by James R Benn
“I guess so. Sir.”
“I still say I should plug him, Sam,” Big Mike said.
“Thanks, Big Mike, but I’d rather see you keep those stripes,” Harding said. “I had the personnel section pull the files on Landry’s platoon, so you and Major Cosgrove can check Flint’s photograph, along with others.” Harding shoved a pile of folders toward Big Mike, leaving a stack behind. The dead.
“Hey,” Big Mike said, opening Flint’s file and looking at the army photograph. “This is Flint?”
“Yes,” Harding said. “Memorize the face.”
“I don’t have to. I saw this guy down at the docks, when I was waiting for Kaz. He stood out because he ducked behind a truck, like he’d spotted someone he didn’t want to see.”
“Was this guy with him?” I pulled Danny’s photograph from his file.
“Didn’t see him.”
“They were both sent down to the docks to pick up replacements. Danny should have been with him.”
“Billy, there were hundreds of guys milling around. I could have missed him easy,” Big Mike said. He was right. It probably meant nothing. My gut told me otherwise.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
I watched the small column leave at 0600, Big Mike at the wheel of a staff car and Cosgrove in back, the red stripe on his service cap proclaiming his general’s rank at a glance. A jeep full of MPs provided escort, nothing out of the ordinary for a VIP. Soon after that, Harding, Kearns, and Kaz drove out, an MP sergeant at the wheel. The plan was for them to hang back and observe, waiting for Flint to make his move.
It was a good plan, and it made sense to leave me out of it. Still, I wished I could be there to keep Danny out of trouble. But if all went as planned, I’d have another shot at getting him transferred out, and I had to settle for that.
Military police had set up shop in a municipal building near headquarters. They had coffee brewing and a good cellar in case of an air raid, so I waited there for news from Harding. The MPs had a radio in their vehicle, and would call in as soon as something happened.
The Germans were shelling around the clock, not always a massive barrage, but enough to keep everyone awake and jumpy. Last night had been no exception, and between air-raid sirens, antiaircraft fire, and the Kraut artillery, I hadn’t slept much. I was pouring my second cup of joe when a clerk from HQ came in looking for me. I had mail. From Boston. It was over six weeks old, but I was amazed it had even caught up with me.
It was from my mother, of course. Dad might scribble a line or two at the end, but it was always Mom who wrote. She caught me up on family news, cousins getting married, a new baby born to the neighbors, the onset of winter. Then she got to Danny. She had just heard about the ASTP program being cancelled, and was worried about him being sent overseas. Could I ask Uncle Ike about him? See that he got a job in London, perhaps? Stay safe, and watch out for your brother, she said. Both were tall orders in Anzio. Dad wrote about lots of overtime waiting for me at Boston PD, and I thought about all the cash I’d have if the army paid time and a half.
I folded the letter and put it in my shirt pocket. As soon as I had Danny squared away, I’d write. I’d tell her he was safe and sound, doing some boring job at headquarters, sleeping inside under blankets. I hoped it would be true.
I relaxed, listening to the familiar chatter of law enforcement. Gripes, complaints, calls coming in, cops going out. It was early, and with the Carabinieri policing the local populace, there wasn’t a lot going on. Until a major burst in to report his jeep stolen. He’d had a . 30-caliber machine gun mounted on it, and he wanted it back, now. Never mind that it was pinched yesterday and he’d been too busy to report it, he wanted action now. A pudgy, red-faced guy, he was with the Quartermaster unit that off-loaded supplies in the harbor, and he cursed and hollered until he got an officer to listen to him. I watched the MPs as they turned away, rolling their eyes at the posturing of a supply officer who needed a machine gun on his jeep. I knew the type, and would bet dollars to doughnuts that he’d have a photograph of himself at the wheel, looking as if he were ready for a raid behind enemy lines. It struck me as strange that even while he was doing important work, in constant danger from German shells and bombs, a guy like him had to throw his weight around and try too hard to impress people.
A couple of MPs donned their white helmets and followed the major out while another radioed units with a description and serial number of the jeep. Good luck with that one, boys, I thought. With a day’s head start, it could be anywhere, and I doubted any MP worth his salt would search front-line units for a stolen jeep, especially for this loudmouthed major.
