An Army of One: A John Rossett Novel

by Tony Schumacher

  “No.” Rossett didn’t sound as convincing as he had hoped.

  “How did you meet her?”

  “I was up here tracing a suspect. He had a little . . . trouble when he was arrested, and she worked in the hospital we had to take him to.”

  “She was a nurse?”

  “Yes.” Rossett took another sip of beer.

  Neumann spoke again. “You must have been a fast worker.”

  Rossett looked at him, so Neumann elaborated. “You must have got to know her quickly to make such an impression.”

  “Yeah, well.” Rossett shrugged. “I spent a week there while my suspect was recovering, so we had a while to get to know each other.”

  “You put him in hospital for a week?”

  “What?”

  “You put him in hospital for a week?”

  “No.”

  “No?”

  “No. It was three weeks, but I only hung around for a week. I had to get back to London.”

  Neumann shook his head. “A little trouble?”

  Rossett ignored him, and continued speaking. “I wrote to her, and visited a few times. We got to know each other and then . . . well, you know.”

  “What?”

  Rossett shrugged. “We fell in love.”

  “Wow.”

  “Yeah, wow.”

  “So you got married?”

  “Yeah, six months later.”

  “Whirlwind romance.”

  “Sort of.”

  “She moved to London with you?”

  “Yeah.” Rossett adjusted the position of his pint glass by a few inches.

  Neumann waited for him to speak again. He didn’t.

  “Do you want to go visit her family while you are in town? We can make time for it if you do.”

  “No.”

  “I can’t imagine that you get much time to see them. It wouldn’t be a problem, John. It’ll be a good chance to catch—”

  “They blame me.”

  “Blame you?”

  “For her death.” Rossett paused. “And my son’s.”

  Neumann was silent.

  “When I got out of the prisoner-of-war camp, after my family were killed by the bomb, I wrote to her family.”

  “And?”

  “They replied—well, her mother replied, saying that if she hadn’t married me she wouldn’t have been in London, and she wouldn’t have been killed by the bomb.”

  “That’s hardly fair.”

  “It’s true.”

  “But still not fair.”

  “Yes, well, they never approved of the marriage. Her dying just fed the fire.”

  “Oh” was all Neumann could think to say.

  “Yeah.” Rossett lit a cigarette.

  “What about your own family?”

  “I don’t have one.” Rossett shrugged, took another slug of beer, and then dragged the conversation away from places best left in the dark. “So this a regular part of the job?”

  “What?” Neumann sounded relieved.

  “Places like this?”

  “Sadly, yes.”

  “Jesus,” Rossett said. “I wish you would have told me.”

  “The worst part is the time on your own away from your family.”

  “You get used to it.”

  “Of course, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to . . .” Neumann held up a hand. “Forgive me.”

  Rossett waved away the apology with a waft of the cigarette. “You got kids?”

  “Son, Dieter, he’s in Africa with the Luftwaffe. My daughter, Leni, is at university in Berlin, studying chemistry.”

  “Wife?”

  “Ex-wife, in Berlin, living in my house.”

  “Was it the job?”

  “The job?”

  Rossett pointed at himself, the drinks, and then around the room in fast succession. “Being a policeman.”

  “No. It was another man.”

  “Ah.”

  “She fell in love with Hitler,” Neumann said.

  “Oh.”

  Neumann sighed and rubbed his chest again. “She was what we used to call ‘an enthusiastic party member.’”

  “I see.”

  “As Kripo I’m a member, and I have to wear the badge.” Neumann tapped his lapel, where the party swastika had been until they had arrived in the outpost of Liverpool. “But I was never . . . you know . . .” Neumann looked at Rossett. “Do you understand?”

  “Yes.”

  “Heidi really went for it, the whole thing. She became a local organizer.” Neumann’s voice dropped low as he looked off across the bar. “Then party secretary for half of Berlin.”

  “And you didn’t like it.”

