The Rat Patrol 6 - Desert Masqueraade
Page 19
"If you leave at zero hour, you will have ample time," the general said. His jaw jutted when he smiled.
"I don't know what you mean," Troy said bluntly.
"When I said behind the lines I didn't say on the ground," the general said. "You will accompany me in the aircraft. I want to see whether we have a good pattern and five pairs of eyes are better than one."
"Whew," Troy said, saluted and left.
A hastily improvised tent of canvas and camouflage netting had been erected between the HQ tent and the pit, and the trucks driven there to unload. The desert flat was being bombed with smoke and the white clouds concealed the three tanks that clattered from their positions to line up behind the workshop. The Vs of tanks and halftracks were closing formation. Smoke bombs continued to haze the valley. The ridge became nervous with what could not be observed and the 75s began to throw shells that fell out of range in the smoke.
The Rat Patrol halted at the side and watched as the sweating crews swarmed over the hot steel tanks, installing the strange banks of plywood cylinders on the turrets. The launchers consisted of four rows of fifteen tubes banked at slants. As each Sherman was fitted and loaded, it rolled from the tent and followed an ammunition truck which had been assigned it.
The crew was working on the third Sherman when Peilowski panted into the baking workshop. Tendrils of smoke seemed to stream after him. "Enemy column starting down the grade," he shouted.
"Let's go," Caruthers snapped and turned toward the airstrip. He beckoned Troy, setting out at a dead trot.
Troy glimpsed Wilson slamming into the staff car and reaching for the transceiver. He must have called the C-47 first because the propellers were turning when the Rat Patrol followed the general onto the strip. The aircraft was shaking and roaring by the time they climbed into the belly. The door banged and the ship gunned down the runway. The general headed through the cargo compartment to six bucket seats that had been placed forward and the plane was airborne.
The aircraft circled to the west. Below, a puffy haze covered much of the flat, but as Troy watched, an awkward-appearing Sherman broke into the clear and headed toward the grade. It was supported by two Shermans which had not been equipped with launchers. The Jerry armor was about halfway down the grade and both the Shermans and Mark IVs were traveling at about the same rate of speed. It appeared the three Shermans would meet the entire Jerry force near the bottom of the slope, but abruptly the missile cluster on the Sherman puffed and the rocket soared dead into the leading tanks. Smoke erupted along the grade and the column ground to a halt. The first launcher-equipped Sherman already was scooting back to rendezvous when the entire ridge and slope spit smoke and fire. It was difficult to see the lower part of the grade, but it was tangled confusion near the top.
The aircraft circled away from the guns on the ridge and came back over the flat. A second launcher had moved up toward the grade and Troy had a glimpse of the missiles piercing the haze and breaking into the center of the Jerry column. The whole slope was draped with dusty haze through which orange fire licked now and then. At the top of the ridge, tanks and halftracks looked like scuttling beetles as they tried to maneuver away from the safe passage.
The third launcher was in place now and threw its sixty missiles on the crest into the retreating armor. Before they were drowned in the smoke, tiny dark figures scurried from gun positions. The smoke had cleared from some of the flat and two Vs were waiting to rush the ridge. Wilson never will get around the wreckage piled on the slope, Troy thought as a Sherman appeared with another load of missiles. This cluster was directed into the base of the slope beyond the flat and it seemed half the hill went up in the combined explosions of mines and rockets. The launchers concentrated bombardment now at the side of the grade and when their last loads had spurted from the tubes, they were jettisoned and the tanks pushed up through the swirling clouds. The rest of Wilson's column ran after them.
The aircraft circled the ridge and General Caruthers leaned forward toward Troy. "Where?" he shouted above the pounding of the engines.
Troy leaned across to point the coastal highway. The route leading to it was marked with crawling armor and running figures. The flight that had been interrupted by the position on the ridge had started and Wilson's column emerged triumphant on the ridge. To the east some of the supply trucks had begun to move out.
"Magnificent!" the general shouted. He was grinning.
Troy, Moffitt, Hitch and Tully all grinned back at him.
