Echo of War

by Grant Blackwood

  Seven kilometers northeast of Saint Servant, Cahil was perusing the map when Tanner cast a glance in the rear-view mirror and saw a pair of headlights rounding the bend behind them. It was the first vehicle they’d seen since leaving St. Meen le Grand.

  “We’ve got a fellow traveler,” Tanner said.

  Cahil glanced back. “He’s moving fast.”

  As Tanner watched, the pinpricks grew until the car was only a hundred yards off their bumper. The headlights were widely spaced, and between them Briggs caught a glimpse of heavy chrome and a three-pointed star. Mercedes, he thought. Big engine.

  The Mercedes hung back for a minute, then began accelerating again, until it was within arm’s reach of their bumper. The headlights blazed through the rear window. Tanner squinted against it. He stuck his arm out the window and waved them to pass. The Mercedes clung to their bumper, matching the Peugeot’s speed.

  “What do you think?” Cahil said. “Just a little road rage, perhaps?”

  As if in response, the Mercedes’s headlights flipped to high, casting the Peugeot’s interior in white light. “Doesn’t look like it,” Tanner replied. He began slewing the Peugeot from side to side. Left unchecked, he knew the Mercedes would have no trouble overtaking them and forcing them off the road. “Where are we?” he called. “Anything on the map?”

  Cahil peered at the map. “No, I don’t—”

  The Mercedes accelerated and crashed their bumper. The Peugeot lurched forward. Tanner felt the back end slipping sideways, the tires stuttering over the gravel. He spun the wheel to compensate and the Peugeot righted itself.

  “He’s trying to pit us,” Briggs called, referring to what the police called a precision immobilization technique. If the Mercedes’s driver could jam the corner of his front bumper into either of the Peugeot’s rear quarter panels, the little car would lose traction and spin out of control. “What about the map?”

  “No, there’s noth—Wait a second…” Cahil peered out Tanner’s window, shading his eyes against the glare, then glanced back down at the map again. “Yeah, that’s it! Right turn!”

  “Now?”

  “Now!”

  Tanner slammed on the brakes. The Mercedes’s headlights loomed in the rearview mirror. Just before their bumpers touched, Tanner downshifted, punched the accelerator, cranked the wheel over, then tapped the brake, sending the Peugeot into a skidding turn. The steering wheel shuddered in his hands. The glovebox popped open and papers began fluttering around the car’s interior. From the corner of his eye Briggs saw a crack appear in the corner of the windshield.

  “I’d say we’ve found her stress limits,” he called.

  “Well, hell, it’s a clown car, not a tank!”

  The Peugeot’s headlights washed over a grass-covered tract. Two hundred yards beyond that Tanner saw a man-made structure of some kind and got the fleeting impression of a crenellated wall. He glanced in the rearview mirror and saw the Mercedes flash past the turn-in. Its brake lights flashed on and it skidded to a stop in a cloud of dust.

  Wheels pounding over the ruts, the Peugeot rocked from side to side. Tanner’s head bumped against the roof; he tasted blood. Through the windshield he caught a glimpse of a white sign with red lettering. The Peugeot’s lights picked out a concrete wall, ten feet wide, twenty tall, and topped with grass and brush. Flanking the wall were a pair of concrete towers, each three stories tall. Sitting atop each was a small dome with horizontal slits. Fifty yards to his right Tanner could see the vague outline of another tower, and another beyond that.

  The wall rose before the windshield. Tanner slammed on the brakes. The Peugeot slewed sideways and came to a stop before the wall. In the side mirror he saw the Mercedes backing down the main road, its powerful engine whining. It stopped, made a Y-turn, then started down the tract.

  “Time to run!” Cahil called. He jumped from the car and began sprinting toward one of the towers. Tanner grabbed the backpack into which they’d stuffed all their gear, then followed. At the base of one of the towers they found a pair of eight-foot steel doors. The latch was secured by padlock and chain. Tanner looked around, pointed. “Hammer.”

  Cahil ran over, hefted the concrete block, then raised it above his head and let it crash down on the chain. The padlock held firm. Behind them came the skidding of tires. Headlights pinned them. Cahil lifted the block again, raised it, let it drop. The chain clattered to the ground. They put their shoulders to the doors and pushed.