  “It wasn’t that I was . . .” Neumann searched for the right words. “Anti-fascist. It was nothing like that. Jesus, I’d be in a cell if it was. I just . . . I just don’t get too excited by it all. It isn’t in my nature. I’m not the kind of man who enjoys torchlit parades and singing songs.”

  “Who does?”

  “Half of Germany.”

  “Half of the world since the war,” Rossett said quietly.

  “We had less time for each other, and more time for our work. I think secretly she sighed with relief when I suggested we get a divorce.”

  “Is that why you came to England?”

  “I was sent here. Not long after she married a senior party member in Berlin. Whether he had something to do with it, I’ll never know.” Neumann waved his hand at the depressing room. “But here I am.”

  “Britain isn’t that bad.”

  “Oh, come on, don’t get patriotic with me. Would you want to be here if you could help it?” Neumann gestured to the room with the flat of his hand, like he was inviting Rossett to take it from him.

  Rossett didn’t reply.

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to be rude,” Neumann apologized.

  “I could have gone.” Rossett looked at Neumann. “During the evacuation, I could have left.”

  “How?”

  “They offered to get me out with the . . .” Rossett looked for the word. “The dignitaries, the king, Churchill, all of them.”

  “Where to?”

  “Canada.”

  “You didn’t go?”

  “No.”

  “Why?”

  “My wife, my son. I didn’t know where they were, so I stayed behind to try to find them.”

  “And you got mixed up in the fighting?”

  “As always.”

  Neumann smiled, then paused. “Did you find them . . . before the bomb?”

  “No.”

  “I saw in the file that your son was a baby; did you . . . did you meet him?”

  “No.”

  “Jesus.”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “So am I.” Rossett took another drag on his cigarette, and they both sat in silence for a while, together, but alone with their memories.

  What passed for the hotel kitchen had made them six cheese sandwiches. The bread was grayer than the wallpaper in the bar. Rossett managed two, then slid the plate across to Neumann with a shake of his head.

  “You need to eat more food.” Neumann was chewing.

  “I’m not sure that is food.”

  “Today you’ve had toast, a sandwich on the road, and two here.”

  “Are you my mother?”

  The German shook his head, then also gave up on the sandwiches.

  “You want another beer?”

  “My round.” Rossett pushed himself out of the booth.

  “My turn to go the toilet then.” Neumann did the same.

  The barman saw Rossett coming, dropped his newspaper onto the counter, and started to pour the beers. Rossett rested an elbow and spun the paper around to read.

  Local news. The kind of stuff that would normally be squeezed in between ads and pictures of prize-winning vegetables. There were no ads or vegetables, just a lead story about how the patriotic workers in the docks had moved
more tonnage than at any other time in their history. Under it, another article detailed the heroic efforts of a group of local volunteers, off fighting communist guerrillas in someplace called Yakutsk.

  They were in the newest British brigade of the Waffen SS, the Legion of St. George. Rossett stared at the photo. Young men with dirty faces gathered in front of a tank, holding a hammer-and-sickle flag. In the middle of flag was a hole, through which one of the men was holding his hand in the V for Victory salute.

  The one that hadn’t worked for Churchill.

  The kids looked cold and thin. Most of them weren’t smiling. Rossett recognized their eyes as the eyes he’d seen a million times in the mirror. He stared so long at the picture, the dots it was printed with seemed to float off the page.

  He blinked.

  They were too young.

  He folded the paper and slid it away from him.

  “Here’s trouble,” said the barman.

  Rossett looked at the barman, who flicked his head toward the door without moving his eyes.

  Rossett turned to look.

  Three SS privates had just walked in.

  They were each carrying a long StG 44 assault rifle. One of them placed his rifle on the bar heavily, then called down to the barman.

  “Three beers, quick.” Halting English accompanied by a rap of knuckles on the counter.

  “I’ll be right with you.” The barman did his best to not make eye contact as he finished pouring Rossett’s drinks.