An hour passed, and then another. I asked the radioman for the tenth time if there were any messages, and he suggested I get some fresh air. He was a corporal, so he said it nicely, but I got the hint. I walked down to the water and watched landing craft ferry in supplies from Liberty Ships anchored in the bay. Antiaircraft guns pointed their barrels at the sky, swiveling back and forth as they searched for targets. A quiet morning at war, almost peaceful, if you didn’t think about all the weapons and rubble about. The water lapping at the rocks along the shore reminded me of Boston, down by the inner harbor. It could be peaceful there, too, until you spotted a dead body bobbing in the swell.
I waited as long as I could, then decided that one of the benefits of being an officer was bothering radiomen whenever you wanted. As I walked up from the seafront, Big Mike pulled up in the staff car, followed by Harding and Kaz.
“He wasn’t there, Billy,” Big Mike said. He sounded worried, more worried than he should’ve been. “He’s been gone since yesterday.”
“Danny as well,” Kaz said, as he got out of the jeep. “Neither of them returned to the unit yesterday afternoon, after they drove to the harbor to get replacements.”
I felt them all looking at me, waiting for a reaction. I didn’t know what to say, or, worse yet, what to do. Flint, loose somewhere in the Anzio beachhead, the sea at his back, the Germans all around, and Danny at his side. I tried not to think about the memory of that floater in Boston harbor as I tried to calculate what Flint’s game was.
“Billy,” Kaz said, resting his hand on my shoulder. “What should we do?”
“I wish I knew,” I said. We trooped inside, and the MPs stood to attention when Cosgrove entered in his general’s getup. He quickly waved them off. Harding spread out a map of the beachhead on a table, and marked the front lines with a red pencil.
“The British are on our left flank,” he said, drawing an arc from the coast up to Compleone, a northward bulge showing where the British had been attacking toward Rome. In the center, the front was a wavy line from Corano to Sessano, south of Cisterna where the Rangers had been cut to pieces. “This is all Third Division, with supporting elements from the 504th Parachute Regiment.”
“Who’s holding the right flank?” I asked, pointing to where the Mussolini Canal flowed south to the sea.
“The First Special Service Force,” Harding said. “It’s a joint U.S.-Canadian volunteer outfit. A commando brigade.”
“That’s a long stretch of canal for three regiments to cover,” Big Mike said.
“German activity is sparse on that flank,” Kearns said. “They’re covering the approaches to Rome on the north. Besides, these Force men are damn aggressive. The Krauts pulled back a mile or more on the other side to avoid their patrols.”
“Is there a general in command?” Kaz asked.
“Yes, Brigadier General Robert Frederick, recently promoted. I doubt anyone could get the drop on him,” Kearns said. “Even without hundreds of his men around him, he’d be tough to take. A real fighting general.”
“Boyle, what do you suggest?” Harding said.
“Let’s have the MPs check the hospitals, in case they got caught in the bombing last night. And send out a bulletin with their names and description to every checkpoint. And to the Carabinieri as well.”
“Billy, Flint may have got himsel
f aboard one of the ships. He could be halfway to Naples by now,” Big Mike said.
“Danny would never desert,” I said. “And if he hasn’t turned up, he’s still with Flint.”
“Sure,” Big Mike said, turning his attention to the map, not saying what we all thought. Danny could be dead anywhere, his body hidden under rubble or weighed down and tossed in the harbor.
“Okay, Boyle, I’ll get the MPs looking for two men, traveling by truck. I’ll contact Naples, and have MPs waiting there. If Flint gets off one of those ships, they’ll grab him,” Harding said. “Then we’ll organize another tour for our general.”
“I’m sure it would be possible to board a ship in all the confusion at the docks,” Cosgrove said. “But staying hidden, and getting off safely in Naples? I doubt it.”
“I agree,” Kaz said. “We need to think like this madman. What would he do?”
“And why?” I said. “What does he want?”
“To win the game,” Kaz said. “To get his general, fill the royal flush, and beat you, Billy.”
