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Chapter Three
31 October 1944
Newkirk sat at the common room table, his diary open and a pencil in hand. The Englishman wasn't writing an entry, despite the fact that the pencil was moving smoothly over the page. Back and forth it went, pausing only occasionally as the man holding it stopped what he was doing to study the results.
Le Beau turned away from the stove he was cooking—and warming himself—at, and looked at his barracks-mate thoughtfully. "You know, if you want to look convincing, mon ami, you should take more breaks when you write. When people are writing from their thoughts, their rhythms are irregular."
Laying the pencil aside, Newkirk stretched out his hand and shrugged. "What do you mean by that, mate?"
Le Beau came and sat across from the Englishman. "I mean you will never fool anyone who really writes in a diary that you are doing anything but moving your pencil across the page." He craned his neck and took a triumphant look at Newkirk's open book. Sure enough, a few scribbles but no actual words. He sat back as Newkirk almost defensively closed the diary. "And when you write from the heart, you rarely go back and check to see if what you have written is okay, because what you feel is always right, whether it is acceptable or not." A pause. "If you do not want to write in the diary, Pierre, why do you not just leave it alone?"
"I don't want to keep a diary, Louis." Newkirk pushed the book away and shook his head. "It makes me feel like I'm back in short pants again almost every time I open the ruddy thing. I kept a copybook when I was a lad, though." The Englishman's voice grew quiet. "Until it was taken from me and burned. Rather lost my taste for it after that. I only get this bloody thing out now and then to humor the gov'nor."
Louis screwed up his face distastefully, then picked up Newkirk's abandoned book and started flicking through the pages. "You draw very well," he remarked casually. "Did you know that I kept a diary the entire time I was at the Dulag and at the Wetzlar camp?" he asked.
"Just a few scribbles now and then; nothing much to look at, really." Newkirk brushed aside the comment on his artwork and went on. "Why'd you do that? I can't think of a single thing I'd want to remember from back then."
Le Beau shrugged. "Call it self-preservation," he said. "Or… maybe I wanted the world to know that I was here, and to understand what it is that men went through, when I am no longer around to tell them myself. I certainly am not the first man to want to shout 'I was here!' from the mountaintop, when things looked their bleakest."
"Never really thought about it like that before, mate." Newkirk went quiet for several moments. "But who would be interested in reading about any of this after it's all done? Most folks'll probably find it strange that grown men would keep a journal anyway."
Le Beau laughed heartily. "Did Napoleon Bonaparte think no one would want to know about what happened before Waterloo? And do not all the kings and queens of England keep memoirs? What makes them any better than us? Who wants to know about all this, you ask? How else will anyone know what happened here, if the people who were here do not tell them?"
Le Beau finished his spirited outpouring, then tapped the book that he had put back on the table. "The YMCA has done a good thing, I think, Pierre. Being able to write out my thoughts when I was first captured was what kept me sane. My diary is the thing I treasured the most during that time. I would have guarded it with my life."
After a moment, Newkirk reached into his pocket and pulled out a worn coin, slowly running it through his fingers as he spoke. "I can understand that, Louis. I told myself jokes and sang every song I'd ever learned from the time I woke up to the time I went to bed. That either entertained the Jerries enough that they left me alone, or they thought I'd gone round the twist and wasn't worth bothering any more." A pause, and the coin stopped moving. "If they'd forced me to be quiet, I don't think I could have handled those first few weeks."
"Maybe they were new jokes then," Louis said with a small smile. Newkirk smiled weakly back. "I am not making fun, Pierre. It is how you survived. We all did something different." He looked toward Hogan's closed door, and shook his head slowly. "I am just saying that when Colonel Hogan told us to use these diaries, I understood. When we are here in a prisoner of war camp, we are afraid to tell anyone how we feel, and we are in almost unreal circumstances here, non? We must be particularly careful about everything we say and do. But if we can write… some of the pressure is taken away."
Kinch had walked into the barracks in the middle of the Frenchman's explanation. He walked up to the table, nodding. "That's right," he agreed, looking from one man to the other. "Having said that, though, I didn't write anything about the other night—you know, about being caught out in the open like that." Le Beau raised his eyebrows in surprise. "Sure, it was scary. But if I put anything in that diary about it, I'd have to write in the tunnel—and I already spend half my life down there; no thanks!"
"Cor, mate! No arguin' with you there. I'm downstairs as much as you are, what with all the work on the Kraut uniforms I'm always doing, so I think I'll go along with you on not puttin' anything down on paper that shouldn't be seen by unfriendly eyes." Newkirk grinned at Kinch, but the smile faded as he turned back to Le Beau. "That does tend to toss a spanner in the works, though, as far as being able to write in the ruddy things the way the Colonel intended."
"I don't think it matters so much which way we do it, as long as we do it." Le Beau paused. "And besides, I am writing in the tunnel now, thanks to my own mistake. But I do not mind. I can visit Kinch!"
Kinch smiled. "Are you expecting me to be down there all that often, Louis?" he asked.
Le Beau shrugged. "Who knows?" he replied. He looked at Newkirk. "You see? It is not such a bad thing to write in a diary. You will have a lot of company!"
