People get carried away with the great “evil-doers”, don’t they? Assuming they were madness factories, scheming and plotting their way into maximising the misery of the general public. They never think of the time when Stalin was swinging on his chair, acting the typical boy that - deep down, he really was - when he fell over amid the stifled laughs of nearby communists. Or the time Sadam Hussein’s barber accidentally left him with a handlebar mustache, and Sadam, in a fit of rage, chased him around the palace with a scissors. There was a vulnerability to these people - they weren’t all about genocide and striking facial hair you know. And say what you like about the holocaust - but that Hitler fella, I won’t hear a bad word said about him.
I was told a story by my grandfather once, about when he fought in the succession of tragedies now known as the second world war. He was in the Navy, patrolling the English channel. Submarines were stealth sharks, and kept the younger men awake at night with anticipation of a roaring-tear in their vessel’s hull that would let all the dark blue and seaweed and so on into their beds. My grandfather was out on deck with some rope that night. He walked around, his life jacket correcting his crooked posture, whistling an old Glen Miller tune as the strong wind provided a demented accompaniment. He also held a lantern for atmospheric purposes, the fagstain-yellow glow of which illuminated the pools of water on the ship’s deck. Unfortunately a wave suddenly knocked him overboard. He lost his rope.
The ship sailed off without him, unbeknownst to the rest of the crew that there was a “man overboard!” My grandfather didn’t mind so much though, he was tired of the war and all the noise. It was 1942 already. “It was so loud”, my grandfather told me. Anyway, he just floated and bobbed about in the dark blue sea like a cork in a bath.
He fell asleep for a while, as the cold water and the passing of time made him feel tired. “It was boring, just floating about, nothing to do, you know”, my grandfather told me. He started to name the stars and do all the other romantic things people imagine soldiers might have done as they laid awake under the nightsky, stifling their dread. But it was all too dull, so he went asleep. After some time, he awoke to a wild red sunrise, and the sound of seagulls bickering over a lettuce led astray by the sea’s current. “I must be near France, I thought”, he told me. A couple of hours later he walked out of the sea onto the beautiful sandy beach with beautiful french wartime women splashing nude in the shallow waters, then he was captured by some Nazis.
My grandfather wasn’t frightened at all, he told me. He was just happy to have something to look at. And boy, were these Nazis something to look at! “I’d never seen men built like them before! They looked like they were made out of scrapyard cubes, with lips like broken fenders, eyes like smashed ovens, and lots of rusty pipes all over them!” The Nazis treated him reasonably, and they told him that the Fuhrer wanted to have a word with him. “Beats the idleness of the sea”, said my grandfather.
After a long time of traveling in a black car with a swastika on it, my grandfather finally arrived at his destination. A nondescript place, so I won’t try.
Hitler took him inside to a mahogany room with a big fire and asked him if he’d like anything to drink. There were loads of other Nazis there, sitting around in their uniforms. But Hitler wore his pajamas. He said he had the best English supermarket blends of tea, he was quite a fan of the English breakfast if he could be so bold to admit. My grandfather was very taken with the Fuhrer, he spoke English very well, like an Earl or a Gentleman. He made a few funny gags too, and an impression of Winston Churchill that brought the house down. He gave my grandfather his dictating hat, and my grandfather did a cartoon-goosestep march, and Hitler laughed, and so did all the other Nazis in the room. Then my grandfather gave Hitler the life jacket he was still wearing from being overboard, and Hitler got in his big bath and lay there with his eyes closed, floating. He stayed like that for what seemed like a very long time, and everybody waited patiently. When he opened them again, there was a tear rolling down his cheek.
Eventually the tea arrived and everybody sipped and chuckled and talked in groups. As my grandfather was the guest of honor, everybody wanted a word with him, asking him about the Earl of Sandwich, and English women, and the rules of cricket. My grandfather had a great time.
When all the tea was gone, Hitler ordered some fine beer, and the joking and revelry went long into the night. Hitler played a lot of Wagner, and when my grandfather mocked the great composer for being overly dramatic Hitler raised his voice, but then remembered that other people are entitled to their opinions too, and apologised.
The next day, Hitler presented my grandfather with a new life jacket as a gift: “Take this. I sent for a brand new English navy life jacket last night when you were asleep. It was very difficult to get at such short notice, so I hope you appreciate the gesture”. My grandfather thanked him gratefully. Hitler said that a car would deliver my grandfather to a french resistance stronghold in Normandy, France, and that they could organise him to be brought back to Great Britain. Hitler shook his hand and said: “I always wanted to meet a live Englishman in the flesh, and the experience did not disappoint.” My grandfather bowed as he got into the black car with the swastika on it, and Hitler chuckled to himself.
“A nice man - but for all his laughter, I thought deep down he was terribly sad”, my grandfather told me.
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