The Rat Patrol 6 - Desert Masqueraade

by David King

  The net had been stretched tight again following the capture of the Arab and the rat hole would not be occupied again until Troy, Moffitt, Hitch and Tully returned. The substitute Rat Patrol had departed from the camp by the simple expediency of depositing the distinctive headgear in the cave with the jeeps and returning to their units. He had planned to have the four men on hand and in evidence for another day but he hadn't been able to tolerate Merriam's brutality. The Lord knew what difficulties he'd create for Troy if the impersonation were permitted to continue.

  Wilson started again for the strip and hesitated at the ramp end of the hollow. He not only disliked Merriam, he distrusted him. If the man had copped Troy's bush hat, there'd be a brawl when the Rat Patrol came back. Merriam would be lucky if he escaped with only a broken arm but then Wilson would have to discipline Troy. The CO peeled back a corner of the net and slipped down the ramp. The three distinctive headpieces and Tully's conventional helmet were where they should be, on the front seats of the jeeps. Wilson blew out his breath in relief and looked about the quarters of the Rat Patrol. It really was quite cool and comfortable here beneath the desert, he thought. The two jeeps stood ready for action at either side and the space between was packed and clean. He imagined it was a good deal more bearable in this cavern during the hot days than under the canvas at his HQ.

  He crawled out, replaced the netting and strolled through the supply trucks to the runway. The work detail had compacted the strip for more than half its distance and the C-47 should have no difficulty in making a smooth landing.

  Back in his tent again, Wilson considered his problem. Without information from the Rat Patrol, he would be at a loss to know where to concentrate the area saturation fire, given him. Well! He stood abruptly and crashed his fist on tlie table. There was one sure way to find out where some of the enemy's guns were located. He turned to Peilowski whose eyes were startled.

  "We're going to attack the ridge today," he said in a clear, strong voice. He felt happy and excited. "You want to see some action?"

  "You're going through that minefield?" Peilowski asked hesitantly and his jaw was slack.

  Wilson laughed. "I'm going to send a dozen tanks with all guns blazing up to the edge of the field. I hope we can trick the enemy into opening up and reveal his emplacements. Come along in the staff car to observe and chart them."

  This time Peilowski did salute. Despite his pudginess, he managed to leap to his feet and bring his hand slapping against his forehead. "Yes, sir!" he said enthusiastically. "I always did want to see some active duty."

  11

  Dietrich swallowed the responses to his three wireless requests but found he was unable to digest them. One, no bombers available; request denied. Two, no FLAKs available; request denied. Three, brandy? You cannot be serious; request denied. He could not say that he was disappointed because he really never had been hopeful. A year before, perhaps at least one of the requests would have been confirmed, but with the Allies now hammering at the Afrika Korps on every front, it was simply do the best with what you have.

  He drew the canvas camp chair to the table and lifted the metal cover on the luncheon plate which Grosse had just brought. Although the events of the morning had been upsetting, he had not eaten any breakfast and he was hungry. Aromatic steam curled from the plate and his eyebrows arched as he wrinkled his forehead in surprise. Two thick rib cutlets embraced half a dozen small boiled potatoes that were coated with melted butter. The chops undoubtedly were goat—or at the very best, kid—and the butter undoubtedly ersatz, but the potatoes looked genuine and the appearance of the plate was appetizing. He knew the coffee would be good. The incomparable Sergeant Kauderwelsch somehow managed to obtain whole beans which he ground with no cereal additive. A large porcelain mug beside the plate was filled to the brim and fragrant tendrils rose from it. He removed the war from his mind and sat down to enjoy the meal. The fork with a juicy slice from the cutlet was halfway to his mouth when firing broke out.

  As he reached for his cap, his mind was busy cataloging the weapons. He identified the whoosh and hollow burst of the mortars, the sharp rattle of the machine guns, the high-pitched whine of rifle fire piercing the heavy sounds, the shattering boom of the 75 mm. cannon and the screaming of the rockets. It sounded as if the ridge had exploded. He also detected the detonations of 75 mm. shells that were shuddering against the slope. They were similar to the shells fired by his own 75s, but not quite the same. The Allied 75 mm. shells seemed to slam and burst with a slapping detonation. Wilson had launched his attack, he thought, and waited for the awful blast of the twenty-five-pound shells from the gun howitzer in the pit.

