eli gets caught

The door to the hut flung open at ten to four in the morning, and in stormed eight guards, pistols drawn and rifles cocked. Those men that weren`t awakened by the door coming off its hinges and the thud-thud-thud of heavy boots certainly were by the sergeant bellowing in half-decent French `Get up you fucking scum! Get up and get out into the yard! Line up in file! And don`t bother getting dressed!`

Alain watched, squinting, his eyes growing accustomed to the harsh light, as the guards spread out into the room, dragging men from their bunks. Alain reached out and put a hand on the shoulder of a guard who was prodding the man to his right with a truncheon, and received a smack with a pistol butt to the side of his head for his troubles. Dazed, he fell out of his bunk to the floor, from where he saw Thorpe being pushed outside. No one was being spared the rough treatment. A hand reached down to help him up, and he groggily made his way outside.

The rain came straight down in long streaks, stinging as they hit the skin. From the steps of D-hut Alain could see the men already lining up in rows - one section facing the gate, the other two along the flanks, facing each other to form a straight-edged `C` - all with soaked hair and glistening wet skin, the high-powered halogen lights from the two front towers concentrating their glare onto the open space in front of them. Alain headed to his allotted place, the same one he headed to for roll-call three times a day, every day, and waited, as the guards prowled fore and aft, rifles held up and ready.

The same sergeant who had led the charge into the hut came to the center, before the men.

`Attention!`, he barked. Meyer, was his name, and he was a brute, kept in check only by his superior officers – most of whom had at the very least a modicum of respect for their detainees, especially towards their fellow officer class – but not Meyer. The reek of his underlying hatred of this `foreign scum`, as he called them, was pervasive, it hung about him like a cheap cologne.

He was quite evidently relishing all this, getting a kick out of making them wait on his every word. As he paused, interminably it seemed, the only sound to be heard was that of the thick, elongated raindrops hitting into the gathering mud, splat-splat-splat, now coming down so close that Alain was reminded of another sound that was very similar, one he`d heard from the airfield not too far from the front, as yet another ceaseless, metronomic barrage of heavy artillery crashed down upon the land. He knew, as the memory came to him, that he would never escape all of this – it would be with him forever.

Alain caught the eye of Thorpe, who had turned to look at him reproachfully from three ahead. Alain frowned back at the Major, yet before Thorpe could gesture or say anything Meyer`s voice rang out again.

`It seems you all need to be taught a lesson. We have put up with the petty pilfering long enough. And we`ve told you time and again that it must cease!` His voice rose at the end of each sentence, like a kettle filled with steam, its innards churning at boiling point. Again, as Meyer paused, the sound of the rain rushed back into Alain`s head, and he saw the flashes of the big guns behind his closed eyelids, orange like hell in the cold darkness.

`Well, we are going to teach you that lesson! We are going to have to make an example of one of you, it seems, before you get the message into your thick heads. Bring out the prisoner!`, Meyer screamed towards the small guard hut by the gate.

Alain opened his eyes suddenly, realising that he had not seen Eli in all of the commotion. He looked down the line to his left to where Eli should have been stood – but he was not there. Alain`s heart skipped a beat. The door of the hut opened, yellow light spilled out, diffusing into the night, and out stepped a guard holding a thick rope – a rope attatched to the neck of Elijah Rosencrans, who stumbled out, pulled by the guard. His hands were tied. Alain felt a sudden sickness gnawing at his gut and let out a sharp, unbidden exhalation. As Eli was pulled forward and then pushed onto his knees at the point where the tower lights intersected, right in front of the men, the bruises on his face were visible for all to see, the blood still fresh that trickled from his cuts. Alain wanted desperately to step forward but his legs had become like stone. He stood rooted to the spot, looking on in horror.

`Rosencrans.`

Silence. Nothing but the rain.

`Rosencrans!`

`Yes.` His head down, his voice weak.