  “Now.” The German jabbed a finger into the countertop. “Or I’ll kick your ass.”

  The barman placed Rossett’s half-filled glasses on the shelf below the pump before selecting three fresh ones for the Germans.

  Rossett looked at the SS men.

  “He’s serving me,” Rossett said quietly in German.

  “Are you German?”

  “English.”

  The soldier smiled. “Well, fuck you then.”

  Rossett looked at the barman. “Pour my beer.”

  The barman didn’t look happy as his hand hovered near the pump.

  “We’re the SS. We get served first, so get at the back of the queue, Englishman.” The second soldier lowered his rifle onto the bar, then took off his field cap and placed it carefully next to the gun. He rested his elbow on the counter and pointed at the barman, then at the pump.

  “I’m a police officer.” Rossett said it quietly.

  “I don’t give a fuck,” the first soldier said loudly, then smiled at his comrades.

  “I’m attached to the Kriminalpolizei.” Rossett felt the rage rise inside him like a dread chill.

  “You’ll be attached to my boot in a minute, Englishman.” The first soldier pushed off the bar.

  Rossett stared at the counter.

  He waited to see if the rage was going to subside in the face of a bully.

  It didn’t.

  He turned his head and looked at the soldier closest to him. “I’m not going to back down.”

  “What?”

  “I’ll not be bullied by you.”

  The soldier looked at his colleagues, then back at Rossett. “I don’t—”

  “I’ll not be bullied by you. Either you back down, or we fight.”

  “I’m the SS.”

  “I don’t care. I’ll not be bullied. So . . .” Rossett pointed to the barman. “He is going to pour my beer, and when he has done that, he’ll serve you. If you disagree, I am going to knock you on your arse.” Rossett looked at the other two soldiers. “Then you, and then you will be next.” Rossett looked back at the soldier who had done most of the talking and waited for a reply.

  It came weakly. “But we are the SS.”

  “I don’t care.”

  The barman gripped the pump.

  The soldier closest to Rossett went for the rifle on the bar.

  He didn’t reach it.

  Rossett slammed a solid right into his solar plexus, then pivoted at the waist as he threw a straight left into the chin of the second German. The second man’s StG clattered onto the floor as he stumbled backward into his colleague.

  Rossett felt the smooth sole of his left shoe slide, then spin on the beer-stained carpet as he rolled through after the punch and danced a step forward. He paused, his feet spread, the muscles in his legs tensed, ready to reload the whip with a pivot from his toes to the top of his head.

  It only took half a beat. It felt like winding up a clock as the tension wound into his body. He weaved his head nine inches to the right, as his fist hovered next to his cheek. The last SS man turned and reached for his rifle on the counter. Rossett slammed the flat of his left hand onto the muzzle, pinning it to the bar.

  The German looked at him, then raised his hand.

  Rossett uncoiled and the whip crack rattled up his body in an explosion of power, a right cross that knocked the German to the floor.

  Silence.

  Rossett looked down at the three men on the floor, then at the barman.

  “Pour,” Rossett said, with a flick of his head to the pump.

  The barman started pouring.

  Neumann emerged from the toilet at the end of the bar and stopped.

  “What the . . . ?”

  “They tried to push in.” Rossett was already starting to regret what had happened. He looked at the barman, who placed a pint on the bar with a nervous rattle of glass on wood.

  “It’s the SS,” Neumann said. The first soldier was now groaning as he clutched his stomach and rolled onto his side.

  Rossett looked at the men on the floor, then frowned. “Yes . . . it is, isn’t it.”

  “We need to—” Neumann broke off as four more SS soldiers, followed by a huge staff sergeant, came through the doors of the bar.

  They all stopped, took in the scene, then raised their weapons toward Rossett, who took a moment before lifting his hands.

  “It’s not what it looks like.” Rossett forced a smile.

  The big staff sergeant pushed through his men, all the while keeping his submachine gun pointed at Rossett. “Back up.”

