Ardennes Sniper: A World War II Thriller

by David Healey

  They ran for a couple of miles until they reached the edge of the road. Cole’s shortcut across the road had worked. Cole hunkered down behind a stone wall and waited for the others to catch up.

  Off to their left, the road ran toward the village, and they could see the flames now from the burning building.

  After he had caught his breath, Lieutenant Mulholland got out his binoculars. "Looks like our friends set fire to a tavern. But their column hasn't left the village yet. We got here ahead of them." Mulholland put down the binoculars and grinned. "You know what Nathan Bedford Forrest used to say, 'Get there firstest with the mostest.' "

  "I reckon we are firstest," Cole said. "But we sure as hell ain't mostest."

  "We'll see about that," Mulholland said. He nodded at a thicket of trees off to their right that surrounded the road like a bead around a string. The trees were thick enough to create a bottleneck for the German column—they would have to follow the road through the woods. Also, a deep ravine paralleled much of the road, creating even more challenging terrain. On the other side of the thicket, the road emptied out into wide open fields, punctuated here and there by deserted farmhouses. An ancient stone barn located several hundred yards from the road was the largest visible structure. "If we take up positions in that field beyond the woods, we can pick off the Germans as they come out of the trees."

  "Not a lot of cover for us."

  "There are some hedgerows we can get into, and plenty more stone walls. That should give us enough cover. We’ll be all right. You lead the way again."

  Cole was skeptical. These were SS panzers they were going against. “If you say so.”

  Cole slipped over the stone wall and ran down toward the road. Fortunately, the Germans were confident enough that they had not sent scouts ahead. Soon, the sniper squad was running down the road and into the woods.

  The trees seemed to close in around them, sucking the light from the winter air. It was such a silent, gloomy place. They ran on. The woods stretched for half a mile, and then they emerged on that open field—and kept running.

  Lieutenant Mulholland brought the squad to a halt. He pointed Rowe and McNulty toward a hedgerow. "You two take up positions in there. Once the Germans are out in the open, let them have it. Try to pick off the tank drivers. When it gets too hot, get the hell out—we'll regroup by that barn over there. These Jerries are in a hurry to get somewhere and they're not going to bother chasing after a few snipers."

  "Yes, sir."

  "One last thing. Let Cole shoot first. Don't fire until he does."

  "Why the hell not?" Rowe asked.

  "Because he's got good instincts. You, you're just a good shot. There's a difference." The lieutenant turned toward Jolie. "Listen, I want you to—"

  "I will go with Cole," Jolie announced.

  "All right," he said. If he wasn't happy about that idea, he was trying hard to hide it. He handed Hank his binoculars, "Kid, you stick with me. I can use a spotter."

  "All I've got is this pistol."

  "Don't worry, Kid. We aren't going to let the Germans get that close."

  The snipers spread out through the field, taking up positions. There wasn't time to set up a real hide before the Germans came at them, so they would simply have to rely on the natural camouflage around them.

  Back toward the village, smoke still filled the sky from the burning tavern. The countryside was no longer silent. Instead, the frigid air trembled with the rumble of distant engines. The German column was on the move, headed right for them.

  CHAPTER 12

  “Brace yourself, Bridget,” Cole said to Jolie. “It’s about to get rough around here.”

  He crouched behind a low stone wall, his rifle aimed toward the passage through the trees where, in a few minutes, he expected the advance elements of the German column to appear. Jolie knelt nearby, her head just visible as she rested a pair of binoculars on top of the wall.

  He would have liked a better sniper’s nest, or at least one that put them farther away from the Germans. This land looked to be what the mountain people back home called scald—barren. Cole felt far too exposed. They did have the stone wall, which Cole could keep between himself and the enemy, using it as a shield if he and Jolie had the need to slip away across the open plain. Also, Cole did not expect that they would be in position long. Once they opened up on the armored column, they would have a few minutes at the most before the German fire got so hot and heavy that they would have to retreat. Considering that it was a few rifles against panzers, there was no doubt they would retreat.

