This one contained the yellowed case notes from the Military Hospital at Pasewalk, in Pomerania, northern Germany. They were dated 1918. So, back to the war. The first clue to authorship was the note scribbled in a different hand on the front page: Dr Edmund Forster dismissed University of Greifswald Feb ’33. Arrested September ’33. Died police custody.
Taking a notebook and pencil from the desk drawer Denham began an English translation as he untangled each word. The scrawl was dreadful-that of a tired doctor writing his notes late at night, his only peace after a heavy day’s caseload.
Chapter Thirty-five
19 OCTOBER ’18
This morning a requiem mass is held for Grubitz in the chapel. A depressing, meagre service. I must have heard tens of hours of his life story during our meetings and he never once mentioned he was a Catholic. The men look shaken. His ‘accident’ has appalled them. They know. Suicide is not a soldier’s death.
The cantor sings ‘Voca me cum benedictus’ and Captain Gutmann is whispering in my ear: ‘I’ve a gift for you,’ and I know at once it is anything but. A blindness case. Mustard gas. When I ask why this one cannot be treated on the appropriate ward, he gives me that thin smile.
Later in the mess I learn that the soldier in question refused to allow Gutmann to touch his eyes because Gutmann is a Jew! The man’s outburst on the subject (the Jews) being so emotional that Gutmann is pointing to neurasthenia as a pretext for getting rid of him. I am not pleased. I remind him that simply keeping my men from harming themselves and each other is a terrible strain on the orderlies, without throwing a racialist into the mix. Also that my ward NCO is a Jew. But Gutmann pulls rank: ‘Forster, he’s yours.’
21 OCTOBER ’18
First thing today I examine Patient H in my office. He is pale and lean, with a long Hungarian moustache. He is deferential towards my rank.
I ask him a few questions in order to observe him. He tells me he is from the River Inn region of Austria and lived in Vienna before the war, where he hoped to become an architect. He enlisted in the Bavarian army, he says, because he did not wish to serve under the Habsburgs, having suffered great hardship in Vienna. He is silent when I ask him if he has a wife or a sweetheart.
He has no tic, twitch, or stammer that I can discern. When I put a glass of water into his hand his movements are coordinated; there is no shaking. He has no nightmares, he tells me, because he sleeps hardly at all. No outward signs of any disorders of the nervous system, though there is a slightly odd prosody to his speech. He is agitated from insomnia, which may indicate depression. The only observable symptom is impaired vision from the gas. Eyelids are severely swollen and inflamed, as is to be expected. Conjunctivitis will persist for some days. I warn him not to rub his eyes.
I am annoyed with Gutmann.
24 OCTOBER ’18
We have a problem with Patient H. The ward NCO, Singer, complains that he is waking the ward at night with his wandering and incessant muttering, which is often very loud. Also, he will not tolerate smoking in his presence and this unnerves the men.
I summon him to my office. My intention is to reprimand him. Standing before my desk he makes a visible effort not to talk, but then to my great surprise he launches into a tirade, his words like hot steam from a boiler. I let him speak. Of course, he has found out that Singer is a Jew. He has a fierce and obsessive hatred for the Jews. When I ask him why, he becomes speechless with rage, shaking almost, but summons his will in an attempt to calm down. I too try to stay calm. His hatred repels me. His voice has a coarse energy to it-I would recoil if I heard it on the street… and yet… I listen to the whole rant.
When he is gone I realise that I have not reprimanded him. I feel cast down and wish I had not seen him.
27 OCTOBER ’18
I do my evening rounds. Without him knowing, I observe Patient H in the ward. The men torment him for his eccentricity and his politics, leading him for a walk in the grounds and abandoning him, or putting meat in his bowl, knowing he is a vegetarian.
Yet I see that he has attracted a few adherents who sit near his bed listening to his monologues. When he’s not speaking they spend hours reading newspapers to him. Some papers are proposing a negotiated peace. Indeed, while I am in the ward one such article provokes our blind prophet into a sermon, railing against betrayal. He refuses to be quiet.
I say ‘Forster here’ to announce my presence and angrily tell him that others have the same right to peace and quiet as he has. He turns his swollen eyes in my direction.
6-7 NOVEMBER ’18
Rumours here all week of something momentous about to happen, of the war’s impending end. A group of sailors who had mutinied at Kiel have been spreading sedition in the wards. The men are highly agitated. I go to visit Patient H.
I expect to find him spitting fire and brimstone, so I am very surprised that he is curled on his bed, silent, a newspaper torn into shreds all around him. The men leave him alone now.
I stand next to him and remark that the swelling in his eyes seems improved. He tells me simply that he is blind. I remind him that mustard gas does not harm the eyes themselves. With the tips of my fingers I open his inflamed lids, and am greeted with a dead, sightless stare.
Later:
— I cannot get that stare out of my mind.
At 10:30 p.m. I call him to my office, knowing he will be awake. One of his adherents leads him in. I see he is agitated. I half expect him to start raving, but he does not speak.
In the darkness of the room I point the electric lamp towards his face and look into his eyes with the ophthalmoscope. The cornea reflects the light, as a blind eye would. But the eyes are healthy-with no signs of damage.
So I have a genuine case after all. Because I am in no doubt that his blindness is a symptom of a psychopathic hysteria.
I’ve seen enough of him to know that he can be possessed of great energy and self-mastery when he needs it. And now I find myself admitting an odd thing. I am impressed with him. I think I understand. Unconsciously he has willed himself not to see. He has blinded himself rather than witness Germany’s defeat.
Chapter Thirty-six
At this time of morning Primrose Hill was deserted. He peered ahead, glimpsing the bench at the top before it was shrouded again in fog, his footsteps loud in the chill air.
When he was close enough to see the bench again, a figure was seated there, silhouetted against the glow of the lamps, which were still lit.
The figure stood as Denham approached, a tall, dark stovepipe.
‘Mr Denham,’ David Wyn Evans said, tipping his hat. ‘I wasn’t expecting to meet you again.’
Denham glanced about. No sign of Bowler Hat Man.
‘Let’s walk,’ Evans said. ‘The bench is damp.’
They set off along a path beneath the trees, their footsteps waking a crow, which began a harsh cry above
