There was a time when Karl would have dismissed it all as nonsense, but having seen so many men die or get horribly injured - he knew that good fortune was at the throw of a dice, and it was better to have something to hold onto, no matter how silly. Sometimes, it would make him smile at the things rational men keep with them in times of stress.
Having woken up most of the hut with his nightmare, Karl muffled an apology amongst some angry remarks, before he lay back and drifted off.
The following morning, after a two-mile drive to Satterthwaite Farm, with fifteen other POWs, Karl climbed out the rear of an Austin K6 lorry. The two guards with them had their rifles slung casually over their shoulders.
The guard that spoke a smattering of German shouted at them to get in line, while the farm owner, a short, thick-set man with a grubby waistcoat and muddy trousers stuck in his boots, eyed them suspiciously with a scowl on his red, weathered face.
Like a general inspecting his troops, with his full head of curly ginger hair and matching bushy eyebrows, the farmer slowly made his way down the line, stopping and pointing then carrying on until eight of the toughest had been selected. He addressed the corporal in a heavy Yorkshire accent,
‘This lot I’ll use for ditching, the rest of them for hedging.’
The corporal addressed the men and repeated in German what the farmer had said. Karl heard a few disgruntled mumblings from the men selected. He guessed there must be a considerable difference in effort between hedging and ditching - ditching more likely to be the most labour-intensive. He watched the ditching team move off with one of the guards and wondered what hedging involved.
Within three hours, his curiosity had been quenched as he maintained hedge fences around the farm perimeter and the windbreakers separating the fields.
At mid-day, he heard the sound of a tractor chugging its way along the lane close by. The guard on detail looked over the fence, then shouted,
‘Tea up, lads,’ and made an eating and drinking gesture.
The farmer’s daughter, Valerie, had arrived with their lunch. She was a tall, attractive, twenty-two-year-old, dressed as a land girl in wellington boots and breeches and wearing an unflattering work shirt that looked a size too large. With her long auburn hair tied at the back and sporting a few freckles on a pretty face, Karl thought she looked gorgeous.
They queued as she handed out sandwiches and poured barley water from a tin jug. When Karl’s turn came, he joked with her,
‘We’ll have to stop meeting like this.’
She dropped the jug in astonishment. She’d never met a German that spoke good English.
‘Oh I’m sorry,’ she said flustered. Valerie stooped as he did to pick up the jug. They bumped heads reaching for it with both of them flinching back with embarrassment.
‘I’m so sorry,’ Karl said.
‘I’m so sorry,’ Valerie said.
‘Now, we’ll have to sort out who’s the sorriest,’ he said teasing her.
She laughed at him and flushed up. From that moment onwards, Karl was smitten.
During the following two weeks, Karl volunteered for hedging every day. And every day, like clockwork, Valerie turned up with lunch. While she waited to collect the used tin mugs and plates, he chatted to her discretely, of course. She would sit on the tractor while he stood on the opposite side so the others couldn’t see him. They were too busy eating or playing cards.
Karl discovered Valerie was an only child. She’d lost her mother to influenza when she was nine years old. Since then, it had just been her and her father. They worked the farm together. Now and again when it got busy, they’d hire labour in, including captured Luftwaffe pilots.
Her dad, Will Crompton, wasn’t fussy. He couldn’t believe his luck when they’d asked him, as part of the war effort, if he could find farm jobs for German prisoners of war.
Because of the constant work-load, Valerie didn’t get out much, although she told Karl she’d visited London a couple of times to stay with an Aunt and Uncle.
It was during one of their lunchtime chats that he saw her wince and rub her shoulder.
‘Lifting too many milk churns,’ she joked. Valerie was sitting on the saddle of the tractor while he stood by the huge back wheel, concealed from the others, looking up at her.
‘I’ll cure that in no time,’ he told Valerie. ‘I have healing hands like the Almighty.’
She laughed,
‘Can you? It’s been giving me jip all morning.’
‘Just needs a gentle rub.’
