Hogan had been pondering for a week how to address his concern about Newkirk's squabble with Olsen. Newkirk was embarrassed to speak in front of him, Carter had said, and while Hogan was loath to believe it at first, his own eyes told him Carter was right. At the very least, Newkirk was avoiding Olsen.
If Olsen took a seat at the table, Newkirk pushed his plate away and climbed up onto his bunk. When Olsen arrived at the wash tubs, Newkirk squeezed the suds out of his shorts and went to have a smoke with Carter. As Olsen told a joke, Newkirk suddenly remembered LeBeau needed him to weed the garden.
Olsen was almost as critical to the team as Newkirk was, but he operated at its edges. Maybe this was inevitable, because Olsen had a different job than Hogan's core team: His role was infiltration, not sabotage and rescue. He was out of the camp as much as he was in it, and Hogan had moved him out of Barracks 2 to give Sergeant Schultz one less thing to have a heart attack about.
Tucked away in Barracks 19, Olsen was under the less-than-watchful supervision of Sergeant Brandt, who was older and meeker than Schultz and had blurry vision courtesy of the last war. Being away from the spotlight occupied by Hogan's main team made it easier for Olsen to come and go for long stretches. Slipping in a downed airman to occupy Olsen's bunk was a breeze when the doddering barracks guard couldn't make out details.
So when Olsen and Newkirk clashed, the camaraderie that the Barracks 2 team had built over the course of many late-night missions wasn't there to soften the impact. Hogan had pulled Olsen aside more than once to urge him to be more patient with Newkirk, and Olsen had seemed to listen. But by nature Olsen was intense and exacting— qualities that made him a good solo operative but a difficult companion. So Hogan had told Newkirk he needed to do his part, too. He had to stand up for himself without resorting to fights or avoidance. He needed to engage with Olsen as an equal. Whether Newkirk knew how was an entirely different question.
Finally, eight days after the dust-up in the tunnel, the opportunity arrived for Hogan to have a long talk with Newkirk. A rainy August day had given way to a bright night. Everyone had supper under their belts, and for once, there was no mission, because a full moon on a clear night made movements easy to detect and the squishy ground yielded too easily underfoot, leaving muddy tracks. So Hogan invited Newkirk into his office for a game of chess and a chat. Crickets chirped at the window as the fertile scent of late summer wafted in with the day's last, low shimmers of sunshine.
Newkirk was new to the game, but he was catching on quickly. He had listened to Hogan and quietly fiddled with his knights and bishops as the colonel laid out his concerns and set up the board. He nodded along as Hogan encouraged him to venture beyond the safe haven of Barracks 2 and mix with others, even if it was hard at first.
"We're all on the same team, Newkirk," he counseled softly. "I think you'd like Olsen if you spent more time with him. He plays soccer, you know."
"I've seen him play with your Ivy League lads," Newkirk said with a smirk. "He mmmoves fast, but he hogs the ball. Never p-passes."
"Maybe you could steal from him," Hogan teased.
"Steal, Sir?" Newkirk looked perplexed.
"You know, when you take the ball from another player. Isn't that a steal?"
"Th-that's called a tackle, Sir," Newkirk grinned.
"Huh. That's nothing like a tackle in football," Hogan said.
"It is football, Sir. Proper football. Played with the feet, you see. No hands on the ball." Newkirk smiled mischievously, having stirred up this particular debate numerous times with various Americans.
"All right, all right, we're not going down that road," Hogan chuckled. He knew from experience that once you got on to the topic of soccer with Newkirk, there was no way to counteract his passion for the sport, exceed his knowledge of it, or alter his perception that American football was unworthy of the name.
Hogan waved at the chess board. Time to play this game. He had white; Newkirk had black. Hogan opened by advancing his queen's pawn to the fourth rank.
"My point is, Newkirk, you can't let the other men get you down. And Olsen would be better as a friend than a foe."
Newkirk tipped his head and spoke quietly and confidently. "I know you're right, Sir. It's j-j-just hard when the other men l-look at me like I'm mmad, or interrupt me, or …" He crossed his arms, bit his lip and let out a sigh. Then he regrouped and moved out a black knight.
