Never fear! Never fear! Rose Marie . . .
† Russian: roughly ‘the Floater’ or ‘Glider’: a suspension platform over a gorge
* Freely: And up with Peter we will make
The dire-cup shake and rattle . . .
* I AM A COWARD
WHO HAS BETRAYED THE FÜHRER
THE MAD OGPU CAPTAIN
The Commissar raises his hand in the signal to halt.
In the middle of a round market-place, half-covered with powdery snow, a number of motorcycles stand parked. They all have side-cars on which machine-guns are mounted.
‘Queer they don’t take the guns inside with ’em?’ Porta wonders.
‘Not a bit queer,’ sneers Heide. He is, as usual, annoyingly well-informed. ‘As long as they’re outside they’re ready for firing. That’s due to their effective frost lubricant. Take them inside and the temperature variation would make them freeze up and they’d be useless.’
‘Watch out that swivellin’ swastika in your ’errenvolk prick don’t freeze to ice,’ Tiny roars with laughter at his own witticism.
‘Not a sign of a sentry,’ mumbles the Old Man, putting his head cautiously up over the edge of the turret hatch. ‘These chaps must feel pretty bloody safe round here!’
‘Over behind that house there’s an old lorry,’ says Porta, pointing.
‘Then there’ll be a lot of Ivans, count on that,’ warns Tiny, craning his neck inquisitively.
The Commissar jumps heavily down from the motor-sledge. With his long cloak billowing in the wind he tramps towards us through the deep snow.
‘Stay on your toes,’ he says, bending his head back to look up at the Old Man in the Panther’s turret. ‘I don’t understand this! There’s not supposed to be any military personnel here! I’m afraid they may have got wind of us. Drive up through that street over there! I’ll make this place safe with the T-34s and the sledge. Don’t fire unless absolutely necessary. The dark’ll help us. These yokels can’t tell the difference between a tank and a tricycle. If anybody asks, tell them you’re transporting muck. They can understand that!’
Porta starts up, with a roar which makes the nearest houses shake. He speeds the 700 HP Maybach up to maximum revolutions to show what it can do. Typical driver showing-off. It is something he will never grow out of.
‘What’ll I put in the peashooter?’ asks Tiny, patting a shell.
‘HE, dammit! What did you think?’ snarls the Old Man, irritated.
‘I thought markers’d be all right,’ grins Tiny, happily. ‘We’ve still got some with red paint! Ivan’d be pleased as punch to get twenty gallons of red paint plastered all round’is chops! Red’s the colour o’ the season in this country, they say!’
‘Good God Almighty!’ the Old Man breaks out. ‘Have we still got those cursed markers? I’ve told you to chuck ’em out! They’ll be the death of us if you make a mistake some time!’
‘I never make mistakes,’ boasts Tiny, in a superior tone. ‘An’ I don’t want to lose those shells! Sooner or later we can ’ave some fun with ’em!’
Porta swings the Panther into a narrow street, which only leaves it fractions of an inch on each side.
‘Get out and steer him,’ the Old Man orders Tiny.
‘It’s always me.’ protests Tiny, sourly. ‘Why can’t it be Sven?’E’s a volunteer an’ wants to be an officer! Let ’im give the orders, then!’
‘Shut up.’ snarls the Old Man,’ and do as I say!’
With a lighted cigarette Tiny steers Porta down the narrow alleyway. When we have got some distance along it the Old Man orders a halt.
‘Where the devil’re we going to end up?’ he mumbles, resignedly.
‘In a boozer,’ grins Porta, indifferently, and points to a large sign KUKHMISS – TAERSSKAJA* Bajomaj.‘They got rooms to let, too! Let’s go in and sign the book. I can’t remember what it’s like any more to sleep in a proper bed.’
Tiny is already on his way up the broad steps leading to the restaurant.
‘Where the hell’re you off to, you crazy sod?’ explodes the Old Man, pulling himself up on to the edge of the hatch.
‘Goin’ to order coffee an’ ’ot Danish,’ shouts Tiny, with his hand on the door-knocker.
‘Idiot!’ roars the Old Man. ‘D’you want to get us shot?’
‘No, I want a cup o’ coffee,’ chuckles Tiny, with a grin like a split pumpkin.
‘You steer Porta, and nothing else,’ snarls the Old Man, not far from boiling-point.
