William Holden credited as playing...
Sgt. J.J. Sefton
- Sefton: There are two people in this barracks who know I didn't do it. Me and the guy that did do it.
- [after Sefton cuts through the barbed wire to let them escape]
- Sefton: Let's blow, Chauncey.
- Lt. James Skylar Dunbar: Let's.
- Sefton: If I ever run into any of you bums on a street corner, just let's pretend we've never met before.
- Sefton: I told you boys I'm no escape artist. For the first time, I like the odds, because now I got me a decoy.
- Hoffy: What's the decoy?
- Sefton: Price. When I go, I want you to give me five minutes - exactly five minutes - to get Dunbar out of that water tank. And then you throw Price out onto the compound, nice and loud. He'll draw every light from every goon tower. It's our only chance to cut through. Well, what do you say, barracks chief?
- Bagradian: He's right, Hoffy. It's either Price or Dunbar.
- Animal: He killed Johnson and Manfredi, didn't he?
- Hoffy: It's all yours.
- Sefton: [questioning Price] When was Pearl Harbor, Price, or don't you know that?
- Price: December 7th, '41.
- Sefton: What time?
- Price: [smugly] 6:00. I was having dinner.
- Sefton: [smirks] 6:00 in Berlin.
- [to the other barrack members]
- Sefton: They were having lunch in Cleveland. Am I boring you boys?
- Hoffy: Go on.
- Sefton: He's a Nazi, Price is. For all I know his name is Preissinger or Preishoffer. Oh, sure, he lived in Cleveland. But when the war broke out, he came back to the Fatherland like a good little Bundist. He spoke our lingo, so they sent him to spy school and fixed him up with phony dog tags.
- Sefton: What is this anyway, a kangaroo court? Why don't you get a rope and do it right?
- Duke: You make my mouth water.
- Sefton: You're all wire-happy, boys. You've been in this camp too long. You put two and two together and it comes out four - only it ain't four.
- Hoffy: What's it add up to you, Sefton?
- Sefton: It adds up that you got yourselves the wrong guy. Because, I'm telling you, the krauts wouldn't plant two stoolies in one barracks. And whatever you do to me, you're gonna have to do all over again when you find the right guy.
- [Duke wants to know who the German spy is]
- Sefton: It's no use, Schulz, you might as well come clean. Why don't you just tell them it's me, because I'm really the illegitimate son of Hitler, and after the Germans win the war, you're going to make me the Gauleiter of Zinzinnati!
- Hoffy: They ought to be under the barbed wire soon.
- Shapiro: Looks good outside.
- Animal: I hope they hit the Danube before dawn.
- Price: They've got a good chance. The longest night of the year.
- Duke: I'll bet they make it to Friedrichshaven.
- Animal: I bet they make it all the way to Switzerland.
- Sefton: And I bet they don't get out of the forest.
- Duke: Now what kind of crack is that?
- Sefton: No crack. Two packs of cigarettes say they don't get out of the forest.
- Hoffy: That's enough, Sefton. Crawl back in your sack.
- Shapiro: He'd make book on his own mother getting hit by a truck.
- Sefton: Anybody call?
- Animal: [watching Sefton cook an egg] Are you gonna eat it all by yourself?
- Sefton: Mm-hmm. The yellow and the white.
- Animal: Is it all right if we smell it?
- Sefton: Just don't drool on it.
- Shapiro: You're not gonna eat the shells?
- Sefton: Help yourself.
- Animal: [Harry gives him half the shell] Hey, thanks. What are we gonna do with it?
- Shapiro: We're gonna plant it, Animal. We're gonna grow us a chicken for Christmas.
- Duke: Come on, Trader Horn, let's hear it. What'd you give the krauts for that egg?
- Sefton: 45 cigarettes. Price has gone up.
- Duke: They wouldn't be the cigarettes you took us for last night?
- Sefton: What was I gonna do with them? I only smoke cigars.
- Duke: Niiice guy. The krauts shoot Manfredi and Johnson last night, and today he's out trading with them.
