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Krafft's glance switched from the boorish face of Cadet Kramer to that of the man beside him. He saw a youth whose clear-cut winning features had a certain nobility about them, and he said encouragingly: “Right, then, next please.”
Cadet Hochbauer rose to his full imposing height and said: “Cadet Hochbauer, Lieutenant. Christian name: Heinz. Born 1923 in Rosenheim. My father is in charge of the political training school at Pronthausen, holder of the Pour le Write. After matriculating I volunteered for the front. Special interests: history and philosophy.”
Hochbauer said this all very much as a matter of course, without attaching any particular importance to it almost in an offhand way, in fact. But he watched Lieutenant Krafft carefully to see if his words had made any impression, and seemed to detect that they had. The Lieutenant's eyes rested thoughtfully for a while on Cadet Hochbauer.
“Next please,” said Krafft.
“Cadet Weber, Egon, born in 1922. My father was a master baker in Werdau which is where I was born, but my father is no longer alive, he had a heart attack at work in 1933 just after being nominated master tradesman of the district—he's been a Party member from 1927 or '26. I learnt bakery too—we've got a number of different branches—and my hobby is motor racing.”
Figures, names, dates, particulars of places and professions, clues, explanations, statements of fact—all these political, human, military details, formed a confused buzzing sound in the room, which seemed completely to bemuse Krafft. By the sixth place-name he had already forgotten the first. By the ninth surname he could no longer remember the third or fourth. He stared at the desert of faces in front of him—bony, flat, round, long, and podgy. He listened to one voice after another—honest, rough, sharp, gentle, rasping voices—and they all merged into this one indeterminate buzz.
Krafft noted the amount of wood there was in the room, taking in the paneled wall, the beams of the ceiling and the floor-board—wood everywhere, worn, scratched, battered, from yellowish-brown to brownish-black. The smell of pinewood, turpentine and dirty water was all about him.
Krafft realized that this method of his was neither bringing him any closer to his section nor enabling him to gain any particularly penetrating insight into them. The hour crawled by with lamentable results. He looked at his wrist-watch and longed for the time to be up.
The Lieutenant's increasing sense of misgiving automatically transmitted itself to his section. The cadets too longed for the end of this hour that had brought them so much boredom and confusion. Disgruntled looks came over their faces as they began to shift restlessly about in their seats. Some who had already said their piece relapsed into sullen brooding. One even yawned—a long drawn-out yawn that was distinctly audible. But the new section officer seemed not to notice this, which the cadets took as another bad sign.
Only two more of them, thought Lieutenant Krafft, and then it'll be over. And automatically he said: “Right, next please.”
Cadet Rednitz now rose to his feet, smiled pleasantly, and declared: “I must beg the Lieutenant to excuse me, but I'm afraid I'm not in a position to give him the extensive information he requires.”
Krafft gazed at Rednitz with some interest. The cadets stopped wriggling about in their seats and also turned and looked at Rednitz, thereby turning their backs on their section officer—an unusual sign of disrespect, which the Lieutenant appeared not to notice. This made Kramer, the section senior, particularly indignant. He began to fear for the preservation of discipline. Discipline was his responsibility, and provided he had the support of his superior officer it was perfectly possible to maintain it in the requisite manner. But if this Krafft were going to let the cadets turn their backs on him, it would only be a matter of time before they were talking in the ranks or sleeping in class. Lieutenant Krafft on the other hand regarded Cadet Rednitz's behavior as a welcome diversion. His spirits recovered slightly, and he asked in some amusement: “Perhaps, Cadet, you would be so good as to explain just why you can't give me this information?”
“It’s like this,” said Rednitz pleasantly. “Unlike my fellow cadets here I'm afraid I can't produce an official father, and so I can't say what his profession was.”
“Presumably what you mean, Rednitz, is that you are illegitimate?”
“Yes, Lieutenant—exactly.”
