Part 24 (1/2)

PRISON THREE--KLINGELPUTZ

CHAPTER XVI

FREE ON ”Pa.s.s” IN COLOGNE

It was two o'clock in the afternoon when I saw the last of Sennelager Camp as the train swung round a curve which blotted the Avernus over which Major Bach reigned supreme from sight if not from memory. The train in which we were travelling, of course, was wholly occupied by Germans. I found it impossible to secure a seat owing to the crowded character of the carriages, and as misfortune would have it I was compelled to stand until I reached my destination.

Naturally being thrown among so many of the enemy I was regarded with a strange interest by my fellow-travellers. They could see I was not a German, and although they did not resort to any provocative word or deed, it would have needed a blind man to have failed to detect their uncompromising hostility towards me. We travelled _via_ Soest, and my position was rendered additionally unnerving because train after train labelled with the flaming Red Cross thundered by, bearing their heavy loads of the German battered and maimed from the battlefields. It was easy to see that the number of the train-loads of wounded was exercising a peculiar effect upon the pa.s.sengers, for was not this heavy toll of war and the crushed and bleeding flower of the German army coming from the front where the British were so severely mauling the invincible military machine of Europe and disputing effectively their locust-like advance over the fair fields of Belgium and Northern France? Is it surprising under the circ.u.mstances that they glowered and frowned at me in a disconcerting and menacing manner?

[Ill.u.s.tration: Facsimile of the Pa.s.s issued by the German authorities to the author on his leaving Sennelager for Coln-on-Rhein.]

As the hours rolled by I began to feel fainter and hungrier. I had had nothing since the usual cup of acorn coffee at seven in the morning.

Although I became so weak that I felt as if I must drop, I buoyed up my flagging spirits and drooping body by the thought that I should soon meet and enjoy the company of K----. But I was aboard a fourth-cla.s.s train and it appeared to be grimly determined to set up a new record for slow-travelling even for Germany. The result was that I did not reach Cologne, or Koln, as the Germans have it, until one o'clock the following morning, having stood on my feet for eleven hours and without a bite to eat.

I fell rather than stepped from the train and turned out of the station.

Again my spirits sank. The city was wrapped in a darkness which could be felt. There was not a glimmer of light to be seen anywhere. To pick one's way through a strange city in a strange land and without more than a bare smattering of the language under conditions of inky blackness was surely the supreme ordeal. At every few steps I blundered against a soldier with his loaded rifle and fixed bayonet, ready to lunge at anything and everything which, to a highly strung German military mind, appeared to a.s.sume a tangible form in the intense blackness. Since my return home I have experienced some striking specimens of British darkened towns, but they do not compare with the complete darkness which prevailed in Cologne that night. Not a single faint gleam of light came from a window. I am confident that if I had dared to strike a match I should have been surprised by a volley of bullets from all directions.

Cologne was indeed a city of darkness and of the dead. Only the footfalls of the guard and the clank of rifles were to be heard. To proceed was impossible. I concluded that before I had gone very far in my wanderings I should be arrested and find myself in the privacy of a prison cell. Moreover I was absolutely exhausted. Sore at heart I returned to the station, and walking up to the first officer I saw, introduced myself as ”Mahoney, late of Sennelager Camp.”

At this revelation the officer stared as if confronted by an apparition and sternly demanded my authority for being at large. I drew out my ”pa.s.s,” together with the address of K----, for which I was searching so vainly.

Thrusting my ”pa.s.s” into his pocket the officer gruffly ordered me to follow him. I demanded the return of the small piece of paper which const.i.tuted my sole protection, but he rudely declined to accede to my request. I followed him and we turned into a room at the station which happened to be the sleeping quarters of the night guard.

Here I was again interrogated somewhat sharply, but taking the bull by the horns I boldly declared that I was an Englishman and had been arrested and imprisoned upon the charge of being a spy!

