Armageddon_ A Novel of Berlin - Leon Uris [37]
“The children?”
“Their mothers may cover their eyes, but they’ll take the stench of this place to their graves. As for the SS ... Blessing, lock them up in the gas chambers. Let them live in there awhile.”
Sean’s burst had been spent.
“I’m not going to let you do this, Major. We’re buying all kinds of trouble,” Dundee said.
“I take full responsibility.”
“But you’re irrational.”
Sean walked slowly to the colonel and stood nose to nose. “As military governor, my authority supersedes yours, Colonel. If you have a beef, register it with headquarters. If you try and stop me, I’ll have you locked up. Blessing! Find out the colonel’s pleasure!”
Colonel Dandy Dundee, a rough fighter from the ranks, was neither prepared for the ultimatum, the fury of the major, nor the consequences. Everyone about them hung frozen. Dundee broke, turned, and walked away.
“All right, Doc. You said something about needing room?”
“Yes. Although many of them are near the end. We must prepare for a dreadful fatality rate. It would be useless to move some of them out.”
“It is not useless. All of the living will be taken out of here. If they are to die at least they won’t die looking at this goddamned barbed wire. They’ve seen enough of it.” Tears of pain for those poor human animals fell down Sean’s cheeks. “Colonel Dundee. Could you please place your motor transport at my disposal?”
“Yes, Major.”
“Thank you, Colonel. Maurice. Have all German patients removed from the hospital in Rombaden. Commandeer the cathedral. Remove all the benches. Take beds and bedding out of as many German homes as we will need to accommodate these people. But for God’s sake, get them out of this place! Get them out of here!”
O’Toole was ill at ease at the presence of Father Gottfried from the cathedral. The priest wore slightly different garments than American priests, his voice was deep and booming, his face dark, and his eyebrows thick. In fact, he looked very much like a German soldier to O’Toole. In one way he was the enemy, O’Toole reckoned. On the other hand he was a priest and therefore could not be the enemy. It was perplexing and made him nervous. He ushered him into Sean’s office.
“I would have paid my respects earlier,” Father Gottfried said, “but I can understand the urgencies you have been under.”
“What’s on your mind, Father?” Sean asked.
“The requisition of Marienkirche.”
“What about it?”
“I understand it is going to be turned into a hospital.”
“That’s right.”
“Of course I am in great sympathy with those poor souls, but you must try to realize, my son, that the Marienkirche is not only a house of God but a tradition unbroken for centuries that is important to us here ...”
“Father Gottfried,” Sean interrupted, “let’s not horse around with each other. I don’t give a damn for your unbroken traditions or what the people think. As far as you are concerned, if we examine your hands closely we will find Nazi dirt under your fingernails. I am, however, a Catholic and I cannot in the conscience of my faith jail a priest.”
Father Gottfried was hardly prepared for the harsh words. Sean had cut from under him the common bond with which he hoped to appeal and he groped for words.
“Your congregation can pray with the Lutherans. The Lord will forgive them. It is about time a cathedral bearing the name of the Virgin Mother is returned to God’s work.”
“You are no doubt aware,” the priest blurted, “that there exists a concordat signed by the Pope with the German Government over ten years ago.”
“I do not believe that the Catholic Church and the Nazis are compatible. In this district I happen to be more powerful than the Pope.”
“Be careful of what you say!”
“Father Gottfried. I am prepared to answer for my acts in heaven, hell, or purgatory. The Holy Father will have to answer for his.”
“You are no Catholic!”
“And you, sir, are no priest of my church. The men of my church who served God properly have been locked up for five years in Compound A of the Schwabenwald