Carnival Read Online Free Page A

23,000.
    Swastikas flew from many of the three- and four-storey buildings that, cheek by jowl, overlooked the former Champ de Mars, the Military Esplanade, now the Militärpromenade . Black wreaths trailed bunting, a noon bell sounded, but no longer was the moment of silence being observed. The workmen who had been clearing away the wreaths continued to do so as the last bell shimmered.
    On 3 February, and but five days ago, Radio-Berlin had announced the defeat of the Sixth Army at Stalingrad, the first such public admission. Three days of official mourning had begun on the fourth but were now over.
    â€˜ “The sacrifices of the army, Louis? Bulwark of a historical European mission and not in vain,” or so that bastard of a propaganda minister claims, but if not in vain, then what?’
    â€˜Easy, mon vieux . Easy. You’re in the Reich.’ Hermann had lost his two teenaged sons, Jurgen and Hans, at Stalingrad, this partner of his having had to convey the terrible news to him early in January. He’d be wanting to see his Gerda, if only to tell her he was sorry for their loss. Granted, it wasn’t that far and perhaps the trip could be arranged, though the delay in getting back across the frontier would be something else again.
    Two direction-finding vans, with diamond-shaped wire aerials, were parked in front of the Polizeikommandantur which overlooked the Cathedral square. Gestapo plainclothes were earnestly talking about the sweep, just as they would have done in Paris and elsewhere in France. ‘Piano study, Hermann.’
    Clandestine wireless transmitters and London … calling London, just as in France when possible.
    A dark blue Renault Juraquatre, the two-door, four-seat economy of 1937 to 39 was parked ten metres ahead and had just been washed and polished— washed in this weather!
    â€˜I told you, didn’t I?’ said Kohler. ‘I warned you.’
    Half-timbering gave great age, the flanking double wings of what was now an expanded cop shop rising through three and four storeys to lofty garrets, steeply pitched roofs, and paddle-shaped brown beaver’s-tail tiles, the Biberschwanzen . No patterns were up there on the roofs to brighten the place. Just broken, crooked shutters or none at all. In the years since 1575 much had happened, but more recently the stucco had sloughed and become stained, had been shot up too, a little.
    â€˜Colmar’s Hôtel de Ville had a fire, Hermann.’
    Its town hall and a reminder that during the Blitzkrieg all the records had been conveniently destroyed. As a result, the town had become the home address favoured by many using false papers in France. ‘Relative upon relative the remaining citizens haven’t even heard of!’ said Kohler with a snort.
    Above them, above the swastika, a columned, railed gallery, looking like something straight out of the Renaissance, was open to all elements. Above this, there were two garret dormers, one on either side, their solid wooden shutters permanently closed and bolted.
    â€˜Hermann, before we go in there I have to tell you something. If we should run into any of my second cousins, I really don’t know what I’ll do.’
    â€˜Hug or hate them?’
    â€˜Or both.’
    â€˜And they?’
    â€˜Will remember the boy they teased until he fought back so hard he learned to use his fists.’
    Louis had spent three summers on the farm of distant relatives near Saarbrücken.
    â€˜ Grand-maman kept saying I would have to return until she was satisfied.’
    She had lived through the siege of 1870–71 to bankroll vivid memories of the Prussians.
    â€˜Their father, my uncle Ernst, had the biggest manure pile in the village and was a real Gauleiter of the shit, Hermann. Looked up to by everyone because of it and other things. Feared, too, let me tell you.’
    â€˜Calm down. Don’t be so nervous.’
    â€˜I even saw my cousin Hedda undress