“Very efficient,” Pagel had persisted. “And cunning. And diligent. Well, you’ll see.”
Yes, Pagel was the only one who believed in the merits of this unbearable buffoon, and it was probably because of this that the two got on well together.
That morning, before riding out to the field, Pagel had paid the principal warder a short visit. Herr Marofke was very susceptible to such courtesies. He was sitting at his table, his face red, staring at a letter which the postman had probably just brought him. Pagel could see that there was a storm in the offing. “Well, any news from the western front, chief?” he asked.
The little man jumped to his feet so suddenly that his chair fell over with a crash. Slapping the letter, he cried: “Yes, news, but not good news! Rejected—my petition to be relieved is rejected!”
“Did you want to leave us?” said Pagel, astonished. “I didn’t know that.”
“Me leave? Nonsense! I wouldn’t let myself be relieved of such a difficult post. Me a shirker? No, never have been—people can say what they like about me. No.” He was calmer. “I can tell you about it—you’ll keep your mouth shut. I made a request that five men should be relieved because they no longer seem safe to me. And the pen-pushers in the office have rejected it—they say my request has no grounds! They have to have a murdered warder in their office before they have their grounds. Idiots!”
“But everything is quite peaceful,” said Pagel soothingly. “I haven’t noticed the slightest thing. Or did anything happen last night?”
“You also think that something must happen first,” growled the principal warder sullenly. “If anything happens in a prison gang, young man, then it is already too late. But I don’t blame you for that; you’ve no experience, and you know nothing about convicts.… Even my colleagues don’t see anything—only this morning they said again that I had a bee in my bonnet—but better to have a bee in your bonnet than be a night owl that sees nothing by day.”
“But what in heaven’s name is wrong?” asked Pagel, surprised at so much sullen rage. “What have you found, officer?”
“Nothing!” said the principal warder dully. “No note, no skeleton key, no money, no weapon—nothing to indicate escape or revolt. But it stinks of it. I’ve been smelling it for days. I notice things like that. Something is going on.”
“But why? What makes you think so?”
“I’ve been in prison over twenty-five years,” confessed Herr Marofke, and saw nothing objectionable in saying so. On the contrary! “I know my men. During the whole of my time of service three have escaped. For two of them I was not responsible, and as for the third, I had only been in service for six months—one doesn’t know anything in that time. But today I do know something, and I swear to you—those five have got something on, and until I get them out of my gang, my gang won’t be clean!”
“Which five?” Pagel had the impression that the principal warder was imagining things.
“I made a request for the following men to be relieved,” said Marofke solemnly. “Liebschner, Kosegarten, Matzke, Wendt, Holdrian.”
“But those are just our pleasantest, most intelligent and handiest men! Except for old Wendt—he’s a bit daft.”
“They’ve only got him in it as a safety valve. He’s to be their scapegoat if there’s any danger. Wendt is their forfeit, as it were, but the other four …” He sighed. “I’ve tried everything to separate them. I’ve redistributed them, none of them sleeps in the same room as the others, I don’t let them sit together, I show favor to one and treat the others severely, which usually makes them angry—but no, hardly do I turn my back when they’re together again, whispering.”
“Perhaps they just like each other?” suggested Pagel. “Perhaps they’re friends.”
“There are no friendships in prison,” declared the principal warder. “In prison everyone is always the other’s enemy. Whenever two stick together they are conspirators—for a definite purpose. No, it stinks; if I tell you that—I, Principal Warder Marofke—then you can believe it!”
For a while they were silent. “I’m going out to the men now,” Pagel said finally in order to get away. “I’ll keep my eyes open in case I see anything.”
“What do you think you’ll see?” said the principal warder. “They are tough lads—they’d make an old detective inspector sweat. Before you’d see anything you’d be lying there with a hole in your skull. No, I’ve thought it over. Since they’ve rejected my request, I’m going all out. I shall cause a mutiny at lunch time; I’ll shove salt in their food, literally; I’ll put so much salt in their grub that they won’t be able to swallow it. And then I shall force them to eat. I’ll taunt them and threaten them until they mutiny. And then I shall have my grounds; then I shall grab my five and send them back as mutineers. That’ll cost them another year or two in prison.” He giggled in scorn.
“Well, I’m damned!” Pagel was horrified. “But it might go wrong. Five men against fifty in that narrow room!”
“Young man!” said the principal warder, and he no longer appeared ridiculous to Pagel. “If you know for certain that someone wants to attack you from the back, what do you do? You turn round and attack him. That’s the way I am. I’d rather be killed from the front than from behind.”
“I’ll come over at lunch time with my gun,” said Pagel eagerly.
“You’ll do nothing of the kind,” growled the principal warder. “I’ve no use for an inexperienced chap in a business like this. One minute, and the nearest crook will have your gun, and then it’ll be Good-by, my Fatherland! Oh, dear no, you just run along now; I’ve got to work out my table order so that I have the loudest shouters sitting just under my truncheon.”
IV
A man’s settled conviction has something in it which can affect even his opponent. Broodingly Wolfgang Pagel rode along the old familiar way to the ninth outfield, where the potatoes were being gathered. Now and then he met a dray loaded with them and, getting off his bicycle, asked the driver what the crop was like. Then, before mounting again, he would casually add: “Everything all right out there?” A silly question. Obviously everything was all right, and the only reply one got from the driver was a vague mumble.
He rode on. It was no good letting oneself be influenced by those who saw ghosts everywhere.
It was a fine autumn day toward the end of September, and if the east wind was a little fresh, it was pleasantly warm in the sun and out of the wind; now that he was in the wood there was not even a breeze. Outfield nine, the remotest of all the areas of the estate, bordered on the long and the short side of the wood. Its other short side bordered on the Birnbaumer field. Almost soundless, except for the whirring chain, his bicycle sped over the forest paths. Of course everything would be in order there, but Pagel had to admit that the outfield, almost four miles from the farm, hidden in the woods and far from all inhabited places, offered the convicts a splendid opportunity.
Instinctively he trod harder on the pedals, then, smiling at himself, put on the brakes. He must not let himself get nervous. The convicts had been working there over a week, without anything happening. What was the good, then, of hurrying just in order to get out there five minutes sooner? If nothing had happened in six working days it was not likely to do so in those five minutes.
He tried to imagine how something could happen. The convicts worked in the open field in four gangs of twelve and thirteen men. Ten paces behind each group stood the warder with his loaded carbine in hand, and in front of him, continually under his eyes, were the men on their knees. A convict might not even stand up without permission. And before he could take three steps he would be shot down. They all knew they would be fired on without warning. In theory, of course, it was possible that two or three might sacrifice themselves to obtain freedom for the others, and that once the warder had emptied his magazine, and before he could draw his pistol, the rest would be off. Actually, however, convicts were not self-sacrificing; each, you might be sure, was quite prepared to sacrifice anyone but number one.