Vagabonding Through Changing Germany

by Harry Alverson Franck

“With the very best of luck in two weeks, more probably three or four.”

I returned to Rotterdam in a somewhat dazed condition, having left Herr Maltzen with the impression that I had gone to think the problem over. Nor was that a false impression. It was more of a problem than even the suave diplomat suspected. It happened that I had a bare six weeks left for a tramp “over in Germany.” If I frittered away three-fourths of them among the placid and contented Dutchmen, there would not be much left except the regret of having given up the privilege of returning home—eventually—under army pay and transportation. Moreover, rumblings from Paris indicated that by that time a trip through Germany would be of slight interest. I retired that night more nearly convinced than ever that I was more properly fitted to become a protectorate under the mandate of some benevolent league of managers for irresponsible persons than to attempt to continue as an autonomous member of society.

Some time in the small hours I was rapped on the forehead with a brilliant idea. So extraordinary an experience brought me to a sitting posture and full wakefulness. The Food Commission had a steamer leaving next day for Danzig. What could be more to my purpose than to drop off there and tramp back to Holland? Among my possessions was an elaborately non-committal letter—I had been given the privilege of dictating it myself—from the “Hoover crowd” in Paris, down toward the end of which it was specifically stated that, while I was not connected with the Food Commission, they would be glad if any courtesies could be shown me. Carefully read, it would have made a rather satisfactory prelude to the request of a starving and stranded American to be permitted to buy a half-pound of bacon. Carelessly perused, however, it might easily have been mistaken for a document of some importance, particularly as it was decorated with the imposing letterhead of the “Supreme Economic Council.” But I had scarcely expected it to be of use until I had succeeded in jimmying my way into unoccupied Germany.

The Rotterdam section of the Food Commission was quite willing that I go to Danzig—or any other place far enough away to make it impossible for me to further disturb their complicated labors. But their duties ceased when they had seen the relief-ships loaded. The ships themselves were under command of the navy. The buck having thus successfully been passed, I waded through a soggy snow-storm to the imposing Dutch building that housed our officers in blue. An exceedingly courteous naval commander gave the false impression that he was extremely sorry not to be able to grant my request, but the already overcrowded boat, the strict orders against carrying civilians.... In short, I should have realized that red tape is not confined to the khaki-clad half of our fighting forces. I shuffled my way back into the heart of the city in my most downcast mood, tempered far beneath by a sneaking little satisfaction that at least if I could not get into Germany I should run no risk of being boiled in oil by the dreadful Sparticists or tickled to death with garden rakes by a grinning band of almond-eyed Bolsheviki.

This would never do. The sun had already begun its last April descent, and I had surrendered nearly three weeks before the privilege of being able to sit idle and still draw a salary. I resolved that May should not catch me supinely squatting in Rotterdam. The chief bridge was soon burned. At the police station my identity card was stamped “out” so quickly as to have given a sensitive person the impression that the country was only too glad to be rid of him. At least I must leave Holland, and if I left in an easterly direction there was only one place that I could bring up. But what of Herr Maltzen? My dime-novel conception of international espionage pictured him as having set a half-dozen of his most trusted agents to dogging my footsteps. I would outwit them! I hastened back to the hotel and wrote the Teuton envoy an elaborate application for permission to enter Germany, with references, copies of credentials, and touching as gently as possible on my unseemly activities during the war. Unfortunately, I could recall the name and address of only one of those distant German relatives of whom I had boasted; the others I was forced to fake, arousing new misgivings in my penny-dreadful conscience. In conclusion I added the subtle misleader that while awaiting his reply I should make the most of my time by journeying about Holland and possibly elsewhere. Then I tossed into a straw suitcase a few indispensable articles, the confiscation of which I felt I could survive, and dashed for the evening train to the eastern frontier.

