Hart's War Page 8
Both Bedford and Scott slowly nodded, and replied in unison: “Yes sir.”
MacNamara half-turned to exit, then thought better of it. He abruptly swung toward the lieutenant he’d first questioned. “Lieutenant,” he said sharply, bringing the officer to attention. “I want you to gather a blanket and anything else you might need for this night. Tonight, you will occupy Major Clark’s bunk.” MacNamara swiveled toward his second in command. “Clark, tonight I think it might be advisable—”
But the major cut him off. “Absolutely, sir.” He saluted crisply. “No problem. I’ll get my blanket.” The second in command turned to the young lieutenant. “Follow me,” he said briskly. Then he turned toward Tommy and the other kriegies crowding the hallway. “End of show!” he said loudly. “Back to your bunks. Now!”
This the kriegies, including Tommy Hart, did rapidly, scattering and scooting down the hallway like so many cockroaches when a light has been shined on them. For a few minutes, from his own space, he could hear footsteps resounding off the wooden flooring in the central corridor. Then a suffocating silence, followed by the sudden arrival of darkness when the Germans cut the electricity. This thrust all the huts into night’s black and spilled inky calm over the small, compacted world of Stalag Luft Thirteen. The only light was the erratic sweep of a searchlight over the wire, across the rooftops of the huts, probing the shadows of the camp. The only noise was the distant and familiar crunching noise of a nighttime bombing raid on factories in some nearby city, reminding the men, as they struggled to drift off to whatever nightmares awaited them, that much of great significance and importance was happening elsewhere.
Rumors flew around the compound the following morning. There was talk that both men were going to be sent to the cooler, others suggested that an officers’ court was to be convened to hear the dispute over the alleged stealing. One man said he’d heard it from a top source that Lincoln Scott was going to be shifted to a room by himself, another said that Bedford had organized support from the entire southern contingent of kriegies, and that regardless of what Colonel MacNamara did, Lincoln Scott’s days were numbered.
As was usually the case, none of the more exotic rumors were true.
Colonel MacNamara met with each man privately. Scott was told he would be moved to a different hut when a bunk became available, but that MacNamara was not willing to order a man to shift locations to accommodate the black flier. Bedford was told that without credible, eyewitness evidence that something had been stolen, his accusations were groundless. He was ordered to leave Scott alone until a switch could be accomplished. MacNamara commanded both men to get along until other arrangements could be made. He pointedly reminded them that they were both officers in an army at war, and subject to military discipline at all times. He told them he expected them both to behave as gentlemen and that there would be nothing more to the matter. This last suggestion carried the complete weight of the colonel’s temper, and it was clear, the kriegies universally agreed when they heard of this, that no matter how much the two men might now actually hate each other, being at the very top of Colonel MacNamara’s shit list was far worse.
There was an uneasiness in the camp for the next days.
Outwardly, Trader Vic went back to wheeling and dealing, and Lincoln Scott returned to his reading and to his solitary turns around the camp perimeter. Inwardly, Tommy Hart suspected much more was happening with both men. He found it all very curious, and actually intriguing. There was a distinct fragility to life in a prisoner-of-war camp; any cracks in the carefully constructed veneer of civilization that they’d created was dangerous to them all. The awful routine of confinement, the stress of their near-death when they were shot from the sky, the fear that they’d been forgotten, or worse, were being ignored, lurked just beneath all their moments, every waking minute. They fought constantly against isolation and despair, because they all knew these were enemies that equaled the Germans in threat to them all.
It was the middle of a fine afternoon, sunlight pouring over the dull, drab colors of the camp, glinting off the wire. Tommy, a law book under his arm, had just exited from one of the Aborts, and was going to find a warm spot in which to read. A furious softball game was going on in the exercise field, men’s voices raised in all the usual catcalls and taunts that accompany the game of baseball, intermixed with the occasional thump of bat against ball, and ball into mitt. Just beyond the game, Tommy saw Lincoln Scott walking the deadline.
