Chapter Sixteen

Reunion

Hogan stopped outside the medical hut and drew in a deep breath. He had dreaded the possibility of having to do this, and though he always knew it might happen, he still felt like he was caught in the middle of some surreal nightmare, and trying desperately to fight his way out. The camp was strangely quiet; there were very few prisoners in the compound, and those that were milling around stayed far away from him, dressed as he was in German uniform. Hogan understood, having learned in his brief stay here that these men would expect nothing but abuse from the enemy.

Hogan knew Newkirk's body was waiting inside, and he tried to prepare himself for what he was about to see. Never caring about the prisoners in life, Brinkfried would hardly have cleaned up the Englishman in his death, and again Hogan felt a profound sense of responsibility to maintain Newkirk's dignity, even though he knew the man's spirit was gone. "It's all right, Peter," Hogan whispered to himself again; "I'm coming."

He forced his unwilling feet to move and opened the door to the medical hut. He stepped inside the doorway and tried to scan the room. The beds were empty—a miracle, Hogan thought, considering how he thought the prisoners who had been left behind would be treated by Brinkfried and his goons after he and Newkirk had left.

Then, in the back of the room, he saw two men, sitting on a bunk facing away from him, hunched over another bed almost hidden from Hogan's view. The Colonel saw a loose blanket draped over a pair of feet, and as he stepped further into the room, his heart racing and his body trembling, one of the two who had been holding vigil at the still form turned around. Hogan recognized him; it was Bramer, one of the men who had befriended Newkirk when they arrived. Clearly he had come to say goodbye, or perhaps to protect Newkirk from any further indignities himself. Hogan met his eye and swallowed hard, his eyes filling with tears that he could not shed, not now, not again until he was alone.

Flight Sergeant Bramer stared at the man who had just walked in, his eyes cold and hard on seeing someone he'd thought was a fellow prisoner, but who was now decked out in the uniform of a high-ranking German officer. "Hawkins, turn around and have a look at the cuckoo we had in our nest."

Corporal Hawkins turned, then quickly got to his feet when he realized who and what he was seeing. "Traitor!" he spat out. "Should have bloody well known you were too good to be true! Why'd you bother to come back anyway? To gloat over what you've done?"

Hogan absorbed the verbal blows, understanding them but feeling their deep cuts nonetheless. Trying, he hoped successfully, to control his voice, Hogan said huskily, "I've come to get Kirkland."

Bramer took a half step forward. "Why? Haven't you damned Nazis done enough to him already? Besides, he's in no shape to be answering questions anyway." Hawkins moved up beside his Sergeant as Bramer spoke, making it quite clear that they were not only standing their ground, they were doing it together.

"It's not what it looks like." Hogan felt a cold hand tighten around his throat, and he had to blink hard to maintain his composure. For a second, he broke eye contact with the defiant Englishmen, then when he raised his head again he tried to be strong. "I just need to take him away from here. This is how I got back into camp."

"'Not what it looks like,' he says." Hawkins started forward, his fists balled up and ready. "I'll tell you what it ruddy well looks like, Herr General. It looks—" He was cut off as Bramer grabbed the much larger Corporal by the arm and tried, without much success, to haul him away from Hogan.

Hogan straightened and braced himself for an attack. He didn't want to fight these men. He wanted nothing more than to get out of here once and for all. "There are things you can't know about," Hogan began, feeling himself reaching his breaking point. "Things he and I were working on together. Now please, just let me get him, and we'll get out of here."

Hawkins shook Bramer off his arm and was moving forward again when a low, distinctly Cockney voice came from behind them. "Gov'nor?"

Bramer quickly glanced over his shoulder. "Be quiet; we'll handle this." The Flight Sergeant practically jumped forward, again grabbing Hawkins by the arm, but this time managing to spin him around and far enough away from Hogan to keep the Corporal from making the fatal mistake of striking a German officer. Bramer kept pushing Hawkins even further away, finally backing the man up against a wall. "Stand down, Corporal! I want a piece of him as much as you do, but it'll just get us all killed!"

Hogan took in none of that. The single word had shocked him to the core. He froze, his eyes wide, his head spinning, and for a minute he was sure he stopped breathing. Newkirk was dead; he had seen him fall. He had seen the Germans drag him away. He had watched, waited, grieved. It couldn't be Newkirk. It just couldn't. Hogan forced himself to look down at the bed, certain that it had been his imagination, and that all he would be seeing was a still body, with only memories to speak to him now.

