Amerikan Eagle

He stripped. Stared at a brown spot on the far wall that looked like old blood spatter. His legs started shaking. “Stand still,” and a hand on his shoulder, the hum of an electric razor, and his hair was on the floor. “Keep still.” A man with a hose in his hand stood in front of him, laughed. “Poor bastard’s hung like a hamster,” and sprayed him with a cloud of dust. Sam coughed, his legs shaking harder, and some clothes were tossed at him. Thin cotton, not even thick enough to be called pajamas, striped blue and white, and his shoes fell at his feet.

“Feeling generous today,” one of the men said. “You get to keep your shoes.”

“But no socks!” another one called out. “Don’t want people think we’re goin’ soft.”

Sam awkwardly put his bare feet into his leather shoes. “Guys, let me make one phone call, to the FBI, a guy named LaCouture, and—”

The Legionnaire who had disinfected him raised his truncheon. “Shut up or those new clothes of yours, they’re gonna be stained. Now let’s go. And it’s your lucky day, asshole, our tattoo man is gone for the day. So no number on your wrist. Tomorrow.”

Aches and pains everywhere, Sam walked out into the cloudy sunshine, the sound of the equipment thumping in his brain. Up ahead, a gate opened at a fence, and he was pushed in.

“Barracks Six, your new home. Work hard, and you’ll have a nice life.”

More laughter, and he walked unsteadily forward, by himself knowing he was no longer Sam Miller, police inspector for the city of Portsmouth. He was cold, he ached, and his ribs and jaw hurt. He was inside the camp for real, in an area filled with barracks, the ground packed dirt. In the distance the walls of the quarry rose up on three sides, smoke and dust in the air. He stood before one of the barracks, shivering, the thin clothing providing hardly any protection. He rubbed at his eyes, crusted from the stone dust in the air. Barracks Six, the numeral painted in dark blue. It was made of rough-hewn wood and built on square concrete piers. His new home. He opened the door. It creaked.

Darkness.

Strong stench of unwashed bodies, other odors as well.

He took a step in, his eyes adjusting to the weak light. There were bunks crammed tight, floor to ceiling, four beds up. Movement as well, as men turned to stare at him, raising their thin shaved heads. He took a step forward, winced at the sharp pain in his ribs and hips.

“Hello?” he said.

Voices murmured in his direction. He took another step forward, the boards creaking underfoot.

The heads turned away. He kept on walking, trying to breathe through his mouth, to block out the stench that seemed to surround him like an old blanket as he went deeper into the barracks. Two small coal stoves with chimneys going up through the roof, more bunks, and in the very rear, what had to be the latrine, for the stench was thicker there. By the latrine was an empty bunk. He saw a bare mattress, a single blanket folded at the end, and a threadbare pillow.

One man unfolded himself from a nearby bunk and came over, favoring one hip. “You new, eh?” the man said.

“Yeah, I am,” Sam said.

“Thought so. Look too clean, too fresh. American?”

“Yeah.”

The man was about six inches shorter than Sam, his head close-shaved. He had a thin dark beard and a prominent Adam’s apple. His prison uniform hung like old laundry on his thin body. “My name is Otto,” he said.

“I’m Sam. Are you German?”

Otto shook his head. “Netherlander. Dutch. Though originally German. Are you Juden?”

“Excuse me?”

“Juden. Jew.”

“No, I’m not.”

Otto looked nervous. “Ah. So why are you here?”

“Because I was in the wrong place at the wrong time and asked the wrong questions.” Sam looked at the faces and said, “Why are they staring at me?”

Otto glanced back and said, “They are nervous. You are clean, an American, and you say you’re not a Jew. They think you are a spy. An informer. Who can blame them?”

“And you?”

The Dutchman cocked his head. “Not sure. Maybe I’m more trusting. Who knows, eh?”

Sam said, “Look, are you all Jews here?”

“Of course.”

“From where?”

Otto shrugged. “Everywhere. Germany. Poland. Holland. Even some English in another bunkhouse, all Jews.”

“How did you get here?”

Another shrug. “How else? We were taken from other camps, brought into trains and then ships. Ships across the Atlantic. All of us got very sick. And then to a military port. Virginia, I think, and then another train here.”

Sam could barely believe what he had just heard. “You mean you all came here from Europe?”

“Yes, of course.”

“But why are you here?” Sam asked.

Otto smiled, his lips twitching mirthlessly. “We all volunteered.”

“Volunteered? To come here to this camp?”

Otto’s smile remained. “Of course. Why wouldn’t we?”

“I’m sorry, I don’t understand. Why would you volunteer?”

“America. We were told we would come to America to work, to survive, and even if we came here to work, who would not want to come to America?”

Sam looked to the man’s wrist.

It bore a series of tattooed numbers.

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO