A Small Circus
Then—to the general surprise—the defence counsel rises, and asks that the witness not be dismissed just yet, because further important testimony was coming for whose corroboration he would be needed. The witness is not allowed to go, but is told to find himself a seat in the gallery. In the front row. There he sits now, very self-conscious and very pleased with himself, just listening.
III
The next witness to take the stand is Fräulein Herbert, daughter of the deceased primary schoolteacher Paul Herbert. She is an energetic and forthright lady of fifty-seven. She swears the oath, in its religious form.
‘Witness,’ says the judge, ‘you have applied in writing both to me and to the defence counsel, saying you had important evidence. Would you tell us please what you saw? You live at the corner of Stolpe Gate and Burstah, do you not?’
The witness was shuffling impatiently to and fro, now she calls out: ‘Your Honour, I’m so indignant! I’m so indignant! I’ve been following the proceedings here in the newspapers. It’s all wrong, Your Honour. It’s all wrong.’
She stops to draw breath. The judge eyes her from below, with head inclined, undecided, the prosecutor is starting to harrumph again, the spectators in the public gallery are nudging each other and drawing attention to what everyone can see anyway.
‘Old battleaxe,’ mutters Stuff.
But the old battleaxe won’t be put off, she knows what she’s about.
‘Your Honour, I was sitting on my balcony, doing some sewing. I had no evil thoughts in my head. And suddenly it was as though . . . no, Your Honour, if I live for another fifty years I’ll still picture it . . .
‘I read that what this is about is the police approach, and did they first ask that the flag-bearer give up his flag or hit him right away, and whether they used rubber truncheons or the flats of their sabres. I read that Herr Frerksen stood here and said he did everything properly by the book. I’ve known Herr Frerksen since he was a boy.’
She turns round and scans the gallery. In the front row she finds Frerksen and addresses him.
‘Herr Frerksen, I know you for a quiet man, and I know you for a polite man. But what you did that afternoon is a scandal, there’s no getting away from it, and you should be ashamed of yourself. You should be ashamed of yourself in all perpetuity—’
Frerksen has stood up, suffused in red, he begs the judge: ‘Your Honour—’
Who says: ‘Fräulein Herbert, you must address the court. Do not address your remarks to witnesses or the public. Would you now tell us quietly what it was you saw?’
‘Yes, of course. I’ll start right away. I just had to say that to him once, because he’s a nice man the rest of the time, but what a bad man he was that afternoon. It’s important to say it to someone’s face, Your Honour, and not always behind their backs—’
‘I understand. I understand,’ he says placatingly.
‘Fabulous woman,’ comments Stuff. ‘Ten of that sort and no farmers, and the police would be in the dock.’
‘What sort of judge is he,’ counters Pinkus, ‘he just lets everyone do what they like.’
Fräulein Herbert begins again: ‘I was sitting on my balcony, and that was when I saw Frerksen come charging up. I could see right away that something was wrong. Normally he’s so kempt, but he looked as though he’d been dragged through a haystack. And he was running so furiously, anyone who didn’t get ten yards out of his way he just charged into them, he was wildly inconsiderate.
‘Then he stopped on the traffic island, and sent the policeman there away. By now I could see the farmers coming. And from the opposite side, there were suddenly policemen, at least forty of them.’
‘Approximately twenty, we’ve been told.’
‘Out of the question. Quite out of the question. At least forty, maybe fifty. And he addresses them, waving his hands in the air, and suddenly they all start running towards the peasants, Herr Frerksen in the lead. Some of them had rubber truncheons in their hands, and some of them had sabres, and a few were pulling the sabres out of their sheaths while they were running.’
‘Do you remember if Herr Frerksen had a sabre in his hand?’
‘Oh no, Your Honour, and you ought to know that. That was all over every paper, how it was found behind the monument. Herr Frerksen was just waving his arms around.