  Cole wasn't interested in making any last stands in some godforsaken Belgian field. This was a delaying action, not the Alamo.

  "I reckon it's cold enough out here to freeze the warts off a witch," he said, shucking his mittens to flex his stiff fingers.

  "Misérable," Jolie agreed. "In French we say, ‘Cold enough to freeze the grin off an American's face.’ "

  "Are you funnin’ me, Jolie?"

  She made a noise through chattering teeth that might have been oui. "Perhaps it should be a saying."

  Cole grinned at her. “Guess it ain’t that cold, after all. That’s some saying, though. And here I thought you Frenchies would be grateful, seeing as to how we liberated your country and all."

  Jolie turned serious. "We are grateful." She shook her head. "I was also at Normandy, remember? So many dead."

  "I wonder how much gratitude a few thousand dead Americans buys. You think the French will still be grateful in ten years?"

  "If you win this war, we will still be grateful in seventy years, or a hundred," Jolie said. "But right now, we have to make sure the Germans do not return to Paris. So shoot some Germans now."

  "I'll do what I can," Cole said, putting his eye to the scope.

  "I wish I had a gun," she said.

  "I gave my pistol to that kid," he said. "You won't be needing a gun. I'm goin' to fire a few shots and then we high tail it for the hills."

  "They will come after us," she said.

  "Maybe, but I reckon they won't try too hard. These bastards have got bigger fish to fry then catching a few snipers. And don't worry, I got your back." He gave her a look. "And your front. And just about any other area that needs covering, come to think of it."

  Jolie couldn't help but smile. "It is good to know that not every part of you is frozen."

  “If we have to sit in this here field much longer, all bets are off on that."

  They did not have to wait long. The winter air already vibrated with the noise from the approaching German column. Tanks, trucks, assorted vehicles—more than a thousand German troops were moving through the woods. Because the Germans had to shout to be heard over the diesel engines, their voices carried clearly toward the waiting snipers.

  "You speak Kraut. What are they saying?"

  She cocked her head and listened. "Nothing important, just something about how it's colder than a polar bear’s asshole."

  "For once, we can agree with the Krauts on something."

  Then the first vehicles emerged from the woods. A couple of smaller vehicles appeared first, followed by a truly massive tank. Cole recognized it as a King Tiger, which was a sort of battleship on land. The tank churned into the field and took up a position beside the road, swiveling its 88 mm gun across the field to cover the rest of the column. Even from this distance, the muzzle looked big enough to fit a watermelon. This was the closest he had been yet to a King Tiger tank.

  "Holy shit," Cole muttered.

  He played his crosshairs over that iron behemoth, but the hatch of the King Tiger was not open, so there was no kind of target.

  The Germans poured from the wood now like angry ants. He picked out another tank, this one with a German in goggles standing in the hatch. Cole breathed out, put his finger on the trigger, and fired.

  The tank commander went down. Quickly, he picked out another target, the driver of one of those German jeeps. He hit the man, causing the car to veer off
course into the field as the passenger clutched at the wheel in an effort to regain control.

  One by one, the other snipers opened up. It was not a heavy fire, but it was a withering one. Much to the Germans' credit, the sniper attack did not slow them down. After all, these were mostly veterans of the Eastern Front. They were well used to snipers. A few Germans deployed to counterattack.

  Fortunately for the Americans, it was hard for the Germans to pick out their individual attackers. Looking across the fields, all they could see was a vast stretch of snowy landscape, punctuated here and there by stone walls and hedgerows. The grinding diesel engines drowned out the individual crack of the rifle shots. The Germans knew they were being shot at, but it was impossible to tell where the shots were coming from.

  Cole fired again and winged a soldier standing ready at a machine gun mounted on the back of a German vehicle.

  "A little to your left," Jolie said, peering through the binoculars.

  Cole worked the bolt and fired again, hitting him so solidly that the German somersaulted backwards off the vehicle.

