Franky Furbo

I leaned over the edge of the bridge again, feeling for something there but not really expecting it. Then, two hands reached out from under the bridge and pulled me down! My carbine strap got caught up on the bridge, so it was ripped right off my shoulder.

There were two of them. Germans. They weren’t SS, only regular field green, garden variety Wehrmacht, German GIs. The one who pulled me over the edge had a knife at my neck, the other had his rifle pointed at my head. I put my hands above my head behind me. I was on my back, half in the water. The one with the knife let me go and pointed up the hill on the other side of the draw. The one with the gun prodded me in the ribs, hard. I clambered up in front of them in the dark, stumbling, wondering if Stan could see us. He probably could, but couldn’t do anything. He could never tell in the dark which were the good guys, me, and which were the baddies, Krauts. I’m hoping he won’t try any shooting. He’s not all that great a shot; he just barely made marksman, with help from all of us.

In a few minutes we reached a hole dug in the lee of the hill on the other side of the draw. They shoved me into it. The one with the knife also had a Schmeisser, what we called a ‘burp gun’, slung over his shoulder. He reached for my neck and yanked off my dog tags. He also used his knife to cut off my division insignia. He searched me and took my Bulova watch and wallet. This was more like a mugging than a capture. I began to be afraid. These guys must never’ve heard of the Geneva Convention. Or maybe they’d heard of it and didn’t believe in it. Just my luck.

He jammed all my stuff into his pocket and said something to the other guy. This Kraut then braced his back against one side of the hole and propped his rifle on his knee, pointed right at my chest. The one with my things clambered out from the hole and took off up the side of the slope.

I tried smiling at the Kraut with the rifle, a smile in the dark. No smile back. I’m wondering what time it is, how soon that artillery is going to start coming in. I wonder if Stan has run all the way back to tell them I’m stuck out here, or if he even knows. Hell, they wouldn’t hold up an artillery barrage for one lousy Pfc.

I slowly try to make moves with my hands over my head like bombs coming in. I make ‘Boom Boom’ noises. He flicks off his safety! Maybe ‘Boom Boom’ means something different in German. I keep trying to get the message across, but he’s only acting more suspicious and crouches behind his sight to let me know he’s ready to shoot if I make one false move. I’m beginning to panic. They’re bound to have this bridge zeroed in.

Then it comes. First one over, then one under, bracketing. The third lands about fifty feet down from us and to the right of the bridge, near the water.

Now my German comrade finally seems to have gotten the picture. Keeping his rifle on me, he looks down as bits of dirt and rocks are dropping all around us. I make moves as if to get the hell out of that hole and up the hill. He points his rifle at me again and shouts something. Another salvo comes whistling and roaring in; the bridge is blown sky high, bits of wood and stone fly around with dirt and shrapnel. So much for the attack over the bridge; everybody’s going to get their feet wet anyway. If the Krauts don’t blow it, we’ll do it ourselves.

I crouch down deep in the hole with my hands tight on my head. I remember I don’t even have my helmet. It fell off when they pulled me under the bridge and is probably floating downstream. I’m beginning to feel I’m in for it.

I’m thinking how I didn’t have a chance to surrender; I’ve had many wonderful fantasies – walking up to some Kraut, handing over my rifle, and surrendering, like General Lee at Appomattox. But they ripped my grenades off me down there by the water before I could think, and my carbine must still be on that bridge, actually flying around in pieces with the rest of the debris.

Well, now I’m a prisoner, but not for long. I try once more to get this guy to climb out of the hole with me, but no go.

Just then, it starts truly coming down. The concussion is so great I feel as if my eyes are popping out of my head. That Kraut and I are groveling, fighting, for the lowest spot in the hole. We’re both screaming. Mommy and Mutti are in great demand that morning but are not responding. I don’t even remember my mother but I’m yelling for her anyway. The impact, the noise, the dirt falling in on us fills the air.