‘Slowly, very slowly,’ warns Tiny. ‘Just a bit to the left an’ you’ll knock the ’ole bleedin’ ’ouse down. The landlord wouldn’t like that a bit!’
‘Hell!’ groans the Old Man, wiping the sweat from his brow. ‘That was close!’
Suddenly Tiny dashes back to the tank and goes in through the side-hatch with the celerity of a rabbit disappearing down its hole.
‘What’s up?’ asks the Old Man, in amazement.
‘The entire Red Army’s standing there just round the corner, scratchin’ its arse,’ pants Tiny, out of breath. ‘If I’adn’t been careful stickin’ me bonce round the corner of the’ouse, they’d ’ave shot me up far as the other side of the bleedin’ moon!’
The Old Man looks through the night-viewer, but can see nothing. The street lies dark and deserted.
‘You’ve been drinking again, as usual. I suppose,’ he says, sending Tiny a nasty look.
‘Oh, you think that, do you?’ shouts Tiny, in an insulted tone. ‘Well then. You take a trip up there yourself an’ stick your own nut round the corner!’
‘What now?’ asks Porta, taking a quick nip at the vodka bottle. ‘Shall we rock along and take a look at these Commie soldiers? Or shall we give ’em an acid drop so’s they’ll know we’re coming?’
‘Slow forward!’ orders the Old Man, shortly.
The heavy tank bobs a deep curtsey when Porta treads cautiously on the accelerator. Its near-side track takes the pediment of a house with it.
‘That whatsit over there on the corner. Ain’t that one of the flowers of the neighbours’ army?’ asks Porta, stopping the tank with a jerk.
‘Slowforward!’ orders the Old Man, in a low voice. ‘He’d never be standing there, gaping, if he had any suspicions of us. He’d have screamed an alarm long since and woke up the half of Russia.’
‘What about givin’ ’im a pot o’ paint?’ asks Tiny, with a little laugh.
‘The gun safe?’ asks the Old Man, nervously.
‘Too true she is,’ answers Tiny. ‘Think I’m barmy enough to be steppin’ along in front of a tin-can with a readied gun pointing at my backside?’
A guard with a Kalashnikov is standing at the street crossing and staring with interest at the tank rattling towards him. If he gets suspicious, we’re caught in a trap. We can’t use the gun in this narrow street. They can put us out with hand-weapons without the least bit of trouble.
‘What the hell’s that clown thinkin’ about?’ whispers Porta, staring out through the driver’s slit at the dark form standing planted like a statue a couple of hundred yards in front of us, with both hands buried deep in its pockets. ‘Must be one of those Cossack abortions they’ve picked up on a midden and given a gun in exchange for his muck-rake!’
‘And it’s all gone that quick the army’s forgot to give ’im the course on tank silhouettes,’ grins Tiny,’ so’e thinks we’re a mechanized shit-barrow!’
Just before we reach the guard, Porta’s eye falls on a narrow side street. With a great noise of falling bricks he turns the Panther into it, only to brake suddenly.
‘They after us?’ asks Tiny, taking a comforting swig at the vodka bottle.
‘No, but we’re in a blind, bloody alley,’ snarls Porta. ‘Why the hell can’t they put up signs? We’ll bloody well complain about this!’
‘Couple of Commie squaddies from the neighbours on the way towards us,’ warns Tiny, peering cautiously out of the side hatch.
Porta tak
es a quick look in the mirror. ‘The devil! And they look like a couple of real public enemies!’
‘Damnation,’ curses the Old Man, nervously. ‘Back! To hell with the consequences! Let’s get out of here, before we get our arses singed!’
Nervously I take down an mpi from its bracket, and cock it. There is a whine of metal biting into concrete.
‘Watch those tracks,’ warns the Old Man. ‘Bust one, and we’ve had it!’
‘’Ere comes another public bleedin’ enemy,’ says Tiny, stretching his neck.
Porta throws the tank round to the right so sharply that the shells come out of their open racks and clang about on the steel deck.
The Old Man lights his silver-lidded pipe with shaking fingers.
‘Drop your speed, damn it!’ he shouts, desperately.
‘Fuck all to be frightened of,’ howls Porta, switching on the forward spotlight. Too late, he sees two four-wheel-drive Tempos parked so close to one another that nothing wider than a bicycle could get past them. ‘Everything’s under control.’ he screams, presses home the accelerator and rips the Tempos in two.
The Old Man drops his pipe, and covers his face with his hands.
