by Leo Kessler
The nearest Cossack fired. Schulze caught a glimpse of an angry bearded face that he remembered from the kolhoz and hastily ducked as the slug whined over his head. Behind him in the tightly packed tractor a Wotan trooper screamed shrilly and clapped a hand to a shoulder which was suddenly jetting bright-red blood.
Matz suddenly let go of the clutch. It popped out. The tractor heaved violently. A black cloud of smoke shot from its exhaust. Matz caught his breath, the sweat streaming down his face in great pearls. The motor didn’t start, and the tractor’s speed slowed immediately. Behind him Schulze cursed passionately and fired a wild burst at the Cossacks who were now closing in for the kill.
‘ROCK!... DAMN YER EYES... ROCK!’ Matz’s desperate scream had its effect.
The panic-stricken troopers, already able to make out the dark faces of the Cossacks on their flying mounts quite clearly now, as they leaned over the outstretched heads, weapons stabbing the grey air with scarlet flame, stamped their feet down.
Once again the tractor began to gather speed to the accompaniment of the slugs whining off its steel plating everywhere. Another Wotan trooper was hit, and another.
Now there were perhaps forty metres of slope left. Beyond lay the flat steppe. Matz knew this was the last chance, the very last chance. It was now or never. He closed his eyes, oblivious to the outcrop everywhere, and let out the clutch.
The tractor bucked. There was a long low groan like the eerie dirge the Tommies played on those bagpipes of theirs. Matz’s eyes flashed open. In the mirror he could see the thick trail of black smoke that was pouring from the exhaust. On the dash, lights were beginning to flash. He hardly dared believe the evidence of his own eyes. It was working... It was working! Yet as the Cossacks galloped through the smoke, the engine had still not started. Now the tractor was bucking and shaking as if it might break apart at any moment, the sound of its rattling tracks drowned by that unholy whine.
Matz gripped the wheel in sweating hands, his knuckles a hard white, willing the son-of-a-bitch to start.
Thirty metres left. The tractor was emitting a loud series of harsh backfires. It sounded to Matz like Schulze indulging himself in one of his famous farts after a litre or two of pea-soup. ‘Fart on, you son-of-a-bitch!’ he cried excitedly. ‘Fart on!’
There were only fifteen metres left now.
Suddenly, there was a tremendous burst of white smoke, completely obscuring the riders behind. The engine roared into life. Matz hit the accelerator. The tractor shot forward. The red ignition light flickered off and on wildly. Matz gunned the engine. It must not fail him now! And then he had it, and the tractor hit the steppe, engine running as sweetly as the day it had been built. As the Cossacks began to rein in their sweating mounts, firing angrily at the rapidly disappearing tractor, its tracks throwing up a huge wild wake of white, Matz turned, his face greasy with sweat, and winked at a pale-faced Schulze.
‘That kept yer heart in yer pants, I bet, you big arsehole, eh?’
‘It’s not my heart I can feel trickling into my boot,’ was all that Sergeant Schulze was able to reply....
EIGHT
‘Damn this snow! Damn this whole country!’ Peiper growled, but the howling gale drowned his curses and bore them away into nothingness.
Visibility was now barely twenty paces and the Arctic blizzard which was whipping across the steppe turned the half-light of the winter day into an icy inferno. Standing upright, vainly trying to penetrate the flying gloom, the young colonel could feel the freezing particles sting his skin, blind his eyes and invade his nostrils and mouth. It almost felt as if the damned things were going right through to his brain, turning it to ice too so that it was impossible to think.
But Jochen Peiper knew he must think and he must think hard. Not only must he out-think the enemy, with very little information from Intelligence at his disposal — save where their front line positions were and that they had patrols everywhere within the Kessel — but he had also to attempt to guess what a bunch of hard-arsed veterans from SS Wotan might do with the situation in which they found themselves.
Now, as the little convoy of armoured vehicles edged its way at a snail’s pace through the blinding snowstorm, heading for the junction of Lake Ileman and the River Redya, Peiper wondered what he would do, if he were in their place. First, he guessed, being SS, they would avoid any contact with the ordinary stubble-hoppers of the Wehrmacht. The latter had a chance of surviving if they surrendered to the Reds in time — the SS didn’t. Hence they would attempt to make their way westwards. Second, he knew that they were familiar with the terrain. After all, the SS Corps had fought its way right across it from the three rivers to beyond Demyansk. So, he guessed they would be heading towards the three rivers.