My candid statement amazed the officer, who appeared to consider that he had made a most fortunate capture. An interpreter, who understood only a little English, was summoned to my a.s.sistance, and we contrived to understand one another. He was visibly impressed by my distressed and sickly appearance and enquired if I were in need of something to eat. I said I was famished and he explained the situation to the officer. The upshot was that a few of those present gave me some bread and cold rice, which I devoured ravenously.

I was handed over to a guard who was instructed to take me--somewhere?

We set out through the dark streets, and it was an eerie journey.

Sentries were stationed at intervals of a few yards and in crossing the bridge we were frequently stopped and not permitted to proceed until my guardian, although in uniform and armed, had given the pa.s.sword. In due course we reached a towering building which I discovered to be the Polizei Prasidium. Here I was handed over to the official in charge, my military guard evidently explaining the whole circ.u.mstances.

The official scrutinised me closely. Bidding me to follow him he again plunged into the darkness. After taking me to the address of K----, which I had produced, and finding no one there, he led me to a restaurant. The proprietor was roused and ordered to take me in for the night. When he learned that I was an Englishman on ”pa.s.s” he commenced to swear and curse in a fearful manner, finally declaring he would not shelter any such swine in his house. The official had a short way with this individual. He drew his sword, drove the awakened and enraged German into his restaurant, and in a tone which could not be misconstrued demanded that accommodation and meals should be found for me. The threatening att.i.tude of the officer completely cowed the proprietor, but I, fearing that the latter would round on me once I was at his mercy, intimated to the guard that I was not going to spend the night in this hotel.

There was a brief altercation, but at last we returned to the Prasidium.

Here I intimated that I was perfectly willing to sleep upon the floor of the guard-room, but the official explained that this was a flagrant breach of the rules and the idea could not be entertained for a moment.

We haggled for a few minutes and then a solution of the distracting problem occurred to the officer. He would lodge me for the night in a cell! I accepted the suggestion with alacrity and thereupon pa.s.sed below where I made myself comfortable, the official a.s.sisting me as much as he could.

It seemed as if I had only just dropped off to sleep when I was rudely awakened. It was six o'clock when prisoners had to be roused, and although I was not a prisoner, but had slept in the cell from my own choice, I had to conform with the regulations. I was turned out into the street, without a bite of food, needless to say, to kick my heels about for some two hours until the business offices opened. I seized the opportunity to have a shave and hair-cut as well as a thorough wash and brush up.

About 8.30 I presented myself at my friend's office. To my surprise he responded to my ring himself and at once introduced me to his wife, who had come into the city with him that morning. I was warmly greeted but my thin and wan appearance affected them, especially Mrs. K----. I then discovered why I had failed to rouse him in the early hours of the morning when accompanied by the officer from the police station. He did not live in Cologne but in a pretty and quiet little residential village overlooking the Rhine some three miles out.

Taking pity upon me they insisted that I should at once proceed to their home, but before this could be done certain formalities demanded attention. My ”pa.s.s” was only applicable to the city of Cologne and did not embrace the outlying places. We had to return to the police headquarters, corresponding to our Scotland Yard, for this purpose. Here my papers were turned out and subjected to the usual severe scrutiny, while I myself was riddled with questions. At last, through the good offices of K----, who was well-known to the officials, I received permission to proceed to his residence. This necessitated our being accompanied to his home by two detectives who furthermore were to see that I received the necessary local ”pa.s.s” for the villa in question.

Notwithstanding the depressing company of the detectives I thoroughly enjoyed that ride along the banks of the Rhine. It was a glorious morning and the countryside was at the height of its alluring autumnal beauty. Reaching the village I was taken before the Burgermeister, a pompous individual, to undergo another searching cross-questioning, but ultimately the ”pa.s.s” was granted. At the same time my ”pa.s.s” for Cologne was withdrawn. I had either to live, move, and have my being in one place or the other--not both--and was not to be permitted to travel between the two places.

I must digress a moment to explain one feature of German administration and the much vaunted Teuton organisation, which is nothing more nor less than a huge joke, although it is unfortunately quite devoid of humour for the luckless victim. In times of war, Germany is subdivided into districts, each of which receives the specific number of an Army Corps.