The Commissar

  ‘“I saw through you straightaway, Herr Spy,” he continued. “I am the Chief of the Military Counterespionage Service here in VI Military District, and I have sent a great many of your kind in front of the military courts. One careless question, and you villains stand tied to the execution post. You are under arrest!”

  ‘“Now you’ve gone too far, general! You’re not going to get away with that,” shouted the dog’s owner. “I’m a party member in good standing, and with a low number! I was in Munich.” He banged himself on the chest. “I have sat alongside the Führer twice in Bürgerbrau. What d’you say to that?” He gave the Nazi salute, with fingertips exactly aligned with his right eye. “In 1923 I marched in the third row behind His Excellency General Ludendorff! I am a holder of the Blood Order! I’m not that easy to muck about with! I’d also like to know since when Army generals have started stealing bicycles? Do you know what it costs to steal a bike?”

  ‘“Are you stark, staring mad?” roared the general, rattling his sabre and spurs.

  ‘“No, but you are,” said the dog-owner, with a sardonic smile.

  ‘By this time a crowd had collected outside the general’s eagle-decorated garden gate. The inquisitive stretched their necks to see what was going on, and laughed with pleasure.

  ‘This disturbed the combatants, of course, so the general invited the Rottweiler and its owner inside, to continue the discussion without outside advice and interference.

  ‘The dog’s owner wasn’t a normal, stupid person, and could talk nicely about most anythin’. He dealt on the Stock Market, too, and knew a good deal about foreign currency. He thought it would be only polite to introduce himself.

  ‘“Strange,” he bowed, clicked his heels and lifted his right arm. “Potato wholesaler, and barley exporter: party member; holder of the Blood Order. Heil Hitler!”

  ‘The general growled a bit, but didn’t consider it was necessary to introduce himself. He thought that any bloody fool, including a potato wholesaler living in that Westphalian hole in the ground Paderborn, ought to know who he was. It was people’s duty, he believed, to know him!

  ‘“Be so good as to take a seat, Herr Strange,” he barked, with false friendliness, offering a gold cigarette-case with the German eagle engraved on it.

  ‘Party member and potato wholesaler Strange scrabbled a cigarette out of the case, but had to light it himself.

  ‘Anybody can understand that,’ smiles Porta. ‘Where’d we all be if this dog-lovin’ spud-basher was only a demobbed Leutnant of the reserve who’d been sent home because he had his party-book in order. Or, maybe, an Unteroffizier, or even a lousy rifle-carrier? That low, a German Army general couldn’t ever sink. Better make it look like forget-fulness on his part.

  ‘For a bit everything was quiet. Like the lull they talk about before the storm. They just sat there watching the smoke spirallin’ up from the general’s cigar and the party member’s cigarette.

  ‘“Have you thought, general,” the potato feller started off at last, “that it’s about time we got moving and won this war? We can’t goon overlooking slackness. Pota to exports’ve practically stopped.” He looked challengingly from the general to the Rottweiler. The dog had stretched itself out comfortably on a lionskin in front of the fire. It was all that was left of a poor rheumatic lion the general’d shot in Africa while he was hangin’ around waiting for World War II to start up. “Things look black to me, general, very black. Out of the few loads of potatoes one can get hold of, from good connections, 50 per cent have to be handed over to the damned Army, who pay bottom prices. Prices set by a group of sour-gutted civil servants in the Ministry of Food. People who can’t even write proper German, but use a kind of idiotic civil servant language of their own. They should leave everything to the SS Reichführer and throw the remains of the rotten monarchy on to the muckheap! It makes a man despair of life, general! I have written to the Führer, but received no reply. We win and win, but none of our victories get us anywhere! Barley I never see any more and potatoes are fewer and fewer. Give us a great, blood-soaked victory, and get it over with so’s a man can begin to do business again. Like we were forced to do by Jewish high finance before the war. Look at the great victory we’re winning just at present! The whole of 4 Panzer Army’s sitting down in the woods along the Oka, where they’re letting themselves get shot up by the Bolshie guns, and regiments, battalions and companies are being smashed to bits and spread out all over the delta marshes. And d’you know what people say? They say that no rnatter which way you look the whole sky is on fire. In every direction. Villages and towns are being laid waste too, so as there’s nothing left of them but piles of ashes. But that’s not what I’m really bothered about. War’s like that. Tough and manly. Not for namby-pamby people! I learnt all about that in my twelve months at the volunteer school!” As he said this the party member an’ spud dealer jumped to his feet and bowed politely to the general.

