HS02 - Days of Atonement (20 page)

R
OCHUS DARTED THROUGH
the dark byways of the fortress like a malignant goblin drawing me into the depths of an impenetrable forest. But then we passed beneath an archway, and came unexpectedly into the desolate vastness of the main square. Snow glistened on the cobbles where I had witnessed the parade of boys that morning. On my right was the main gate and the command post from which the captain-of-the-guard had emerged the night before. A phrase from the paper attached to the medical report flashed through my mind.

An entry in the Out-Book . . .

Rochus was ten paces ahead of me. Without a word, I veered away and strode directly into the command post, where a finely dressed officer with braided red hair, trailing mustachioes and bushy side-whiskers had made himself comfortable. Seated behind a desk, riding boots crossed on the edge of the table, silver spurs hanging down into space, he was smoking a massive meerschaum pipe. It dangled like an upturned question mark from the corner of his mouth.

At the sight of me, he pushed his chair back, and raised himself to his full height.

‘I am looking for Lieutenant Klunger,’ I announced.

‘I am he,’ he replied.

At that moment, Rochus came bursting in through the door. At the sight of the officer, my guardian angel snapped to attention, his mouth shut tight in a fearful grimace.

‘I am Hanno Stiffeniis,’ I began to say, but the smug smile on the officer’s narrow face revealed that my name was known to him already.

‘The magistrate, sir!’ Rochus chanted, just in case.

‘I wanted to ask a question, Lieutenant Klunger,’ I said. ‘I know that you have more important things to do than answer idle questions from a civilian.’

I glanced at the pipe smouldering lazily on the table-top.

‘Indeed,’ he agreed rather stiffly. ‘Most considerate.’

‘You were on duty the day that Major Gottewald’s body was brought back to the fort. I read a facsimile of your note in the duty book,’ I added, in case he should make any attempt to deny it.

‘Indeed,’ he said again, though more forlornly. ‘The man was dead on arrival, as you know.’

‘Indeed,’ I echoed, ‘but what of the men who brought his body home?’

I struggled to recall their names. ‘One was called Albert Rainer . . .’

‘Albrecht,’ Lieutenant Klunger corrected me.

‘That’s right,’ I agreed, grateful to him for this unexpected assistance. ‘Then there was a corporal whose name was Luthant. Rodion Luthant? And . . . Malevic?’

‘Malekevic,’ Lieutenant Klunger corrected me again.

‘I’d like to speak to them,’ I said.

‘Sir!’ Rochus cried. In warning, I believe, but the officer turned on him as if he meant to stamp on him like a beetle.

‘Hold your tongue!’ he snapped.

He turned his attention back to me. ‘You should have come a month ago,’ he said with a sweep of his hand, and an apologetic smile. ‘Malekevic has been drummed out for drunken conduct. They should have done it years ago, the man was a disgrace, rude and violent, totally uncontrollable. He’ll be drinking himself to death in some lurid den in the wilds of Poland, his head deep inside a barrel of spirits, I shouldn’t doubt.’

‘What about the corporal, and the other two men?’ I tried again.

Klunger clicked his tongue and shook his head. ‘All dead, I’m afraid, sir. Lost in a skirmish with rebels just the other week.’

‘Prussian rebels?’ I asked, hardly able to believe my ears.

‘Are there any other kind?’ the officer replied with a sardonic smile.

I strode out onto the parade ground again, charging ahead before Rochus caught up with me.

‘You shouldn’t have done that, Herr Magistrate,’ he said.

‘Done what?’ I asked, enjoying his displeasure, reflecting at the same time that audacity had got me nowhere.

He led me wordlessly on. The whole fortress seemed colder, blacker, more sinister in the flickering light of pitch-dipped torches. Rochus roamed effortlessly through the place, seeming to know its every trick and turn. We climbed steep staircases which might have been carved from solid ice, ran down others that were as filthy as they were slippery, and all the while the Buran ripped and roared through the building, a turbulent gale from the Steppes of Russia.

At last, he pulled up sharply, took a lantern from the floor, lit it from one
of the torches, then pushed open a battered door which had not seen paint in a hundred years.

‘This is it,’ he announced, ‘the best that Kamenetz can offer.’

By flickering candlelight the room was ten or twelve feet wide, twenty feet long, and unfurnished, except for a narrow cot and a three-legged stool. A blanket had been placed on the bed, which stood beneath an iron grating set high in the wall. This fissure would have let in light, if daylight there had been, but it could never keep out the cold.

‘Am I supposed to freeze to death?’ I asked. ‘Is that the general’s plan?’

There was an unmistakable glint of amusement in the eyes of Private Rochus as he replied. ‘He ordered me to make you comfortable, sir. I’ll bring you something to eat and drink.’

Then, like a whippet from a trap, the boy was gone.

I walked up and down the length of that cell a number of times, my temper cooling. I would have to make the best of it. The following morning I would be leaving for home, I reminded myself. Never to return.

I took off my heavy, outdoor mantle. Moving more freely, I positioned the stool beneath the window, climbed upon it and used my cloak to block out the freezing draught which surged in through the open grille. I was standing on the stool when Rochus returned, a plate of food in one hand, a large stein of beer with a metal lid in the other.

I jumped down, and took possession of my viands.

‘I know that visitors here are rare,’ I said, ‘but even the hardiest must occasionally feel the need to relieve his bowels and empty his bladder. I see no pot intended for night-soil in this room. Can you bring me one?’

General Katowice had made no plans for me on that account either. A mottled flush spread slowly over the boy’s nose and his cheeks as he tried to come to grips with the thorny question of how to dispose of the solids that might come bursting at any moment from my intestines, the fluids that might gush in torrents from my bladder.

‘We . . . we don’t use pots,’ he stuttered uncertainly.

