Beneath the Clouds

Chapter 3: Homecoming

On leaving the clinic, Captain Paul Fischer followed the main road homewards. Here, the terrain rises from the river plain to the hills. The streets seemed deserted. One or two bicycles passed him, little else. This added to the city’s desolate appearance.

He paused, looking back. The gaps left by the razed buildings afforded him a clear view across the ruined city. On that sunny and cool morning, all he saw were bones. The grey frames of broken houses. Church spires were frail fingers, pointing skyward. In many places, smoke spiralled up into the cloudless sky.

It was hard to recognise the place, but he couldn’t avoid a deep sense of loss. Weathered by three years of combat, his face mirrored the desolation before him.

He passed the wrecked structure of his old parish church, St. Joseph’s. Allied bombs had hit it hard, its magnificent twin bell-towers shattered, the clocks missing. Remembering happier days, his First Communion, Confirmation. His marriage to Gisela. A different world.

Back in the present, he followed the familiar path sloping through the trees. All around, so many houses destroyed or torn open. Swatches of coloured walls, rooms exposed to the sky. Smashed furniture, pipes and fittings hanging out at crazy angles.

These were the homes of friends, homes of neighbours. An uneasy feeling of voyeurism assailed him. That private, internal world was now made public. He was awash with a poignant awareness that these broken shells were once the scene of hopes and dreams. Here, family quarrels played out. The walls echoed with laughter, joy, and pain. The cold stone standing as a memorial to that vanished life. Gone, left to the rats, the ghosts.

On discharge from the clinic, his only clothing was the loose-fitting, dappled battledress. Now, walking through the ruins, he fitted in with this uncanny tableau, an agent of the chaos. A wretched sense of loss tormented him anew.

He breathed in the stench of burning that hung in the air. Not the sweet scent of wood smoke, but something more acrid. Burnt rubber, plastic, chemicals mingled with soot. Even with his eyes closed, there was no escaping the destruction. Not all the rain in the world could wash it away, could sweep these streets clean again.

He rounded the corner, the way before him strewn with rubble. Piles of furniture, dragged out of the damaged houses, stacked up across the path and on the road. A figure of a woman visible in a window opening on the first floor of a collapsed house. The Korbach’s house, he recalled, or what remained of it. What happened to the Korbachs?

“Frau Schmidt, good morning.” he called to her. “What in heaven’s name are you doing up there?” He recognised his neighbour, the wife of a school friend. She seemed unprepared for whatever task she was about, dressed in a heavy skirt and woollen cardigan.

She looked down from her perch. “Herr Fischer, you have returned. I had heard from Monika that you lay injured below in the clinic? And now you are healthy again?”

“As you may see, I am on my feet and walking! But tell me, what are you doing up there? It is dangerous.”

“It is Minka. She has climbed up and won’t come back down!” She gestured further along the wall.

“Minka? Who to the devil is Minka?”

“My cat, naturally!”

“Come down! Leave the stupid cat up there. They always find their own way down!”

“Since Gerd went away, Minka is all I have. She has been up there for an hour already!”

Paul let his kitbag drop and studied the building. About three metres up, he noticed a black and white cat mewing unhappily. It was sitting on a baulk of protruding timber.

“You climb down, Frau Schmidt. I will take care of it.“

His neighbour picked her way back to street level.

Easier said than done. Climbing over the broken masonry, he approached the cat. It backed away from him, hissing, but had nowhere to go. Bracing his leg against an exposed steel joist, he stretched out to seize the timber.

With only four fingers on his left hand, his hold was precarious on the rough wood. He reached out with his free arm to grab the creature. At that moment, it leapt onto the window ledge and quickly scampered down to the street below.

“Ach du liebe…” Paul cursed the animal, smiling at the same time.

“Thank you, Herr Fischer! You have saved Minka!” Her cat rubbing against her leg.

He picked his way back off of the pile of rubble. “It hurts me to see our city like this. So much loss, so much damage.”

“The bombings have been hell. We are stuck here between Rheinmetall, Mannesmann, and the railway. It draws the bombers as the bees to honey.”

“Gerd, he was serving in Africa, no?” Paul had been in school with her husband, they’d played on the same soccer team.

“Yes, last I heard, they were in Tunisia. Sounds as if they are on a holiday.”

“That would be no holiday, Frau Schmidt. You can believe me.” He was encouraged to hear that she hadn’t received any bad news, as was all too common.

“Well, I hope this is all over soon, now the Allies are getting close. All I want is peace. An end to this madness.” she said, with a challenging glance at the SS insignia on his uniform.

“As do we all, Frau Schmidt.” he murmured. Paul gathered up his bag. “Anyway, take care of yourself – and your cat. I must see how Monika is.”

“Give her my regards. She is a good girl. She brings me food when she has some to share.”

“So, schönen Tag noch!” he said, turning back towards home. His neighbour’s remarks about the war occupying his thoughts as he crossed over.

Only about one house in three looked inhabited, the rest empty, damaged, deserted. Surface water lay in pools on the tarmac. Waste ducts blocked or destroyed, he surmised. The cellars would be underwater, too. At one point, he made a detour down an alley, avoiding debris of what had once been a home, now hurled into the road.

At last, he reached his own street. By a miracle, the bombs had spared the row that included his house. Fire scorching and broken windows were the only visible signs of damage. He climbed the steps. With a sense of apprehension, he rapped on the door.

After returning from the front, he had received treatment at the Augusta clinic. Located only a kilometre from his home, Monika had often been in to visit him. That said, it was at least a few weeks since she had last been in. He had noticed the changes in her since his departure, three years earlier. She’d grown, of course, and losing her mother, she had to grow up fast, too. 

He knew he’d also changed. Injuries aside, he was tired, older and less assured of himself, and of the path he had taken.