Trader Vic shrugged.
"Ain't right. And anyway, what's a Yankee like you know about niggers?
Nothing. Absolutely goddamn nothing." Bedford drew out each vowel sound, giving each word an elongated importance.
"Why, I'll bet, Hart, that you ain't hardly ever even seen one before, much less lived with 'em, the way we do down South…"
Tommy didn't reply to this, because there was some truth in what Bedford said.
"And what we come to know about 'em ain't good," Trader Vic continued.
"They lie. Why, they lie and cheat all the damn time. They're thieves, every one of 'em, as well. Good many of 'em are rapists and criminals, too. Not all, mind you.
But a good many. Now, I'm not saying that they maybe might not make good soldiers. Why, that's a possibility, because they don't see things exactly the way white folks do, and they can probably be educated properly in how to kill, and do a right good job at it, I suspect, same as like chopping wood or fixing a machine, though flying a Mustang, I can't see that.
They just ain't the same as you and me. Hart. Hell, you can see that just by watching that boy walk his way around the deadline. And I think it'd be a whole lot better if old man MacNamara figured that out before some trouble happens, because I know niggers, and there's always trouble wherever they are. Believe it."
"What sort of trouble, Vic? Hell, we're all stuck here, just the same."
Vincent Bedford burst out into a small laugh, shaking his head vigorously back and forth.
"The one thing may be true. Hart, that we're all stuck here, though that remains to be seen, don't it? And the other, why, it absolutely ain't the same. No sir. Not the same at all."
Vincent Bedford pointed at the wire.
"The wire be the same. But everybody here sees it different.
You see it one way, I see it another, and the old man sees it a third.
Likely even our boy walking along out there, why he's probably started seeing it in his own way, too. That's the wonder of life. Hart, which
I'd even expect an overeducated and tight-ass Yankee like yourself to figure out.
Ain't nothing ever the same for two men in this world. Not ever.
Except maybe death."
Tommy thought that of all the things he'd heard Bedford say, this last observation was probably as close to the truth as he ever came.
Before he could reply, Bedford clapped him on the shoulder.
"Why hell. Hart, you're probably thinking that I'm prejudiced, but it ain't so. I ain't no stars and bars-waving, tobacco-chewing, white-hooded, night-riding Klansman No sir. In fact, I have always treated every nigger good. Treat 'em like men. That's my way. But I know niggers, and I know they cause trouble, and that's what we'll have here."
The southerner turned and eyed Tommy.
"Trust me," Trader Vic continued with a small laugh.
"Trouble'll be coming. I can tell. Best to keep folks separated."
He smiled again.
Tommy kept silent.
Bedford brayed.
"Hell, Hart, you know, I'll bet even money that maybe my great-granddaddy took a shot at one of your ancestors once or twice, back in the great war of independence, except that ain't what your damn fool Yankee textbooks call it now, is it? Good thing for you that the
Bedfords never were much in the way of marksmen."
Tommy smiled.
"The Hart family traditionally was always good at ducking," he said.
Bedford burst out laughing.
"Well," he said, "that's a valuable ability. Tommy. Keep that family tree alive for centuries to come."
Still smiling, he stepped away.
"Well, I'm gonna go do my talking with the colonel. You change your mind, come to your senses and wanna make that trade, you know I am definitely open for business twenty-four hours a day, and Sundays, too, because right now I think the good Lord is paying more attention elsewhere, and not watching out for this particular flock of sheep too damn much."
From the playing field, several kriegies started yelling in their direction and waving at Vincent Bedford. One of them waved a bat and ball above his head.
"Well," the Mississippian said, "I guess I'll have to put off talking with the big boss man until this afternoon, 'cause these boys need someone to show them how the great game of baseball is properly played.
Be seem' ya. Hart. You work on changing your mind…"
Tommy watched as Trader Vic trotted toward the field.
From the opposite direction, he heard a distinctly American voice shout out, "Kein drinkwasser!" in half-fractured German. Then he heard the same call answered from a hut a few yards away. The German phrase stood for "not drinking water" and was what the Krauts printed on the steel barrels used for hauling sewage. It was also the standard kriegie early warning for the men in the huts to know that a ferret was walking through the camp in their direction and gave any men involved in escape activities time to hide their work, whether it was digging or forging documents. The ferrets were rarely pleased to be called sewage.
Tommy Hart hurried toward the sound of the voices.
He hoped it was Fritz Number One who'd been spotted lurking around the compound, because he was generally the easiest ferret to bribe. He did not dwell long on what Bedford had said.
It took a half-dozen cigarettes to persuade Fritz Number One to accompany him to the northern compound. The two men marched through the camp gate into the space that separated the two compounds. On one side there was a barracks for guards, and then the commandant's offices. Behind that was a brick-and-mortar coldwater shower block.
Two guards with slung rifles were standing outside, smoking.
From inside the showers. Tommy Hart could hear voices raised in song.
The British were great chorale lovers. Their songs were invariably wildly ribald, dramatically obscene, or fantastically offensive.
He slowed his pace and listened. The men were singing "Cats on the
Roof " and he swiftly recognized the refrain.
"Oh, cats on the roof, cats on the tiles… "Cats with the syphilis and cats with the piles…"
Fritz Number One had also slowed.
"Do the British know any normal songs?" he asked quietly.
"I don't think so," Tommy replied.
The voices bursting from the shower room launched into a song called
"Fuck All of It."
"The commandant," Fritz Number One said softly, "I do not think he enjoys the British singing. He no longer permits his wife and their little daughters to come visit him in his office when the British officers are going to the showers."
"War is hell," Tommy said.
Fritz Number One quickly raised his hand to cover his mouth, as if blocking a cough, but in reality to stifle a laugh.