  The German’s voice rumbled low like distant thunder.

  Rossett considered his options, then did as he was told. “I’m a police officer.”

  “He’s with me,” Neumann said, but his explanation drew the aim of two gun barrels at his chest.

  He lifted his hands.

  The sergeant glanced at the men on the floor and nudged one of them with his toe. “Get up.”

  Only one of them was able to immediately comply. The other two rolled onto their backs and stared up at the ceiling, still unsure of what was going on.

  “He attacked us.” The first soldier was still rubbing his stomach as he reached for his weapon on the bar.

  “I told them what was going to happen,” Rossett said calmly in German to the staff sergeant, who didn’t reply.

  “We are police officers,” Neumann said from over by the toilet. “I have identification in my pocket.”

  “I know who you are.” The sergeant didn’t look around at Neumann. “Take your beer, and go and sit down.”

  Every customer who wasn’t involved in the fight had been cleared out of the bar. All that was left was a terrified-looking barman wringing a dishrag in his hands, and Rossett and Neumann with two pints of beer.

  They were back sitting in the booth, both of them staring at the Germans, who were tending to the three soldiers Rossett had put on their backsides.

  “I go to the toilet for two minutes, and when I come out I discover that you’ve started another war.” Neumann was turning his head slightly so that the other Germans in the bar wouldn’t be able to see his lips moving.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry? You’ll be sorry if they put you up against a wall and shoot you.”

  “What was I supposed to do?”

  “You are supposed to let them do what they want.” Neumann picked up his pint and tried to avoid eye contact with the staff sergeant, who was st
anding at the end of the bar staring at Rossett and Neumann.

  “Is it always like this?” Neumann shielded his mouth with his pint.

  “What?” Rossett stared back blankly, not bothering to hide his words.

  “This, the trouble. Does it follow you everywhere?”

  Rossett didn’t reply for a moment. Instead he leaned forward, picked up his beer, and took another slug. “Stop panicking, it’s going to be okay.”

  “You think?”

  “I know.” Rossett looked across at the staff sergeant. “If we were in trouble, would he have sent us over here to finish our beer with our pistols in our pockets?”

  Neumann had to resist the urge to check his pocket for his gun. What Rossett had said made sense. He nodded, almost to himself, then took a sip of beer.

  They both watched as an SS major entered the bar, took a look at the scene, then headed toward Rossett and Neumann.

  “Do me a favor.” Neumann was back to hissing.

  “What?”

  “Don’t hit anyone else.”

  The major was at the table’s edge before Rossett had a chance to reply.

  “Gentlemen, do you mind if my colleague and I join you?” It came out in excellent English.

  The big staff sergeant was already dragging two chairs across.

  “Please do,” Neumann replied.

  The major dropped into his chair without bothering to check if it was behind him. He placed two empty glasses down, then produced a quarter bottle of brandy out of his trench coat pocket.

  Rossett heard the seal break on the cork. He knew the sound all too well. It was probably the second bottle of the night, judging by the major’s slight sway as it opened.

  “I didn’t want to risk the beer.” The major winked at Rossett, then poured two glasses, one for himself and one for his staff sergeant.

  He lifted the brandy for a toast.

  “Gentlemen, please . . . the Führer.” This time he spoke German and left his glass hanging like a challenge in midair, daring them to ignore it.

  Rossett and Neumann paused, then lifted their drinks, a little less high and a lot less enthusiastically.

  “The Führer,” Neumann said softly.

  Rossett noticed that the NCO had placed his glass on the table with its contents untouched. Their eyes met. The big man stared back at him. There was no challenge, just two more eyes that had seen too much and were tired of it all.

  Neumann and Rossett put down their glasses, but the officer pouted. He reached across with the bottle and sloshed some into Rossett’s almost empty pint glass. Neumann quickly pulled his own glass closer to his body, as the officer banged the bottle back onto the tabletop.