The examining magistrate is another one. I told him Padberg sent me to collect his papers, and if he turns round and says he never sent me, then he’s just lying, I said.’

  ‘You’re right.—Here we go. The prosecution first.’

  ‘He won’t bite the farmers either. We should have done something else . . .’

  The prosecutor stands there with a sheaf of papers in his hand. He is a small, white-haired old gent, with a droopy, fraying beard. His pince-nez is hanging down likewise.

  ‘None too fearsome,’ says Medical Councillor Dr Lienau. ‘They used to have really crisp lawyers put the fear of God into you. But not that one. Dear me, no.’

  ‘You’re right,’ says the locomotive driver Thienelt, also kitted out with his Stahlhelm badge on his lapel. ‘He looks—forgive me, I’m thinking of my bunnies back home—like a pregnant bunny rabbit. Mournful . . .’

  ‘“Pregnant bunny rabbit”, I like that. Remind me to write it down later . . .’

  The prosecutor is already speaking. By way of economic consequences and party warfare he gets to this sentence, pronounced with emphasis: ‘But politics does not cross this threshold.’

  ‘He may say so now,’ grunts Count Bandekow, ‘but he took care to ask every witness on the peasant side what party he belonged to.’

  ‘That’s his living,’ argues Farmer Henke-Karolinenhorst, ‘he can’t just stand there and give everyone five years.’

  ‘He’d like that, I bet,’ agrees Farmer Büttner.

  But the prosecutor has already got to the evaluation of the testimony. ‘Detective Inspector Tunk was violently attacked in the press, for observing things that none of the other witnesses had. But this witness did not observe merely differently, as a trained criminologist he observed more precisely. The prosecution follows the line of his testimony.’

  ‘That’s a disgrace,’ says Police Sergeant Hart, ‘that pig that did nothing but provoke me—’

  ‘You pipe down,’ says the perennial Deputy Inspector Emil Perduzke, ‘the word of a detective in court is trusted by the prosecutors more than if it had come from God Himself.’

  ‘The witness Tunk saw the defendant Henning take the commander’s sabre, and trample on it to render it useless. Then he punched the commander . . .’

  ‘Did Henning really do that?’ a surprised Frau Frerksen asks her husband. ‘You always told me it was Padberg, Fritz. He stared at you in such a mad way—’

  ‘No names, Anna! For God’s sake!’ whispers Frerksen. ‘My name will be mud—’

  * * *

  ‘No clash with State authority has so far been able to deflect the farmers from their course of implacable hostility against the administration. An exemplarily stiff punishment is what is required!’ demands the prosecutor.

  ‘Who’d have thunk it,’ says Agricultural Councillor Feinbube. ‘Now they’re going to encourage our feelings for the Red Republic by giving out long spells in prison.’

  ‘The defendants admittedly believed the approach of the police on the marketplace was unlawful. That must be seen as grounds for mitigation . . .’

  ‘It won’t be so bad,’ says Cousin Benthin. ‘Mark my words, he’ll just demand a fine.’

  ‘You can’t mean that,’ says Farmer Kehding-Karolinenhorst, ‘when they gave me a week just for my open letter in the bloody Chronicle!’

  ‘. . . but the ferocity, yes the sheer ferocity of the defendants in resisting is of course an exacerbating factor . . .’

  ‘Henning should have had rubber heels fitted to his boots. Then he wouldn’t have hurt the militia so much when he kicked them,’ says syndic Plosch.

  ‘Those lawyers! Those lawyers! The hair-fine distinctions they presume to make!’ says the Reverend Thomas, shaking his head in dismay. ‘I’ve heard tell of a case, Herr Plosch . . .’

  ‘. . . the prosecution has no interest in a hefty punishment for the defendants, but . . .’

  ‘This is going to come out dear,’ says Trautmann, business manager of the News.

  ‘How come?’ asks Heinsius, now back in his corner.

  ‘I know that as a man of business,’ the tutor of the newspaper mogul Gebhardt opines. ‘When I say, “I don’t know why I bother about this or that deal”, that’s my way of saying I intend to make a spectacular profit.’

  ‘The immoderate dislike of Police Commander Frerksen, an able and dutiful official, does not exactly show a spirit of contrition and remorse in the defendants.’

  ‘It was me that bandaged Henning,’ says Dr Zenker. ‘I saw his arm. If anyone has anything to be remorseful about, then . . .’

  ‘It’s a poor lawyer,’ says Prison Governor Greve with a gloomy smile, ‘who can see both sides of an issue. I should know, I once stood where the prosecutor is now standing.’

  ‘The fact that the police may have been the first to use force is immaterial. The police are allowed to use force.’

  ‘Listen to that, so he can be cheeky as well,’ says the weighty Manzow.

  ‘Why in all the world did the accused not surrender their flag willingly? It was a minor matter.’