But what he did see forced a small cry from his lips. There was Newkirk, struggling to sit up, eyes looking straight at Hogan, bandaged on the head and shoulder but clearly, unmistakably alive. Hogan felt himself getting light-headed. "Peter…" he gasped, unable to move more than a couple of steps toward the vision.

Newkirk nearly fainted with relief as he fell back on the bed. The pain lancing through his skull from even that small movement blurred his sight, but Nazi uniform be dammed, that was still his Colonel, and nothing could change the simple fact that Hogan was there. "Good to see you, mate," he managed to get out past the rush of emotions that threatened to choke him. "I knew you'd come back for me."

"I promised," Hogan whispered before he could realize it would make no sense to the Englishman. Bramer and Hawkins looked on, confused. Hogan moved tentatively toward the bed. "I thought… I was sure you were…" Hogan stopped, overwhelmed, unable to say the words, and shook his head, frustrated with himself and his lack of emotional control.

The Englishman took a deep breath, and made another attempt to sit up. He tried grabbing the sides of the cot with both hands, then did his best to stifle a moan of pain as the effort wrenched his injured shoulder.

Hogan reacted automatically, moving in swiftly and easing Newkirk back down onto the bed. "Easy, boy, easy," he said, as the Englishman accepted the ministrations without protest. Hogan stopped now and looked at his friend. Then he found himself speechless again. "You always did know how to get a rise out of me," he said, his voice still a whisper.

"Someone's gotta keep you on the hop, Colonel." Newkirk reached out and took a tight grip on Hogan's arm with a trembling hand. "Can't have things go too easy for you now, can we, mate?" He smiled briefly, then let his hand fall away as his eyes slowly closed. "No... that wouldn't do at all," he whispered softly.

Hogan wanted to laugh in relief, but he felt too weak to do it. Instead he just contented himself with watching Newkirk breathe steadily. "I'm getting you out of here," Hogan said. "Today. And I'll get Wilson to give you a going over, so you'll be better than you were before by the time he's done." He squeezed the Corporal's arm. "Give me a minute and we'll be gone." He looked up at Bramer and Hawkins. "Help me get him outside. There's a truck waiting."

"I don't know what's going on here, but you're not taking him anywhere, not if we can stop it." Bramer walked over and stood protectively beside the cot. "This man is a member of my command, and I'm making an official protest under the Geneva Convention about the way he's been treated since his arrival here." The Flight Sergeant paused, and gave Hogan a thin smile that was loaded with irony. "The horse might be long since out of the barn on this one, but it's high time you Jerries started following the rules of civilized warfare for a change. Of course, you might just stand me up against the wall for this, but I'm having my say before you do."

"Hang about there, mate." Newkirk's eyes came open on hearing Bramer's words, and he gave the Sergeant an urgent look. "He's no bleedin' Kraut; he's one of us. A Yank at any rate." A pause while Newkirk caught his breath. "He's the gov'nor, a real china... and I trust him with my life."

"He's not what you think, Kirkland—he's a Kraut," Bramer replied. "He's been fooling you all along." He paused. "And why did he call you Peter? I thought you said your name was Richard."

Hogan shook himself when he realized he had given away part of Newkirk's true identity. No matter what, no matter when, he wasn't supposed to do that. He had let this whole situation get on top of him, and no matter how deeply he felt something, he could not afford to put his men's lives at risk by losing control of his thoughts for even a second. Hogan glanced around the room to be sure no one else had come in. "I think we owe you two an explanation. But if it leaves this room, we're both dead, and so are a lot of other innocent people."

"Righto, gov'nor. I think we need to tell them the truth." Hogan nodded. Newkirk's voice, though weak, was steady. "My real name is Peter Newkirk, and I really am a Corporal in the RAF. The gov'nor here is Colonel Robert Hogan, US Army Air Corps." The Englishman took a breath, closing his eyes for a moment before continuing. "He's as real as they come, Bramer, the genuine article all the way, mate."

Hawkins and Bramer exchanged doubtful looks, but waited quietly for more.

