Chapter Three: When Allies Speak Harshly and Enemies Speak Kindly

The air was cold and the snow crunched with every step Kinchloe took but these walks around the compound were the only time that he could be alone and think and not worry if his actions would cause some real or imagined offense.

He had been in Stalag Thirteen a couple of weeks and his impression of the place had not improved. He had quickly learned that it was best to stay out of the other prisoners' way, a difficult task when he was forced to spend most of his day in close proximity with eight other men.

So whenever the Germans allowed them out of the barracks, Kinchloe walked. While it was cold, the weather was no different than what he was used to in Detroit, although if he had ever walked in the snow dressed as he was here his mother would have had his hide.

To be honest, Kinchloe realized he should be thankful that he was healthy enough to walk. Shortly after his arrival in camp, he had gotten so sick that he had spent more time in the latrine than in his bunk. And while the worst of the sickness was now over, he still didn't feel like his usual self.

Would he ever in this miserable place?

He knew that he being a downer but today was going to be one of those days where it would be impossible not to feel sorry for himself. Not when mail had arrived and his fellow POWs were busy reading the latest news from their families while he had nothing. His brain tried to tell him that it was too early to expect anything but his heart hurt to think that his family still may not know if was alive or dead.

His father and Matthew would have their work at the factory and his sister had her job at the shop which Kinchloe hoped would help distract them during the difficult days. But his mother worked at home where every nook and cranny would remind her of her missing son. At least Eliza would be with her; his sister-in-law was a gentle, caring woman who he was confident would listen to his mother's fears. And grandfather, he would be home too. The Kinchloe patriarch had waited while his father had fought in the Civil War; he would help the family wait through this war too.

Still, he would have given almost anything to hold a letter written by their hands. To know that while he currently lived in a place where he was unwelcome that there was a place in this world where he was loved. To be reminded that there was a place where he was always welcome.

With a sigh, Kinchloe trudged back to the barracks only to immediately wish that he had remained outside in the cold where it was at quiet.

Slamming the lid of his trunk shut, LeBeau turned to face those in the barracks with his hands on his hips. "Alright, which one of you took my sewing kit?"

"On me bunk," Newkirk replied.

As LeBeau grabbed his kit, he said sarcastically, "Thank you for asking."

Newkirk shrugged. "Don't get your knickers in a twist. I only borrowed it."

"Without asking first! Do I have a sign on my trunk that says, 'Newkirk, take whatever you want?'"

Annoyed, Newkirk replied flippantly, "It would have to have a lock on it for me to think that."

Kinchloe guessed that was exactly the wrong answer for Newkirk to give because LeBeau's temper snapped. "You are nothing but an inconsiderate, pilfering English cheat!"

"Well, you're incapable of being anything other than a short-tempered, loudmouthed prat!"

Switching to French, LeBeau answered with a fast tirade that was full of what Kinchloe suspected were the equivalent of four letters in English but the vocabulary was beyond his abilities.

"Well whatever you said to you too!"

"I know we're in the middle of a war but can we have a little peace!" a frustrated Sergeant Bennett cried.

Newkirk faced his fellow countryman and demanded, "How am I supposed to make peace when he starts with that nonsense?"

LeBeau rambled on and this time Kinchloe was able to understand most of what the corporal was saying. Believing that things were only going to get worse, the American Sergeant decided to speak up. "He says French isn't nonsense and asks how you would feel if you never had anyone to speak English with."

The whole barracks immediately looked at Kinchloe, their faces all showing varying degrees of shock but none was more surprised than LeBeau. "You speak French!" he cried out in his own tongue.

"Read mostly," Kinchloe confessed. "I have not had many opportunities to practice speaking."

"I can hear that; your pronunciation needs work but I can teach you." LeBeau's face lit up at the prospect.

"Why not? It is not like we do not have the time. But first you need to talk to your friend."

"He is not my friend."

"Then why does he steal food for you?"

LeBeau shot Kinchloe a dirty look and for a moment the sergeant feared that he had overstepped his bounds.

"Quiet down!" Clayworth hollered as he rose from his bunk. "I have had enough of this bickering. And you…" the irate POW turned toward Kinchloe. "Just because you outrank them doesn't give you the right to order them around."

"He didn't…" LeBeau began.

"I'm not talking to you, Corporal," Clayworth snapped. The Englishman then turned his attention back to Kinchloe "Do you hear me?"

Kinchloe walked toward his bunk. He didn't have to take orders from Clayworth.

Brown moved to block his path. "You will answer when your betters speak, boy."

Kinchloe gritted his teeth. He outranked everyone in this barracks except Anderson but he was no fool. He knew that everyone expected him to defer to the white soldiers. His race mattered more than his rank. "I hear you, Sarge. It won't happen again."