“Well,” said Krafft cheerfully, “such things happen from time to time. And it doesn't seem altogether a bad thing—especially when one realizes that official fathers are by no means always the best. I hope, though, that this minor- deficiency won't prevent you from giving me at least a few other particulars.”
Rednitz beamed. He liked the Lieutenant. But there was another reason for his undisguised pleasure. He could see Hochbauer's angry face glowering at him, and this alone made it worth the little extra trouble.
“I was born in 1922,” declared Rednitz, “in Dortmund. My mother was a housemaid to the director of a big firm, though it would be unwise to draw any particular conclusions from that. I went to the primary school, spent a year at technical school, and another year at higher technical school. In 1940 I was called up into the Wehrmacht. Special interests: philosophy and history.”
Lieutenant Krafft smiled. Hochbauer looked black. He regarded Rednitz's statement that his special interests were also history and philosophy as a personal insult. Some of the cadets grinned, but only because their section officer had smiled, thus giving them something to go on.
But Cadet Kramer got to his feet and in his capacity as section senior said: “May I draw the Lieutenant's attention to the fact that time is up?”
Krafft nodded, trying to conceal his relief. He did up his belt, put on his cap, and made for the exit.
“Attention!” roared Kramer.
The cadets jumped to their feet rather less briskly than at the beginning of the period, and came to attention with a certain sluggishness. The Lieutenant saluted the room briefly and went out.
“Impossible,” muttered Cadet Kramer. “If he goes on like this the whole section will go to pieces.”
The cadets looked at each other for a moment, and then burst out laughing with relief. The prevailing mood was excellent, and more than a few of them now found themselves facing the remainder of the course with a certain equanimity. “Well, Mösler,” asked his friend Rednitz, “what do you make of him?”
“Yes,” said Mösler thoughtfully, “what do I make of him? He's not unsympathetic—but that's not much to go on. My grandmother's quite sympathetic too.”
“Fellow sportsmen,” said Cadet Weber, Egon, pushing his way closer, “this much is certain: he seems an energetic sort of type, and yet acts like a sheep. Now, what is one to make of that?”
Böhmke, poet and thinker, merely shook his head a number of times. All in all he would have found it difficult to give any very clear opinion of Krafft, and indeed no one asked him for one.
Kramer, the section senior, made an entry in the class log, sensing complications ahead. This fellow Krafft hadn't even signed the book confirming the subject and duration of the class. Kramer saw that they were in for a period of reorganization and indiscipline.
But in the group round Hochbauer joy reigned supreme. Amfortas and Andreas even went so far as to convey utter contempt when the new section officer's name came up. “A complete nonentity, eh, Hochbauer?”
The latter nodded vigorously. “We’ll soon have him where we want him. He'll either be eating out of our hands within a week or be fit for nothing but a pension.”
9. A JUDGE-ADVOCATE SPEAKS OUT AGAINST HIS WILL
“Fräulein Bachner,” said Lieutenant Bieringer, the General's A.D.C., “we’ve known each other quite a time now, I think?”
Sybille Bachner looked up from her work. Bieringer pretended to be preoccupied with the notes he was putting in order. “Is something wrong?” she asked.
“What could be wrong here?” cried the A.D.C., with an expansive gesture. “But I'm worried about your private life again.”
“I haven't any. You know that!”
“Exactly!” said the A.D.C. “No one can live by work alone.”
“Except the General.”
“Fräulein Bachner,” said Lieutenant Bieringer, “the General is married to the army. He's not a normal man at all—he's a soldier. And you're a woman, not just a secretary.”
Sybille Bachner smiled, but there was a serious look in her eyes. She sat up straight and pushed her chair back. Then she asked outright: “What are you getting at this time?”
“Well,” said Bieringer rather hastily, “I was wondering what you might be doing this evening, for instance.”
“Are you offering to take me out?”
“You know I'm a married man,” said the A.D.C.
