Remember Me (14 page)

Mack was a fisherman. He was the best fisherman on Great Barrier. He was the best fisherman on the
La Rita
. He was the best fisherman I ever met. I like to think that he is now sitting down and sharing stories with that other great fisherman, St Peter.

A
N EXTRACT FROM THE EULOGY PREPARED FOR
M
ACK’S FUNERAL

I didn’t find out about Mack’s heart attack until after school. Mum’s notice board was back outside the shop and that’s how I discovered what had happened. I turned and sprinted as hard as I could up to the Church Army, my heart bursting with guilt, tears blurring my eyes. I’d told my pals about Sister Glorious. I’d broken my promise to God and now God was punishing me by giving Mack a heart attack. It was my fault! Captain Biggs opened the door just as I was about to charge through the doorway into the hall to his office.

‘Ooof!’ he shouted.

I knocked him backwards about a yard and ended up sprawled on the lino. Doubtless you’ve seen cartoons where a bull charges a lamppost and ends up sitting on its haunches with stars spinning around its head. I was like that bull. Captain Biggs helped me up and held onto me because I was dizzy from hitting him so hard.

‘What happened?’ I said.

‘You just ran into me.’

‘No, to Mack.’

Captain Biggs sighed and crouched down until our eyes were level.

‘I was going to say something but I didn’t want to worry you. Besides, Mack was starting to get better.’

‘That’s right. He was great yesterday.’

‘The doctors warned me this could happen. They were worried about blood clots. They wanted to thin his blood down but could only go so far because of the risk of him starting to bleed again internally.’

‘Can I see him?’

‘He’s back in intensive care. If another blood clot breaks free he could have another heart attack or a stroke. To be honest with you, the doctors didn’t expect him to survive the night. It’s a good sign that he did. But if he has another heart attack it’ll be all over. We have to face that possibility.’

That didn’t surprise me. I didn’t need Captain Biggs to prepare me for the worst. I’d already accepted that
Mack was as good as dead, anyway. My parents, aunties and uncles often mentioned someone who’d had a heart attack and died. That’s what happened when you had a heart attack. You died, you ended up in Coxs Creek. One followed the other like the tail on a dog. I didn’t remember them ever talking about someone who’d had a heart attack and lived. Heart attacks were fatal. End of story.

‘Are you all right?’

I nodded. It was safer to nod.

‘I’m going up to the hospital now.’

I guessed what was coming next and resigned myself. Yesterday was fabulous, today was the pits and sinking.

‘If you’re not using your bike this afternoon, could I borrow it?’

Why not? Maybe it wasn’t my fault that Mack had suffered his heart attack but it would serve me right if Captain Biggs stacked my bike for blabbing about Sister Glorious. I watched him ride off then sat down to write a eulogy. I’d never written one before and wasn’t sure what to write. But with Mack as good as dead, starting a draft of his eulogy seemed a good idea. I hadn’t been allowed to attend the funeral when Mack’s wife Anya had died and I wanted to make sure I could this time. I wanted to say goodbye to Mack properly and I thought if I wrote a eulogy I’d be allowed into the chapel to read it. If I wasn’t allowed to read it myself, I planned to give it to Captain Biggs to read on my behalf. I figured they’d at least allow me in to hear it being read.

I also wanted to write a eulogy so people would remember the Mack I knew, a good, loyal man who life had treated unkindly. I wanted people to remember the young Mack who’d patiently won Anya’s heart and then her hand in marriage. I wanted them to remember Mack the fisherman with the body of an All Black, who lived a simple life on Great Barrier; the man who’d given up the life he loved to help his sick wife; the man who’d befriended the boy across the street and taught him how to catch fish. I didn’t want them just to remember Mack as a drunk.

I’d only put down a few tentative thoughts when the irony struck me. Just days earlier I’d written the essay that had brought Mack back to life. After all the years of bearing his secret burden he’d been set free. When I’d left him twenty-four hours earlier he was laughing. Laughing for the first time in such a long time. He’d taken his
billet libre
from his pyjama pocket to read again how he’d been exonerated. He’d handled the folded papers like they were the Dead Sea Scrolls. Just when life once again beckoned him, he’d been struck down. It seemed so unutterably unfair and unjust.