“He has Danny,” I said. “I’m counting on him keeping him alive until he finds a general to take. Which means he has to have a story, something that would convince Danny to go along with him.”
“So boarding a ship to Naples is out. But how many places are there to go within the beachhead?” Kaz said.
“I don’t think he’d head for the British sector. A couple of Yanks would stand out. Back to the Third Division front? They’d be nabbed and sent back to their unit,” I said. “It doesn’t make sense, there’s nowhere to go. What does he hope to accomplish?”
“Okay, we gotta slow down and think like detectives,” Big Mike said. That wasn’t hard for Big Mike; blue flowed in his veins. He still carried his shield from the Detroit Police Department wherever he went. “When’s the last time you saw Danny and Flint?”
“Yesterday, mid-afternoon. I brought some supplies out to them; I was supposed to be leaving since we’d found the killer. We took some artillery fire, watched the Carabinieri haul off some Italians, had some chow, and then the company CO told Flint to go down to the docks to grab replacements. The ones for his platoon had been killed in the shelling. It was probably five o’clock by the time they got there.”
“How was Flint acting? Like something tipped him off, maybe?” Big Mike said.
“No, he played it cool. He’s not a guy who rattles easily.”
“So something happened between there and the docks. Something that caused him to skip town with Danny.”
“That was about the time I came ashore,” Kaz said. “Could he have seen me?”
“What if he did? It wouldn’t mean anything to him,” Big Mike said.
“Oh no,” I said, the sequence of events becoming clear in my mind. “I think I know what it was. Stump. The guy we supposedly had in custody as the killer. Doc Cassidy was going to transfer him to Naples with the wounded. Damn! I’ll check with Cassidy, but I bet Stump got on a ship yesterday afternoon.”
“And Flint saw him, and knew the jig was up,” Big Mike said. “Then he comes up with a story that Danny will buy, and takes off to parts unknown.”
“But there are no parts unknown here,” Kaz said, pointing at the map. “The beachhead is nothing more than an open-air prison, with the Germans guarding all sides.”
“Maybe he’s planning a jailbreak,” Big Mike said. I stared at the map, trying to put myself in Flint’s shoes. “From what Cassidy said, he’s pretty committed to going through with this plan. But he also said psychopaths can be impulsive, so it makes sense that he changed course so quickly.”
“If he’s like most hoodlums, he’ll have a new set of wheels in no time,” Big Mike said.
“There was a major from the Quartermaster Corps in here earlier. His jeep was stolen yesterday, down by the docks,” I said. It fit perfectly. “Big Mike, check with the officer in charge, and find out the time it was taken. If it was around 1600 hours, it was probably Flint. Tell them to approach with caution, that we want the driver and passenger taken alive. There’s a mounted. 30-caliber machine gun on that jeep, and I don’t want any itchy trigger fingers with Danny on board.”
“Sure thing, Billy.”
“What should we do next?” Kaz asked. I gazed at the map. The right flank, lightly guarded, lightly defended. A wide gap between the Germans and the First Special Service Force. That had to be it.
“We have to tempt him,” I said, looking at Cosgrove. “We have to let him think he has a chance to pull it all off. And we have to take him before he does any of it.” Once, I might not have cared if Cosgrove got himself killed, but familiarity had bred admiration, so I wanted to be reasonably certain he didn’t end up being a victim. Most of all, I wanted Danny out of Flint’s clutches. Trouble was, Flint knew that, and would use it against me.
“Billy, the time checks out,” Big Mike said, returning to the table. “The jeep was last seen at 1530 hours. That major left it there for his corporal to pick up, but when the corporal got there, he thought the major had kept it. That’s why it wasn’t reported right away.”
“Okay. They sending it out?”
“Yep, radioing it now to all units, and sending a message to the Carabinieri like you asked. And here’s the good news. The major gave them the serial number, VI-37Q-DP-4. The Q identifies it as a Quartermaster vehicle, and the DP means from the Depot Company. It ought to be pretty easy to spot a Quartermaster’s jeep with a. 30 mounted on it.”