  ‘I have to say,’ opines the station barber Punte, ‘if it was me carrying our association banner, and I was supposed to surrender it to that lackey Frerksen in front of all the lads, I think I’d have hit him over the head with it first.’

  ‘Peace will only return once a verdict has been arrived at. Then the farmers will concede that they have been unfair in their boycott of the town of Altholm. There is no doubting the identity of the guilty party, neither in this courtroom nor outside it. In the final analysis, what caused this cri
me? Why did all this extraordinary misfortune happen? It was because someone wanted to honour a man who had already broken the law, and who was quite rightly in prison! Was this kind of thing in practice earlier?’

  The defendant Henning calls out: ‘Yes!’

  The prosecutor looks at him angrily and disparagingly through his pince-nez. ‘No, that was not the practice earlier.’

  Henning protests by nodding his head.

  The prosecutor has had enough. He gets to the tariffs.

  ‘For the defendant Henning for riotous assembly and breach of the peace, for common assault with a dangerous weapon . . .’

  ‘He must mean his rubber heels,’ says Plosch.

  ‘. . . fifteen months in prison . . .

  ‘For the defendant Padberg for riotous assembly and breach of the peace, one year and two weeks . . .

  ‘For the defendant Rohwer for the same offences and common assault and damage to State property . . .’

  ‘Didn’t he tear a policeman’s glove . . . ?’ remembers Stuff.

  ‘. . . twelve months in prison.

  ‘For the defendant Czibulla for riotous assembly and breach of the peace and common assault, twelve months.’

  ‘They have to put Czibulla away,’ says Councillor Röstel to Chief Adviser Meier, ‘otherwise the town will be liable for damages and medical bills and a lifelong pension.’

  ‘Ach, I’m sure they will,’ Adviser Meier assures him, ‘these punishments are so moderate, I think they’ll just be nodded through.’

  ‘Comrade, if that had been us,’ says the KPD functionary Matthies, ‘they would have thrown the book at us. We would have got long jail sentences.’

  ‘Sure,’ says the recently appointed municipal gardener—grace of Manzow—Matz. ‘They won’t lay a finger on them. But when it’s unemployed workers . . .’

  ‘Those demands are outrageous,’ says Revenue Councillor Berg. ‘If they’d wanted to, those farmers could have beaten the cops to a pulp.’

  ‘And Henning is a cripple for life. And prison to follow. He’s not come out of it too well.’

  II

  Two hours later, Streiter and Stuff go back to the Hotel Cap Arcona. Behind the pair of them marches Henning, flirting for all he’s worth with his counsel’s secretary.

  The great Berlin lawyer is still glowing with zeal, with the adrenalin from his speech. ‘And you really liked my speech, Herr Stuff? Was it really as good as that?’

  ‘Extraordinary, Legal Councillor! Magnificent! The way you proved that even after the public were offended by the flag, it was still the police’s duty not to seize it but to protect the flag-bearer, well, I thought that was—’

  ‘Yes,’ says the legal councillor self-complacently, ‘the poor prosecutor. If he wants to come with precedents and verdicts in comparable cases, then he’ll have to start getting up earlier. There’s not many people in the whole profession who are so canny as I am.’

  ‘It must take a prodigious memory,’ says Stuff adoringly.

  ‘Good God, yes. Of course. And diligence. Application.—And the way I gave it to them, the unwrapped scythe? Of course it hadn’t occurred to any of those clowns that Henning had gone to the trouble of cutting off the edge with a pair of metal shears: effectively, it was no longer a scythe!’

  ‘No, Legal Councillor. You couldn’t see it from where you were sitting, but the expression on the prosecutor’s face—’

  ‘The poor fellow! Well, given that he’s normally up against provincial lawyers, he doesn’t need to exert himself very much—’

  ‘There’s only one drawback, Legal Councillor. If the verdict is pronounced this evening, then your lovely speech will be entirely wasted.’

  ‘Why’s that? How come, Herr Stuff?’

  ‘Well, because the papers will only carry the judgment, and not your speech!’

  ‘You’re right. One ought to do something, then, to prevent the judgment from being spoken tonight.’

  ‘What if you were to fall ill?’

  ‘No, it doesn’t look good. Henning, my lad, listen . . .’

  But he needs to call him twice more before Henning will part from his new lady-friend.

  Stuff asks: ‘What are the chances of your having a nervous breakdown tonight? A proper one, that a doctor will confirm, and that I can report in the paper?’

  ‘Tonight? Before the judgment? Oh, I don’t think so. Anyway, we want to go out and have a drink tonight, whatever happens.’

  ‘You could always drink in your room?’

  ‘Oh no! Absolutely not! Today I’ve got to show myself to the people, lest they think I’m worried.’

  A dark shadow has crept up alongside them and come to a stop. ‘Excuse me, gentlemen, my name is Manzow, Democratic town councillor. Herr Stuff knows me.’