  Field glasses thumping against his chest, he ran toward the flat rock that overlooked the valley from a position beside a halftrack. The halftrack was gone and he remembered he had sent Kraemer with three halftracks to assist Doeppler in the search for the Rat Patrol. The firepower from four halftracks withdrawn from battle! he thought and his head ached dully. In the place where Kraemer's halftrack had been emplaced, an ox of a man was standing, feet well apart as if to brace the massive body against the shock of the blows from the shells. His back was to Dietrich and under his short-sleeved shirt his shoulders bulged like animal haunches. Hands were to his face, cupping field glasses. It was Major Haussie, the artillery officer who commanded the guns on the slope and ridge but who temporarily was under orders from Dietrich. In North Africa, the tanks of the Afrika Korps came first.

  The valley and the slope were enshrouded with a gritty mist of sand and dust that roiled to the ridge itself. The opaque clouds reverberated with each shell blast. Dietrich lifted his glasses, but it was impossible to see the attacking force through the turbid air or see the results of the firing from the slope and ridge. The Germans and the Allies slammed shells blindly at each other.

  "Have they used the twenty-five-pounder yet?" Dietrich asked. He dropped his glasses and wiped the abrasive particles from his eyes. Already, perspiration was making muddy tracks on his cheeks.

  Haussie let his glasses fall against his great belly and bent his head down to Dietrich's. When the face was so near that Dietrich could see the little purple veins under Haussie's skin, the major blinked surprisingly clear blue eyes solemnly and rumbled, "Do they possess a twenty-five-pounder, Herr Hauptmann?"

  "They have a British twenty-five-pounder howitzer concealed in a pit," Dietrich yelled.

  "You know that this is so?" Haussie said.

  "This is a fact that has been observed," Dietrich answered. "Soon they will be using it." His throat was raw from talking above the noise and he stopped to swallow. "With what are they attacking?"

  "With a V of Sherman tanks they came at us," Haussie thundered. He seemed to have no difficulty raising his voice above the roar and crash of battle. "They have not for one minute let up since but we are holding them off."

  Abruptly Dietrich gripped Haussie's hammy shoulders with both his hands, horrified at the thought that had erupted in his mind. "Schwachsinnige!" he raged at the top of his voice. "Call off the guns. Cease the firing. The tanks cannot cross the minefield without blowing themselves up. From where they fire they are not within effective range. Dunderhead! They are drawing your fire to get the range of the emplacements for the twenty-five-pounder. Cease firing!"

  "Herr Hauptmann!" Haussie exclaimed, and his face grew so livid his veins disappeared. "I am your superior."

  "Major Haussie," Dietrich said harshly. "As long as my armored column of the Afrika Korps remains at this position, I am in charge. You will command the guns to cease filing. That is an order."

  He turned brusquely and marched to the communications truck. There had been two position reports from Doeppler and an observation on the weather. The wind was blowing.

  "Kloake," Dietrich called as he approached the truck. The boy's head appeared between the canvas flaps. His eyes looked frightened. "Anything more from Doeppler or Kraemer?"

  "Nein, mein Hauptmann," Kloake said nervous
ly. "What is happening with the battle?"

  "Nothing, not a thing at all. Soon there will be no more firing," Dietrich assured him. Already the guns were falling silent; by banks it seemed. "It was a mistake and no one was hurt. Have you been able to raise Mueller?"

  "I am happy it was a mistake and no one was injured," Kloake said with a timid smile. "Also, I regret that all I receive from Lieutenant Mueller is silence. But I shall persevere, sir."

  "That is good," Dietrich said, voice softening as he looked at Kloake with an almost paternal feeling of responsibility. Perhaps it was necessary to draft up the boys so young, but why didn't they keep them for the defense of the Fatherland, close to home? "I shall be on the rock observing if I am not in my tent."

  "Ja, mein Hauptmann," Kloake said. He sounded grateful. Dietrich felt a lump gathering in his throat and walked away quickly.

