The silence in the car was brooding. Nor Klink, nor Hella uttered a word, and Schultz didn´t dare to open his mouth either.
When the car turned into the camp and came to a halt in front of Klink´s quarters, Hella was out in a flash, and slammed the cardoor shut in Klink´s face.
"But Frau Linkmeyer, please...!" she heard Klink whine.
But she had no time to listen. First she was going to cool her wrath on that Schwein of a general, and then she´d take a turn around the camp in search of an instant groom. So, throwing up her arms in desperate impotence, she ran into the building and slammed the door shut behind her.
"Gertrude...! Frau Linkmeyer...!" she heard Klink faintly begging through the door.
She stopped dead in her tracks. Had he perhaps changed his mind? Was he willing to marry her after all? She listened with tense expectation.
But no such luck. He was talking to someone else out there. Hrmpf.
And while Hogan outside inquired with Klink how his date had gone, and talked him into releasing Carter and Newkirk from the cooler immediately as agreed if he´d help Klink to scare off Frau Linkmeyer, Hella stomped into Klink´s living-room, where General Burkhalter lay stretched out on the sofa with a brandy in one hand and a cigar in the other.
"Well?" he enquired with all the audacity of a pest of a brother. "When will the wedding-bells be ringing?"
"You are the most loathsome Schwein in all of Germany!" she pitched out at him, making him choke on his brandy. "To interfere at every turn when I´m trying to win him over! It´s all your fault, Albert Burkhalter! And you´re going to pay for this! Dearly, I promise you! I´ll turn you into a stink-horn, here and now!"
She focused her concentration on him, and to his utter dismay Burkhalter suddenly realized he tasted the flavour of rotten eggs and tainted Sauerkraut in his mouth. And what was that: was he melting into the sofa!?
Hella fumed. There; that would teach the Schwein a lesson. And Klink. He deserved no better than having a gigantic stink-horn in his quarters.
But suddenly her eye was drawn to the clock on the mantelpiece. What?! Only ten minutes to midnight?! Ten minutes to...!
The Schwein would have to wait; first of all she needed a groom now. Time was running out terribly quick!
She stormed outside, forgetting all about the spell she had started on Burkhalter. It would reverse soon enough anyway if she didn´t complete it, but she´d worry about that later. That is: if there was going to be a ´later´.
Now where was that leader of the prisoners? The one with all the crazy ideas, who had written the loveletter? He might just be crazy enough to oblige her on so short notice.
No, no time to be picky. She´d have to take the first one she could get. So off she ran towards the barracks across the compound.