Assault on Abbeville

by Jack Badelaire

  “When will we meet the other members of your cell?” Gorski finally asked, glancing at the clock on the mantle. It was four in the morning.

  “Tomorrow - that is to say, tonight, if all goes well,” Berger replied. “I will leave here in a few minutes. I begin my work day very early, picking up deliveries from the farmers, and while making my rounds, I will make contact with the other members of the cell.”

  “Will you bring more wine?” Dumond asked, peering into an empty bottle.

  Berger smiled. “But of course! It was agreed to bring the others here, where we are out of sight of the road, rather than anywhere closer to town.”

  “The less we move about, the better,” Lambert added.

  “Yes, that is it exactly!” Berger replied, nodding enthusiastically. “Your safety is our greatest concern.”

  Dumond set down the empty wine bottle, and stretching his arms out wide, let out a bellowing yawn before knuckling his eye sockets and scrubbing his face with his hands.

  “Pardon me, my friends,” Dumond said, stifling another yawn. “But after so much food and wine, I must sleep. My apologies, Monsieur Berger, for such a gross display of exhaustion, but your hospitality puts me at ease.”

  Berger raised his hand. “No apologies necessary, good sir. And now, I must make my departure. Please, that couch is most comfortable, and my bed is in the room to the left. For the rest of you gentlemen, I shall fetch blankets and make my home as comfortable as possible.”

  “That is not necessary,” Verhoeven replied, recovering from a yawn of his own. “The warmth of the day will arrive soon enough, and our coats will be sufficient until then. Please, do not tarry on our behalf.”

  It took a few more minutes for Berger to splash some water on his face and pack a lunch for the day, and then, with a final farewell, he departed, glancing back to see the five men curling up in various places around the living room, all save Dumond, who was already sprawled across the couch, woolen cap pulled down across his eyes, arms across his belly.

  A moment later, the truck’s engine started, and the sound faded away into the distance.

  FIVE

  “Lambert, the window.”

  The five Revenants sat up, obviously wide awake. The Belgian sniper picked up his rifle and stepped to the window, waiting until the others doused the lamps in the room before carefully pulling the blackout curtain to the side just enough so he could peer out with one eye.

  “He is gone. No movement.”

  The others got to their feet. Dumond bent down and picked at the remnants of the cold chicken from the serving tray and shoved it into his mouth, chewing and swallowing. He shrugged when Verhoeven gave him a questioning look.

  “It’s good chicken,” Dumond replied, his mouth still half-full. “I’m not going to let it go to waste.”

  “At least now we know where all of Wormwood’s funding went for the last four months,” Verhoeven said. “This bastard has been eating better than we have.”

  “The wine is only passable,” Dumond said swallowing the last of the chicken and picking up the second bottle of wine. He swirled the few centimeters of liquid at the bottom around for a moment, then raised the bottle to his lips and finished its contents.

  “Clearly that is not stopping you from drinking it,” Verhoeven observed.

  “It might only be passable, but one should never turn down free wine,” Dumond answered.

  “Enough jokes,” Johansen grunted, pulling his automatic from his shoulder holster. “What now?”

  Gorski stepped over to the windows and looked out. The windows faced east, and the pale light of dawn was lightening the sky beyond the trees. He estimated that by the time the sun was breaking over the horizon, there would be enough light to see cars passing by along the road, but that was still likely an hour away.

  “He’s not going to let us rest up before he returns with an arrest party,” Gorski said. “I am willing to bet they arrive within the hour. The nearest town with a garrison is little more than a twenty-minute drive from here.”

  “Germans, or the Gendarmerie?” Verhoeven wondered aloud.

  Gorski looked at him. “You know our orders, does it matter either way?”

  The Dutchman shrugged. “It does not. I am just speculating who our friend might be reporting to - the enemy, or other collaborators.”

  “The Germans will have much bigger guns,” Johansen added, raising up his pistol, a .45 caliber Colt automatic.