"Or what?" Hogan asked, eyeing the move. It was a little early for a knight, but Newkirk was still learning the game, and one thing he had obviously learned was that a knight was the only piece that could advance before a pawn had moved.
"Or laugh, Sir. They often laugh. Olsen does, all the time. Addison does, too." He paused and crossed his arms again. "I, I can't blame them, Sir. They don't know what a st-stammer is. I'd probably laugh too if I didn't understand how hard it is to have this… this…" He paused again and fiddled with the end of his sleeves. "Well, you know. This. I w-w-w-wish I could control it better, Sir."
"You're doing fine, Newkirk," Hogan said firmly, moving out another pawn. "I'm not worried about your speech. But I'm concerned that you're worried about it."
"Of course you're worried about my speech, Sir," Newkirk scoffed. "W-we wouldn't be talking if you weren't worried about it, would we?" He advanced a pawn and tried to concentrate on anything but his rising emotions. He'd learned that Hogan liked to establish a strong center on the chessboard and could already see he was coming for him. He could focus on that.
Hogan sighed. "I don't think your stammer gets in the way of the job, Newkirk. I think your fears about it hold you back and get you into unnecessary conflicts, though. You told me yourself once: A stammer is what happens when you're trying not to stammer." He slid out a knight.
"That's true," Newkirk snapped. "But it's bloody hard to stop. Easy for you to ssssay, but hard for me to d-d-do." He stopped and added, "No disrespect intended, Sir."
"None taken. And I know that," Hogan said apologetically.
Newkirk shook his head adamantly as he slid his bishop into the square vacated by a pawn. "With all due respect, Sir, you don't know. You don't have any idea, lucky for you." He paused and his expression softened. He looked for a moment like he was deciding whether to cross a busy street, like he was sizing up how fast the cars were moving. Then suddenly he plunged headlong into traffic.
"Every single day, it's like w-walking on ice, Guv. I'm going along j-j-just ffine one minute, but suddenly with no warning I fffeel all slippery under my feet. Even though I know h-how to walk, and w-where I want to walk, and where I'm trying to go, I start to skid and lose my balance. I'm trying desperately to stay up but suddenly I'm flailing my arms. I don't want to ffall and make a ffffool of myself. But the harder I try, the harder it is to stay in c-control. Everyone is staring, or they're coming at me. And w-when I'm not in control, that's when accidents happen, and suddenly I'm cr-crashing down on my arse. Some people are laughing; some people are giving me hand up. I can get b-b-back up meself, but w-what if I slip again?"
Newkirk looked ragged for a moment, as if expelling all those thoughts had sucked the wind out of him. "I'm always worried about falling, about stammering so hard that I can't finish my thoughts," he said, barely above a whisper.
Then, imperceptibly, he straightened up and composed himself as he watched Hogan advance another pawn to the fourth rank, building a defense at the center of the board.
"I'm not sure I'd have half the guts you do, Newkirk. You really are brave," Hogan replied. But he could see in an instant that praise was not going to help—not judging from the way Newkirk's eyes were starting to roll. Hogan studied the corporal, who was now pouring his complete attention onto the chess board, and biting the hell out of his lip. Hogan could see he was trying to keep it from quivering. Unsure what to say next, Hogan finally came up with a question.
"What if you did slip again?"
"Well, it would hurt, for a start. My figurative bum gets sore from all these crash landings," Newkirk said with a smile that stopped well short of his eyes. He castled his king as Hogan's eyebrow shot up. Was that a rookie error or a bold move?
Hogan sat back and looked Newkirk over. For both of them, jokes were a defense mechanism. Newkirk had stopped biting his lip because his mask was now firmly in place, Hogan realized, and there was absolutely no point in mentioning it. So he responded with a joke of his own.
"So you're telling me it's Ice 1, Newkirk 0," he replied, advancing a pawn to block Newkirk's knight. He looked up, trying to suppress his satisfaction with the move, then leaned forward on the table that separated them.