"We're sabotage and intelligence," Hogan said briefly. "We were out on a mission the other night and things went haywire. We can't explain much more to you, but please believe me, this uniform is nothing but a means to an end." Hogan paused. "I've had too many run-ins with the real live ones to ever want to put this on for pleasure. We have to get back to Stalag 13 or our whole operation will be in jeopardy." He looked at Newkirk, who seemed to be fading fast. "We have a truck waiting to take us there, where Newkirk can get proper medical attention, and we can get back to work." He looked from one man to the other, then added, "You don't need to believe us. But if I was really a Kraut, do you think I'd go through the trouble of explaining all this to you? Not the goons I've met. Nor the ones you have, from what I've seen here."

"Hang about. You said Stalag 13, didn't you?" Hawkins raised an eyebrow as he glanced at Bramer. "That's the one they call 'escape proof,' innit?"

"It is," replied Bramer. "But I've also heard some of the guards talking once in a while about some rather unusual goings-on in that area. Important Germans going missing, numerous acts of sabotage..." The Flight Sergeant's voice trailed off as he gave Hogan a thoughtful look.

"Let's take 'em with us, Colonel." Newkirk rubbed his eyes before opening them again. "I can't think of two blokes that deserve the chance to scarper more than they do." He looked up at Hogan with a faint smile. "That's sorted then."

Hogan considered protesting, but was by now too tired and too overwhelmed to put up much of an argument. What man didn't deserve a chance to get out? He nodded. "I outrank you again, Corporal," he said, trying to offer a smile that for some reason seemed hard to come by. "So from now on you take your orders from me." Hogan looked at Bramer and Hawkins. "You'll have to do exactly as I say if you want out. Get whatever you need to take with you and meet us here in five minutes."

"That's easy," Hawkins said, still not believing what was happening; "I carry everything that I hold precious. There's nothing else in this hole I want to remember."

"Me, too," Bramer added with a nod.

"Even better," said Hogan. "So you get a stretcher and you move Newkirk to the truck. It's waiting in the middle of the compound. If anyone questions you, you say you're following the orders of General Peiper. I guarantee you, they won't hold you up after that."

"General Peiper?" Bramer echoed. "Who's that?"

Hogan nodded minutely. "At your service," he said. "Get moving. We have a stop to make before we get back to Stalag 13." Hogan bent down over Newkirk, who was starting to fade back to sleep. "We'll have to have the Gestapo bring us back into camp," he explained. Newkirk chuckled. "That's how the boys explained our absence."

"Bloody near close, they were," Newkirk mumbled in reply.

Hogan closed his eyes and breathed in a calming breath. "I know." He straightened. "I have something to attend to. I'll meet you at the truck. Don't be late."

----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- -----

"Hey, what's this all about?" Hawkins asked, nearly backing out of the truck as he saw Brinkfried sitting in the back with Townsend keeping a gun trained on the Major.

"Don't ask questions; get in the truck. All will be explained later," Hogan answered, putting on a German accent for Brinkfried's benefit.

Newkirk turned his eyes to Hogan, silently questioning the switch in accents until the stretcher was finally loaded into the truck and he could see the reason for it. Cor! What's that bastard doing here in the middle of everything? He started to say something, but realized at the last second that as he didn't know the game that the Colonel was running here, he'd best keep his mouth shut, at least for now. That turned out to be an easy task, as his eyes slid closed again of their own will, and exhaustion claimed his mind and body once again.

Bramer and Hawkins hesitated, clearly considering pulling Newkirk back out of the truck and turning tail back toward the barracks. "Raus!" Hogan barked, and with a nod he urged the pair inside. Townsend, who with wide eyes watched a very alive RAF Corporal loaded into the truck, maintained his silence and continued guarding Brinkfried. When Hogan had come earlier to make sure all was well, he had not indicated that Newkirk was alive or that anyone else would be joining them. In fact, he had made it a point of continuing the charade of being a German General. What was going on?

Hogan made sure everyone was in and secured, then took over for Townsend. "Drive, Schatzie," he said abruptly. "Let me look after our soon-to-be-departed friend." He smiled falsely at Brinkfried. "I brought along some of the other Englanders. I know how much you enjoy their company."