  Gorski nodded. “We’ll just have to see if Monsieur Berger was taken in by our ruse, and thinks us easy prey for whoever he brings back.”

  They’d come to France with a minimum of firepower in order to give the impression that they were not much of a threat. If Berger reported that they were carrying an arsenal of military weapons, any force sent against them would be sized and equipped to overwhelm them with greater firepower. By seeming weak, the Revenants hoped their enemies wouldn’t be expecting much resistance.

  “What is our next move?” Verhoeven asked.

  Gorski considered this for a moment. “No matter who Berger returns with, we cannot be caught inside the house. Piet, find a place to hide near the road, and give warning if you see anyone approach. The rest of us will prepare for Berger and his friends.”

  Gorski’s original estimate was half an hour short. He was hidden behind a woodpile about twenty meters from the house, his automatic in hand, and his watch showed it was almost six in the morning when he heard Verhoeven’s imitation bird call carry through the trees. A few seconds later, the faint sound of multiple automotive engines reached Gorski’s ears, growing steadily louder.

  Lambert shifted slightly next to him. “Sounds like a car and two trucks.”

  Gorski looked at the Belgian. “That is quite specific.”

  “Make a bet for the first pints when we return to Britain?” Lambert asked.

  “I won’t take that bet,” Gorski replied, chuckling. “Besides, here they come.”

  Whoever led the capture party, they weren’t taking any chances. Gorski watched through his binoculars as a four-door Renault sedan stopped along the side of the road, followed by Berger’s truck and another, larger, truck of French design bearing German military colors and insignia. Two men dressed as French gendarmes emerged from the Renault, followed by a German officer and another man in a leather trenchcoat and a fedora. Berger was the only one who exited his truck, but a half-dozen German soldiers disembarked from the back of the larger transport. Gorski counted two soldiers holding machine pistols, the rest carrying rifles.

  “So, the enemy and the collaborators,” Lambert muttered. “Monsieur Berger has many new friends indeed.”

  “It appears Wormwood will have the satisfaction of being correct in his suspicions,” Gorski replied. “It’s no wonder the information Berger was giving his smuggling contacts became more and more useless. He might have been feeding them misinformation for months.”

  Lambert’s normally phlegmatic expression dissolved into one of undisguised hatred. “And the smugglers passed it to us, and we acted on it, and risked the lives of good men for nothing. Pilots and operatives died because of this man, this traitor.”

  “Compose yourself,” Gorski warned his comrade. “Here they come.”

  The German troops began to spread out into a wide skirmish line, each man five meters apart from the others, with the men carrying machine pistols at the flanks. Berger joined the four men from the Renault, and they conversed for a moment, gesturing occasionally towards the house. Finally, one of the gendarmes stood back with Berger next to the Renault, while the German officer signalled the soldiers to begin converging on the house.

  “Make the call,” Lambert whispered, settling in behind his rifle.

  Gorski eased back the slide of his pistol, confirming a round was chambered. “They need to get closer.”

  “Thirty meters,” Lambert informed him.

  “I need them closer,” Gorski repeated. “Right in front of the hou
se.”

  The German troops began to tighten their formation as they approached the house, angling so they covered the front door while, behind them, the three men from the Renault approached. The gendarme fingered his holster, but didn’t draw his service weapon. Even twenty meters away, Gorski could see the Frenchman was nervous.

  Gorski felt his hand instinctively tighten around his pistol. He’d spent more than a year in exile, hiding in Britain when he should have been here, on the mainland, fighting against the Germans. The rational part of his mind knew that he would have made no difference here - that escaping occupied territory was the only reason he was still alive, or not in a prison camp. But the other side of him, the side that woke him up in the middle of the night, his teeth aching because he’d been clenching them in rage while he dreamt fantasies of vengeance, that side had always shamed him for running away.

  Well, Gorski thought to himself, we’re not running any more. Never again.