  Behind came the sound of car doors opening, then a shout: “Halt!”

  If Tanner had had any doubts about the identity of their pursuers, they were now gone. Litzman’s cronies from the Black Boar hadn’t given up.

  Cahil grunted. “Let’s hope they don’t have—”

  From the Mercedes came three overlapping cracks. Dust and concrete shards rained down on them. “Guns?” Tanner finished.

  “Yeah, that. One more time!”

  In unison, they gave one final heave. The doors gave a screeching groan, then shuddered open a foot. Through the gap Tanner saw blackness. “Go,” he ordered.

  Cahil began squeezing through. Tanner glanced over his shoulder, saw six figures sprinting across the uneven ground. Cahil wriggled through the gap, then grabbed Tanner’s arm and began pulling. Briggs shoved his head and shoulders inside, then exhaled all the air from his lungs, coiled his legs, and pushed off. Together they tumbled into the darkness.

  16

  They fell together in a heap, then scrambled on hands and knees back to the doors, and jammed their shoulders against the steel. As the doors swung shut, Tanner saw figures rushing toward them. A trio of muzzles flashed. Bullets thunked into the doors, sounding like hammer strikes on the steel.

  “Push!” Tanner yelled.

  The doors slid shut with a reverberating gong. They were engulfed in blackness. The doors began bucking as boots and fists pounded from the outside.

  “The duffel,” Cahil whispered. “There’s a penlight.”

  Tanner felt around in the darkness, hand groping over the rough concrete until it found the duffel. He pulled it to him, opened the side pocket, fished around for a moment, then came out with the flashlight. He clicked it on. A small pool of light enveloped them.

  From outside, voices: “Helfen Sie mir!” Help me!

  Tanner shined the light about. Above their heads the doors were fitted with steel L-brackets; to the right, mounted on a hinge in the jam, was a cross brace. It was held in place by a loop of wire.

  “Can you hold?” Tanner asked Cahil.

  Bear grunted. “Not for long.”

  “Five seconds.”

  With his back pressed to the door, Tanner slid upward, dug in his pocket for his folding knife, then opened the blade. He slipped the blade beneath the wire and began sawing.

  The doors bucked inward a few inches. Cahil slammed them shut.

  With a twang, the wire split. Tanner pulled the cross brace down into the brackets. “Okay, let it go.”

  Cahil did so. The doors bucked again, but the brace held. The pounding and shouting continued for twenty seconds, then stopped. Briggs could hear murmuring from the other side.

  “Looking for another way in,” he whispered.

  Cahil nodded. “If we found one, they will.”

  Tanner shined the flashlight around. “What is this place?”

  “The Ligne de Fantôme,” Cahil replied. In the relative quiet, their voices echoed off the walls. “The Ghost Line.”

  The Ghost Line, Tanner thought, trying to recall where he’d heard the phrase before. “Another tidbit from Fodor’s?” he asked.

  “Baedeker’s.”

  Then Tanner remembered: The Ligne de Fantôme was the nickname for the Quily portion of the Maginot Line—or at least that had been the original intention when France and Great Britain had begun its construction prior to World War Two.

  In 1929, with memories of the First World War fresh in i
ts collective mind, the French government began building an underground line of interlinked bunkers, gun emplacements, and fortresses, or ouvrages, along its eastern frontier, where they were certain another German invasion would eventually come. Each ouvrage consisted of gun cupolas, artillery turrets, underground power plants, barracks, and rail lines for transporting troops and munitions to adjoining forts.

  The main Maginot Line, which stretched from Switzerland to the Ardennes in the north and from the Alps to the Mediterranean in the south, was to be France’s answer to Germany’s advantage in manpower and equipment.

  However, in the spring of 1940 the Maginot Line was rendered obsolete as Hitler’s blitzkrieg went over, around, and on occasion through the line, battering France into submission in a matter of months.

