A Mortal Terror

by James R Benn

  “Why did a Carabiniere in Acerra call you a Fascist? He said you were a friend of the Nazis.”

  “I have no idea,” Luca said, waving his hand in the air as he looked down at the empty green surface of the croupier’s table.

  “Was it because of what you did at Rab? At the concentration camp?”

  His hand fell from the air, as if a puppet master’s string had been cut. “I am not a Fascist,” he said, sighing in a way that let us know he’d said it many times before. “I am also not a friend of the Tedeschi. What do you think this has to do with a bordello in Acerra?”

  “I think it has something to do with your capitano. He has you under his thumb, and you feel you have to protect him. I’d say Inzerillo was paying him off, and you knew it. You tried to warn Inzerillo that Landry’s killer would be coming for him; that’s why you blurted out that Landry was dead.”

  “If it is as you say, then you are wasting your time with me,” Luca said. He lit a cigarette, keeping his eyes on the pack, the matches, the ashtray, everything but me.

  “No, I don’t think so. You don’t strike me as a man who likes working for a crooked cop,” I said, leaning forward until he had to look me in the eye. “I think you’re ashamed of something, and you know that protecting Trevisi is only going to lead to more shame and disgrace. Am I right, Luca?”

  Some guys aren’t made for lying. Some are. Luca was in between. He put a good face on things, and I’m sure he could lie to a crook or a killer if it meant getting a confession. But something was eating at him, and I knew he wanted to tell all.

  “Yes, you are right,” he said finally. He took a drag on his cigarette, leaned back and blew smoke at the ceiling. “Capitano Trevisi had business dealings with Inzerillo.”

  “What kind of dealings?” Kaz asked. Luca only shook his head. It was the same the world over. No cop wants to give up another cop, no matter how dirty. The blue wall of silence.

  “That’s why he was so glad to offer your services, so you could keep an eye on things?” I said, not asking him a direct question about corruption.

  “Yes. He was worried about Inzerillo. He thought there was trouble brewing, even before you came to Caserta.”

  “Why?”

  The truth came easier now. The dam had been broken, and it spilled out. “There was trouble, first with Lieutenant Landry. He threatened to bring in the military police if Inzerillo didn’t let one of the girls go.”

  “I thought Inzerillo didn’t run the girls himself.”

  “He didn’t. It was what Ileana told him.”

  “Ileana? The prostitute Landry fell for?”

  “Yes. She told him she needed money to buy her freedom from Inzerillo, that he would not let her go free. Trevisi said it was all a lie, to extort money from the lieutenant who loved her.”

  “So you lied to us when you said it would be impossible to find her,” I said.

  “She is gone, that much is true. She fled when she became frightened.”

  “Frightened by what?”

  “One of the soldiers. He threatened to kill her.”

  “That couldn’t have been Landry,” I said.

  “No, he saw himself as her defender, and she as his Dulcinea.” I must have looked puzzled, since he explained. “From Don Quixote.”

  “A simple peasant girl who becomes Don Quixote’s idealized woman,” Kaz added.

  “Oh yeah,” I said. I knew that was an old book, but not much more. “So who threatened her?”

  “I only know it was a sergente. The same one who gave Inzerillo the beating.”

  “Was it Sergeant Stumpf?” He came down with venereal disease after partaking of the pleasures at Bar Raffaele. That might be a motive for attacking Inzerillo and the girl.

  “I do not know. I would tell you if I did.”

  “Why didn’t you tell us before? Why keep this a secret? You knew we were investigating a murder.”

  “The murder is another matter entirely. I can only say that this sergente asked for Ileana, even knowing Landry was smitten with her. Perhaps there was some problem between them, but I can only guess at that.”

  “Why did the sergeant threaten her?”

  “Because she laughed at him,” Luca said, a bitter laugh escaping his lips. “At his failure in lovemaking. He struck her violently and promised to kill her if she breathed a word. Inzerillo heard her screams and tried to intervene, and was beaten for it. I believe the sergeant came back again to hurt him some more.”