It seemed to Bieringer only right to point this out occasionally. For though he and his wife lived together in barracks, in the guest house, few people knew her. She was expecting a child, and never appeared at an official function. She hadn't once been into the staff headquarters building where her husband worked, and had never once telephoned him during working hours. She simply might not have existed. And it was not least on account of this very strict reserve that Bieringer loved her dearly, though only after working hours, of course.
“All right then,” said Sybille pleasantly, “I’m doing nothing this evening, but why do you want to know?”
“You could go to the cinema,” said Bieringer. “There’s a comedy of some sort on there, people even say it's quite funny. Or perhaps you could go for a walk. I know at least forty officers who'd be delighted to escort you.”
“What’s all this about?” said Sybille resentfully. “I just haven't arranged anything. Anyway the General may need me—he's got a whole pile of work to deal with.”
“The General only needs you if you're not otherwise engaged. I'm to make that explicitly clear to you.”
“Good,” said Sybille Bachner, “you’ve made that clear. Now what?”
Bieringer shook his head, and this gesture could have been interpreted in a number of different ways. He cleaned his spectacles carefully, looking at Sybille as he did so with his gentle watery eyes, and said finally: “So you're prepared to work overtime again?”
“Of course, Lieutenant,” said Sybille briskly.
Bieringer felt a certain misgiving about this keenness of hers. For Sybille Bachner was said to have had something of a past. Between her and the previous commanding officer there had been something more than a mere working relationship.
But then Major-General Modersohn had been made commanding officer of Number 5 Officers' Training School, and Bieringer had confidently assumed that Bachner's days in staff headquarters were numbered. But it wasn't long before an unexpected development took place: Sybille Bachner proved herself a first-class worker. And she didn't seem to make the slightest effort to extend her influence beyond the General's ante-room. The General therefore tolerated her and said nothing, though the A.D.C. remained on the alert.
“The General would like a talk with Judge-Advocate Wirrmann at nineteen hundred hours. Also with Lieutenant Krafft. Also at nineteen hundred hours.”
“Both together?” asked Sybille in astonishment.
Lieutenant Bieringer took care not to look at her, for he could not have helped conveying a certain reproach. His order had been clear enough; any expression of private opinion was unnecessary. He was the best possible A.D.C. the General could have had.
Sybille Bachner dropped her eyes. Her long, silky hair hung down each side of her face like a curtain. She reminded Bieringer of some tender portrait by Renoir in which the streaming tresses caught by the rays of the sun told of a voluptuous indolence. Bieringer found this combination of thoughts rather unsettling. For he was on duty, after all, and a happily married man and expectant father into the bargain.
“I rather think, Fräulein Bachner,” he said cautiously, “that you should try and get yourself a slightly more severe hair style.”
“Has the General been complaining about my hair?” she asked with a flicker of hope.
Bieringer looked at her reproachfully, pityingly. “Fräulein Bachner,” he said, “you’re not a soldier—why should the General show any interest in your hair?”
“Order and cleanliness,” declared Captain Kater, “are what I set store by. And in that I'm second to none.”
Captain Kater was inspecting number one kitchen in his capacity as commander of the headquarters company. All kitchens in the barracks area came under his jurisdiction.
Parschulske, the kitchen corporal, accompanied him on his round, respectful and attentive. His conscience was never wholly clear, and his fingers were in almost every pie. Astonishingly enough he was as thin as a rake.
“I’ve taken the liberty of laying the table as usual, sir, so that you can check the rations and sample the quality of the food.”
Kater nodded. He went into the store-room, prodded one or two sacks and satisfied himself as to the contents. Then he pulled open a drawer or two—and suddenly stopped dead in his tracks, for he had caught a glimpse of something pink hidden in the semolina.
Captain Kater pushed his hand deep into the semolina and felt about in it. And there he found three lengths of sausage. Three large, fat, juicy lengths of sausage, each weighing about six pounds.