- Sefton: Look. This may be my last hot breakfast on account of they're going to take that stove out of here, so would you let me eat it in peace?
- Animal: Now ain't that too bad? Tomorrow you'll have to suck a raw egg.
- Shapiro: Oh, he don't have to worry. He can always trade the krauts for a six-burner gas range. Maybe a deep freeze, too.
- Sefton: What's the beef, boys? So I'm trading. Everybody here is trading. So maybe I trade a little sharper. That make me a collaborator?
- Duke: A lot sharper, Sefton. I'd like to have some of that loot you got in those footlockers.
- Sefton: Oh you would, would you? Listen, stupe. The first week I was in this joint, somebody stole my Red Cross package, my blanket, and my left shoe. Well, since then I've wised up. This ain't no Salvation Army - this is everybody for himself, dog eat dog.
- Sefton: Okay, Herr Preisshoffer, let's have the mailbox.
- Price: The what?
- Sefton: The one you took out of the corner of your bunk and put in this pocket!
- [pulls a black queen out of Price's jacket]
- Sefton: Let me show you how they did it. They did it by mail.
- Harry Shapiro: Mail?
- Sefton: That's right. Little love notes between our Security officer and Von Scherbach, with Schulz the mailman.
- [gestures to a lightbulb hanging above a table]
- Sefton: Here's the flag. They used to put a loop in the cord.
- [does so]
- Sefton: Did you ever notice? And here's the mailbox. Hollow black queens.
- [pops the two queens open]
- Sefton: Cute, huh? They delivered the mail or picked it up whenever we were out of the barracks, like for appell. And when there was a special delivery, they'd pull a phony air raid to get us out of here, like last night for instance. There wasn't a plane in the sky. Or was there, Price?
- Geneva man: [a Red Cross official is inspecting the camp just after Sefton was beaten on suspicion being an enemy informant. The official sees his injuries] What happened to you? Were you beaten?
- [Sefton doesn't answer]
- Geneva man: Why don't you answer?
- [to the German officer escorting him]
- Geneva man: What did you do to this man?
- Sefton: They didn't do nothing.
- Geneva man: Who beat you?
- Sefton: Nobody beat me. We were playing pinochle. It's a rough game.
- Price: Anybody asks for your papers, you're French laborers. And here's your map, Kraut money, Swiss francs.
- Sgt. Manfredi: Roger.
- Price: All right, now let's hear it one more time, boys.
- Sgt. Johnson: We've been over it a hundred times.
- Hoffy: Let's hear it again.
- Sgt. Manfredi: We stick to the forest going west until we hit the Danube.
- Price: Check.
- Sgt. Johnson: Then we follow the Danube up to Linz.
- Price: Check.
- Sgt. Johnson: In Linz, we hop a barge and go all the way to Ulm.
- Price: Check.
- Duke: [Joey begins playing his ocarina] Stop it, Joey. Joey!
- [he stops]
- Duke: Go back to sleep.
- Price: Go on. You're in Ulm.
- Sgt. Johnson: Once in Ulm, we lie low until night. Then we take a train to Friedrichshafen.
- Sgt. Manfredi: Once in Friedrichshafen, we steal a rowboat, get some fishing tackle, and start drifting across the lake, always south, 'til we hit the other side. Switzerland.
- Sefton: Once in Switzerland, just give out with a big yodel, boys, so we'll know you're there. It's a breeze.
- Hoffy: Stay out of this, Sefton.
- Sefton: Just one question. Did you calculate the risk?
- Hoffy: I called a meeting of the barracks chiefs this morning, Sefton. I thought maybe I could get you transferred to another barracks. But it turns out that nobody likes you any more than we do.
- Sefton: So you're stuck with me, huh?
- Animal: Maybe the Russian broads would take him.
- Shapiro: Not with that kisser. Not anymore.
- Duke: You got off lucky last night, Sefton. One more move, and you'll wake up with your throat cut!
- Price: You listening, Sefton?
- Sefton: Yeah, I still got one good ear.