In the middle of everything, I see the rifle leaning, unattended, against the front edge of the hole. The Kraut has forgotten all about it. We’re involved with bigger guns now; this popgun looked like a peashooter.

I decide how, if by some major miracle we get through this, I’ll look a lot better if the German is my prisoner than the other way around; so, in a clear instant, when dirt isn’t being blown into my mouth, eyes and ears, I lean over with one arm and cradle that gun against my chest. I might as well look like a hero, it can’t hurt. Single-handed, in hand-to-hand combat after he’d been captured, he overwhelmed the enemy and escaped – all that crap. It could make a fairly nice bronze star citation.

The Kraut looks at me as if I’m nuts. He probably figures we should be past all that. He’s right. I try to relax, let my mind wander, think about other things, because there’s nothing I can possibly do concerning what’s actually happening now. I try to justify what’s going on, explain it to myself.

So far, I’ve found out there’s a big difference between recklessness, fearlessness and bravery. The first is to be avoided, except as something from afar, say in a movie or a story. The second is also something to be avoided. If you are fearless, you probably lack some critical aspect of imagination. If you’re near someone who is fearless, chances are you’ll get sucked into the vortex of fearless madness and get hurt yourself, no matter how careful you are. I’d already discovered the truth of this second one before the crazy war, but have had it verified too often over the past few months.

Bravery is doing what has to be done even though you’re afraid. Most brave people I’ve known have done what they did very cautiously. They were scared, but for survival reasons, either of self or others they valued, did something that normally would require fearlessness or recklessness. But they don’t do it fearlessly or recklessly. They only do what has to be done and they do it with an absolute minimum of bravado.

Then, there’s another category. I could call it pragmatic sensibility. It’s when one does the obviously intelligent thing, which can easily be confused with bravery, that is, if you don’t look carefully. My reaching out for the rifle and cuddling it to myself fits in here somewhere.

But I don’t have long to cogitate all these minor variations in human behavior. I keep telling myself that anything I can hear or feel probably isn’t going to kill me. I’ve gotten through a few other bombardments with this specious rationale, but then the one I didn’t feel or hear must have come. I don’t know how close it was, but it was close enough to just fold that hole right in on top of us. Everything stops for me.

When I come to, I’m covered with mud, dirt and blood. I can’t move. I can barely see. My ears are ringing. My feet and arms are numb. I feel strangely warm and comfortable. I consider the idea that I am dead.

In front of me, stretched out on my dirt-covered lap, is the Kraut. His eyes are open and looking right at me, but he isn’t seeing. His neck looks twisted the wrong way. I figure he’s dead, too, and if he’s seeing anything, he’s seeing me dying. We’re on the inside of a mass grave for two.

If I’m dead, then there’s nothing to do but wait and find out what happens next. If I’m not dead, then I’m probably dying. I’m astounded at how easy it is, how I’m not as scared as I thought I’d be.

I can see enough to know, or think, that it’s full daylight. Some considerable time must have passed. I feel the way you feel when somebody buries you deep in sand at the beach, or when, in a hospital, they give you an ether anesthetic, or I should say, the way I felt when they gave me an ether anesthetic to take out my tonsils and adenoids at the orphanage when I was eight years old.

I know I’m crying, but I can’t hear myself. When you’ve been under a one-five-five artillery bombardment, you don’t hear much of anything for a while.

I’m not sure how long we lie there like that. Nobody comes to check us, neither GI nor Kraut. The war seems to have passed us by. That’s not too disappointing.

I drift in and out. I’m just beginning to feel some pain. Maybe I am alive, more or less. I try moving a few fingers but nothing happens. I can’t even lift my head to look up over the edge of the hole, and that’s when I’m conscious. When I’m passed out, we must just look like a couple of prime candidates for the grave-registrar bunch, and they won’t be along till much later. Everybody’s too damned busy fighting the crappy war to pay much attention to us for now. We’re sort of obsolete.

