“Now you are positive that you saw four German soldiers lying on the barrack’s room floor?” asked Vogel.
Shaw was surprised by the question. Why would his answer elicit such a reaction from Vogel? Rubbing his hand over his stubble-covered chin, Shaw said, “I never personally examined what was under each of the blankets, but I could clearly see four pairs of German army issue boots sticking out from underneath the blankets.”
Vogel leant forward in his chair, studying Shaw. “Would your friends corroborate your story? I can very easily have them questioned as well.”
“Major there is no need for that, I’m telling you the truth.”
Vogel stood, called for Sergeant Muller to accompany him and Shaw outside. A minute later, Shaw found himself heading towards the camp’s mess hall. Recalling the gruesome sight of the murdered Germans inside the building, a cold shiver ran down Shaw’s spine. He didn’t want to step back inside the slaughterhouse, but he knew that had no choice. Vogel was hell-bent on having him seeing something. Following Vogel inside, the dimly lit building reminded Shaw of stepping inside a crypt. Looking about, he saw that all of the camp’s dead had been moved inside the unheated building, their contorted limbs reaching up in their death throes. Moving to a corner of the room, Shaw saw the four bloodstained blankets on the floor covering the corpses hidden underneath.
“Sergeant, pull down the blankets,” Vogel ordered Muller.
One-by-one the blankets were removed, exposing the frozen bodies underneath. The look of disbelief in their own deaths was etched onto the face of each man as it was revealed.
“Wait,” said Vogel sharply as Muller got to the last blanket. Turning his head, he looked over at Shaw and said, “Captain, are you sure of what you saw?”
“Major, I told you. I never saw what was underneath all of the blankets. I saw four pairs of—,” Shaw’s eyes grew wide when he saw a pair of leather winter boots, not army issue boots, sticking out from under the last blanket. He was positive that he had seen four identical pairs of boots.
Seeing the look of hesitation and confusion in Shaw’s eyes, Vogel ordered the last blanket removed.
“Jesus,” mumbled Shaw. In an instant, he realized that he wasn’t a good poker player and that by his reaction he had already shown too much.
“Remember Captain, I can bring your friends over here,” warned Vogel. “Do you recognize the man lying here on the floor?”
Shaw’s mind struggled to comprehend what was happening. Finding that his mouth had turned dry, he swallowed some saliva and then nodded his head. “His name is Gert. He was one of the Norwegian resistance fighters. He was the one who found these four bodies.”
“Please Captain, you’re not making any sense. How can a man be in two places at once?”
“I don’t know…I don’t know,” said Shaw, still staring down at Gert’s mutilated corpse.
“I think we are done here. I will have Sergeant Muller escort you back to your room,” said Vogel. “You have been most helpful Captain. I may ask to see you later in the day.”
With that Shaw was taken back and locked in the room with his compatriots.
Seeing the alarmed look on Shaw’s face when he walked back in their building, Bruce said, “Captain, what’s going on? You look like you just saw a ghost.”
“I just may have,” said Shaw, as he looked out a frosted window wondering of the whole world had turned mad.
What he had just seen did not make any sense, yet there was no denying that Gert’s body was lying frozen to the floor in the mess hall. Yet he had seen the man alive barely twelve hours ago. A feeling of dread seeped into Shaw’s heart. Looking back over his shoulder, he wondered if the people in the room were who they appeared to be. Could he even still trust Duncan? So this is how it begins, thought Shaw. Is this how the garrison tuned in itself, and if so how long before the new occupants of the camp began to suspect one another?
It wouldn’t take long for that question to be answered.
20
Weather Station
“Tell me, what did you learn from the American?” Wagner asked Vogel. His blood was still up. He had asked to participate in the interrogation of the prisoner but had been ignored.
“His presence in the camp was pure happenstance. He heard about the massacre and came to investigate, nothing more,” said Vogel. With the sun shining outside, he wished that Wagner would leave and head back to Haugesund.