When my puppy was run over the weight of sorrow had been unbearable. I couldn’t imagine the world continuing. It was the first death of someone or something I loved and there’d never be another time in my life when I’d feel despair so keenly. With Mack it was different. I just felt crushed, too sad for tears and too unhappy for words.
I screwed the top back on my bottle of ink and cleaned the nib of my pen. I closed my pad for another day. Mack was dying and may even be dead. Death should mean something but it was becoming increasingly apparent that it didn’t have to mean anything. It could be totally pointless.

I finished my eulogy over the following two days but it appeared I’d jumped the gun. Mack hung on and hung on, fighting for his life, while Mum’s notice board sat outside the shop and Captain Biggs phoned in updates. I knew Mack was tenacious—his courtship of Anya had proved that—but what was tenacity to a blood clot? He was destined to fail as King Canute had failed. Heart attacks were fatal, death was inevitable, and everyone knew that. Every day when I came home from school I expected Mum’s notice board to proclaim the worst and I kept revising my eulogy. But Mack hung on and hung on and then, ten days later, I read that he’d been moved out of intensive care.

That evening, just as I was helping Mum bring in the mat and notice board to shut up shop, Captain Biggs came to tell me Mack had asked to see me and he wanted me to write a letter. He arranged to take me up to the hospital the following afternoon after school.

‘Why does Mack want you to write the letter?’ he asked. I could see he was hurt at being usurped. That was the sort of thing he was supposed to do for his congregation, part of his job. ‘Who does he want you to write the letter to?’

‘I haven’t the foggiest,’ I answered, although I certainly had my suspicions. The naval base at Devonport and the War Memorial Museum featured prominently among them. I guessed Mack was looking to substantiate my claim one of the raiders had laid the mines that had sunk the
Niagara
, and maybe even confirm the sailing date of the troopship. ‘Why can’t he write the letter himself?’

That’s when I discovered another little blood clot had gone for a wander and this time it had lodged in his brain. Mack had suffered a stroke and partially paralysed the right-hand side of his body. Mack couldn’t wipe his backside, let alone write a letter. This news had never made it on to the notice board because Captain Biggs hadn’t told anybody. He didn’t want everyone to worry. He said he’d been told the paralysis may only be temporary and in time Mack could make a full recovery. Captain Biggs’s heart was in the right place but sometimes his brain definitely clocked off. I thought it best to keep my eulogy on hand for a while.

We walked past the dragon like Leper and Son. Captain Biggs smiled in her direction but he would’ve got more response from an Easter Island statue.

Mack had been put in a different ward, a smaller ward with only four beds and one sash window to let in light. Apparently it was what they called a ‘quiet room’. Mack was propped up on pillows but the other three patients looked dead. Guess you couldn’t get quieter than that.
Half of Mack’s face creased in an attempt at a smile when he saw me. It was unnerving.

‘G’day, Mack,’ I said.

‘…Gerr-ray…’ he slurred. Just saying g’day was an enormous effort.

‘You wanted the lad to write a letter for you,’ Captain Biggs cut in. Sometimes I wondered why my parents had bothered to give me a name.

Mack nodded.

‘Who do you want him to write the letter to?’

Mack struggled to frame words.

‘The navy?’ I suggested.

He shook his head.

‘The War Memorial Museum?’

He shook his head again and began to get agitated.

‘…Inyin…’ he mumbled.

‘Inyin?’ I glanced at Captain Biggs. He looked as mystified as I felt.

‘…Inyin…er-rer…’

If I hadn’t written ‘Mack’s Story’ I would never have guessed. When I write, the sounds of the words run through my head and when I rewrite a lot they run over and over. Whole passages lodge in my memory. Mack’s ‘inyin er-rer’ struck a chord.

‘The submarine commander?’ I asked incredulously.

Mack nodded furiously. He wanted me to write to Christian Berger? For all I knew the U-boat commander was fish food. I thought of destroyers depth-charging the
crap out of him. I thought of the essay Mr Holterman had yet to help me write. I thought of Sunderland flying boats bearing down on his U-boat, forward guns blazing. I thought of all the movies I’d seen where U-boats finally got their comeuppance.

