by Bill Jones
‘Then what?’
‘Well, if you all do your jobs, five thousand prisoners walk out of the gate.’
‘And you, Rosterg? Whose side are you really on? Tomorrow night, where will you be?’
‘Right behind you, Max. Now, goodnight.’
Left alone, Hartmann began to shiver. Either it was colder than he’d thought, or the news had left him in mild shock. With Rosterg gone, there was no prospect of another smoke, and he was desperate for nicotine, or a stiff drink, preferably both.
If he went back inside, there’d be a cigarette – he was a hero, after all – but if he saw Goltz’s face, there was a strong chance of being sick. A little longer in the fresh air might just clear his head.
Coming out from the shadows, he walked on to the worn grass which ran between the two rows of huts. All the other insomniacs had returned to their beds, and the only sign of life was a faint orange glow in the guard hut by the gate which led out into the rest of the camp.
With no conscious purpose, he began moving towards it. Maybe he could charm a cigarette out of the sentry. Maybe he’d get himself shot. What did it matter? As he drew close, he could make out the outline of a solitary soldier through the window. He had a paperback book loosely clutched in his hands, and his rifle was leaning up against a free-standing paraffin heater. Even from a distance, Hartmann could smell the warm fumes. Another few minutes and the soldier would probably be fast asleep.
He knocked on the closed door and stepped away. From inside, he could hear the gun falling, and a chair being pushed back hard across the floor. Moments later, the door slammed open and the muzzle of the rifle appeared, swinging wildly from side to side. Out of sight, Hartmann could hear the soldier’s short, hard breaths. After a few more seconds, he could see his face peering out, spot-damaged and white. It was the young guard from the apple-picking detail, the lad who’d brought him the buckets of warm water in the cell block.
Hartmann edged forward to face him, his hands over his head. ‘Listen. Don’t panic. Don’t shoot. There’s no danger here. I just wondered, can you spare a cigarette?’
The boy turned, recognising him. Hartmann smiled. ‘Are you the only guard they’ve got?’
‘Go back, back to your hut. Please don’t make me shoot.’
Behind the soldier’s back, Hartmann could see a calendar on the inside wall of the hut. Pictures of girls in red swimming costumes, and the numbers struck through with a pencil. Thirteen numbers. Tomorrow was a Thursday. December 14th.
‘You don’t seem to have many mates, Kraut. Same as me.’
‘Don’t they ever give you time off?’
‘Tomorrow. First in a month. I’m getting my motorbike back too.’
‘Sounds like fun. Can I come?’
‘Yes, it will be. And no, you can’t. Now fuck off back to your hut.’
35
By four the next day, it was already dark.
In a week’s time, it would be the winter solstice, and the camp had never looked more anaemic. All day long, a sullen bank of cloud had hung over the entire place, and the electric lights which circled the fence had burned yellow in the speckled fog. On the flagpole by the main gate, the Union Jack had given up. There was no rain and no wind, and the daylight hours passed so slowly, it felt to the prisoners as if time had actually stopped.
Inside the eight huts of Hartmann’s compound, the men were counting down the minutes and not one of them could keep still. Games of chess lay abandoned. Listless groups paced in circles outside. Small talk had become almost impossible and half-hearted conversations floundered on the strict requirement to reveal nothing.
Every individual knew what he had to do and with whom. Beyond that, the soldiers were chained to their secret orders, and forbidden from asking what they each desperately wanted to know.
If it felt odd waiting for a battle without weapons, no one said so. Self-belief had never been an issue for the Schutzstaffel, and everyone was glad the deadline had come forward. Most had masked their faces with dirt. A few had even daubed swastikas on their cheeks in their own blood.
To pass the hours, like most of the men, Hartmann had wrapped himself up in his blankets. Sometimes, he slept. Mostly, he simply watched his fellow-prisoners through half-closed eyes, and like all of them he felt charged with expectation.
