The Book Thief

THE ACCIDENT

It was a surprisingly clear afternoon and the men were climbing into the truck. Hans Hubermann had just sat down in his appointed seat. Reinhold Zucker was standing above him.

‘Move it,’ he said.

‘Bitte? Excuse me?’

Zucker was hunched beneath the vehicle’s ceiling. ‘I said move it, Arschloch.’ The greasy jungle of his fringe fell in clumps onto his forehead. ‘I’m swapping seats with you.’

Hans was confused. The back seat was probably the most uncomfortable of the lot. It was the draughtiest, the coldest. ‘Why?’

‘Does it matter?’ Zucker was losing patience. ‘Maybe I want to get off first to use the shithouse.’

Hans was quickly aware that the rest of the unit was already watching this pitiful struggle between two supposedly grown men. He didn’t want to lose, but he didn’t want to be petty, either. Also, they’d just finished a tiring shift and he didn’t have the energy to go on with it. Bent-backed, he made his way forward to the vacant seat in the middle of the truck.

‘Why did you give in to that Scheisskopf?’ the man next to him asked.

Hans lit a match and offered a share of the cigarette. ‘The draught back there goes straight through my ears.’

The olive-green truck was on its way towards the camp maybe ten miles away. Brunnenweg was telling a joke about a French waitress when the left front wheel was punctured and the driver lost control. The vehicle rolled many times and the men swore as they tumbled amongst the air, the light, the rubbish and tobacco. Outside, the blue sky changed from ceiling to floor as they clambered for something to hold.

When it stopped, they were all crowded onto the right-hand wall of the truck, their faces wedged against the filthy uniform next to them. Questions of health were passed around until one of the men, Eddie Alma, started shouting, ‘Get this bastard off me!’ He said it three times, fast. He was staring into Reinhold Zucker’s blinkless eyes.

THE DAMAGE, ESSEN

They dragged each other out until only the corpse was in the truck.

The driver, Helmut Brohmann, was sitting on the ground, scratching his head. ‘The tyre,’ he explained, ‘it just blew.’ Some of the men sat with him and echoed that it wasn’t his fault. Others walked around smoking, asking each other if they thought their injuries were bad enough to be relieved of duty. Another small group gathered at the back of the truck and viewed the body.

Over by a tree, a thin strip of intense pain was still opening in Hans Hubermann’s leg. ‘It should have been me,’ he said.

‘What?’ the sergeant called over from the truck.

‘He was sitting in my seat.’

Helmut Brohmann regained his senses and climbed back into the driver’s compartment. Lying horizontal, he tried to start the engine, but there was no kicking it over. Another truck was sent for, as was an ambulance. The ambulance didn’t come.

‘You know what that means, don’t you?’ said Boris Schipper. They did.

When they resumed the trip back to camp, each man tried not to look down at Reinhold Zucker’s open-mouthed sneer. ‘I told you we should have turned him face-down,’ someone mentioned. A few times, some of them simply forgot and rested their feet on the body. Once they got there, they all tried to avoid the task of pulling him out. When the job was done, Hans Hubermann took a few abbreviated steps before the pain fractured in his leg and brought him down.

An hour later, the doctor examined him, and he was told it was definitely broken. The sergeant was on hand and stood with half a grin.

‘Well, Hubermann. Looks like you’ve got away with it, doesn’t it?’ He was shaking his round face, smoking, and he provided a list of what would happen next. ‘You’ll rest up. They’ll ask me what we should do with you. I’ll tell them you did a great job.’ He blew some more smoke. ‘And I think I’ll tell them you’re not fit for the LSE any more and you should be sent back to Munich to work in an office or do whatever cleaning up needs doing there. How does that sound?’

Unable to resist a laugh amongst the grimace of pain, Hans replied. ‘It sounds good, Sergeant.’

Boris Schipper finished his cigarette. ‘Damn right it sounds good. You’re lucky I like you, Hubermann. You’re lucky you’re a good man, and generous with the cigarettes.’

In the next room they were making up the plaster.