Order of Battle (22 page)

“Who isn’t?”

“She’s scared. Maybe I can straighten things out in a few minutes.”

“Oh, sure!”

“Why don’t you start getting the gear together? I’ll join you right away.”

“Sure you will!” Don looked at Erik. He shook his head in mock exasperation. “Okay. Go rescue your damsel in distress. But don’t fuck up the mission!”

He walked from the room. Erik went over to Anneliese. He looked at her.

“All right, Anneliese,” he said. “Now tell me what’s the trouble.”

“They will not give me a pass at your military government,” the girl blurted out. “To travel. To go home to Regensburg!” Her troubles came spilling out. “They say the road is closed for civilians. For many days closed. But I cannot stay here. I do not know anybody. And the other officer, he
said
I could go home. You
heard
him say I could go home! And you said—”

Erik interrupted her.

“Take it easy,” he said. “Don’t worry. We’ll get it straightened out.”

She looked up at him hopefully. He started toward the door.

“Come on. I’ll take you over to the military government myself. We’ll find out what’s up.”

He felt oddly satisfied.

Only a few civilians were in the street outside the jail, hurrying to get home before darkness and curfew.

Erik did see the small flare of the match being struck diagonally across the street. It stabbed a pinpoint of light upon his peripheral vision, but it did not reach his conscious mind, which was struggling with the presence of Anneliese. Much less did he connect it with himself.

The man, standing in the deeper shadows of a boarded-up doorway to an empty house, lit a cigarette butt. The striking of the match and the lighting of the butt were done in a fluid motion, although the man had only one arm. For a brief moment the flame illuminated his face. One eye was covered by a patch. It was Heinz.

On the side street around the corner of the jail, another man was kneeling in front of a time-scarred bicycle, fixing its chain. The bicycle, leaning against the wall of the building, was loaded with bundled-up house gear and string-wrapped cardboard boxes. A torn knapsack was latched to the rusty handlebars.

When the match flared across the street, the man stood up. He tugged at his dirty leather cap and pulled the bicycle from the wall. Pushing it alongside, he rounded the corner of the building and trudged on down the street a short distance behind Erik and Anneliese. The old bicycle had no tires. The naked wheel rims clanked metallically on the cement-slab sidewalk. The man plodded on. He never took his eyes from the two people in front of him. It was Krauss.

A few houses down the street from the jail, a building had received a direct hit. Rubble and broken masonry had spilled from the ruins out across the sidewalk into the street. Two men had been clearing a narrow path through the debris. They were in the process of loading their tools and a few pieces of salvageable lumber on a wooden cart as Erik and Anneliese approached. The clattering bicycle behind them was loud in the quiet. The two workers looked up.

Erik let the girl go through the passage first, then he started after her. He was halfway through. . . .

Suddenly the man loading the cart appeared to slip on a loose brick. He fell, and slammed against Erik’s legs in a low tackle.

Erik went down.

He hit the ground at the feet of the second man. He looked up.

For a fraction of a second time stood still for him, his eyes locked on the German towering directly over him. The man’s face was distorted with fanatic hate; a pickax, gripped by two white-knuckled fists, was raised high above his head.

The man brought the pickax down in a vicious stroke. Straight for Erik’s upturned face. It seemed to obliterate the world above him.

He wrenched his head aside. For an instant he knew he hadn’t made it. Then the pickax crashed into the rubble inches away, showering his face with stinging chips of mortar and brick.

He twisted away, reaching for the gun in his shoulder holster.

He was sharply aware of his two assailants. The man who had fallen against him was scrambling to get up; the man with the pickax was struggling to regain his balance.

Erik’s fingers found the reassuring cool solidity of his gun.

Suddenly, Anneliese cried out:

“
Pass auf!
”

Instantly Erik twisted around. He lost his grip on the gun. Immediately behind him stood Krauss. He was aiming a savage kick at Erik’s temple with his hobnailed boot.

The girl’s warning had come just in time. Erik’s hands shot up and caught Krauss’s foot as it came hurtling toward his head. He didn’t have the strength or leverage to stop the force of the kick, but he managed to deflect the heavy boot. The steel-reinforced toe of the boot hit him on the neck with jarring impact. He didn’t feel it. He hung onto the boot with all his strength, and Krauss toppled heavily among the rubble.

