The Bavarian Gate (the lion of farside)

by John Dalmas

  The cellar's rear entryway was locked, which disappointed but didn't surprise him. Slipping around the comer into the shadow of the north wing, he leaned against the wall and thought for a bit, reviewing plans. He was stiff, seriously now-thighs, buttocks, calves, even tibias. By noon he'd have trouble walking, let alone running if necessary, unless he did some thing about it. And before long, the shortage of sleep would dull him.

  Macurdy, old horse, he told himself, it's time to take care of yourself for a change. With that he crossed the lawn again and hiked back into the woods. Feeling thirsty, he reached for his canteen. Empty. He must, he thought, have drunk it all that morning, and in the intensity of his focus, never noticed; only now did he realize his clothes were wet with sweat. So he continued to the lake, where he refilled his canteen, drank deeply from it, and topped it off again.

  By that time he was hobbling badly, so he went well back among the trees, sat down against one, and focused on the dark and murky aura around his legs. You did good work, he told them, damn good, and I appreciate it. Now let's see what I can do for you.

  He began to touch the sore places, willing increased blood flow into them, touched the energy vortices in his hip joints, knees, ankles, feeling their energy. Then he began manipulating the energy threads. The tissues were heavily loaded with fatty acids, and responded more slowly than he'd expected.

  30 minutes though, the soreness was much reduced, and he got to his knees, to work on his buttocks by feel and visualization. That done, he took off his boots and gave attention to his blood-blistered toes. Finally he found a patch of feather moss, and lying down on it, went to sleep almost at once.

  He awoke famished, and realized he had nothing with him to eat. In his intensity of the day and evening before, he'd failed to put any rations in his pockets; they lay in his musette bag, behind the TNT he'd piled in the south wing room.

  His watch read 1833 hours. He'd slept the whole afternoon. And to his surprise, his legs had stiffened again, somewhat, so he sat down and began to work on them. Guys, he told them, I'm sorry, but I really didn't have any choice. He'd never "talked" to his body before while healing it- not as if its parts had a sentience of their own. When he'd thought to them, it had been to direct them, guide them, not apologize or acknowledge. But somehow it seemed the thing to do now.

  This time he continued till the soreness was gone. His watch read 1911. He drank again, to put something in his stomach, and gave his attention to the evening.

  Tonight some of the SS men would be on pass, would ride a truck to Kaufbeuren, probably; it was somewhat nearer than Kempten, and not a lot smaller. He really didn't know much about their lives, he realized. Presumably they'd bring back girls, and the cellar beneath the north wing would be dangerous for him. If he could blow the stack he'd made beneath the south wing, though, that should collapse the south wing interior, and the Voitar would end up part of the rubble. A train of gunpowder could serve as a fuse, with a candle for a timer if he could find one. But he'd need a detonator of some kind in lieu of the blasting caps.

  He could always blow the stack with a plasma ball, as he'd done on the ridge, but it would be his dying act.

  So. Detonators. Somewhere in the north wing, probably on the first floor, the SS would have its ordnance room. Find it, steal a few grenades, get the detonators out of them… The potato masher grenade was one German weapon he hadn't been taught to dismantle, but it was easy enough with American grenades; the German were probably no harder. The tricky part would be getting the grenades.

  Once again topped off his canteen at the lake, then headed briskly for the schloss. Dusk was settling. The guardsmen on pass would have left for town already; maybe the cellar door would be unbarred.

  When he reached the manor's grounds, he stopped, chagrined. Two men stood guard by the cellar entryway, one on each side. Clearly something had happened, and the only thing he could think of was, they'd discovered that a large amount of TNT was missing from the magazines. If so, they might have searched, maybe found the stash he'd made beneath the south wing.

  For a moment he stood uncertain, then crossed the yard opposite the north ell and moved along the front of the building just far enough from the wall not to leave tracks in the flowerbeds. There were two guards at the front door, too; there'd been only one before. On the porch, he used the additional concealment of a pillar, and waited. Within a few minutes, Captain Kupfer arrived, a driver letting him off in front of the entrance. Daring, Macurdy followed him closely through the door.