‘And now, pay attention, Your Honour. I read all about the proceedings in the papers, but they didn’t have anything about what I’m about to tell you now. Where was Herr Frerksen when the attack started? His men were running faster and faster the closer they got to the farmers, and Herr Frerksen was running slower and slower. And when the police were getting going, and hitting at the farmers with their sabres, by that stage Herr Frerksen was ten paces behind his men. And the whole time he didn’t get any nearer to the fighting.’
‘But you said yourself, Witness, that he didn’t have a weapon.’
‘Then he should have borrowed one from one of his men,’ Fräulein Herbert counters energetically. ‘If you start something like that, you can’t loiter in the rear, you have to join in. At least that’s what I’d have done, Your Honour, take it from me.’
The judge looks at her, his face beaming with a sweet irony. ‘And then what happened, if you will, Fräulein Herbert?’
‘Then? Then the fighting started. You must have heard that described twenty times. But I’ll tell you this, Your Honour, what they did to that young man,’ she turns to look for him in the dock, spots Henning, and then beams: ‘That’s him. That’s Herr Henning . . . What they did to him was horrible. He was lying on the ground, still holding on to his flag, and they were still laying into him. I thought: Are the people doing this men of Altholm? They’re savages. They’re pirates.’
She draws breath. Then, pointing to the collapsed-looking Czibulla: ‘He caught it the worst. I saw him very well. He was running around like a headless chicken. I think the crowd utterly confused him.
‘And the notion that he had a stick with him, or an umbrella, as you asked him the first day, that’s simply not true. He was encumbered enough with his travelling bag. Look at him, Your Honour, if he had an umbrella, he would just leave it all over the place. His wife must be pleased just to have him get home safely, and remember his bag.’
The judge says a little labouredly: ‘So you too are of the opinion that Herr Czibulla didn’t assault the policeman?’
The witness is withering in her contempt: ‘Of the opinion? Your Honour, that man and assaulting policemen? He’d be happy not to get hit himself. I read it in the News, about him plucking at the officer’s coat, like a mouse. That’s exactly right.
‘And then he was dealt the most awful blow. That was the worst thing. When I saw his face, and the blood streaming down it, at that point I turned away, I couldn’t watch any more. I went back in my room, and I felt so sick, please forgive me, I had to vomit.’
Silence.
Stuff is scribbling nineteen to the dozen. ‘The voice of humanity and common sense,’ he writes.
The judge says hastily: ‘Are there any questions for the witness? If not—’
Then, despairingly, but reconciled to his role: ‘All right, Councillor—’
‘Fräulein Herbert, could you tell us, in this clash, would you say the police were the aggressors or the farmers?’
The witness is full of contempt: ‘And you still ask me that after all I’ve told you? Of course it was the police that were attacking. They attacked like a mob of savages.’
Councillor Streiter smiles: ‘I know that very well. But there are still some in this court who question it.’
The judge: ‘Prosecutor, your question.’
The prosecuting counsel begins quietly and innocuously: ‘I’d like to ask the witness if her impression is that the whole bloody clash would have been avoided if the farmers had peacefully given up their flag?’
Councillor Streiter quickly intervenes: ‘I object to the question, Your Honour. It’s purely hypothetical, whereas my que
stioning was about the witness’s actual impression of the scene unwinding before her eyes.’
The judge: ‘The question is permitted.’
And the prosecutor: ‘Would the judge pursue the question for me?’
The judge: ‘All right, witness, do you think the bloody clash would have come about if the farmers had peacefully given up their flag?’
Before the witness can reply, the defence counsel cuts in again: ‘I object to the question a second time, and ask for the court to take a position.’
The judge duly gets to his feet and leaves the court followed by his cohorts. A general conversation ensues.
Fräulein Herbert turns to the defendants’ bench and shakes hands first with Henning, then Czibulla. The usher protests.
‘Magnifique!’ declares Stuff.
‘She’s no witness,’ says Pinkus. ‘She hasn’t seen anything. Babbling on about blood. Completely hysterical.’
‘Boy oh boy,’ says Stuff. ‘I’ll tell her what you just said. Then she’ll show you the meaning of the word “hysterical”.’
