by Len Levinson
Mahoney held his broken bottle steady, his eyes fixed on the switchblade. His chin was tucked into his throat, and he held his left arm at stomach level to block any slashes that came that way. The cafe was so quiet you could hear water dripping in the sink.
Hooper pushed his way into the circle and grinned. “Hey you guys—why don’t you shake hands and make up before you get in trouble?”
The sergeant from the Fourth Division snarled at him, “Mind your own business, Fatso!”
Mahoney kept his eyes on the switchblade. “Stay outta this, Hooper.”
Hooper stepped back into the crowd. He wanted to call the MPs before somebody got hurt, but if he called the MPs, Mahoney would go to the stockade.
The sergeant leaned toward Mahoney, who balanced himself on the balls of his feet. Their eyes met and hatred passed between them like high voltage current. Mahoney opened his lips and spoke through teeth on edge. “C’mon, fuckhead,” he said.
The sergeant went oof and lunged forward, streaking his knife toward Mahoney’s face. Mahoney stepped to the side and pushed the edge of the broken bottle into the sergeant’s wrist, slashing all the way up his arm. The sergeant screamed and jumped back, but Mahoney kept after him. Mahoney ripped the bottle across the sergeant’s face, nearly slicing off his nose, and the sergeant bellowed as he whipped his knife wildly through the air. Mahoney grabbed the sergeant’s wrist with his left hand and dug the broken bottle into the sergeant’s belly, twisting it around. The sergeant continued to scream as blood poured from his arm, face, and stomach. He tried to break loose from Mahoney’s iron grip, but Mahoney wouldn’t let him go. He tried to kick Mahoney in the balls, but Mahoney stepped to the side and slashed sideways with the bottle, ripping apart the sergeant’s windpipe.
Blood gurgled out of the sergeant’s mouth, and he went limp, dropping to his knees on the floor. He held both his hands to his throat, trying to stanch the blood, looking up at Mahoney pleadingly. Then he pitched forward onto his face as whistles blew and MPs charged into the little cafe.
Chapter Two
Twenty miles west of Clervaux, in Bastogne, Belgium, Major General Troy Middleton, commander of the Eighth Corps, was uneasy. He paced back and forth in his office, looking nervously at the maps strewn over his table. Reports had been coming in all evening about movements of heavy armor behind the German lines. A woman had been sent up from the Twenty-eighth Division earlier in the afternoon, and she said she’d seen huge formations of German troops behind the Siegfried Line east of Clervaux. Middleton had sent her to First Army headquarters in Spa, but staff officers there believed the German troops were only training in the area. The enemy used that sector as a rest and training area, as did the First Army.
General Middleton hoped the staff officers at First Army were right because if the Germans attacked through his area, a massacre of American soldiers was likely to ensue. The Ardennes sector was the weakest part of the American line, the so-called “Ghost Front,” where nothing ever happened and artillery was fired mainly for registration. American and German soldiers waved to each other across no-man’s-land, and sometimes they got close enough to chitchat. Reports had been received that American and German soldiers even engaged in black market activities with each other.
Middleton had only six under-strength divisions holding a ninety-mile front. Three of the divisions were green and had been sent to the area to get “blooded” before being transferred to sectors where the real war was taking place. The other three divisions, which included the famous Fourth Division, were recuperating from the bloody Hurtgen Forest campaign, where tremendous losses had been suffered.
Middleton was a heavyset man who wore glasses and had a hook nose. He’d been dean of administration at Louisiana State University before being recalled to active duty at the beginning of the war. Prior to that, he’d served twenty-seven years in the Army and had been a colonel of infantry in the First World War.
Middleton looked down at the map and adjusted his wire-rimmed glasses on his nose. General Bradley at EAGLE TAC and General Hodges at First Army had told him that the Germans would never attack through the Ardennes although they’d come this way in 1940 when they had attacked France. General Bradley said that if the Germans were foolish enough to attack, General Hodges would hit them in flank from the north and General Patton would do the same in the south, catching them in the jaws of a giant American nutcracker.