Beneath him, Zuhlsdorff coughed and snored on without stirring. For three days, the two men had barely spoken and Hartmann liked it that way. The boy was a murderous cretin. Losing a few fingers had been too good for him. Somewhere down the line there’d probably be a firing squad for all of them, and with a bit of luck Zuhlsdorff would be ahead of him in the queue.
That way he’d be able to watch.
At precisely 6.30 p.m., it started.
‘Brave comrades, it is time.’
No one said anything, but Bruling sounded scared; he was saying the right things, but saying them like a schoolteacher.
‘The other huts have their own jobs to do. Some of them may have already started. We have ours. You know what it is. Now let’s go and do it. Heil Hitler.’
Later, Hartmann would always wonder why they weren’t stopped at that exact moment. Under a starless sky, the sheer volume of men on the move was absurd. In the four corners of their compound, huge groups were massing for action. Every moment, he expected to hear gunshots. No amount of stealth training could conceal the chaos.
From every direction, Bruling’s company surely looked – and sounded – like a herd of suicidal elephants threading single-file towards a catastrophe. One pair of sharp eyes was all it would take and they were finished.
As they shuffled past the bulk of the army compound, Hartmann looked across at the huts. There were lights in a few of the windows, but nothing appeared to be moving. The whole place seemed fast asleep.
A rising. Goltz had promised a fucking rising. Where the hell was it?
At the very least, prisoners should be starting to congregate. It wasn’t even bedtime. He checked again. Not a flicker. Either they hadn’t been told, or they weren’t interested.
Ahead of him, Bruling’s men had reached the spot by the outer defences they’d chosen a few days before. Another thirty Luftwaffe prisoners had swollen their ranks. As Hartmann pushed forward to the front, Bruling passed him the pair of stolen bolt-cutters.
‘You feeling OK, Max?’
Men with blackened faces sat tensely on the grass. Every pair of eyes was on the double wire and the warehouses beyond.
‘There’s no one out there. I told you we’d be on our own.’
‘No one we can see.’
‘We go together. You cut and I’ll pull. Like we agreed. All right?’
‘Terrific.’
But Bruling was already gone, squirming on his belly to the fence. When Hartmann crawled alongside, the lower edge of the inner section had already been pulled clear of the soil. At Bruling’s nod, he started to cut, working upwards and then across until a gap had been opened that was wide enough for three men to walk through side by side.
Behind them, in the darkness, the watching company was practically invisible. No one would move until each of the three fences were breached.
Horribly aware of their own breathing, the two shuffled forward. Every snip sounded like a cracking branch. Another nod, another rapid sequence of cuts. They were tight up against the second fence and Bruling was tugging it back to make room for the cutters. This time, the wire was thicker and every cut required more exertion. At times it took two of them to apply sufficient leverage, but the men worked well together, and their progress was swift. After five minutes, only the last fence stood between them and the trucks. Just a few more snips and they’d be through.
Hartmann breathed heavily in the silence. Sweat was stinging his eyes, and he ran the inside of his arm across his forehead to clear it. Just for a moment, something had felt wrong, as if a false note had been struck somewhere in the chorus of the night. Tuning his ears to the darkness, he scanned
left and right. Nothing. Maybe he’d imagined it.
Bruling was already busy pulling away the final doorway for his men. Little more than a sprint was left between them and the trucks which would take them away from there. He raised a triumphant fist back towards the company of men who were charging down towards the gap.
And then the arc lights came on.
Shocked by their sudden exposure, the prisoners halted. A dark snake of army vehicles was roaring along the track which ringed the camp. Hartmann and Bruling were running back, heading for their three ragged holes as the night around them was ruptured by the sound of diesel engines and cocked rifles.
With every step, Hartmann felt certain he would die. He could feel the beaming eyes of the jeeps behind him and hear furious, incomprehensible voices. Surely someone soon would let a round fly. Any moment there’d be a bullet ripping into his back. A stride ahead of him, Bruling was pushing back through the fence. Arms were reaching forward to pull him clear. Seconds later, they had grasped Hartmann too and he was turning to see what was happening.