He had an unreal sensation of being two people at once. One was strictly an observer. It’s ridiculous, he thought. It can’t be happening. Not to me! The other was acutely aware, with hair-trigger reflexes.

He rolled toward the street and came up on one knee, gun in hand.

One of his assailants was ducking into the street, shielding himself behind the few people who had begun to gather. The other man was also on his feet; he lunged toward.Anneliese and gave her a violent shove, which sent her sprawling in the rubble, and kept running. Erik’s gun instinctively shifted to cover him, but the girl was in his line of fire as she got up from the broken masonry.

Erik whirled toward Krauss. The man was just disappearing behind the remains of a collapsed wall. He squeezed off a shot knowing it would go wild.

He was suddenly aware that he was alone with the girl. The bystanders were slipping away, melting quickly into the dusk, as a couple of GIs came running toward the scene.

Anneliese stood motionless among the debris. She was watching Erik with frightened eyes. She was shivering, unaware of it.

Erik replaced his gun in his shoulder holster. He walked up to the girl. He put his hands on her trembling shoulders and looked into her face searchingly.

“Thank you,” he said. His voice was low. “Thank you—Anneliese.”

The girl met his eyes for a long moment. Then she closed her own big eyes tightly. She sagged into his arms and put her head on his shoulder. The little sob that escaped her was a mixture of spent fear and relief. . . .

Erik put his arms around the trembling girl. He held her. His arms tightened around her. He was intensely conscious of her softness. Her warmth. His world was filled with the fresh scent of her hair, mingled with the acrid-sweet smell of her fear. It was overwhelmingly exciting. And he thought of nothing but her. . . .

Nothing . . .

The attack had taken exactly twenty-three seconds.

A lifetime.

Don and Murphy came running. Murphy carried a carbine, ready for trouble.

“What’s going on?” Don demanded. “What the hell’s the shooting?”

Erik let the girl go.

“It’s all over now,” he said quietly. He was speaking to both of them.

“What happened?”

“Some blasted idiot tried to put a pickax through my head.” Now that it
was
all over Erik felt a sudden anger. “God damn his hide!”

Don looked from Anneliese to Erik. He was relieved that nothing had happened to his partner, but he was deeply irritated with him for letting himself get into a situation where he could be jumped.

“Wouldn’t have been easy,” he said caustically, “with that thick skull of yours.”

Erik glanced at him. Don had spoken with unwonted tenseness. He went on:

“You should have known better. Going out alone at this time of day with a goddamned Fräulein in tow! Where the hell do you think you are? Brooklyn?”

He felt better. He’d had his say.

Murphy came up to them.

“Anything I can do?” he asked.

Erik looked at him. Outwardly he was calm. But inside he felt a strong tide of emotion throb through him. Anneliese stood quietly away to one side, but he could still feel her in his arms. He could still smell the scent of her.

“Yes, Jim,” he said. “Take care of the girl.”

He turned to her.

“Don’t worry,” he said gently. “We’ll get you to Regensburg.”

“If you please,” she said in a small voice. Erik turned back to Murphy.

“Tell Lieutenant Howard to let her ride the supply truck to Regensburg. Tomorrow morning. Understand? I’ll take the responsibility.”

“Okay, sir.”

Murphy walked over to the girl, a big smile on his face.

“You see, baby,” he said confidentially, “I told you I’d fix everything for you.”

Erik was watching them.

“I hate to break this up,” Don said, “
but
. . .”

Erik started.

“Yes. We’d better get going.”

They headed toward the jail. Murphy and the girl followed. For a moment the two men walked in silence. Don inspected Erik out of the corner of his eye. Something’s eating him, he thought. Has been for some time. He was concerned. He’d better work it out. Soon. Aloud he said:

“Erik, old cock, you’ll get yourself in real trouble one of these days.”

Erik frowned.