But Middleton knew it would take several days for that nutcracker to get moving, and by then, the Germans might very well roll over his men and his own headquarters in Bastogne.
Well, he thought, scratching his jaw, I hope to hell they really are on maneuvers over there.
~*~
The Fourth Division MPs roughed up Mahoney a little in the back of the three-quarter ton truck as it drove through the streets of Clervaux on the way to the Provost Marshal’s office. Mahoney’s hands were handcuffed behind his back, but he could take a punch pretty well, and he rolled with them as the MPs batted him around. He was from a strange division, and he’d made them leave their warm headquarters. He’d nearly killed one of their own, and they were going to make him pay for it.
The truck stopped in front of the Provost Marshal’s office, and the MPs let down the tailgate. They dragged Mahoney out, and he fell to his knees in the snow. He shook his head and tried to clear out the fog, wishing he didn’t have the cuffs on because he’d love to wade into the MPs and bust a few heads.
They picked him up and pulled him into the big building that was the MP headquarters in Clervaux. An old MP master sergeant with white hair sat behind the high desk and looked down as the other MPs held Mahoney’s arms.
“He went at a guy with a bottle,” one of the MPs said. “The guy might die.”
Mahoney cleared his throat. “He pulled a knife on me first.”
An MP elbowed him in the ribs. “Speak when you’re spoken to, shit-for-brains!”
Mahoney looked up at the old master sergeant. If this had happened in the Hammerhead Division, they’d probably have known each other because Mahoney knew everybody of consequence in the division. But here he was like an orphan.
“What’s your name?” the old master sergeant asked.
Mahoney told him.
“What’re you doing here?”
“I’m on TDY with First Army.”
TDY was Army-speak for temporary duty.
“From where?”
“Third Army.”
The old sergeant squinted his eyes. “Is that the Hammerhead patch I see on your shoulder there?”
“Yeah.”
The MP elbowed him in the ribs again. “Say yes, Sergeant.”
“Yes, Sergeant.”
The old sergeant sneered. “You Hammerheads are supposed to be a real fancy bunch of soldiers.”
Mahoney didn’t reply. The MP hit him a shot in the ribs again, and it doubled Mahoney over.
“He asked you a question, scumbag!” the MP said.
Slowly Mahoney straightened up and glowered at the MP, who had swarthy skin and looked Italian.
“If I ever see you outside this stockade,” Mahoney said through bloody lips, “I’m going to fucking kill you.”
“WHAT!”
The MPs attacked him and beat him to the floor with clubs and fists until he was unconscious.
“Lock him up,” the old master sergeant said.
The MPs grabbed Mahoney’s clothes and dragged him across the floor toward the cells.
~*~
Less than three hundred miles away, on the German side of the Siegfried Line, Adolph Hitler was chatting with Martin Bormann, the head of the Nazi Party Chancery, and with Walther Hewell, a diplomatic liaison officer with the Foreign Service, in the Eagle’s Nest, Hitler’s headquarters near the Western Front.
Hitler was in an unusually ebullient mood despite the recent throat operation that prevented him from speaking loudly. In a hoarse whisper, he lectured Bormann and Hewell on the lessons of Histor
y.
“Frederick II earned his title the Great,” Hitler explained, “not just because he was victorious, but because he did not despair in adversity. In the same manner, History will come to recognize me because I too will never have surrendered after grievous misfortunes.”
Bormann and Hewell listened to Hitler with rapt attention, their eyes glistening with devotion. They did not try to speak because they didn’t want to miss any of their Fuehrer’s precious words.
“This war,” Hitler continued, “will determine the survival or extinction of the German people. It demands the unqualified commitment of every individual. Even seemingly hopeless situations have been mastered by the blind courage and bravery of our soldiers, the stubborn steadfastness of all ranks, and my calm unyielding leadership.”
Hitler sat on a sofa in front of a low table on which was a glass of mineral water. He looked over the heads of Bormann and Hewell at the huge oil portrait of himself on the wall. It had been painted in the early thirties and showed him wearing a brown shirt, a resolute expression on his face and a dagger at his waist. At one time he used to give small autographed copies of the painting to his female admirers, but there was no time for that anymore.