Kater said nothing for the time being. He removed his hand, let his eyes sweep over Parschulske, the kitchen corporal, who was standing stiffly to attention by his side, and moved on into the kitchen, where the table was already laid.
Here he sat down and examined the food in front of him: cold roast beef, fat sausages, creamy portions of cheese. All this was there to be sampled for quality, taste, freshness, general condition, and whatever else served as an excuse. Kater cut himself a slice or two here and there. It was his principle never to act precipitately. There were always considerable advantages in keeping people guessing, and he was, he thought, a master of such tactics. He had left the kitchen corporal completely in the dark as to whether or not the pilfered sausages had been spotted—as to whether or not they would have to be accounted for.
For the time being, the wretched Parschulske didn't know where he stood, and felt distinctly uncomfortable. He therefore rounded on the cook for stealing the rations.
But the cook wasn't going to lie down under that: he immediately laid the blame on the various kitchen assistants. “What if a few sausages have been whipped?” he said. “It could have been anybody, or is there a label on them saying who took them?”
“But in the last resort,” said the kitchen corporal, “it’s my responsibility!”
“Doesn’t worry, Captain Kater will allow an extra helping or two to confuse his memory?”
But Captain Kater just thoughtfully ate on. He was still trying to decide what he ought to do about the sausages. A short note to the General, perhaps. In this way he would be able to demonstrate both correctness of approach and a certain skill in detection. But there were also advantages in putting the kitchen corporal under an obligation to him.
And while Captain Kater thus turned over various possibilities in his mind he let his glance sweep across the kitchen —over kettles and coppers and tables to the female kitchen personnel. Strapping, buxom girls, most of them. They might have been specially fattened for the job. Not his type. One of them caught his attention, though, a new girl who looked at him with large inquiring eyes. Presumably, thought Kater, it's a surprise for her to find her superior officer here.
Affably he beckoned her over, still holding his knife in his right hand. The girl hurried across at once. Obviously there was nothing she had wanted more than to be noticed. This delighted Kater.
“Name?” asked the Captain, affecting a sympathetic, paternal expression.
“Irene,” she said. “Irene Jablonski.”
“Stationed here in barracks?” asked Kater, observing with increasing interest the splendid curve of her bosom. This feature was all the more remarkable, since in every other way her figure could be described as neat.
“Yes, sir, in barracks,” said Irene looking at him hopefully. “I’m in a room with a number of other girls, but none of them works in the kitchen.”
“How’s your stenography?” asked Kater. “Can you type? Know shorthand?”
“I can learn anything,” Irene assured him, beaming at him as if he had been her rescuer. “I learn very quickly—really. I can be taught anything. Really anything.”
“Well,” said Kater, “we’ll see.”
Lieutenant Bieringer, the A.D.C., hung up and stared thoughtfully in front of him for a few seconds. Then he said: “The General wants you, Fräulein Bachner.”
“I’ll go right in,” said Sybille.
Bieringer did not look up at her. There really was something suspiciously keen about her. She was a good worker and he didn't want to lose her, but he would most certainly lose her if she were to try and break through the barrier of reserve with which the General surrounded himself He adjusted his spectacles, picked up a bundle of papers and left the room. The A.D.C. was on his way to the routine weekly conference with the course commanders, at which the training plans for the following week were settled.
Sybille Bachner, however, went into the General's room without knocking, in the usual way. She saw Modersohn sitting at his desk exactly as she had seen him sitting there every day of the week for the last six months—in the identical position and the identical uniform, practically motionless.
“ Fräulein Bachner,” said the General, “ I'd like you to take a shorthand note of my conversation with Judge-Advocate Wirrmann and Lieutenant Krafft, and to type it out immediately afterwards. No carbon—no one else to see it.”
“Very good, General,” said Sybille. She stood there waiting, a picture of devotion.
“That is all, Fräulein Bachner,” said the General, bending over his desk again.