Karl held his hand out for her to get down. While she stood with her back to him, he massaged her shoulders, pressing his thumbs into the base of her neck.
‘God! That feels good,’ she said, moving her head around in response to the pressure. Then, Karl lifted her auburn hair and kissed her neck.
Valerie spun round in surprise.
‘I’m…I’m sorry,’ he said looking embarrassed. ‘I just couldn’t help…’
‘What you sorry for?’ she said smiling. Valerie moved closer to him, so he could kiss her properly this time.
*
The tunnel was ready and on the night of the concert. The whole camp, consisting of over three hundred and sixty men, sat eagerly in the canteen. They were waiting in anticipation to be entertained and have a good laugh. They hadn’t seen a lot of laughs and wanted cheering up.
Each member of the escape group had a little money, not much, only what had been smuggled in and shared out and a fake ration card.
Karl didn’t want to go. He hadn’t told anybody. There was nothing to go back to as far as he was concerned. While serving in Le Havre, he’d learnt of his parent's death during an allied bombing raid over Frankfurt. At the time, Karl had sobbed; he’d been bitter and swore revenge on the enemy. Then had come the incident with the young lad on the bike. That had changed his attitude. He’d killed a child by mistake. Others may have felt justice had been done. But any feelings of retribution had been lost in the sights of his 7.7mm wing canons when he’d gunned down the boy.
With no brothers or sisters either, he couldn’t see the point in trying to return to a country where racial policies, although he’d fallen in with the flow, didn’t sit happily with him.
Karl had made up his mind. The only thing to do was to twist his ankle, limp badly and tell the others to go on.
Only the guard towers with their searchlights were manned that night. The rest of the camp garrison, sitting along both sides of the canteen walls, wanted to see the show.
As Felix was head of the escape committee, he’d decided to pair himself off with Karl after the breakout. He reckoned because they spoke good English, they stood a better chance together of making it to the coast than the rest of the men.
Being the last of the escape group, they planned to make their move after the men had completed the final song and dance sketch with the grass skirts and coconut brassieres. As scheduled, Felix would come out on stage, thank everybody then announce that to finish off the night, tea and cake would be served at the canteen counter.
It was an added bonus that the men in Karl’s Nissen hut were the only ones organizing and acting in the concert party. Along with the performers, they had permission to help out as scene-shifters and work the gramophone and lighting in the partitioned-off kitchen. The kitchen, at the rear of the canteen makeshift stage, also doubled as the dressing room. A back door from it led to Karl’s hut just opposite. All they had to cover was a distance of twelve feet. But it was in full view of the sentry tower.
Major A.P. Henderson, also attending the concert, had briefed the guards not to be trigger-happy. There was going to be some activity in and out of the canteen tonight, no doubt for some extra bit of costume or scenery prop that a concert party demands. He told the guards on duty to relax a little.
‘At least all the prisoners are under one roof,’ he’d joked with them.
Oberstleutnant Felix Kappel, had g
one over the escape plan with the men. In groups of twos and threes, they would slip out of the back door of the canteen kitchen and walk slowly, no running, in full view of the guards, to their Nissen hut,. Then, as an excuse, one would walk back again carrying something; a prop or costume. They were relying on the guards not counting or keeping check on the numbers of men who went backwards and forwards. This would continue, gradually depleting all the prisoners from the canteen kitchen helping with the show until, the only men remaining were the Hawaiian act, with himself and Karl. Whoever was last man in the hole, it was essential to tie the rope to the stove and pull it over the opening.
The concert party finale had been timed for nine-thirty. With six remaining men on stage, the evening had gone according to plan. The first groups had moved the stove in the Nissen hut, climbed down into the hole, crawled along the tunnel and made their way up through the warehouse floor. The floorboards had been carefully loosened and kept in place in case of discovery. All there was to do was punch out a small area of the wooden slats, enough to climb through and pass the canteen forms, then use them to make a bridge across the barbed wire.
