After work, some days later, Papa Mueller approached Erwin Schmitz and said: “I’d like to talk to you for a bit, if you’ve got time.” As they walked down the street Schmitz asked the plasterer to discuss whatever it was over a drink at the Blind Cow. Mueller declined; what he had to say was best talked over somewhere else. He led Schmitz to an open shelter owned by the tramways and used at night by trackmen, sometimes by tramps. The shelter stood by the kerb of the main street and faced the traffic. It was almost dark inside; intermittently the headlights of a passing car would light up their faces.

“I won’t keep you long,” Mueller began.

“All right, what’s the trouble?” said Schmitz.

There was a pause. Mueller took out his pipe, pressed his thumb down into the tobacco, lit it. The flame played deep shadows on his thoughtful face.

“Whenever I’ve got a job like this I get a bit uneasy,” he said simply. “I’m thinking what I might talk a man into. But with you it’s a bit easier. You’re on your own aren’t you—you’ve got few responsibilities?”

“That’s right. What do you want, Papa?”

“Erwin, do you feel you can trust me?”

“I think you’re an honest man.”

“You’ve been around, you can judge people?”

“I think I can.”

“I’m glad you said that. I can judge people, too. I want you to help us against the Nazis.”

“What made you pick on me?”

In the darkness Mueller could not tell that the other’s face had paled, his lips set, his body tensed. "Erwin, I’m talking as plainly as I can, and simply enough. I’ve said enough now to put me out of the road in a concentration camp for good—that’s if you want it like that,” said Papa Mueller.

"You haven’t known me long, but long enough to know that I’m no rat. Say what you want to say.”

"I’ve known you longer than you think—besides some men are easy to trust.”

“What do you want of me?”

“Does the name Spartacus League still mean anything to you?” “I’m finished with all that.” Schmitz’s hands trembled as he lit a cigarette.

“I don’t want to sound like a conspirator,” Mueller said. "I’m a plain working man and I’ll tell you all about myself if you want to know. But will you let it go if I tell you that I know something of your past?”

“You needn’t explain anything; it’s all done with, anyway. We were stabbed in the back in '19 and again in ‘33. I can guess what you want me to do, but it’s no use. I know you re a Communist I’ve guessed that for a long time. I know you’re sincere, But that’s not enough. Look …” He checked himself. No, it s no use, Papa.

His tone was bitter and lost.

Cars swished by, a tram, a bus. Schmitz gazed into the street as if the traffic held all his interest. The cigarette hung between his lips; his fists in his coat-pockets were bunched hard.

“Erwin,” Mueller said, “I want you to know that I won t blame you and won’t judge you. It’s something only you can decide. There s not a man with us that will take on himself another man’s decisions. I haven’t said to you what I want you to do, and perhaps there s no need now. But I’m glad that I had a chance to talk to you. We 11 be breaking up in Prinzenstrasse in two weeks or so, and we might not see each other after that.” He rose, holding out his hand. Schmitz looked up, but his own hands stayed in his pockets: Wait a minute, Papa,” he said. Slowly Mueller sat down again.

“Just tell me this. What can a man do these days? It s each one for himself now, the best way he can, just so long as he stays honest, does his work and doesn’t rat on his mates. That s as much as a worker can do. We can’t fight the Nazis with our bate fists. What hope have we against guns and truncheons and spies and prisons? There were times, not so long ago, when it hadn t come to all this. Only a year ago, Papa, we could ve pushed the Nazis back into the gutters where they sprang from. But the same lot of bastards the pot-bellied politicians and the spineless union leaders who let the Orgesch and the three Corps shoot us down in 19 they did the boss s job again all along the way. We were pretty strong once, Papa, but we had our guts eaten away from the inside. What did they call themselves, those rats who used to come out with a lot of fine phrases and sit on top of a strike and strangle it? Social Democrats! I don’t know where they got the Democrat from! The only unity those fellows’ve ever known was the unity with the boss. Of course, they’re finished now, some of them are even dead or behind three rows of wire, but that’s not the way they d worked it out. They were going to get fat under Hitler too. No, Papa, it s too late to fight the Nazis now—be honest.”