Now the question remained, whether they would attempt to make for one of three towns within the Kessel, which according to Intelligence were still believed to be in friendly hands. In weather like this, it would be the predictable thing for exhausted, hungry men to do. But would the Wotan troopers do the expected? They knew as well as he did that it was asking for trouble to park your arse in a town defended by unwilling troops, who were only too ready to surrender the first time a Red farted.
Mentally he visualized the map of the Kessel; it was one of the abilities which had made him such a tremendous tactician — he had a photographic memory for topography and terrain. There were three towns, running from south-east to north-west, Demyansk, Federovka and Romushevo. The first, he reasoned, would be definitely out for the missing Wotan men. It would be the first place the Reds would attack, once they entered the Kessel in force. He dismissed Federovka and told himself that if they headed for any place it would be Romushevo. By the time they reached it, they would be completely exhausted and in desperate need of information on the lie of the land between it and the Russian perimeter....
‘Obersturm.’
The gunner ‘s voice crackled over the intercom and broke into his reverie.
He pressed his throatmike. ‘Yes?’
‘Man ahead, Obersturm.’
Peiper raised his head over the edge of the Panther’s turret and peered through the swirling white flakes.
A heavily-swathed sentry emerged from the gloom like a ghost, waving his signal lamp. He was a German all right. A Red would not have stood up in front of the column like that. Below him the driver must have thought the same, because he started to ease on the brakes gently, in order not to skid on the slick snow and run over the man who foolishly stood in their path.
Peiper looked over the turret. The man wasn’t alone. There were other snow-shrouded figures in the ditches on both sides. Most of them were bearded, forty-year olds, miserable old men, who wished they were back in front of their pot-bellied stoves holding mutti’s hand instead of stuck out here in the freezing midst of nowhere.
He grinned sympathetically and called, ‘Where’s the fire, soldier?’
‘There ain’t any yet,’ the man with the lamp said sourly. ‘But we live here, if yer can call it living, and as soon as the Ivans spot those tin cans of yours, there’ll be all hell to play.’
‘Sorry about that, soldier. But there’s a little thing called a war going on. People get hurt.’
‘As long as it ain’t us,’ a grumpy voice said from the ditch.
Peiper frowned and bit back the hot reply which had come to his lips. They were old and already war-weary. Trying to control his hot temper, he asked, ‘What’s the situation up here?’
‘Shitty, decidedly shitty.’
Peiper realized that he was not going to get anything from the grumpy old soldier. ‘Where’s your commander located?’ he snapped.
‘Up there — in the commissar’s villa.’
‘Commissar’s villa!’ Peiper exclaimed.
For the first time a weary smile crossed the soldier’s face. ‘Fireball ain’t no fool, sir. He likes to make hisself comfortable even in the line.’
‘Obviously. All right, tell me how I can find t
his — er — Fireball’s HQ.’
A moment later, the little convoy was crawling its way in the direction indicated by the soldier. The upper storey of the commissar’s villa had been destroyed by enemy gunfire, but the bottom half was in good order, though most of the windows were boarded-up. Obviously the place possessed a good cellar, for there was a large broken arrow pointed to a low door with the usual legend painted above it Luftschutzkeller.
Peiper sniffed. Fireball, whoever he might be, certainly did like his comfort, even this far forward. He pressed the throatmike and ordered his driver to stop. Then, after ensuring that his vehicles were well distributed around the building, although the swirling snowflakes provided cover enough, he entered the villa.
Five minutes later he was in the presence of Colonel Xavier Clohse, nicknamed the Fireball. It did not take Peiper long to guess how he had acquired that name. The fat full-colonel was a bustling individual, bursting with energy, and his permanently crimson face, obviously the result of high blood pressure, added to the impression.
‘SS, eh?’ were his first words and he looked at the slim, handsome officer in the smart black uniform of the panzers with undisguised contempt.