‘Please God, don’t do that,’ says Pinkus, and retreats.
The court returns and the judge announces: ‘The prosecution’s question will be allowed in the following form: Did the witness, in her observation of the police, take them for so heated that they would have struck, even given the withdrawal of the flag?’
Fräulein Herbert is about to reply when the prosecutor gets up and declares with a forced smile: ‘We are not interested in putting our question in such a form, and withdraw it.’
‘Then if there are no further questions to the witness? Fräulein Herbert, you are released. You can, though, if so inclined, take a seat in the gallery.’
Fräulein Herbert says, all too audibly: ‘No thanks, I’ve had all I want,’ and leaves the hall.
The judge: ‘Usher, please call the next witness, Police Sergeant Hart.’
All duly seat themselves once more, police testimony tends to be neither illuminating nor popular.
IV
The judge says: ‘The defence counsel has intimated that you wish to round off your testimony on a certain point.’
But the sergeant replies: ‘The defence? That can’t be.’
He looks suspiciously round at Stuff, but Stuff nods amiably back and blinks his eyes at him. The policeman concludes that Stuff must have pulled the wool over the defence’s eyes, and he allows: ‘All right then. Defence it is.’
The judge looks searchingly at the man, he senses there’s something not right here; once again, as so often in this trial, someone is playing their cards very close to their chest, so he merely asks: ‘What’s this about, then?’
‘When I was questioned a couple of days ago, I talked about how I was doing traffic duty on the Stolpe Tormarkt. And how a farmer came up to me, and provoked and taunted me to such a degree that I felt like laying about all the farmers. Well, I saw that farmer in the witness stand this morning.’
‘A farmer?’ asks the judge. ‘You must be mistaken. We’ve had no farmer here this morning.’
‘But I saw him sitting there, a fat, dark-haired man with a pasty face.’
The judge thinks for a moment. He can see the defence counsel on the point of jumping in, but he knows what’s going on here. Nicely done, he thinks, Streiter is ten times as feisty as that dopey prosecutor. The sergeant has no idea. How did Streiter manage it?
But what he says aloud is: ‘No, we haven’t had any farmers giving evidence today. But perhaps you wouldn’t mind turning round and surveying the people in the gallery. Perhaps your man is sitting there.’
While Police Sergeant Hart begins to look, the judge looks meaningly at one individual, who first turns his head away, then reaches into his pocket and pulls out a handkerchief and thoroughly and rather quietly polishes his nose.
None of which helps, because Hart goes straight up to him, and declares aloud (everyone is waiting with bated breath): ‘This is he.’
‘Are you sure?’ asks the judge. ‘This is the man who taunted, teased and provoked you?’
‘No possible confusion, Your Honour,’ says the sergeant. ‘This is the man. Back then he was wearing top-boots and a green loden suit with tunic and a green hat with a chamois brush. The best corroboration is the way he was just trying to hide his face from me.’
‘I was not trying to hide my face from him,’ the man retorts roughly. ‘I’ve got a cold, and when I have a cold, I have to blow my nose a lot. On the contrary, I’m grateful for the opportunity of completing my testimony.’
‘Well, well,’ says Hart, ‘you talked a lot then, and you talk—’
The judge intervenes. ‘The witness is to speak only when asked a question. Herr Hart, this gentleman is not a farmer at all, he is Detective Inspector Tunk from Stolpe.’
‘Goddamn it . . .’ the policeman bites his tongue, looks round at the press table, where Stuff, with his head down, is busy writing.
Hart turns back to the judge. ‘Everything happened as I said. And if the gentleman is a detective, then I don’t get it. He said to me, “We farmers gave you a thrashing—you’d better run, or else we’ll smash your faces in . . .” I don’t understand that, Your Honour, I just don’t . . .’
The detective is quite calm. Imperturbable.
The judge asks: ‘Is Herr Hart’s account of your behaviour correct, in your view?’
‘Entirely, Your Honour, entirely correct. I would only add that I was trying to nettle him even more than appears from his words.’