“I don’t get it,” he said. “Why should they suddenly jump me? Are we missing something?” He looked at Don. “Do you think—”

“It’s not hard to figure out, lover boy. The Krauts don’t like to see an ‘Ami’ promenading one of their good-looking Fräuleins. Especially not one of the ‘American Gestapo.’ You just got their goat is all.”

“Maybe you’re right.” Erik dismissed the incident. There were more important matters to take care of. “Did you get everything?” he asked.

“Yeah. But I’ve got to stay here. Wait for Division clearance. They haven’t gotten off their collective ass yet.”

“Okay. I’ll take off for the farm now. Start the ball rolling.”

“Good. Jim and I’ll finish up here.” He glanced at Erik. “Including fixing your girl friend’s TS slip!”

They were almost at the jail. The street was empty of civilians except for one lone man, hurrying along the sidewalk toward them. It was almost curfew time. The man limped. One sleeve of a stripped Wehrmacht uniform jacket was pinned up, empty. One eye was covered by a crude patch.

He stepped into the gutter to let the Americans and the girl pass. . . .

Schönsee

The Zollner Farm

1913 hrs

Erik and Don had selected the Zollner farm to serve as command post for the operation for a couple of very good reasons. Located just north of Schönsee on the road to Eslarn, the farm’s north fields bordered the forest where Plewig had placed the Werewolf headquarters; also, it was uninhabited. Zollner had been the local
Ortsbauernführer
and had thought better of staying to welcome the Americans.

The farm itself could not be seen from the forest because of a row of trees. It consisted of a main building, a barn, a stable and a chicken coop arranged around an unusually spacious farmyard. Even the oozing dunghill in the center left ample space for the barbed wire enclosure being put up in one half of the yard. Some eight to ten GIs were busy turning the farmyard into a temporary PW enclosure, unloading concertina wire from a three-quarter-ton truck, setting up corner machine gun emplacements and erecting floodlight poles.

The evening was crisp and clear and the men displayed no lights, working as quickly and silently as possible. From their shoulder patches and collar insignia it was apparent that they were 97th Division military police.

Erik was satisfied. The preparations were coming along fine. And the activity could not be observed from the forest in the distance. He walked up to an MP sergeant putting up a floodlight. “Well, Sergeant, how’s it coming?”

“Okay. Should be finished in a couple of hours.”

“Great. When you’re through you’d better have your men turn in. It ought to be a busy day tomorrow.” He pointed to the bam. “That barn is full of hay. You can bed down in there.”

“Good deal.”

Sergeant Sammy Klein glanced at the CIC agent. He was curious. As usual his orders had been half-assed. A PW enclosure for werewolves? He knew those CIC guys were a little
meshuge,
but
werewolves?
Led by Frankenstein and Dracula, no doubt! But he was responsible for eleven guys from his outfit. Better he should know as much as possible about his
tsemishne
operation. Now was as good a time as any to find out. He held the wires of the floodlight toward Erik.

“Would you hold these?” he asked. “Out of the way? I gotta secure this pole.”

Erik took hold of the wires.

“Sure.”

“Say, what are these—uh—werewolves you’re out to get?”

“It’s an organization of fanatics.”

“Yeah?”

“They’ve sworn to keep their own private reign of terror going, even after the war is over.”

“They responsible for those guys in the river?”

Erik nodded. “Very likely.”

Klein spat on the cobblestones.

“Helluva way to fight a war,” he said with disgust.

He’d finished securing the pole to an old hand pump. He took the wires from Erik.

“Thanks.”

He began to wind them around the pole.

“Why the screwy name Werewolves?”

“It comes from a medieval superstition that certain people can transform themselves at will into ferocious wolflike beasts.”

Klein gave a short laugh.

“That’s no superstition. Happens to every guy with a three-day pass!”

Erik smiled.

“Wrong kind of. wolf, Klein.” He grew sober. “Anyway, those creatures were called werewolves. They’d terrorize the countryside with, quote, fiendish acts of murder and destruction, unquote. And that’s exactly what the Nazi Werewolves plan to do.”

Klein nodded toward the distant forest.

“And they’re supposed to be in there someplace?”

“They are. We don’t know exactly where. Could be just across the fields.”