CHAPTER 20: THE URCHIN

"His fever's down to 100.6°, Sir," Wilson said, checking the thermometer as he sat on the edge of Newkirk's bunk in the Colonel's quarters. "He's not out of the woods yet, but it's progress." He addressed his patient: "Do you think you can swallow some soup?"

Newkirk nodded. His throat was still sore, but no longer throbbing. His ear hurt and his rash itched, but he was starting to feel hungry. It had been a long week.

"Great," Wilson said. He stood and put a hand on LeBeau's shoulder. "He can have broth for now until he's more comfortable swallowing. Then add in a little something—the Krauts should have some of those spätzle they like so much."

LeBeau waved his hand dismissively. "Spätzle? Bah. I can make much better nouilles than that with an egg and some flour," he said.

"Good. And I'll see what we've got in the Red Cross invalid packages. There's this stuff that only the British guys seem to like called Horlick's. Maybe he'd drink some of that. You mix it with warm milk." Wilson's nose wrinkled at the thought, but Newkirk's eyes brightened and he smiled for the first time in days.

"Oh, you know what that is?" LeBeau said, happy to see a smile of anticipation on Newkirk's face. "We'll take it, Wilson. I'm sure we can get Schultz to bring us some milk when he brings me that egg for his second favorite prisoner," he said, adding "after me, of course" and winked at Newkirk, who rolled his eyes in return.

Teasing, eye-rolling and food negotiations—things were starting to feel a little more normal in Stalag 13, Hogan thought as he observed the scene from across his small room. He looked over at Newkirk, and was relieved to see him alert. He felt a surge of paternal pride at the sight of him looking better, and relief at knowing that he was on the mend.

As the room cleared out and Newkirk stretched out to rest, Hogan sat at his desk, watching and thinking.

Hogan was keenly aware of how protective he suddenly felt toward Newkirk, although he wasn't entirely sure what to make of it. At 34 and single, Hogan certainly didn't consider himself the fatherly type. He hadn't even thought of marriage and family until he was in his late 20s. But he wasn't ready to settle down—not when he was feeling the call of duty and the growing conviction that war was coming.

He had spent his late 20s in London, focused on his responsibilities as a captain in the U.S. Army Air Corps. Hogan had been viewed by his superiors as a rising star ever since he graduated third in his class at West Point, so it was no surprise when he was dispatched in the late spring of 1936 to London as an assistant attaché to the U.S. diplomatic mission. The assignment was prestigious, and the opportunity to learn about the connection between politics and conflict was unparalleled. Less than 600 miles away in Berlin, the German government was running amok. Germany had just reoccupied the Rhineland in violation of the Treaty of Versailles. Temperatures were running high.

Hogan watched up close as Ambassador Robert Bingham pushed for stronger ties between the U.S. and Great Britain and decried the rise of fascism and Nazism. Then along came Ambassador Joseph Kennedy, who got behind Prime Minister Chamberlain's appeasement strategy. Hogan was dismayed by what he saw as the British government's failure of nerve, and requested reassignment stateside. By the summer of 1938, he was home, polishing his combat maneuvers; by the spring of 1939, he was back in England, training pilots to take on what was clearly a growing Nazi threat.

Hogan looked back on those days—especially his time in London—with great fondness and had become quite taken with the plucky British people. It was no doubt one reason why he'd taken to Newkirk so quickly. There was something familiar about him.

A spring morning, Grosvenor Square, 1936. The robins were singing, and Captain Robert E. Hogan was whistling along with them as he walked to work. He felt like a lucky son of a gun. Not even six years out of West Point, and here he was in London, assigned to the U.S. Embassy. With advanced pilot training and assignments in Hawaii, Panama and the Philippines under his belt, Hogan was on a fast track for advancement in the U.S. Army Air Corps.

Mayfair was one of the prettiest parts of London, but you still had to be careful. In a city of great wealth and crushing poverty, thieves were about, especially in posh areas like Mayfair. So his hackles were raised when he spied band of ruffians, an adult man and three or four teenagers, who were approaching him and jostling one another as they made their way down the street. They were probably on their way to work at menial jobs—sweeping streets, delivering coal, digging ditches. When they swarmed around him to pass, his hand instinctively went to his wallet. That was when a little boy, tagging along at the back of the pack, sprawled at his feet and began crying.

"Ow! You tr-trod on my arm!" he protested. He sobbed so pitifully that Hogan picked the little fellow up.

Captain Hogan's eyes turned to the crowd that had just passed, but no one stopped to help the child, who was now holding onto his lapels, wide-eyed and weepy. Turning his attention back to the boy in his arms, Hogan asked, "Are you with them?"

The little boy nodded seriously. "P-p-put me down so I can catch up, mmmister!" he sniffed. He was a grubby little thing with brown hair and light eyes and looked to be seven or eight, though who knew. Hogan wasn't an expert on kids.

"Tell me first—are you all right?" He put the kid down and inspected his badly scraped knee. "Come with me and I'll tape it up," he offered. "I work right over there," he added, waving toward the embassy.

The boy hesitated as if he was considering the kindness, but he shook his head. "No," he said, "my old mmmman will be l-looking for me."

"All right, off with you," Hogan said. "They haven't gone too far." He watched as the boy skittered away down the street.

Hogan was climbing the steps to the embassy a few minutes later when he felt a tug on his sleeve. It was the kid.

"You dropped this, mmmister," the boy said. His eyes—very wide and very green, Hogan realized—looked serious and misty as he handed over a leather wallet. Hogan patted his pocket. He hadn't even realized it was missing. What a swell kid!

"Thanks," Hogan said as the boy ran down the street, pausing to peek over his shoulder as he reached the street corner. As Hogan settled into his office, he took off his jacket and noticed one of his captain bars was missing. He must have lost it in the scuffle.

Hogan emerged from his daydream and realized he hadn't thought of that incident for years, although it had long bothered him. He wasn't sure if he'd been pickpocketed or just careless enough to drop his wallet. Either way, it surprised him every time he thought of it that the kid had returned with his wallet. If he'd stolen it, why didn't he keep it? And if he found it, what made him so sure it was Hogan's and what gave him the nerve to run after an adult?

Hogan pulled out a book, and took out the note that was tucked inside it. It was the letter Newkirk had written; Hogan hadn't destroyed it, because he hadn't stopped thinking about it.

Newkirk was right; he'd earned the right to stay, even though London still disagreed. Hogan knew he'd have to negotiate that. But Newkirk didn't just want to stay; he also emphatically did not want to go home. Not to London, but home. What was he avoiding there?

Hogan's eyes went back to the same passage in the letter that he'd read dozens of times:

All my friends are here and being with them teaches me to be a beter man. Also, my dad will hurt me and you won't.

Yes, he had no doubt that Kinch, LeBeau and Carter were a positive influence, three good men that Newkirk had already begun to emulate. But what was he saying about his father? Was he afraid of him? He read the sentence again:

Also, my dad will hurt me and you won't.

Whatever Newkirk was saying, it was clear he had complete trust in one man – Colonel Robert E. Hogan – to look after him. And Hogan was not about to let him down.

I knew about Joseph Kennedy, but didn't know much about the Ambassador before him until I decided to research it. I like the idea that Hogan was already in England as early as 1936 when the signs were increasing that a war would be coming.

And yes, that' s Newkirk. He would have been 10, not 7 or 8, but I think he was probably a scrawny, underfed little guy.