by James R Benn
“The Green Hornet and Kato?”
“That is somewhat better. I assume you are Kato the faithful chauffer, and I am the rich crime-fighter? You are driving, after all,” Kaz said, his face almost relaxed. Maybe this little jaunt in the fresh air would cure his headache.
“Okay, you come up with a better duo,” I said, slowing as three heavy trucks came down the road.
“Very well,” he said. “I say Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. They were at least Europeans and embarked upon a mission for their king.”
“That’s Shakespeare, right?” I said, remembering English class back in South Boston. Sister Mary Gabriel had taught Hamlet like it was a lost book of the New Testament, and those names had always stuck with me. “What happened to them?”
“It is best I do not tell you.”
Chapter Ten
The MPs at the HQ entrance had taken down the license plate of the green Amilcar, 7857 MZ. They’d radioed it to the other checkpoints, with instructions to confirm sightings and let the driver pass after a short delay, allowing us to draw closer.
Kaz navigated, skirting the southern edge of the Falaise Pocket on side roads that were little more than forested tracks. The wind gusted up about a half hour out and the stench of rotting flesh flowed over us, clinging to our clothes and skin, leaving a lingering scent of decay.
“Drive faster,” Kaz said, sniffing his sleeve, then holding out his arms to the open air. I stepped on it, zipping along the dirt road between stands of spindly pines, feeling a bit like a kid on a joyride.
Then the snarl of a diving aircraft snatched the joy away. I took my foot off the gas and coasted, not wanting to brake and send up a telltale plume of dust. I steered off the road, bumping along on the rough ground until thick pine trees blocked the way. I didn’t know if it was ours or theirs, as rare as Luftwaffe sightings were these days, but it didn’t make much difference where the ammunition was made when it was hurtling in bursts straight for your head.
The prop wash from the fighter’s propellers blew branches and pine needles around like a gusting nor’easter as we hunched over in our seats, waiting for the bombs and bullets that never arrived.
“Idiot,” Kaz said, craning his neck to see between the branches. “He is coming around again. A Tempest, I think. Doesn’t he know where he is?”
“There still could be Germans around,” I said. “It’s our fault for making dust. He might think we’re Krauts making a run for it.” The Tempest roared overhead, his wing dipping to get a better look at the ground as he circled. A rugged fighter-bomber, the British Tempest sported 20-millimeter cannon with bombs slung under its wings. If this guy decided to have a go at us, he’d leave a lot of kindling by the side of the road.
He gained altitude, soaring in a giant arc overhead before diving again, his nose pointed right at us.
“He’s spotted us,” I said, as he opened up with his four cannon, the staccato bursts coming nearer as he descended.
Kaz threw himself on top of me, my face shoved into the dirt. The Tempest rose skyward, dropping two bombs, deadly black dots of steel and explosive growing larger and closer. I felt Kaz tense as the bombs struck and detonated.
The ground shook, and the shock wave sent a blast of air and branches overhead. Then a secondary explosion sent a ball of flame skyward, maybe one hundred yards through the woods.
We hadn’t been the target.
“Kaz, you okay?” I asked as we untangled ourselves, keeping one eye on the fireball.
“Yes,” he said, brushing himself off. “I thought those bombs were meant for us.”
“They could have been.” I leaned in to look him in the eye. “And you could have been killed.”
“I still may be if we do not investigate,” he said, turning away and grabbing his Sten gun. “The jeep is well hidden here. Let’s see what is ahead.”
I grabbed my Thompson and followed, wondering what had gotten into him. I don’t mind my life being saved, but having your best pal show he was willing to take a load of shrapnel for you was a shocker. I didn’t have much time to think that through. There were Germans ahead.
We eased through the trees, one eye on the plume of smoke, the other on the lookout for field-gray uniforms through the green branches. The ground was soft with pine needles, our boots making no sound, the air filled with nothing but the snap of flames.
And one ungodly cry.
Someone was alive.
Without a word, we moved apart and crouched low as we worked our way forward, presenting less of a target in case any Germans were still alive and in better shape than the guy shrieking and moaning.
We came to a dirt track. The smoke came from around a corner, and we each took a side of the narrow lane, where tread marks were gouged into the rutted road. We both stared at the shattered trees, evidence of the Tempest’s cannon fire. We edged around the corner and saw the carnage it had inflicted.
A German half-track was on its side, a smoking crater marking a near-direct hit. Bodies were strewn across the road, men ripped apart from the shredding 20mm fire. It looked like the half-track had tried to get off the road as we did, but a drainage ditch must have snagged the front wheel. The men riding in it had been sitting ducks. The strafing and bombs had accounted for a dozen dead Krauts.
And one barely alive, but nowhere to be seen. The rear of the vehicle was empty except for several unmarked crates. The front compartment was taken up by an officer with most of his head elsewhere.
“Here,” Kaz said, appearing through the acrid smoke from the burning fuel tank. The side of the half-track was in the ditch, flames licking at the undercarriage from the fuel tank. Right by the screaming German.
He was pinned, his legs crushed by the seven-ton armored vehicle. Blood and oil stained his face, which was contorted in a grimace of horror and pain. The flames were already licking at his torso as his blackened hands slapped madly at the fire. If he saw us he gave no sign and had no words other than the scream of the damned.