"It is not,” the older man said emphatically. “I know its not. Today the best of us are tortured and killed, but still we’re not crushed. There are always new ones to take our places. Tomorrow we’ll win. Look what they went through in Russia before they got Socialism there. Even defeat has another side to it. It teaches us the need for political struggle—teaches us to fight better. Lenin wrote about that in a pamphlet I got at home. I remember it well. Somewhere in it I underlined a sentence: 'In times of misfortune you get to know your friends.’ And that s true … that s true, he said reflectively.

Again he rose as if there was nothing to add. Schmitz rose with him. “I’m with you and I’m no coward,” he said defiantly, but perhaps I’m a little saner than you—just now, anyway.

“I don’t think so, Erwin—you’ll come our way in the end. You know the score, and once you know’, you can’t forget it. This isn t the first time for you.”

“Listen to me,” Schmitz said. “1 know’ what you want me to do. Why don’t you say it? You want me to paint up a slogan or two, get rid of some leaflets, come to a meeting sometimes. Be sensible. Is that going to make any difference now?”

"Not right away, but in time. Listen, I don’t want you to do any thing. It’s w’hat I know you want to do yourself. They stepped out into the street, and the wind blew in their faces. It was dark.

“I don’t want to risk my neck for a leaflet or slogan or a word here and there,” Schmitz said quietly, "you can be sure of that.

“No one does,” answered Mueller, "yet 1 know of four or five who are doing it this very moment while we’re talking.”

“They’re fools, Papa.”

"I don’t think you believe that,” said Mueller. “You’re not the sort. I saw you take a bigger risk not long ago.”

“Where—when?”

“In Muelheim, Erwin, last March. You yelled at the top of your voice at an S.A. man who kicked me in the kidneys and sent me flying on the pavement. ‘Cut it out, will you?’ That s what you yelled. Something snapped in you. You didn t think of the risk then, did you?”

Schmitz look up amazed. The plasterer smiled. "It was me all right. And it was you that yelled,” he said quietly.

For a moment Papa Mueller hesitated. He relit his pipe deep in the shelter of his upturned coat-collar, turning away against the wind. Then he said: “However, I’ve learned one thing. A man can argue and argue and get nowhere. Then one day everything conies clear to the one you tried to convince. He’s made his way on his own. It seems to him as if a lid’s been lilted from his mind. Suddenly he stops thinking of any risk he’ll take or won’t take. He 11 do what he can once he realises all that fascism means. And about that, you don t need much convincing—I can tell by the way you talk.”

Erwin Schmitz relaxed. It was as though he had known Papa Mueller all his life. If some danger had threatend him now he would have fought like a tiger in the old man’s defence. I here was nothing he could say; words teemed in his mind, but his lips were silent.

Mueller’s tram arrived and be boarded it. But before he did he turned back and smiled. "Goodnight, Erwin, see you tomorrow,” he said.

"Goodnight, Papa,” he replied with warmth.

Schmitz caught another tram that approached from the opposite direction. Out on the platform he began to smoke thoughtfully. His glance swept past a young woman sitting in the almost empty car; he did not recognise her. In time his attention focussed on a darkhaired, ragged boy, with bare feet in boots too large for him.

“What’re you looking at?” the boy demanded suddenly. Schmitz, who had been starring absentmindedly, began to notice him. The boy was clutching a parcel that was bulging under his jumper.

“What’s on your mind, you brat?” Schmitz asked good-naturedly, trying to place a hand on the boy’s narrow shoulders.

The lad edged away as if stung. “Get out,” he hissed.

“Oho! Tough, eh?” Schmitz said, then grinned and let him be.

The tram swung into Moltkestrasse and stopped by the gasworks, where a large group of workers, homeward bound from a late afternoon shift, mounted noisily. They nearly fillled the car. The boy’s eyes darted about like a wildcat’s. The instant the tram moved off he whipped out the parcel, which turned out to be a bundle of leaflets; then, darting about like a weasel, he handed the leaflets out.