They had traveled along for about twenty minutes when a particularly rough jolt from the road brought Newkirk around again. He brought his hand up to his head in a futile effort to ease the pain. When that didn't help, he opened his eyes to see Major Brinkfried staring at him with undisguised hatred. A moment of panic set in on seeing the German officer, and he struggled to sit up, wanting nothing more than to get away from the man who had inflicted so much misery on him.

Hogan noticed and at once was kneeling over the Englishman. "Relax, Newkirk; this tiger's toothless now," Hogan said in his own voice. He looked up at Brinkfried as Newkirk settled down. "You've got a problem, Major. You're surrounded by people who despise you."

Newkirk took a deep breath and nodded ever so slightly. "Righto, gov'nor. Sorry about that. Guess I forgot where I was for a second there." He turned his head enough to look at Brinkfried. "He's right about that. If I were anything like you, I'd dump you in a ditch somewhere with a bullet in the back of your sick, twisted skull." A pause to breathe and collect his thoughts. "But you're lucky that our side doesn't operate that way."

The Major kept his gaze fixed on Newkirk, the man he was rapidly coming to believe was responsible for his downfall. He wondered why the General didn't silence the insolent Corporal permanently; in fact he was starting to wonder why this General Peiper actually seemed to care about the Englishman's well-being at all. "The likes and the dislikes of the English do not concern me," he said with forced disinterest.

"Well, they will soon," Hogan answered. Brinkfried merely raised an eyebrow. "You see, Major, you're not going to the Russian front." Hogan noticed Hawkins and Bramer looking at each other in confusion. "You're going to England."

Brinkfried gave a start, but Hogan raised his pistol just a little higher, and pointed it a little more sharply. The German backed down almost immediately. "I didn't lie to you back in your office, Brinkfried; I'm not Private Jim Dane." Hogan leaned in closer, as if he were sharing an intimacy with the Major. He chuckled and spoke softly. "But I'm not General Peiper either." Brinkfried's face took on a look of alarm. "I run a bit of a Travelers' Aid Society, Brinkfried… sending boys back to England so they can live to fight another day, blowing up railroad tracks," he added, watching for the German's reaction as it dawned on the Major exactly what Hogan was referring to, "relocating troublesome camp Kommandants…"

Hogan leaned back out of Brinkfried's personal space and gestured vaguely to Bramer and Hawkins. "These two fine young RAF men are going to escort you back to England, with a little help from the Underground. You will never be in charge of a prisoner of war camp again. God bless the men whose lives you've already irreparably damaged. I can't change what's already happened, but by God, I can stop it from happening again. I promise you, if you so much as put a toe out of place, you'll be dead."

Bramer and Hawkins looked at each other, both wondering just exactly what they'd gotten themselves into, but the sincerity in Hogan's voice was compelling. They wanted to believe what the American was saying, but it sounded so impossible. Their thoughts were interrupted when a weak chuckle came from their fellow Englishman lying on the stretcher at their feet.

"When we send 'im out, gov'nor, can I have his uniform? If I take it in a bit, it'll fit like it was made for me." Newkirk looked up at Brinkfried and grinned. "And it'll give me a good laugh knowing that he knows one of us 'damned Englanders' is wearing his uniform and his decorations while giving his precious homeland a knock for six."

Hogan offered a wry grin in return. "I'm sure that can be arranged. And I'll be more than happy to personally help you rip the ribbons off his chest." He dropped his smile as the truck came to a stop.

"We're here, Colonel," Townsend said.

Hogan nodded and looked out of the back of the truck, visibly pulling himself back into command mode, one that Newkirk knew was accompanied by as little detectable emotion as possible. He looked at the Englishman, his voice suddenly rough. "I'll be back in a minute," he said.

Newkirk frowned at the sudden change in the American's demeanor. "Colonel Hogan?" he asked, his voice full of concern. "What's going on?" He gripped the edge of the stretcher with his good hand and tried to pull himself up so he could see out the back of the truck.

Hogan shook his head and tried to get Newkirk to lie back down without success. "Just scattering the troops, so to speak. Don't concern yourself," he said. "I know three men who are going to want to see you."

