Hart. And remember you only have one job ahead of you: just follow orders…' the man said. He squeezed painfully hard one time, then released his grip, before slinking away into the darkness. Tommy could hear the door creak open and then close. Gasping for breath like a fish suddenly plucked from the ocean, Tommy remained rigidly on his bed as he'd been told, the normal night sounds of the other men in the room slowly returning to his ears. But it was some time before his heart rate slowed from the deep drumming that pounded in his chest.
Chapter Five
Tommy kept his mouth shut as the kriegies flooded from the huts for the morning Appell. The early sky had lightened slightly, turning from dull, metallic gray to a horizon of tarnished silver that held out the hope of clearing. It was not as cold as it had been the day before, but there was still an unpleasant dampness in the air. Around him, as always, men complained, men grumbled, men muttered obscenities, as they formed the usual five-deep rows and began the laborious process of being counted. Ferrets moved up and down the rows, calling out numbers in German, starting over and repeating themselves when they lost track or were distracted by some kriegie asking a question. Tommy listened carefully to every voice, straining hard to recognize in the snatches of words that flowed at him from the collected airmen the sounds of the two men who'd visited him in the night.
He stood at parade rest, pretending to be outwardly relaxed, trying to appear bored as he had for hundreds of similar mornings, but inwardly stretched taut with an unruly turmoil and an unfamiliar anxiety that, had he been slightly older and more worldly, he might have recognized as fear.
But it was a far different fear from the fear he and all the other kriegies were accustomed to, which was the universal fear of flying straight into a squall of tracer rounds and flak. He wanted to pivot around, to search the eyes of the men surrounding him in the formation, thinking suddenly that the two voices who'd arrived at his bunk side in the midnight of the camp would be watching him carefully now. He surreptiously shifted his eyes about, darting glances to the right and left, trying to pick out and identify the men who had told him that his job was simply to follow orders. He was surrounded, as always, by the men who flew in all the ships of war. In Mitchells and Liberators, Forts and Thunderbolts, Mustangs, Warhawks, and Lightnings.
Someone was watching him, but he did not know who.
The catcalls and complaints of that morning were the same as every morning. The ragged lines of U.S. airmen were no different from what they were any day-except for the two men absent. One dead. One in the cooler and accused of murder.
Tommy exhaled slowly and had to control himself to keep from twitching.
He could feel his heart accelerate, almost as fast as it did during the night when he'd been awakened by the hand closing over his mouth. He felt almost light-headed and his skin burned, especially his back, as if the eyes of the men he sought were scorching him.
The morning air he gasped at was cool, suddenly tasting to him like a smooth pebble plucked from the bottom of one of the trout streams of his home state, placed under his tongue on a hot day. He closed his eyes for a moment, envisioning fast, dark waters bubbling with white froth as they coursed through some narrow rapids on the Battenkill or the White River, waters that had fallen out of the crags of the Green Mountains, made by late-melting snow and racing toward the larger watersheds of the Connecticut or Hudson. The image calmed him.
He heard a ferret close by, grunting out numbers.
He opened his eyes and saw that they had nearly completed the count. He looked across the yard and, almost as if on cue, saw Oberst Von Reiter, accompanied by Hauptmann Heinrich Visser, emerging from the office building and making their way past the cordon of saluting camp guards through the front gate toward the assembled fliers. As always, Von Reiter was dressed with rigid precision, each crease of his immaculately tailored uniform slicing the air, and Tommy imagined that as he strode forward they made the same whistling sound as a sabre slashing the wind did. Visser, on the other hand, appeared slightly less neat, a little crumpled, almost as if he'd slept in his uniform the night before. The empty sleeve of his greatcoat was pinned together but still napped as he kept pace with the taller camp commandant.
Tommy watched the Hauptmann's eyes, and saw that as he approached, they were sweeping across the rows of kriegies, taking in and measuring the men as they came to attention.
He had the sensation that Visser looked on them with some anger that he concealed carefully but not totally. Von Reiter, Tommy thought, even with all his military bearing and Prussian appearance, like a caricature from a propaganda poster, remained nothing more than a glorified jailer. But Visser, he was the enemy.
Colonel MacNamara and Major Clark stepped from the formations to confront the two German officers. There was a quick exchange of salutes and whispered conversation, then MacNamara turned, took a step forward, and loudly addressed the assembly.
'Gentlemen!' MacNamara shouted. Any residual noise among the kriegies ended instantly. The men craned forward to hear the commanding officer speak.
'You are by now all aware of the despicable murder of one of our number. It is now time to end all the rumors, scuttlebutt, and loose talk that has surrounded this unfortunate event!'
MacNamara paused, waiting until his eyes rested on Tommy Hart.
'Captain Vincent Bedford will be interred with military honors at noon today in the burial ground behind Hut 119.
Shortly after that point, the man accused of his murder, Lieutenant
Lincoln Scott, will be released from the cooler into the custody of his counsel, Lieutenant Thomas Hart of Hut 101.
Lieutenant Scott will be confined to his quarters in that hut at all times, unless engaged in legitimate inquiries in preparation of his defense.'
MacNamara swung his eyes away from Tommy and back to the rows of men.
'No one is to threaten Lieutenant Scott! No one is to speak with
Lieutenant Scott unless they have pertinent information to impart! He is under arrest and is to be treated that way! Do I make myself clear?'
This question was answered without a sound.
'Good,' MacNamara continued.
'Lieutenant Scott will appear before a military court-martial tribunal for a preliminary hearing within twenty-four hours. His trial on the accusations is scheduled for next week.'
MacNamara hesitated, then added: 'Until that tribunal reaches a conclusion. Lieutenant Scott is to be treated with courtesy, respect, and total silence! Despite your feelings and the evidence already collected he shall be presumed to be not guilty until a military court determines otherwise! Any violation of this order will be dealt with harshly!'
The colonel had drawn himself up, shoulders back, legs spread his hands clasped behind his back. The force of his command was like an ocean wave flooding over the kriegies.
There wasn't even a grumble from the back of the ranks of men Tommy exhaled slowly. He thought it would have been hard for the Senior American Officer to make a statement to the camp that was more prejudicial. Even the words not guilty were spoken in a tone designed to imply the precise opposite.
He wanted to step forward out of the lines and say something in defense of Lincoln Scott, but bit his lip, reined in an urge he knew would help no one and might actually harm his case, and remained silent.
MacNamara waited for an instant, then swung toward the German officers.
They saluted Von Reiter as always lifting his leather riding crop to the brim of his cap, then snapping it down to his polished boots with a cracking sound.
