The Hour of the Donkey

The German officers were arguing. One of them had a map held open—no, a map-case of some kind—

Suddenly they looked up at him, and in the same instant dummy4

someone shouted loudly and angrily.

Bastable looked in the direction of the shout and saw a German soldier running towards him The German shouted again and threw his rifle to his shoulder. Bastable stopped in instinctive terror, cringing from the rifle.

Someone else shouted—it was one of the officers from the group by the car. The German soldier lowered his rifle, but still kept it levelled at Bastable's chest. The officer barked out another order, and the soldier advanced menacingly, until he was within two yards of him.

Now it was finished. It had all been madness from the start, from the very beginning, but row it was finished.

The soldier swore guttural words at him, unintelligible sounds which could only be questions or orders, but which only served to increase his abject helplessness.

He looked around desperately, taking in the sharp images of his despair, knowing that they couldn't help him: the garden, with its sweet-williams flowering brightly, the trees—

chestnut trees—the long grey car and its occupants—its peak-capped officers festooned with field glasses and pistols and maps—and the pathetic contrast of the handcart, with the old couple's belongings— Oh, God, help me! Help me!

The soldier shouted at him again, jerking the rifle to point his questions.

Bastable lowered one arm cautiously and pointed at the hand-cart.

dummy4

The soldier cast a quick glance at the cart, then returned to Bastable wearing an expression of irritation rather than anger on his face.

'Nein, nein—' The short explosive gibberish which followed was accompanied first by a vigorous shake of the steel-helmeted head and then by a nod towards the house which translated the likely meaning of the words.

'Clear off at once, you stupid bugger!'

Bastable stood his ground. He was still frightened—he was indeed so frightened that even if he had decided not to stand still he wasn't sure that his legs would have obeyed his brain

—but he was also prey to other fears which refused to release him.

Simply, he had to have that bloody cart.

He pointed at it again.

The soldier sighed, reversed his rifle, took two quick steps forward and hit Bastable in the chest with the flat of the stock.

The blow wasn't hard, it was more of a push than a thump, but Bastable knew with a sickening certainty that if he still refused to retreat then the next one would be very hard indeed.

'Halt!'

The sharp command came from the right, out of his vision, but the soldier's instant obedience to it transformed Bastable's choice of evils into no choice at all: that was an dummy4

officer-voice, and now it was discovery, not injury or retreat, which he faced.

Not that faced was the right word, for he was too scared to lift his eyes from the patch of dirt on which they had focused sullenly after the thump on the chest, a circumference which just included the muddy jackboots of his tormentor.

As he watched the jackboots they came to attention.

The officer spoke sharply again, and the boot-heels clicked.

A very small pebble and fragment of dried mud stood out in high relief in the pathway. A small black beetle scrambled frantically across it, zig-zagging and lurching as though aware of its danger but obstinately determined to disregard it.

'M'sieur—'

Oh God! The German officer was addressing him in French!

'M'sieur . . . kes-ke-voo-voolay, m'sieur?'

Meaningless. The beetle mounted a larger pebble, slithered sideways and rolled over on to its back, its legs waving helplessly in the air. Bastable raised his eyes five degrees, to take in a new pair of jackboots. They were noticeably superior to the soldier's boots, not only recently polished under their coating of dust but also narrower and better-fitting.

'M'sieur?'

The voice went with the boots. There were Germans and Germans, as he had good cause to know from his own dummy4

experience now; yet it seemed more strange that any one of them should speak to a French peasant so courteously, thought Bastable suspiciously.

But whatever the question he had no reply to it, only a gesture. Without looking up, he pointed once more at the hand-cart.

'Comment?' There was a moment's pause. 'Ach—so! Mein Gott—' The German officer rapped out an order so peremptorily that Bastable was startled into looking up.

'Schnell, schnell!' the officer chivvied the soldier.