The Hour of the Donkey

... the aforementioned Lance-Corporal Jowett then said to rne: 'Shortly after this German soldiers from the lorries took over from those who had been guarding us. The new guards wore black uniforms with camouflaged caps, and had 'Skull and Crossbones' on their collars. Their officer had two bands of silver braid, between the elbow and the wrist, on his tunic, with some lettering between the bands, to the best of my recollection. The new guards treated the prisoners very roughly, driving them into a barn close to the bridge.'

Paragraph 4. Lance-Corporal Jowett then continued: 'After some minutes two of the guards took Major Tetley- Robinson from the barn. Major Tetley-Robinson, who had been wounded in the shoulder, was the senior officer present and dummy4

had been commanding the battalion since the death of the Commanding Officer. Shortly after this I heard a shot outside the barn. The Adjutant, Captain Harbottle, was then taken from the barn by the same two guards. Then, after a while, there was another shot.'

Paragraph 5. Lance-Corporal Jowett continued. 'The guards came back a third time. This time they took away an NCO, I think it was Sergeant Heppenstall of B Company, but I'm not sure as he had a bandage round his head. Corporal Pollock came to me and told me that there was a hole in the wall of the barn behind some sacks nearby, and that he intended to try to get through it and make a run for it. He said 'I think they're going to do for us one by one, Bill, and I'm not about to wait and find out.' I said I would go with him. The hole was not very big and Corporal Pollock couldn't get through it, but when I tried I did get through.'

Paragraph 6. Lance-Corporal Jowett continued: 'There were no Germans directly outside the barn by the hole, but there were some standing around a lorry about fifty yards to my right. There wasn't any cover, so I started running towards the river bank, trying to make for a big clump of reeds to my left. I'd got about half-way when I heard shouts behind me, and looking over my shoulder I saw that two other men had got out, but I don't know who they were. Then there were shots and screams. I went on running, but just as I reached the reeds I was hit in the upper leg and I fell into the river.

The water came up to my chest and it was all red, and I dummy4

couldn't stand properly, but I held on to the reeds growing next to the bank.'

Paragraph 7. Lance-Corporal Jowett continued: 'I don't know how long I stood there, it semed a long time. I heard the sound of grenades going off, and then a lot of firing, in bursts, like from an LMG. Then a German soldier finally appeared on the bank above me. He was very young and he had a zig-zag badge on his collar, on a green patch. He looked at me like he was sorry for me, and while he was looking at me there were more shots, single ones, which sounded as if it was further away, but I think they were inside the barn.

Somebody shouted something at the soldier and he pointed his gun at me. It was a little machine-gun, with the magazine underneath it which he had to hold on to. He said something to me, and then he fired into the water just alongside me. I don't know why he did this, but I'm sure it was deliberate, because he couldn't have missed at that range. So he saved my life—'

'One good German—even in the SS,' said Wimpy. 'But he didn't, I'm afraid.'

Bastable swallowed. 'Didn't what?'

'Didn't save Jowett's life,' said Wimpy. 'He stayed there in the reeds until they cleared out, and then he pulled himself onto the bank—God only knows how, he must have been as weak as a kitten, with all the blood he'd lost, with that smashed leg of his . . .'

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Bastable tried to swallow again, but found he had nothing to swallow. 'You found him—but you found him —'

'And he talked, yes.' Wimpy stared at him, almost belligerently. 'Some woman found him, actually— And she did what she could for him ... I don't know what hit him, but it wasn't just one bullet, poor devil. And it wasn't just in the leg, either.'

Bastable stared back at him, speechlessly.

'But he talked,' said Wimpy. 'He talked—and I shan't forget what he said.'

'You . . . left him?'

'Of course I bloody well left him!' snapped Wimpy. 'What d'you think I am—a bloody surgeon, complete with an operating theatre? Do you think I carry a needle and thread to sew his leg back on—or a hacksaw to cut it off? Or you think I should have given him a fireman's lift and put him on the back of the Norton instead of you? Don't be bloody stupid, Harry—of course I left him. The man was dying—loss of blood, shock, exposure—take your pick, for Christ's sake!

He was dying— and the rest of them are all dead—can't you get that through your head, man?'

It wasn't possible, was all Harry Bastable could get through his head — it wasn't possible—

'The barn's a shambles—a slaughter-house ... Grenades—and they must have fired machine-guns into it too . . . And the Aid Post under the Mairie, in the cellar there—'

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'The Aid Post?'

Wimpy's expression was frozen. 'I picked up Doc Saunders's battledress blouse off the peg at the top of the stairs... It was dark down there, but it smelt—it smelt—Christ! I can still smell it, Harry—they did the same thing there . ..' He trailed off helplessly. 'Let's go—let's get moving. I can't be sick again, I haven't got anything to throw up— let's go, Harry—'

They went.

If Wimpy had ridden fast before, now he rode furiously, as though all the devils in hell—or all the ghosts in Colembert—

were after him, as well as the whole German Army.

Up, over the brow of the hill, and across the main road.

The crossroads, which they had passed once before... and he had passed again the previous evening—where he had found Alice bawling weakly in her pram—the crossroads were gone like a dream before he could recognize them properly.