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Kinch sat at the radio, trying to stay awake while he waited for a call confirming that all had gone to plan in a rendezvous with the Underground. Letting out a huge yawn, he dug into his back pocket, where he had shoved his journal before descending the ladder to the tunnel below the barracks. He flattened the curled-up edges, grabbed a pencil from the desk, and moved over to the cot he had set up nearby.
Figured I'd take a few minutes to write in this thing while I'm waiting for… something else to happen. I'm not about to write what that thing is, though, or according to the rules, I won't be able to write in this… where I want to. If I ever bother reading this again years from now, that might not even make sense. But right now, I don't want it to make sense to anyone but me.
I walked in on an interesting conversation today. Louis and Newkirk were debating whether writing in a YMCA diary was worth doing—or even helpful. Turns out Louis wrote in a diary when he was at the Dulag and Wetzlar, so he's pretty keen on it. I didn't write anything when I was in those two places. No matter what Louis says about people needing to know what it was like from the people who were there, I won't be saying very much. Just like I know Colonel Hogan went through Hell before he came here, and he never talks about it. I wasn't real happy with my experiences either, and I'll always have them burned somewhere in my brain. But will I ever tell anyone else about them? That I can't answer. But I'm not writing it in a diary, at least not yet. Some things I'd rather forget about for awhile.
You know, I wonder sometimes if that's part of what makes me and the Colonel work so well together. There's not a person who hasn't looked at Hogan a little funny at least once when we've been spotted deep in conversation somewhere in camp. Some day, an American officer spending time with a colored man isn't going to make people even bat an eye. But I can sense Colonel Hogan's moods pretty well, and I can tell when he's going all dark and sad inside. He tries hard to hide it—I think the man was born to hide his feelings, which makes him equally born to have an ulcer—but when he's feeling the pressure a little more than usual, I think he senses somehow that I understand, and we end up playing chess, or talking about nothing, or just having a cup of lousy coffee together. I don't push him, and I don't poke my nose in. I'm just there. And sometimes I think that's all he needs to get himself going again. So I'm happy to do that for him—the same way I know he's happy to be there for me, for all of us. And he has been, time and time again.
Peter wasn't really writing in his diary at all. I think he planned to just make it look like he was and then let it go. Louis said he reminded Peter that England's royalty kept journals, and if they could do it, why couldn't Newkirk? Well, Newkirk's nothing if not proud of England's royalty—King and Country, and all that. So if diaries are good enough for them, maybe they'll be good enough for him.
I just looked back and realized I've rambled my way through two full pages in this thing without thinking about it. I didn't intend to write anything I just wrote. Maybe what's good enough for King and Country is good enough for me, too.
And there goes what I was waiting for. If nothing else, these books are good for passing time.
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Had an interesting chat this afternoon. I was mucking about with this book, and Louis caught me out. Even though I thought he was busy cooking, it seems he was paying more attention to things going on around him than I gave him credit for. That, or he knows me a bit too well, but no wonder there, as long as we've been stuck in this rotten hole together.
Anyway, he took me to task about pretending to make an entry, and I'll admit I was surprised when he said he'd kept a diary before coming to Stalag 13—said it kept him sane. Surprised myself even more by talking about my time at Wetzlar, but he understood. Got a big heart, my little mate does.
He made a good point about writing in here, though, and it was something I hadn't really thought much about. After the war is over, this book will probably wind up in the bottom of a trunk in an attic somewhere, and who knows, a grand-nephew or a grandson—if I should be fortunate enough to have children of my own some day—will read what's in it. I know that the things I've seen and done during this God-awful war have changed me, and not always for the better. This might be my only chance to explain how I became such a barmy old codger when all was said and done.
That said, I'll try and write more often, but I can't promise to put down everything that goes on here. Some things just aren't meant to be known or remembered.
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It occurred to me today that I have mainly used a diary to discuss the terrible things that have happened to me since I was captured by les Boches. But I have left out the other side of this whole experience. And that is that I have some of the most wonderful friends I could ever imagine having. I told Newkirk today that I used to use my diary to stay sane. And that many men in the past have used them to simply make their mark in history—to tell the world that they were here. But I should also use mine to tell people that if I lived for 100 years, I would never find people to whom I could tell so very much and feel so very close. We live packed together like sardines, we are woken at all hours of the day and night to be counted, we risk our lives every day—something I can say now that I am stuck writing this in the tunnel anyway—and we have seen each other at our best and our worst.
These are my brothers. And strange as it sounds, since I could not have met these men if the Krauts had not started causing trouble… there must be one thing which has come out of this war, which is worth cherishing.
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Hey, tonight turned out pretty good. It's Halloween, and if I was home, I'd be down at the Harvest Dance and the Costume Contest down at the old Methodist church. But I'm not home, I'm in a POW camp in the middle of Nazi Germany, so the Harvest Dance is a little hard to get to. But Newkirk made a jack o'lantern—we didn't have any pumpkins; he used a turnip!
It was a real celebration, though—I mean, considering that if we went outside too late we could get shot. There was real bread, and Louis made some great soup—we used the leftovers of the turnip, too. The only thing missing was real apple cider. Even Colonel Hogan came and listened while Kinch told some really scary ghost stories. I wish the turnip was big enough to keep a candle lit in the middle of it all night—some of those tales made the hair on the back of my neck stand up!
If we ever get out of here, I'm never gonna forget the scariest Halloween of all—with the best friends I could ever hope for. Even in a POW camp!