Newkirk laughed. "Yes, Sir, exactly. Actually, it's Stammer 1, Newkirk 0, all bloody day long." He downshifted to a small smile. "Although the truth is, Sir, if we're really keeping score, I do w-w-win quite a few rounds. Hardly anyone knows it but me, of course, but I do win because I work bloody hard at it."
That was better, Hogan thought. At some level, Newkirk knew that, however difficult his stutter was, he was indeed making progress against it.
"How do you work at it? What's an example of how you win?" Hogan asked.
Newkirk tipped his head, looking reluctant for a moment, though whether that was because his knight was blocked or in response to Hogan's question was anyone's guess. "W-well, Sir, I anticipate every conversation, trying to figure out where the slippery ice is going to be, and I skate around it. I substitute words, or I run up to the sentence, or I talk with a bit of a growl, because I don't stammer when I do that. Sir, there was a time when I was younger that I couldn't have got a sentence out around people I didn't know. Now, mmmost of the time I actually don't stammer. And of course, I talk with you now, Sir. That used to be mmmuch harder."
"I remember. I thought you were nervous or afraid. Nothing could have been further from the truth. Of course, I figured that out pretty quickly after you took my watch and my wallet." Hogan smirked and shook his head.
"Then I fooled you, because it was bloody scary," Newkirk answered. "I was afraid, because I thought you'd hear me stammer and decide I was an idiot. It was much easier for me show you than to tell you what I could do. It, it was like that for mmmonths, really, Guv." He returned his knight to the back row and thought about ways to loosen the protection of Hogan's pawn. "I mean, you are an officer, Sir."
"Good move," Hogan said. "Protect your knight." He looked up. "And I'm pleased to hear you noticed the eagles," he smirked. "I do have to wonder sometimes."
"You forced the move. I had to retreat or that pawn would get me," Newkirk replied with a shrug. "How do you look out for your knight, then? How do you protect him?"
Hogan studied the board. "My knights are OK," he said. "Look, one of them is still in its home position; the other is guarded behind these three pawns." Newkirk was still learning the game, and Hogan didn't mind stopping to explain strategy.
He looked up and saw that Newkirk was blushing slightly, eyes down. Realization dawned. He wasn't talking about the game.
Hogan nodded. "Ah, my knight. Yes, you are a knight, aren't you? You play close to where the action is. The worst place for you is at the edge of the board. I need you in the middle." He stopped and pondered for a moment. "You're strong enough to be the rook. But you'd go out of your mind being blocked in for half the game, wouldn't you?"
Newkirk grinned, relieved to be understood. "I think I would, Sir. And anyway, everyone knows Kinch is the rook. He can exert control on every square on the board without exposing himself to a great deal of risk. But the knight's in the game early. The bishop's all right too, but I think I like the knight the best," he said, picking up the chessman and examining it before placing it back on the board. "He's a bit stealthy, with his jumps and crooked moves."
"You said 'crooked,' not me," Hogan joked. I think I would have said 'unique,' or 'unconventional,' maybe. The thing about knights, Newkirk, is that they're vulnerable to traps. If you're on a light square, you've got to be focused on where your opponent's dark-square bishop is, because they could take you out in their next move."
"Thinking ahead is what I do, Sir. Couldn't get a sentence out if I didn't. But knights can also move to – what did you call it, Sir? - an outpost."
"Yes. If there's a hole in the other guy's pawn structure, that can work," Hogan said. "But a knight on the edge of the board is severely limited in terms of movement. Like I said, I need you in the middle."
Newkirk smiled ever so slightly. "That's where I want to be, Sir. But I need your help getting the other chessmen off my back. I, I, I can't let you ffffight my battles for me, but I also can't do it alone. I need a king in my corner."
"Technically, I think I'm the queen," Hogan said as Newkirk sputtered out a laugh. "Not like that, soldier," he added with mock sternness. "There's a lot I can do on the board. But in the end, the game can continue without me. Allied Command is the king, the indispensable one."
"Not around here, Sir," Newkirk said.
"Well, I appreciate the vote of confidence, Newkirk," Hogan said sincerely. "The thing about chess is," he said, tapping the board, "you can't win with one piece. In the end, they are all important. You have to play them all, and play them well. And the pieces have to work together."