The parade pranced, staggered and reeled to the gate of the Dresden slaughterhouse, and then it went inside.  The slaughterhouse wasn't a busy place any more.  Almost all the hooved animals in Germany had been killed and eaten and excreted by human beings, mostly soldiers.  So it goes.
    The Americans were taken to the fifth building inside the gate.  It was a one-story cement-block cube with sliding doors in front and back.  It had been built as a shelter for pigs about to be butchered.  Now it was going to be served as a home away from home for one hundred American prisoners of war.  There were bunks in there, and two potbellied stoves and a water tap.  Behind it was a latrine, which was a one-rail fence with buckets under it.
    There was a big number over the door of the building.  The number was five.  Before the American could go inside, their only English-speaking guard told them to memorize their simple address, in case they got lost in the big city.  Their address was this: "Schlachthof-fünf."  Schlachthof meant slaughterhouse.  Fünf was good old five.