BIENVENIDO SANTOS

The Prisoners

In Hays, Kansas, I saw some German prisoners. It was a late evening on a melancholy winter day. They marched in the snow through the deserted campus, four abreast, with a quick, eager motion in their strides that was somehow dignified. They were young, all of them, their faces flushed, and some were smiling as they walked, as though they were not prisoners, but happy workers in a happy land.

It was to have been my last day on the campus. My itinerary allowed me a Christmas vacation which I could spend anywhere I wished to, so I began planning as soon as I arrived in Kansas. From Emporia I went on to Hays, and from there it was up to me. ‘You could move to your next city and await the opening of classes there,’ read Dr Hager’s instructions, ‘or you could return to Washington, if you wish … It’s up to you.’ The note included the usual season’s greetings which did not cheer me up at all, but through no fault of the good doctor.

It was quite depressing, travelling through snow-covered places. The cold streets of the little cities looked unhappy as though bearing more than their winter share of snow. And people were always hurrying to get to a room where there was a lighted stove. All the way, long before Thanksgiving, from Shippensburg in Pennsylvania, the snow had been falling all over the land. In Oneonta in New York, the frost came early. Shortly before I left the town, the trees on the hills had lost their gold.

After Hays, the next stop on my schedule was Evanston. So I decided to go to Chicago. I had been there before during my first year in America. I had run away from the deserted campus in Urbana, thinking it would be much better spending Christmas in Chicago, but it turned out differently. Now I remembered the winds, the soot, and the indifferent strangers, their impersonal faces. But, too, I remembered the huge manger where the Child Jesus lay surrounded by Mary and Joseph, and the beasts and the adoring kings. Especially at night, this familiar scene, right at the foot of the bridge on the riverside, glowed with life as though the Birth were just now, a few moments back and the cause for great rejoicing was fresh, was real.

I had made arrangements to leave for Chicago. I was coming from the railway depot when I saw those prisoners. The station agent spoke of a great snowstorm that had developed somewhere along the way, and it might be that there would be no transportation available for the next few days.

‘Please give me your telephone number and I’ll keep in touch with you,’ he said.

I told him I was staying at the college campus. Hays was not a big city and at that time of the year, with all the college boys and girls away, it was a pretty lonesome place. The snow was still falling. Earlier in the day, during the noon hour, it looked like twilight and felt like twilight; dusk and ashes and a shadowy vagueness were over all things.

The building superintendent who gave me back the key to my room was sorry to hear that I could not go, but I told him it was all right, I expected to hear from the station agent any time.

‘I’m lucky,’ I said, ‘I’ve the entire campus to myself.’

‘That’s right,’ he laughed, ‘but you’re not quite alone. There are some German prisoners of war assigned to the compound temporarily. I guess you’ve seen them.’

‘Oh, yes, I have,’ I said, thinking of the tall, blond men marching in the snow.

Then I was alone in my room.

As I removed my coat, I noticed that the room had been made up, readied for the next guest of the school. Strange, but nothing in it looked familiar, nothing in it I remembered as though I had just come. Of course, there had been many other rooms like this in all my wanderings, simply furnished, warm, and comfortable. Always there was a clean smell; and mostly the walls were bare, but cool and easy on the eyes. Now I turned off the light and looked through the glass window. Outside, the snow was falling, thickest, it seemed, under the lamplights. In the distance was the highway. Headlights glared occasionally and passed on. That was the only difference, the view from the window. It was a highway now, winding somewhere through a wide expanse of level whiteness. Sometimes it was a river as in Natchatoches or a church as in Cape Girardeau.

That night, it was Christmas Eve. I could not sleep at once. The room felt too warm and the radiator made a lot of noise that was like the scampering of rats in the attic. At first I thought I had caught a fever, my ears burned and I had difficulty breathing. So I tiptoed to the window and raised the shutter a little. A whiff of the night air filled the room at once and I felt better under the thick blankets.

Then the night was filled with sounds, distant and near: the crunch of tyres on the snow, somewhere the honking of a horn, but far away; a door banging as though a house had fallen, then silence again, the noiseless fall of snow upon the earth. I remembered home; perhaps I dreamed. Now the night was filled with music, soft, muted strains of a familiar Christmas song … silent night, holy night …

My brother and I had come from Manila. It was Christmas Eve. By mistake we got off the wrong station. We had not been home for so long, we had forgotten it was to have been the next station yet, a flagstop, not the main town station. But we were so excited to be home at last, we had not remembered. So we walked a long way, in the dark, through sandy pathways, under the bamboo trees. We told our way by the sound of the river. We kept going towards it. We knew that our house was somewhere in that darkness on the river bank.