  An stopped. A guard now stood at the door to the cellar stairway, and another on the second floor landing, overlooking the foyer. Then it struck him: this evening they had submachine guns. Before, they'd had bolt-action Mausers, varnished and polished-fire one shot, then work the bolt-much more accurate at a distance, but close up, far less dangerous. Deciding, Macurdy walked toward the guard at the cellar stairway. The man's aura reflected boredom, resentment, inattentiveness. Heart in throat, Macurdy slipped past him and down the stairs, then turned toward the north wing. At the hell he saw the guards at the magazine doors. Now he had no doubt: His thefts had been discovered.

  That left the question of his south wing stash, so he started for it. Peering around the south hell, he saw no one, so he continued to the room he'd made a bomb of. Was it booby-trapped? Wired to an alarm? He turned its knob and pushed; it made hardly a sound. Stepping inside, he closed it behind him and turned on the light. Things weren't as bad as he'd feared. The stack of TNT, and the musette bag on top of it, still were cloaked. Again he folded the towel against the bottom of the door, then ate a K ration and drank some water.

  Now, he thought, to find the SS ordnance room and steal some grenades. Intent and somehow confident again, he retraced his way up the cellar stairs and past the guard, who, like the others, held his weapon at port arms, ready for quick use.

  Macurdy, he told himself, the guards aren't your main problem. Just find their damned ordnance room.

  There might, he thought, be a building diagram in Landgraf's office. Slipping past the staircase, he entered the corridor, stopped in front of the colonel's door, and put an hear to the panel. And heard the colonel's voice, apparently on the phone.

  Macurdy straightened. He'd planned to warn Edouard Schurz before he blew the place; he might as well do it now. Warning Schurz was one of the details he'd deliberately omitted from his mission plan. He was confident the professor wouldn't expose him, but even Von Lutzow might object to warning the man: The reaction would be, why take the chance? So rather than disobey an order, Macurdy had said nothing about it.

  Going to the staircase, he slipped past the guard and up to the second floor. Normally Edouard would be in the recreation room in mid-evening, so he peered in. Something new had been added-a radio, a large floor model, from which music issued-from Lohengrin, though he didn't know it. The only woman there was Berta, playing cards with a girl about 10 years old. Macurdy had never seen the child before. Otto was absent; Philipp sat turning cards as always, aimlessly it seemed; Manfred Eich sat in the broken-down easy chair by the window, reading. Edouard dozed with a magazine in his lap.

  On an impulse, Macurdy tried to project a thought into Edouard's mind, but got no response, so he walked softly into the room and leaned near his ear from behind.

  "Edouard," he whispered, "I am in the men's quarters. Come to me. Pretend that nothing unusual is happening. There is something urgent you must know."

  Edouard opened his eyes, and for a long moment stared straight ahead, then got to his feet, lay the magazine on a shelf, and left. By that time Macurdy had backed out the door and moved quickly to the room, where he stood by the open latrine door. Edouard entered, looked around, and still failed to see him.

  "In the latrine," Macurdy murmured, "in case anyone looks in," and watched a frowning Edouard walk past him not five feet away. Following him inside, Macurdy dropped his cloak and closed the door. "Here," he said quietly. Turning, Edouard stared first a
t the strange uniform, then at Macurdy's face. "Lieber Gott!" he breathed.

  "Where is Otto?"

  "Sent away. Back to the farm; he is too old even for the Volkssturm. And Marie is gone; the old woman. And Sofia, the red-haired gypsy, God knows where. What has become of Anna?"

  "As soon as we reached England, she turned us in. She is working for the Americans now. As I have been, all along, investigating the aliens, though she didn't know it."

  Edouard's mouth was as round as his eyes.

  "You need to get out of here, you and Berta. Tonight. I will take you to Switzerland with me. That's all I can tell you, except that if you stay, you will die."

  "But why? How will we die? I need to know more about this!"

  Macurdy put his hands on Edouard's shoulders. "Look at my aura, Edouard, and trust me. I beg you!"

  Edouard looked a long moment, licked dry lips. "How do we get out?"