To carry out still further my movie-bred disguise I took third-class and mingled with the inconspicuous multitude. There was no use attempting to conceal myself in the coal-bin or to bribe the guard to lend me his uniform, for the train did not go beyond the border. On the platform I met an American lieutenant in full uniform, bound for Hamburg as a courier; but I cut our interview as short as courtesy permitted, out of respect for Herr Maltzen’s lynx-eyed agents. The lieutenant’s suggestion that I ride boldly with him in first-class comfort gave me a very poor impression of his subtlety. Evidently he was not well read in detective and spy literature. However, there was comfort in the feeling of having a fellow-countryman, particularly one of official standing, within easy reach.

Holland lay dormant and featureless under a soggy snow coverlet. Many of her hundreds of fat cattle wore canvas jackets. Every town and village was gay with flags in honor of the tenth birthday of the Dutch princess, a date of great importance within the little kingdom, though quite unnoticed by the world at large. The prosperous, well-dressed workmen in my compartment, having been inconspicuously let into the secret that I was a German, jokingly-seriously inquired whether I was a Sparticist or a Bolshevik. It was evident that they were too well fed to have any sympathy for either. Then they took to complaining that my putative fatherland did not send them enough coal, asserting that thousands had died in Holland for lack of heat during the past few winters. Beyond Utrecht the long stretch of sterile sand-dunes aroused a well-schooled carpenter whose German was fluent to explain why Holland could not agree to any exchange of territory with Belgium. To give up the strip of land opposite Flushing would mean making useless the strong Dutch fortifications there. The piece farther east offered in exchange looked all very well on the map, but it was just such useless heather as this we were gazing out upon. Holland could not accept a slice of Germany—Emden, for instance—instead, because that would be certain sooner or later to lead to war. Of course, he added, teasingly, Holland could beat Germany with wooden shoes now, but ten years hence it would not be so easy. Besides, the Dutch did not care for a part of Belgium, though the Flemish population was eager to join them. They were quite content to remain a small country. Big countries, like rich individuals, had too many troubles, aroused too much envy. He might have added that the citizens of a small country have more opportunity of keeping in close touch with all national questions, but his own speech was a sufficient demonstration of that fact. He knew, for example, just what portions of the Zuyder Zee were to be reclaimed, and marked them on my map. All the southern end was to be pumped out, then two other strips farther north. But the sections north and south of Stavoren were to be left as they were. The soil was not worth the cost of uncovering it and the river Yssel must be left an outlet to the ocean, a viaduct sufficing to carry the railway to the peninsula opposite.

It may have been the waving flags that turned the conversation to the royal family. A gardener who had long worked for them scornfully branded as canards the rumors in the outside world that the German consort was not popular. The prince was quite democratic—royalty radiates democracy nowadays the world over, apparently—and was so genuinely Dutch that he would not speak German with any one who knew any other tongue. He spoke most of the European ones himself, and in addition Tamil and Hindustani. He took no part whatever in the government—unless he advised the Queen unofficially in the privacy of their own chamber—but was interested chiefly in the Boy Scout movement, in connection with which he hoped to visit the United States after the war. They were a very loving couple, quite as much so as if they were perfectly ordinary people.

By this time the short northern night had fallen. With two changes of cars I rattled on into it and brought up at Oldenzaal on the frontier at a late hour. The American lieutenant put up at the same hotel with me and we discussed the pros and cons of my hopes of getting into Germany. They were chiefly cons. The lieutenant was quite willing for me to make use of his presence consistent with army ethics, and I retired with a slightly rosier view of the situation.

In the morning this tint had wholly disappeared. I could not stir up a spark of optimism anywhere in my system. Army life has a way of sapping the springs of personal initiative. To say that I was 99 per cent. convinced that I would be back in Oldenzaal before the day was over would be an under-statement. I would have traded my chances of passing the frontier for a Dutch cigar. I bought a ticket on the shuttle train to the first German station in much the same spirit that a poker-player throws his last dollar into a game that has been going against him since the night before.