  The little known Ghost Line, a joint venture between France and Great Britain, had been envisioned as not only a fallback position for the French Army, but also as an unassailable beachhead for British reinforcement troops crossing the channel. With the collapse of France, construction of the Quily Line ceased, and for the past sixty-three years the three-kilometer-long redoubt had sat deserted in the middle of the French countryside.

  “According to the article,” Cahil whispered, “it never saw any action.”

  “Until now,” Tanner replied. “I don’t suppose the guide had any ‘you are here’ maps.”

  “ ’Fraid not.”

  On either side of the doors a steel ladder ascended the side of one of the towers—which Tanner now recognized as 75mm gun cupolas—and ended at the opening to the dome itself. At the base of each ladder was a hatch which Tanner assumed was a munitions elevator. Down the tunnel to their right, they would find the next cupola and another set of doors. To their left lay the entrance to a catwalk ladder shaft.

  The floor was littered with piles of shoring timbers, cement blocks, and the occasional hand tool, as though the workers had dropped what they were doing and run—which, given the speed of the German invasion, may have been exactly what happened. Somewhere in the distance came the sound of water dripping.

  “What’s the plan?” Cahil asked.

  “Find a way out, steal their car, and run,” Tanner replied.

  “Just like that?”

  “I’m an optimist.”

  In truth, Tanner wasn’t hopeful about grabbing the Mercedes. Nor did the idea of taking on six armed Spetsnaz soldiers appeal to him. Their best chance was to elude the Germans, find an exit, and slip undetected into the French countryside while their pursuers scoured the complex for them.

  “Do you remember how many levels in the complex?” Tanner asked.

  Cahil thought for a moment. “Six—eighty feet from ground level to the bottom. Munitions magazines on the lowermost level, then the power plant and sewer system, then barracks and supplies on the ones above. What’re you thinking?”

  “Go all the way to the bottom and start running. We get ahead of them, then climb back up and find another exit. It’s three kilometers to the end; multiply that by six levels and they’ve got a lot of ground to cover.”

  Bear made a flourish toward the stairwell. “After you.”

  They jogged to the ladder and started down. As Tanner’s foot touched the third step, he felt a tremor run through the steel. He froze. With a wrenching sound, the catwalk began swaying. After a few moments it stopped. Slowly, gingerly, Tanner lifted his flashlight and played it over the walls.

  Steel bolts connected the ladder to the wall. Without exception, the head of each was a misshapen lump of rust. Tanner touched one with his fingertip. It trembled, then slipped halfway from its hole, exposing rusted threads. The catwalk shuddered.

  “Please don’t do that again,” Cahil muttered.

  “Sorry.”

  “What’s your preference?” Cahil asked. “Fast or slow?”

  From above, they heard a crash and a reverberating gong. “They found your cinder block,” Briggs said. “I vote for fast.”

  “Me, too.”

  Tanner took a deep breath, shined the flashlight ahead of him, then began running. He took the steps two at a time, one hand on the rail for support. With each footfall the ladder trembled and groaned. Briggs felt a momentary wave of dizziness, but shook it off and kept going. At his back, he could hear Cahil panting out a mantra: “Hold together, baby, hold together…”

  As they passed the fourth level, Tanner cast a glance upward and immediately regretted it. The upper catwalks were swaying from side to side, banging into the walls. Concrete dust drifted down like fine snow. Bolts and chunks of railing bounced down the ladder, clanging as they fell.

  Tanner saw the bottom of the stairs come into view. He called “Jump,” then leapt off the top step. He hit the concrete floor, curled into a ball, and let himself roll to a stop. A few feet away, Cahil was rising to his knees.

  “Okay?” Tanner asked.

  “Yep.”

  Up the ladder shaft, voices called out: “Wo sind sie?… Welcher Weg?”

  A circle of light appeared at the top of the shaft. Tanner could just make out the dim outline of a face peering down at them. “Hier!” a voice called.

  Tanner clicked off his flashlight. He and Cahil backed into the shadows. “We’ve got to move,” he whispered. “They’ll try to cut us off.”

  “Ready when you are.”

  Footsteps pounded on the catwalk, which gave out a groan. The footsteps stopped. A panicked German voice called, “Ach, Gott!”

