No Neutral Ground: A World War II Romance (Promise for Tomorrow Book 2)

by Terri Wangard

  Lunch concluded and the three prepared to go their separate ways. “That’ll confuse any watchers.” Emma slipped into her coat and pulled on blue gloves that matched her hat. “They won’t know who to follow.”

  “Sure they will.” Phyllis wore a flamboyant, feathered hat that matched her personality. “Jennie’s the new face. They’ll want to work up a dossier on her.” She grinned at Jennie. “Enjoy your sightseeing.”

  Jennie hesitated before heading for the Old Town, located on its own island just south of the legation. Might someone be following her? Quite likely. Phyllis was right. The Germans probably watched everyone who deplaned at the airport, and put as much zeal into identifying newcomers as the Allies did with them. She paused at a shop window, studying the reflection of the street and checking her periphery vision. Too bad she didn’t have a colleague from Morale Operations to explore with. Somehow, she didn’t seem as prepared as she’d thought to work in a neutral country.

  Nancy Drew wouldn’t quail from this opportunity to do some sleuthing. Jennie squared her shoulders. Neither would she. Pulling out her city guide, she got her bearings, and marched down the street.

  Ridgewell Air Base

  Saturday, April 8, 1944

  Back to Germany today. Over a week of bad weather had kept the planes on the ground. Rafe shifted at his desk in the nose, waiting for takeoff. Only the mildest discomfort remained from the bruising he’d suffered.

  A flash of color drew his attention to Alan. The bombardier nestled an orange in a towel and tucked it atop his control panel.

  “An orange?” Rafe arched his brows. The fresh fruit would likely burst out of its skin when it froze at altitude. “Are you seriously considering peeling that with mitts on when the temperature is forty below zero?”

  Alan looked up with a sheepish expression. “What can I say? Harold’s jabbering about oranges made me crave ‘em, and when I saw this in the mess, I couldn’t resist.” He hesitated at Rafe’s frown. “Oh, that’s right. You weren’t at interrogation last week. Harold reported the conversation between that fighter pilot who helped us and his base. Something like, ‘Orange Peel calling Orange Grove, requesting Orange Juice.’ If the Germans monitored that call, they’d be none the wiser.” He patted his orange. “I know it’ll freeze, but it’ll be like sucking orange ice like Ruby makes.”

  A westerly wind carried the bomber formation quickly across the North Sea. The planes’ contrails formed vapors as deadly as natural clouds. Each succeeding squadron had to climb higher to rise above the contrail clouds. Rafe struggled to pinpoint their position. They were on the bomb run, their eyes glued to the lead plane, watching for its bombs to fall, when Carlo shouted a warning.

  “Bombers at four o’clock level.”

  Rafe jumped up to the window. Another formation was flying right through their group. Two bombers collided nearby, exploding and falling to earth in large pieces.

  Dee Marie strained to jump higher as Steve reacted. “Close those bomb doors. They’re dragging us.”

  Alan slapped the switch and lunged for his rolling orange. It fell to the floor and shattered like glass into a hundred pieces.

  The formation broke up as well. They were on their own, somewhere over western Germany. Only the drone of the engines told Rafe the aircraft remained intact and functioning in the sudden eeriness.

  “We’re the only plane in the sky when there should be hundreds around us. Where’d everybody go?” Carlo likely had his face plastered to his window.

  Steve responded. “They’re all below us in that cloudy murk. We’ll stay at thirty thousand feet until we’re sure we won’t let down on top of someone. Keep your eyes peeled.”

  Steve’s word choice prompted Rafe to look down at the legs of his flight suit. They sparkled with bits of frozen orange. He’d have a sticky mess when they melted.

  He turned back to his desk and started calculating. “Navigator to pilot. What do you want to do? Head for the rally point in hopes of finding our formation? Or head back to England?”

  “I think we’d better head for home. Our squadron was in the Tail-End Charlie position. By the time we get to the rally point, everyone will already be gone.”

  “All right then, new heading, two-six-four. We’ll overfly the corner of Holland to the North Sea.” Using a rule, Rafe traced their new route on his map. “After our wind sprints coming in, we’re facing a marathon to get back with a headwind. Better start letting down as soon as possible or we’ll need to stop at a filling station.”

