‘You can’t do it, Rudi. They’ll find you.’
‘Maybe they won’t. There’s no choice. I have to try, you know I can’t
stay here. One way or another, he’ll get me,’ said Rudi.
‘We won’t let him. We’ll protect you,’ said Hans.
Rudi Fischer smiled at his friend. Hans Meyer was a good friend. He’d
been a farmhand in a tiny village back home, a bit like Rudi’s own. It was
why they’d naturally been drawn to each other, helped each other out; kept
each other’s spirits up when the trials of being imprisoned in a land far
away from your country became overwhelming.
But Hans couldn’t help him now. Nobody could. Not against that bully
Hoffmann. ‘Okay,’ said Hans. ‘Say you even manage to get away from this
place. I’ve been out there, been on one of the farms. It’s the back end of
nowhere. Where would you go? The whole bloody country is an island.’
‘So?’ said Rudi. ‘Didn’t you say you could see the ocean from that farm
of yours?’
‘What?! All of a sudden you’re a sailor?’ Hans laughed.
‘I know how to row a boat,’ said Rudi. ‘And I hear that the Southern
Irish don’t feel the same way about us filthy Krauts as the English.’
But even as he said it, he knew it was a measure of his own desperation.
Of course he wasn’t a sailor. He’d been on Lake Hintersee near his home,
but someone else had been in charge of the boat – and there’d been no
waves. Even then, he’d been seasick.
‘That’s it? That’s the plan? You steal a boat. I’m assuming this is a
rowing boat.’ Hans smiled again and punched his friend in the arm. ‘And
then – what? You row around Britain, then head across the Irish Sea, where
you’re greeted like a long-lost friend by some strange Irishman as you pull
up on a friendly beach.’
‘I never said it was perfect.’ Rudi returned his friend’s smile. ‘Still a
work in progress.’
They both knew it was thin. Any kind of escape needed planning, and
resources, and friends who could help. But most of all it needed luck. And
so far, Rudi Fischer hadn’t had a lot of that.
But Rudi had already made up his mind. Today was the day. No way
around it. He couldn’t stay here for another day, and whatever happened,
even if the guards discovered him trying to make a run for it, what would
they do to him? Send him to another camp – a harsher one? That would be
nothing compared to whatever Oberleutnant Karl Hoffmann had in mind for
him.
At breakfast that morning, Hoffmann had accidentally stumbled into
him, had loudly and courteously apologised, smiled, clicked his heels in
that polite German way. But quietly, for Rudi’s consumption only, he’d
whispered in Rudi’s ear that that day was to be a special day. No prizes for
guessing what that meant. Hoffmann had already warned him that an
accident could happen. He meant to carry out his threat. Hoffmann was a
sociopath who liked to have fun with his prey. To keep them guessing. But
even he wouldn’t wait for ever.
‘It’s insane,’ warned Hans, when Rudi explained he wouldn’t be there
for evening roll call.
‘Not as insane as staying,’ said Rudi.
‘Okay, even if you get as far as joining the work detail in the lorry, they
always look in the back; do a headcount of those going out.’
‘Throw of the dice. Maybe I’ll get lucky.’
‘Go to the camp commandant. I’ll come with you, they can’t ignore
both of us.’
Rudi slapped his friend on the back: better than words, for there were no
words to express the solidarity, the feeling of comradeship they shared. But
he knew that Hans would be putting himself in danger too, would end up on
that bastard Hoffmann’s list – and for what? The British would hardly take
them seriously. Would dismiss the whole thing as just rivalry between the
troublesome Krauts. And even if somebody did feel their complaint was
worth investigating, it would take time. It would be too late.