It’s getting to be night again when I hear a small scurrying sound. That wakes me! I’m sure it’s rats come for a free nibble. We had rats in the night at the orphanage. I wonder, if I try, if I can make a noise like a cat. I try making a noise and two things happen. The ‘dead’ Kraut starts to moan; muddy tears come out of his eyes, puddle with his muddy sweat. The other thing is I can hear myself as well as hear his moan. Of course, I’d also heard the scurrying, so my ears must be working. I try to turn my head a little, but it hurts, hard, down deep in my back, under all the dirt. My arms, hands, legs and feet begin feeling cold – not so much cold as dead. I’m starting to wish all of me could feel as dead as they seem. At least they don’t hurt.

I look around for the rats, but there aren’t any. It’s a fox! It’s a beautiful fox standing on two legs! He comes close and begins carefully, with small fine almost handlike paws, scraping dirt off the Kraut and me.

I watch, not knowing what’s happening or what to do. Then the fox looks me in the eyes and says in a clear, calm voice:

‘Stay perfectly still, William. I’ll have you out of here very soon.’

Now I’m sure I’m dead or crazy, or both, but there’s nothing I can do. He slowly lifts off the Kraut’s helmet and gently slides his head off my chest. He works slowly, carefully, pulling dirt from the both of us until we’re completely uncovered. Then this little fox stares down and at me again.

‘Now you do just as I say, William, and everything will be all right.’

I’m sure I’m dead now, but how is it nobody ever figured out God was a fox? The Kraut moans again, and the fox touches him all over with his light, tender, moving paws. He speaks to him in another language. I’m not sure, but it sounds like German. In either language, his voice is a strong modulated whisper, warm and comforting, still loud enough so I hear it easily through the mud and dirt packed in my ears.

He turns back to me. His eyes are an incredible yellowish amber.

‘William, you shall both die unless you do exactly what I tell you.’

I’m numb, dumb with shock and fear. His eyes peer intelligently at me over his reddish black muzzle.

‘Look deeply into my eyes. Try to relax. You will have a strange sensation, but it is the only way I can think right now to remove you from here and to a place where I can help you.’

I stare into his eyes and slowly seem to feel myself lifting out of my body. At the same time, I sense an intense enclosing concentration, a compaction of all I am. The closest thing I can think of is the way it would feel for loose snow to be squeezed into a snowball. I slowly become as nothing. The pain and numbness leave, then I lose consciousness.

4

The Warren

The next thing I know, Caroline, I’m in a large room. I’m stretched out on a bed. My entire body is in traction, with pulleys and weights hanging from rafters in a ceiling. The ceiling, rafters, walls and floors are made from wood, and they’re not painted. It seems like a strange kind of hospital. But I’m in a clean bed and it’s quiet. I don’t feel any pain if I lie still, not even a headache.

I try to remember what’s happened to me. I can move my hands, my arms, if I do it carefully, but it is painful. I turn my head slowly back and forth. In the bed beside me is the German soldier. He’s asleep and breathing hard. I recognize him by his split front teeth. I have the same kind of teeth myself, you know, Caroline, and when I see it in someone else I always remember it. I have a feeling of family with people who have this kind of teeth.

I figure that somehow some medics, Kraut or American, have found us, and we’re in a field hospital somewhere. I couldn’t care too much which, Kraut or American. I’m beginning to believe I’m alive and out of the war, out of pain. I fall gently back to sleep.

When I wake again, I can’t believe what I see. A giant fox is leaning over me, checking my bandages, checking the bottles and tubes hanging above my bed. He’s human sized and wearing white doctorlike clothes! He has the build of a medium-sized man, taller than most bears.

He sees I’m awake and lays his paw on my forehead. The underside of his paw is soft but feels cool.

‘Well, William, you are awake at last. Those were really horrible wounds you had, but you shall soon be all right. You had two fractured vertebrae, which were hard to repair without damage to your spinal cord. You also had six broken ribs and a broken collarbone. There was some damage to your liver and one of your lungs as well, but that is all repaired.’

