She had understood it would take a while for him to breathe freely again, to relax and come to terms with what he had experienced, whatever it was. What she hadn’t expected was how lost he would appear. How fragile. She thought she’d been prepared, but seeing him like this was so difficult. He would need much more time than she’d planned. While he slept, she went down to the front desk and rented the room for an entire week, though it was far more than she could afford. Feeling a little sheepish, she telephoned Gerald and explained what was happening. He told her not to worry about a thing, and he said he would cover both the room and room service for the entire time they stayed. He also sent over some clean clothes for Gus.
The next morning, Gus got up and took a shower. She set the new clothes outside the bathroom door, then she phoned downstairs and ordered breakfast, which arrived before Gus was done getting dressed. When he was ready, he sat with her at the little table in their room. She encouraged him to eat and she could tell he was a little stronger after he finished his eggs and toast.
Then he looked at her. It was the first time his eyes had really focused. “Dot, thank—”
“Please don’t thank me.” The words rushed out. She needed him to know that she would always do anything for him. He never had to thank her. “But I need to thank you.”
He frowned, confused.
“Dash,” she said, and he smiled.
“She’s okay?”
“She’s fine.”
“I was worried about her when I found her. She’d been through a rough time. You know, you were amazing, finding me like that.”
She shrugged lightly. “I knew you were my only hope.” She sucked in an unexpected sob. “But then I didn’t hear from you, and no one knew anything…”
He stared at the cup of steaming coffee on the table, uncertain. Dot knew the sound of voices, the dots and dashes of hidden messages being sent into the unknown. After all she’d heard, she knew what those voices needed. What Gus needed.
“You don’t have to tell me anything.” She took his hand. “Either way, I’m right here.”
“It’s not a nice story, but I do need to tell it. I suppose you should get Gerald to debrief me.”
So she telephoned Gerald, and he was in their room within a half hour, welcoming Gus back with open arms.
“This girl refused to give up on you. It was either you or the entire Allied military forces, you know.”
“I never had to choose,” she said.
“No, because you managed both,” Gus replied, smiling softly.
“And she did it behind my back.”
Gus grinned. “You have to give her credit for that.” He cleared his throat. “All right. Ready?”
“Ready,” Gerald said, sitting back.
Dot pulled out a pen and paper. “I’m listening,” she said.
Gus took a deep breath, and his eyes lost their focus. “I was kept in solitary at first. For questioning. Gordon was in another cell. I was trained never to say a word, so I didn’t.”
What Gus wasn’t saying was that he’d been tortured. They all knew it. Dot felt sick, but she didn’t interrupt.
“Keeping quiet didn’t work, so I asked the Germans what they wanted me to say. That made themreallymad.” He drew down the neckline of his shirt and showed her an ugly round scar on his shoulder, trapped inraised webbing. “The bullet from that night with Dash is still there. They cauterized it inside me when I wouldn’t say anything.”
“We’ll get that looked at,” Gerald muttered.
Dot noticed Gus’s two fingers slightly parted in a V. “Gus, do you want a cigarette?”
He gazed past her, through the window. She turned and grabbed a pack off the table. She’d bought it just in case and tried not to cough as she lit one for him.
“The camp was real big,” he said, inhaling the cigarette, long and deep. Smoke seeped out of his nose and lips. “Thousands of us were in there. I’d heard of POW camps before, but when I first saw those men, it was hard to believe. They were skeletons. I tried to talk with them about escape, but they weren’t listening. They were past believing it was possible, and soon I was, too. In the winter, there was hardly any food. Ironically, I knew a lot of the shortage was because of what I’d done with my teams. We’d cut their supply lines.”
As soon as she’d received his letter, Dot had researched what she could of Stalag VII-A in Bavaria. It had been built to hold ten thousand Allied prisoners, but by the time Gus had been liberated, theNew York Timesreported over one hundred ten thousand men had been there. Most were French, Polish, and Russian. She was glad Gus at least spoke French and German. It might have helped him along the way.
The tip of his cigarette burned hot when he inhaled. “One morning, Stinson came to see me. Sergeant Major Stinson. He was called a ‘man of confidence’ for the Canadians in the camp. A representative, I guess. He told me the Red Cross had thousands of care packages but no way to deliver them. He needed volunteer drivers and mechanics. I jumped into a driver’s seat before he could get the question out of his mouth.” He shook his head, looking bemused. “We Canadians manned three convoys of relief trucks and drove all over Germany. Sometimes we drove for forty-eight hours straight just to deliver the boxes of food. By that point, the Germans didn’t care about us. We were more concerned about the Allies shooting us or hijacking the trucks.”
