Stalag 13, 1943
"Er… sergeant?" said Goldman.
"Damn it, Newkirk, this isn't funny! Now hand them over, you bastard, before I come over there and make you—"
"I can't give you what I haven't ruddy well got! What in hell would I want with your old rubbish, anyway?"
"Um… Mills? Mills!"
"Shut up, Goldman!" Sergeant Mills took a step towards Newkirk, his eyes narrowed to slits and his fists clenched. "Right, you want to do this the hard way? One way or the other, I'm getting them back; it's just a matter of how many teeth you still have left when I do."
Newkirk glared at him, and didn't back down an inch. "Oh, that's charming, that is. Taking lessons in tactics from the Gestapo now, are we?" Two men edged closer to the argument, their postures less than friendly. Newkirk's mouth twisted. "Bloody hell. You seriously think you need two mates to hold me down while you put the boot in? The Gestapo'll be taking lessons from you—"
"Sergeant Mills!" Goldman, a mild-mannered sort, who was not at all used to shouting at his bunkmates, even, or perhaps especially, when they were being utter jackasses, took a deep breath. "Mills… is this them?"
The barracks went dead silent as Goldman held up a small packet of what looked like letters. Mail, in a POW camp, was not merely a pleasant diversion, not merely a lifeline. Mail was sacred. Even the sort of mail they got, months out of date and censored into near-incomprehensibility, was proof that they had not been forgotten by the rest of the world, that there even was still a rest of the world. There was not a man among them who did not understand the unreasoning fury that had gripped Mills when his letters had gone missing… and not a man who didn't realize how far out of line he'd gone.
"They… they'd slipped down between your mattress and the side of the bunk," Goldman babbled. "There's a crack in the frame, and, um… there was just a corner sticking out and I guess you didn't see them, and, um…"
Mills looked at the packet of letters, then at Newkirk, and fumbled for something to say.
Newkirk took the matter out of his hands. "Never you mind, then," he said with a pleasant smile. "These things happen, don't they? Can't blame you any for picking the most likely suspect when it comes to locked footlockers, now can we?" The smile faded. "But just so we're clear, lads. There are a couple of rules when it comes to this sort of thing, and one of them is this—you don't shit where you eat. Stealing from my mates wouldn't be exactly clever at the best of times, and doing it when we all know damned well that I am always going to be the one what gets told to turn out his pockets is just plain daft. And that's supposing I wanted your bloody post, and I can't think of a single reason I would. I'm actually more than a tad insulted you think I'm enough of a ruddy fool to just lift it, because, believe you me, if I did want it, I'd've come up with a better plan than that."
Hogan, who had entered the barracks in time to catch the last bit of that, strode into the middle of the floor, not-so-subtly separating the two combatants. "What's going on here?" Hogan kept his voice light; no sense in adding fresh fuel to the fire if it could be avoided.
"It's my fault, sir," Mills started.
"Not a bit of it," Newkirk interrupted again. "Just a little philosophical discussion, sir; nothing to trouble yourself with. I'd appreciate it if you'd do me a small favor, though, Colonel." He kicked open his own locker, stepped pointedly away from it. "As much fun as this little chinwag's been, I don't think we need to do it again anytime soon. So I'd take it as a kindness if you'd search my things, sir. Doesn't have to be now, if it's not convenient; just do spot-checks every now and then, make sure there's nothing in there what oughtn't to be."
Hogan narrowed his eyes; Newkirk's face was open and earnest, which was suspicious in and of itself. Even Schultz knew that the more innocent the Cockney looked, the more trouble was brewing behind those clear green eyes. "Newkirk, I hardly think that's necessary." He shoved his hands in his pockets, pointedly not coming any closer. "Nothing's been stolen, nothing's missing, nobody needs to have their lockers tossed."
"No, not this time, sir," he replied smoothly. "But I do think we'd all feel a tad better if you were a bit more obvious about keeping on top of the situation. With a dodgy bastard like me running about, the men need to know all their bits and bobs are safe and sound, and I'd feel better if they all know you're keeping a firm hand on my leash, so we won't have no more of these little dust-ups."
The floor, it seemed, had become intensely interesting, Hogan noted. A good third of the men in the barracks were studying it. This was going to get exceptionally ugly. Newkirk was smiling again, and the bitter edge to his voice was an oddly painful counterpoint to the genial expression.
Mills tried again. "Look, it's all my fault—I just flew off the handle, and I owe you an apology—"
"You don't owe me a damned thing, and I wouldn't want it even if you did. Glad you've found your post. Colonel, may I be dismissed?"
Hogan nodded slowly. "Sure, Newkirk. Get some air."
"I'll do that very thing, sir." Newkirk saluted and walked out with his head held high, leaving the locker wide open.
With a sigh, Hogan slammed it shut. He turned a cold gaze on Mills. "Next time you feel the need to make a scene, Sergeant, could you do us all a favor and resist the urge? We're all supposed to be on the same damned side here."
Mills, still clutching the packet of letters, turned a bit pink around the ears. "I know, sir. I was way out of line. I have no excuse."