Sybille's eyes shone darkly. She turned to leave, but hesitated for a moment at the door, then stopped and said: “General, I don't expect you'll have time for dinner this evening, shall I get something for you?”
Slowly the General raised his head, with a cool lack of surprise. He stared at Sybille as if seeing her now for the first time. And with a flicker of a smile he said: “No, thank you.”
“Not even a cup of coffee, General?”
“Thank you, no,” said Modersohn. And the flicker of a smile quite suddenly disappeared. “If I need anything like that, Fräulein Bachner, I will inform you at the time.”
And with that, this semi-private conversation—the first in six months—was quite clearly at an end. The General was already at work once again surrounded by that wall of reserve, like a wall of bullet-proof glass, which so unnerved his colleagues.
Sybille withdrew, neither perplexed nor surprised. She had grown used to Modersohn's idiosyncrasies over the course of time.
There had been much she had had to get used to. The General's predecessor here had been a jovial, condescending sort of man of the world, who knew what he wanted and got it—a boisterous, benevolent despot, an uninhibited, demanding character with whom she had finally been on intimate terms.
With the advent of Modersohn everything had changed overnight. The officers of his entourage froze in the icy atmosphere with which he surrounded himself, and either kept out of his way or crawled round him like eager watchdogs.
In this way Sybille Bachner got to know each of them pretty well, and saw all her illusions scattered like balloons in a storm.
“May I break in on this idyll?” asked a remarkably friendly voice from the door.
It was Captain Kater. He smiled through the half-open doorway—warily, benevolently, confidentially. For Sybille Bachner was alone in the room, a fortunate coincidence which enabled him to demonstrate what a jovial, good-hearted fellow he was.
“It always gives me pleasure to see you,” he declared, extending a hand towards her. This too was something he only did when no one else was present.
“What can I do for you?” asked Sybille Bachner with some reserve.
“Your very existence makes all other needs superfluous,” Kater assured her exuberantly. He had worked out this phrase some time before. This Bachner girl was important, she had to be flattered.
“Is there any information I can give you, Captain? I'm afraid Lieutenant Bieringer isn't here at the moment. But if you have a message for him, I can take it for you.”
“I have a problem, my dear Fräulein Bachner, which may in the end prove somewhat complicated—I wouldn't like to say yet.”
“You wish to speak to the General, Captain? I don't think that's possible just now.”
“I’m sorry about that,” said Captain Kater with visible relief.
This was probably the best solution, for the time being. It saved him from having to make a decision. It was in fact a development on which he'd been reckoning.
“If it's something particularly urgent ... “
“No, no, not at all!” the Captain hastened to reassure her. “I really can't say that. It will be enough, my dear Fräulein Bachner, if you could simply confirm if necessary that I have been here.”
Sybille Bachner saw at once what was up: the Captain wished to cover himself a familiar situation. Types like Kater were always wanting to cover themselves—by little memos, by pushing responsibility on to others, or by pretending that they had made every effort to deal with some matter, though alas in vain.
“I’ve an uncommonly high regard for you,” Kater assured her, winking confidentially. “It’s a real pleasure to work with you. And I'm certain the General knows how to appreciate you.”
This was a clumsy piece of insinuation. For what Kater meant was that after all the General was a man too. But Captain Kater—so his wink conveyed—was a gentleman and knew how to keep his mouth shut so long as it seemed politic or profitable to do so.
“Captain,” said Sybille Bachner coolly, “I shouldn't like to think I've given you occasion for the slightest misunderstanding.”
“But of course not!” cried Kater with an expansive gesture. “Quite the contrary! There's no question of any misunderstanding.”
“May I once again assure you,” said Sybille Bachner, “that I am not in a position either to take any decision or to influence one. My job here is simply that of secretary.”
“You’re made of sterling stuff!“ cried Kater with enthusiasm. “You must stay like that. Don't you think we ought to be friends? And if there's any little wish you should have, no matter how private—come to me.” And in the next breath he added: “What did you say the General was doing?”