It was as if the troops had sprung from the earth. Around twenty vehicles were massed in a blockade between them and the warehouses. Many more were still moving in the direction of the main gate: armoured cars, jeeps and lorries bristling with weaponry. Along the outside of the wire, a line of heavily armed soldiers was spreading out at measured intervals. Every one of them was wearing a red beret.
Fucking hell, thought Hartmann. Parachute regiments, the heavy squad.
‘They fucking knew,’ panted Bruling. ‘They were expecting us.’
But there was no time for a discussion.
Out of nowhere, a squally wind had blown up, drawing sleety rain on its edge. From the far side of the camp, there were single gunshots, followed by longer bursts of machine-gun fire. From every direction, there was furious unintelligible yelling, and Hartmann could see prisoners in their hundreds surging out of their huts towards the perimeter wire.
All discipline had collapsed. In the darkness, it was no longer possible to say where anyone had gone. Bruling had vanished, and his company was dissolving into the night, each man finding his own way into the huge groups stampeding towards the camp’s outer fence. Either voluntarily or under duress the huge silent army was mobilising. If they could find a weakness – a gap – Goltz might still pull this off.
At the army compound, Hartmann ducked left under a ruined section of wire and headed towards Hut 19. The rain was coming even harder now. Searchlights were criss-crossing the night sky and an expectant hum seemed to be building; a low background roar centred on the area around the central parade ground. All around him, prisoners were streaming towards it in a state of expectant curiosity. As yet, few of them looked in the mood for a serious fight.
‘Max, what the hell are you doing here?’
It was Eschner. He’d found him.
‘It’s a long story. What have you been told?’
‘That we’ll be home by the weekend.’ Eschner examined Hartmann mock-seriously, and then laughed. ‘No one has told us much. Some sort of mass breakout?’
‘How did you get out of the compound?’
‘I walked. Like everyone else. The gates were open and the guards seem to have made a tactical withdrawal.’
‘You should have stayed in bed.’
‘Not an option. We’ve been ordered down to the wire. Seemed sensible to do what we’re told.’
‘There’s rather more to it than that. Do you want to take a look?’
A small plane was flying directly overhead. Hartmann could see the outline of its cockpit and the lights on its wingtips. Not far behind it was a second plane. At a rough guess, both were heading east.
It wasn’t possible. Surely.
‘I wouldn’t miss it for the world. Lead on.’
Since hearing the gunfire, the mood of the prisoners had changed. Curiosity had morphed swiftly into fear then rage; the swell was now a growling, leaderless charge. Up against the fence, the crush was already five deep and more prisoners were arriving all the time.
From what little Hartmann could see, every guard stationed inside the camp had fled. Wooden sentry huts were being ransacked. Heaters and chairs were being carried away. Desks had already been smashed up for firewood, and random bonfires were hissing in the downpour, piled high with stolen papers and files.
With Eschner behind him, Hartmann steered a path through the chaos towards the parade ground. Away to his right, beyond the wire, the ring of red-bereted soldiers seemed to extend the entire way around the camp. Behind the troops, extra floodlights were being wheeled into place, creating a blazing white corridor within which countless men were now milling.
Inside, only a few doubters had held back. The rest were transformed into an unexpected mob, hurling rocks and abuse and standing nose to sodden nose with their enemy.
‘They’ll be terrified, paras or not,’ said Hartmann.
Everywhere he looked, the camp’s pathways were being ripped apart for makeshift weapons. A relay of men was passing lumps of concrete to the wire where they were broken into smaller missiles and lobbed over on to the heads of the soldiers. Already, in places, the prisoners had torn at the fence with their hands, pulling it back until the posts lurched, inspiring the men to surge forward against the wild barking of the dogs, furiously, randomly and without any regard for consequence.
‘I was wrong,’ Hartmann muttered. ‘All it took was a spark.’
‘They’ve given us an enemy,’ said Eschner. ‘That’s the only thing that’s changed.’
He was right. You couldn’t fight what you couldn’t see. ‘I thought you’d all stay in your beds. Stick to your carols.’
‘You people think it’s all so simple. It isn’t.’