  "At midnight, I want you to open the window and throw out the fire rope, then climb down. If Berta cannot climb down, tie it beneath her arms and lower her over the window sill."

  "But how do I get her? That will be after lights out."

  "You are the Herr Doctor Professor. The guard will allow it. Just do it."

  Edouard look unconvinced. "What if she doesn't want to go?"

  "She will. She told me before how much she longs to escape this country."

  "She will never go without Lotta. You do not know Lotta; she is new here, a child 10 years old. She is like Marie; she does not speak Colonel Landgraf has told me something of her history; her experience of life has been-ugly. Berta is very good for her."

  "Then lower her, too. And when you get outside, move as quietly as you can. There may be guards, but there is no moon. Go to the forest and wait for me at the edge, near the stable." Macurdy glanced toward the door. "I haven't much time," he said, and from an inside pocket, took the folding stiletto he'd been issued in the 505th. "If Eich wakes up, and he probably will, he will try to stop you, cause an alarm. So use this first, through an eye socket into the brain. To the handle. If you simply cut his throat, you'll be a bloody mess."

  He paused, then added, "Edouard, I know this is hard for you. But if you cannot do it for yourself, do it for the child. Give her a new life, with Berta."

  He pressed the weapon into Edouard's hand, fearing as he did so that this man could never murder someone in their sleep. That's all you can do for them, he told himself. From here it's up to Edouard. He clapped the German on the shoulder, then opened the latrine door and peered into the room. No one was there, so he left, closed the door behind him and reactivated his cloak.

  Edouard Schurz stared at the door that had closed in his face. Then, for a long moment, he regarded the small but deadly instrument in his hand, as if it might bite him. Before returning to the recreation room, he put it under his pillow.

  Feeling more confidence than ever in his cloak, Macurdy returned to the first floor, meeting no one enroute except the unknowing guard on the second-floor landing. In the first floor corridor, he was alone except for the rather distant guards at the ells. His ear against Landgrafs door heard nothing. Still listening, he scratched softly, then tapped with a finger nail. Again nothing, so he took the set of lock picks from a tunic pocket. The bolt opened with an audible "cluck," and Macurdy glanced left and right down the corridor. No one had hear Opening the door, he went in and closed it behind him, grateful that it swung inward.

  The blackout curtains were drawn, and the corridor well enough lit that light wouldn't show beneath the door, so he switched on the ceiling light. Now, he thought, scanning around, where…

  Shock gripped him, followed by a sure of excitement: On a table in front of the window lay the right orange chute and ballast bag, and on top of them, the coil of fuse and the drawstring pouch. Quickly he stepped to them, and with hands that shook, opened the pouch, checked the contents, then tucked it into a tunic pocket. The coiled fuse he stuffed into a thigh pocket. Then, after a long deep breath, he tightened and relaxed his muscles to steady himself, and stepped quickly to the door. Again he heard nothing, but as the first floor was carpeted, that simply meant that no one was talking nearby in the corridor.

  He switched off the light and pulled the door open-to see the corporal of the guard about to pass as he made his periodic round of the guard posts. The sight of the colonel's door opening jerked his gaze toward it-and reflexively, Macurdy's empty hand pumped a plasma charge into the corporal's head. The skull popped as if the contents had boiled, and the corporal fell bonelessly to the floor. From the south ell, the guard called, "What is wrong? What happened?"

  Macurdy stepped into the hall at once; the corridors would soon be crowed, and it wouldn't do to be cornered in Landgrafs office. He slipped silently but quickly to the foyer, going under instead of around the staircase, avoiding the view of the guard on the second-floor landing. But the man on guard at the cellar stairway stepped away from his post to look toward the disturbance, and seeing a body in front of Landgraf's door, hurried toward it. Macurdy barely got out of his way, then grasping the opportunity, stepped quickly to the cellar stairs and down them.

  Moments later he was in the room with his TNT stash. There he cut off a long length of fuse, inserted it into a blasting cap, pressed the cap into a block of TNT, willed a bright bead of hot plasma at a fingertip-then stopped. If he blew the stack now, Edouard and Berta would die, and the child. If he didn't, the building would surely be searched, but…

  So far his concealment spell had worked better than he'd ever expected. He would, he decided, sit on the TNT and wait. If they came in and looked, hopefully, probably, they'd see neither him nor the evidence. If they did see him, he'd pump a plasma charge into the stack.

