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The victorious British army relaxed in German territory in the lovely spring of 1945. Their officers busied themselves variously as the mood took them. The senior ones thought about their imminent return the civil life, and the junior ones about the prospects of the war still to be waged against the Japanese.
Of the latter group was Major Paton, RAMC. His particular war had stretched right back to the day when the lights went out over Europe for the second time and he had left his teaching hospital to don the unfamiliar uniform.
While he had felt the exultation of victory he was under no illusions as to what lay ahead, and he did not relish the prospect. Meantime their was a job to do. His Brigadier had just been on the phone to give him a new and awkward task and as he signed his routine orders for the day he wondered vaguely how he was going to carry out the new assignment.
The Brigade Staff Captain came on phone. "That you doc? Brigadier been on to you? Well this is the form and I think you'd better do it yourself."
Paton resented the intrusion of the layman into what he felt was a purely medical matter but he could see what his friendly Staff Captain meant. The job was indeed one requiring considerable experience of the Service and it's ways, so he replied encouragingly. "Yes, Tom. I don't think it would be fair to pass it on to anyone else, but put me a bit more in the picture for God's sake."
Back came Toms saying, "It's really quite simple. These Russian ex-POWs of ours in the village of Axdorf are all 'het up'. They say that one of their women has been taken to a German nursing home near Puizen and 'bumped off'. They're prepared to make a thing of it and we want a post mortem carried out. Not only that but it's got to such a level that there will have to be a Russian doctor and a doctor from the World Health Organisation there with you as well."
Paton groaned and thought about the last time he had done a post mortem examination. It was seven years before when he was a student and there were lots of experts there to help and advise. He wondered how he would manage this time. Then he saw the solution quite simply. He would probably be able to pull his Major's rank on one of the other doctors to persuade him to do the autopsy. The idea greatly cheered him and he answered much more confidently.
"Oh, yes! That will be OK. Just tell me where I pick up these chums and we'll do it this afternoon."
So at 2pm that afternoon a strange figure was ushered into Paton's office, and from the titters of the office staff he judged correctly that in accordance with Service custom something upsetting was afoot. The representative of the medical services of the World Health Organisation was a charming Frenchman, and without a word of English, and whose new uniform had been made of a different shade of material. Yes, he spoke a very little German, but English….NON! Paton dived deep into his schoolboy French and came to the surface red faced but triumphant. His visitor was a well intentioned Eye Specialist who was giving his services to help to create order out of the chaos that had been Germany. He too had no relish for the task at hand. He had however brought along his tools in case they might be useful. Paton noticed that he carried a tiny wooden box, and as tactfully as possible asked to be permitted to examine what must have been a miniature post mortem outfit. As the box was opened he was not really surprised that it contained only the small fine instruments of the Ophthalmic Surgeon.
The two doctors looked at each other over the box and wide grins spread across their faces. Interesting instruments maybe, but having little relevance to the job at hand. The smile together had established good relations and the absurdity of the situation.
Together, with much bowing and clicking of heels they went out to the awaiting battle-scarred Jeep. The Frenchman was obviously unused to such a barbarous vehicle and said so in no uncertain terms as he gingerly mounted it, looking as if it was about to be shaken off. But the sun was high above and the open car made them both feel that life was worthwhile and that with goodwill nothing was impossible.
Their intercommunication was so limited that they could not discuss the prospect of meeting their Russian colleague, but a silence fell as they ran into the Russian area and pulled up outside an office marked with a very British sign saying 'HQ'.
Paton got past the sentry outside by the old ruse of waving the heavily stamped orders he had from Brigade HQ. They were ushered into the outer office and stood uneasily as several heavily armed Russians calmly looked them over. English, French and German having failed they were nevertheless given indication that they could pass into the inner office, and here at last the British officer felt they were in the presence of someone in authority. They all smoked British cigarettes with some signs of disgust and then miraculously they appeared to be understood. Although they had not managed to convey the purpose of their visit, they found themselves not only trying to talk to a Russian who said he was a doctor, but walking easily with him out to the waiting Jeep.