‘I do not intend to foul the room where I am obliged to sleep,’ I contended.

‘We have latrines . . .’

‘You’d better tell me where they are,’ I said. ‘I’m sure the general has more important matters on his plate. If you wish to check with him, of course, I’d be most grateful. He told you to make me comfortable, did he not?’

Rochus stood there, debating silently what to do. An armed French thug might have been standing over him, demanding to know where the keys to the arsenal were kept.

‘The latrines on this side of the fortress are beneath your feet,’ he said at last.

‘Thank God for that,’ I said. ‘How am I supposed to go there?’

Getting anything out of the boy was like trying to extract gold from the basest of metals. He frowned, scratched his head, looked this way, then threw an uncertain glance in the other direction.

‘All I want to do’, I said emphatically, ‘is
piss
. Am I asking too much?’

‘Turn left out of the door, there’s a ramp of wooden stairs. Take the short corridor on the floor below till you reach the stone steps. Go down there, and it’s right in front of your nose.’

‘Is there any news of Doctor Korna’s return?’ I ventured.

‘I thought you wanted to empty your bowels?’ Rochus shot back.

‘I will use the latrine when I feel the need,’ I replied. ‘Unless you intend to lock me in for the night?’

The boy glanced at the door.

‘I don’t see no lock, do you?’ he scowled.

He snapped to attention, saluted, and marched out leaving the door wide open. If I had expected to hear a sliding bolt from the outside to seal my tomb, all I heard were his metal-tipped clogs crashing away down the corridor.

I closed the door, pleased to realise that I was not going to be imprisoned for the night. It was a small consolation. Then I sat down to eat. The cuts of meat were cold, tough to grind and harder to swallow, so I washed them down with the beer, which was flat and stale and certainly more than a quart. Afterwards, I lay down fully dressed on the bed and covered myself with the blanket in a vain attempt to keep warm. More tormenting than the cold was the knowledge that my journey to Kamenetz had been a disaster.

At dawn I would be evicted from the fortress, and I had nothing to show for my pains. I had abandoned my wife and children, leaving them in danger. I had travelled for two days only to discover that Major Bruno Gottewald was dead. Thanks to the single-minded obstinacy of General Katowice, I knew the extent of his wounds, but I had found no proof of foul play, no reason to suspect that there might be a direct connection with the massacre in Lotingen. The medical officer might have been able to add some valuable detail to what I had read, but I had not been allowed to question him. My only source of information had been Rochus. If the boy were any measure of the officers and the doctor, I could hope to learn little more before I set off on my journey home. I felt like an eel-fisherman examining his pots on a bad day. All of them were empty.

Suddenly, the light from the oil lamp guttered in the draught and went out.

No matter how I tried, sleep would not come.

I was tormented by another goad that would not let me rest. What had happened in Lotingen in my absence? And what was I to say to Lavedrine when I returned? There was no telling what the Frenchman might have discovered. Had he found Sybille Gottewald? Had Durskeitner confessed? Rather than the eel-fisher, I felt like the hooked fish, twisting and turning this way and that to free myself of the uncomfortable barb.

I was frozen beyond coherent thought.

My cloak covered the window, keeping out the wind to some extent, but it could do little against the numbing cold. After turning restlessly from one side of the bed to the other for an hour or more, I jumped to my feet in the dark, frantically beating my stiff arms and aching legs with my gloved hands. Then I took off my gloves, the better to rub my hands and agitate my limbs, trying to stimulate more rapid circulation of the blood, as the English doctor, William Harvey, recommends.

As time stretched out, the temperature continued to drop. Sleep was out of the question. And that dreadful beer had begun to swell my stomach painfully. Left with no alternative, I opened the door and glanced warily into the gloomy corridor. To my left, a torch dimly lit the beginning of the staircase of which Rochus had spoken. I darted a look the other way, expecting to find the boy lurking somewhere close by, but all was still. The profound silence was ruffled by the wind and nothing more. Stepping out into the corridor, I made my way down the stairs, smiling to think that even the most dutiful of boy soldiers had to rest.

I could have found the latrines in total darkness, as Rochus suggested, by following my nose. The acrid smell of organic waste was heavy on the cold night air. And there was nobody on patrol. Indeed, I did not recall seeing a single soldier on guard in any of the yards, corridors, or passages that I had traversed that day. And yet, it made sense. If the French decided to take control of the fortress they would not bother doing so under cover of night. They would come marching straight in through the gate. Dittersdorf was right: Kamenetz could only survive so long as the French persisted in ignoring its existence, or the Prussian high command continued to close a benevolent eye on what Katowice was doing there.

On the floor below, a torch illuminated a legend written in chalk on the wall by a door in what seemed to me to be a childish scrawl—
PISSHOUSE.
I dashed into the room, unbuttoning my trousers as I went. The latrine was long, narrow, totally unlit, except for the pale glimmer of the moon which filtered in through an iron grille taking up most of the wall at the far end of the room. This grid had been provided to disperse the oppressive smell, no doubt, but even the driving power of the Buran had little chance of doing
that. On the right-hand side, a structure of planks had been set like a long bench with holes cut at intervals. On the left was a tin sink full of water which had frozen solid, the surface glistening, a wooden handle trapped in the ice until spring. There would be a sea-sponge or a bundle of rags attached to the end of the stick for the purposes of cleansing one’s body.

In my desperation, that stinking cavern was like an oasis in the desert. I sat down at the first place on the bench-top, the wood warm and smooth to my naked buttocks. The stench that rose from beneath me might have caused a less desperate man to flinch. Where there’s filth, I thought with revulsion, there are rats.

I gave myself up to hopelessness, let out a sigh, and unclenched my bowels.

In that instant, a voice spoke out in the gloom.

‘Don’t move, sir! I will come to you.’

 16