“Healing nicely,” Gorski answered. “The naval surgeon had a deft hand with the needle and thread. It’ll scar, but not too badly.”
Wormwood smiled around his pipestem. “Brilliant! Glad to hear that was the worst of it. Would you mind fetching the rest of the lads? We’ve got quite a lot to talk about.”
A few minutes later, the four other Revenants were standing with Gorski and Wormwood, each man holding a tumbler of eighteen-year Balvenie. Wormwood raised his glass in a toast.
“Gentlemen, here’s to a job well done. Cheers!”
The six men sipped their Scotch and enjoyed the warm glow of the liquid as it hit their bellies. Then, Wormwood gestured for everyone to take a seat, as he pulled a file folder from his valise.
“We have had a man in the Normandy sector for about a month now,” Wormwood began. “I cannot divulge any details, but suffice to say, he has direct access to German intelligence. According to him, the Germans aren’t releasing the official cause of Kohl’s death, that he was killed by British agents. The Germans claimed he was killed by French partisans, remnants of the partisan band formerly led by the Butcher of Calais.”
The five men looked at each other. Dumond shrugged. “What of it?”
Wormwood looked down at the file in his hand, then opened it, clearing his throat. He seemed reluctant to discuss its contents, and suddenly, a chill ran down Gorski’s spine.
“They didn’t…” he said.
Wormwood looked up at him, his eyes solemn, and he nodded.
“Yes, lad, I’m afraid they did,” Wormwood said.
“Did what?” Johansen asked, his expression bemused.
Wormwood looked around the room. “The day after Kohl was killed, an SS colonel, one of their Einsatzkommando leaders, arrived in Abbeville from Calais with a contingent of his men. After an investigation, this SS chap declared the attack the work of partisans, and he ordered, well, he ordered the reprisal killing of sixty Abbeville citizens.”
“Dear God,” Lambert breathed.
“The Einsatzkommandos trucked the civilians out to Paquet’s barn, herded them inside, barred the doors,” Wormwood stopped, a quaver in his voice.
“He burned them,” Johansen said.
Wormwood nodded. “Yes, the colonel ordered the barn to be torched, with those inside still alive. The building was doused in petrol and set alight. Several attempts were made by those inside to escape, but the Germans fired into the barn and killed anyone who tried.”
“Better a bullet than burning to death,” Verhoeven muttered, looking down at his feet.
“Well, yes, I suppose you’re right,” Wormwood agreed. He drew another sheet of paper from his file. “Among those killed by the SS, there was a married couple, a Bernard and Anna Dubois, who owned a wine shop in Abbeville.”
“Ethan and Helene,” Gorski said, the pit of his stomach knotted with horror.
“There is no evidence that they were suspected of any participation in the events that transpired,” Wormwood said. “If that had been the case, they would have no doubt been detained and interrogated for some time. Their deaths were, unfortunately, just bad luck.”
Gorski looked up at him. “No, not bad luck! It was because of us, because of what we did there. Sixty innocent lives burned away because of us!”
At that Wormwood drew his lips into a thin line, tucked the papers back into the folder, and flung the folder onto the coffee table in the middle of the room, where it landed with a flat whack.
“Do you think I relish their deaths?” Wormwood asked Gorski, then swept his gaze around the room, looking at each man in turn. “Do any of you? I should hope not. I don’t like what happened any more than you did. But this is war, and not a war to claim a fat colonial territory from some native savages, or uphold the honor of some royal who was slighted by another. This is a war for the fate of civilization! That bloody maniac in Berlin is driving a steel sword into the heart of Russia even as we speak, and more of Stalin’s divisions are being obliterated every day! If the Soviets fall, we stand alone! All of you, more than anyone else, should understand this! All of your homelands are suffering daily because of that bloody conqueror!”
“And so, innocent Frenchmen must die,” Dumond said softly, looking at Wormwood with a dark gaze.
Wormwood leaned back in his chair. “Yes, innocents must die. Sixty innocent lives to kill one of the enemy’s most lethal combatants, and in turn save the lives of many skilled airmen.” Wormwood tapped a finger against his temple. “There is a ledger, up here, you see. I must tally up the value of every life - and mark my words, in this war, some are more valuable than others - and I must make sure that at the end of all this, this madness, we are in the black. And I am not the only accountant. Politicians, generals, officers, all maintain ledgers.”