Kaz put a burst of three bullets into his heart.
The forest went quiet except for the crackling of flames.
“There is a time for burning,” Kaz said. “And a time for mercy.”
I stared at the dead German. His face frozen in a rictus of pain. I tore my gaze away as a rattling sound demanded my attention. It was my right hand, trembling against the wooden stock of my Thompson.
We were both still up on that hill, and I didn’t think we were coming down anytime soon.
I found Kaz riffling through the pockets of the headless Kraut officer. He hauled out papers and climbed down, reading them as I stood guard.
“This is an engineer detachment,” he said, scanning the document. “The lieutenant had orders to deliver demolition materials to the commander of the Paris garrison and place himself at his disposal. They were sent from Le Mans and must have gotten lost.”
“There were wooden crates in the back,” I said, as flames lapped up over the side of the half-track and the implications dawned.
We ran.
I started the jeep as the explosions began, a series of concussive blasts that shattered the air and sent debris spinning off into the sky.
Driving by where the track emptied into our lane, I slowed to survey the remains. The huge half-track was nothing but a blackened and twisted hulk of smoking metal. All traces of the men were gone, replaced by a gaping shell hole. Trees were torn in every direction, as if a Kansas tornado had churned through the pines.
“What would the commandant of Paris want with such explosives?” Kaz said.
“That Tempest pilot saved our lives,” I said, having no answer except to wonder how many other engineer units were heading to Paris with similar cargoes. “If he hadn’t happened by, we would have collided with those guys, and it would have been us blown to hell.”
“Yes, but no
t quite so spectacularly,” Kaz said, adjusting his glasses as he unfolded the map on his lap.
“There is a crossroads ahead,” he said, after a moment’s study, “where the Maquis Henri are stationed. One road goes south to a small village, Tanville, the other east to Beaulieu. Unless Fassier took the long way around, he would have passed through the crossroad.”
“But ahead of Henri and his crew,” I said. “We’ll check in with them anyway.”
“There is an MP roadblock on the route to Beaulieu,” Kaz said. “They should know.”
The dirt road widened as it left the forest, carrying us out along a gently sloping ridge with a view of a valley graced with farmland and a scattering of houses and barns. The crossroad came into view as we crested a hill.
No sign of Henri and his maquisards. I slowed, and we craned our necks for some sign of the Frenchmen, thinking they might be dug in and camouflaged. All we saw were crushed cigarette butts and an empty wine bottle at the side of the road.
“They were here, but only long enough to smoke a few cigarettes,” Kaz said, taking the binoculars from the back seat. He focused on the distant village of Tanville in the valley below. “There, a vehicle with FFI markings.”
I could make out a faint white blur and the outline of a truck next to one of the jumbles of buildings grouped together along the road.
“Come on,” I said. “Even though they’re dogging it, we ought to warn them there are actually Germans in the area.”
“Real maquisards would not need to be warned,” Kaz said, as I wheeled the jeep around and descended into the village. Farms and barns surrounded a clutch of gray houses huddled by the roadside, like so many tiny hamlets scattered across the French countryside. A single truck with FFI in whitewash splashed across the door was drawn up outside a café. I pulled the jeep between the café and the next building, not wanting to leave an obvious target in the middle of the street.
Two men with Sten guns slung idly from their shoulders and cigarettes dangling from their lips lounged on chairs outside the entrance. One, a young fellow who looked semi-alert, stood and greeted us. His pal, older, unshaven, and with the heavy lids of a working drinker, pulled the kid’s sleeve and got him to sit down.
Inside the café, Henri sat with half a dozen men, glasses of cloudy pastis at their elbows. The barman looked apprehensively at us, his eyes darting to the young girl carrying a jug of water to the table. The anise-flavored liqueur had to be diluted, and everyone had their favorite ratio, but these guys were more interested in the server than what she was serving.
Henri barked at us as he grabbed the girl’s arm, asking what we wanted and a bunch more I couldn’t catch. Kaz spoke to him calmly, and Henri responded with a brief silence, then laughter.
“I told him I wanted him to pay his bill, leave the young lady alone, and assume the post he had abandoned,” Kaz said, watching as the girl scurried behind the bar.
Henri poured water into his glass of pastis, downed it in one gulp, and moved his hand to the pistol in his belt. Then he spoke.
“He says they will not pay this man who drank with the boche. That we should find our own woman, and that it is ridiculous to stand about on a deserted road,” Kaz translated. “What do you say, Billy, should I shoot him?”
Henri and his gang didn’t blink an eye. I knew that last bit was to see if they understood English. For the most part, anyway. “Let’s wait,” I said. “Tell ’em about the Krauts.”
Henri wasn’t impressed. Or too drunk to take the warning seriously. The café owner told Kaz they’d refused to pay, insulted his daughter Natalie, and he’d never seen them before, so how could they know if he drank with the Germans? Of course, he had to serve them, but he never raised a glass with them. And he was afraid for his daughter.
For himself, as well, I could tell by his nervous glances between us and the well-armed men. He was taking a chance on us leaving him alone with them.