It was a beautiful night. Stars filled the sky. Choose the brightest, Greg said, and that would be the star that led the wise men to the Child in the manger. We are the wise men now, I said, although we aren’t so wise, we have forgotten the way home. But the old Santiago river would lead us. Dogs barked and we shouted at them. When we passed by a nipa shack where a light shone through the nipa walls, we would call, in God’s name, may we pass? And a voice or voices would answer, pass on, please, and God watch over you … Merry Christmas!

When we came to more houses, we could almost see our way from the lights by the windows. The air was sweet with the odour of native cakes and candies. We felt tired and hungry, but we walked on. And we kept walking till we saw the river under the stars and the familiar house on the sands. Father and Mother were there and the little ones. As we unpacked the presents we had bought for them, Father said, you didn’t have to spend all your money.

Mother was having quite a time with the sticky stuff she was cooking, so I came to her and took the ladle from her hand; but instead of helping her, I put it aside and flung my arms around her thin body and squeezed her hard, crying as I did so; I had missed her so much, the smell of betel nut in her breath and the fragrance of lime in her hair. Let me go, let me go, she screamed, you’re breaking my bones. As I relaxed my hold, she put her arms around my neck. She was crying also. You have stayed away too long, my son, she said. Greg was looking out of the window, towards the river. Father had turned away. Suddenly from somewhere in the night, above the noise of the river, floated the Christmas song, silent night … holy night …

Maybe I had fallen asleep after all and had dreamed all this. In my devastated country only the river perhaps had not changed.

It was daylight when I opened my eyes. I was shivering. Hurriedly, I reached for the shutter and pulled it down. The snow had stopped falling, yet there was no sun.

Merry Christmas, I said, looking at the ceiling, thinking of warm, old arms around my neck, sniffing the air for the smell of betel nut and the odour of lime. Don’t be silly, I chided myself, as I always did when I was feeling quite lonesome and was missing home too much. Then I started on the usual thoughts that were supposed to make me less miserable during such moments.

About my being not too really badly off. Think of the places you have seen, the many good people you have met. You are to be envied. You are treated well wherever you go. People have been kind to you. They give you standing ovations. They hold parties in your honour. Sweet young American girls ask for your autograph as though you were a celebrity. And they write you letters. They say nice, lovely things … Think of other men, less fortunate, who walk alone. Think of the prisoners of war. An Ohio private in the jungles of New Guinea had written to his wife in America: ‘It will be a different Christmas this year. The altar will be a fallen tree in this stinking jungle. All around there will be the stink of sweat, unwashed clothes and the fainter, sweeter smell of death. But as I kneel to pray I know you will be alongside me, praying too, and that will make it a Happy Christmas, darling.’

Suddenly I felt a great need to go to church. I should not have forgotten in the first place. It was Christmas Day. There should be a church somewhere. It was not yet too late.

Downtown, a few well-dressed people walked the streets. Some were coming from church, others were just walking, hand in hand, or alone. The things I really wanted to say, on my knees, were not too easily said. For a time I just knelt there, listening to organ music, not saying anything in particular, just thinking how it was, back home, beside the Santiago river.

At the depot, the station agent recognized me at once. ‘I’m sorry for you, fellow,’ he said, ‘having to spend Christmas away from home like this, but I’ll ring you up as soon as I have some definite news for you.’

I thanked him and walked out and the sun was shining. The streets were dirty and slushy now. I wondered whether the restaurants were open on Christmas Day. In Chicago, during that first year, I had to walk many blocks, and found one open in the dingier section of the city where the shiftless roamed in rags. Fortunately, it was not that difficult in Hays. There was a food shop open on a side street. A coloured picture of Santa Claus dispensing cigarettes was nailed on the wall above the counter.

In the afternoon, after wandering around in the sun I was back at the campus. As I was about to open the door to the main entrance, I saw the man hacking away with a shovel at the ice-covered fountain. He was one of the prisoners I had seen the day before. He wore gloves and a thick uniform. I stopped to watch him. The exertion kept him warm, I supposed. When he looked my way, I said, ‘Merry Christmas,’ hoping he would understand. He bowed slightly, and smiled, mumbling words. Then he resumed his work.

Soon a young man in the uniform of a US soldier came along and saluted me politely. When I greeted him, he grinned back, ‘Same to you, sir.’

Then both of us watched the prisoner. The guard knew who I was and why I was still on the campus. The building superintendent had told him. Then he said that the German prisoners were keeping quarters temporarily at the boys’ dormitory, the squat brick building on the west side of the hall where I was staying.

‘This fellow here,’ he said, ‘is not supposed to work today. But ever since he saw the ice-covered fountain and learned that there were fishes there, he has been wanting to get them out. His companions don’t pay any attention to him. They’re feeling good and warm in their quarters, playing chess, and writing or listening to the radio.’

‘Do they speak English?’ I asked.

‘Hardly. Just what they pick up when we talk to them and what they learn in class. Some are diligent. They learn. They try to read the papers. Others just look at the pictures.’