The black man was perhaps thirty yards behind the right fielder, his head down, as usual, his pace steady, yet somehow tortured. Tommy thought Scott was beginning to resemble the Russians that had marched past and disappeared into the woods.
He hesitated, then decided he would make another effort to speak with the black flier. He guessed that since the fight in the barracks no one had spoken, other than in a perfunctory manner, to Lincoln Scott. He doubted that Scott, no matter how strong he thought he might be, could keep up the combination of self-imposed isolation and ostracism without going crazy.
So, Tommy stepped deliberately across the compound, not really thinking about what he would say, but thinking that someone ought to say something. As he approached, he noticed that the right fielder, who had turned and stared briefly at the passing flier, was Vincent Bedford.
As he walked in their direction, Tommy heard a distant whomping sound, instantly accompanied by a cascade of hoots and cries. He twisted and saw the white shape of a softball curving in a graceful parabola against the blue Bavarian sky.
In the same instant, Vincent Bedford turned, and raced back a half-dozen strides. But the arc of the ball was too quick, even for an expert like Bedford. The softball landed behind him with a thump in the dust, raising a small puffy cloud, and, filled with momentum, immediately rolled past the deadline, up against the wire.
Bedford stopped short, as did Tommy.
Behind them, the batter who’d launched the shot was circling the bases, shouting out, while his teammates cheered, and the other fielders yelled across the dirt diamond toward Bedford.
Tommy Hart saw Bedford grin.
“Hey, nigger!” the southerner called out.
Lincoln Scott stopped. He raised his head slowly, pivoting toward Vincent Bedford. His eyes narrowed. He said nothing in reply.
“Hey, little help, how ’bout it, boy?” Bedford said, gesturing to the softball resting up against the barbed wire.
Lincoln Scott turned and saw the ball.
“C’mon, boy, get the damn ball!” Bedford shouted.
Scott nodded, and took a step toward the deadline.
In that second, Tommy realized what was about to happen. The black flier was about to step over the deadline to retrieve the baseball without first donning the white smock with the red cross that the Germans provided for exactly that purpose. Scott seemed unaware that the machine-gun crew in the nearest tower had swiveled their weapon, and that it was trained on him.
“Stop!” Tommy shouted. “Don’t!”
The black flier’s foot seemed to hesitate in midair, poised over the thin wire of the deadline. Scott turned toward the frantic noise.
Tommy found himself running forward, waving his arms. “No! No! Don’t!” he cried.
He slowed as he passed Bedford. He heard Trader Vic mutter, “Hart, you damn Yankee fool . . .” beneath his breath.
Scott remained stock-still, waiting for Tommy to approach him.
“What is it?” the black man asked sullenly, but with just a tinge of anxiety in his voice.
“You have to wear the damn jacket to cross the deadline without being shot,” Tommy said breathlessly. He pointed back toward the baseball game, and they saw one of the kriegies who’d been playing half-running across the field, carrying the smock, which fluttered in the breeze he made by hurrying. “If you don’t have the red cross on, the Germans can shoot. Without warning. It’s the rule. Didn’t anyone tell you?”
Scott shook his head, but only slightly.
By this time the kriegie carrying the smock had arrived at the deadline. “Got to wear this, lieutenant,” the man said, “unless you’re looking to commit suicide.”
Lincoln Scott continued to stare past the man, directly at Vincent Bedford, who stood a few feet away. Bedford pulled off his leather baseball mitt and started massaging it, working the leather slowly and deliberately.
“So,” Trader Vic called out again, “you gonna get us the ball, boy, or what? Game’s wasting away here.”
Tommy squared around toward Bedford. “What the hell are you trying to pull, Bedford? They would have shot him before he’d gone two feet!”
The southerner shrugged, and didn’t reply. He continued to grin widely.
“That would have been murder, Vic,” Tommy shouted. “And you damn well know it!”