“He’s lying,” said Wagner.
“I don’t believe so.”
“What makes you so sure?”
“He has no reason to lie. I could have just as easily interrogated the British Corporal and gotten the same answers, but I wanted to hear it from him.”
A loud knock at the door stopped the conversation.
Looking over, Vogel saw that it was the driver who had brought Wagner to the station yesterday. With a sharp Nazi salute, the soldier stepped inside, handed Wagner two messages and then left the room.
Wagner stood there reading the notes over; slowly a smug smile grew on his face. “It would appear that things have turned in my favor Herr Major,” gloated Wagner.
Vogel suddenly felt uncomfortable. “Why is that?”
“When we left yesterday to attack the partisan camp, I sent my driver back to battalion headquarters. He had with him a message that I wanted sent to Oslo right away. And now I have my response,” explained Wagner as he handed Vogel a note.
Vogel read over the note. Instantly, his blood began to boil. Wagner had gone behind his back and reported to Oslo that there had been a massacre in the weather station and that the local resistance was to blame.
“As you can see clearly Herr Major, you are to cooperate with me and give any, and all assistance that I may require to crush these partisans,” said Wagner arrogantly.
“You’re a damned fool Wagner,” snapped Vogel. “Even you can see that this wasn’t the work of the Norwegian underground. Your premature communique will only complicate matters. We still don’t know what happened here. Turning the countryside inside out looking for partisans will not help us. Every Norwegian you wrongly shoot or send to jail will drive three more into the arms of the resistance.”
Wagner stepped close and glared at Vogel. “Listen here Major, I know that the resistance are behind this. How, I don’t care, but they are responsible. I can see this. Why can’t you? Perhaps you are too old, too soft, to see what is happening all around you. Also, I don’t need your help or your support.” Holding up a second note, Wagner said, “Tomorrow morning a platoon of Waffen-SS will arrive and with them under my command, I intend to deal with the partisan infestation in this area. Starting with the village council, I intend to shoot a Norwegian every twelve hours until they tell me where I can find those responsible for the murder of the garrison.”
“This is madness.”
“I am the new face of war. You and your foolish notions of military honor are an anachronism. I suggest that you keep out of my way from now on Herr Major.” With that, Wagner stormed out of the room leaving Vogel standing there staring straight ahead. His jaw was clenched so tight that it ached.
Crumpling up the note in his hand, Vogel threw it to the ground. He stood there wondering if things could possibly get any worse.
21
Weather Station
Shaw looked out the window. The once-clear sky was darkening. Thick, dark clouds were rolling in from the north. Another heavy snowfall was coming. During his teenage years in Pennsylvania, he had seen plenty of snow, but the amount that fell in this region of Norway seemed limitless. Turning away, he wearily took a seat and then watched Anna as she worked hand-in-hand with an elderly doctor brought up from the village by the Germans. Together they cleaned and re-dressed the wounds of the two critically wounded fighters.
“If they don’t get to a hospital soon, they will both die from their wounds,” said the doctor as he wiped the blood from his hands.
Shaw said, “I will ask for them
to leave with you, but I cannot guarantee that the Germans will do as I ask.”
“It is getting late in the day. If they are to come with me, we will need to leave right away before it starts snowing again,” said the doctor.
Shaw nodded his head, walked to the door and then asked to speak with an officer. A minute later, Beckers walked over and listened to Shaw’s request. Without saying a word, the young officer left to speak with Vogel. When Beckers returned, Shaw was surprised to hear that Vogel agreed. A jeep was quickly brought over, and the wounded fighters were placed inside. Climbing into the front passenger side, the doctor thanked Shaw and then closed the door. Standing in the doorway, Shaw wondered why Vogel had changed his mind and allowed the doctor to take the wounded men with him. Whatever had happened, Shaw wasn’t going to question it.