  The German officer was now close enough for Gorski to see he wore the insignia of a Leutnant. The young officer looked to the man in the trenchcoat, who produced a Luger from his pocket and nodded. The Leutnant whispered a command, and two of the soldiers - one of them carrying a machine pistol - separated from their section and began to circle around to the back of the house, where Gorski knew there was another door.

  “Bruno,” Lambert murmured, “Dumond can’t see them coming.”

  “Dumond can handle himself,” Gorski replied. “Be ready to take that officer in three, two, one...now.”

  Lambert squeezed the trigger. The rifle, a Swedish-made Mauser, fired with a flat crack. The 6.5 millimeter bullet caught the Leutnant just in front of his left ear, blowing apart his skull and spraying blood and brains all over the two men next to him.

  There was a moment’s hesitation as everyone froze in surprise, and in that moment, Gorski pulled taut a pair of wires running to two fragmentation charges fitted with pull-fuzes, each carefully secured and hidden in front of Berger’s house. The charges detonated simultaneously, shredding two of the German soldiers and wounding a third. The explosions were immediately followed by the roar of two shotgun blasts on the other side of the house. Gorski hoped that meant Dumond had dealt with the two Germans maneuvering towards the rear door.

  Lambert quickly cycled the bolt of his rifle, but Gorski was already firing at the one German soldier left standing, the section’s Feldwebel. Gorski’s first shot went wide, knocking a hole through one of the house’s windows. The German sergeant spun around, finger clamped to the trigger of his MP-38 machine pistol. A line of little explosions tore up the ground, racing towards the woodpile, and Gorski steadied his aim before firing two more shots. The first caught the German just below the navel, while the second struck higher and to the right. The Feldwebel staggered before Gorski dropped him with a final shot through the throat.

  A chunk of firewood exploded into splinters next to Gorski’s head, and he saw the man in the trenchcoat firing at him. Gorski ducked back just as another bullet snapped through where his head had been a moment before. A second later, Lambert’s rifle fired again, and Gorski peered back out, seeing the trenchcoat man on the ground, screaming and clutching at his thigh. Next to him, the gendarme stood stock-still, his hands high in the air, his eyes tightly shut.

  Gorski and Lambert stepped out from around the woodpile, just as Dumond emerged from the other side of the house, his shotgun ready in one hand, a heavy-framed revolver in the other. Gorski watched as Dumond approached the German soldiers cut down by the hidden explosives. The Frenchman stopped to fire a bullet into each man’s head, the last shot silencing the groans of the one soldier still moving.

  “We’re coming in!” Verhoeven shouted from the direction of the road.

  “Clear here!” Gorski replied. As Lambert and Dumond covered him, Gorski picked up the Luger from where it lay next to the man in the trenchcoat, then he approached the gendarme, who was whispering a prayer, his eyes still shut.

  “You can open your eyes now,” Gorski told him.

  The gendarme stopped praying, then opened one eye after the other. He looked around and shuddered, swallowing hard. The man looked to be somewhere in his middle years, with white hair thick around his temples and shot through his thin moustache, but he was still fit and trim, despite the lines across his brow and the wrinkles around his eyes. Gorski could see little flecks of gore spattered across the man’s face and uniform.

  “I’m going to take your gun,” Gorski told him. “Do not move.”

  The gendarme gave a little nod, having composed himself, and then stood motionless as Gorski pulled an old Chamelot-Delvigne revolver from its holster. He dropped the weapon into his other coat pocket, then stepped back. “You can lower your hands now, but have a care. If you make a sudden move, I’ll put a bullet in you,” Gorski cautioned.

  Verhoeven and Johansen approached from the east, weapons at the ready. Berger walked in front of them with raised hands, his features pale and visibly sweaty.

  “The gendarme?” Gorski asked.

  “Went for his gun,” Johansen answered, his voice emotionless.

  Gorski left Lambert to cover the gendarme he’d just disarmed and walked over to Berger. The man slowly reached for his Homburg, removing the hat and holding it to his chest. The smile he gave Gorski was nauseating.

