The Long Trick

by Bartimeus

There had been a time when Oberleutnant von Sperrgebiet possessed the rudiments of a conscience. It could never have been described as acutely sensitive, and it never developed much beyond the rudimentary stage. Nevertheless, it had existed once: and in the early days of the war it was still sufficiently active to record certain protests and objections in his mind.

The mysterious forces that were at work in Germany, industriously remoulding, brutalising and distorting the mind of Oberleutnant von Sperrgebiet, together with millions of others, had not been blind to the prejudicial effects of conscience to an evil cause. Imperial rodomontade and the inflammatory German Admiralty War Orders had deliberately rejected, one by one, the deep-seated principles of humanity and chivalry in war. It had been done gradually and systematically—scientifically, in fact, and in the majority of cases it succeeded in producing a state of atrophy of the moral sense that was altogether admirable—from a German point of view.

In the case of Oberleutnant von Sperrgebiet, however, these early qualms had a trick of recurring. They pricked his consciousness at unexpected moments, like a grass-seed in a walker's stocking…. And now, as he sat swinging his legs in the warm June sunlight, a whole procession of such reflections trooped through his mind.

For instance, there arose in his intelligence an obstinate doubt as to whether the torpedoing without warning of a liner carrying women and children at the commencement of the war had been quite within the pale of legitimate Naval warfare. He had met the man who boasted such an achievement, and for a long time he carried with him the recollection of that man's eyes as they met his above a beer mug. They had drunk uproariously together, and von Sperrgebiet heard all about it first hand, and even fingered enviously the Iron Cross upon the breast of the teller of the tale. But somehow those eyes had told quite a different story: and it was that which von Sperrgebiet remembered long after the wearer of the Iron Cross had gone out into the North Sea mists and returned no more.

Then there had been the rather unpleasant business of the boat….

It was in mid-winter a long way North during one of the few calm days to be expected at that period of the year. The Submarine was running on the surface when the Second-in-Command (of whom more anon) reported a boat on the starboard bow. They altered course a little and, slowing down, passed within a few yards of it. It was a ship's life-boat, half full of water; lying in the water, rolling slowly from side to side as the boat rocked in their wash, were five dead men. A sixth sat huddled at the tiller, staring over the quarter with unseeing eyes, frozen stiff….

Von Sperrgebiet caught a glimpse of the ship's name on the bows of the boat: it happened to be that of a neutral ship he had torpedoed at the beginning of the previous week during a gale.

The German Admiralty Orders of that period contained a clause to the effect that ships were not to be torpedoed without ensuring the adequate safety of the crew. Which meant that those who had not been killed by the explosion of the torpedo could be allowed to launch a boat (weather permitting) and get into it if they had time before the ship sank….

Von Sperrgebiet had given orders for the boat to be sunk by gunfire, but somehow the memory of that stark figure at the helm persisted. Try as he would, he failed to banish from his mind the staring, sightless eyes and grey, famished face….

Altogether it was an unpleasant business. Other memories of this nature came and went with the smoke from his cigarette. For some reason or other he found himself wondering whether, after all, a Belgian Relief Steamer could have been considered fair game. But he did so hate the word "Belgium," and there was always the theory of a mine to account for the incident…. He torpedoed her by moonlight: a very creditable shot, all things considered.