A strong, cold wind surged through the camp, stirring up the loose snow. With a shudder running down his spine, Shaw knew that it wouldn’t be long before the snow fell. Stepping back inside, Shaw closed the door and saw that Anna had grabbed a blanket and was trying to make herself as comfortable as she could on the hard, wooden floor. The deep black lines under her bloodshot eyes told Shaw that she was utterly exhausted. Moving over beside her, he placed his blanket over the top of her and told her to get some shuteye. With a weak smile, Anna thanked Shaw and then laid her head down on her hands. Within seconds, she was fast asleep.
“Here Captain, come over and have some soup,” said Bruce as he poured soup from a pot on their stove into a couple of borrowed metal mess tins.
Taking a mess tin, Shaw thanked Bruce and then took a seat by the stove. The soup was surprisingly good. Shaw was amazed what a person could do with the contents of a ration box.
“Where did you learn to make such tasty soup?” Shaw asked Bruce.
“We grew up very, very poor. My father was a coal miner and died in an accident when I was just a wee one. With my father gone, my mother, bless her heart, had to support us all. There were four of us kids all under seven when my father died. My mother took a job in local textile factory working twelve hours a day, six days a week for pennies. She could take a chicken and make it last all week,” said Bruce. “These German rations aren’t all that bad. Not like home, but in a pinch they’ll do.”
Shaw grinned and then dug into his soup. Finishing it off, he asked for more. As he had made soup for five, Bruce had plenty to give away.
“What about you? How were things when you were growing up, sir?”
Shaw told Bruce everything about his birth in Germany and his family’s flight to the United States. He had never told anyone other than the men back in Bag End the truth about himself before.
“Well that kinda explains how you can speak German so well,” said Bruce. “I was a bit curious, but with you being an officer and all, I just thought you were well educated.”
Shaw chuckled. “I’m actually not all that bright. I’m just lucky with languages; that’s all.”
Bruce placed his empty mess tin down. “So what do you think will happen to us now?”
“I’m not sure how much longer we will remain here. Major Vogel seems fixated on finding out what happened to the garrison. I suspect that we’ll be stuck here for another day or two. After that we’ll be moved to Oslo where we will both be interrogated for a few days before being shipped off to Germany where we will be split up. You’ll sit out the war in a Luftwaffe camp, and I will find myself in a German army one.”
“Aye that sounds about right,” said Bruce, shaking his head.
Shaw looked over his shoulder and saw that Anna was still fast asleep. Turning his head, he said, barely above a whisper, “Major Vogel showed me something that doesn’t make any sense.”
“What would that be?”
“Remember back in the barracks when Gert and Carl showed us those four German soldiers who had been cut open and their organs removed?”
“Aye I do. It was a horrible sight,” said Bruce, shuddering at the thought of the cut open body.
“Well, when I went with Vogel earlier in the day to look at the bodies, I was floored when they pulled back the blankets and revealed that one of them wasn’t a German solider.”
“Who was it then?” said Bruce, hanging on every word.
“I know this is going to sound crazy, but it was Gert.”
“But he was with us in the camp. Hell he even accused his own brother of murdering that man, Gunnar.”
“I know it all seems hard to believe, but I know what I saw, Gert’s body was lying there on the floor beside the German soldiers. Don’t forget, we only looked at one body. It was Gert who told us that there were four German soldiers lying dead on the floor.”
Bruce thought about it for a few seconds and then said, “Aye, you’re right. He did say they were all the same. But I saw four pairs of German army boots sticking out from under those blankets.”
“As did I,” replied Shaw. “But today, there were only three sets of German boots and a pair of civilian winter boots.”
“Surely not.”
Shaw hunched up his shoulders and said, “It’s the truth.”
“Perhaps the Germans killed Get at the camp and then brought his body down here to try and throw you off?”
“To what end? I told Vogel about our mission. There was no reason for him to try and trick me. Besides do you remember seeing Gert in the camp when the Germans attacked?”
