Población objetivo

One day here is very much like another. The summer has been hot, and now, with the leaves beginning to turn, Indian summer is in the air. As if nature were determined to show that she can still prevail over so much stupidity, destructiveness, and cruelty, the rose borders and beds of autumn flowers in front of the barracks are a riot of color. The monotony of hospital life is beginning to get on our nerves. The old familiar doctors were demobbed long ago; the new ones look in occasionally to say a few noncommittal words but otherwise leave us and our problems alone. There are only ‘‘serious cases’’ left here. We ‘‘facial burns’’ are among them, and we get the feeling that people have not quite made up their minds what to do with us. The clinics for plastic surgery are not operating yet, and in any case no one ap- pears to have very much experience in this field.

We cling to the daily routine as if it were a military duty roster. After breakfast, as soon as the beds have been made—here Holzamer and I are dependent on others’ help as our hands are still thickly bandaged—I start dictating. Holzamer has developed considerable skill at typing with his crippled hands. He sits hunched over the big Remington and, sucking the saliva from the corners of his mouth at regular intervals, he asks me question after question.

The weather prophet can barely restrain his desire to break out and be free. (‘‘I’ve got to get across before winter sets in. I know the way through the Thuringian Forest like the back of my hand.’’) As we climb the hill in the evening to look at the sunset (between our legs, of course, bent double) he speaks warmly of his home in Thurin- gia, its forests and its people, and of his mother.

The hospital has long ceased to be cut off from the outside world. We not only have the radio but we also read the newspapers. They are printed on cheap, unsized paper, but they give us a picture of the extent of the catastrophe, of the concentration camp atrocities, and of the preparations for the Nuremberg Tribunal.

When we came here months ago the world beyond the fence ap- peared lifeless. Now the bustle seems to increase daily. They are going to work again, on bicycles or walking to the nearby tram stop. There are also more and more cars—no new ones, of course; many of them are veterans, still showing traces of camouflage paint, and there are cast-off jeeps, wood-gas burners, and others that had been ‘‘con- scripted.’’

Barter over the fence flourishes. Cigarettes, eggs, even medicine, bandages, scissors, and alcohol (not denatured!) are the new currency. I find the temptation to convert my watch or even my Leica (assuming this has not been ‘‘frisked’’ into new, American ownership) into solid food increasing in proportion as the hospital diet becomes less and less nourishing.

In July I had another trip up to Beuerberg Convent. The University Opthalmic Clinic is housed there because their bombed building in Munich is not yet ready for reoccupation. They wanted to try an eyelid transplant. I have been having a great deal of pain; the corneas threaten to dry out because the lids are so burned they no longer cover my eyes. At any rate Dr. Stumpf, who is touchingly concerned about my case, thought we ought to try.

It was my second visit to Beuerberg; the first had been some two months earlier, when I still lacked the strength to walk.

We were shipped in a convoy of heavy American trucks from Bad Wiessee, where our hospital had been closed down. The GIs drove us through the lovely Upper Bavarian landscape at breakneck speed. At Beuerberg they simply pulled up in front of the convent and dumped

their entire cargo of human misery—amputees, blind, bullet wounds, and burns—on the eye clinic, leaving it up to them to sort us out.

They were marvelously restful days. An atmosphere of peace and silence enveloped us immediately in the cells of the convent. The nuns, who provided some of the clinic’s nursing staff, outdid one another in deeds of loving kindness, and the nourishing convent food was undoubtedly many calories over the loser’s appointed quota.

One day they stood me up and walked me out into the interior courtyard, which was surrounded by a magnificent old cloister. They sat me down on a bench with a number of privates in hideous hospi- tal-issue clothes who were already enjoying the warm May sun. The privates greeted me as an equal, using the familiar Du of brothers in affliction. ‘‘Hello there,’’ they said, and: ‘‘There you are, see? You can do it. Another few days and you’ll be hopping round like a weasel.’’

Pansies and primulas flowered in the beds in the middle of the little courtyard. It was very still, only the nuns in their huge white starched hoods moving soundlessly along the arcades. We all took a typical private’s enjoyment in it, almost as if we suspected that the idyll was to be short-lived. Suddenly each of us had a glass of cold, frothy beer in front of him.