“I would like you gentlemen to leave me now,” Hitler said. “I need some time to think.”
“Yes, sir!” they said in unison, jumping to their feet. They saluted, shouted “Heil Hitler!” and marched out of the room, closing the door behind them.
Alone, Hitler raised the glass of mineral water to his lips and drank some down. He believed the mineral water was good for him, along with his health food vegetarian diet, although he suffered from terrible stomach cramps, headaches, flatulence, and numerous other ailments.
He wanted to savor these final hours alone, for it was nearly one o’clock on the morning of December 16, and his long awaited and carefully planned Ardennes Offensive, code-named Operation Wacht am Rhein, was scheduled to begin in only four and a half hours.
He and his staff had been planning this operation since early September. They’d managed to draw together a quarter of a million soldiers, nine hundred and seventy tanks, one thousand nine hundred pieces of heavy artillery, three-point-eight million gallons of gasoline, and fifty trainloads of ammunition on the German side of the Siegfried Line. Also there were three hundred and fifty new planes, among them eighty of the latest jets.
At five-thirty they’d strike into the Ardennes and roll over the scanty American positions. Utilizing tried and proven blitzkrieg techniques, they’d knife through Belgium, cross the Meuse River, and continue on to Antwerp, capturing the big allied port there and splitting the British and American armies in half. Then they’d annihilate the British Army, knock the Americans senseless, and transfer the bulk of the forces back to the Eastern front, where they’d attack relentlessly until they brought Stalin to his knees.
Hitler knew very well that the fate of the Third Reich was riding on Operation Wacht am Rhein, but he was confident he’d win the great victory that he so ardently desired. However, many of his leading generals, among them von Rundstedt and Model, believed they didn’t have enough men and materiel to attain all the operation’s strategic objectives, though Hitler had been right and they’d been wrong many times in the past. Surely it would be that way again.
Hitler chuckled to himself. The Allies thought they had him nearly defeated, but he’d show them a thing or two during the next few days. The fools wouldn’t know what had hit them.
Chapter Three
Mahoney awoke on the cold stone floor of his cell in the MP station in Clervaux. His head felt as though it had been run over by the Red Ball Express, and he ached all over his body. He had difficulty opening his mouth, because his lips were sealed by dried blood. Moistening the blood with his wetted tongue, he pulled his lips apart and opened his mouth. He touched his teeth with his tongue; some of them were loose.
“Those fucking bastards,” he muttered, getting up and sitting heavily on the wooden cot affixed to the wall. He felt his ribs and bones to discover whether anything was broken, but it appeared that nothing was. The MPs had jabbed him in the gut with their billy clubs, and he might be pissing blood for awhile, but those were the breaks of the game.
He wished he had a cigarette, but the bastards had taken all of them away from him. Glancing at his watch to find out the time, he saw that they’d taken that away too. He cursed them again and shivered in the cold cell. His overcoat had been left behind in the cafe, and he wore only a fatigue shirt with a wool sweater underneath it. He realized he was in a serious mess.
If this had happened in the Third Army, he’d probably be free as a bird right now, but he was in hostile territory, even if it was held by the same U.S. Army that he was in. Hooper would testify that the other guy pulled a knife first, but who knew where Hooper was, and there might not be a trial anyway. They might just take him out back and shoot him down. Afterwards, they’d say he’d tried to escape. Such things happened from time to time in the Army.
And it was all because of a piece of ass, from a whore of all things, and he didn’t even get into her pants. He closed his eyes and remembered her sitting at the table, holding her coffee cup with dainty fingers, her face as pretty as any movie star’s. Naw, he thought, she’s not really a whore, and she’s not just another piece of ass either. She’d touched his heart somehow in the brief time they’d been together, and he hoped he’d see her again someday. He was glad he’d kept that sergeant away from her. Mahoney wondered if he’d died. Fuck him anyway.
He heard a commotion in another part of the jail. Somebody was shouting in German, “The Germans are coming tonight, I tell you! Why don’t you believe me?”