The sun still shone and the orderly assorted trio felt the exhilaration of motoring freely along the country road. Paton thought that he managed to convey to the Frenchman that he had to make a detour but he doubted if this penetrated the Russian mind. However the Russian did not seem at all alarmed by the diversion from the route and they pressed on.
Paton had still to find his post mortem instruments for the Russian obviously carried none. He remembered that only the previous week some poor intoxicated British soldier had been found dead in the river and that one of the Regimental Medical Officers had conducted a post mortem on him. Paton wanted these tools. He found them when he found the Captain Gordon who had conducted this examination and asked him where he had got his set of tools from.
"From the local butcher." he said, his eyes twinkling.
"But did he just give them to you?" Paton asked, and then smiled sheepishly when Gordon replied "Oh, no. I had to break in his shop window first."
Such was war.
The tools were taken out to the car and shown to the Russian. He admired them as good examples of the German cutler's art. He tried their edges and showed great appreciation till by various signs it was made clear to him that he was expected to use them. At that he became very voluble but even less intelligible than before but it was clear that he had no intention of using these newly acquired weapons.
A very silent trio drove on to the nursing home. The sun was no longer high in the sky but it had done its work and the nursing home was like an oven when they entered it to ask for the German Doctor in Charge. Somehow none of them were surprised to find that the doctor was a lady. She wore a white coat and a calm serene expression. Her cleanliness made the others feel travel stained and unkempt. She smiled in rather a superior sort of way as if she had had enough of this particular case. She was expecting us but hastened to explain in German that the victim had had meningitis as far as she could ascertain. She had not been able to treat her in the way she would have liked because her source of pharmaceutical supplies had been destroyed by the Americans. She produced various charts that were examined while she spread her words around in the mixture of French and German required by the group. She explained that this was only a small nursing home and it did not have any facilities for post mortem examinations, nor did it have any instruments for such a major procedure. She then played her ace.
"It has been very hot," she said "we have nowhere cool to keep the body and she has been dead for five days!"
This took a little time to circulate and penetrate, but when it had done so the trio of examiners were a very subdued group.
Paton now felt the time had come to assert whatever authority he had left to him and ordered that they be led to the corpse. A swinging door was held open to them and a waft of fetid air hit them. They blanched but went in and gathered round the head of the bed where the victim lay. The lady doctor, smiling rather resignedly the whole time then looked round seeking permission to draw the sheet from the head of the cadaver. The trio nodded in turn and slowly the sheet was turned back.
A great bloated, obese face was revealed, Maggots were seen to be wriggling where once the eyes had been.
Paton reverently pulled the sheet over the now hideous sight and retired to one side of the small room where the Frenchman was already seated with his head between his knees trying to get over his faintness. The Russian was a greenish grey colour with beads of sweat on his forehead. Paton was having difficulty in keeping his last meal in its proper place. The heat was suffocating, the stench abominable.
"Natural causes" said the Briton.
"Certainment" moaned the Frenchman weakly, looking appealingly at the Russian. He surely did not understand but he caught the meaning and nodded weakly to everyone in the room.
A sheet of paper came to Paton's hand. He wrote in English "Certified that we, the undersigned have this day examined the remains of a person believed to be Maria Deprovnik, and we consider that she died from natural causes."
Solemnly they all signed this scrap of paper and hurried from the room in almost indecent haste. Outside in the fresh air they took in great gulps of it and looked with sympathy and understanding at each other. They solemnly shook hands and mounted the Jeep for a very silent run back to their own locations.
That evening the Staff Captain was on the phone again.
"How did it go, Doc?"
"Oh, alright. You'll be getting my report in the morning together with a certificate signed by the four doctors that death was due to natural causes".
"Thanks, Doc. I hope we won't hear any more about this. By the way, the Brigadier wants you to come to HQ for cocktails tomorrow night. Can do?"
The following night at the cocktail party the Brigadier did catch Paton's eye.
"Good show, Doc." He said, "these Ruskies seem very happy about the whole thing now."
"I think they should be, sir" Paton replied, and downed his glass to the memory of that poor soul on the bed, and the esprit de cors of the medical profession. He told himself that he must remember to take these tools out of the back of the Jeep when he returned to Blighty, providing his driver hadn't already 'acquired' them.

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