by Sven Hassel
For a moment the Oberfeldwebel stands undecidedly, staring at the remains of the window through which the armourer has disappeared.
‘Herr Oberfeldwebel, sir! Instructions carried out!’ grins Tiny, saluting.
Weiss draws a deep breath, purple in the face. He opens and closes his mouth several times without a sound crossing his lips. He looks like a balloon from which the air has escaped.
‘I won’t have you spoiling my canteen,’ he whines, tamely. ‘Drink up your beer and pay at the desk. Sing good German songs, pray to God for victory and otherwise keep your mouths shut! If you don’t abide by the regulations out you go on your ear!’
‘Count on us, we’re on the side o’ religion,’ Tiny assures him, putting his head out of the broken window to see where the armourer has got to.
The yes-men are chased away from the round table like a flock of sparrows from a newly sown kitchen garden.
‘Deal the cards,’ orders Chief Mechanic Wolf, amicably. ‘Double stakes!’
Weiss pushes himself to a place at the table, and arrogantly demands cards.
‘Who the hell invited you?’ asks Porta, highly surprised, laying heavy emphasis on the ‘you.’
‘Just you watch yourself,’ warns Weiss, importantly. ‘What are you then? I’m a whole lot above a shitty little Obergefreiter.’
Porta regards him condescendingly.
‘Well, I’ll be damned! Don’t you know that I am of the same rank as the Commander-in-Chief, Obergefreiter Hitler?’
‘Piss with all that,’ breaks in Wolf, categorically. ‘Deal the cards, Porta and you, Weiss, shut your face, or you’ll be out on your arse, smartish!’
‘Thrown out of my own kitchen?’ shouts the Kitchen-General, excitedly. He looks as if he is ready to start something.
‘Own? You don’t own nothin’,’ states Wolf, with assurance. I ordered Hauptfeldwebel Hofmann to give you that kitchen because I reckoned you was one of mine. But maybe I’m wrong about that?’
‘Course I am. I’m with you all the way,’ crawls the Kitchen-General, sweat breaking out on him at the thought of going back to the ranks.
‘Want more than four cards?’ asks Porta with a crooked smile, as his hawk’s eye catches Weiss letting a card disappear.
‘If you should happen to be tryin’ to twist us,’ roars Wolf, with false pathos, ’then us two’ve been pals as long as neceesary, and you will be out of your nice warm kitchen an’ into an icecold trench fightin’ the good, but hopeless, fight for Führer an’ Fatherland, quicker’n knife!’
Weiss sulks. It is the end of the month, and his lack of money is catastrophical. He has to win a few hundred marks. He cannot let any more supplies slip out on to the black market. The Catering Officer has expressed surprise, three times now, at the pilferage rate. It will not take much more for his house of cards to collapse.
‘You look as if you were thinking of Napoleon’s hurdles race to Moscow,’ grins Porta, examining Weiss’s pallid face with savage pleasure.
Wolf wins the first two games and the three following. He is in noisy good humour.
‘You wouldn’t be cheating now, would you?’ asks Porta, inquisitorially, looking greedily at the considerable pile of money in front of Wolf.
‘I reject such insinuations with the contempt they deserve,’ replies Wolf, arrogantly.
Gregor swears ill-humouredly. He has already lost a large amount. The Old Man is silent and nervous, having lost 200 marks he had intended to send home to Liselotte.
Weiss is on the verge of tears. He asks for a small shortterm loan. He is still optimistic that the piles of money in front of Wolf and Porta can be made to change owners.
Generously Porta pushes 500 marks over to him.
‘Just sign this piece of paper, please!’
Weiss runs his eyes over the writing.
‘Eighty per cent!’ he howls, outraged, ’it’s usury! How dare you make an offer like that to a higher rank, to a Chief Cook? Don’t you know it’s piss against regulations and a civil crime even?’
‘Are we going to have a discussion on illegalities?’ asks Porta with a crafty look in his deep-sunken eyes. ‘What about an Oberfeldwebel who borrows money from ORs?’
‘A kick up the arse and off go his bleedin’ stripes,’ whoops Tiny, taking the opportunity of secreting two cards. He regards Weiss’s borrowed money as already his.
Weiss gives up and signs the note with a sour expression. He puts the 500 marks in his pocket quickly as if he were afraid someone would steal them.
Porta hawks noisily. A gob of spittle lands in a bucket by the door.