  The decision left him calm, even serene. Sitting on a ton of TNT, he assumed the meditation posture Varia had taught him, and began to meditate. Seldom had it gone so well. Remarkably, not even his ankles complained. After 20 minutes the door opened, the light turned on, soldiers peered behind the table, then the light went off again, the door closed, and they were gone.

  Macurdy sat calmly through the hours, aware when midnight came and passed, and after a bit stood up without stiffness in knees or ankles. Using his penlight, he went to the switch and turned on the light, then put the towel in place. Next he cut a TNT block into four cubes, cut four short lengths of fuse and capped them with detonators, pressed a detonator into each cube, and put all four quarter-pound bombs inside his tunic. His remaining K rations he distributed in pockets.

  Finally he lit the long fuse, turned out the light and left the room. He had only one thing more to accomplish-blow the magazines as quickly as possible, before something went irretrievably wrong.

  At the north ell he paused a moment, peering around the corner at the guards outside the magazines. No longer bored or heedless, they were looking in his direction, submachine guns ready. He drew his.45. If he stepped out and snapped off two quick shots on target… But only one of the two needed to fire a burst in his direction, and even unaimed… Any significant wound would be deadly. So he compromised: His.45 ready but silent, he stepped out and started toward them.

  It was obvious at once they didn't see him, but every step of the way he half-expected at least one of them to start firing. Both stood in mid-corridor, so he moved along one wall, and when he reached them, slipped by slowly, to avoid making an eddy of air. His senses were preternaturally sharp; he smelled his own stale sweat, with a lingering trace of cow manure, and wondered that the two Germans didn't. Ten feet past them he speeded up, and at the end of the corridor, opened the door to the room nearest the entryway. Then, quiet he lifted the bar from the exit door, took it into the room, laid it by the wall, and stepped back into the corridor.

  A hundred feet away, the magazine guards still stood with their backs to him. His.45 boomed twice, the shots so close together, the second man had hardly started to turn before a heavy slug smashed through a rib into the heart. Both me
n fell without firing.

  Turning, Macurdy pushed open the entryway door, and with as little Baltic accent as he could manage, called: "For the love of God, come quickly!", then stepped back out of the way. He heard a brief exchange above the entryway, then one man ran down. As he passed, Macurdy shot him too, then stepped back into the room, took out one of his small, short-fuse blocks of TNT and lit it, intending to throw it out of the entryway and take out the other guard. With an eye on the sparking fuse, he stepped into the corridor-colliding with the other guard, who'd heard the unfamiliar boom of the.45, and after brief indecision, had run down to back up his buddy.

  Both men recoiled with shock, then Macurdy pounced, at the same time tossing the block of TNT into the entryway. Wrapping powerful arms around the guardsman, he pinned the submachine gun between them, and wrestled him against the wall, out of line with the door. Felt, heard, smelled the man's weapon fire, bullets pocking the concrete near their feet. Squeezing with more strength than he knew he had- strength multiplied by desperation-he compressed the man's rib cage. For a long moment they struggled, the man's eyes bulging, then Macurdy found an added surge of strength, felt the man go limp, and staggered with him into the corner next to the entryway door. A quarter pound of TNT exploded just outside it. Macurdy let the German fall, and picking up the man's submachine gun, pointed it at him and squeezed the trigger, three rounds slamming into the fallen guard before the gun was empty.

  Meanwhile there'd been a shout from somewhere up the corridor. Picking up the other guard's submachine gun, Macurdy started toward the magazines at a lope, then became aware of boots pounding on concrete, running toward the ell, so he slipped through an unlocked door, leaving a crack to peer through.

  Landgraf himself rounded the ell first, followed by four guardsmen. An image imprinted on Macurdy's mind, of the colonel, tall riding boots freshly shined and a Luger in his hand. The others carried submachine guns. Seeing the bodies, they faltered, then one shouted, "Colonel! The door at the end of the corridor! It is open!"