Bruce thought back to the attack on the camp and said, “No…no, I don’t. His brother Carl was there. I watched him run away with those other fighters. But they were all killed weren’t they?”
“That’s what I was told?”
“A dead German camp, that peculiar looking plane in the woods and now this strange tale about Gert, I don’t mind telling you, Captain that I’m becoming more than a wee bit skittish about all of this.”
“You and me both Duncan,” said Shaw.
Outside, the world turned dark. Slowly, the snow began to fall. A bitterly cold wind raced through the camp. Men on duty already dressed for the cold had to grab scarves, extra-thick gloves, anything they could get their hands on to ward off the mind-numbing cold. The temperature quickly fell well below zero. It was going to be a long, cold miserable evening. For some, it would also be their last.
22
Weather Station
The howling wind sounded like a shrieking banshee to Sergeant Muller as he pulled on his heavy woolen greatcoat to go back outside. He, Corporal Zach, and Lieutenant Beckers had agreed to take turns walking the perimeter of the camp checking on the men. Muller knew from experience that when it was cold, and they thought that they weren’t being watched, his soldiers would find a place out of the wind to keep warm instead of doing their jobs. Pulling his gray wool cap down low on his head to protect his ears, Muller stepped outside into the driving wind. The blast of freezing air was a shock to his system after being inside a warm building for the past hour. Wrapping his scarf around his face, Muller looked about in the dark. With a heavy snowfall coming down, visibility had been reduced to a few yards. Muller wasn’t worried though; he had memorized the layout of the camp. Hefting his submachine gun under his right arm, Muller set off to check on the sentries. Walking straight over to the fence, Muller placed his hand on it, turned to face south so the wind would be at his back, and slowly began to walk the perimeter of the camp. There would be hell to pay if he caught a soldier not doing his job tonight.
At the opposite side of the camp, two men stood with their backs against the raging wind, trying desperately to stay warm.
“I’m freezing,” said Private Zabel, his voice muffled behind his thick scarf.
“What was that?” replied Private Freytag as he jumped up and down trying to stay warm.
Zabel pulled down his scarf and yelled, “I said I’m fucking cold.”
“Tell someone who isn’t.”
“How much longer do we have left on our shift?”
Freytag looked down at his watch and said,
“Fifteen minutes.”
“Might as well be fifteen hours.”
“Quit your bellyaching. I’ve heard that it is far colder than this in Russia. And the winters there last ten months of the year.”
“I don’t give a fuck about Russia. I’m standing here freezing my balls off. The sooner our shift ends, the better.”
Freytag shook his head and continued to move his feet. Zabel was a good friend, but the man complained far too much. Sometimes he just wished the man would shut up and do his job. Fifteen minutes wasn’t the end of the world.
Suddenly, Zabel reached out and grabbed Freytag’s arm. “Hey, did you see that?”
Freytag turned his head and looked out into the blowing snow. Reaching into his pocket, he dug out his flashlight and turned it on. The beam barely reached out more than a dozen yards before the falling snow blocked the light.
“What did you see?” Freytag asked.
“I’m not sure. I thought I saw someone moving around beside the trucks.”
“Are you sure that you saw something and that you didn’t imagine it?”
“Yes, I’m dammed well certain that I saw something moving around out there.”
The platoon’s vehicles were parked alongside the fence near the barracks.
Handing his flashlight to Zabel, Freytag pulled his rifle from his shoulder and then loaded a round into the chamber. Walking slowly towards the line of vehicles, Freytag could feel his heart begin to race in his chest. His stomach knotted. He was scared. When they attacked the partisans, there was safety in numbers. Now in the dark, there was only him and his edgy partner. From Zabel’s shaking hand, the narrow beam from the flashlight searched out in the dark. The trucks sat there silently, covered in snow; they looked dark and menacing to Freytag.
“Who’s out there? Come out where I can see you with your hands up or I’ll shoot,” called out Freytag, hoping that no one heard the fear in his voice.
Incursion Page 13