‘I trust you,’ he says. He has no other choice. He gives up. leans back in the tank-commander’s seat, and watches the night come rushing towards him.
The motor is thundering at maximum speed. Round about in the houses, lights come on without consideration for the black-out.
‘Oh hell!’cries Porta. ‘Now we’re stuck! Elevate the gun! I’m going straight on!’
‘You’re not bloody well going straight through that wall, are you?’ asks the Old Man, in fear. ‘That ought to make ’em realize we’re not on their side!’
A balcony comes down, raining bricks and mortar on the tank. A motorcycle is flattened under its tracks.
Three Russians come towards us waving their arms.
‘Shall I give ’em a pot o’ paint?’ asks Tiny. ‘That ought to make ’em think a bit!’
‘Stoi, stoi idjiotsetvo,’ they shout and make threatening gestures at the tank, which goes roaring on down the narrow street smashing everything in its path.
The three Russians stop, and stare in terror at the on rushing tank. The next moment they are thrown up into the air, fall again to the cobblestones and two are crushed under its tracks. The third is back on his feet, and rushes off madly down the steep street.
‘Get him!’ shouts the Old Man. ‘He mustn’t get back and give the alarm, or all hell’ll be loose!’
‘I’ll eat ’im!’ shouts Tiny, and is already out of the side hatch with his garrotting-wire in his hand. He falls, of course, on the icy road. ‘Ruki verch!*’ he screams after the fleeing Russian, who is out of his mind with terror. He stops and spits angrily towards Tiny, and bends down and picks up a lump of ice which he throws at the tank. Then he sprints off again with Tiny thundering at his heels. They go down in a heap in a snowdrift.
Tiny jabs with his combat knife, but slips on the ice and misses his stroke.
The Russian gives out a scream of terror and disappears at top speed round a corner before Tiny can get back on his feet.
Careless of what he hits. Porta backs out of the narrow street at such a speed that you’d think the whole town was coming down round our ears.
A woman screams, hysterically, somewhere out in the night.
‘Where the hell’s that woman?’ asks Porta, craning his neck. ‘Screamin’ women make me nervous!’
‘She’s moved in with us. Up on the turret!’ answers Tiny, laconically.
‘Moved in?’ asks the Old Man, blankly.
‘Yes, and she’s brought’er bed an’ blankets with’er, too,’ grins Tiny. He puts his head out of the side hatch.
The girl lets out a couple of strange long gulps at the sight of Tiny’s sooty face. Then she gives another rattling scream.
‘’Eavens above. She’s fell off,’ he says, rubbing the palms of his hands together.
‘Jesus no! Didn’t hurt herself I hope?’ cries Porta.
‘Don’t think so,’ answers Tiny, who is hanging half out of the hatch opening. ‘She’s running that fast you’d think she’d got a wildcat in’er pants!’
‘Did she take the bed with her?’ asks Porta, interestedly.
‘No, it’s still’angin’ there,’ chuckles Tiny.
‘Great! We can take it in turns to sleep in it!’ Porta turns the tank in the direction of some old wooden houses with balconies and loggias projecting out over the street.
‘Be careful, you’re too close,’ warns the Old Man. There is a sound of splintering wood and the tinkling of broken glass.
‘The devil!’ curses Porta, treading on the brake.
‘What’s wrong?’ asks the Old Man nervously, bending down from the turret. ‘Brakes gone?’
‘They’re all right!’ snarls Porta, tramping away at the pedal. ‘It’s this rotten can. It keeps skidding, and smashing into these shitty houses!’
‘Looks like the bleedin’ ’ouses are tryin’ to overtake us!’ shouts Tiny, throwing half a loggia off the side hatch.
‘That’s what they are tryin’ to bloody do.’ answers Porta. He continues his attempts to brake lightly, but the tank only goes faster down the icy road. ‘Somebody must be pushin’ us. Shoot the bastard!’ he shouts.
‘Are we in difficulties, then?’ asks Tiny.
‘Difficulties?’ answers the Old Man. ‘We’ve been in bloody difficulties ever since this fuckin’ world war got started!’
‘What about goin’ outside an’ ’avin’ a look at things?’ suggests Tiny. What he really wants to do is to get his feet on solid ground again. The atmosphere inside the tank seems to have become very hot all of a sudden.
Porta steers us in between two apartment blocks built of reinforced concrete. We are stuck there, quite helplessly.