Involuntarily Peiper flushed. ‘I do happen to be German too, like you, Colonel,’ he said icily.
‘What do you want?’ Fireball did not seem to notice the implied insult.
‘Your cooperation while we cross the river, sir. Fire-cover and a—’
‘Impossible!’ Fireball cut into his words brutally, taking some sort of dried fish from the silver tray and swallowing it whole, like a stork. ‘Quite out of the question! Don’t you know we front-swine have got to live here, unlike the gentlemen of the SS, who will undoubtedly pass through on some merry little jaunt or other, while we get the shit slung at us.’
‘I seem to have heard that phrase – we’ve got to live here – before, sir,’ Peiper said, his voice heavy with irony. ‘And I have no intention of disturbing the peace, god forbid. All I ask is that you give us the minimum of assistance so we can cross the river, be on our way, and allow you to enjoy your peace and calm here.’
Fireball smiled suddenly and taking a monocle out of his pocket, screwed it firmly into his right eye and gazed at Peiper as if he were seeing him for the first time.
‘I do not like your corps, Obersturmbannfuhrer, I do not like it one bit. But I like you. Come we will eat.’ And before Peiper could object, he found his arm seized and he was swept into the next room.
Fireball obviously enjoyed his guest’s surprise at the delicacies served by a mess waiter clad in an immaculate white jacket and wearing, of all things, cotton gloves. For an entrée there was caviare on toasted white bread, washed down with red Crimean champagne. It was followed by a great piece of roast venison, drenched in a rich wine sauce, and served with a heavy red burgundy that tasted, to an astonished Peiper, as if it might well have come from France.
‘Yes, my dear fellow,’ Fireball said expansively as they finished the venison and the mess servant handed the two officers a fat cigar each, ‘one has to enjoy this war. Peace’s going to be terrible.’ He puffed out expansively on his big cigar. ‘I went through the last one, you know. Four years in the trenches. Seen it all before. Why take it all so damned seriously, what?’
‘But Colonel, we of the SS have got men cut off in that Kessel on the other side of the river.’
‘So!’ Fireball said pleasantly, looking at Peiper’s serious face through his monocle, his crimson face bursting with good food, and greased with sweat from the tremendous heat thrown out by the huge Russian stove in the corner.
‘There is also Gauleiter Kirn with them,’ Peiper lied glibly.
‘Munich-Kirn!’ Fireball sniffed and dipped the end of his cigar in the glasses of Georgian cognac that the mess waiter was now serving. ‘I doubt if that would be such a great loss for the Reich. I’m no snob, but they do tell me the chap was once a baker’s journeyman.’ He looked at Peiper, as if he expected him to be shocked. ‘I ask you, a chap like that can’t be too bright, can he?’
Peiper smiled. Fireball was a card. In fact, he could not recollect ever having met an officer like Fireball in all his career. The energetic infantry colonel was determined not to let the war interfere with his bodily comforts. Not even the fact that one of the Fuhrer’s oldest comrades was supposedly out there across the river in the Kessel seemed to worry him. Fireball lived for the moment; he obviously did not expect to survive the war.
For nearly an hour over cigars and ever more cognac, a harassed Peiper tried to get Fireball’s support for his river crossing, but without success. The colonel always seemed able to parry his question and launch off into other more peaceful lanes: his hobby, stamp-collecting— ‘... and when I have a chance rather buxom blondes, my dear chap,’ and his hunting activities— ‘... the game around here is tremendous. No one has been out shooting in this neck of the woods for years.’ On and on he went, until finally in exasperation, Peiper slammed down his glass and rose to his feet, his face flushed with both cognac and anger.
‘Colonel, I don’t need your help. I’ll go it alone!’
‘You’ll draw fire and we live here.’
‘That particular piece of military wisdom seems to be the motto of your command,’ Peiper snapped. But that’s your bad luck. There is a rough bridge, according to my tactical map, some half kilometre from here, guarded by your people on this bank. I shall take it at dawn.’
Fireball’s smile had vanished now. His fat face seemed redder than ever and the monocle about to pop from his eye with suppressed rage. ‘I ‘m ordering you not to. Obersturmbannfuhrer!’