  “Thank God you were prepared for this unfortunate turn of events!” Berger exclaimed. “They stopped me and began asking very pointed questions. I told them nothing, of course, but it was clear they already knew you were here. I could only hope you were wary enough to avoid capture.”

  Gorski smiled at Berger, then looked to Johansen. “Kill him.”

  SIX

  Berger dropped to his knees and wailed, turning and looking over his shoulder at the tall Norwegian as Johansen lifted his gun and pointed it at the Frenchman’s face.

  “No! Alright, please, no!” he cried.

  Gorski held up a hand. Johansen paused, his pistol unwavering.

  “Please, you must understand!” Berger pleaded, turning back to look at Gorski. “I was arrested five months ago. They would have tortured me, then shot me, if I did not cooperate with them!”

  “What did you tell them?” Gorski asked.

  Berger let out a sob and wiped his nose along his sleeve. “I passed along information, from time to time. Bits and pieces, things I heard about the resistance cells. Now and then, they would provide me information - false information - that was meant to be passed on to my smuggling contacts who would, in turn, get the information to you.”

  “And the money you were provided by the British?” Gorski asked. “It was meant for bribes, or to aid others. But you spent it, didn’t you?”

  Berger was silent for a moment, before his face screwed up in an ugly, twisted grimace of despair, and a queer keening noise came from his throat. Gorski saw Johansen sneer, and the Norwegian clipped Berger on the top of the head with the barrel of his pistol.

  “Talk,” Johansen said.

  “Yes...yes! I spent some of it, and buried the rest.”

  “The money,” Gorski said. “Do you need a shovel to dig it up?”

  Berger shook his head. “It is in a canning jar, buried under some rocks behind the house. I wanted to be able to get to it quickly.”

  “That’s good,” Gorski nodded to Johansen. “Take him back there, get the money.”

  “And then?” Johansen asked, raising an eyebrow.

  Gorski shook his head. “We still need him, for the rest of it. Unfortunately.”

  Johansen frowned, then grabbed Berger by the collar, hauled him to his feet, and shoved him towards the back of the house.

  “This one is getting weaker,” Lambert called.

  Gorski turned. The Belgian was standing over the man in the trenchcoat, who still lay on the ground, silent but clutching at his wounded leg. The man looked up at Gorski as the Pole approached and knelt down in front of the wounded man.

  “Y
ou are Gestapo?” Gorski asked in German.

  “You will be hunted down and tortured for days,” the German replied, gasping from the effort. “Every scrap of knowledge with be painfully extracted from you. Then, one by one, you’ll be killed in front of each other in the worst ways possible.”

  “I imagine that is a very long way of saying ‘yes’ to my question,” Gorski replied.

  “Yes, I am Gestapo!” the German answered. “And you are all dead men!”

  “Your threats mean nothing to us,” Gorski said, standing up. He pulled out the man’s Luger, drawing back the toggle-lock to make sure there was a round in the chamber.

  “You see, we’ve all been dead before.”

  Gorski emptied the pistol into the German’s face.

  The gendarme, standing nearby, shook his head and looked at Gorski. “He is right, you know. After this, they will never stop until they find you.”

  Dumond, who’d been watching a few meters away, turned to him. “You speak German?” he asked.

  The gendarme nodded. “Yes, enough to understand what he said to your friend. Shooting the soldiers was bad enough, but killing a Gestapo agent makes things worse. There aren’t many rules constraining the actions of the Wehrmacht when it comes to hunting partisans and spies, but the Gestapo have no rules at all. They will burn the whole region to ashes trying to find you.”

  Just then, Johansen emerged from behind the house, Berger stumbling along in front of him. The collaborator was bleeding from his nose, and there was a fist-sized welt on his cheek.

  “I said we needed him for the rest of it,” Gorski said to Johansen.

  “He lives,” Johansen answered.

  “If he is seen looking like that, people will ask questions.”