‘By all the devils in hell!’ curses the Old Man, tensed like a spring. ‘What the hell did you want to come in here for?’
‘I’m tired of bustin’ up houses,’ answers Porta, resignedly,’ and as you know, all roads lead to Rome!’
‘We gotta go to Rome now?’ asks Tiny, in amazement. ‘Them Commies moved our gold to Rome, then, ’ave they?’
‘Idiot!’ snarls Heide. ‘You are as stupid as you look!’
Tiny is about to go for him, when a yell is heard above from a first-floor window. A big Russian in shirt-sleeves with a steel helmet on his head leans out and waves his arms furiously.
What happens next is really a reflex movement.
Tiny’s machine-pistol spits blue flame at the gesticulating figure. It rolls out through the window, slides down the front shield of the tank and lies still in the snow.
‘Dis-mount!’ orders the Old Man, jumping down from the turret. ‘Let’s get back to the market-place and see what’s happening there! It sounds as if all hell’s broke loose!’
At full speed I run headlong into Albert coming the opposite way past the baker’s shop on the corner. He lets out a hoarse yell, and stumbles over a dead dog.
‘If I get out of this alive I’ll go to church every single Sunday!’ he whines miserably. ‘I’d rather be a sausage-man in Africa!’
‘Who’s firin’?’ asks Porta, dropping down behind the LMG.
‘Neighbours,’ shouts Barcelona, taking cover behind a road-sweeping machine.
The market-place is a scene of wild confusion. Muzzle-flashes blaze from all directions.
‘Take cover, for Christ’s sake,’ shouts ‘Frostlips’, as Gregor dashes recklessly across the square with tracer whistling around him.
‘What’s going on?’ he asks in terror. He goes over the fence in a long arc and lands alongside ‘Frostlips’ in a cloud of snow. They are only a foot away from one another, but shout at the top of their lungs, covering one another with spittle.
‘They shooting?’ Gregor asks excitedly, readying his machine-pistol.
‘Yes, you dope,’ spits ‘Frostlips’. ?
??That’s what they’re doin’ nothin’ bul!
‘Why don’t you shoot back at ’em?’ roars Gregor. sending a waterfall of spittle into ’Frostlips’s’ face.
‘That’s what we are doin’!’ answers ‘Frostlips’. He sprays a rain of bullets out in front of him without taking any kind of aim.
‘Think we can make it?’ shouts Gregor in a voice which echoes between the houses.
‘How the fuck should I know?’ squeals ‘Frostlips’, sending an idiotic burst through a plateglass window. It breaks up into a million pieces and sets a burglar alarm going.
‘Burglars!’ shouts Gregor. ‘They’ve got a nerve with both the German an’ the Red Army in town!’
‘Shut your stupid bloody mouth!’ rages the Commissar, wiping spittle from his face.
The snarl of a Kalashnikov cuts him short. The windows on the far side of the market-place disintegrate, and all six tyres on the lorry parked under cover of the long house, go off with deafening explosions.
In the confusion I throw two hand-grenades. One of them goes into the cabin of the lorry which immediately catches fire.
‘What the’ell’s goin’ on?’ shouts Tiny, staring round him in confusion. ‘What kind of bleedin’ idiots are shootin’? An’ who the bleedin’’ell they shootin’ at? We’re friends!’
A long, raging burst from a pair of machine-guns answers him.
‘This is bloody well enough!’ shouts Porta resentfully, losing his yellow topper.
‘Those bastards have mounted guns up there on the third floor,’ screams Albert, pointing wildly. ‘I don’t think they know we’re friendly!’
‘I’m not taking any more of this shit,’ shouts Porta, lifting his machine-pistol.
The shutters splinter. Snow, ice and shards of glass fly in all directions, as he empties the Kalashnikov’s entire magazine into the window in one long burst.
A very fat and very angry lady in a bright yellow nightdress, and with a red nightcap on her head, appears at the shattered window.
‘Sons of bitches!’ she screams, furiously. ‘You’re going to have to pay for every bit of what you’ve smashed! Cowardly mongrels! Go out and shoot Germans, and leave us Russians in peace!’ She lifts a large pottery floor-vase above her head, goes back a little way and runs forward to get more distance on her throw. Unfortunately for her she gets too much distance. She forgets to let go of the vase and goes with it out of the window. With a shrill scream she lands in a snowdrift. The vase flies out of her hands and hits ‘Frostlips’ on the head. He gulps, and goes out like a light.