‘Nobody orders the SS!’
Fireball sprang to his feet, his flushed sweating face only centimetres from Peiper’s. ‘Well, I’m damn well giving them orders as from now! Obersturmbannfuhrer Peiper, one hour ago while you were washing, I ordered my commander at the bridge to blow the shit-thing sky-high at the first sign of anyone trying to cross it from either side! You attempt to cross at dawn Peiper, and it will be German fighting German...’
NINE
Peiper bit his bottom lip, then nodded to the young lieutenant who was going to lead the advance. ‘Give them every chance,’ he ordered. ‘Every chance possible, but,’ he hesitated momentarily. ‘But if they don’t get out of the way, you know what to do?’
‘I know, sir,’ the teenage second-lieutenant said suddenly realizing that he was going into action for the first time — against his own people! He clambered inside the turret, slipped on his earphones and mike. Giving the controls in the turret a quick check, he ordered: ‘Carbide!’
Peiper smiled momentarily. Like all greenhorns, the youngster tried to cover his inexperience by using the old soldier’s slang. He stepped back hurriedly as the Panther’s motors roared into violent life, its exhausts spouting thick blue streams of smoke as it started to rattle down the snow-covered slope towards the bridge.
Peiper climbed up to his own position in the turret of the command-tank and said through the intercom: ‘To all. We’re going in. As soon as we’ve passed our own lines, button up and keep your eyes skinned. There’ll be three days inside the building for anyone who manages to let some Ivan pop an anti-tank grenade up his arse. Over.’
There were chuckles everywhere.
‘All right, roll ’em! Over and out!’
*
‘Wer da?’ The challenge came just as the Panther swung around the ninety-degree angle, spraying up snow and mud on both sides, and came to a noisy halt just in front of the barbed-wire hurdle which barred the entrance to the bridge. On either side were two dug-in 57 mm anti-tank cannons. The young lieutenant blinked as the bright light caught him directly in the eyes.
‘For god’s sake, douse that shitting light!’ he cried. ‘You want every Ivan this side of Moscow to see us?’
The man with the light, who had challenged them, a burly bearded middle-aged man, laughed heartily. ‘What makes you think they don�
�t know all about us already, sonny boy?’ he demanded, but he lowered the torch.
‘Don ‘t call me sonny boy. I am a German officer.’
‘Yes, and I’m the shitting Queen of the May, sonny boy!’ the bearded man replied easily. There was a low, tired rumble of laughter from the anti-tank gunners on both sides of the road.
‘Listen, old Fireball has told us all about you young fellas from the SS. We know you’re full of piss and vinegar like all the SS, ready to die for Folk, Fatherland and Fuhrer so that yer mothers can collect a bit of tin and stick in a cupboard to gather dust — when yer dead. But I’ll tell you this, sonny boy. I’ve been out here since 1941 and before that I was in France and Jugoslavia and Greece and all the rest of those shitty places. I’ve got a whole shitting room of tin. You can have it if you want. But understand this, kid, you’re not passing this point as long as old Fireball is in charge here.’ The hardness disappeared from the old soldier’s voice to be replaced by a tone of understanding. ‘Don’t try to shit old heads like me and the rest of the boys. Go back to where you came from and forget all about it.’
Trying to fight back his tears at this unfair treatment, the young officer had the presence of mind to kick the driver down below in his compartment with his right foot — the signal to keep moving forward.
Gently the driver eased off his brakes and almost imperceptibly the Panther rolled a few centimetres closer to the barbed-wire hurdle which barred the entrance.
With surprising speed for his age, the man with the lamp flashed up his machine pistol, snapping off the safety-catch as he did so. ‘I’m warning you, sonny boy. Another move like that — and I’ll fillet yer! SS lieutenant or not, I’ve got my orders. I’ll feed yer lead as soon as I look at yer.’
‘But we’re only trying to do our duty,’ the young officer cried, his voice a mixture of rage, frustration and desperation. Already he could hear the rest of the small task-group clattering down the slope. He could not fail his idol Obersturmfuhrer Peiper — he simply couldn’t! ‘All we want is to cross the bridge and fight the Russians.’