Luck on the Wing: Thirteen Stories of a Sky SpyHaslett, Elmer
History
Luck on the Wing: Thirteen Stories of a Sky Spy
Haslett, Elmer
World War, 1914-1918 -- Aerial operations; World War, 1914-1918 -- Personal narratives, American
As he came in the Corporal came with him as no one was supposed to enter
the room without the Corporal, but just as he laid my purchase on the
table the telephone rang and the Corporal had to step away temporarily,
which gave me the opportunity I needed. I handed the guard the piece of
I.O.U. paper and a hundred marks in prisoners’ money. The deal was
closed.
All the remainder of the afternoon I carefully laid my plans. This time
it looked like a clean get-away, but there is always something to take
the joy out of living, for about four o’clock the interpreter came
around with the prison paymaster, who told me to turn in all my money
for which they wrote me out a receipt. I decided that I had been
double-crossed by the Corporal; the other guard would not have had time
since the act.
“You had more than this the morning after we had you searched,” the
paymaster said after perusing a big ledger.
“Yes,” I stumbled, “but I sent some of it back to one of my friends to
whom I owed some money.”
Then they put all my fears to rout by telling me that I was leaving at
five o’clock with a transport of prisoners, going to a permanent camp.
This was simply hard luck, because as I figured it, it was absolutely
impossible for either the other Corporal or the weazened-up old guard to
give this plan of mine away. Furthermore, they would not have dared.
Well, that was finished for me, so, I asked the interpreter where we
were going, and about my sentence. Like all other Germans he pulled the
Kultur stuff by telling me that I was being sent to a fine, big camp and
that my penalty here was finished. So, he and the officer left and the
door was locked behind.
Immediately it was again unlocked; the old German Corporal came in,
highly excited because he thought the visit of the officer meant that
they had gotten something on him. I told him I was going to leave at
once for a permanent camp.
“Oh,” he whispered, really surprised, “then you will not escape
to-night.”
Upon affirming this statement that I was really leaving, the old fellow,
to my utter surprise, looked around to see that no one was looking in
the window, then closed and bolted the door behind him and handed me
back my money and my note. Here was a real, decent old guy. I believed
in his sincerity, and German or not, if I ever have a chance to do
anything for that old fellow I’d do my best to do it, for he was
absolutely honest, no matter what one might say as to his patriotism. I
gladly gave the old fellow the last bit of tobacco I had and when I left
we parted real friends.
But, the other old fossil—of course, I didn’t have a chance to see him,
and my one hundred marks, together with my large note, was gone to the
devil. Of course, I didn’t worry about the note; I never intended to pay
that any way, if for no other reason than the fact that it would
bankrupt me even though the mark is not now worth much at all.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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