  “Roger that. No stops for gas.”

  Alan swiveled and quirked a brow at him. Rafe shrugged. He hadn’t expected Steve to respond to his joke.

  “We still have our bombs.” Harold’s voice sounded like he asked a question.

  “Should we salvo the bombs? Or should I stick the cotter pins back in?” As the flight engineer in possession of the only tools aboard the aircraft, Mickey often assisted Alan with the bombs.

  “We’ll hang on to them for now.” Steve paused. “Rafe, watch for an alternate target. I don’t care to drop indiscriminately, even if we are over Germany.”

  Cal started calling the routine oxygen check. Alan, Rafe, and Harold responded. Then there was silence. “Rusty? Come in, Rusty.”

  “Carlo, George, open up the ball.” They’d probably already started for Rusty’s turret, but Steve wasn’t taking chances.

  “His oxygen hose is disconnected,” Carlo announced. “He’s passed out.”

  “Rusty, wake up. Hey, Rusty.” George was likely slapping his face, something he wouldn’t dare try at any other time. “He’s coming around.”

  “What are ya doing? What’s going on?”

  Rafe smiled. Nothing wrong with their pugnacious ball turret gunner.

  They were down to ten thousand feet and off oxygen when the North Sea came into view. Not once had they glimpsed another bomber. With any chance of flak behind them, and no enemy fighters around, Rafe eased out of his flak suit and stretched. Shedding the weight was a relief. He turned to his Gee Box for a position fix. He had a ready answer when Harold called him.

  “Radio to navigator. Do you have our exact position? Another Fort’s going down and calling for Air Sea Rescue. They’re at latitude 52.295042, longitude 3.581543.”

  “That’s thirty to forty miles due west.”

  Steve put Dee Marie into a banking turn. “Might as well see how they’re doing.”

  Again Alan twisted around and raised his brows. Rafe grinned. Maybe Steve thought the boys would enjoy a little side trip. He might never be buddy-buddy with the crew, but he seemed to be trying to ease up and earn their loyalty.

  Using binoculars, Alan searched for signs of life rafts. “They’re in for a rough ride. The wind doesn’t look as strong down here as it was at twenty-five thousand feet, but those are still some mean waves.”

  “Air Sea Rescue thinks they’ll get to them in thirty minutes. They ask if we have a visual.”

  “Not yet, Harold. Hold it. Yes, there’s a raft. They released the dye marker. The plane’s sunk. There’s the second raft. Steve, come left a tad.”

  “They got company coming.”

  Rafe flinched at Rusty’s yell. He took the binoculars from Alan and scanned the sea. “It’s a Schnellboot, like our PT boats. It’ll get to our men before Air Sea Rescue.”

  “Can we strafe ‘em?” Rusty clearly wanted blood. His brush with anoxia hadn’t affected him.

  “Looks to me like the best chance I’ll have to aim for a pickle barrel.” Alan glanced back with a wolfish grin. “And we’ve still got our pickles. Steve, take us down to two hundred feet and give me control. I want to do a little target practice.” He flipped a switch and the bomb bay doors rumbled open.

  Dee Marie sank lower. Steve offered caution. “Remember, they’ve got guns too. I’d hate to be shot down by a little boat. Everyone be ready with your guns.”

  With a hand poised on the bomb release, Alan guided the plane on his improvise
d bomb run. “They’re not sure what to make of us. They’ve slowed down and want to zigzag, but that will make it hard for their gunners to aim at us. One of them’s trying to shoot. Here we go.”

  Twelve general purpose bombs fell away.

  “Bull’s eye,” Rusty shouted. “But they didn’t explode.”

  “No, they punched right through that boat though. At least three of ‘em.” In the tail, Dan now had the best view. “It’s sinking fast.”

  “The bombs didn’t have time to arm. We’re too low for that. But five hundred pounders still pack a wallop when they fall on you.” Alan sat back and laced his fingers behind his head.

  Steve circled around to check on the downed airmen. They were cheering wildly. One man, trying to jump up and down in a rubber raft, toppled into the sea.

  Rafe shook his head and searched for the Germans swimming amid their wreckage. He saw at least a dozen, and some likely hadn’t survived the bombing. S-boote had large crews. As Steve continued to circle, he saw their faces look up.

