Epitaph for a Working ManO Page B

pinching the tops of my feet.
    At one o’clock I was sent down to the village. First Lieutenant Simmen would pick me and a few others up at the shopping centre. Drivers were standing around. I ate gendarme sausages and bread. As soon as the shop opened we withdrew into the warmth behind the sliding doors.
    At half past two the First Lieutenant came. He was in charge of the command platoon. I had been assigned to him as a traffic controller.
    I was not to let any vehicle pass unless it was civilian. Any military persons were to be stopped, including those wearing the white armbands that marked them out as exercise referees.
    So I stood there.
    Whenever a motor vehicle approached I stepped out into the road holding up my hand like a traffic policeman: “Where are you going? Regimental command? Driving prohibited. You have to go on foot. A hundred metres, then turn left. Put your vehicle under cover.” Sergeants, majors, captains squeezed themselves out of their Pinzgauers and Jeeps.
    I stood there for one hour, two hours, three hours. As long as I was standing there at the crossroads I knew what I had to do.
    Dusk was already falling when I was relieved.
    The platoon command had been installed on the stage of the theatre at the Sternen. Tables had been pushed together, a field telephone set up; in the back, along the wall under the heavens, rucksacks, holdalls
,
guns. In front of the curtain, down in the auditorium, two rows of mattresses.
    Simmen’s relief schedule. My spells on duty were in the evening from seven to nine, in the middle of the night from one to three, then from seven to nine in the morning and from one to three in the afternoon. On Monday and Tuesday the troops would be supplied with nothing but tea, soup, cocoa. On Tuesday we thought: on Wednesday we’ll be breaking up, they’ll transfer us to the Central Plateau or deeper into the Jura region. On Wednesday we thought: Thursday at the latest. But we stayed put. Positional warfare. We had to hold two passes.
    Standing against the wall or pacing up and down. You kept a lookout for military vehicles, recited your lines. Other than that you were left in peace. You greeted the village women. They asked, “How much longer is this going on?” They asked, “Are you cold?” They said, “We’re being well guarded.” They laughed. Twice a woman from the house next door brought me hot coffee and a bottle of schnapps. “For you and your mates,” she said.
    In the morning between seven and eight the schoolchildren came tearing round the bend behind me on their bikes. I pulled back my gun so as not to be knocked over. At eleven they probably came back down the hill from school, but at eleven I wasn’t there any more. I was sitting on the stage at the Sternen having something to eat, drinking hot mugs of tea. By one I was back on duty, watching the children trotting up from all sides, those on bikes flitting over the crossroads just before half past one, cutting corners so as to make use of the momentum of their downhill ride to take them as far as possible up the slope to the school. I didn’t see the children between four and five because by then I was sitting on the stage again or dozing on one of the mattresses down in the auditorium amid the hubbub of the cantonment. Between seven and nine I watched people coming home late from work; then people who were going out after supper, to the village on foot or through the village toward Egglen in their cars. On Tuesday the brass band rehearsed in the Bären. On Wednesday the village council held its meeting. On Thursday there was gymnastics up in the school gym.
    A nondescript village surrounded by mountains.
    But the women walked to work in high heels and tight jeans like anywhere else. Girls rode through the November weather on their mopeds. Jackets billowing. Global chic in a rural backwater.
    The best time was after midnight, between one and three. The