‘Stop that filthiness,’ admonishes Weiss, darkly. ‘That’s not a spittoon, that’s No. 3 Company’s coffee pail.’
‘All right then,’ answers Porta, readily. ‘Next time I’ll spit in your face!’
Wolf whinnies with laughter and wins again.
Gregor takes a loan from Porta, but naturally on the eighty per cent man’s terms.
Weiss lays down his cards. He cannot understand how it is possible to have such bad cards all the time. He is pale as a corpse. For a moment he thinks of suicide, but gives up the idea. After the third hand in which he has not taken part, he begs, in a whisper, for a new loan.
Porta looks at him doubtfully, but after a long pause he pushes 300 marks over to him and solemnly unfolds a new I.O.U.
‘What the hell?’ roars Weiss, red-faced as a lobster. ‘Payable within twenty-four hours! Why?’
‘Because you’re a bad risk,’ grins Porta, shamelessly, continuing to deal the cards with practised fingers.
‘A bad risk?’ mumbles Weiss, despondently. ‘What do you know about that?’
‘More than you think,’ smiles Porta, knowingly. ‘Soon as the figure-boys come to take your stock, you’ll be on your way out into the ranks of the great unknown heroes.’
Weiss goes dark blue in the face.
‘Are you insinuating that I’m a thief?’
‘I didn’t think you were slow on the uptake,’ grins Porta, shamelessly, and almost jumps when he finds he is holding three kings.
Wolf whinnies again and slaps Porta on the shoulder with assumed friendliness.
‘You’re probably right, Porta. You an’ me can smell a pork pincher a mile off. Weiss just stinks of rancid innocence and armpit sweat!’
‘I hope your sense of humour can stand the sight of these,’ grins Porta, slapping his three kings down victoriously on the table.
‘Same to you,’ smiles Wolf, blissfully, putting down two aces and a queen. His hand is already out to rake in Porta’s money.
‘’Old it then,’ shouts Tiny, throwing down two aces and a king. He has quickly exchanged a deuce with one of the aces he was sitting on.
‘You aren’t cheating, are you?’ asks Porta, staring hard at Tiny.
‘Never in all my life,’ bawls Tiny, insulted.
Porta looks round the table. He knows Tiny has cheated. The three he is sitting on and has exchanged for a king feels red-hot and he is in no doubt that Tiny is sitting on a card he has switched. He can, of course, demand that Tiny stand up and he will then be exposed, but if Tiny has one of his rarer, bright moments he will demand that everybody stand up and Porta himself will be exposed. On the other hand it is probable that there were others sitting warming cards. This would mean that play would be started again from the beginning and all winnings would have to be handed back. He does a lightning calculation in his head and decides to let things go on as they are. With his eighty per cent loans and his winnings he has had a good day. But he decides to watch Tiny like an Alsatian dog watching a stolen meat-bone.
Porta wins the next five hands.
Weiss withdraws from the game and goes down to the cellar to eat bread and sugar. He has heard that sugar is an energy source. Porta gives him a new loan, but this time he has to give 50 kilograms of coffee as security. What the company is going to do for coffee tomorrow morning doesn’t worry Weiss. It’s a long time to br
eakfast, and a lot can happen before then.
The door flies open with a bang, and in marches Staff Quartermaster Sieg with a large, threatening, black briefcase, adorned with the Reich eagle, under his arm. Fat and wobbling he drops into a shaky armchair which creaks under his weight.
Weiss goes quite green in the face.
‘What the devil do you want?’ asks Wolf, without attempting to hide his disgust at this unexpected visit.
‘Now then, now then,’ Sieg stops him with a conceited mien and bangs the briefcase down on the table, where it lies with the threatening look of a time-bomb. ‘It’d be cleverer to go a bit more easy, don’t you think?’ He snaps his fingers and bares a row of tobacco-stained teeth in an unpleasant grin.
‘Maybe it’d be cleverer for you, too, son,’ says Wolf, grinning like his namesake, in a way that doesn’t promise anything good for Sieg.
Sieg looks at Wolf through narrowed eyes.
‘If it’s the last thing I ever do,’ he hisses, ’I’ll see you and Porta full o’ bullet holes before this man’s war is over!’
‘You poor dope,’ grins Porta, superciliously. He picks up the brimming glass of vodka in front of Sieg and empties it in one long happy swallow. Then he fishes a cigar out of Sieg’s tunic pocket, and asks for a light.