‘How in the heck can I write to him?’ I demanded. Mack was sick but the idea was preposterous.

‘…Eeze…’ Mack gasped. His whole body began to spasm. His face flushed red. He looked on the verge of another heart attack.

‘It’s OK,’ said Captain Biggs. He took Mack’s hand to calm him down. ‘I’ll help him. I’ll help him write the letter and make sure it gets sent to the right place. It’s OK, it’s OK.’ This was the captain at his pastoral best. He turned to me. ‘We’ll do it together, right?’

I thought Captain Biggs was out of his mind. I was about to say so in no uncertain terms when I noticed Mack staring at me. I saw the hope, the pleading and the desperation in his eyes. He’d suffered a heart attack, a stroke and being hit by a van, on top of sixteen years of remorse and guilt. All he wanted, when you got down to it, was a favour from a pal. My problem was that it was a favour akin to a miracle. Nevertheless, he made me feel ashamed. What he was asking for was nothing less than confirmation from the U-boat commander that mines from the raiders had sunk the
Niagara
. He wanted to hear from the horse’s mouth that he wasn’t complicit in its sinking. He wanted to be sure my story was true so he
could get on with his life or, as seemed more likely, die happy.

‘Mack,’ I said, ‘I’m going to write the best letter you ever saw.’

Mack closed his left hand into a fist in triumph, slumped back into his pillows and closed his eyes. I remembered how he’d loved my stories the last time I’d visited so I told him about my adventure in the drain and how it had inspired a story about a U-boat sinking a freighter. I knew Mack was listening because a smile crept back onto the left-hand side of his face, and his bed shook once more when I told him how I’d almost pissed myself when Nigel and Maxie had dragged the manhole covers back over the shafts. I told him about the water rising and my conviction that I was about to die. I know Captain Biggs was listening, too, because all the blood seemed to drain from his face. If I’d gone on any longer the nurses would’ve had to bring him a bed. I didn’t mind telling Mack in front of Captain Biggs because I knew I’d be swearing Captain Biggs to an even bigger secret before the day was out and figured another wouldn’t make much difference.

Captain Biggs threw another hopeful smile towards the dragon as we were leaving but he was wasting his time. We’d gone from being Leper and Son to Invisible Man and Sidekick. She could’ve read the newspaper through us. Captain Biggs looked thoroughly bemused.

He made me promise to come and see him in his office
after dinner. I duly sat and told him the whole story from go to whoa, leaving out nothing. I even read the tatty first draft of ‘Mack’s Story’. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone look more astonished.

‘I had no idea,’ he said.

‘Now you know what you’ve let yourself in for,’ I said. ‘How the heck are you going to find the U-boat commander? He’s probably dead. Even if he isn’t you’ll never find him.’

Sister Glorious had brought us in two enormous mugs of tea while I’d been talking. I think she made it in an urn because Church Army tea had a taste all its own. I picked up my mug and took a sip. Sister Glorious had been gone for five minutes but the tea was still hot enough to burn my tongue. ‘How are you going to break the news to Mack?’

‘I said I could help and I can,’ said Captain Biggs. ‘Do you know that right now there are agencies all over Europe helping to trace missing and displaced people? Do you know something else? The Church Army is helping people contact those agencies. If Christian Berger is still alive, I’ll find him.’

Do you see why I liked Captain Biggs? I’d been treating him like he was some dumb cluck and then he pulls that rabbit out of the hat. He wrote a letter to the Church Army’s London HQ that night and sent it off by airmail the next day. Four weeks later we had an address. Christian Berger was one of the few U-boat commanders
to survive the war and was living in Hamburg. I went to the hospital with Captain Biggs to tell Mack the good news. If the whole of Mack’s face could have smiled, his smile would’ve been something to behold. It didn’t take a genius to work out that we’d given Mack something to live for. Once more colour started to invade his cheeks. I thought I was finally looking at an ending to Mack’s saga, the happy ending I’d feared was impossible to achieve.

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

There I was, twelve years old and fancying myself as a writer, and couldn’t tell the difference between an ending and a beginning. I helped Captain Biggs draft the letter to Christian Berger. I think if Captain Biggs had known what lay ahead he would still have sent it because he believed people were fundamentally good and decent and things always worked out in the end.