`This little shit, this pathetic excuse for a human being – he was caught red-handed sawing planks of wood from off the table in the yard wash-house. I personally watched as he carried the pilfered pieces back towards D-hut. There he prised open a plank from the wall that covers the underfloor section.`

Thorpe, who until this point had not been certain whether Eli had compromised the tunnel or not, let out a breath himself. The tunnel, however, wasn`t under D, but A-hut. Immediately however the tension returned, for he could sense that Meyer, having caught a whiff of blood, was not going to be happy until his lust had been satiated. The Englishman looked down at Eli, who had now raised his head. He winced at the sight of his already battered face.

`We went after him and found this-`. He signaled again towards the guard hut. Another guard brought out what looked like nothing more than an armful of wood in various sizes, though one was obviously peculiar – one large rounded piece, about the size of a café table-top, that had obviously been fashioned from something large, like a door – the door missing off the latrine in D-hut, Alain guessed. There were a handful of bolts and a rubber belt of some sort too, too, fashioned from the straps that were used to keep the tarpaulin from blowing off of the food trucks.

`The little Jew will not talk!` shouted Meyer, now red with rage. `He won`t tell us what it`s for, this contraption. Now, I demand that you tell me what this is for!` he screamed, sending a showers of spit into the air, arcing under the halogen rays. He turned to face each phalanx of men in turn. Yet no-one came forward, no one moved – no one spoke. Indeed, the men glanced about at one another in puzzlement, for whatever the collection of wood there on the mud before them was for, none had the faintest notion.

The sergeant waited a few moments, then called the youngest guard in the camp over to him.

`Becker,` said Meyer, as calmly as he could. `Raise your rifle. Aim it at this cretin`s head.`

Becker paused, looking twice at Meyer, blinking furiously, then back at Eli.

`I said`, spoke Meyer through gritted teeth, `aim your fucking rifle at this little Jew`s head.`

A few of the men started as if to make a move towards Eli and Becker, though were immediately repelled from any such notion by a short blast of 12mm bullets which screeched into the ground between them and Eli, sent down expertly from the watchtower above.

Thorpe was one of those who had made a step forward, though Alain had remained still, his eyes transfixed now on the wood, metal and rubber that lay in a pile by Meyer`s feet.

`Let`s see if we can get you to remember what this thing is for,` said Meyer sarcastically, looking at the men. `Becker. Cock your rifle.`
Becker gulped. His hands were shaking. `Sir I…`

`What was that Becker?`, asked Mayer, not able to here the feeble voice above the rain.

`Sir I – I can`t sir! I can`t! It`s not right sir!`

Perhaps Meyer had been content only to try to force the hand of the men by threatening to kill Eli – perhaps he hadn`t meant to do it at all. However, on having his direct order refused by this boy, in front of the prisoners, he flew into a further rage, rushing forward towards Becker. He grabbed the gun from Becker`s frozen grasp, almost sending the young man sprawling into the mud.

`You are fucking weak!` he screamed at Becker, cocking the gun and taking aim an inch from Eli`s head. He stood there a moment shuddering with tension, his whole body rocking as though the earth beneath him was quaking - then, seemingly losing his nerve at the last moment, he turned the gun around in his hands and forced the butt of the rifle straight into Eli`s face. A sickening crack rang out through the humming rain, as Eli`s lifeless body fell backwards. Meyer raised the gun again as if to hit Eli once more, when suddenly a movement from his side sent him twisting round. It was Alain, pushing through the men before him, shouting `I know what it is! Eli! I know what it is!`, yet before he could reach his stricken friend the sergeant had brought the rifle around in a deep arc, and sent its butt into the chest of Alain with violent force.

After that, the noise of the rain was all that remained for some time. Many of the men stood with closed eyes, others looked away, not able to dwell on the heart-wrenching scene that lay before them – Meyer, heaving with exertion, half in silhouette, the gun in his hands like a cricket bat, and their two comrades laid out on the floor like sacks of filthy coal, neither moving at all. Another sergeant stepped forward and ordered the men to be taken back to their huts and locked down. Once inside, they quietly got into their bunks and waited for the dawn, each and every one of them unable, and unwilling, to sleep.