  He went to the rock. Haussie had left and now the firing was sporadic. It fizzled out during the next five minutes until there was only an occasional rifle shot from some embittered enlisted man who found expression and release in his weapon. The firing from the Shermans became desultory and then they were silent. The clouds that had puffed from the desert and the slope still obscured the Allied tanks but in the stillness, Dietrich could hear the clanking of their treads. By the time holes were torn by the breeze in the tawny veil that hung over the valley, the Shermans were halfway back to their formation in the Allied lines.

  As he had discerned at once, the entire maneuver had been another American deceit. Tricky Yankee, descendant of Jan Kees. Fortunately, he'd been in time to stop that mutton-brained Haussie before the enemy was able to get the range for the twenty-five-pounder.

  The wind had blown the dust out toward the sea and now Dietrich could see the tanks moving into their original positions, hatches flying open, crews tumbling out. Trucks began to shuttle between them, unloading shells. The camouflage net still was tightly in place over the pit, he saw, and at the airstrip the work crew had almost completed tamping the entire length of the runway. That was something else again to corrode his mind with worry. First there was the twenty-five pounder. Now the runway that was being prepared to receive something formidable.

  He neither marched nor strode to his tent. He walked deliberately, and although he was erect with his shoulders thrown back, he felt as if he were slouching. He sat at his table and absently lifted the fork to which the bit of meat still clung. It was cold and had a decidedly goaty taste. The ersatz butter had congealed on the potatoes. The coffee was tepid and grit gave it substance. He pushed the cup and plate away and poured a glass of brandy. He had no appetite anyway.

  Kloake ran into the tent and halted at attention. "Mein Hauptmann," he said breathlessly, "Lieutenant Doeppler reports he has found the patrol of Lieutenant Stengle."

  "Yes?" Dietrich waited patiently but not hopefully for the rest.

  "He reported the patrol car had been destroyed—he thought by a grenade. It had burned itself out with three men of the patrol. The fourth, an enlisted man, a Corporal Verkehr, had been killed outside the car behind a rock where he had fired until the drum of his MG42 was empty."

  Dietrich nodded his head sadly. Stengle had been outmaneuvered by a standard Rat Patrol tactic with the two heavily armed jeeps. "Verkehr, Corporal," he made a note. "I shall see that he is awarded the Iron Cross, Second Class, posthumously. He was a brave man to stand alone against the Rat Patrol."

  "Lieutenant Doeppler reports also that the wind increases its strength and visibility is limited," Kloake said. "Although there are no tracks to follow he will continue with the search for the Rat Patrol."

  Dietrich shook his head wearily. If there were a sandstorm it would undoubtedly sweep into his position from the west and he could expect the Rat Patrol to ride into his camp on the tail of it.

  Peilowski was sweating. He always perspired freely—to Wilson's intense annoyance—but now there was a reason for it and the sweat crawled down his cheeks and dripped from his jowls. He stood in front of Wilson's desk, clinging to a clipboard which held a paper on which a scaled map of the slope and ridge had been drafted. His moist cheeks were pale beneath the sunburn and the board shook in his hands.

  "You did not mark a single position?" Wilson repeated frostily. The generous response the 75s had received from the ridge had pleased him beyond all expectations.

  "You couldn't see where anything was coming from in all that dust," Peilowski mumbled.

  "But surely you observed the first rounds that were fired," Wilson said evenly although his mind was frigid.

  "I saw them all right," Peilowski blurted. "The whole hill was firing at us from everywhere at once. I like to hit the floor."

  "Wasn't there anything that you could chart?" Wilson demanded.

  "Well, I know where what was," Peilowski said.

  "You know what?" Wilson asked incomprehensibly.

  "I know what is where," Peilowski said. "First, above the minefield, there's machine guns and some riflemen. Then, halfway up the hill, there's mortars. On top, 75s and, I think, some rockets."

  "Yes, you're quite right," Wilson said acidly. "I was aware of the disposition." He sighed heavily. "I'm afraid we shall be compelled to arbitrarily select an area to saturate."

  "Yes, sir," Peilowski said promptly, "I guess that's what we'll have to do."

