Hogan didn't see Hochstetter again for a week, but the time passed quickly. With Igor's help, the colonel was able to establish that he was in fact the highest ranking officer, and that no one in particular had any interest in challenging him for command.
The men had in the past made little effort to govern themselves and avoided the mob of enlisted men like they were the plague, enjoying the peace that their rank provided. The officers referred to the giant U-shaped complex as The Zoo, a place fit only for wild animals. They saw no value in the men and no purpose in trying to rally or contain the rowdy Russians housed only fifty feet away.
Deciding that this would have to change if he was ever going to make it out of Gusen, Hogan spent one morning studying The Zoo. Standing alone in the compound he watched the men of The Zoo from twenty feet away, waiting to see what they would do. At first Igor insisted on going with him, afraid that the colonel's sudden lapse in sanity would get him killed.
Hogan explained that this was an experiment in psychology, a chance to see what the men would do with a new prisoner in their midst. The data would be skewed if Igor was there.
"The d-dat-"
"Data…information." Hogan said, brightly.
"Dah, the information will sk-"
"Skew.."
"If you are killed, nyet?"
Hogan gave the younger man a disapproving look, then clapped him on the shoulder reassuringly. "I promise not to get too close."
Reluctantly Igor gave in, and returned to the officer's barracks leaving Hogan alone in the yard at his requisite twenty foot distance.
He attracted plenty of attention in the first ten minutes and enough men rushed to the two ends of the balcony to cause the wood to creak under their combined weight. The buzz of questioning conversation rose to a crescendo, peaked with shouts thrown in his direction. Hogan didn't respond, couldn't have responded given his lack of Russian. He simply waited.
There had to be an alpha, this was his theory. No zoo in the world could maintain a healthy pride of lions without an alpha. Every herd had a mustang. Every jungle had a king. It was the way nature oriented itself, and somewhere in this mess of angry and unruly men, there had to be a natural born leader. If he waited long enough, that leader would make himself known.
Two hours of pacing later he finally spotted his man. The difference was subtle, an act of omission really. He was the only man in sight with his mouth closed. If the others weren't talking, they were staring in wonder, mouths agape, but the thin, wiry, mousy-haired Prussian perched just inside an open window, was silent.
Once he'd spotted the man, Robert Hogan spent an additional ten minutes studying him, even as he was being studied, then quietly walked back to the officer's barracks. That afternoon he made his first executive decision and ordered the junior officers technically under his command to fall out an hour before evening roll call for calisthenics. As he expected, the order was met with vast disapproval and only a handful of the men joined him on the parade ground.
As Hogan wasn't able to do much more than a stiff march, he restricted the men to a long in-formation walk around the perimeter, attracting both the attention of the guards, and the men in The Zoo. Their parade ended in front of the officer's barracks where they waited for the SS guards to show up.
Finding some of the prisoners already on line, and some in the barracks created a confusion of activity that went badly for the men who had ignored the colonel's orders. Dragged from their bunks they were formed apart from the other men and forced to stand an hour longer than the others while they were counted over and over.
The next morning every man in the officer's barracks joined the colonel for his AM march.
They formed for roll call directly in front of The Zoo, forcing the guards to withstand the barrage of insults from the enlisted men, while they counted. It was a subtle trick of circumstances that the guards could do nothing about without risking the accusation of cruel and inhumane treatment. The prisoners were, after all, following the rules.
After five days Hogan's morning parade had gone from consisting of only a handful of officers, to all of the officers and about half of the two-hundred enlisted men.
At first the participants from The Zoo were there for the entertainment. Making fools of themselves as they followed the officers for the sake of the laughs they were getting from their buddies on the balcony.
The mockery ended and Hogan thinned the herd a little when he added a lap of quick march to the regimen. He barely survived it, but it had done its purpose. The jokers fell out, and by the afternoon parade the group was bigger, more focused, and organized.
Their training starting to kick in again, some of the NCOs arranged the straggling group of men into proper battalion formation, barking out commands enough to keep the men in line, and mark time.
When the exercise period ended with the men standing at attention, a few minutes early for scheduled roll call, those men that had opted out of the march, were none the less present and on line before the SS guards arrived. After the fifth morning of unexpected military efficiency the guards ceased dragging out roll call unnecessarily.
At the end of the week, Hogan stood in front of the group of what he had begun to consider his men, his thumbs in the pockets of his flight jacket, like always, waiting for the SS guards.
All but twenty-three of the entire compliment of soldiers on the POW side of the camp stood at attention, in proper formation in front of The Zoo. Organized by newly named barrack units, each group of enlisted men stood behind an NCO, the Junior officers arranged in front of them, with Colonel Hogan to the front and center of the column.