  “And then a third visit, to kill him.”

  “If it was the same man. All I know is what I heard from Inzerillo himself. A sergeant, and the second time he came with another man, but he would not say who.”

  “Inzerillo told you it was a sergeant?”

  “Yes, but he would say no more. He and Capitano Trevisi both wanted it kept quiet so there would be no trouble with the military police.”

  “Do you know where the girl is now?”

  “No, truly I do not. Trevisi had her taken away to a farm where she could heal. Not that he is kind, but so she can return to work as soon as possible. In another location, of course.” Luca ground out his cigarette and stared at the ashes. Finally he looked at us. “I am sorry for lying to you.”

  “What does Trevisi have on you?” I asked. “Was it something that happened on Rab? What did you do there?”

  “I did nothing,” Luca said.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  LUCA HAD CLAMMED up tight after that. He’d looked past us, out to sea where the sun was setting and casting a red glow across the horizon. I wondered if he was thinking of the view from the island of Rab, and if he preferred looking out over water to what he’d seen on solid ground.

  I’d gotten Kaz on a PT boat shuttling brass between Naples and Anzio, leaving it up to him and his Webley revolver to talk to Trevisi and find Ileana. We needed to know who had beaten her and Inzerillo. That had to be our killer, fixing up loose ends. Maybe Landry was the real target after all, but if so, I couldn’t figure out all the red heart stuff. It seemed overly complicated. I was stumped, and our only hope seemed to be that the killer would slip up and leave a clue or two next time. Not the best investigative technique, I’ll admit.

  Ileana was the key to finding out everything. If she hadn’t run off, if she’d talk, and if she wasn’t under lock and key in some Naples whorehouse, we had a chance of catching this murderer before he struck again.

  But I had another reason for sending Kaz back to Naples. I didn’t want him talking me out of heading back to the front in the morning. Someone had to watch over Danny. I might find a clue, but probably not. What I was more likely to find was a lot of lead in the air and bodies on the ground. But I might be able to make sure one of them wasn’t Danny’s.

  Which is why the next morning I was on the road before dawn, driving without lights to Le Ferriere. Grenades in my pockets, extra clips in my ammo belt, Thompson on the seat. The road was packed with vehicles—trucks and ambulances, jeeps crammed with GIs, towed artillery, all strung out on the narrow straight road. If the Luftwaffe paid us a visit after the sun came up, it’d be a shooting gallery. Some of the traffic peeled off onto side roads, but most flowed to the front. Artillery thundered up ahead; outgoing stuff, thank God.

  I was half a mile out of Le Ferriere when I noticed that the GIs marching on foot were making better time than I was. And that it was getting light. I didn’t want to be a stationary target, so I pulled off the main road, crossing a short bridge over the wide drainage ditch that ran alongside the roadway, and drove down a dirt road until I found a dry spot to pull over. The road was packed with men and vehicles, but out here everything was still. The fields were empty, stubble showing where plants had last been harvested. A few hundred yards away was one of the stone farmhouses that dotted the fields around here, built according to Mussolini’s plan. A woman came out of the house and began to hang laundry. White sheets fluttered in the early morning breeze, and the image of domesticity h
eld me for a moment, before I turned to join the column of heavily armed soldiers heading into Le Ferriere.

  “Here you go, fellas,” a sergeant shouted from the back of an open truck as he tossed out small bundles to each man passing by. “Stick ’em in your pack, they don’t weigh much.”

  “What are these?” I asked as I caught a tightly bound pack of folded white cotton material.

  “Mattress cover,” he shouted back, not missing a beat as he tossed them to the oncoming men.

  “They got mattresses up front?” a skinny kid asked as he stuck the bundle into his pack. Laugher rippled around him, and a corporal by his side shook his head wearily. There were no mattresses waiting in Le Ferriere or beyond, I knew. The Graves Registration Units used them as shrouds for the dead. Usually they carried them to collection points where bodies were left, but they must have been expecting heavy casualties. Some officer who thought less about morale than efficiency probably figured this would save time. A couple of guys tossed the covers by the side of the road, but most kept them, either not knowing what they were for, not caring, or figuring they might get lucky and find some hay to stuff inside. Hell, maybe even a mattress.