  It was all a little too easy, and Cole worried when things were easy—in his book easy didn’t last long, or worse yet, something with teeth and claws was sneaking up behind you.

  He glanced to his right, where Rowe was located behind another stone wall similar to Cole’s. Rowe was alone, but he was picking out and shooting targets just like Cole. But Rowe was still new to being a sniper. So far the attack on the German column had the air of a Mason Lodge turkey shoot, and Rowe was caught up in the excitement, firing as fast as he could without giving enough thought to keeping behind cover.

  "Keep your head down, you damn fool," Cole muttered.

  • • •

  Von Stenger lay stretched out on the raised log, feeling the cold seep into him. He longed to tug his coat collar tighter to keep in as much body heat as possible, but the first rule of the sniper was to minimize any movements. Motion drew the opponent's eye. Although he felt confident that he was well hidden, there was no point in tempting fate.

  "Herr Hauptmann?" the driver whispered up. "What do you wish me to do?"

  "When I want you to do something, I will tell you," he said. "Now get down and don't move a muscle."

  The driver did not have the patience of a sniper. He coughed softly once or twice, and even had the audacity to sneeze, which surely would have given away their position if there had not been a column of panzers churning through the woods and filling the air with a tumult of diesel engines and clanking tanks treads. There was no one in sight, so Von Stenger considered shooting the driver just for being annoying.

  He ignored the fidgeting SS driver and kept his attention on the wintry field. At any moment, the enemy would reveal himself.

  His predictions of an ambush had been correct. No sooner had the column emerged from the woods than the firing began. Friel’s men were met with a handful of well-placed shots, rather than a barrage of machine gun fire and mortars. Snipers, then.

  He peered out across the field, trying to see where the shots originated. As Von Stenger knew from personal experience, locating a well-hidden sniper in a country landscape was like trying to find a flea on the belly of a shaggy dog.

  He held his fire and watched. As he had often lectured his students at the SS sniper school, the chief skill of a sniper was not necessarily his ability with a rifle, but his capacity for patience. One had to wait out the enemy until he gave himself away with a sudden movement or even a muzzle flash.

  Patience. Then accuracy.

  Meanwhile, bullets continued to chew up the German ranks. But these were bullets, not bomb shells. In the end, a few snipers were just a nuisance to an armored column. Like bees on a bear. Like flies on das scheisse.

  To his surprise, Friel came barreling up the road in another Schwimmwagen. Even from this distance, Von Stenger could hear him shouting. "Keep moving! Forward! Get going! Let the panzer finish them off."

  Bullets flicked around the commander, but Friel gave no sign of noticing. He really was a brave bastard, Von Stenger admitted. A real fire eater. Under Friel's verbal lashing, the column ground forward, once again an unstoppable force, like a glacier of steel.

  Von Stenger returned his attention to the field.

  Instead of binoculars, he used his telescopic sight to explore likely sniper nests. A fallen tree. A notch in a stone wall. A hay rick.

  There. A flicker of movement caught his eye. Near the foot of a haystack. He was not sure, but it might have been the motion of someone working a rifle bolt. The air was gray and gloomy, flecked with snow, but he was sure he saw something else—the telltale puff of warm breath on the winter air.

  The American sniper was well hidden, because Von Stenger could not see a clear target. He sent a bullet just below where he had seen the vapor of someone's breath. Even if he missed, it would give the Ami something to think about.

  No other targets presented themselves. The field, after all, was vast. Then he saw a head and shoulders showing above a stone wall. He put the sights over the sniper’s heart and fired. The man slumped forward. A machine gun opened up and continued to riddle the body. Then the column continued its advance.

  Bullets kept coming at them. Where were the other snipers?

  • • •

  Rowe never expected the bullet that killed him, but felt it bury itself in his chest like a stake being driven into his heart. His body shut down the way a fan stops when the cord is yanked from the socket. His thoughts kept spinning even as his body fell across the stone wall in front of him. At least it doesn’t hurt, he thought. He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t talk. Then everything got far away, like looking through binoculars from the wrong end.