“Good work. Now let’s catch up with Harding and get this thing rolling.” The army believed in doing things big, so each vehicle had its serial number stenciled in white paint on the front bumper. If the MPs kept their eyes open, and Flint stayed on the roads, it was only a matter of time. Big if.
Cosgrove was not going to be very popular. Harding agreed to inform First Special Service Force HQ that a senior general was coming through on an inspection tour, to determine if the unit should be disbanded. It was precisely the kind of news that would spread like wildfire throughout the brigade. If Flint came within earshot of even a single private, odds were he’d hear about it. If I’d guessed right about his plan.
“You sure you want to go through with this, Cosgrove?” Harding asked as our phony general eased himself into the backseat of the staff car. “The Force men are a rough bunch. Between Flint, the Krauts, and them, you won’t have a friend within miles.”
“Don’t worry, Sam,” Big Mike said. “I got my. 45 automatic, a Winchester Model 12 trench gun, and a. 38 police special for backup.” Harding permitted a causal familiarity from Big Mike, which no one else would ever dare to try to get away with. Big Mike did it so naturally, I don’t think Harding could take offense. Plus, Big Mike knew when to call him ‘sir.’
“Where the hell did you get a shotgun?” Harding asked.
“It’s not hard when you’ve got a supply officer desperate to get his fancy jeep back,” Big Mike said. “Automatic at my hip, shotgun by my side, revolver in my pocket, and walkie-talkie on the seat. If Major Cosgrove gets killed, you can fire me.”
“That’s General Paget to you, Sergeant,” Cosgrove said. “And if he does get me killed, Harding, break him to private and keep him in the army for life.”
“In that case, you’re safe as a baby with me,” Big Mike said, settling in behind the wheel.
“Remember, the SCR-536 has a range of only a mile. We’ll stay close, but don’t wander off, or we’ll lose you. Check in every thirty minutes.”
“Will do.” With that they were off.
Their first stop would be Valmontorio, on the coast where the Mussolini Canal ran into the sea. It was the far end of the line that the Force held, and the plan was for Cosgrove to kick up a big stink, so word would spread ahead of him. Kearns had already radioed General Frederick, who agreed to go along with the plan, and let word slip to his staff about an inspection by a British general who thought highly trained units like the FSSF were a waste of resources.
&nbs
p; The unit held the canal north up to Sessano, and that was where Luca and his Carabinieri came in. He was there with a truckload of men, supposedly searching for spies. If we needed help, we’d send a radio message and then have reinforcements from another direction. It was a good plan, especially since GIs were used to seeing the blueuniformed Carabinieri, and tended to ignore them.
The dull crump of distant artillery rolled in from the north, and I had the usual thought: glad it’s them, not me. We went in the MP office for one last check. No one had reported seeing the missing jeep, no sign of Flint or Danny. By the time we left, the artillery was louder. Closer.
“Why’d you switch to that peashooter?” Harding said as we got into the jeep. He was carrying a Thompson submachine gun. Kaz was armed only with his Webley revolver, but he was pretty good with it and didn’t like carrying anything else. Ruined the cut of his uniform, he claimed.
“Traded with a guy who got us out of a scrape,” I said. “Besides, it’s light, and more accurate than the Thompson.”
“Just make sure you shoot him more than once with that,” Harding said. “I’ve seen Krauts take a couple of those slugs and keep running.” He was right; compared to the M1 rifle, or the Thompson, the M1 carbine round was small and less powerful. Still, it had its uses.
I drove, Kaz at my side, Harding in the back. We went along the coast road, and watched destroyers cut circles in the bay, smoke pots churning on their fantails, disappearing into the white clouds that they created. All that smoke was camouflage for an incoming convoy, and the German gunners registered their disapproval by sending a few shells after the destroyers, not even getting close but sending up great geysers of blue-and-white foam. The wind kicked up, and dark clouds drifted in from the sea, blowing the smoke in our direction. The water, air, and sky became the same uniform gray, the heavy weather covering the land with an opaque, damp, shivering chill. I steered the jeep around the occasional bomb crater not yet filled in by the engineers, who had round-the-clock work keeping roads, bridges, and airfields functioning.