Peter Hencke was home.

Part Three

NINE

‘War sets the stamp of nobility upon the peoples.’ He couldn’t remember who had said it, the words were but a vague echo in his mind from one of the interminable pre-war wireless broadcasts. Nobility … He wondered how close the author could ever have got to the stench of battle. Never as close as this.

The journey from Hamburg to Berlin would normally have lasted only three hours, but already it had taken eight and they had still another sixty miles to go. In many places the autobahn was impossibly cratered or blocked by ruined vehicles and the stretches still open were being bombed and strafed regularly by British Mosquitoes. One moment they were forced to climb cautiously around potholes and piles of vehicular wreckage, the next manoeuvring past the bloated, gas-filled carcasses of dead horses, frequently being left with no option but to leave the autobahn altogether for the side roads that ran through the towns scattered along the banks of the Elbe. It was there the journey became even more hazardous and disjointed as they encountered a flood tide of humanity streaming towards them. The whole of Germany seemed to be on the move, shuffling west, away from the advancing Russians, carrying with them what they could. In two hours Hencke reckoned they must have passed almost 100,000 refugees, old women pushing barrows laden with linen and decrepit husbands; lines of young girls, many barefoot, shuffling behind as they pushed prams or dragged carts; mothers struggling to carry wounded children who stared out of dirty bandages with enormous, frightened eyes. There were farm girls driving cows or pigs, or trying to round up stray chickens, women in fur coats covered in dirt, women in their best suits, women in rags and women in peasant costume still marked by the signs of toil on the land. But there were no men, at least none capable of walking, and there were precious few boys above the age of ten. They walked and stumbled, heads down, carrying whatever they had salvaged of their lives on their backs, resigned to the idea that whatever lay ahead could be no worse than what they had left behind.

These were the survivors, what was left of Germany, trudging away from terror towards a future which none could comprehend. And this was but one road, in one corner of the country, a small piece of a kaleidoscope of misery which was being repeated throughout the land as the German people were scattered like chaff.

The tide of shattered humanity was so thick that choking grey-brown dust rose in great clouds as far as the eye could see and no amount of bellowing, leaning on the horn or threats could part it. The shouts of the driver were met with red, exhausted eyes that did not understand, while in those few that did began to smoulder the spark of hostility as they saw the black Mercedes, clearly an official limousine complete with curtains and cocktail cabinet, trying to batter its way back to Berlin. Hencke sank deep into the red leather of the seats and his companion couldn’t fail to notice the blaze of anger that spread across his face.

‘I can understand how you must be feeling, you of all people. When you see sewer-Deutsch like that it makes you wonder why we bothered,’ the other man sneered. ‘In my book deserters like these should all be shot. Still, maybe they soon will be. The British front line is less than ten miles from here. That’s why Reichsminister Goebbels sent his personal car for you. We couldn’t afford to take the risk by plane.’

Captain Otto Misch sat erect and resplendent in his SS uniform with its FBK insignia, staring straight ahead and trying to avoid the hostile glances cast at him from the straggling crowd of refugees. He toyed nervously with the Iron Cross pinned at his neck. It wasn’t that he was afraid of the human flotsam outside his window, he simply didn’t understand them and the lack of understanding made him uneasy. This wasn’t the valiant resistance against the enemy which had been planned in Berlin and which he had been led to expect. As he twisted at the medal he noticed Hencke staring at his mangled hand.

‘Moscow. I left the fingers in Moscow.’ He waved his hand with a casual pride. ‘I’m going back to reclaim them one day.’

‘Not in this bloody car you’re not,’ the driver muttered as he swung the wheel sharply to avoid another crater, but his violent efforts succeeded only in running the car into a charred beam thrown across the road by recent bombing, and their progress came to a jarring halt moments before they would have run into yet another group of refugees.

‘Scheisse, it would be quicker by bulldozer!’ the captain swore.

‘And a damn sight safer,’ the sullen driver responded. ‘The front wheel’s gone. I’ll have to change it. I’ll need help.’

‘Then get it!’ Misch snapped irritably as an artillery shell landed less than a hundred yards away, sending up a malevolent plume of cement and brick dust. So close to the front not even Goebbels’ bulletproof limousine was safe.

It was dusk and they were on the outskirts of a small town, semi-derelict and ghost-like, over which a pall of brown smoke drifted as British artillery sporadically pounded what was left. Through the dust thrown up from the ruins of houses and by the tramp of a thousand feet they could make out a group of people gathered around a campfire which stood at the centre of a crossroads; in front of them lay a tram which had been thrown on its side and filled with rubble. It was a primitive barricade behind which the defenders would be expected to fight tanks armed with little more than rifles and the one-shot Panzerfaust being churned out from back-street workshops and bicycle sheds – anywhere with a bench and a primitive set of tools. The driver set off towards the barricade in search of assistance, leaving his two passengers listening to the radio which was tuned to pick up warnings of air raids in their sector. He was soon back, shaking his head.

‘They say they’re too busy to help – got problems of their own,’ he reported glumly.

‘Did you tell them that this was Reichsminister Goebbels’ personal car?’ Misch, instantly annoyed, slapped his gloves into his half-hand.

‘Sure. They said if that was so it was the first official car they’d seen all week which wasn’t headed full speed for the British lines.’

Misch ground his teeth in fury.

‘I told them they were wasting their time with the barricade,’ the driver continued laconically. ‘That it would take the British only twelve and a half minutes to get past it.’

‘Twelve and a half minutes?’ queried Misch, taken aback by the exactitude of the estimate.

‘Sure. Ten minutes splitting their sides with laughter, two minutes to bring up an artillery piece and thirty seconds to blow the whole fucking thing into the river.’ Insolence was written all over the driver’s face. Hencke noted that although he was in uniform, the driver hadn’t saluted Misch once. This was not the German army he remembered. But this was scarcely the Germany he remembered, either.

Consumed by rage the captain slammed the door of the car and stalked off in the direction of the barricade. Hencke followed and found still more to astonish him in the new Germany. In the rapidly failing light the campfire threw lurid patterns on to the buildings surrounding the crossroads, all of which had been reduced by battle to empty hulks standing sightless and open-mouthed where once had been windows and doorways, homes. Dust and smoke drifted like witches’ breath through the gaping apertures, as the thunder of exploding artillery shells rolled all around. By the fire in the centre of this primeval setting stood an elderly man and a dozen boys. Scattered around them lay a motley collection of rifles of varying vintages, some from the First World War with fixed bayonets, and by the kerbside lay a canvas bag which appeared to be filled with grenades. The man was perhaps in his sixties, the empty right-hand sleeve of his jacket pinned to his side. None of the boys was older than fifteen, all were filthy and covered in grime, a few were in the uniform of the Hitler Youth and one who had a split lip and a bruised temple was sobbing pitifully. Into their midst strode Misch and instantly there was silence. The old man looked up at the tall captain and his face filled with anxiety as he saw the unmistakable markings of the SS uniform.