Newkirk nodded toward the patch of woods that he could see from where he was lying. "We're about a half a mile from camp, because I'd know that lightning-scarred tree over there day or night from all the times we've used it as a meeting point. So why would you be meeting them way out here now?" The Englishman's voice faded as a thought slowly formed in his mind. "Blimey, gov'nor," he whispered. "You came to Stalag 2 thinking I was dead, didn't you? Does that mean this is where you were going to..." Newkirk couldn't force the words out, because he suddenly didn't want to think any more.

Hogan turned away, blinking constantly, trying to keep his emotions in check. "We're going back to camp," he said hoarsely. He stared out to the quiet spot he had chosen earlier, and in his mind again saw himself digging the grave, reciting the Scriptures, offering his eternal friendship and loyalty. The unreal future memories sliced through him, in a way he didn't want to share with the Corporal. He would have to deal with it on his own, later. "Wilson will look after you."

"Colonel Hogan, I..." Once again, Newkirk's voice trailed off, but this time it was because he didn't know what to say. There were a hundred things that he wanted to say, that needed to be said, but he just couldn't find the right words. Finally, he settled on something simple, though he felt it wasn't nearly enough to say to the man that had risked his own life to bring home someone he thought was dead. "Thank you, sir. For... everything."

Hogan nearly broke at that, and so he jumped roughly out of the truck and started walking away. "Just stay there," he said gruffly over his shoulder.

"How touching." Brinkfried's voice, dripping with sarcasm, broke the silence after Hogan left the truck. "Perhaps I've been wrong about you Englanders. It's possible that you actually can learn after all. You seem to be quite loyal after you've been trained."

Anything else the German was going to say was lost when Bramer and Hawkins grabbed him by the arms and frog-marched him right out the front of the truck. "We'll fix this bastard for you, Corporal. Take him out for a little walk and give the air in here a chance to clear." The Flight Sergeant's tone promised a very rough go of things for the former Kommandant if he put up any resistance.

Group Captain Townsend, who had been silently observing the entire scene from his place in the driver's seat, was nearly bowled over when the three men came out through the front of the truck. He felt it was a wise move to accompany his fellow RAF men as they hustled their prisoner away from the truck and into the edge of the woods; he was almost, but not quite, sure that the pair wouldn't do anything to the German.

Meanwhile, Hogan's men watched their commanding officer approaching, taking in his stiff gait, noting the still-present limp and the ugly bruises that did nothing to hide his white face and strained expression. They looked at him solemnly when he came to stand before them. "I'm… sorry," Hogan whispered before they had a chance to speak.

Hogan's men looked at each other, concerned. "Colonel?" Kinch said.

"I let you think…" Hogan faltered. "I was wrong," he said. "I was wrong—come back to the truck. Newkirk wants to see you."

The men looked at Hogan, at first not understanding what he'd just said. Le Beau was the first to move, tearing his eyes off the Colonel and running to the vehicle. "Pierre! Tu êtes vivants! Mon Dieu, je n'ai pas cru que je tu verrais jamais de nouveau!" For once, the little Frenchman didn't need help to climb into the back of a truck as he caught sight of his friend lying on a stretcher, propped up on one elbow and looking back at him with a grin.

"It's good to see you again too, little mate." Newkirk blinked against the tears forming in his eyes as Le Beau took him in a careful embrace. "You have no idea how good it is," he whispered as the Frenchman released his hold and sat back.

"Welcome back, man," Kinch said, clapping the Englishman gently on the arm. He smiled softly. "Leave it to you to play for sympathy in such a dramatic way."

"'Play for sympathy,' he says." Newkirk shook his head slightly in deference to his massive headache. "If that's the case, remind me to do Macbeth the next time I want drama, mate. Be a lot easier on everyone that way."

Carter grinned, his broad smile not able to outshine the light in his eyes. "I'm really good at acting, Newkirk!" he said. "Would there be a part for me?"

Kinch shook his head and laughed. "I doubt there are any crazy Nazis in Macbeth," he said.

Newkirk laughed softly. "I'll give you a better part than that, Andrew. You deserve it." I've had my fill of crazy Nazis for a while, mate.

Hogan stood back from the truck, watching and listening. His men belonged together. This was right. He felt a profound sense of guilt for letting Le Beau, Kinch, and Carter believe wrongly that Newkirk was dead; judging from their rapport both now and in the past, he knew that the idea would have made them suffer terribly, and he regretted having made them suffer through it. Now, he knew they would be all right with Townsend, as long as they had each other.