Free Reign of Hell by Sven Hassel

oppressors—’
    For ten minutes they listened to him in a respectful drunken silence, and then Danz gave a loud cheer and smashed the last beer bottle against the wall. He dragged Lenzing down from the table and clapped him on the shoulder.
    ‘That’s not bad, my little red comrade! Not bad at all!’
    Proudly he paraded his protégé about the room, showing him off like an exhibit in a fairground. See, this is the man who dared stand up and preach Communist propaganda to the soldiers of the Führer . . .
    It was of course inevitable that before very long some quarrelsome ape like Hofmann or Sergeant-Major Kleiner – Kleiner it was, from all reports – should take it into his head to become obstreperous and break up the party. To begin with, he started arguing with Lenzing; and being far too drunk to speak clearly, he very soon got the worst of it. From there it was but a short step to denouncing Lenzing as a traitor, and a Communist dog, and a friend of the Jews; and from there an even shorter step towards a general howl for blood. Danz, by this time, appeared to have taken Lenzing under his wing, for when someone bawled across the room that all Communist sympathisers were lily-livered cowards, Danz was instantly up in arms in his new friend’s defence. It was thereupon proposed to put his courage to the test by standing him up against a wall and playing William Tell with him, taking pot-shots at a beer bottle perched precariously on top of his head. This idea seemed to have satisfied Danz, for at that point he faded out of the picture – in all probability lying on the floor unconscious. It was Kleiner who appointed himself chief marksman.
    ‘Just try to keep still, Communist puppydog, unless you fancy having your brains blown out . . . I don’t very often miss the mark, but even if I do, there’s no cause for alarm. You’ll be dead before you even know you’ve been hit.’
    He pulled out his revolver and took aim with a hairy porcine paw which wavered perceptibly from side to side. It was then that Hofmann, of all people, began to lose his nerve. We were, he no doubt reasoned, at the front now, not at Sennelager, and awkward questions might well be asked if a man was found dead next morning with a bullet through his forehead.
    ‘You reckon?’ jeered Kleiner, in high good humour at the prospect of murdering someone. ‘I’d like to see the courtmartial as would tear a man off a strip for shooting a lousy Communist. More likely give you a medal for it.’
    He held the revolver before him and squeezed the trigger. The bullet ricocheted off the wall and went screaming out through the window. Half the assembled company at once dived under tables and chairs, while the other half, either more drunk or more full of patriotic fervour, urged Kleiner to ‘have another go at the bastard’. Kleiner scarcely needed any encouragement. He seemed puzzled that he should have missed the target first time round, though whether the target was by now a beer bottle or a man’s head was anybody’s guess.
    ‘For Chrissakes!’ gasped Hofmann, holding a chair in front of him by way of protection from stray bullets. ‘For Chris-
sakes
, you’ll have the whole place buzzing round our ears!’
    Kleiner ignored him. He staggered back against the wall and again took aim. Someone bet him three bottles of vodka that he’d miss. Someone else offered a month’s pay that he wouldn’t. The revolver in Kleiner’s sweating hand waved slowly from side to side. Hofmann, from behind his chair, began to babble tearfully about repercussions if anything should happen to Lenzing.
    ‘Go and stuff yourself,’ said Kleiner, quite amiably for him. ‘When I want your advice I’ll ask for it. Meanwhile, piss off out of it, and leave us alone. There’s three bottles of vodka at stake here.’
    Not, of course, to mention a man’s life. Kleiner closed one eye and squeezed the trigger a second time. The bullet tore into the wall only centimetres