  Tanner and Cahil crept down the tunnel a few feet. Tanner clicked on his flashlight and played it ahead, looking for obstacles. There were none. He clicked off the light. “When we get past the next shaft, I’ll check again,” he whispered.

  Cahil nodded. “Pray the rest of the ladders are bad.”

  “I am.”

  They waited for twenty seconds for their eyes to adjust, then took off running.

  They made it past eight ladder shafts—about a quarter mile—before being spotted. A powerful beam of light suddenly pierced the shaft ahead, creating a pool on the floor. Tanner saw it too late, tried to veer into the darkness, but wasn’t fast enough. Cahil stumbled around him and dove into the shadows along the opposite wall.

  Rifle cracks echoed down the shaft; bullets sparked on the concrete. Above came the click of footsteps on the ladder. The pool of the light jiggled as the owner tried to keep it focused on the floor.

  New plan, Tanner thought. They weren’t going to be able to outrun Litzman’s men. Not only were the topside tunnels wider, but the Germans had better flashlights and no reason not to use them. He and Bear had at least two kilometers to go before they reached the end. Sooner or later they would stumble into an ambush.

  He gestured to Cahil his idea. Bear nodded then trotted down the tunnel and ducked behind a pile of timbers. Tanner sidestepped the pool of light and ducked around the corner. He dropped into a crouch. He listened, trying to gauge the German’s descent. When he estimated the German was near the bottom, he yelled, “Run, Bear, go!”

  From the ladder there was a moment of silence, then “Scheisse!” Shit! Footsteps began pounding. Tanner peeked around the corner just in time to see the German leap the last few steps to the floor. The man spun, his flashlight dancing off the walls. He carried a 9mm H&K MP-5.

  Tanner pulled his head back, held his breath. Come on, Bear.

  Down the tunnel there came the scuff of shoes on concrete, then a crash and a moan of pain from Cahil.

  The German took off in pursuit. As he passed, Tanner stepped out and palm-punched him. Stunned, the German stumbled sideways, dropping the flashlight. Tanner rushed forward and heel-kicked the man’s wrist, spinning him away. The MP-5 clattered to the ground. Tanner stepped forward, wrapped his forearm around the man’s throat—thumb knuckle pressed into the hollow beneath the ear—and levered his other forearm against the back of his head, compressing the carotid artery. The German struggled for several seconds, then slowly
went slack. Tanner lowered him to the floor, then grabbed the flashlight and clicked it off.

  Cahil trotted up and collected the MP-5. “Next time you play the hare,” he whispered.

  From the shaft a voice shouted, “Johann!”

  Tanner muffled part of his mouth with his hand, then called, “Sie laufen!” They’re on the run!

  He gestured to Cahil, who fired a short burst down the tunnel.

  “Werden Sie voraus von ihnen!” Tanner shouted. Get ahead of them!

  They waited until the footsteps retreated up the ladder, then dragged the German’s body into the shadows. “Time to backtrack,” Tanner said.

  They were turning to leave when Tanner stopped and returned to the body. He quickly searched the man, but found nothing but a cell phone. He turned it on, called up the address book, and scrolled through the entries. When he found the number he was looking for, he set it to memory, then dialed “0,” listened for ten seconds, and replaced the phone.

  Cahil looked at him questioningly.

  Tanner said, “Tell you later.”

  They retraced their course, pausing at each shaft before continuing. When they reached the shaft they’d started from, Tanner felt his heart rise into his throat. The ladder was all but collapsed, twisted to one side and swaying like a child’s defunct mobile.

  “How’re your shimmying skills?” Cahil asked.

  “What?” Tanner turned. Bear wasn’t looking at the ladder, but at the far wall and the hatch to the munitions elevator. “Maybe,” Tanner said. “It’s going to depend on the cable.”

  They slid open the hatch, revealing a box three feet deep, three feet tall, and two feet wide. Tanner craned his neck so he could peer through the gap between the box and the wall. They were in luck. The box was supported not by a steel cable, but by a rope. It was as big around as a man’s wrist and appeared intact. Cahil reached in and gave it a tug. “Seems solid.”