We formed part of Company 5, which was sent down a communications trench cutting in at right angles and leading to the brush where the trees stopped. The engineers must have really sweated, cutting through all those roots. Everywhere, sections were settling in, improving and deepening their shelters. It was about six o’clock in the evening, and the heat of the day was beginning to slacken off.
We followed the trench out of the woods and across a range of low hills with wooded crests. An officer with his eyes glued to a map showed us the way. We turned off to the right, which brought us back under the trees, where the heat was trapped and much more oppressive than out in the open. Everywhere, men pouring with sweat were jostling each other, looking for their positions. Finally, we came to a large half-covered shelter packed with young soldiers from the Hitlerjugend.
“Halt!” shouted the noncom who’d been leading us. “You’ll split up here, and take your positions when the order’s given. Your feldwebel will explain what’s expected of you.”
He saluted, and left us with the Hitlerjugend, who were sitting on the ground or squatting on their haunches, talking gaily. I went over to Hals, who had just put down his MG-42, and was wiping the sweat from his face.
“Hell,” he said. “I was better off with my Mauser. This damn thing weighs a ton.”
“I’ll be with you, Hals. It seems we’re part of the same group.” We compared left hands, which had both been stamped 5 K. 8.
“What does that mean?” asked Olensheim, who had just come up.
“Our group number, Gefreiter,” said Hals. “If you’re not in the 8th, we don’t know you.”
Olensheim looked anxiously at his hand.
“Damn — I’m eleven. Do you know what that means?”
“Not I,” said Hals. “But ask Corporal Lensen. He must have an inside tip.”
“We’re going on a picnic,” Lensen said, laughing, secretly displeased that his rank did not let him in on the secrets of the gods.
One of the Hitlerjugend came over to us, as pretty as a ripe young girl.
“Do the Soviets hang together in combat?” he asked, as though he were inquiring about an opposing football team.
“Extremely well,” said Hals, sounding like an old lady in a tearoom.
“I was only asking because I thought you looked experienced,” he said. We were all about the same age.
“Let me give you a piece of advice, young man,” said Lensen, whose tiny promotion was after all worth a little something. “Fire on anything Russian without the least hesitation. The Russians are the worst sons of bitches the world has ever seen.”
“Are the Russians going to attack?” Olensheim looked very white. “We’ll surely attack first,” said the beautiful young man, whose Madonna face was incapable of a ferocious expression. He walked back to his gang of boy companions.
“Do you think someone will tell us what all this is about?” Lensen said, in a voice loud enough to be overheard by the feldwebel.
“Shut up,” shouted a real veteran, sprawled full length on the ground. “You’ll know soon enough where they’re going to do you in.”
“Hey,” one of the Hitlerjugend took him up. “Who’s the shit talking like that?”
“You shut up too, you crap heads,” said the veteran, an old man in his thirties, who must have been taking it for several years now.
“We’ll have enough of listening to you when you get your first scratch.”
One of the Junge Löwen got up and walked over to the veteran.
“Sir,” he said in the assured voice of a law or medical student, “will you please explain your defeatist attitude, which is sapping the morale of everyone here?”
“You just let me whistle my own tune,” said the other, who appeared unimpressed by a flowery turn of speech.
“But I’m afraid I must insist on a reply,” said the young man. “And I say you’re a bunch of fatheads, who won’t begin to think until you’ve been cracked on your nice little skulls.”
Another of the young Hitler boys jumped up, as if he’d been shot. His features were regular and firm, and his steel-gray eyes reflected an unshakable determination. I thought he was going to rush the older fellow, who wasn’t looking at anyone.
“Do you think we’re still tied to our mothers’ apron strings?” he asked, in a voice as steady as his look.
“We’ve been through months of training too, and we’re just as tough as you. We’ve all been in endurance squads. Rummer,” he said, turning to a friend. “Hit me in the face.”
Rummer jumped to his feet, and his strong, nervous fist struck his friend in the mouth. The latter staggered for a moment under the impact of the blow, and then walked over to the veteran, who decided to look up. Two streams of bright red blood were pouring from the mouth of the Junge Löwe and running down his chin.
“Fatheads like me can take it just as well as bourgeois shits like you.”
“All right,” said the veteran, who had decided against coming to blows ahead of H-hour. “You’re all heroes.”
He turned away, and tried to whistle.
“How about writing to your families, instead of squabbling like this?” said our feld. “Mail will be collected in a little while.”
“That’s a good idea,” Hals said. “I’m going to write to my parents.” I had a letter to Paula in my pocket which I’d been carrying around for a couple of days, waiting for a chance to finish it. I added a few tender sentiments, and sealed it. Then I wrote to my family. When anyone is afraid, he thinks of his family, especially of his mother, and as the moment of attack drew closer, my terror was rising. I wanted to confide something of my anguish to my mother, and felt that somehow I could do it in a letter. I had always found it difficult to confide in my parents face to face — even the slightest of crimes — and had often criticized them for failing to help me. But on that occasion I was able to express myself.
Dear parents, especially Maman:
I know you must be quite angry with me for writing to you so little. I have already explained to Papa that the life we lead here leaves almost no time for letters.[11]
At last, I want to ask your pardon, and describe something of my life here. I could have written to you in German, Maman, because I’m getting much better at it, but it is still easier for me to write in French. Everything here is all right. I’ve finished my training, and I’m a real soldier now. I wish you could see Russia. You can’t imagine how huge it is. The wheat fields near Paris seem like tiny gardens compared to what we have here. Now it’s as hot as the winter is cold. I hope we won’t have to spend another winter here. You wouldn’t believe what we went through. Today, we’ve moved up to the front line. Everything is quiet, and it seems as if we’ve just come here to relieve our comrades. Hals is still my best friend, and I have a good time with him. I think you’ll like him when you meet him on my next leave unless the war is over before then, and we’re home for good. Everyone thinks it must be going to end soon — that we can’t have another winter like last one. I hope that my brothers and sisters are well, and that my youngest brother doesn’t broadcast my affairs too much. I look forward more than I can say to seeing them again. Papa told me that life was hard for you. I hope it’s easier now, and that you don’t have to do without too much. Don’t go short yourselves to make a package for me — I’m more or less all right. Dear Maman, soon I want to tell you about something wonderful that happened to me in Berlin.
11
This was not strictly speaking true: I had written to Paula at least twenty times, and only once to my family.