Caruthers stepped into the pilot's compartment and when he returned, the C-47 turned back over the flat and thundered in for a landing at the strip. Wilson might send a flying squad of Shermans in pursuit of Dietrich, but Troy knew he would have to pause at the commanding and strategic ridge position to clear the slope and consolidate the gains from the battle he had won. Beyond, to the west, the territory was still controlled by the Jerries. Dietrich would probably limp somewhere to the safety of the Afrika Korps and fight another day again.
The pilot came from his compartment before the Rat Patrol had followed General Caruthers from the C-47. A broad smile lighted his tanned face as he nodded and said, "You fellows are an odd lot to keep the general company. Any of you speak English?"
"Burlone," Hitch said with a fierce scowl.
"We're spotters," Troy said with a grin.
"Oh?" the pilot said, seeming surprised. "You happen to spot that funny little Jerry car that was heading south, away from the road the others were taking? It was weaving all over the desert. Either the driver was drunk or chasing something."
"Oh?" Troy said, interested.
"Yeah," the pilot said, shaking his head. "Sure was funny. Everybody else going northwest and this one car going south. Wasn't anything I could see in that direction."
Troy lifted his eyebrows at Moffitt. The Englishman's mustache bristled but his eyes gleamed. Troy looked at Hitch and Moffitt. Their heads bobbed in unison.
"Let's shake it," Troy said and jumped to the. ground.
The four of them ran to the camouflaged pit. While Moffitt and Troy jerked away the net, Hitch and Tully started the jeeps and ran them out. They hastily checked weapons and ammunition, cans of gas and water. The jeeps spun in the loose sand and raced toward the HQ net. General Caruthers popped out his grizzled head.
"What's up?" he shouted.
Hitch and Tully braked and Troy said, "Going to find out why a Jerry patrol car was heading in the opposite direction from the retreating column."
"Room for a passenger?" the general called and without waiting for an answer slid in the front seat of Troy's jeep beside Hitch.
Side by side the heavily armed little vehicles sped across the desert flat and lunged to the chewed-up side of the grade. The smoke rose from the smashed and blasted Jerry armor and from the craters. They wove through confused Allied and Jerry armor, past Dietrich's tent where Wilson already was setting up HQ. He stood in the entrance in his white varnished helmet, lifted a hand in confusion and stared after them as Caruthers returned the casual greeting.
The jeeps bounded down the rocky slope that led to the coastal highway and turned west on it. Troy picked up a submachine gun and handed it to the general. Moffitt and Troy both were at the spade handles of their .50 caliber Brownings, but the sand and stone that burned on either side of the road seemed deserted. The sun beat at Troy and the wind slashed at his face. Even with the mustache and black hair under the bush hat, he felt normal again.
When Hitch and Tully swerved the jeeps off the road and started south over hard-baked clay toward the rocky desert sand beyond, Caruthers turned his head to Troy.
"If there's shooting I want to be in it," he called. "But only for today. I have appointments in Washington day after tomorrow."
They were off the hardpack and into the sand when Troy saw a dust streamer curling in the distance. Tully's jeep surged ahead almost at the same moment Hitch's dropped back. The general swung about and glared at Troy.
"You'
re trigger-happy," Troy called. "I don't think there'll be any shooting."
Three men were in the Volkswagen patrol car, one at the steering wheel and two in the back seat. One of the men in the rear wore a white robe. Tully drew alongside and Moffitt leaned toward the other car over his machine gun. Hitch parked behind and Troy saw the driver who had his hands in the air and was shouting at Moffitt in German was the officer, Doeppler, from Dietrich's camp. The Jerry in the back was Dietrich's orderly-driver, Grosse. The third man was an Arab.
Moffitt turned. His mustache was lifted in a J. Enna smile. "He said they were coming over the ridge to bargain," he called. "They captured the deceitful Arab and will turn him over to us if we don't send them back to Dietrich."
"What a way to run a war," General Caruthers growled and shoved his tommy-gun to the floor.
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