Unold’s face started to twitch.
‘Siebel, please,’ he answered, ‘don’t go asking such stupid questions now! The very reason I’m sending you there is so you can bring some kind of order to the situation on the ground!’
Major Siebel was renowned as someone who always spoke his mind without fear or favour. And that was exactly what he did now.
‘Can’t be done, sir! It’s easy enough resolving impossible situations in a war room. You issue various orders, and if things go pear-shaped later the shit sticks to those who are charged with implementing them. I know all about that… but I’m not prepared to play along with this sham, Lieutenant Colonel, sir!’
The colour drained from Unold’s features. For a while, the two officers stood silently, sizing one another up, and even Siebel’s face slowly began to blanch. Then the lieutenant colonel spoke quietly through gritted teeth.
‘Siebel – you know me. I’m warning you.’
Ssssss – Woom! The bunker reverberated and shook. The cellophane panel was torn from the window as if by some invisible hand. A cloud of snow, chalk and fine soil enveloped everything. In a single bound, Unold had leaped to the wall and pressed himself flat against it. Now he dashed back to the table, pulled the map with the new positions on it from under a heap of rubble and pressed it into the major’s hand.
‘Go on, get on with it – now! No time to lose!’
And with that, he ushered the three officers from the room.
Anyone stepping into the sweeping Talovoy Gorge, which sliced through the flat land west of Yeshovka, found themselves quite unexpectedly in a valley of peace. The bunkers and sheds there nestled between trees and bushes (a curious miracle of survival) like the huts and chalets on an allotment. Field kitchens steamed away, well-fed horses grazed on long yellow stalks of grass, and fresh laundry fluttered on washing lines strung between lorries and trees. Pink and blood-red cuts of juicy meat could be glimpsed through the flaps of a butchery unit’s tent.
While Siebel, with the lieutenant colonel from the artillery in tow, went to announce his arrival to the Corps commander, Breuer sought out the resident intelligence officer.
He found two elegantly dressed officers, who greeted their dishevelled guest with somewhat perturbed civility. Breuer took in the desk and chairs here, the thick-pile carpet and the pictures on the walls. He started to recount his experiences. He talked about the ferocious rearguard actions, the destruction of the division and the miserable hunger they’d endured… His hosts listened to him with the kind of polite interest with which a neurologist listens to the stammerings of a deranged patient. ‘Yes, we heard about that… It’s been quiet for weeks here on the Volga front… Oh yes, it must have been really bad for you back there.’ ‘Back there’! They made it sound like he was talking about China. How was it possible that there were still people here in the Cauldron whom the whole Dance of Death of the last two months had left totally unscathed?
‘Gentlemen.’ Breuer’s voice took on an imploring tone. ‘Gentlemen! In two days’ time, a front line of defence is going to be drawn immediately to your rear, just a few metres away – that is, if a front even exists by then!’
Yes, yes, they were well aware of that. They had taken note of it, like something one hears but doesn’t really comprehend.
Where the Talovoy Gorge opened out into a flat depression resembling a broad square – the sides of the ravine were at this point only some three or four metres high – the windows and doors of a line of bunkers with a wooden walkway in front of them, partitioned off by a balustrade, mimicked a row of houses on a street. The scene in some measure reminded Breuer of a corner he knew in the bazaar quarter of Sarajevo. This was the site of the quarters that the Corps had assigned to the ‘Fortress Construction Group Siebel’. Breuer and Siebel entered one of the two rooms. Plywood-panelled walls with built-in cupboards and seating recesses, a large cooking range, curtains and some stylish peasant furniture! The officers looked at one another. They opened the door to the second room and stood there, dumbstruck. They found themselves standing in a – bar! Sideboards, bar stools, drinks’ cabinets, a pendant light with a red silk shade. On the walls, which were a deep shade of pink, someone had painted a series of racy murals showing young men in tuxedos embracing half-naked girls. In one corner stood an iron stove, a proper heavy old German one with a manufacturer’s nameplate.
‘I think I’m going crazy!’ exclaimed Major Siebel, momentarily distracted from his cares and worries by the unlikely sight before his eyes.
‘What on earth is this place?’
‘It was the 79th military police division’s HQ.’
‘Never knew such a place existed. How is it even possible? People are lying out there in the open, and here…’
The only person who found no reason to be amazed was the unfortunate lieutenant colonel. Grumpily, he picked out for himself the best-sprung mattress in the sleeping bay and started complaining about the fact that they hadn’t been supplied with any blankets. Other cares were weighing down on him as well, as it turned out. ‘I’ve got to find out what’s happened to my columns tomorrow,’ he muttered. ‘How stupid to deploy gunners as infantrymen – who ever heard of such a thing! Outstanding leadership here, I must say. And who knows where the hell our vehicles have got to by now! If anything’s out of order, I’ll be the one who carries the can for it later.’
Breuer looked at the lined face sporting the pince-nez, which struck him as so curiously familiar, and shook his head in despair. Did the man have any idea of the situation he was in? On the other hand, how could he? Well, he’d find out soon enough.
Siebel paid not the slightest heed to the lieutenant colonel. He paced up and down the room with long strides, raking his good hand through his tousled hair and nervously plucking at the leather glove on the hand of his false arm. He was struggling with a sense of duty on the one hand and a feeling of outrage on the other. He kept cursing under his breath: ‘What total madness! It’s all so pointless… fantasies, criminal fantasies, the whole thing!’
All of a sudden, he threw himself into a nervous flurry of activity. Rudely, and none too gently, wrenching the lieutenant colonel from his new-found cosiness, he announced that the two of them were going to go off there and then and inspect the planned defensive line.
Breuer stayed behind to keep an eye on their quarters. A few steps further on there was a supplies bunker, where a friendly and innocent paymaster handed out four days’ worth of rations up front: fresh-baked bread, crispbreads, cheese, butter (Breuer wondered where in heaven they’d got that!), tins of potted meat, sardines, dried coffee, and last but not least three pounds of home-made horse sausage. It was like being in a fairy tale. Before long, logs were blazing in the stove and thick slices of sausage were sizzling in billycan lids. Breuer was as happy as a sandboy. If they only had a short while left to live, then they might as well live well! Out of the blue, as if by magic, a reflection of the old comfortable, peaceful feeling of well-being had come to life once more in the midst of chaos and destruction, a final salutation from the past, as it were, before everything finally came to an end.
It was getting dark outside. Breuer drew the curtains and got out the candles they’d brought with them. Just then, the prettily carved wooden candelabra above his head flickered into life and the room was bathed in electric light, courtesy of a quiet and efficient generator nearby. Breuer jumped up and went over to the switch near the door. He switched the light on and off, on and off, over and over again, laughing like a small boy and with tears running down his face.