As Eschner spoke, a lamp crashed down off the fence, sparking wildly as it shattered inside the camp.
‘You’re not the only ones who went into this war wanting to win. It’s just that we’re better at knowing when we’ve lost.’
For the second time, Hartmann heard gunshots, distant pops against the rising wall of sound. ‘So why all this?’
‘It’s an impetuous rush of blood. No more. We’ll all regret it in the morning,’ said Eschner, grinning.
The two men had reached the parade ground where the wind had strengthened and swung, driving sleet across the prisoners streaming towards the main gate. Once the adrenaline subsided, the men would quickly freeze. If this madness still had a chance, the prisoners would need guns, and they’d need them quickly. But where was Goltz? Where were any of them?
Tanks and rifles, that was the promise. Instead, there were sticks and stones and a saturated throng massing aimlessly in the puddled shadow of the old four-storey barracks. Hard against the fence, the men were packed so tightly they could no longer turn round. Strange waves seemed to ripple through the crowd as the heads leaned first one way then another like stalks of black corn.
As more prisoners pushed from behind, the weight of the crush intensified. High-pitched shrieks of protest could be heard from the front, climbing above the deep bellow of discontent. Taking care not to get sucked in, Hartmann and Eschner hung back, seeking a better view of what was happening.
Inside the old barracks, curious faces were peering out from the rows of barred windows. Higher up, along the edge of its turreted rooftop, they could see rifles aiming into the crowd. Down at the main gate – ten yards to their left – two tanks were rumbling into position, side by side, with their immense green barrels lined up on the prisoners. On either flank, three open-backed army lorries were standing ready, and sitting on each was a two-man crew behind a tripod-mounted Bren gun.
‘It doesn’t look good, does it?’
Even in the lashing rain, there was something about the way Rosterg carried himself; imperious, never flustered. As he moved through the confusion, people gave him space and his voice revealed no trace of alarm.
‘I gather you had a welcome party over there. I’m sur
prised they didn’t shoot you.’
‘What about everyone else? What the fuck’s happening, Rosterg?’
‘Bruling is telling everyone the guards had been tipped off, that they were waiting for you to come.’
‘You’ve seen Bruling? Is he all right? He just vanished.’
‘Yes, I’ve seen Bruling. In the same place I saw Goltz and the rest of them.’
Rosterg stepped aside. Another stream of prisoners was elbowing its way to the gate.
‘They’ve all been rounded up, Max. No one had any more success than you did. No one got beyond the fence. Reception parties everywhere. Anyone deemed to have been a ringleader is being taken away.’
‘No tanks? No planes?’
‘Nothing, I’m afraid.’ He turned to survey the crowd. ‘Unless you count this bunch of headless chickens. Rather a good turnout, actually.’
‘We heard shots.’
‘Warning shots. Just a few looseners over the bows.’
‘What about you? Will they come for you?’
‘Possibly. Possibly not. It depends how fast their brains work.’
‘And me?’
‘I’m quite sure they’re already looking.’
Hartmann turned to Eschner. The boy’s face looked grey with fatigue. ‘You should go now. Whatever happens, you don’t want to be with me.’
‘In a minute. I want to see this.’
In the glare of the floodlights, over a thousand faces were turned towards the fence. If they knew it was all over, few of them cared. There was too much momentum now, and this was already a night they’d remember.
From the drenched huddle of men, a fresh storm of rocks was flying up and over the wire. A lone voice chanting ‘Deutschland, Deutschland’ had been joined by hundreds more, driven on by the tribal pounding of cold feet. Through the racket, Hartmann could hear a British officer screaming instructions. Stones were raining down on his men.
‘Hold your fire. Hold your fire.’
A few feet away, German prisoners were spitting insults, and the fence was rocking in its foundations. One concerted effort and it would be down. All across the parade ground, there was a deep moan, followed by a sustained mass surge on the gate. Right down the line, Hartmann could see concrete posts starting to lean. Yet more missiles were falling, and a paratrooper had gone down, blood pouring from his scalp.