Banging away, Colonel MacNamara managed to regain order in the courtroom. He turned to Hauptmann Visser and coldly said, 'Hauptmann, it would help matters considerably were you to merely answer the questions you are asked without any further characterizations.'
'Of course, Herr Colonel,' the German responded.
'Let me rephrase my statement: My examination of the crime scene and the evidence collected to this point suggest a different series of events from those claimed here. Is that preferable, Your Honor? I should, perhaps, eliminate the words ludicrous and ridiculous?' Visser managed to infect his words with distaste.
'Yes,' MacNamara answered.
'Precisely.' It seemed to Tommy that the hatred in the courtroom was almost palpable.
Best deal with that right away, he thought to himself.
He cleared his throat harshly.
'Let me get something straight, let's everybody get something straight, before we go on about this case, Hauptmann. You hate us, correct?'
Visser smiled.
'I beg your pardon?'
'Us,' Tommy said, sweeping his arm to indicate the assembled kriegies.
'You hate us, without knowing us. Merely because we're American. Or English. Or any Allied airman.
You hate me. You hate Captain Townsend and Flying Officer Renaday and Colonel MacNamara and every last one of us sitting in the audience. Is this not true, Hauptmann?'
Visser hesitated, shrugged, then nodded.
'You are the enemy. One should always hate the enemies of the fatherland.'
Tommy took a deep breath.
'That's too easy an answer, Hauptmann. That sounds like a schoolboy's memorized response. Your hatred seems somewhat greater.'
Again Visser paused, measuring his words carefully, doling them out in an even, hard-edged, and cold voice.
'No one who has been wounded, as I have, who has seen his family-mother, father, sisters- killed by terror-bombing, as I have, who has seen his friends die, as I have, and who can remember all the hypocrisy and lies spoken by your nation, can avoid feelings of anger and hatred, lieutenant. Does that answer your question perhaps better?'
Visser's response was as frozen as winter rain. Each word pelted the men in the audience, because there were aspects of everything he said that they, too, felt. In that second, Visser managed to remind everyone that outside the wire the world was gathered in homicidal rage, and they all felt stricken that they were no longer taking part in it.
'It must be hard for you,' Tommy asked slowly, 'to be stuck here in charge of keeping men alive whom you would rather see killed.'
Visser's lip curled in a small, nasty smile.
'This is an oversimplification. Lieutenant Hart. But true.'
'So if I were to die tomorrow, or Captain Townsend or Colonel MacNamara or any of the men here at Stalag Luft Thirteen, this would please you?'
Visser's smile did not so much as budge a millimeter, as he replied, 'That is almost entirely true, Mr. Hart.'
Tommy stopped, paused, then asked, 'Almost entirely?'
Visser nodded.
'The sole exception, Mr. Hart, of course, would be your client. The Schwarze airman, Scott. Of him, I do not care one way or the other.'
This comment took Tommy slightly off-guard. He asked his next question rather foolishly, before first considering it.
'Why is that?'
Visser lifted his shoulders slightly, almost as if with that gesture he was taking the time to install the mocking tone into his voice: 'We do not consider the Negro to be human,' he said calmly, staring directly at Lincoln Scott as he spoke.
'The rest of you, yes, you are the enemy. He, on the other hand, is merely a mercenary beast employed by your air corps, lieutenant. No different from a Hundfuhrer’s dog patrolling the camp wire. One may fear that dog, lieutenant, perhaps even respect it for its teeth and claws and devotion to its master. But it remains little more than a trained beast.'
Tommy did not have to turn around to see Lincoln Scott stiffen his back and clench his fists. He hoped the black airman would manage to keep his own fury in check. From the crowded kriegie audience, Tommy heard a ripple of conversation, like a wind racing through treetops, and he knew Visser had just helped him to take the trial of Lincoln Scott across an important line.
For a moment, he rubbed his chin.
'What makes a man a man, Hauptmann?' Visser did not reply immediately, letting a smile curl across his face. The scars he wore on his cheeks from his encounter with the Spitfire seemed to glisten, and finally, he shrugged.
'A complex question, lieutenant. One that has bedeviled philosophers, clerics, and scientists for centuries. Surely you do not expect me to be able to answer it here, today, in this military court?'
'No, Hauptmann. But I would expect you to be able to give all of us your own definition. Personal definition.'
Visser paused, thinking, then replied, 'There are many factors,
Lieutenant Hart. Sense of honor. Bravery. Dedication.
These would be combined with intelligence. The ability to reason.'
'Qualities Lieutenant Scott does not possess?'
'Not to the degree sufficient.'
'You consider yourself to be an intelligent, educated man, Hauptman?
A sophisticated man?'
'Of course.'
Tommy decided to take a chance. He could feel his own fury at the fanatic German's smug responses fighting to take over his emotions, and he had to struggle to keep a certain coldness in his voice and in his questions. At the same moment, he hoped that all his prep school training from a decade earlier had stuck with him. The faculty back at his old school had always said there was a reason for memorizing certain great works, and that someday a recitation might prove important.
He trusted this to be one of those times.
'Ah, an educated, intelligent man would understand the classics, I suppose. Tell me, Hauptmann, are you familiar with the following: Arma virumque cano, Troiae qui primus aborts Italiam fato profugus…'
Visser stared harshly at Tommy Hart.
'Latin is a dead language, from a corrupt and decadent culture, and not among my skills.'
'So you do not recognize…' and Tommy stopped.
'Well, don't let me tell you…' He spun sharply about, taking a gamble.
'Lieutenant Scott?' he demanded in a loud voice.
Scott sprang to his feet. He stared across at the German, a small, cruel smile of his own on his face.
'It would seem to me that any truly educated man would recognize the opening lines to Virgil's Aeneid,' Scott said sharply. '
'I sing of arms and the man who first from the shores of Troy came destined an exile in Italy…' Would you like me to continue, Hauptmann'? '… multum ille et terris iactatus at alto Vi supe ram saevae