“Then I suppose we should keep our own, as well,” Dumond said levelly.
Wormwood tilted his head to the side and raised an eyebrow, then stood up. “As you wish, my good fellow. We all must be true to our own consciences.” He picked up his valise and turned towards the doorway.
“A last question, if you would,” Gorski said.
Wormwood turned. “Yes, of course, certainly.”
“The bombing raid on Abbeville, on the second day,” he said. “Were they meant to bomb the railyard? Did they see the flares?”
Wormwood gave a small smile. “I did see the report, yes. A group of four Wellingtons had strayed off course by a few miles while avoiding some heavy flack along the coast. They were coming at Abbeville from the wrong direction, and saw your flares illuminating the yard. The flight leader decided to hit the yard, and then turn away before he was over the aerodrome, a decision that earned him a severe reprimand upon landing.”
“And the bombers the night we returned?” asked Verhoeven. “Sims said they’d been waiting for his signal to take off. Seems that would have taken orders from rather high up the chain of command.”
Wormwood smiled at that. “Yes, well, as you are aware, I am merely the, well, the facilitator of sorts here. You gentlemen don’t really work for me of course, but for those I report to, men of power who are willing to do things which aren’t strictly in the book, as it were, in order to win the war. Some of these men can, with a phone call, make things happen.”
“And when will things happen again?” Gorski asked.
Wormwood turned away and walked out of the room.
“All too soon, I’m afraid. All too soon.”
Gorski waited until he heard the Invicta’s engine come to life outside, and the sound of the motor faded away as the sedan departed. Then, he turned and picked up the bottle of Scotch from the table, eyeing its contents.
“Well then, another dram it is, while we can still enjoy it.”
The four other Revenants raised their glasses in agreement.
Author's Note
Much of the WW2 adventure fiction written between the 1960s and 80s can be put into two broad categories: stories about fighting men in regular or elite military units – Commandos, Rangers, SAS, Marines, Submariners, and so forth – and stories about men operating either for intelligence organizations such as the OSS or SOE, or for completely fictitious, ad hoc groups with dubious official standing.
Having written about British Commandos for the last four years, I began to consider writing a story about a group of men who operated outside of any official military or intelligence organization, men who would take on the assignments that no one would officially sanction, either because the risk of failure was too great, or because the missions were too sensitive in nature. In many of the stories of this variety, the characters are criminals or prisoners, offered a deal to take on a mission in exchange for a reduction or pardon of their sentences. While this had some appeal to me, I didn't relish writing about protagonists so reprehensible, the reader would come to despise them. So, I landed upon the idea of men who were already considered dead – men whose governments had already written them off as casualt
ies of war.
If you're coming to this novel without having read any of my Commando novels, I hope you enjoyed the story, and would consider reading the Commando series – the two series occur in the same “universe”, and there are references here to events that took place in Operation Arrowhead and Operation Bedlam. If you've already read my Commando stories, I hope you enjoyed Assault on Abbeville, even though Gorski and his men operate in a somewhat darker moral space than the likes of Lynch, Price, and McTeague. I hope that, in time, these two different series “flavors” of WW2 fiction will complement each other well.
Also, for the record, although there was no German fighter ace in France by the name of Werner Kohl, there is an Abbeville in France, and it was home to at least a portion of Jagdgeschwader 26, one of only two fighter wings stationed in northern France after the invasion of Russia in the summer of 1941. JG 26 possessed a number of skilled German fighter aces, men who achieved dozens of kills in the air, although many of them never lived to see the end of the war.
Contact Me
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Works by Jack Badelaire:
The COMMANDO Series (WW2 Adventure Pulp)
Operation Arrowhead
Operation Bedlam
Operation Cannibal
Operation Dervish
Operation Archery
The Train to Calais (short story)
A Sergeant's Duty (short story)
The RANGER Series with Dan Eldredge (WW2 Adventure Pulp)
Operation Axehammer
The HANGMAN Series (‘70s Men’s Adventure)
San Francisco Slaughter
Killer Instincts (vigilante revenge thriller)
Renegade’s Revenge (western novella)
Spiders and Flies (fantasy novella)
Nanok and the Tower of Sorrows (fantasy short story)
Rivalry – A Ghost Story (horror short story)
Hatchet Force Journal #1 (fanzine)
Assault on Abbeville Page 15