‘‘Cigar?’’ asked my neighbor to the left, giving me a pleasant start. He lit it for me, and with my bandaged hands I carefully raised the precious thing to my lips.

Their conversation gradually faded in my ears until it sounded like something happening a long way off. A feeling of sheer joy at being alive took such immediate possession of me that I had to make an effort to nod polite agreement when addressed. I breathed in the deli- cious spring air. I was surrounded by men who, like myself, had fought and suffered. They talked of their plans, their homes, their families, wives, children, and girlfriends, and the war seemed as re- mote as a ghastly dream.

Our peace was rudely disturbed. Suddenly all those hoods were fluttering along the corridors like frightened birds while all around us soldiers vigorously gave vent to their feelings: ‘‘No—it can’t be true. We want to stay here, we want to stay here!’’

‘‘Everyone go to your rooms and pack your things. We’re moving out immediately,’’ a medical officer was shouting. Then I saw the GIs. With cries of ‘‘Come on, boys—los, los, snell, snell!’’ they tried to hurry us along. When they took my arms to help me to my room I

rebelled. ‘‘No!’’ I screamed. ‘‘I won’t come with you! I’ve had enough—I can’t take any more!’’

‘‘Come on,’’ said my companions. ‘‘Don’t make a fuss, man. They’ll take you anyway.’’

I resisted like a stubborn child, but they carried me bodily along the corridor and put me on my bed while a nun collected my things together.

The convoy of trucks was drawn up on the dusty road in front of the convent. They were open trucks, and the prospect of driving along farm tracks on one of them made me feel physically sick. So I kept up my protest from the bed, repeating monotonously, ‘‘They’ll not get me out of here, they’ll not get me out of here!’’ But they did. Two of them dumped me unceremoniously on a stretcher, carried me down the stairs, and loaded me—carefully—on the back of a truck. The nun had trotted along beside me, urging me to keep calm. But when she saw the open lorries it took her breath away too. Looking round for someone in authority, she said pleadingly, ‘‘You can’t do it—his whole face is an open wound!’’ But a sergeant, obviously the trans- port commander, stepped up and pushed her aside, shouting, ‘‘Snell, snell—we’re in a hurry.’’

Just as they were about to close up the tailboard the nun darted forward, tore the enormous butterfly hood from her head, and placed it over my face. I caught a glimpse of cropped hair as she bent over me and said, ‘‘To stop the dust.’’ Before I grasped what had happened the tailboard had slammed shut and the truck was rolling off down- hill. After a journey of several agonizing hours we were unloaded at Allgasing.

They were not able to operate on my eyelids this time. It was too early, apparently; the scar tissue is still ‘‘working,’’ and my face has not yet ‘‘settled down.’’ So after a couple of days at Beuerberg I came back to Oberfo¨hring to find that my roommates had been longing for my return. ‘‘We missed you,’’ they said.

As we sat around the table that evening I realized for the first time that though we are all in a hurry to get out, at the same time we are afraid of the world beyond the fence. We talk more and more about our relations, not knowing whether they are still alive or not. Since the Russians marched into Thuringia I have been one ambition the poorer; I had hoped to be able to return home. And since the Russians

are also in Pomerania and Mecklenburg my thoughts revolve more and more frequently around what had happened to Ursula and the children. Did they manage to get away from the estate in Western Pomerania before the Russian army swept over them?

The thing we had always put off talking about we now discuss every evening: what will we do when we are released? The weather prophet, a doctor of physics summa cum laude, already sees himself teaching—at a university, if possible. Holzamer’s dream is a job at the Ministry of Finance. (‘‘There’ll always be a Ministry of Finance, and I’ve got my clerk’s diploma.’’) For the count and myself things look less rosy. He is a school-leaver without a trade and I am a philol- ogy student without a degree. What are we to do? And there are still these rumors about deporting senior officers.

With the weather prophet busy with his preparations for departure, help has arrived for me from the other side of the fence. It arrived in the form of two ladies in summery dirndl dresses bringing us bulging handbags full of fruit, bread, sausage—and above all books.