It was an imposing sight. It was meant to be, and Hogan was proud of the men. Proud of the Russians and their military training, which he had come to appreciate in the past week. He was also proud of the mousy-haired Prussian, who had been one of the first to join the twice daily parade from the ranks of The Zoo.
He'd introduced himself simply as Private Caine, when Hogan had questioned him, and proved to be an apt soldier. He was shorter than Hogan had expected, but physically fit and clearly intelligent. He spoke English and Russian with an accent that Hogan also questioned. Caine's response was that he had been born in Russia, but moved a lot as a child, and there the explanation ended.
The SS guards, slightly more relaxed now that military decorum appeared to be returning to the POW side of the camp, had begun a habit of arriving later for roll call. They were no longer needed to wrestle the soldiers out of their beds, and seemed to be enjoying the reprieve that they perceived they had earned.
It was a habit that Hogan knew he could turn to his advantage in due time.
This morning however the SS guards were punctual, primarily because they had an audience. Major Hochstetter marched behind the group of six guards assigned to the officer's barracks, his hand resting casually on his Luger. Hogan could see the Major's eyes scanning the large formation with barely disguised disbelief.
Roll call was called quickly, the men snapping to attention but not saluting. Hochstetter watched the display with a barely visible smirk on his face, clearly aware of the changes that had taken place in the short time Hogan had been there. Hogan looked away long enough to focus on the guards heading to The Zoo to check on the prisoners not accounted for. By the time he looked back he was surprised to see Hochstetter suddenly pale, sweating and staring at some of the enlisted men.
Once finished the guard who had called the roll turned to Hochstetter and asked for the name of the prisoner he was taking with him. The short major didn't respond at first, and the guard had to ask again before Hochstetter jolted and nodded to Colonel Hogan. Two of the guards approached, pointing their guns and ordering the CO to go with them.
Hogan made no effort to resist them, but couldn't help jerking around when he heard a low hum pass through the men. The sound started out barely audible, then rose to a spine chilling mezzo, hovering where it could neither be mistaken as something else, nor considered a disturbance.
Colonel Hogan's story had passed through the camp like wild fire. The story he'd told via Igor, embellished by time and imagination, and always ending with the vicious beating at the hands of a Gestapo man. The newly reformed army of men were riled at having the closest thing to a commanding officer marched away at gun point. Especially back into the clutches of Major Hochstetter.
Hogan's only response was to turn his head far enough to catch Igor's attention and nod. Igor alone had been warned that Hochstetter would show up sooner or later to collect the American pilot, and he'd been given specific instructions for the men to keep their 'training' going in Hogan's absence. Igor returned the nod then stepped in front of the group of men and snapped an order.
The humming stopped and the men gradually returned their attention to Igor. The SS guards, no longer interested in wasting time inside the wire, quickly followed the major and his prisoner back to the administration side of the camp.
Colonel Hogan could feel the tension vibrating off of Hochstetter as they walked together, the little man easily keeping pace. The major's color still looked off, but he had recovered admirably, his jaw once again stiff.
The gates closed behind them, but to Hogan's surprise he wasn't led back to the administration building, but toward a waiting black sedan parked just inside the prison walls.
One of the SS men opened the driver side door and looked at Hogan expectantly. Hogan in turn looked to Hochstetter who pulled his Luger, cocked it and simply said, "Drive."
Hogan climbed in, the sole target of half a dozen rifles, and waited for Hochstetter to climb into the back. The door slammed shut and Hochstetter growled, "The gun is at your back, Colonel. You do not want to test me. Drive out of the gate and take the first right onto the Hauptstrasse. There will be a park five kilometers down the road."
Hogan already had the car in gear and was releasing the clutch. Hochstetter was taking a huge risk, and Hogan had the feeling that the purpose was to be able to talk without an audience. Even as he was weighing the wisdom of escape, Hogan knew he wouldn't try it. Not until he knew why Hochstetter had gone to such great lengths to organize Hogan's extraction from Stalag 13.
As they left the gates of Gusen, Hogan remembered the stricken look that he had seen on Hochstetter's face. More than once, now that he thought about it, and only in the past few weeks. Hochstetter was a different man, a man worried almost literally to death about something.
As the Gestapo agent who had caught the Papa Bear, he should have been rolling in Frauleins, champagne and praises from the Fuhrer.
Instead he had taken said high-value prisoner to a POW camp in Austria, and left him there to rot for a week.
Turning onto the main street, Hogan asked, "Am I permitted to talk, Herr Major?"
"Now is not the time." Hochstetter responded, saying nothing else until he prompted Hogan to take the turn into the park. What followed was a confusing, zig-zagging route that took them beyond the populated children's playground, picnicking pagodas and fountain, and into a thick wooded area. Hogan thought they might have been heading north, but quickly lost track as they turned and twisted on the narrow, dirt road.