If I’d known I would’ve thrown the letter in the bin.

‘Stop engines.’

The U-boat captain attempted a smile hoping to instil confidence and defuse the tension. The smile fooled no one. Lips were drawn thin. Fear visited every face. There’d been a time when the chance to attack a convoy had made his crew so eager he’d had to rein in their exuberance to prevent mistakes. Now there was fear—fear and resentment. Even if they were successful in sinking a few cargo ships it would do nothing to alter the course of the war. The war was already lost. All they could do now was lose their lives.

The captain listened to the soft monotone of his hydrophone operator, more aware than anyone of the risks they were taking and the consequences they faced even if they were successful. But his job was to sink Allied shipping until such time as he was ordered to stop, orders he knew would not be forthcoming until his country’s defeat was complete.

‘…target bearing 320…’ His hydrophone operator completed his sweep.

In a move both audacious and desperate the captain had slipped inside the defensive ring of destroyers into the heart of the convoy. He waited for the sub to lose speed almost all the way before raising the periscope. It was a precaution designed to prevent it throwing up a rooster-tail wake and announcing their presence. He hoped to get at least three torpedoes away before the destroyers homed in on him.

A
N EXTRACT FROM
‘D
EATH OF A
U-B
OAT
’

Christian Berger knew well the dangers of Hafenstrasse, but the street and its inhabitants no longer intimidated him. On his first visit there his woollen greatcoat and, above all, his boots had marked him out as a fool. Only a fool walked alone down that street at any time of the day; past the boarded-up old homes the squatters had fortified to resist attempts by the police to evict them; past the squatters themselves, the lost souls from a lost war, the dispossessed, the desperate and the mentally and physically broken. It took a special kind of fool to venture there alone at night and the inhabitants jostled each other in their haste to strip the intruder of his possessions. But Christian Berger was not unprepared. He was a man on a mission and his mission had prepared him to expect the worst.

He stopped in the pool of light from a street lamp, one
of the few unbroken, pulled a Luger pistol from the pocket of his greatcoat, ostentatiously cocked it and fired two rounds into the air. The third he aimed squarely at the face of the man closest to him.

‘I have come to see Walter Harmann. Take me to him.’

His attackers stopped dead in their tracks, pulled up as much by the sound of Christian’s voice as the sight of the pistol. It was the voice of authority, of commands that demanded to be obeyed, and left no doubt as to the consequences for those who chose to ignore it. The voice, the boots and greatcoat were the last reminders of Christian’s previous occupation. The Luger was a later—and necessary—acquisition.

‘Walter Harmann?’

Christian Berger took a step closer to his would-be attacker, his pistol rock-steady in his hand. ‘Walter Harmann. I’m told he lives here.’

‘He means Vincent,’ said a voice. A man wrapped in a stinking horse blanket stepped forward, eyes over bright, teeth missing, nose twisted, his podgy red face framed within a wild tangle of hair and beard. ‘You mean Vincent.’

‘Vincent?’ Christian Berger studied the man but kept his pistol fast on its original target.

‘As in
van Gogh
,’ said the target. ‘I’ll take you to him but it’ll cost you one hundred marks.’

‘You’ll take me to him or it’ll cost you your life.’

The small crowd that had gathered laughed.

‘Why do you want to see Vincent?’ horse blanket asked.

‘His name is Walter. Why do you insist on calling him Vincent?’

‘You’ll see.’

And Christian Berger, to his horror, did see. The breakdown that had threatened his hydrophone operator had finally overwhelmed him. The ears that had brought him the terrifying sound of attacking destroyers and of launched depth charges, the source of his nightly visions of destruction, were no longer attached to his head. In a futile, alcohol-fuelled attempt to curtail his nightmares, he’d hacked them off with scissors.

