Chances and Changes: My Journey with Molly

I tell the others that we should keep the dog with us. We shouldn’t leave him alone. Linda and Molly agree with me. Linda takes off her neck scarf and we squat around the dog. But before we can slip the scarf around his neck, he lifts his ears and barks, startling us. We fall back on our bottoms in surprise. We look over our shoulders to see a curly-haired teenage boy squatting with open arms. He calls out to the dog, Maxie, and just as joyfully, the dog scrambles to his feet and hobbles into the boy’s arms. This dog clearly knows and loves this boy.

The boy calls out to us and thanks us in German. Linda and Molly jump to their feet. He is German. Molly pulls in her breath, her eyes wide. I can see from their faces that Molly and Linda are both scared stiff, but I’m not sure why. Molly whispers that her dad told her there are Prisoner of War camps in the United States. But she didn’t know there was one near here. Linda looks horrified. A prison camp? I turn to Molly and ask if she thinks he’s a prisoner. Why?

Molly tells us to look at the letters on his pants and shirt. P-O-W. That means Prisoner of War. Linda whispers that if he’s out here in the woods, that makes him an escaped prisoner. He could be a German soldier or a spy. He might hurt us!

Gently, the boy lifts the dog up into his arms and steps towards us. Molly and Linda take abrupt steps back. The boy snuggles his face into the dog. Finally, brave Molly greets the boy with a “Gesundheit.” Molly says it’s the only German word she knows. Then, the boy greets her with a “Howdy, pardner.” Linda says it’s probably the only English that he knows. The boy smiles and his brown eyes shine. He tries to introduce himself as Johann. Molly says what her name is, and she points to us while saying our names.

Suddenly, I blurt out the word “Tannenbaum.” I tell them it means Christmas tree. I play that carol on my flute. The boy nods and points at a fir tree. Then, he struggles to explain his situation. He pantomimes running, and taps his chest. He shades his eyes with his hand and looks all around anxiously. Then he hugs Maxie and says something in German. Molly says that he’s trying to tell us he’s been looking everywhere for his dog. She turns back to Johann and tries to pantomime that Maxie’s collar got caught on a bush and he scratched himself and we freed him.

Linda tells Molly to keep talking. While Molly does that, Linda and I should circle from behind to tackle him. Linda says he’s an enemy. We’ve got to capture him and take him back to Camp Gowonagin. At the sound of the word “Gowonagin,” the boy smiles and points down the hill. Then he points up the hill and pretends to march that way, giving us a little wave. I say that he’s trying to tell us that Camp Gowonagin is down there. And wherever he’s going is up there.

Molly says we don’t need to tackle him. He doesn’t seem dangerous. He’s going back to the Prisoner of War camp with Maxie. Linda flatly says she doesn’t trust him. We can’t just let him go. Maybe he parachuted in and is on his way to Chicago or someplace to spy for the Germans. Or if he’s a runaway from the Prisoner of War camp—

Molly interrupts and says that Maxie is the runaway. All Johann did was come looking for his dog.

Linda is still stubborn. She says that he’s not supposed to be wandering around the forest. Molly and I look at each other. Linda does have a point. Linda says we should stay with him to make sure he goes back to prison. But Johann doesn’t understand. He waves and says, “Auf Wiedersehen.” Johann whistles to Maxie and they both start to walk up the path.

Linda shadows him, and I reluctantly follow on their heels. We’ve only gone a few steps when Johann realizes we’re behind him. He points down the path again and says, “Gowonagin fur sie.” It’s easy to see he thinks we’re mixed up. He waves and says in English, “So long, pardner.” Linda shakes her head at him. We are going with him.

Johann looks puzzled. Again, he starts to go up the path, and again he stops when he sees us behind him. He can’t figure out why we’re not going back to Camp Gowonagin. Maxie eventually solves the go-stop-go problem. Now that he feels better, he’s eager to be home. So he moves pretty quickly up the path and Johann has no choice but to follow his dog. Maxie leads us up one hilly slope and down another. Eventually, we come to a small pond. Across the pond and through the trees, we see a tall chain link fence surrounding buildings arranged in straight rows. We are amazed. A Prisoner of War camp is right here. Molly says it looks more like a camp than a prison.

Molly turns to us. What do we do now? Do we tell someone we found Johann in the woods? Or do we just let him sneak back in without being noticed? I say he might get in trouble if we tell someone he left camp. Linda says it’s against army rules to be absent without leave. It’s called being AWOL. We have to tell someone. I comment that maybe he had permission to leave. Linda says she doubts it. He’s probably AWOL, and that means we need to report him. Otherwise we might get in trouble. Molly turns to me. What do we do?

My mind is in a whirl. Johann was a soldier in the enemy army. Doesn’t that make him partly responsible for the awful things the German military did? Should we treat him like an enemy? Is it unpatriotic to help him? But on the other hand, Johann doesn’t seem dangerous. He’s just a kid who wanted to find his dog. He didn’t cause trouble, and he didn’t hurt us. Why shouldn’t we let him go back to camp without being noticed. Isn’t that the kind thing to do? Isn’t the war over?