  His body had slumped forward over the top of the stone wall. There was a burst of machine gun fire from the King Tiger. The Germans kept pumping bullets into him.

  From his own hiding place, Cole watched helplessly.

  “Goddamn,” he said. The sight of Rowe’s body jumping and quivering from the impact of the bullets made him angry. They weren’t just killing him. They were mutilating him. He yanked at the bolt action on the Springfield.

  Cole was sure a single bullet had killed Rowe, not the burst of machine gun fire. Where had it come from? That was some fine shooting to hit him from the German position.

  While he thought about that, Cole noticed a squad of SS soldiers taking cover behind the tank that was chopping up Rowe. Cole picked one off. Worked the bolt. Scanned for the next target.

  "Nine o’clock," Jolie said.

  He caught sight of a man crouched low to the snowy ground, just beside the tank tread. There was a jolt of flame from the German's muzzle. Cole settled the crosshairs just where the rim of the helmet crossed the bridge of the man's nose. Slowly, he let his breath out, squeezed the trigger, and was almost surprised when the rifle butt kicked his shoulder.

  A rifle scope magnified a very focused area, which was useful for shooting, but made it hard to see the big picture of a battlefield. Taking his eye off the sight tended to disorient him. That was why it was useful for a sniper to have a spotter. A spotter could also stay aware of the immediate surroundings, leaving the sniper free to focus on targets.

  At this moment, however, Jolie kept the binoculars glued to her eyes. "To your left, there's a man trying to charge the machine gun on the back of that armored car."

  Cole shot him.

  "Good. At two o'clock there is un fou with his head still out of his tank."

  Cole put the crosshairs on the German and squeezed the trigger.

  • • •

  Von Stenger scanned the field for more targets.

  "Schiffer?" he called down to the driver.

  "Yes, Herr Hauptmann."

  "Take those binoculars I gave you and watch the field. Tell me if you see any movement."

  "Do you want me to shoot at them, Herr Hauptmann?"

  "No, it's just your eyes I need right now."

  "Yes, si
r."

  Over to his right, he could hear the distinctive mechanical whine of a panzer turret and gun being aligned for a shot.

  The problem with using tanks to fight a handful of pesky snipers was that it was like trying to drive a nail with a boulder, when what you needed was a hammer. He held that hammer in his hands.

  "Herr Hauptmann? I think I see something," the driver said.

  "Where?" Von Stenger had to prompt.

  "Ten o'clock. Behind that stone wall. I think I saw the cloud from someone's breath."

  Von Stenger swept the scope over the wall. Nothing. He tried again, and finally noticed where the snow had been disturbed where someone had gone over the wall. But there was no one in the immediate vicinity. Where, where ... finally, he spotted the vapor left by warm breath in the freezing air. Two distinct patterns of vapor, which meant two snipers, or a sniper and a spotter.

  The sniper's rifle was buried under snow, creating the perfect camouflage. Clever, clever. The sniper had arranged his rifle in such a way as to present almost no target. Just where his head should have been, Von Stenger found himself staring at a large frozen rock. This Ami was good at hiding himself.

  He thought about sending a bullet out anyway, bouncing it off the frozen wall, on the off chance that a splinter of stone might catch the sniper in the face.

  "Herr Hauptmann, the panzer is preparing to fire. Trust me, sir, but you will want to cover your ears."

  "Schiffer, maybe after the war you can get a job announcing soccer games on the radio. But for now, please shut up."

  Von Stenger had never taken his eye off the scope. He was amazed when the American sniper lifted his head up from behind the wall. Like Schiffer, he seemed worried about the tank.

  He saw the American clearly through the scope. Thin face like a fox, covered in stubble. Young. And on his head was a helmet decorated with what the Americans called a Confederate flag—the "Stars and Bars" of the Old South. Von Stenger knew his American military history better than most Americans.