  ‘“Beg humbly to report, Herr General, sir, one-year volunteer Strange, Leonhard, 33, Prussian Infantry Regiment, 6th Brandenburgers, discharged from active service by reason of potatoes and barley!” He fell back into the leather chair, a gruesome, antique monster with a back so uncomfortable that it was something only a masochist could love.

  ‘“I don’t complain at guns being fired off, towns being burned and people being killed. That’s what war’s about!” “Spuds an’ barley,” he went on, waving a fresh cigarette around in the air, “but the worst thing is those accursed artillerymen, that go shooting one distillery after another into ruins. What have the distilleries done to them to make them turn their rotten cannons on the distilleries?” He lugged a thick note-book from his pocket, shaking with anger. “Listen to this, general. I’m beginning to feel this whole world war is aimed specially at ruining me!” He wets his fingers and turns the pages. “‘Red Star’ at Kiev – took 185 tons of potatoes – razed to the ground;’Fatherland’s Oasis’, Minsk – 200 tons potatotes and 100 tons barley – shot to bits. These untermensch owe me for the last two deliveries! What about the insurance? Force Majeure! Not a sausage back for all those high premiums!

  ‘“Will the mighty German Army cover my losses? Excuse me, general, it was just a passing thought. Here’s the ‘Golden Eagle’, Kharkov – good solid business – runs night and day the year round – the manager was a lovely chap. His wife’s name was Wilma – always off to some spa she was. Nerves, general. Easy for them to get shot – nerves I mean – when you live in the Soviet Union, where the state can decide what colour your bedroom wallpaper’s got to be, and can clip its greedy fingers into your pockets whenever it gets the fancy. Almost as bad as it is here!” Herr Strange put his hands to his mouth in fear, as he realized what he had said. He jumped from the masochist chair in confusion, stuck out his right arm and roared: “Heil Hitler!”

  ‘The general gave a forced smile, and looked out of the corners of his eyes at the Rottweiler on the lionskin. It seemed to be amused at its master’s disloyal remark. All its teeth were showing.

  ‘“The day before yesterday I found, to my dismay, that eight distilleries had been burned to the ground. Honestly, general, if it goes on like this much longer, we’ll all go bankrupt, and I’ll be totally ruined. Who in the devil’s name’ll buy potatoes and barley when there’s no distilleries left?”

  ‘“Aren’t you looking a little too much on the dark side of things?” asked the general, and suggested their taking a glass of something. “Our position is quite good just now. The German divisions are rolling victoriously over the Russian steppe. I will admit that a distillery goes up now and then, but we must all make some sacrifices to achieve the final victory.”

  ‘“It’s time it arrived; preferably before those Red dummies shoot the last distillery to pieces!” sighed the potato-dealer sorrowfully.

  ‘With a commanding wave of his hand the general ordered his visitor over to the war-map which decorated the wall alongside the fireplace.

  ‘“See her
e, Herr Strange. Here we have the Dniepr and a little further back the Volga, the lifeline of Russia. We have only to get a short way over on the other side of that and our punishment expedition to the east is over. And here we have Africa. As you can see, it is no great distance to Cairo!”

  ‘“How many kilometres?” asked Strange, practically. He picked up a match-stick, which represented about a thousand kilometres on the map.