  ‘That I do! I know you. Yes indeedy.’

  ‘Gentlemen, I’m sorry to be waylaying you on the public street, but I’d like to have a word with you as soon as possible . . . The thing is this: I’ve tried to get into talks with the farmers about the boycott. They were unwilling at the time, and made monkeys of us.

  ‘Now I’m making a second attempt. Before the verdict, so that you’ll see our desire for peace is real. Couldn’t we get together somewhere and sort it all out?’

  ‘I believe it,’ growls Henning. ‘Your desire for peace is perfectly genuine, because you’re afraid we’ll be acquitted following the councillor’s brilliant speech. Then the town will have to pay and pay and pay!’

  ‘Excuse me, Councillor, for not yet having offered you my congratulations. I’ve never heard a speech like yours. I talk a lot myself, I have to, it’s part of my job as a local leader . . .’ Grunting sheepishly: ‘The one-eyed man is king in the kingdom of the blind. But I’ve never heard anything like your closing plea, you know . . .’

  Manzow becomes wilder and wilder in his enthusiasm.

  ‘Tell me, gentlemen,’ says the legal councillor, ‘why not listen to what Herr Manzow has to say? It can’t do any harm.’

  ‘No, no. Absolutely not,’ says Henning.

  ‘Well then, Herr Manzow,’ says the councillor, quite unmoved, ‘we’ll expect you in an hour at the Arcona. You’ll probably find us in the back saloon. Who knows whether it’ll come to anything, but . . .’

  Manzow offers his profuse thanks and disappears.

  ‘I wonder if that was right?’ ponders Stuff. ‘As soon as he catches a sniff of compromise he’ll come over all insolent.’

  ‘You won’t catch me sitting down at a table with that fellow,’ says Henning stubbornly.

  ‘In that case I’ll do it for you,’ says the legal councillor, unmoved. ‘I don’t know what plans you had, but I want my fee. Why not get the Altholmers to foot the bill. That’s much better than the farmers having another whip-round.’

  ‘When you put it that way,’ says Stuff.

  ‘And now I’m going to call the court right away and ask that the verdict be put back to tomorrow. I have an important meeting. They won’t mind taking the evening off. It could be midnight by the time they get around to the verdict.’

  III

  It’s eleven in the morning. The sports hall is half lit by the wet, murky light of a rainy October day.

  Even though the verdict is imminent, for the first time the court is almost empty. The town doesn’t yet know it’s coming, the Altholm papers don’t hit the streets until the afternoon.

  Stuff sits glumly at the press desk. His skull is clouded with alcohol.

  Last night turned into one hell of a booze-up, and that wretch Manzow bought endless bottles of champagne, that girls’ tipple, which gives you a head like a beehive if you mix it with beer and schnapps.

  ‘I can feel every hair on my head,’ he moans to Blöcker.

  ‘I’m wondering what we’re about to hear,’ comes the reply. ‘Henning looks a bit pale. I expect he’s worried.’

  ‘Worried?’ says Stuff derisively. ‘He’s been puking his guts out since three. Boy, was h
e tanked.’

  The court file in.

  This time, the defendants don’t sit, they await judgment standing up.

  The judge covers his head with the cap and intones: ‘In the name of the people, and of justice. The sentences are as follows:

  ‘The defendant Georg Henning for resisting arrest in two instances, to three weeks’ detention.

  ‘The defendant Heino Padberg for resisting arrest in one instance, to two weeks’ detention.

  ‘The defendant Herbert Rohwer for resisting arrest and actual bodily harm, to two weeks’ detention.

  ‘The defendant Josef Czibulla is acquitted.

  ‘The costs of those found guilty are payable by the defendants, otherwise by the State.’

  The judge takes a breath, and a ripple goes through the courtroom. People look at each other. The defendants, the sentenced, stand quite still and look at the judge.

  He begins with the reasoning behind the verdicts. In the friendly, fatherly tone he maintained throughout the trial, he says:

  ‘Experience has taught one that it is difficult to reconstruct sequences of events like those of the 26th of July . . .

  ‘The essential question is this: Were the Altholm police legally justified in their confiscation and removal of the flag?

  ‘This court is persuaded that their conduct was unjustified in purely objective terms. The scythe was no scythe, nor was it a weapon, it was merely a symbol. The demonstrators had the right to carry the flag, the police had no right to take it away.

  ‘On the other hand, this court believes that Frerksen thought he was subjectively in the right when he impounded the flag. He took the flag for a provocation, and thought he would not be able to prevent subsequent clashes. The flag caught him by surprise.

  ‘Henning and Padberg both showed resistance at Tucher’s pub, by holding on to the flag.

  ‘The question whether there was a plan or conspiracy must be answered in the negative. On the contrary, both Padberg and Henning did all they could to calm the situation, and carry on with the march.

  ‘Rohwer put up some resistance, and exceeded the bounds of self-defence.