"No, you don't," Hogan agreed. "Consider yourself on report. We'll discuss this in more detail later. Anyone else have some dirty laundry to air?"
A dozen mumbled variations on 'no' still hanging in the air, Hogan nodded crisply. "Good. Dismissed."
As Hogan walked back into his office, and the barracks lurched back to some semblance of normal behavior, Carter shook his head. "Boy, that was a real mess. Why did Newkirk want the Colonel to go through his stuff? We all know he wouldn't take anything he didn't give right back." There wasn't a man in the camp—and that included the guards—who hadn't been handed his own watch or wallet at one time or another, but Carter was right. That was as far as it had ever gone.
LeBeau, elbow deep in preparations for their evening meal, did not look up from his cutting board. "Punishment, Carter. Think of it as a sort of mental cooler."
"Huh. Maybe you're right. Well, Mills really was being a jerk, and he deserved to be embarrassed like that. I can't blame Newkirk for wanting to put him in his place."
"Non. Pierre was not trying to punish Mills for the false accusation," he said. "That was not why he insisted on that farce with his footlocker."
"Then what was he doing?"
"He was punishing himself." LeBeau's voice was tight.
"What? Why? He didn't do anything!"
"Ah, but he did. He allowed himself to believe that he is trusted." LeBeau sighed. "There will be no living with him for a few days."
"That's crazy," Carter objected. "Of course we trust him! We've all saved each other's lives a hundred times!"
"C'est vrai. And yet, how long did it take for Mills to convince half the barracks to turn on him?"
Carter opened his mouth, shut it again. "Still… shouldn't we go talk to him or something?"
"And say what? 'Pierre, mon ami, I am sorry that when possessions go missing, suspicion falls on a thief?' It is hardly a secret that he could open any lock in camp with his eyes shut and both hands tied behind his back."
"Yeah, but he only really steals from the Germans…" Carter trailed off; even he could hear how weak that sounded.
LeBeau retrieved his knife and went back to chopping onions. The blade fell with the precision of a guillotine. "True. We know this. Colonel Hogan knows this. That idiot Mills knows this. Pierre would not steal from us. He would not. He, nonetheless could, and at times when a man is angry and afraid, mere suspicion can easily seem like proof. C'est fini. It happened. It is done. If we are fortunate, we will receive a mission soon and we will all be too busy to think of this."
"Don't you even care that he's feeling rotten? I thought he was your friend too," Carter said, with just a hint too much accusation in his voice.
"Non. He is not. I have had many friends. Pierre is my brother," said LeBeau, and if the knife met the cutting board with a bit more force at that, the onions were in no position to complain. "Of course I care. But when there is nothing to say, it is sometimes kindest to keep silent."
Carter frowned. "That can't be right. He shouldn't be left alone."
"Perhaps not. But the last thing he wants right now is reassurance and sympathy; it would only hurt him more, and he would not believe it anyway. Leave him his dignity, and let it be."
"But that's no good either! He'll think that we think Mills was right to suspect him."
"He has spent the greater part of his life being suspected, Andre," LeBeau said. "Do you think it is easy for him to trust? To believe that he is trusted? He already thinks we think that."
*.*.*.*.*.*
Kinch wasn't trying to spy on their thief. He wasn't. If he just happened to wander on past some of Newkirk's preferred leave-me-the-hell-alone-for-five-bloody-minutes hideouts, well, it was a fairly small camp, and there really were only so many places a man could go. Coincidences happened. And sure enough, a casual stroll past the delousing station revealed a lanky form holding up the wall, unseeing eyes on the dirt and fists clenched in impotent frustration.
He looked like what he was—a man who had spent far too many years of his life behind barbed wire. Half-starved, half-frozen, half-beaten, half-broken. He had been in the camp longer than anyone else, including most of the guards, and even taking that into consideration, he had spent more time in the cooler than any three other prisoners put together. He had gritted his teeth and survived more than any man's fair share of privations and punishments, of hunger and cold, of beatings, interrogations, and worse. He had voluntarily stayed in Hell, risking his life on mission after hare-brained mission, with no real prospect of anything but the wrong end of a rifle or a rope for his pains, and he had done it all with a cheeky smirk and a wisecrack. Because that, he had decided, was what the others needed from him. And he was probably right.
Newkirk was a lot of things, and he readily admitted to most of them, but at his core, he was a protector. You might want to kill the man sometimes, and the feeling might well be mutual, but once he'd decided that you were his responsibility, he'd stand between you and the devil himself if it seemed necessary. Whether you wanted him to or not. He didn't actually care much about that bit of it, and your opinion on the matter was duly noted and blithely ignored.
The scene in the barracks had been damned poor repayment for his service.
Some sixth sense alerted him to Kinch's presence before the radioman could decide whether or not to slip away, and he looked up. Kinch watched, a bit impressed, a lot saddened, as his friend slipped back into the persona of devil-may-care Peter Newkirk without missing a beat.