They had driven at a slow pace for almost fifteen minutes before Hochstetter pointed the American toward an even fainter path, barely two ruts between patches of overgrown weeds. Not entirely sure that the car would make it, Hogan did as he was told and gunned the engine, shooting the car up the path a hundred feet or so before he could go no further.
A cabin had appeared around a short bend in the road. Hochstetter ordered Hogan to set the brake and turn off the vehicle before getting out and commanding that the American do the same. Still under the gun Hogan stood staring at the cabin, massaging his aching side, trying not to imagine the absolute worst that Hochstetter had in mind.
"The second key. Open the trunk. There is a basket." Hochstetter waved the gun, his free hand guiding him along the side of the car as he backed across the rough track. Hogan unlocked the latch on the trunk and lifted the heavy metal shell to find an honest-to-God picnic hamper in the back.
"How thoughtful…" He muttered, not sure he felt any better about things. He hefted the basket into his arms and shut the trunk again with his elbow, then followed the major's directions onto the porch of the cabin and toward the front door.
The unlocked, free swinging front door was what changed Hogan's mind. Doors were tricky things, especially when they were made of thick black forest oak and moved on well oiled hinges. A door in good condition is a bad thing for someone holding a gun on someone else.
Hogan felt the door give without trouble, made up his mind, and a second later feigned a struggle with the thick wooden panel. Hochstetter stalled, perhaps suspecting something, but not acting fast enough to prevent the chain of events from unfolding.
The second he saw Hochstetter hesitate Hogan shoved the door open, threw the picnic hamper at the major with all his might, ducked into the cabin, then slammed the door shut again.
The lock on the door required a key, but the thick block of wood balanced on iron brackets didn't, and Hogan slid it home, effectively barring the door. The shots came and Hogan ducked out of habit, knowing that a Lugar vs. an oak door was a fifty-fifty prospect. He spotted the hunting rifle a second later and vaulted a hand hewn varnished settee to get to the fireplace, jerking the rifle off its mount above the mantel.
It wasn't loaded, and the firing pin was gone. Clearly Hochstetter hadn't left anything to chance. The major's fourth or fifth bullet had gone through a crease in the door and winged off one of the rocks that formed the fireplace, effectively warning Hogan to keep his head down.
It wouldn't be long before the major remembered that glass gave less resistance than wood and started shooting through the windows.
"The rifle is not loaded, Hogan! The back door has been welded shut and the windows painted closed. Life will become very uncomfortable for you if you insist on keeping yourself locked in."
"Alone and alive sounds better than dead with company." Hogan responded, desperately searching the walls, the floor, the ceiling, anywhere for anything that might get him out alive.
"I need only siphon gasoline from the car and set fire to the cabin…"
It hit Hogan like a ton of bricks.
Hochstetter didn't want him dead. Hochstetter didn't want him tortured. And Hochstetter didn't want information. Hochstetter wanted help, his help.
The broken rib hadn't been revenge or a warning, it had been a safety measure. It had been a stall! Something to keep the indomitable Papa Bear from disappearing from the POW camp while Hochstetter made final arrangements.
Hogan raced back to his memory of Hochstetter's reactions to the POW formation. In a little over two weeks Hogan had gone from immobile and flat on his back to CO of over two hundred men. Those men had been dispirited and defeated enemy soldiers before Hogan got there, and were proud Russian nationalists the day Hochstetter returned. Even if leaving Hogan at Gusen hadn't been a test of what he could do, clearly the American colonel had passed.
The ashen appearance of the Major was still haunting him when Hogan finally stepped to the door and lifted the bar. He backed up to the settee that he had jumped over before and put his hands in the air before he said, "The door's open, Hochstetter. My hands are in the air. Try not to shoot me."
The Major entered cautiously, but confidently, and to Hogan's surprise appeared to have caught the hamper when it had been thrown. The delicate basket showed no sign of damage from a drop.
Hochstetter put the hamper on the table next to the door, closed the oak panel behind him and slid the block into place without looking at the door once. With the click of the varnished wood against the metal bracket the final few pieces clicked into place in Hogan's head and he felt like the floor had dropped a bit.
"You want me to get somebody outta that prison camp, don't you, Major?" Hogan said, baffled that he hadn't seen it before.
The major's shoulders seemed to sag, a motion so slight that anyone not studying the major would have missed it. His habitual grimace fell and his eyes sank a little behind a glisten of moisture that might have been tears. But men like Hochstetter didn't shed tears. Men like Hochstetter were monsters, demons, devils.
"Yes, Colonel Hogan." The Gestapo man hesitated briefly, then said, "There is a private in that camp that was shot down a few months ago. His name is Caine."
Men like Hochstetter, Hogan realized…
"This Caine…" Hochstetter began, a heavy breath escaping him. "Is my son."
Men like Hochstetter…were also fathers.
TBC!
Look for a story called "The Camp" coming to a fan fiction site near you.