  In spite of himself, Wilson smiled. He really shouldn't be too stern with Peilowski. After the first rounds he himself had been unable to locate the emplacement of the weapons. He supposed the best target for the missiles would be the minefield itself. Lacking the knowledge he hoped the Rat Patrol would bring back about the safe passage through the mines, he would be forced to direct the missiles on the minefield to clear a path for the armor. This meant his tanks would be assaulting the fortified ridge under direct fire from emplaced artillery. Casualties would be heavy.

  A scuffle outside the tent interrupted Wilson's thoughts. He glimpsed whirling robes, bare brown legs, faded GI fatigues. Arabian invective shrilled in discordant, nerve-rasping cries. Wilson jumped from his chair and ran outside. Merriam, the former MP who had impersonated Troy, was wrestling with a small Arab in a ragged, soiled robe.

  "You again?" Wilson said sharply. "What do you do, set snares for them?"

  "When I see one sneaking around camp, I grab," Merriam said sulkily. He had one of the Arab's arms twisted behind his back. The man's other arm hung limply. "Maybe I should look the other way."

  "Of course not," Wilson said, immediately sorry. "Bring him in." He went back into the tent and sat behind his table.

  "I guess I shouldn't of bothered you, at that," Merriam said, shoving the Arab into HQ. "You warned him. You told him the next time he'd be shot."

  Startled, Wilson examined the prisoner. He recognized the pocked face, the darting bright eyes of the native who'd been trapped in the net the night before. "Get Kalmuk," he told Peilowski. "I want to know why this man returned."

  "I come to see you, effendi," the weasel-faced Arab said in broken but understandable English.

  "You speak English!" Wilson was astounded. He tried to recall what had been said in the Arab's hearing. He did not think anything of importance had been disclosed. Angrily he said, "Why didn't you tell us you spoke English?"

  "I am treated bad," the Arab said and his eyes burned resentfully.

  "Why did you come back?" Wilson asked.

  "I have a thing to say," the Arab said. He jerked his head to the side, glaring at Merriam. "I talk when he let go."

  "Release him," Wilson said to Merriam. "He came voluntarily. I don't think he'll bolt."

  Merriam dropped the Arab's arm; reluctantly, Wilson thought. The truck driver suddenly seemed uneasy. He's concerned with what the Arab will tell me, Wilson decided.

  "After I am here, I go with two friends to the camp of your enemy," the Arab said.

  "Why?" Wilson asked coldly.

  "We think we can sell story of what we see," the Arab said.

&n
bsp; "Information about this camp?" Wilson asked.

  "Yes."

  "Did you?"

  "No." The Arab's eyes were filled with wrath. "They treat us worse than your man. I do not understand what they say, but they beat us and beat us. My friends cannot move today."

  "How did you get into the German lines?" Wilson asked.

  "That is what I come to tell you," the Arab said craftily. "There is a way. They do not know it. You pay for this?"

  "Didn't the Germans ask how you got into their lines?" Wilson asked suspiciously.

  "We say we ride from west, no one stop us. You pay, I show path they not know."

  "Yes," Wilson said. He did not trust the Arabs and had never dealt with them. He knew they peddled information to the Jerries. Perhaps he had been wrong. A trail into the enemy position not known to the Jerries would be invaluable, "I will pay you one hundred silver dollars but only after you have pointed out the trail."

  "You are kind, effendi," the Arab said. He swung suddenly, half facing Merriam, and spit at his feet. Turning to Wilson again, he said, "Who I show? He?"

  Wilson started to assure the Arab that it would be an officer who would treat him well when an idea flashed into his mind. Merriam needed to be disciplined. Brutality could not be tolerated.

  "Yes," he said with a thin smile. "You will show him. You will be taken to a place to stay until it is dark and given food. This man and three others will go with you and you will show them the trail." He looked sternly at Merriam. "You will report to me at oh-nineteen-hundred with Corporal Heath and the other two who were with you on the Rat Patrol. When the Arab has shown you the path, you will scout it to the Jerry perimeter and observe the emplacement of their weapons." Looking back at the Arab, he said, "All you need do is show them the path. Return and I shall give you the hundred silver dollars." He glanced again at Merriam. "If the Arab tells me you have mistreated him in any way, you will stand court martial. Do you understand?"