Since that first night Christian had tried to help Walter but his old comrade-in-arms was beyond rehabilitation. Christian had dragged him kicking and screaming to a mental hospital where his friend could recover and overcome his addiction, but one morning Walter walked out and returned to the street and to the bottle. There was no reasoning with him because his addled mind no longer accepted reason. Instead, once a week Christian brought him the bare essentials: food, cigarettes and a bottle of schnapps. There was no point bringing anything else because it would only be sold and the proceeds converted into alcohol. The food helped keep him alive, the cigarettes brought him calm and the schnapps kept his demons at bay, at least for a while.

Now as he walked down Hafenstrasse Christian
returned the shouts of the squatters with a dismissive wave. They knew why he was there and the contents of his bag. They also knew his visits would soon be coming to an end. Walter had begun a final descent into oblivion but it was debatable whether his mind or his wasted body would give out first. It never failed to strike Christian as ironic that Walter Harmann was officially classified as a survivor.

His hydrophone operator failed to recognise him or even acknowledge his presence. The end was closer than Christian had expected. He glanced over at the woman he paid to look after Walter, although ‘look after’ in such appalling conditions was a relative term. She was also an alcoholic, her mind a casualty of the war. She’d defied all odds to be pulled out alive from the ruins of bombed buildings on no fewer than three occasions. The first time had been following the devastating bombing of July 1943 when Hamburg had become the first city in the world to endure a bomb-induced firestorm, an inferno in which over forty thousand had perished. The bomb that destroyed her home killed every member of her family except her brother, who’d already lost his life on the Eastern Front. The second occasion came when a flakdamaged RAF bomber jettisoned its bombs as it turned back towards England. The bombs destroyed her billet, killing her roommates but sparing her and the buildings on either side. On the third occasion she was pulled from the ruins of the hospital where she worked as a nurse’s
aide, but not until three days after the bombing. A deranged patient had interfered with her for much of the time she lay trapped and helpless.

The woman cleaned Walter when he fouled himself, washed him daily and fed him what little food he’d eat. She shrugged in response to Christian’s glance towards her. What was there to say? Walter’s death would be a double tragedy. The money the visitor gave her to look after his friend wasn’t much but it was a lot to lose when there was nothing to replace it.

‘Goodbye, old friend.’ Christian squeezed Walter’s hand for what he was certain would be the last time. He stood and approached the woman. ‘Thank you,’ he said. He passed her a small wad of folded notes. ‘Come and get me at the Centre when he dies. I will see he is buried with appropriate dignity.’ Christian would’ve liked to give the woman more money but he couldn’t look after everyone, and others claimed priority. Hafenstrasse was mostly silent as he retraced his steps. Death commands respect even among those whose lives have lost all value.

He walked back towards the fish market and the partially destroyed building that housed the Centre for U-Boat Personnel. Light rain began to fall, driven and chilled by a breeze streaming south from the Arctic. Alongside him the lifeblood of Hamburg, the River Elbe, flowed grey and sluggish to the North Sea. Hamburg was blessed with mild winters—mild for northern Europe—but cursed with summers that never amounted to
much. Christian yearned to feel the sun on his back and the breath of dry, desert winds, anything to drive away the cold that never quite left his bones. September had ushered in autumn and he was already in his greatcoat and grateful for it. He could remember when being cold and wet was a normal state and his body had adjusted to it, when enduring freezing North Atlantic spray and bitter ocean winds had been all in a day’s work. Times had changed but the cold and damp remained.

Christian turned left up a narrow lane towards the Centre. Light and argument spilled from a seamen’s bar at the end of the lane. Doubtless something important was being discussed, the merits of one footballer over another. Prostitutes and the homeless had already claimed doorways offering shelter from the rain, the latter huddling on the concrete, shapeless beneath low tents of cardboard and newspaper. He stepped over a prostrate body into the hallway leading to the stairs up to the Centre.

‘Keep warm,’ he said. The homeless man just grunted. Christian always made a point of being courteous and considerate. The streets were littered with former sailors and soldiers, all of whom he believed deserved better. He opened the Centre door and entered, immediately grateful for the warmth from the kerosene heater, one of the office’s few luxuries. Naked light bulbs hanging from plaster roses revealed drab green filing cabinets leaning against walls damp with mould. Two abutting metal desks
filled the centre of the room, the tops of both tidy with files in trays, pads centred and pens alongside them in military orderliness. The room’s only occupant, Helmut Koenig, looked up as Christian entered. He’d been dozing, his head resting on his arms alongside the telephone.