"Kinchloe, do want to play a hand?"

Kinchloe looked up skeptically from the novel he was reading at the RAF corporal who was sitting at the table shuffling a deck of cards in his hands. Was the man serious?

Looking around, Kinchloe double-checked that he and Newkirk were the only prisoners currently in the barracks. Clayworth and Brown would be sure to say something if they found out he had accepted Newkirk's offer.

Suddenly, Kinchloe felt ashamed. He had lived here too and he had every right to that table and if he didn't start standing up for his rights then his fellow prisoners would continue to feel free to push him around for the rest of the war.

Jumping down to ground, Kinchloe replied, "Sure. But I don't have anything to bet."

Newkirk grinned. "No problem. Just a friendly game."

Kinchloe sat down at the table as Newkirk dealt. They played the first hand in silence and the American won easily. When he studied his next hand, Newkirk opened the conversation. "Look, yesterday with LeBeau. We didn't mean anything by it."

"I guessed you two were close," Kinchloe said.

Newkirk chuckled. "You can say that. He gets on your nerves, but you won't find a better mate in this camp."

Not knowing how to respond to that, the sergeant changed the subject. "You been here long?"

"Since the camp opened six months ago. Was at a couple of other camps before that."

"You were shot down early."

"Wasn't shot down. I was a mechanic who never made it out of Dunkirk."

Kinchloe privately whistled. No wonder Newkirk seemed so bitter at times; he'd been a prisoner from almost the beginning of the war. After exchanging two cards, he asked, "Ever think of escaping?"

"Who doesn't? I managed to get outside the wire a couple times. That's the easy part. The hard part is getting out of Germany. Don't know where to go."

Newkirk tried to give off an air of a man who didn't care but Kinchloe knew it was just an act. The English corporal would try again. He wasn't a man who would simply accept his imprisonment.

However, if Newkirk had trouble staying hidden after escaping camp what did that mean for Kinchloe's chances? One look at him and it would be clear that he was an escaped prisoner.

"Lay down your cards," Newkirk said as he showed a pair of kings.

Kinchloe grinned as played a full house. "I win this hand."

"Good thing this is just a friendly game."

Kinchloe studied his opponent. He had a nagging suspicion that the corporal's skill with cards was greater than his was letting on. Oh well, he let the Englander think he had him fooled.

As Newkirk shuffled, the door to the barracks opened and several POWs walked into the room. Newkirk dealt the next hand without a word but as Kinchloe picked up the cards he tensed up, unsure of how his barrack mates would respond to his presence on their 'side' of the hut.

Brown didn't disappoint. "Who let the trash sit at our table?"

Newkirk jumped to his feet. "Why you…" He was cut off by his countrymen O'Brien and Bennett grabbing his arms and pulling him to the side.

"This isn't our fight," Bennett hissed in Newkirk ear.

If Newkirk had a response, Kinchloe didn't hear it as at that moment Clayworth grabbed him by the collar and threw him off the bench and onto the floor.

Pushing down his rage, Kinchloe slowly rose to his feet and looked his tormenters in the eye. If this came to fists, he had no doubt that he could take Clayworth and Brown easy. His boxing days weren't that far behind him. However, he couldn't count on the rest of the barracks staying out of the fight and in a fight between white and colored, the colored man would always be seen as being in the wrong.

Clayworth's eyes promised nothing but hell as he yelled, "Are you deaf, nigger? I thought we told you to stay on your side of the barracks."

Kinchloe kept his mouth shut. There was no defense he could make that would defuse the situation and he was too proud to apologize for refusing to submit.

"That's enough!" Anderson ordered.

For a second Kinchloe dared hope that Anderson was coming to his defense but that second quickly passed. "Kinchloe, I want to see in my office now."

Closing the door behind, Kinchloe prepared himself to face an angry Anderson.

"What did you do?" the sergeant major demanded.

Kinchloe bristled. As he suspected, Anderson assumed that he had done something to provoke Clayworth and Brown.

Determined not to be intimidated, Kinchloe stated, "Newkirk invited me to play a round of poker. We were sitting at the table when the others returned."

Anderson seemed to accept that answer, as he murmured to himself, "That fool of a kraut. This is why I suggested your people be given your own barracks."

Surprised at his superior's bluntness, Kinchloe dared a response. "I doubt you'll be able to change his mind, Sarge."

"I wish I could. You survived getting shot down. You deserve to survive this place."

Surprise turned to shock as Kinchloe hadn't realized that Anderson cared about what happened to him. However, that shock quickly disappeared as the Sergeant Major made it clear he had no intention of holding the others responsible, when he continued, "But if I reprimand the others it will only make things worse for you."

