Then Mittelstaedt makes them practise skirmishing, and as a favour appoints Kantorek squad leader.
Now, in skirmishing the squad leader has always to keep twenty paces in front of his squad; if the order comes “On the march, about turn,” the line of skirmishers simply turns about, but the squad leader, who now finds himself suddenly twenty paces in the rear of the line, has to rush up at the double and take his position again twenty paces in front of the squad. That makes altogether forty paces double march. But no sooner has he arrived than the order “On the march, about turn,” comes again and he once more has to race at top speed another forty paces to the other side. In this way the squad has merely made the turnabout and a couple of paces, while the squad-leader dashes backwards and forwards like a fart on a curtain-pole. That is one of Himmelstoss’ well-worn recipes.
Kantorek can hardly expect anything else from Mittelstaedt, for he once messed up the latter’s chance of promotion, and Mittelstaedt would be a big fool not to make the best of such a good opportunity as this before he goes back to the front again. A man might well die easier after the army has given him just one such stroke of luck.
In the meantime Kantorek is dashing up and down like a wild boar. After a while Mittelstaedt stops the skirmish and begins the very important exercise of creeping.
On hands and knees, carrying his gun in regulation fashion, Kantorek shoves his absurd figure over the sand immediately in front of us. He is breathing hard, and his panting is music.
Mittelstaedt encourages Kantorek the territorial with quotations from Kantorek the schoolmaster. “Territorial Kantorek, we have the good fortune to live in a great age, we must brace ourselves and triumph over hardship.”
Kantorek sweats and spits out a dirty piece of wood that has lodged in his teeth.
Mittelstaedt stoops down and says reproachfully: “And in the trifles never lose sight of the great adventure, Territorial Kantorek!”
It amazes me that Kantorek does not explode with a bang, especially when, during physical exercises, Mittelstaedt copies him to perfection, seizing him by the seat of his trousers as he is pulling himself up on the horizontal bar so that he can just raise his chin above the beam, and then starts to give him good advice. That is exactly what Kantorek used to do to him at school.
The extra fatigues are next detailed off. “Kantorek and Boettcher, bread fatigue! Take the handcart with you.”
A few minutes later the two set off together pushing the barrow. Kantorek in a fury walks with his head down. But the porter is delighted to have scored light duty.
The bakehouse is away at the other end of the town, and the two must go there and back through the whole length of it.
“They’ve done that a couple of times already,” grins Mittelstaedt. “People have begun to watch for them coming.”
“Excellent,” I say, “but hasn’t he reported you yet?”
“He did try. Our C.O. laughed like the deuce when he heard the story. He hasn’t any time for schoolmasters. Besides, I’m sweet with his daughter.”
“He’ll mess up the examination for you.”
“I don’t care,” says Mittelstaedt calmly. “Besides, his complaint came to nothing because I could show that he had had hardly anything but light duty.”
“Couldn’t you polish him up a bit?” I ask.
“He’s too stupid, I couldn’t be bothered,” answers Mittelstaedt contemptuously.
What is leave?—A pause that only makes everything after it so much worse. Already the sense of parting begins to intrude itself. My mother watches me silently; I know she counts the days; every morning she is sad. It is one day less. She has put away my pack, she does not want to be reminded by it.
The hours pass quickly if a man broods. I pull myself together, and go with my sister to the slaughterhouse to get a pound or two of bones. That is a great favour and people line up early in the morning and stand waiting. Many of them faint.
We have no luck. After waiting by turns for three hours the queue disperses. The bones have not lasted out.
It is a good thing that I get my rations. I bring them to my mother and in that way we all get something decent to eat.
The days grow ever more strained and my mother’s eyes more sorrowful. Four days left now. I must go and see Kemmerich’s mother.
I cannot write that down. This quaking, sobbing woman who shakes me and cries out on me: “Why are you living then, when he is dead?”—who drowns me in tears and calls out: “What are you there for at all, child, when you—”—who drops into a chair and wails: “Did you see him? Did you see him then? How did he die?”
I tell her he was shot through the heart and died instantaneously. She looks at me, she doubts me: “You lie. I know better. I have felt how terribly he died. I have heard his voice at night, I have felt his anguish—tell the truth, I want to know it, I must know it.”
“No,” I say, “I was beside him. He died at once.”
She pleads with me gently: “Tell me. You must tell me. I know you want to comfort me, but don’t you see, you torment me far more than if you told me the truth? I cannot bear the uncertainty. Tell me how it was and even though it will be terrible, it will be far better than what I have to think if you don’t.”
I will