I’m beginning to wonder again whether I’m dead. But this is even more than I’d expect if I were dead; this is all just nuts. The fox is still standing there, leaning over me. The tip of his nose is wiggling so the whisker hairs dance.

‘I’m sorry, William, I know it must be very confusing. I can tell you that you are not dead and you are not crazy either. I should also tell you I cannot only speak English, but that your thoughts speak to me as clearly as words.’

It takes a little courage getting myself to say anything. I have an inside feeling that if I begin talking to this giant fox all dressed up in a white coat like a doctor, I would definitely be bonkers. But what else is there to do? Maybe if I start talking, he’ll disappear and some real people will come running to help me.

‘How did I get here? What are you? What’s happening?’

The huge fox pulls a chair over from the wall. He sits in the chair beside me.

‘Now you just relax and listen, William. Your questions are hard to answer and the answers will be even harder for you to believe.

‘How did you get here? I brought you here from that hole where you were dying. I made you very small, along with Wilhelm across there, and carried you both back with me to my home. For me, it was not a long or difficult journey. I shall tell you why later. I brought you into my home to see if I could make you well. I should tell you that my home is in the inside of a tree. You think I am a big fox right now, and I could be if I wanted to, but actually I have made you and Wilhelm small and I am the natural size of a fox. You only think I am big because we’re the same size and you expect a fox to be smaller than you.’

He pauses. It’s almost as if he’s watching my brain and waiting until what he’s said has printed itself in there. I’m wondering how I could make this all up. In general, I’m not very imaginative. He starts talking again.

‘Don’t worry about it, William, just listen. You shall understand much more as time goes by. Your second question is harder because I do not understand it very much myself. “What am I?”

‘It seems easy just to say I am a fox. But you can see I am not an ordinary fox. For reasons I do not know or understand, I was born very intelligent, with many skills and abilities no fox or even humans have. I live by myself here in this tree. My mother, brother and sisters were ordinary foxes. I don’t know why or what I really am. I know that doesn’t answer your question, but it is the truth.

‘Now your next question. “What’s happening?” I was wondering the same thing. What’s happening here in this place where I live? Humans are dashing up and down, back and forth, killing one another, making noise, destroying towns. I know it is a war, but I don’t know why there must be all this killing, how they force all of you to do such a crazy thing.

‘So, this is what is happening to you: I decided to select two samples of people who are doing the killing, acting so insanely, and find out why they’re doing it. I didn’t want to capture anyone who was well and healthy so I waited till I could find two humans, each speaking a different language, who were fighting each other but were about to die. When I found you and Wilhelm in that hole, I decided to take you two because I could see you would soon be dead anyway. Wilhelm is hurt even worse than you. But he is soon going to be well, too. One of the many skills I have is that I can heal others, better than any human doctor.’

I watch his eyes. They show only kindness and intensity. I begin to feel myself relax, able to believe a little bit what I’m hearing. In a crazy way, it almost makes a kind of sense, at least as much sense as the dumb war does.

‘That’s good, William, now you are relaxing. It will help you become well sooner. I have only a little more to say now, then I want you to sleep.

‘I shall be asking questions, as well as reading your mind over the next while. I want to understand why humans do some of the things they do, especially war. I want you and Wilhelm to know each other, to speak to each other. I shall teach each of you the language of the other so you can share what you know. I shall also teach you another language, one that will make understanding, for all of us, much easier. I cannot teach you to read each other’s minds because it is probably impossible for humans to do that; but this language I shall teach you is the most complete communication possible for humans.

‘When you are well, when you want to, you may leave here and go back to your own people. I hope you don’t mind my having taken advantage of you this way, but I think it will be good for us all. Now, close your eyes and go to sleep.’

With that he puts his cool paw on my forehead and slides it down over my eyes. I go to sleep, a deep sleep, immediately.

