A SMALL TOWN IN GERMANY by John le Carré

Again the radio crackled, but the words were drowned in laughter as Karfeld made another joke; a harsh joke, enough to raise their anger, a reference to the decay of England and the person of the monarch. The tone was new and hard: a light blow on their backs, brisker, a purposeful caress, promis­ing the sting to come, tracing like a whip’s end the little vertebrae of their political resentment. So England, with her allies, had re-educated the Germans. And who better quali­fied? After all, Churchill had let the savages into Berlin; Truman had dropped atom bombs on undefended cities; between them they had made a ruin of Europe: who better qualified, then, to teach the Germans the meaning of civi­lisation?

In the alley, nothing had stirred. The leader’s arm was still raised before the little band as he waited for the signal to begin the music.

‘It’s the Socialists,’ de Lisle breathed. ‘They’re staging a counter-demonstration. Who the devil let them in?’

So the Allies set to work: the Germans must be taught how to behave. It was wrong to kill the Jews, they explained; kill the Communists instead. It was wrong to attack Russia, they explained; but we will protect you if the Russians attack you. It was wrong to fight for your borders, they explained; but we support your claims for the territories of the East.

‘We all know that kind of support!’ Karfeld held out his hands, palms upwards. ‘Here you are, my dear, here you are! You can borrow my umbrella as long as you like; until it rains!’ Was it Turner’s imagination or did he detect, in this piece of theatre, a hint of that wheedling tone which once in German music-halls traditionally denoted the Jew? They began to laugh, but again he silenced them.

In the alley, the conductor’s arm was still raised. Will he never tire, Turner wondered, of that gruesome salute?

‘They’ll be murdered,’ de Lisle insisted. ‘The crowd will murder them!’

‘And so, my friends, this is what happened. Our victors in all their purity, and all their wisdom, taught us the meaning of democracy. Hurray for democracy. Democracy is like Christ; there is nothing you cannot do in the name of democracy.

‘Praschko,’ Turner declared quietly, ‘Praschko wrote that for him.’

‘He writes a lot of his stuff,’ de Lisle said.

‘Democracy is shooting Negroes in America and giving them gold beds in Africa! Democracy is to run a colonial empire, to fight in Vietnam and to attack Cuba; democracy is to visit your conscience on the Germans! Democracy is to know that whatever you do, you will never, never be as bad as the Germans!’ He had raised his voice to give the sign, the sign the band expected. Once more Turner looked across the crowd into the alley, saw the white hand, white as a napkin, fall lazily in the lamplight, glimpsed the white face of Siebkron himself as he quickly relinquished his place of command and withdrew into the shadow of the pavement, saw the first head turn in front of him, then a second, as he himself heard it also: the distant sound of music, of a percussion band, and men’s voices singing; saw Karfeld peer over the pulpit and call to someone beneath him; saw him draw back into the furthest recess while he continued speaking, and heard, as Karfeld assumed his sudden tone of indignation, heard through all Karfeld’s new anger and his high-pitched exhortation, through all the conjuration, the abuse and the encouragement, the unmistakable note of fear.

‘The Sozis!’ the young detective cried, far out across the crowd. His heels were together and his leather shoulders drawn well back and he bellowed through cupped hands. ‘The Sozis are in the alley! The Socialists are attacking us!’

‘It’s a diversion,’ Turner said, quite matter of fact. ‘Sieb­kron’s staging a diversion.’ To lure him out, he thought; to lure out Leo and make him chance his hand. And here’s the music to drown the shot, he added to himself, as the Marseillaise began. It’s all set up to make him have a go.

No one moved at first. The opening strains were barely audible; little, irrelevant notes played by a child on a mouth organ. And the singing which accompanied it was no more than the male chant from a Yorkshire pub on a Saturday night, remote and unconfident, proceeding from mouths unused to music; and to begin with the crowd really ignored it, because of its interest in Karfeld.

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