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180 D Chapter Fifty-Three d the russians are Coming The next morning I awakened to an uncanny silence,and it took me a few moments to fully recall the events of the previous day. I went downstairs and, peeking outside, immediately noticed the total absence of American soldiers, tanks, or jeeps. In the stable, Arabella gave me one of her benign looks.I ran back upstairs and looked out the window.Something was definitely very, very wrong, but what? Then I saw it! Slowly winding its way toward the village from the distant woods came a procession that resembled a tape worm,a seemingly unending stream of trucks,motorcycles,and rickety carts pulled by little shaggy horses, accompanied by soldiers in mud-colored uniforms. There could not be any doubt; this was the Red Army! Horror-struck, I realized that the war was not over by far, and if I did not act fast, I was going to be“liberated”a second time. I grabbed my few belongings, threw the knapsack over my shoulder, and raced into the garden where I hurriedly buried the golden medallion with diamonds on the golden chain that my grandmother had given me, my ring with the coat of arms, and the diamond pin from the kaiser in shallow sand under a bush; they would not catch me, and they would not have my jewels. In a panic, I headed for the stable to retrieve Arabella, but I was too late. The head of the convoy was just about to reach the first houses, so I raced across a narrow bridge over a river behind the mansion, letting myself plop down into the reeds on the other side. Just in the nick of time, because I spotted the first Soviet soldier with his Kalashnikov, a machine gun, across his chest stomping into the front yard, and I heard his coarse, guttural roar:“Matka—Frau!” Arabella, I thought, what are they going to do with my horse? Pressing myself against the ground as flat as a flounder,I did not dare to move a muscle. Would Red soldiers make it across the bridge and find me? And then what? The presence of my friend Ortgies hidden in the inside pocket of my jacket was somewhat reassuring; if worst came to worst, I would definitely turn to him for help, whatever the consequences. But what was the worst? Shaking with fear, teeth chattering, I lay motionless on the wet ground until the onset of darkness. Toward the evening, screams from women mixed with the bawling of drunken Russians began to fill the air. They would not stop all night, nor in the weeks to come. “Frau komm” became the most feared two words in those days. The mass rapes were followed by Destruction unlimiteD 181 mass suicides,brutal killings of husbands trying in vain to protect their wives,fathers in futile attempts to spare their young daughters. It was like an unending hell had broken loose. What I did not anticipate at this point was that the Red Army did not just pass through, but had come to a forced halt at the river behind which the American troops had installed themselves. Unable to proceed any further, thousands of Soviet soldiers kept pouring into the small village.Their resourcefulness in finding liquor as well as women would be unlimited , their permanent state of drunkenness leading to continuing disaster. As darkness fell over the scene, I decided it was safe enough to creep along the western bank of the river in search of a human being other than a Red soldier. Where in God’s name had the 82nd Airborne gone? Finally,I spotted one of my original liberators down by the water. The sudden appearance of an archangel in all his glory could not possibly have caused me to feel more relief. Giving me a lopsided grin, the young man greeted me with obvious relief. He proceeded to explain that, after depositing me at the Ortsbauernführer’s house together with my horse, what happened next went so fast that no one had the opportunity to warn me. The Americans had received the order to withdraw from the east bank of the river; within minutes, the village itself was cleared for the Soviet troops to move in, the innocent little stream now marking the border between East and West, or as far as I was concerned, between heaven and hell. It was only now that I...

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