I don’t know how much longer it is before I wake again. I feel much better. The traction has been removed. I’m stretched out on my bed, very relaxed, warm and with a happy feeling. I hear talking on the other side of the room.

I turn my head, without pain, and see that the fox is sitting in a chair beside the Kraut’s bed, just as he had been with me before. I try to listen. They are talking German. I stare at the ceiling and want to put it all together. I’m beginning to feel nervous, frightened again.

The next thing I know, the fox is leaning over me, smiling. He pulls the covers down and begins to feel over my body with his gentle paws. His eyes, his ears, seem to be concentrating on my body. When he finds a spot that still hurts, he covers it with his hands, makes it warm, and it doesn’t hurt anymore.

‘You’re coming along fine, William; you are almost completely healed. You will feel weak for a few days but with some good solid food you shall be on your feet soon.’

I don’t know how to thank him. How do you thank a fox? What should I call him, Mr Fox? He’s checking the back of my neck now.

‘Don’t worry about it, William. My name is Franky Furbo. At least, that’s what I call myself. Foxes usually don’t have names. You may call me Franky, if you will. I’d like that.’

‘All right, Franky. Thank you for saving my life. You saved the life of that Kraut too, right? Whose side are you on?’

‘I don’t take sides, except I’m on the side of life. You two are now alive and are human, the closest creatures on this earth to myself I’ve found so far. There’s no need to thank me; my pleasure is in seeing you well.’

There’s no answer I can think of to that.

‘Did I hear you speaking Kraut – I mean German – to that guy over there?’

‘That’s right. I can speak any language spoken on this earth; it’s a hobby of mine. Do you know there are more than six thousand languages spoken on this planet alone? I find it fascinating, also the way languages come about, how they’re constructed. It is easy for me to learn all these languages because of my special mind skills. Our German friend’s name is Wilhelm, the same as yours only in German. His full name is Wilhelm Klug. And your name is William Wiley. Is that right?’

Of course it’s right. At first I think he’s read my dog tags, but then I remember the other German took them with him. It’s so weird being around someone, even if it is a fox, who knows everything in your head. It almost makes it not worth talking.

‘I’d like to teach you to speak German, William. It won’t take any time. I can also teach you everything that is in Wilhelm’s head so you can know him as well as he will know you. That way, I feel you can talk about this war and understand more of what it is supposed to be all about. Are you agreed?’

By now, I’m so confused I’ll agree to anything. I nod my head.

‘All right then, just relax. You will feel a strange warmness and you won’t be able to see or hear for a few minutes, but then it will go away. It’s best if you close your eyes now.’

Franky lowers his head close to mine. I close my eyes. It’s the way it was in the hole. I feel warmth, but this time going through my whole brain. There is a smell, almost of burnt almonds or the smell of the seed inside a peach stone. It seems to last only a few minutes. Then Franky leans back. He speaks to me.

‘Well, how did that feel? It wasn’t so bad, was it?’

‘It felt warm in my head and I smelled something peculiar. How should I feel?’

‘Listen to yourself.’

Only then, I realize I’ve answered in German, and it was so familiar to me it sounded like English to my ears. I also realize I do know everything about Wilhelm, all he can remember about his own life. I know where he lived, about his wife, how he misses her. It’s almost as if they are my own memories, but more, as if it’s a movie I’m watching, only seeing it, not actually participating. I stare over at Wilhelm. I turn to Franky.

‘You did it. You actually did it. But can I still speak English?’

‘Certainly. Sometimes, at first, you might get confused and speak the wrong language, but that won’t last long. In time, your own language will control your German. It’s what you are, an American who speaks English as your home language.’

‘You haven’t done this with Wilhelm yet, have you?’

‘No. He isn’t quite strong enough, but in a few days he’ll be ready. I think now he would appreciate it if you would speak with him some when I am gone. He’s very lonesome and frightened.’

‘I never thought about that. He’s probably as scared as I am. In fact, I know he is, I can feel his feelings. He’s afraid of me even.’