  As I approached the entrance to the stone wall that encircled the village, a sudden sound pierced my ears, rising above the clatter, clank, and chatter of GIs, the revving of engines, and the crunch of tires on gravel: the shriek of artillery shells. Not the thunderous, sharp sound of our own fire, but the piercing screech of artillery rounds falling toward us. Toward me.

  “Incoming!” I yelled at the same moment a few other guys did, and I wasted no time running off the road and leaping face-first onto the flat ground, holding my helmet in place, bracing for the blast that I knew was coming.

  The sound shattered the air as the explosions shook the ground and the concussion swept over me, peppering my body with dirt, debris, and who knows what else. The shelling kept on, hitting the village and the roadway precisely. The Germans had this area zeroed in. They knew the column was here, even though we’d come up in the dark and the approach was shielded from their lines by the walled village. I didn’t spend much time thinking about that, though. I mainly tried to melt into the ground, praying that I was far enough off the damn road to survive. The ear-splitting crash of each explosion drove everything else from my mind, until there was nothing but the trembling earth beneath and my prayers sent up to the saints.

  As quickly as it began, it ended. I moved my limbs, shaking off dirt and making sure everything worked. I was grateful for the silence, until it began to be filled with the groans and cries of the wounded. Smoke roiled from within the village, and wrecks of vehicles littered the road. Men rose from the fields, gazing at those who didn’t. A few yards away an arm lay by itself, a gold wedding ring gleaming bright on the still hand. Medics began running out of the village, seeking the wounded, finding plenty. Most of the dead had been caught in the road, slow to react. The words to a prayer ran through my mind: from thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead. I had to get into the village and find Danny, make sure he was still among the quick. As I got to the road, I saw the Graves Registration sergeant, dead, mattress covers smoldering at his feet.

  My ears were ringing as I stumbled into Le Ferriere. Rubble spilled out into the street where buildings had taken hits. GIs began to file out of the standing structures, eyes cast to the skies, ears tilted to hear the incoming rounds. Officers formed them up and got them moving, toward the German lines. I passed one building that took a direct hit, the sign for 2nd Battalion HQ blackened but readable.

  “Third Platoon, Easy Company?” I asked one lieutenant. “Know where they are?”

  “Easy pushed off before dawn. They’re out there somewhere,” he said, pointing with his thumb to the open fields that led to a wooded rise across the Mussolini Canal. “You might be able to see the advance from the third floor of that factory over there. It’s full of brass who came to watch the show.”

  “I’ll give it a try anyway,” I said.

  “Good luck.” He returned to his men, probably knowing that everyone’s luck ran out, sooner or later. I climbed the metal steps up the outside wall of the factory, a short, squat concrete building that had a few chunks blown out of it, but was still in one piece. The third floor looked out over the town wall, to the northeast and the waiting Krauts. Inside, a gaggle of officers stood at the far wall, their binoculars trained on the advance. Their helmets and jackets were covered in dust shaken loose from the bombardment, but otherwise they were in good shape. No getting caught out on the open road for them. On a table near the door were thermoses of coffee and a couple bottles of bourbon. A man gets thirsty watching a battle, after all.

  A lieutenant turned, probably checking to be sure I wouldn’t swipe the booze. It was easy to tell he was an aide to a senior officer. Clean boots, a good shave, and a West Point ring on his finger. He was along to carry the booze and get points for being at the front, so his benefactors in the West Point Protective Association could promote him as soon as possible.

  “Can I help you?” he asked.

  “Where’s Easy Company headed?”

  “Battalion HQ could help you. They’re down the street.”

  “They’re in pieces. Who’s running the show here?”

  “Boyle?” It was Harding. He and Kearns detached themselves from the scrum of officers and gave a nod to the aide to let him know I was allowed access to the high and mighty. Ring knockers, we called them, for those big academy graduation rings they flashed around. “What happened to Battalion HQ?”