Frau von Coester is the mother of the adjutant I lost on the Russian Front. Having heard I was in the hospital here, she came with her friend to get me out. Their helpfulness is overwhelming, their opti- mism infectious. I’m to apply for my release as quickly as possible. I’m to stay at their place (‘‘But of course!’’) and start the search for my wife from there. At the same time I can help them get their book- shop started.

Next morning: Removed the bandage from my eyes to find the weather prophet ready to march. He was just securing his iron rations on top of his knapsack. (‘‘I have to get through the forests. It may take me days.’’) Noticing that I was awake, he said, ‘‘I’m off today but I’ll be in touch—don’t you worry.’’

Holzamer watched his departure with envy and has hardly said a thing all day, sitting brooding, fiddling with a map of Germany, and occasionally exchanging whispers with the count.

I am to be released tomorrow.

As I turn in the doorway and say, ‘‘Look after yourselves,’’ they look at me as if I were a traitor.

inability to hold a pen in my right hand for the vital signature, clearly makes an impression on the American officer. ‘‘Good luck,’’ he says, and next minute I am out in the corridor again—‘‘discharged.’’

Later, waiting at the tram stop with my bulging pilot’s knapsack at my feet, I find I am one among many. I am jostled about when the tram arrives and people get out. No one takes any notice of me or helps me get in. The tram is crowded. I stand between the rows of seats with the knapsack between my knees as we clatter through the ravaged city toward the station. I see people in the streets going about their business. They are dressed simply, but the women in their gaily colored summer dresses enliven the desolate spectacle of Munich’s ruins. I ride through the streets that have been cleared of rubble and that already offer shops with modest window displays and flowers.

Walking along the platform toward the exit I experience a wave of energy and exhilaration. I am thirty-two years old, one of millions who share the same fate, and I mean to seize my chance!

I N D E X O F N A M E S

Areopagus (two-day discussion, Gatow), 11, 29, 32, 41, 56, 66, 75, 80, 82

Allgasing, 3, 4, 180

Allied bombers, 25, 30, 36, 72, 79, 80, 100, 119, 121

Alpine Fortress (See Obersalzberg) American 8th Air Force, 45 American 15th Air Force, 45 Americans (‘‘Amis’’), vi, 3, 9, 10, 13,

17, 39, 45, 49, 144, 154, 155, 157, 166, 170, 171

Angerer, Leutnant, 71

Augsburg, 53, 118, 144, 160, 170 Auschwitz concentration camp, ix, 6 Austria, 32

B., Leutnant, 36, 39

Bad Wiessee hospital, 3, 171, 178 Baku, 37 Barkhorn, 142, 168 Battle of Britain, 17 Bavaria, 3, 17, 134, 168 ‘‘Bedplate’’ operation, 100 Berlin, 6, 15, 16, 50, 51, 89, 95, 101, 113–114, 117, 124, 135, 151, 161, 166

air raids on, 16, 25, 26, 44, 67, 85, 88, 100, 130–31

Luftwaffe club in, 100

Preussenhaus in, 102 Beuerberg Convent, 3, 178–80 Black Sea, 37, 40, 141 Blomert, Leutnant, 128, 129, 132–33, 134 Boeings, 152 Br., Major, 65, 69, 72, 73, 77, 78 Brandenburg, 44, 50, 81, 124 Fighter Group 7 at (1944), 43–61 passim Fighter Unit 44 at (1945), 126–36, 158 Brenner Pass, 119, 170 British Intelligence, 14

Buchenwald concentration camp, 6 Bulgaria, 79

Caucasus, 25, 37, 40, 51, 52, 65, 141 Churchill, Winston, 88

Ciampino, North airfield, 121 Coester, Frau von, 181 Crailsheim, 166

Director of Day Fighters, 65 Don river, 167

East Prussia, 38, 60, 83, 87, 88 Ebenhausen, 87

Eglfing-Haar mental hospital, 156 England, English, 13, 16, 17, 26, 31,

32, 60, 67, 68, 89, 108, 123, 141, 144, 159, 168

Fa¨hrmann, Leutnant ‘‘Kaczmarek,’’ 24, 26, 50, 51, 128, 138, 143– 151, 163–165