“I am taking Natalie to her mother,” Kaz said, after whispering with her and her father. “Their house is across the street.” I took a seat as he left, my Thompson cradled in my arms, watching Henri. It was clear he was the leader, and his men would wait for him to make any move. So, he’d get it first.
Minutes later I saw a khaki blur flash by the window.
“Germans!” Kaz said, slamming the door against the wall and running back out. I followed, barely making it to the door ahead of Henri, who moved pretty damn fast for a stumbling drunk.
I followed Kaz around the side of the café, taking cover as he showed me where the road curved around the last of the houses and vanished into the rolling hills. Another Kraut half-track was barely visible, its camouflage blending almost perfectly with the line of trees at the edge of the cultivated field. The engine rumbled into life, and it jolted forward, a line of field-gray advancing on either side.
The young guy, who seemed the least inebriated of the lot, dove into the doorway of the café and aimed his weapon at the Germans. Henri made for the FFI truck, getting into the driver’s seat and starting it up. Before half his men had climbed into the back, he floored it in reverse, knocking one guy over who didn’t move fast enough.
The kid fired his Sten. He got off three short bursts before the Germans returned fire. A fusillade of lead spat from the machine gun mounted on the half-track, chewing up masonry and kicking up stone chips from the front of the café.
The men of Maquis Henri ran, the smartest, and most fortunate, making for narrow passageways between buildings. Anyone showing even the slightest hesitation was cut down, the rapid-fire machine gun slicing into flesh and bone like a butcher’s blade.
Henri drove wildly, skewing the truck across the road in a vain attempt to turn around and gain speed. The German machine gun was faster. Rounds shattered the windshield, perforated the hood, blew out tires, and sent men twisting in agony over the side to fall dying in the dusty road.
I saw the kid raise his Sten, astounded he was still alive. Kaz hissed out an order in French, and he pulled back into the cover of the doorway. More Kraut soldiers came out of the woods as the half-track halted in the middle of the street, its machine gun swiveling, searching for any remaining threat.
Another half-track came through the trees, and the rest of the soldiers climbed aboard, carrying two wounded men with them.
“They haven’t seen us,” Kaz said. I remained still, thankful that the jeep had been hidden from view. I watched an officer shout orders, calling his men to regroup. Then he pointed down the road, away from the village.
“Another lost unit?” I whispered. “More demolitions?”
“Can you see their collar tabs?” Kaz said. I shook my head. Engineers wore black piping around their collar tabs and rank badges. But they were too far away. Kaz took a few steps to the jeep and returned with the binoculars, handing them to me.
“Engineers,” I said, spotting the black piping. I watched as they eased down one of the wounded and laid him on the ground. He was dead. They gathered around him for a moment, then broke apart with angry shouts that echoed against the stone walls. The first half-track took off, away from us on the road heading west.
The second moved forward into the street, men standing up with their weapons aimed over the side. They machine-gunned the houses and threw grenades, casually, as if it were target practice. The heavy-caliber weapon shattered doors and shutters, evaporating glass and starting fires with incendiary rounds. It lasted less than a minute, and half the village was in shambles. The half-track turned around and roared down the road, its punishment meted out.
We came out from under cover. After the intense gunfire and explosions, the street seemed quiet. But then cries and moans rose up from within the houses, as crackling flames bit at doorframes. The kid stood with his Sten hanging by his side, his face streaked with tears and disbelief.
“Je suis désolé,” he said.
Over and over again.
“Tell him it’s not his fault,” I said to Kaz. “He doesn’t need to be sorry. At least he fought back.” Kaz nodded and spoke to the kid. Soothingly, with his hand on his shoulder.
People began to come out into the street. The café owner ran to his house calling out his daughter’s name. A woman with bloody outstretched hands stood in front of a neighboring house, shrieking in a high-pitched, terrified voice.
“I told the boy that the Germans have done this before, without the slightest provocation,” Kaz said. “But I think he will always blame himself.”
“It was Henri’s fault,” I said. “If he’d kept his men at the crossroads, this fight wouldn’t have happened.”
Two men appeared, pulling an ancient fire cart with a water tank and hose. They pumped water into the worst of the fires as stunned residents gathered together. The café owner came out of his house alone and walked dazedly by us, mumbling Natalie’s name, tears coursing down his cheeks.
“We need to report in,” I said, trying to shake off the numbness that seemed to descend over me as I surveyed the carnage. “The checkpoints need to be warned and Harding should know about the engineers.”
“Yes,” Kaz said, his voice a sigh. “We cannot help these people.” We turned to get in the jeep, and the kid followed us, asking a question I couldn’t catch. Kaz spoke to him, then sat wearily in the jeep.
“What’d he want?” I said.
“He asked me what he should do,” Kaz said. “I told him to bury the dead.”
Chapter Eleven
We drove back up the hill and parked where Henri and his pals should have stayed. Better reception on the high ground, and it got us away from the mournful village of Tanville.
I reached to flip a switch for our assigned frequency.
I couldn’t. The shakes were back in my right hand, which quivered as I tried to work the dial.
“Do you need help?” Kaz asked from the front seat.