“Shaddup, kraut!” said an American voice, and Mahoney heard something that sounded like a punch in the mouth.
The commotion came closer, and Mahoney saw a group of MPs dragging a German soldier through the corridor. The German’s blond head hung down, and Mahoney realized that the MPs must have really clobbered him. They passed Mahoney and opened a cell farther down the corridor. Mahoney pushed his head against the bars of his cell and could see the MPs throwing the German soldier into a cell.
The MPs walked toward Mahoney, and he held out his hand. “How about a cigarette, boys?”
“Fuck you,” replied one of the MPs.
“Hey—c’mon,” Mahoney said. “We’re in the same Army, aren’t we?”
Another MP stopped and reached toward his shirt pocket. “I can’t deny a man a cigarette,” he said in a Southern drawl.
“Don’t get too close to him!”
“He don’t look so dangerous to me.”
The MP held out a cigarette, and Mahoney took it, placing it between his bloody lips as the other MPs watched glumly. The first MP held out his Zippo and flicked the wheel, bringing the fire close to the cigarette. Mahoney puffed and filled his lungs with the rich smoke.
“Thanks, buddy,” Mahoney said.
The MP winked.
“What’s with the kraut?”
“He’s a deserter. We picked him up tonight.”
“He said the Germans are going to attack.”
The MP cocked an eye. “How you know that?”
“I speak kraut.”
“Yeah, that’s what he told the officer who interrogated him. The information’s been sent up to Corps.”
“Let’s go!” said one of the other MPs.
The MP who’d given Mahoney the light moved off into the darkness with the others. Mahoney sat on his cot and puffed the cigarette, feeling better already. Everybody always said that cigarettes were bad for you and cut your wind, but how could they be so bad if they always made you feel better? He thought of the German and wondered if he was telling the truth about the attack or whether he was just a nut or if he’d been sent by the Germans to confuse everybody. The Germans were tricky people, and you never knew what they could be up to.
Down the corridor, the German muttered to himself. Mahoney arose from h
is cot and stepped toward the bars of his cell. He’d learned to speak German fluently when he was in North Africa, dealing black market goods to the Germans in the big POW camp near Oran.
“How are you feeling?” Mahoney called down the corridor in German.
There was a pause, and then the German soldier replied, “Who’s there?”
“An American soldier behind bars like you.”
“You speak German!”
“What’d you say about an attack?”
“Early in the morning, there will be a major offensive against this area!” the German said fervently. “I told your captain, but he wouldn’t believe me!”
“Why did you desert?”
“Because I hate the Army and the Nazis, and I couldn’t take it anymore. My country is being destroyed.”
Mahoney sat on his cot and puffed his cigarette, wondering if the German was telling the truth. He decided he couldn’t do anything about it either way, so he stretched out on the cot, rested his head on his arm, and blew smoke rings toward the ceiling.
~*~
On the German side of the Siegfried Line, Field Marshall Walther Model stood with his aides in the darkness and watched the troops and tanks of the Fifth Panzer Army advance to their attack positions. Moveable ramps had been brought up from the rear and laid on the dragon’s teeth of the Siegfried Line, so that the tanks could pass over. All roads leading to the front had been covered with straw to muffle the sound made by the tracks of tanks and personnel carriers. Ammunition for the opening artillery barrage was being carried forward by hand, to save gas and avoid the noise that trucks would make. Military police roamed the lines making certain there was no unnecessary movement. Strict radio silence was being observed.
Field Marshall Model stood with his hands in his greatcoat pockets and thought about Operation Wacht am Rhein as the tanks and men streamed past him. He knew that Hitler was gambling everything on this offense, and he was one of the officers who thought it could not succeed. He’d told Hitler that there weren’t enough tanks, men, and supplies to carry the attack all the way to Antwerp, but Hitler had disagreed. All Model could do was follow orders. He was commander of Army Group B, which comprised the three panzer armies that would participate in the attack. Hitler had transferred all responsibility to his shoulders, and he’d done his usual, thorough job, but deep in his heart he thought the war was lost.
