built camps. This all-out effort led to water shortages and a sewage system on the verge of collapse.
Gang sixty-two weren’t trusted to walk the streets in prisoner jackets. They got an armed escort on an uncomfortably brisk three-kilometre walk from the dockside to a Frankfurt Water Company maintenance depot.
Leonard stuck close to Marc as they were assigned a job list and sent out with two other prisoners and a pistol-toting supervisor. Their open-backed cart was packed with shovels, rakes, pipes, hoses and tubs of chemicals.
Marc’s first taste of his new job was an open sewer run-off at a women’s prison camp. The stench was familiar from every toilet he’d encountered since being taken prisoner, but rolling up trouser legs and wading into a rat-infested lagoon of human waste was all new.
Marc fought dry heaves as he joined the other three prisoners on his team, using rakes and shovels to dig out a soggy blockage made up of newspaper and card that the women had used to wipe themselves.
The next two jobs on the work list were similar. Marc felt sick most of the time and was terrified by the obvious risk of disease, standing barefoot in open sewage. The fourth and final job of the day was a factory, where instead of dealing with sewage they had to clamber into a fume-filled outlet pipe and shovel a build up of toffee-like sludge into wheelbarrows.
There was a disinfectant hose down when they arrived back at the water department at the end of their shift, but it was nowhere near enough to get the stench off clothes and skin.
Marc’s second day on the job began well enough when his German supervisor dug out a pair of rubber boots for him, but by afternoon he had a fever and was doubled over with stomach cramps.
Leonard said everyone got sick in this job. He reckoned the first few weeks were worst for picking up infections because you gradually built up immunity. The big long-term danger was exposure to chemicals in the factory run off.
‘Losing all my nails,’ Leonard said, proving his point by peeling back a yellowed thumbnail that flipped up like a car door. ‘A lot of long-termers get problems with their breathing. So far I’ve been lucky with that.’
That night Marc ran between bed and buckets with diarrhoea. He stumbled off his bunk next morning, shivering and barely able to stand. None of the other prisoners helped because he stank so bad.
‘Back to bed,’ a guard yelled, when Marc staggered on to the quayside.
Marc felt awful: when it seemed life could get no worse there was always some new depth to plumb. His feverish mind thought about escape, but how could that happen when he could barely move?
The man in the bunk above took pity and fetched Marc some bread and water when the evening meal came. The guard Marc encountered first thing next morning showed less sympathy and forced him to stagger across the quayside to meet up with his gang.
He barely survived the three-kilometre walk to the maintenance depot and his supervisor left Marc behind, hosing down equipment and sweeping the yard.
*
Marc was starting to hope that Fischer had forgotten about him, but he woke that night with a hand on his throat.
‘How’s life?’ Fischer asked, smiling nastily as his muscular arm drove Marc down into his bed slats. ‘Night shift can be boring, you know? Old Fischer needs entertaining.’
A couple of the other prisoners stirred as Fischer dragged Marc from his bed, then marched him ashore to a guard hut by the main exit gate.
The security set up was identical to the Oper, with prisoner jackets piled up inside the door and a table where guards took their breaks. But the Adler had more than double the number of inmates so there were more guards around.
‘Patrol the perimeter,’ Fischer told a fat guard, who sat at the table puffing a small cigar. ‘I need to have a private conversation with my young friend.’
‘I just sat down,’ the guard complained, but one whiff of Marc sent him running for the door.
Fischer shut the door with a backwards kick, then shoved Marc hard against the wall, before eyeballing him.
‘So, what information have you dug up for Old Fischer?’
‘It’s hard,’ Marc said, trying to hide his fear. ‘They’re not French. I can’t even understand what they’re saying.’
‘Didn’t ask for excuses,’ Fischer said, but then stepped back abruptly and laughed. ‘Christ, you reek of shit. Aren’t you gonna thank me for setting you