  ‘“That is of no importance,” shouted the general, furiously, knocking the match from his visitor’s hand. “As I say, it is not far, and now at this very moment Field-Marshal Rommel is preparing to make a decisive strike through the weak British lines. The German war banner will soon wave over the minarets of Cairo. The rest is merely a question of local mopping-up operations. The Egyptians and the Arabs have always sympathized with us Germans. It can be only a matter of hours before they turn openly against the British terror regime and place themselves under the protection of our just, German leadership. Throughout Africa you hear the call ‘Heim ins Reich!’*”He sweeps his pointer from Cairo to the mountain ranges of the Caucasus and describes a graceful loop around the whole of Georgia. “Here the German war-machine rolls forward, crushing all that stands in its path.” The pointer hops over to Burma. “And here the Imperial Japanese Army is smashing the British and American forces. The day is fast approaching when the victorious German and Japanese forces will join hands across the northern border of India. A masterstroke of strategy. What do you say to that, Herr Strange? Can you now see the Final Victory?”

  ‘The potato-dealer cleared his throat, passed his hand across his face and ran his eyes over the large war-map. At the same time he couldn’t help remembering all the wrecked distilleries.

  ‘“Yes it looks all very nice, general,” he admitted. “We’re going forward a lot!” He seemed to consider a little, judging the distance between Burma and the Caucasus. “But we’ve retreated in a lot of places, too,” he remarked, weakly. He put out a stiff, cautious finger and touched the chart. He ran his finger backwards and forwards at the western end of Georgia. “The Georgian Army road is unfortunately no longer in our hands,” he said, speaking as if he himself had personally pulled the road out from under the feet of the German Army. He was getting close to high treason. “And what about Moscow, general? Even with the best of German eyes I don’t think anybody could see a lot of Moscow from where our boys are at!”

  ‘“And you have been a volunteer?” roared the general, purple in the face and sending the Rottweiler on the lionskin a severe military look. “We have had one or two small setbacks recently in unimportant sectors of the front. But what you call retreat, my good man, is no more than regrouping and straightening of the front. A necessary tactical operation which demonstrates the cool-headedness of our Supreme Commander. At this very moment our tanks are crashing along the Russian roads. Machine-guns rattle and German artillery pieces roar. Our shells rain down on the heads of the untermensch, who are now beginning to realize who makes the decisions. A good army leader can do great things with the German soldier!” He crashes his pointer down on the map. “In these forests we have amassed an army with a striking power of which neither God nor the Devil has ever seen the like. Once it begins to roll nothing will stop it until it is east of Moscow. Look, man! We have stormed from victory to victory. We have rolled up Jugoslavia and Greece, and thrown them into the ashcan. The crowing Gallic cock has lost his feathers, and been sent head over heels to defeat in just 40 days! Holland, Belgium, Denmark and Norway smashed and thrown on the scrap-heap. They can only do what we order them to do. And here are Finland, Rumania, Bulgaria and invincible Hungary, our brave European allies. We could, if we wished, hand over the whole conduct of the war in the east to them.”

  ‘“The general forgot Italy,” the potato-dealer put in.

  ‘“Yes! We must also take Italy into account,” admitted the general, letting the pointer wave a few times up and down the Italian boot. In reality he couldn’t stand the Italians, or their spaghetti.

  ‘“Can we really trust these Bulgarians and Rumanians?” asked Strange, thinking of all the money owing to him in those two countries. “I’ve heard they desert to the enemy by the battalion and they won’t speak German any more?”

  ‘“That’s enough,” roared the general. “I won’t have high treason talked in my house! Understand that, you – you rolunleer!”

  ‘Now things began to develop at a pace nobody could have foreseen,’ smiles Porta, happily. ‘All the accusations they could think of, from cycle-stealing to high treason, flew to and fro in the room, accompanied by barked comments from the Rottweiler.

  ‘“They can stuff this world war for all I care,” roared “Spuds”, scarlet in the face. “I don’t give a damn who wins. All I want is for a few distilleries to be left standing by the artillery shits and the mad bombers, so that I can get my potato and barley sales back up again when it’s over!”

  ‘“I’ve seen through you,” screamed the general, planting his fists on his hips. ‘Do you understand me? You – you bottle-lover!’’ He grabbed the potato-dealer by the shoulders and shook him like a rat.