Bedford shook his head. “What’cha saying, Tommy? All I asked was for that boy there to get us the ball, ’cause he was closer. Why, of course I thought he’d wait for the smock. Any damn fool knows that you gotta be wearing those colors if you want to cross the deadline. Ain’t that right?”
Lincoln Scott slowly pivoted, and turned his glance up toward the machine-gun crew leaning out over the tower, watching the gathering of kriegies closely. He reached out and took the pullover with the red cross and held it in his hand for a moment. Then he held it up, so the machine gunners could see it.
Then he deliberately dropped it to the dirt.
“Hey,” the kriegie said. “Don’t do that!”
In the same instant, Lincoln Scott stepped over the deadline. He kept his gaze on the machine-gun crew in the tower. They stepped back, crouching behind their weapon. One of the crew worked the bolt on the side of the gun, which made a sharp, metallic clicking sound that resounded through the suddenly still camp air, while the other grasped the belt of bullets, ready to feed it into the gun’s maw.
His eyes still locked on the gunners, Scott strode across the short space to the wire. He reached down and seized the softball, then walked slowly back to the deadline. He stepped over the line stiffly, gave the Germans in the tower a final, contemptuous glance, and then turned from the machine gunners to Vincent Bedford.
Bedford was still grinning, but the smile was fading and seemed false. He slipped the mitt back onto his left hand and pounded the leather palm two or three times.
“Thanks, boy,” he said. “Now fire that pill right on over here so’s we can get back to the game.”
Scott looked at Bedford, then glanced down at the ball. He picked up his eyes slowly, and stared past Bedford, toward the center of the baseball diamond, and beyond, to where the catcher, a kriegie umpire, and the next batter were standing. Scott hefted the softball in his right hand, then, abruptly stepping past Tommy, took a half-jumping stride forward and unleashed the ball in a single, savage throw.
Scott’s toss carried on a direct line, like a shot from a fighter’s cannon, across the dusty field, toward home plate. It bounced one time in the infield before slapping into the surprised glove of the catcher. Even Bedford’s mouth dropped open slightly at the speed and distance of the throw.
“Damn, boy,” Bedford said, surprise tinging his words. “Y’all got some kinda arm there.”
“That’s right,” Scott said. “I do.” Then he turned, and without saying another word resumed his lonely walk around the deadline.
Chapter Three
THE ABORT
Shortly after dawn on the third day following the incident at the wire, Tommy Hart was slowly awakening from another sleep rich in dreams when the high-pitched and shrill sounds of whistles once again catapulted him into alertness. The noise erased a strange dream-vision in which his girlfriend Lydia and the dead captain from West Texas were sitting on the small front porch of his parents’ white clapboard house in Manchester in side-by-side rocking chairs, each beckoning to him to join them.
He heard one of the other men in the room mutter: “Christ, what is it this time? Another tunnel?”
A second voice replied as the slapping sound of feet hitting the wooden floors filled the air: “Maybe it’s an air raid.”
A third voice chimed in: “Can’t be. No sirens. Gotta be another tunnel, goddamn it! I didn’t know they were digging another tunnel.”
Tommy pulled on his pants and blurted out, “We’re not supposed to know. We’re never supposed to know. Only the tunnel kings and the escape planners are supposed to know. Is it raining?”
One of the other men pulled back the shutters over the window. “Drizzling. Shit. Cold and wet.”
The man at the window turned back to the rest of the crew in the bunk room and added with a small lilt to his voice, “They can’t expect us to fly in this soup!”
This statement was immediately greeted by the usual mixture of laughter, groans, and catcalls.
From the bunk above him, Tommy heard a fighter pilot wonder out loud, “Maybe somebody tried to blitz out through the wire. Maybe that’s what’s going on.”
One of the first voices replied with a sarcastic snort: “That’s all you fighter jocks ever think: That somebody’s gonna blitz out on their own.”
“We’re just independent thinkers,” the fighter pilot replied, giving the other man a halfhearted, playful wave. Several of the other fliers laughed.