Looking directly at his charge, Anderson ordered, "Keep your head down and stay out of the way. If a white soldier tells you to do something, do it." Anderson's voice softened as he continued, "You're a good lad but you don't belong here. They never should have let your people fly. Understood?"

"Understood," Kinchloe replied, his voice devoid of all emotion.

Anderson dismissed him with a nod and without hesitation Kinchloe walked out of the office and then out of the barracks. The last thing he wanted to do was put up with the hateful stares of white men who were supposed to be on his side.

A bitter cold wind hit him as soon as he stepped outside but he welcomed the wind. At least the cold let him feel something other than the overwhelming anger that threatened to consume him.

But why was he angry? The prisoners here treated him the same way he had been treated all of his life. Had he really been that idealistic fool who had thought that wearing a uniform would make a difference?

His brother had tried to warn him.

He should have known better.

Alone in the middle of camp, Kinchloe wandered over toward the wire. It was an ugly simple thing and yet it kept him here in a camp full of allies who hated him simply because of the color of his skin.

Matthew had been right. Enlisting hadn't changed a thing. He was still the colored boy imposing his presence where it wasn't wanted or needed. And now he was stuck. Stuck in a camp with no way out.

No way out but one.

Could he do it?

Kinchloe didn't see any reason to subject himself to possibly years of this treatment. Back in Detroit he had his family and his own people to support him and give him a reason to live. He had none of that here.

Anderson had tried to appear sympathetic even as he defended segregation.

LeBeau was only excited because he spoke French.

Newkirk had spoken up but who was to say that Newkirk was even defending him? The man had already proven that he had a temper and he could have thought that he was the one who Brown was calling trash.

Clayworth and Brown openly hated him.

The rest of the men ignored him.

No, there wasn't a man in this camp who would blink an eye if he was gone tomorrow.

Before he realized it his feet had made his decision for him and they brought him right up to the kill line. If he took one more step the guards would assume that he was an escaping prisoner and he would be shot.

He could end it all right now.

"Halt!" a loud voice boomed.

Out of at the corner of the eye, Kinchloe saw the sergeant-of the-guard hurry towards him. Schultz was breathing heavily as he moved to stand beside the prisoner. "What are you doing?"

Kinchloe ignored the large guard and kept looking at the wire and the guards in the towers who were preparing to shoot. It would be so easy to end it all now. No one in this camp wanted him here or would miss him if he was gone.

All it would take was one step.

Schultz, however, was fed up with the prisoner's silence and forcibly pulled him away from the fence. The German's eyes were full of hurt as declared, "Do you think we want to kill?"

A wave of guilt hit Kinchloe. He had been so busy thinking of his own pain that he had forgotten that the guards were human too. Was he really the type of man who would force another person to take his life?

"Sorry, Sergeant," he murmured softly. "I guess I wasn't thinking."

"That's better," Schultz said with a grin. "It is too cold to stand outside. You should go back inside and talk with a friend."

"I don't have any friends," Kinchloe whispered.

Schultz looked shocked. "It's not good for you to have no friends. Every man needs a friend."

"No friends."

"You must give the men another chance. You could be here a long time."

Schultz looked so caring and compassionate that Kinchloe wished that he could steal some of the guard's innocence. The kindness in the guard's eyes made him wonder if the guard even noticed that he was colored.

"Okay, Schultz," he lied, "I will."

Letting Schultz lead him back to barracks, he reentered his current home. Shooting his fellow prisoners a look that said stay back, he climbed into his bunk and picked up the discarded novel. Yet, he could read no words as his mind was a thousand miles away.

That night as he lay in on his bunk sleep refused to come. What would have happened if Schultz hadn't arrived? Would he really have crossed that line? Was he really the sort of man who could take his own life?

Kinchloe wasn't sure he wanted to know the answers to those questions.

Though the one thing that he was sure of was that the kindest words he had heard since he had been shot down had come from the mouth of a German guard.

The muffled sound of feet hitting the floor broke he away from his thoughts. Moving carefully as not to let the other person know that he was awake, he lifted his head and noticed a figure standing at the foot of his bunk.

He tensed. He had chosen the top bunk in hopes of discouraging others from messing with him while he slept but he knew that it wouldn't stop the truly determined. However, the POW seemed to have no interest in him and instead cracked open the door and looked around outside.

After a few moments, the POW stepped outside and closed the door. It was too dark to see who it had been but a quick glance of the bunks told him that is was Sergeant Olsen who had decided to go for a moonlight stroll.

Kinchloe counted the minutes, waiting for the sound of the sirens but it never came. Olsen must have gotten away. Good for him, he thought even as Olsen's activities made him realize there was something he had forgotten.

There was more than one way out of his predicament.

He could escape and show them all.