‘And why is that? Wouldn’t that strike you as a strange way of proceeding?’
‘It seemed right to me, Your Honour. I acted after mature reflection. I had seen that the police numbers were tiny, and the farmers vastly outnumbered them. The farmers were aroused and pugnacious. The police were quiet and disinclined to take action.
‘Moreover, I had seen the somewhat flaccid attitude of the commander, so it seemed to me that things needed gingering up.
‘I was not allowed to liaise openly with the uniformed police. Therefore I chose this approach. I wanted to shake them up, make them a bit gung-ho, above all I wanted them not to be caught out by the farmers.
‘What Herr Hart has said tells me that I succeeded.’
In the gallery, Herr Frerksen has got to his feet. Step by step he approaches the judge’s table, now he says several times in quick succession: ‘Your Honour! Your Honour!’
‘Yes, Commander? Have you something else to contribute?’
His voice shaking with emotion, Frerksen says: ‘The detective spoke of my flaccid attitude. I want to counter that by saying that in the auction hall, the detective explicitly congratulated me on my conduct. He said to me—and I quote his words verbatim—he said: “You put on a good show.”’
‘That’s what I said, Your Honour,’ says the unflappable detective. ‘That’s right. But you should have seen the man when he came running up to me—he knew me—and asked me what they would make of all this in Stolpe, and if he had performed well, and so on and so on. It was purely to calm him down that I said that, from the kindness of my heart.’
‘Detective—’ Frerksen begins.
But the judge takes a hand. ‘This is without any interest for us.—Any more questions to the witness Tunk? You, Legal Councillor?’
‘No, thank you. I’m finished with the witness.’
V
At the end of the testimony, the expert witness, retired Police Major Schadewald, enters the court.
He is a rotund gentleman with a shiny bowling-ball skull with three pigeon-egg-sized lumps on it.
The judge says: ‘The expert witness is not here to offer any value judgements. He is here merely to tell the court how he would have solved the problem of taking a flag from a crowd of demonstrators. Three questions have been formulated for him . . .’
But first the judge paints the scene. He goes up to a blackboard.
‘Here is the bar, Tucher’s. Here is the demonstration route
, across the marketplace, following the Burstah, past the Stolpe Gate, under the railway line, through the villa suburbs, approximately three thousand strong. You, Police Major, have some twenty men under your command, armed with nightsticks, sabre and revolver. All clear?’
Police Major Schadewald gives a distinct: ‘Yes, sir.’
The judge: ‘I’ll ask my first question: Is it necessary and customary to follow a set plan if required to confiscate a flag?’
Major Schadewald gives a distinct: ‘Yes, sir.’
Everyone listens hard, but nothing follows. The expert has given, in his view, a complete and satisfactory answer to the first question.
The judge: ‘I proceed to question number two: Would the commander give detailed instructions for the execution of such a task?’
Major Schadewald gives a distinct: ‘Yes, sir.’
And silence again. All are in despair. Good God, an expert who isn’t in love with the sound of his own voice—is such a thing possible?
Then the judge puts the third question: ‘What is the effect of a commander’s calm or agitated demeanour, his precise or vague orders, on the group under his command?’
Expert witness Major Schadewald explains: ‘The calmer the man in command, the calmer the men.’
And falls silent again.
The three questions are over.
The judge smiles, a little awkward, a little perplexed.
Then something occurs to him: ‘Major, perhaps you’ll allow me to put a supplemental question to my second. At what length and level of detail would you give instructions to your men? In fact, what orders would you give them?’
The expert opens his mouth to speak: ‘First, I must know where I am going to take the flag back.
‘Of course it would be at the narrowest part of the road, because that’s where the demonstration can most easily be brought to a halt. So not under any circumstances the marketplace, but’—he points to the board—‘the upper or lower Burstah.
‘Then I would divide my men up into groups.
‘Eight men would cordon off the road. They have to stop the march, but possibly allow the flag-bearer and possibly some of his friends to pass, thereby cutting them off from the body of demonstrators.