In amazement Sieg hands him his gold cigarette lighter.
Porta takes his time lighting his cigar, but finally he is successful. He blows enormous clouds of smoke towards the ceiling and puts the lighter in his pocket.
‘That wasn’t a bloody present,’ protests Sieg, weakly.
‘You said, here you are, didn’t you?’ Porta cuts him off, condescendingly, ‘and now I say thank you! Presents are always welcome.’
‘I’m not standing for this,’ shouts Sieg, furiously. ‘I’ll put you on a charge, Porta, I’m a Staff Quartermaster, I am!’
‘You are a stupid man,’ states Porta. ‘Keep on an’ I’ll kick your arse ten feet up in the air!’
Sieg jumps up in a rage and knocks over Gregor’s mug. The table swims with beer.
Gregor looks at him reproachfully.
‘Mind you don’t wash yourself away, old son,’ he warns and wipes the beer up with Sieg’s officer’s scarf.
‘My scarf!’ roars Sieg raging.
‘My beer,’ smiles Gregor, throwing the soaking-wet scarf on to the floor at his feet.
‘What the hell do you think you’re up to?’ shouts Sieg, clenching his fists in powerless rage. ‘You’ll get paid out for this! I’m not your old buddy any more. I’m the Staff Quartermaster now. And I’ve got friends big enough to crush lice like you lot!’
‘You remind me of a randy buck rabbit on heat,’ says Porta, contemptuously. ‘Staff Quartermaster! The arsehole of the Army!’
‘You’ve had it now all right,’ shouts Sieg, threateningly waving the beer-soaked scarf above his head.
‘We have decided to release you from the heavy burden of living,’ Porta grins, diabolically.
‘I’d kick you straight up the arse if I wasn’t scared of losin’ me boot,’ says Wolf, waggling a hand-made officer’s boot out in front of him admiringly.
‘You’re under arrest,’ roars Sieg, drawing his Mauser. With murder in his eyes he cocks the gun and releases the safety-catch.
Like lightning the Old Man knocks the pistol out of the enraged QM’s hand.
‘Now you can choose whether or not we settle this here and now or whether I make a report on it! In the latter case you’ve been a kind of an officer for a good long time anyway!’ says the Old Man sharply, putting the Mauser in his pocket.
‘What do you mean settle it here and now?’ asks Sieg, uncertainly.
‘You are a stupid fool,’ the Old man nods in confirmation of his own words. ‘You haven’t changed a bit since you were a saddler with our lot.’
‘I was an Oberfeldwebel,’ Sieg corrects him, inflating his chest. ‘And now I’m an officer!’
‘Rubbish,’ the Old Man rebuffs him, coldly. ‘You’re some kind of civil servant in uniform and nothing more! How’ll you have it? Want us to beat you up here or will you have it out with Porta behind the cook-house?’
Sieg rocks uncertainly, thinking furiously. He is both bigger and stronger than Porta and he was one of the best boxers in recruit school. On the other hand you never know what kind of underhanded dodge Porta can get up to.
After a minute or so he nods sharply.
‘I’m ready to bash the bastard’s face in!’
Porta gets up from his position in cover behind Wolf, and removes his tunic ceremoniously.
‘I’m ready to get my face bashed in, if that wobbling lump of jelly thinks he’s the man who can do it.’
Wolf bends over and whispers something in his ear which makes him shake with laughter.
Soon after, we are standing in a circle behind the cookhouse waiting for the fight to begin.
Porta and Wolf put their heads together, and look Sieg over like a couple of old, knowledgeable tom-cats.
‘Can we wear gloves?’ asks Porta, obsequiously. ‘I’d hate to spoil my manicure on a face like that.’
‘You can wear boots on your hands, far as I’m concerned,’ shouts Sieg, contemptuously. ‘You ain’t gonna hit anything anyway, before I’ve splattered you up against the wall.’
‘Did you know the QM officer is fucking your wife while you’re out counting sacks of spuds?’ grins Barcelona, cheekily.
‘Fuck you,’ screams Sieg, furiously. ‘My wife never went to bed with nobody but me. She was a virgin when I met up with her.’
‘If she ‘adn’t of been, she’d never’ve took you,’ shouts Tiny, provocatively.