  ‘Unfortunately he carried out this unbridled attack on a party member right in front of the Führer’s melancholy likeness.

  ‘The potato-feller tore himself out of the general’s grip, and took the opportunity of giving the Führer’s picture a stretched-arm salute.

  ‘“I warn you, general,” he howled, insultedly. “I am not just a uniformed booby dancing round with a tin sword at his side! I am a holder of the Blood Order! I am a party member, I have a permit to carry a gun, and I’m not afraid to use it!”

  ‘“What do I care about that,” shouted the general, who had by now forgotten all he had learnt at Potsdam Officers’ School, and was back on the parade-ground again. “I shit on your Blood Order, believe me, you schnapps burner, you! And where your party’s concerned there won’t be much of that left when the war’s over! Ha!” he barked, whiffling his pointer through the air. “Do you and your Führer think that we,” pointing a finger at his own chest,”the Prussian Army, which sprang from the earth at the command of Frederick the Great, will give your seventh-rank party the time of day? A party that’s only able to think in terms of swivelling swastikas! D’you think we Germans can be led astray by foreign idealogies?”

  ‘The potato-dealer couldn’t believe his ears. He was close to going over to the wall and knocking his head against it to clear his thoughts. A foreign idea! Shit on the party! This uniformed fop must have had his brains boiled from too much sun on his pickelhaube! Swivelling swastikas? What interesting thoughts those generals had! But the red-tabbed dope had it all wrong. They weren’t curtseying round a semi-crippled Kaiser any more. A Kaiser whose only positive result in life was to lose a world war. They’d got to learn what the new era was all about! He opened his mouth several times to say something. His brain was overflowing with ready answers. But the general didn’t give him time to speak.

  ‘“Look at that,” roared the general in a well-trained voice of command. He pointed to a large, dark painting which represented German justice. A giant oak, decorated like a rich family’s Christmas tree. From every branch dangled a malefactor with a good German rope round his neck. It was a well-balanced composition. Women, children, young and old, even a skinny dog, were hanging there. “Look you potato-dealer, look!” he roared. “Here ends every German scoundrel, mongrel, schweinhund and plague-rat, who dares to besmirch the Fatherland with word or deed. Take note of it, schnapps-burner! We Prussians deal harshly with villains who think they can go their own way. A rope round their necks, and up with them. The thought, my man, is father to the deed! Consider that!” He emphasized his harsh words and dark warnings by pointing to a number of beautifully framed pencil drawings, showing smiling SS-men carrying out executions after the Army’s victorious march through Poland and Russia. Carrying them out completely in accordance with Army Regulations. “I had begun to regard you as
being a good person, but now I have seen through you. You are a beast of the field, an untermensch swine! Get out of my house! You wicked scoundrel! March! And take your mongrel with you! It too will get to know what facing a German court-martial means!”

  ‘The potato-dealer almost fell out of the door, followed by his dog. The dog turned its head and stared, with grinning jaws, at the raging general. “You can just wait,” it thought, “till we two party members’ve been down to have a word with our Gauleiter!”

  ‘Herr Strange jumped on his bicycle and pedalled off. He almost fell off again, when he turned in his saddle to spit a few farewell curses and threats at the general. He was still standing in the doorway, slashing holes in the air with his riding-whip.

  ‘“That uniformed queer’s going to learn what it’s all about,” the potato-dealer confided to his dog as they spurted down Soest Weg.

  ‘“Bow-wow!” barked the dog, in agreement.

  ‘They didn’t stop till they arrived at the Gauleiter’s pompous residence. Outside it the blood-red swastika flag waved lazily in the summer breeze.

  ‘“The flag,” said the potato-dealer, raising his right arm; “Heil! Sieg!”

  ‘The Gauleiter came all the way out on to the steps to greet him. They had been friends ever since they worked together as farmhands on the estate of a baron who had since been executed.

  ‘“Asphalt disease, Leonhard?” asked the Gauleiter in his thick, beery voice. “You look as if you’d been eating tar!”

  ‘“A general,” panted Strange, “an Imperial Prussian sod!”