The crowd rocked with laughter as the Hawaiian dancers, supported by an old HMV gramophone, and sand sprinkled on stage, wore paper grass skirts and lopsided coconut bra’. Jerking their heads backwards and forwards sliding one foot in front of another, they finished off the evening with an Egyptian Wilson and Keppel routine.
To make himself heard over the deafening noise, Felix nudged Karl and cupped his hands and said,
‘Haven’t seen that snake of a Lagerführer, Lutz.’
From the canteen doorway, they both scanned the crowd and looked worried.
‘Nor have I,’ Karl said. ‘What do you think he’s up to?’
‘I don’t know, but he can’t be trusted,’ Felix said looking serious. ‘If he smells anything, he’ll grass on us, just to look good with the Major. He’s got him in his confidence.’ Felix leant in closer, ‘They’ve got some black market going on together. POW rations being sold in the local village and the rest of it. Just remember, Lagerführer Lutz would sell his own mother down the river for a couple of Reich marks.’
‘Do you want me to go and check out; see if he’s sniffing around?’ Karl said.
‘No, I’ll go. He knows me. I often run into him having a quick smoke outside the hut when I’m on lookout. I’ll keep him talking while the others move the stove back and clean up. If he sees you, he might get suspicious. You stay here and wait until I get back. OK?’
Karl nodded and gave him the thumbs up.
Felix stepped outside and made his way to the hut. He saw the lights inside were on. As he got to the doorway, he ducked down. He spotted Lutz crouching by the stove. Thankfully, the last group through had pulled the stove over the hole. Nobody else was in the hut.
Lutz was examining the stove. It was cold. Something Felix had hoped nobody would notice. The stove was lit every night, even in the summer for heating tea and coffee. Why not tonight?
Lutz was thinking. He rubbed his fingers in the dirt and then to Felix’s horror, picked up a small piece of solid mud. He rolled it in his hand with a suspicious look. He put his hand under the stove and pulled out some more clumps of mud. He looked around and over his shoulder, making sure he was alone. Then he stood up. Bracing himself, he grabbed the stove and with an almighty grunt he dragged it away.
Lutz stared in disbelief at the wooden board temporarily jammed in the hole from the last man in the tunnel. He crouched again and touched it, still not able to comprehend. Lutz leant over and pulled at the board; suddenly it came free, sending him spilling over backwards. He got up and stared into the hole with astonishment. Felix watched him as his face slowly changed and he knowingly smiled. Lutz pulled out his whistle and put it to his lips.
With his attention diverted, Felix had crept behind. He swung the heavy tea kettle, which smashed into the back of Lutz’s head who cried out as the blow catapulted him into the hole. The brittle snap of his neck as he hit the bottom, echoed through the hut.
Felix put a hand to his mouth and nervously mumbled,
‘Oh God, what have I done?’ He looked at the doorway expecting to see British guards running in with their rifles pointing, but there was nothing. All was quiet apart from the distant concert music and bursts of laughter.
With no time to waste, Felix dragged the stove back over the hole. Then panic gripped him. He thought what to do; can’t use the tunnel anymore, to risky. Just hope the others had made it through. Felix walked out of the hut. He looked up and saw in the floodlight that the men in the sentry tower were chatting and smoking. They ignored him as he made his way back to the camp concert.
The finale was loud and noisy with everyone singing to a scratchy Lili Marlene record. The men had changed out of their Hawaiian costumes and waited with Karl in the kitchen for Felix to come back with the all-clear.
As he walked in, Felix shook his head and they could see it was bad news. Felix spoke to Karl in English so as not to alarm the others. ‘I had to kill Lutz, he found the hole,’
‘You killed him,’ Karl said in amazement. ‘What about the body?’
‘It’s in the hole. There was nowhere else to hide it.’
‘So what now?’ Karl said. The other men looked at Felix expectantly.
‘It’s too risky for the rest of us. We’d have to get him out of the hole first, and there’s no room with him in the hole. If we were seen, it would jeopardize the plan for the others already through. We’ve got to give them time to get away as far as possible. If we get a chance, we can make an escape another time.’
