Winfred

108

Official Report

British Intelligence

Code: 3986                 

Kathleen Winfred

May saw the allies advancing, and the Germans falling back at multiple fronts. So far, our prison had been ordered to hold its position. We saw an influx of troops, occupying the prison and the nearby town, as well as multiple other surrounding small towns.

We watched tanks drive by along the roads, and German soldiers marching in straight lines along behind them.

I could tell that Freidrich was feeling the strain of the current events.

He had gotten his aunt sent off to stay with Maddalyn, and she had sent him one letter to which, although he told me how much he regretted it, he did not reply. The less contact that Maddalyn, his aunt, and Maddalyn’s family had with him, the better.

Anyway, his aunt had let him know of her safe arrival.

I tried to make things easier for him. I took over as many office tasks for him as I possibly could. I brought him dinner in his office, and fetched him glasses of water and ran other such small errands.

I could tell, however, that although he appreciated my attempts to help him, it wasn’t working much.

I had become skilled enough in French, by necessity. Enough, at least, that Freidrich discontinued my lessons in the face of all the other things he had to attend to at the prison.

Accommodations had to be made for the new soldiers at the prison. Prisoners were transferred in and out. Matthew and Jessica were forced to part when Matthew was sent to Auschwitz. Jessica was almost beside herself, especially when Freidrich told her, reluctantly, that, with things as they were, he could not get letters from Matthew back to her.

She yelled at him, in her grief, telling him he should try harder.

Freidrich did not argue, or defend himself. He simply stood, and took it, and once Jessica was finished, and after she, feeling bad about her words, had apologized, he left, even though I could tell it had upset him.

I got up early, and stayed with Freidrich throughout the day, not wanting to be apart from him. Even though he was staying up later and later in order to finish everything that needed to be done and picking up slack for some of the new officers beneath him, I stayed up with him, never leaving his side until both of us parted outside the office and went to bed.

Rumors of resistance began to arise.

The rumors were that the French were planning movements of resistance. However, much to the Germans frustration, they could not figure out if the rumors were true, or when the resistance attacks would occur.

You could almost cut the tension with a knife.

I came back from fetching a glass of water for Freidrich to find him standing before the window, his hands behind his back.

“Freidrich?” I said, setting the glass down and going to stand next to him, looking up at his face.

His expression was one of weariness. He sighed. “I feel as if I’m being pulled…stretched…in all different directions.”

I put my arm around his, and grasped his hand. He squeezed my fingers, tightly. “The storm’s going to break, Kathleen,” he whispered.

I leaned my head against his arm, looking out the window with him, over the dark courtyard and, beyond it, the high barbed wire fences marking the outskirts of the prison.

He leaned his head against mine.

“I love you,” he said. “I love you, liebling. I always will love you, until the day that I die. Until the very end.”

I closed my eyes, willing myself not to cry.

“I love you too,” I said. “I will never stop loving you, Freidrich.”