"Allo, mate," Newkirk said easily. "Out for a stroll by scenic Barracks 8?"
"Well, their view of the trash heap is second to none," Kinch replied.
"How true, how true," Newkirk agreed, just a hint of a smile peeking from the corners of his mouth. "The gentle zephyrs wafting the scent of rotting cabbage, sun glinting off the rusty tin cans… Like a garden in springtime, it is."
Kinch grinned back. "Wouldn't know, actually. There aren't that many gardens in Detroit, and mostly they smelled like exhaust fumes, just like the rest of the city."
"London smelled worse than that, but we city lads might be the fortunate ones. Carter was rabbiting on about the farms back where he comes from, and when he got to the bit about spreading manure all over the place—on purpose—just where a fellow's got to walk, well, I thanked my lucky stars I grew up somewhere civilized."
Going by some of the things he'd let slip over the years, 'civilized' was not actually the word Kinch would have used to describe the neighborhood where Newkirk had grown up. "Guess it's all a matter of what you're used to," he said.
Newkirk glanced eloquently at the guard towers. "Blimey, mate, if that's true, God help us all."
"Oh, He will," Kinch said. "He has so far, after all."
Newkirk shrugged. "Daresay," was all he said. He didn't believe in much that he couldn't see, and Kinch knew it. Newkirk believed in his own ten fingers and the quick brain behind them. He believed in the Colonel, and he believed in their mission and the unquestionable rightness of it. He had believed in the comrades watching his back—Kinch only prayed he still did—and he believed in his own near-pathological need to guard the people he cared about, and by extension, the rest of the world, from harm. And… not much else, so far as Kinch was aware.
When all was said and done, their trips through the tunnel notwithstanding, they were only prisoners, and prisoners were routinely stripped of their possessions. They were issued clothes and bedding that could be confiscated at any time. Barracks were inspected and footlockers tossed on a semi-regular basis; anything the guards deemed contraband was severely punished, and anything deemed interesting was stolen. Their mail was censored into illegibility; Red Cross packages were habitually shorted. Even their bodies weren't really their own; after the first couple of times they'd been strip searched on a whim or herded into the delousing station at the point of a rifle, the humiliation became simply another thing to accept and endure. Their captors counted on that; take a man's dignity, his pride, and you've gone a long way towards taking his will to resist. Stalag 13 was, for obvious reasons, better than most. But the principle remained; the only things a prisoner could unequivocally call his own were his faith and his friends. Newkirk had taken a hit to both, and Kinch was afraid for him.
"Look, mate," Newkirk said, tiring of the game. "If you're out here to make sure I'm all right, I am and I thank you, but get back to the barracks, would you? It's too bloody cold to stand about counting the clouds."
"Same goes for you," Kinch said, just as bluntly. "Mills was being an ass, and he knows it. Come back in, and let him apologize before he explodes."
"Nothing to apologize for. Mills was getting a bit wire-happy. Just needed to have a go at someone, let off a bit of steam. If not me, it would've been whoever else crossed his path. No harm done."
"Sure. And that's why you're standing out here without so much as a jacket, right? Come on, Pete. He's sorry, half the guys in the barracks are giving him dirty looks, and the other half are trying to seem casual about glancing out the window every five seconds to see if you're okay. Come back and smooth things over before I go nuts, all right?"
Newkirk rolled his eyes, but pushed himself away from the wall. "We need to blow something up, and no mistake," he said dryly.
"You're probably right," Kinch agreed. "We've been sitting around watching our fingernails grow for more than two weeks. I'm starting to feel like a prisoner."
"Ah, well, we can't have that, now can we?" Newkirk said. "Perhaps a very stern chat with the chaps over in London is in order. For that matter, perhaps we ought to have a stern chat with the lads in Berlin, as well. Letting prisoners get this bored is probably a violation of the Geneva Convention."
It would have been so much easier if he'd sounded angry. As a rule, if Newkirk was sounding off about something, he either was or was going to be just fine. Even if he'd sounded hurt— and Kinch knew him well enough to be absolutely certain that the contretemps in the barracks had cut him to the quick— there might have been ways to help, to heal.
But he didn't. He just sounded tired. He was playing along, both because it was the right thing to do and because he would have cut his own throat with a rusty butter knife before admitting that anything was wrong. But he couldn't quite hide a bone-deep weariness with the way things were and probably always would be. He wore his past like a brand, and Kinch, who had his own experiences with the summary judgment of the ignorant to grapple with, understood in a way the others, perhaps, never could.
*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*
London, 1969
None of the men still sitting in the conference room could hear the low-voiced conversation between Stephens and Donnelly, and their expressions gave nothing away.
They didn't hear any of it. Not just then. Later, it would all be parsed and analyzed and studied to the point of absurdity. But they didn't hear it then. Frankly, they didn't need to.
Because everyone saw Stephens, with dignity in his every move and heartbreak in his eyes, walk calmly to Kay's desk and methodically begin to search it, and they saw the stricken, almost guilty look that flickered over Donnelly's face as he did so.
Said it all, really.