‘I’ll look after you when I’ve finished with this one,’ Sieg promised him, darkly.
‘Get them bloody gloves on,’ he shouts, moving towards Porta who is still fumbling with a pair of black gloves.
‘Ready when you are,’ grins Porta, happily, pulling the gloves well up on his hands.
‘First round,’ orders the Old Man, bringing his hand down.
Sieg charges forward like a bull elephant in musk.
Porta steps to one side and Sieg rushes past without hitting him. Instead he runs into Gregor who is thrown up into the air and ends in the withering potato rows.
‘Hey, I’m over here,’ shouts Porta, who has moved back a couple of paces. ‘What the hell you knockin’ Gregor about for when it’s me you’re fightin’ with?’
Snuffling, Sieg gets back on his feet, rubbing his left fist.
‘I’ll trample you into the ground,’ he snarls, bitterly. By God, I’ll smash you! I’ve been waitin’ for this for seems like a century!’
‘I’m impatient,’ smiles Porta, amiably. ‘I feel the same way. I shoot my load thinking about bashing you up.’ He dances towards Sieg, keeping his gloved hands up to protect his face.
Sieg tries a straight left but Porta isn’t there any more. He turns and sees something black coming towards him. It hits his face with a force of about 2800 joules. The force of the blow lifts him up and deposits him several yards away on top of a dustbin. His face looks as if it had been on the receiving end of a dum-dum bullet.
‘Get hold of a medical orderly,’ says the Old Man, brusquely. He goes quickly into the canteen. He doesn’t want to know what has happened.
Wolf laughs loud and long.
‘Next time he won’t be so easy about lettin’ a bloke wear gloves, will he?’
‘He’ll have learnt something then, won’t he?’ laughs Porta, punching a dent in a heavy plate of steel standing by the door.
‘Lovely grub,’ shouts Tiny, admiringly, ‘loaded gloves!’
Porta removes the black gloves. They are lined with lead, Russian loaded gloves, an heirloom from a fallen NKVD lieutenant.
‘Merde, ca va barder,’ says the Legionnaire, warningly. ‘In a couple of weeks’ time, when he begins to be able to think again, he’ll realise there was something fishy about those gloves!’
‘Couldn’t care less,’ says Porta, carelessly, banging the loaded gloves against the wall. ‘In this world war’s difficult moments, I’ve so far been able to keep a clear head and to get by without damage.’
‘What if ’e was to backshoot you, then?’ asks Tiny, well knowing that Sieg is a dangerous and pitiless enemy.
‘I’m the one that shoots people, not the one that gets shot,’ boasts Porta. He goes into the canteen and empties a large mug of beer.
‘Christ but it’s rainin’,’ says Tiny, shivering, as we fumble our way back to the company lines in the dark.
Z.b.V. duty30 is on the board for No. 2 Section. It annoys us. Z.b.V. could be anything.
At 07.30 hrs on the dot, we scramble up into the big Krupp-Diesel which has come to pick us up.
‘Now you men, remember I expect you to be a credit to your company,’ roars Hauptfeldwebel Hoffmann as we move off. ‘Ifs a great honour for sad sacks like you to be chosen for this kind of special duty. The eyes of the Fiihrer are upon you! Chests out, chins in, you lot of vultures!’
At Spree we turn the corner and drive alongside the river in the direction of Spandau.
‘I thought as much,’ says the Old Man, tiredly. ‘An execution!’
‘Well, let’s be glad it’ll soon be over, and we’ll have the rest of the day off,’ says Porta, and begins to plan his afternoon.
‘If I’d known it was an execution,’ says Barcelona, angrily, ‘I’d have gone sick.’
‘That’s why they never tell you,’ explains Gregor, testing the bolt of his rifle.
‘Why can’t they leave that shit to the SS or the MPs?’ protests Barcelona, resentfully. ‘We’re soldiers not bloody executioners!’
‘C’est la guerre, you are the slave of the rifle just like the rest of us,’ the little Legionnaire admonishes him. ‘Yours not to reason why. It is your duty when you live on the military dungheap — where you in all probability will also die.’
‘You lot’ll addle your brains thinkin’ too much,’ says Tiny, carelessly. ‘What do you care what they tell us to do? When I knock one o’ them off all I think about is it’s the same as it was in the Reeperbahn when you’re sendin’ the bleedin’ clown off ‘is perch down into the water.’