Felix explained in German to the others what had happened. The POWs threw their arms up in despair.
‘But if they find Lutz, they’ll shoot us or hang us,’ Karl said worried.
‘No, they won’t,’ Felix assured him. ‘If he’s in the hole, they’ll think he escaped with the others, and, if they do discover the hole, it’ll look like he fell while trying to escape.’
‘But the tunnel entrance, it’s in our hut.’ Karl said concerned. ‘They’ll know we were in on it if it’s discovered.’
‘If they have us in for interrogation that’s where we have to keep our heads,’ Felix insisted to Karl. ‘All we have to say is, if we knew about the tunnel and the escape, then why are we still here? We’ll just say the others never told us about it and that they couldn’t have trusted us.’
. ‘Everybody’s got to have the same story. I just wish I shared your optimism.’
Felix looked serious,
‘I just hope the last man replaced the floor boards in the warehouse.’
Because the concert party had been such a success, flushed with one too many Brandies, Major Henderson decided to cancel the usual evening roll call until the following day. His logic being that there couldn’t be a problem as all the POWs had been under the same roof.
In the morning, something was wrong. No one could put their finger on it at first. It was too quiet, Major Henderson thought. He always had his office window open, first thing. He looked at his watch. It was four minutes past seven. The morning roll call was late.
The Major looked out of his window. Where was Lagerführer Lutz? He should have blown his whistle by now. The guards with their roll call sheets had assembled outside the huts in front of the flagpole. They were getting restless. In hurried conversations, Lutz’s name was mentioned several times with shaking heads and shoulder shrugs.
Just then, one of the soldiers who’d been on night watch, produced an air raid whistle and handed it to the Sergeant Major.
With bulging cheeks that pushed against his waxed moustache, he produced a long, drawn-out shrill, which immediately brought moans from inside the rows of Nissen huts. This was the usual morning wakeup call as British guards went from hut to hut banging on the doors shouting,
‘Achtung! Achtung! Raus! Raus!’
Reluctantly as usual
, with a lot of muffled swearing and cursing in German, the POWs got themselves into line outside their huts to be counted. With hut Number Four there was an immediate problem. Eight men stood in line instead of forty-three.
The Sergeant Major stepped down from his podium and walked over to them. He barked at Felix,
‘Where’s the rest of your men?’
Felix looked around and shrugged his shoulders.
‘I thought they’d been seconded for some early morning work detail. When we woke up, they were all gone,’ he told him innocently.
‘All gone, what do you mean, all gone?’ the major barked back. The sergeant major waved two guards over and went inside the hut with them. After a couple of minutes, he came out with the guards following. The Sergeant Major looked bewildered. He looked at Felix and his men.
A corporal marched over with a fistful of roll call sheets and stamped his black polished boots to attention. He saluted the Sergeant Major and offered him the sheets with a resounding,
‘Huts Five to Number Nine, all present and correct, sir.’
The sergeant major looked at him and said wryly,
‘Thank you, Corporal Oskins. I wish I could say the same.’
At that moment, a jeep drove up. A worried Major Henderson climbed out, still buttoning his tunic and holding his cap. Before dressing properly, he’d driven the half-mile from his stately home barracks in panic. Major A.P. Henderson had a lot of responsibility and a lot to answer for if things went wrong. As far as his military career was concerned, he was at the last chance saloon.
He’d messed up with his battalion at Dunkirk. Got a lot of British Servicemen killed. Retreated too early and got his men lost in a minefield. At his court-martial, his only saving grace had been his father-in-law, General Douglas Fielding, who had sat on the bench with two others from the high command. No doubt, with more feelings and concern for his daughter than the man standing nervously in front of him, and after nodding and conferring for ten minutes or more, Major Henderson’s court-martial was dismissed on the grounds of diminished responsibility.
From A Poison Pen: A collection of macabre short stories Page 25