Free Blitzfreeze by Sven Hassel Page B

Libjatkastrasse. I don’t suppose anything would have come of all this is they hadn’t run into the wife of the CO of the regiment, and slipping their hands up under her dress remarked that it was like feeling-up a frozen Polish cow on a rainy day in November. The well-born officer’s lady rushed straight to the Oberst of dragoons who rang to the Rittmeister of police and demanded that order be kept in the district so that God-fearing married women could walk the streets in safety without the risk of being compared to Polish cows.
    ‘The Rittmeister of police was well away when the dragoon Oberst rang to complain about the treatment his wife had received here in the middle of a war. After opening a new bottle of Tokay and thinking about it for a while, he paraded his force and numbered the men in threes. Nos. 1 received a slash across the face from his riding-whip, as was usual when officers and gentlemen, as happened occasionally, ran across the rank and file. Nos. 2 were given a regimentally correct kick in the pants. Nos. 3 got a punch on the jaw for being last in numbering-off.
    ‘“You villains! You’re not Royal Serbian Police at all!” roared the Rittmeister. “You’re nothing but a shower of flat-footed pot-bellied parsons in uniform. You’re the Royal Austrian Steers!” he added thoughtfully as he looked at his sleepy herd.
    ‘The Rittmeister was generally known as a notorious nutcase who sprayed insults and curses around whenever he was under the influence. Which was almost always.
    ‘“I hate the bloody sight of you!” he continued. “You stand here on parade thinking all the time that the Fatherland and the war effort can all get fucked as far as you areconcerned. But the Fatherland has no intention whatever of getting fucked! You would be surprised what the Fatherland
does
intend and
will
do! With
you
however it will have nothing whatsoever to do”
    ‘He went on to speak of discipline and regulations.
    ‘“Presumptuous persons, who put their hands up under the skirts of officers’ wives in the public streets, shall be handcuffed and taken to the police-station. The lady will also be taken to the station as a witness, but
not
handcuffed, you witless fools! At the station the crime can be reconstructed for the report!”
    ‘He withdrew a circular from his cuff and began to read aloud:
    ‘“From the All-Highest Royal Ministry of War it is made known that it is not beyond the bounds of possibility that spies and similar criminals are operating, by reason of the present war, within the country. It is the Royal Police’s highest duty to apprehend these suspicious persons and make provision, according to the law, for their being hanged.”
    ‘The Rittmeister of police from the Zagreb Military District was, all-in-all, a highly respected idiot who every Saturday evening at the officers’ weekend parties stripped himself completely naked. He was close to disgrace once, when he lay down in front of the Tihomil statue in Petersplatz with a kipper stuck up his backside and explained to passers-by that he was a mermaid on tour to Monte Negro. It wouldn’t have been half so bad if the drunken fool hadn’t had his sabre with ceremonial trappings clanking around his naked loins, and if he hadn’t had his garrison cap hanging on his dick. He explained this later as being due to personal modesty. They took him to the main guardroom where the warrant officer in charge of the cells, Brieler, ordered him to be hung in irons and gave him a thorough going-over with the bastinado.
    ‘“We’ll teach a civilian bastard like you not to take the piss out of the fighting forces. Lying down in front of King Tihomil and farting straight up in his noble granite features!”
    ‘The next day the warrant officer was broken two grades and fined a quarter’s pay for disrespect to an officer. His excuse, that the Rittmeister was naked and in this condition bore a remarkable resemblance to a civilian, did not help