CHAPTER 4
The poker game in Barracks 2 was in high gear. There was a knock on the door. Before the men could hide the cards, the door opened. Schultz stepped in, with Doofenshmirtz behind him.
Newkirk, the dealer, breathed a sigh of relief. "Oh, it's you, Schultzie."
Hogan looked up from his cards. "Didn't your mother teach you to knock, Schultz?"
Schultz looked at the men around the table: Hogan, Newkirk, Garlotti, Kinchloe, and Langenscheidt. "It is against regulations for guards to fraternize with prisoners. Out," he ordered the German corporal.
"But, Sarge, I'm winning," Langenscheidt protested.
"Yeah, winning the money you lost yesterday," Kinch pointed out.
"Out, Langenscheidt. Doofenshmirtz and I need to talk to Col. Hogan." Schultz's voice was more serious than usual.
Hogan laid his cards face down on the table. "We can go into my quarters, if this is private." Schultz waited until Langenscheidt had gathered up his money and left the barracks before he answered. "Nein, that is not necessary. You will tell your men anyway; they might as well hear."
LeBeau lay in his bunk, reading a two week old newspaper. He looked up from the Dusseldorf Stern."What's wrong, Schultzie?"
"You know that I know nothing. I am happier that way. I do not want to see anything out of the ordinary. It is better for me that way. It is better for you that way. But," the portly sergeant held up a finger for emphasis, "you know that I know that you are not ordinary prisoners."
"Well, I like to think that my men are above average, but most COs are biased in favor of their troops." Hogan kept his voice nonchalant as he eyed Doofenshmirtz. Schultz didn't know everything about their operation, but he knew more than he should. If London ever found out how much Schultz did know, Hogan mused, they'd probably order him to shoot the sergeant. Doofenshmirtz, however, was an ordinary guard. As far as Hogan knew, he did know anything about the POWs' "extracurricular activities."
"Col. Hogan," Schultz chided, using much the same tone as he did when his children claimed not to have known who broke the cookie jar.
Hogan said nothing.
"Private Doofenshmirtz has a problem. I think you can help him. But after that," Schultz warned, "I know nothing and I do not want to know anything."
Sighing, Hogan glanced at Garlotti, then at one of the empty bunks. Garlotti took the hint and stood up. As he scooted out of the way, Hogan gestured at the empty chair.
Schultz sat down where Langenscheidt had been. Doofenshmirtz took Garlotti's seat. Schultz nodded at Doofenshmirtz. The young private pulled his wallet out of his pocket. Then he removed a photograph of a young boy from his wallet.
"Cor, 'oo's that? Little Lord Fauntleroy?" asked Newkirk.
"That is Prinz Fritz," Doofenshmirtz said.
"Qui?" LeBeau asked.
"His Royal Highness Prinz Wilhelm-Friedrich," Doofenshmirtz replied. "Crown Prince of Drüselstein."
"Cute kid," Hogan acknowledged.
"It is not safe for him in Germany," Doofenshmirtz said.
"It's not safe for anybody in Germany these days," Kinch muttered under his breath.
"Because of the Anschluss, Drüselstein is now part of the Greater German Domain. And that is logical," Doofenshmirtz said hastily, as if not wanting to disparage the Führer's plans in public. "We speak the same language, we listen to the same music, we eat the same food. We are - we were - a small country, small and weak, and Germany is strong."
"So's a skunk," Kinch muttered.
"But if - if Drüselstein is part of Germany now, it is ... inconvenient for the royal family to be there, reminding people we were once independent. And the Gestapo has a way of making inconveniences ... disappear."
"But he's only a kid," Carter said.
"Like that's gonna stop the bloody Gestapo," Newkirk scoffed.
"That might not stop the Gestapo," Hogan admitted. "Unfortunately, there's not much I can do about your prince. I'm a POW, not a babysitter."
"But you - you know things, you do things," Doofenshmirtz half-pleaded, half-protested.
"Did you see the barbed wire, Obersoldat? Did you see the men in feldgrau with rifles?" Hogan asked. "They're not here to keep burglars out. They're here to keep us in." The colonel shook his head. "Sorry, there's nothing I can do to help you."
"Herr Oberst." Doofenshmirtz looked up at him. His brown eyes were like a puppy's eyes, begging to be taken for a walk or have a stick tossed.
Hogan steeled himself against the puppy dog eyes. He'd had practice, resisting Carter.
"Fritz's father enlisted in the German army, to prove his loyalty. Der Führer sent him to the Russian Front, to prove his courage." Doofenshmirtz's face was pale. Men who were sent to the Russian Front seldom came home.
" 'Ard luck, that," Newkirk said quietly.
"He is not just the hope of a nation. He is a little boy - a frightened little boy - far from his home and family," Doofenshmirtz explained.
Hogan bit his lip. He thought quickly. He wanted to help. London would want to help, if they knew. Not only would it be spitting in Adolf's eye, proving the annexed lands like Austria and the Sudetenland weren't the docile little lambs the Nazis liked to pretend they were, but most of the officers at Whitehall were diehard royalists. Helping a prince, even a foreign prince from some country smaller than Rhode Island, would strike them as the right and proper thing to do.
The only problem was, helping the kid meant Obersoldat Doofenshmirtz would know more about them and their operation than Hogan dared permit.
Hogan said nothing.
Schultz stood. He took a few steps toward the colonel's quarters. "Colonel, a word in your ear, bitte schön." Hogan followed him. The sergeant lowered his voice. "Col. Hogan, I have a Fritz, too."