“You still need permission from the escape committee,” Tommy said, shrugging. “And after the last tunnel failure, I doubt they’d give anybody permission to attempt suicide. Even some crazy Mustang jockey.”
There were a few grunts of assent to this comment.
Outside, the whistles continued, and there was the rumbling and thudding noise of booted men running in formation. The kriegies in Hut 101 started to reach for woolen sweaters and leather flight jackets hanging from makeshift lines stretched between the bunks, while shouts from the guards urged them to hurry. Tommy laced his boots tightly, grabbed his weatherbeaten cap, and quickly made his way into the push of Allied prisoners emerging from their bunks. As he passed through the barracks door, he turned his face upward to a deadening gray sky, feeling a misty rain on his face and a deep foglike chill penetrate past the barrier of underwear and sweater and jacket. He instantly raised his collar, hunched his shoulders forward, and started for the assembly ground.
But what he saw almost made him stop.
Two dozen German soldiers, in long, winter-issue greatcoats, their steel helmets glistening with moisture, ringed the Abort located between Hut 101 and Hut 102. Hard-eyed and wary, the soldiers faced the Allied airmen, rifles at the ready. They seemed poised, as if awaiting a command.
There was only one entrance to the Abort, at the near end of the small wooden frame building. Von Reiter, the camp commander, a gray overcoat tinged with a red satin lining more suitable for a night at the opera draped haphazardly across his shoulders, stood outside the single Abort doorway. As usual, he had his riding crop in his hand, but now he repeatedly smacked it against the polished black leather of his boots. Fritz Number One, at rigid attention, stood a few paces away. Von Reiter ignored the ferret as he watched the kriegies hurry past him. Other than the nervousness with the riding crop, Von Reiter stood like one of the sentinel fir trees that lined the distant forest, oblivious to the hour and the cold. The commandant’s eyes darted over the rows of men forming on the assembly ground, almost as if he were intent on counting them all himself, or as if he recognized each face as it passed by.
The men gathered into blocks and came to attention with their backs to the Abort and the squad of soldiers surrounding it. A few kriegies tried to twist about and see what was happening behind them, but the “eyes front!” command came barked from the center of the formation. This made them all nervous; no one likes having armed men standing behind them. Tommy listened carefully, but could not make out what was happening in the Abort. He shook his head slightly, and whispered to no one and everyone at the s
ame time:
“That’s a helluva place to dig a tunnel. Who thought that baby up?”
A man behind him answered, “The usual geniuses, I guess. Situation normal . . .”
“All fucked up . . .” a couple of voices spoke in unison.
Then yet another man in the formation added, “Yeah, but how the hell did the Krauts ever find it? Man, it’s the best, worst place to be digging. If you could stand the smell . . .”
“Yeah, if . . .”
“Some guys would be willing to crawl through the shits to get out of here,” Tommy said.
“Not me,” he heard in reply. But another voice just as quickly disagreed.
“Man, if I could get outta here, I’d crawl through a lot worse stuff. Hell, I’d do it just for a twenty-four-hour pass. Just for a day, Christ, even a half day on the other side of that damn wire.”
“You’re crazy,” the first man said.
“Yeah, maybe. But stayin’ in this dump ain’t doing much for my overall state of sanity, neither.”
A number of voices murmured in agreement.
“There goes the old man,” one of the airmen whispered. “And Clarkie, too. Looks like they got fire in their eyes.”
Tommy Hart saw the Senior American Officer and his second in command pace across the front of the formations, then swing past the men, heading toward the Abort. MacNamara marched with the intensity of a West Point parade ground drill instructor. Major Clark, whose legs seemed half the size of the senior officer’s, struggled to keep pace. It might have been slightly comic were it not for the hard look on each man’s face.
“Maybe they can figure out what this is all about,” the same voice muttered. “I hope so. Man, my feet are already soaked. I can hardly feel my toes.”