‘Busy night,’ said Christian with a smile.

‘A quiet night’s a good night,’ said Helmut. ‘And we’re getting more of them. Perhaps it’s a sign our work here is finally drawing to a close.’

‘There will always be someone who needs help,’ said Christian.

‘But thankfully fewer and fewer.’ Helmut Koenig had been a latecomer to U-boats, taking up his first posting just before the war ended. Though grateful to have survived that most dangerous period he always regretted missing out on the glory days when U-boat packs ruled the Atlantic. He’d been with the Centre since its inception and Christian had to concede it was the younger man’s flair for organisation and sense of discipline that kept the office running.

‘How is Walter?’ asked Helmut.

‘Walter is dying. There is nothing more we can do for him except organise his funeral.’

‘I’m sorry, Christian, really sorry.’

‘I think for him death is a kindness.’

‘Are you still going to Blankenese?’

‘I don’t know.’ Christian had intended to catch the train
down to Blankenese to visit the widow of his chief engineer, Friedrich von Wiebe, but the plight of Walter Harmann—as inevitable as it was—had left him feeling as though a part of himself was also dying. The carton of food stored beneath his desk and the thin envelope of money inside his greatcoat could wait. Soon his visits to Blankenese would also cease. If Walter Harmann was one of his failures at least he could count Friedrich’s widow as a success. On his repatriation, the widow and her two small children had been the first of many families Christian had called upon. He’d done what he could to help them overcome their loss and, as circumstances had improved, had helped them more tangibly. The Centre had paid to repair the bomb damage to their little cottage and provided parcels of food, small enough compensation for the debt he felt he owed his friend. While he would always be welcome in the household, Christian knew it was time to withdraw. There comes a time when help once eagerly received becomes an embarrassment and Christian felt that time had come. The food in the carton was not the stuff of survival but of celebration—bacon, tinned ham, a tin of real coffee, one of nuts, dried fruit, a bag of precious icing sugar and a single bottle of champagne. It was a wedding present from the Centre and its constituents who’d dug deep into pockets. Juta, Friedrich’s widow, was about to remarry.

‘If you prefer I could go to Blankenese for you,’ said Helmut.

‘I would appreciate that. Apologise for my absence and reassure Juta that nothing on earth will prevent me being there on Saturday to give my support.’ He handed Helmut the envelope from his pocket. ‘And give her this. Make sure she takes it. Understand?’

‘Are you sure?’ Helmut had lost count of the number of times he’d tried to stop Christian giving his money away, and lost count of the times the Centre had to step in at the last minute to pay his rent. Christian went without so that others wouldn’t. It was a compulsion in danger of devouring its own future.

‘I’m sure…and Helmut?’

‘Yes?’

‘I told you about Walter because you are entitled to know, but there is no need to inform Juta until after the wedding.’

‘I understand.’ Helmut rose and walked over to the coat stand by the door. ‘There is little for you to do here except stay close to the phone in case someone rings. There is some coffee in the cupboard, not good but I’ve had worse. Once again, I’m sorry about Walter.’

Christian passed him the carton of food.

‘Oh, I almost forgot.’ Helmut paused in the doorway. ‘A letter came for you. It’s in the tray with the rest of the mail. It’s from New Zealand. I’ll see you tomorrow.’

Christian turned away from the door and headed for the far corner of the room where an ill-fitting bench with a basin and single cold-water tap passed for a
kitchen. He filled the kettle with just enough water for one cup of coffee. Electricity was expensive and the Centre saved money every way it could. The fact he’d received a letter from New Zealand surprised him a little, but no more than that. He’d become accustomed to receiving letters from far-flung corners of the earth. Those who’d been able to leave his ravaged country had done so. Mostly the letters came from South America, Canada and the United States. But wherever they landed, families still needed to know what had happened to sons, brothers, fathers and husbands whose war had ended beneath the waves. They looked to Christian and the Centre for answers. Sometimes he was able to report that men believed dead had actually survived, been captured, interned and temporarily ‘lost’ between the various displaced persons’ agencies, but those occasions were rare and becoming rarer.