The prisoner had cracked the ice open. He smiled at us.

‘Success, eh?’ the guard said.

The prisoner rolled his sleeves up close to the armpit, and kneeling on the ground, dipped his hand into the water. He winced as the ice-cold water bit into his flesh. But after a while, perhaps it was not too cold any more. He kept his arm in the water for some time, searching the bottom for fish.

‘No, no!’ the prisoner said, straining to reach farther down.

‘He’s stubborn,’ the guard said, walking away.

Then the prisoner rose to his feet. In his hand he held a tiny golden fish.

‘See?’ he said, smiling as though he was about to perform a trick.

‘But it’s stiff. It’s dead,’ I said.

‘No, no!’ the man protested, ‘Will live, will live.’

He made a sign for me to follow, and together we walked to the prisoners’ quarters. As the door closed behind us, the warmth of the room sent a pleasant tingle through my body. I did not realize I had stayed quite long out in the cold.

Some of the men were sipping coffee. Their bunks were clean and very neatly made. When they saw what my companion had in his hand, they turned their attention away from me. And they spoke loudly at the same time, with a lot of grimaces and gestures. My companion shook them all away, angrily it seemed, and walked towards one of the bunks and got out a glass tumbler like the ones students use in the laboratory. With this he ran out, back to the fountain.

The guard invited me to a cup of coffee and we sat among the men. They looked at me and smiled and talked among themselves in their language.

‘Look,’ said the guard to them, ‘this gentleman comes from the Philippines.’

The prisoners took up the word, mouthing it with difficulty. ‘Philippines … Philippines,’ and it sounded strange as they pronounced the word. Some of them seemed to say that they knew the place, others didn’t seem to know. They talked and they laughed. A group of them had started to open a book that lay on a table where there were magazines and a radio. A man was sitting at a corner of the long table, writing something. The noise didn’t seem to bother him.

‘They’re all right,’ I said, putting down my cup.

‘You bet they are,’ said the guard, ‘they got to be.’

Then the group, which was interested in the book, gave out a shout, ‘Philippines … here … here.’ And they came to me with a map of the Orient. They were pointing at the archipelago. I glanced at it and nodded. The island looked so small.

‘Very far … very far,’ one of the prisoners was saying.

‘You like the snow?’ I asked the men, wanting to talk about something else. They didn’t understand me at once, but when they did they said a lot in German. Then one of them spoke. ‘Snow, huh? Plenty snow in Germany.’

‘In the Philippines,’ I said, ‘we have no snow.’

The same fellow translated this to the others and they began another discussion among themselves.

Then this man who seemed to know more English than the rest, asked, ‘Why not go home to Philippines. Must be nice, huh? No snow.’

‘I can’t go home,’ I said, ‘the war, you know.’

The meaning of these words was relayed to the others and suddenly there was boisterous laughter among them. They were saying a lot of things that certainly amused them, but this word they kept repeating as they looked at me, ‘Gefangener … Gefangener,’ the word spreading in the room like a refrain. Even the man writing at the table turned to look at me.

‘What’s all this about?’ I asked the guard.

Their interpreter answered quickly, ‘They say, you’re prisoner, too.’

‘Well,’ I began, trying to smile, but just then the prisoner came in, holding in both hands the glass tumbler half-filled with water, where many fishes floated, all dead stiff.

The other prisoners gathered around him, looking at the fish, saying things, and this man shook them all away.

‘He insists,’ said the guard, ‘that the fish will live.’

The man had placed the tumbler on the long table and sat on the bench and stared at the fish. I came over, sitting beside him, and watched the fish for some sign of life. It looked like a vigil. Someone had turned on the radio and soft church music filled the room.

‘Maybe you’re right,’ I said to the man beside me.

‘Yes, yes,’ he said without looking away from the tumbler. And softly, in a half-whisper, he kept muttering to himself, ‘Wird leben. Wird leben. Hoffnung. Es besteht hoffnung.’ Then he looked at me briefly and his eyes didn’t look so young, and again he turned to the fish, murmuring, ‘Will live … will live. There is hope.’

I have learned the words since then, trying hard especially in desperate moments to believe in them. As it turned out, I never got to know whether the prisoner was right.

The station agent had been on the phone right after I had seen him, but it was not until evening that he was able to talk to me. When I left the prisoners’ quarters to take the phone call, I didn’t know that I was not going to see them again.

The station agent said that the Chief was coming through on its way to the East Coast. There was barely time to get packed again, although I could have returned to the prisoner’s quarters and said goodbye and found out perhaps whether the fish in the tumbler had showed any signs of life, but I was too excited.

I paused under the lighted doorway as the cab-driver started putting my luggage inside the car. I looked towards the prisoners’ quarters, but their lights were out. They had turned in early, but some of them must be awake, looking out through the windows. Perhaps they could see me. I waved towards them. It could be that they waved back.