  “Direct hit. If anyone’s alive in there, they aren’t up to running this attack. You didn’t know?”

  Neither of them answered, but Kearns was off, taking the aide with him. Maybe the kid would get his boots dirty.

  “What are you doing here?” Harding asked.

  “Checking on my kid brother,” I said. I saw no reason to lie. Harding knew me pretty well, and I thought I had his number. He was a straight shooter, and he responded best to the truth, even when it went against regulations.

  “Easy Company, Third Platoon, right?”

  “Yes sir. How are they doing?”

  He handed me binoculars and eased a major out of the way at the window. “See that track, across the canal?” I did. It was bigger than a path, smaller than a road. Drainage ditches had been dug on both sides, and the piled earth gave a few inches of cover. Small trees and shrubs grew along the ditches, giving some visual cover too. “They headed up there. Two companies on either side, spread out in the fields. The objective is that wooded rise beyond them.”

  I could make out men crawling in the road and across the fields. Others lay still, dead, or scared out of their wits. Explosions hit the wooded rise, but through the binoculars I could see the deadly sparkle of machine guns sending controlled bursts down into the advancing GIs. It was terrible, that ripping chainsaw sound of the MG42, a machine gun they called the Bonesaw. It spewed out 1200 rounds per minute, so fast that you couldn’t hear the individual shots, just a blur of noise that sounded like heavy fabric tearing. Against that fire I could make out the almost leisurely rat-tat-tat of our machine guns, no match for the dug-in German firepower.

  “They need smoke, and air cover,” I said. “Do you have a radio here?”

  “No,” Harding said. “The communications gear was in the headquarters building, and the cloud cover is too low for air support. Hell, we’re just here to escort the visiting brass, and to observe.” He nearly spit out that last word as he grabbed my arm. “Come on, Boyle. I’ll find a way to call in smoke and get more artillery on that hill. You find your brother and his platoon and help them out, then get word back to me. That’s what you wanted, right?”

  “Yes sir. I’ll send a runner back and let you know how far they’ve gotten.” I sprinted down the street, heading for the north gate that opened to the fields and the storm of steel and death my kid brother had plunged into. Danny, who used to follow me every
where, who got bullied when I wasn’t around, who was smarter than I was though I never admitted it, who I’d punched in the arm, hard, more times than I could count—Danny, out there, alone. Meaning with no one he could count on. No family, no Irish, no veteran platoon leader. I jumped smoking craters and debris until I was clear of Le Ferriere. As I descended the slope, I could barely make out the tiny shapes of crawling men amidst the smoke and dust of battle. In the distance, three Sherman tanks made their way along a narrow road across the canal, the first good news of the morning. Bad news caught up with the lead Sherman as it blew up, black smoke churning out of every hatch. The other two tanks reversed, not wanting to roll over another Teller mine or into the sights of a hidden antitank gun. They retreated, I went forward, and I couldn’t help thinking they knew what they were doing.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  I CAME ACROSS the litter bearers first, hustling the wounded back to aid stations along the canal. Mortar rounds were landing near the closest bridge, so I went into the water, scrambling up the embankment into chaos. Two jeeps, pulling trailers stacked with dead, careened across the field, evading enemy fire so vigorously that the bodies leapt with every jolt, arms and legs bouncing as if they’d come alive. Machine-gun rounds chewed up the fields and zinged over my head, the odd thrum like a hornet buzzing by my ear. White phosphorous rounds began to land to our front, and I knew Harding had managed to get the coordinates to the artillery. Thick white smoke blossomed in the morning air, and I ran until I found the dirt track.

  It was crowded with men, prone and pressed tight on either side, up against the cover of the ditch wall. The fields on either side had a gentle rise to them, like a lazy wave about to crest. It was less than a foot high, but when everything else is dead flat, a foot is damn good cover. That’s where the advance on the flanks of the road had stopped. Men had scraped shallow depressions in the soil and rolled into them, protected at least from machine-gun fire. To their rear, a trail of bodies stretched back to the canal.