  Rusty proved unwilling to leave them alone. “I can get those two fellows crawling on that big piece.”

  “No!” The objection burst out of Rafe. “No strafing. The war’s over for them. Air Sea Rescue will pick them up and they’ll be prisoners. Leave them alone.”

  Why did he feel so strongly about those men? Germany started this war and all its horror. But many Kriegsmarine sailors came up through the Naval Hitler Youth. Maybe he knew someone down there. With a different heritage, he might have been serving aboard a vessel like that.

  “The faces of war,” Dan mused. “Now we’ve seen the enemy up close.”

  “Here comes Air Sea Rescue,” George announced. “They’ll be kind of crowded once they get everyone onboard.”

  They watched the launch pause by the first raft.

  “They’re coming in with air sea rescue and a prayer.” Dan sang to the tune of “Coming in on a Wing and a Prayer.”

  “They didn’t need a prayer. They had us.” Count on Mickey for a tart comment.

  “Sure they did. They prayed for deliverance and got it through us. We’re an answer to prayer.”

  “Time to head for home before we run out of gas and join them. What’s our heading, Rafe?” Steve swung Dee Marie toward England.

  “Two-eight-three.” Rafe responded, without need of a Gee fix.

  The vibration of the engines rattled his soul. The faces of war, Dan had said. The enemy faces of the war. Had he known anyone on that S-boat? Would he ever know? He slumped in his seat. Weariness like a leaden flak suit weighed him down, and not because they’d been roused at four that morning.

  Alan stared down at the sea. “How many planes litter the sea floor?”

  “With how many men still in them?” Cal added.

  Not a pleasant thought. Rafe rested his head on his arms and closed his eyes.

  Dan’s voice didn’t let him doze. “If we’re going to die in combat, I’d rather it happens fast, in an exploding plane. That’s the way to go. No mangled bodies or food for fish or worms. Or on fire all the way down. We’d fly right up to heaven.”

  Mickey scorned such sentiment. “How do you know there’s a heaven? Hell would be better. I bet it has more interesting people. No goody two-shoes, for one thing.”

  “You’re nuts.”

  Rafe opened one eye to see Alan bolt upright. If the bombsight hadn’t been in his way, he might have launched himself right out the window. “Even if all your friends and interesting people are there, you won’t enjoy being with them. Hell is a place of torment to be avoided. Basic Sunday school stuff.”

  “Well, I ain’t interested in sitting on a cloud and strumming no harp all day.”

  Rafe pushed his headphones down around his neck to avoid the full volume of Mickey’s antagonism. Too bad he couldn’t push away his thoughts as easily; they raced along another celestial avenue of musing, dragging him along for the ride.

  How many German warriors entered heaven these days? Did they believe in God, or Hitler?

  Someone in Milwaukee, or maybe Paul Braedel, had commented about Abe Lincoln saying during the Civil War that each side prays to the same God. The same held true for this war. Both Germans and the Allied nations prayed for safety and victory.

  If only he could be sure his friends were safe.

  Stockholm, Sweden

  Saturday, April 8, 1944

  Jennie wandered from room to room of the National Museum to familiarize herself with the layout. Occasionally, she stopped to study an exhibit. Alternate display possibilities came to mind. That painting should be set apart with better lighting. This grouping looked too cluttered.

  She paused by the display of Carl Larsson’s watercolor paintings. Her Royal Highness, Big Sister brought a smile to her face. A young scamp saluted his sister. Good thing she had an older brother rather than a pesty younger one. Tom, though, probably considered her a pesty little sister. She moved on.

  The painting titled Grandfather was perplexing. She stepped back to study it. Nearby was Woman Reading. Her gaze swung back and forth between the two. Both subjects were at the edge of the paintings. The setting worked for Woman Reading but Grandfather was nearly lost in his portrayal. How curious.

  She was gazing at Letter Writing, once more off center but delightfully so, when a man also stopped. She moved on. So did he. This wasn’t good. She turned down a passageway that looped back to the Larsson grouping. If he was here to look at the art, he wouldn’t backtrack as she did. But he did. He was following her. She stopped at a display case. He paused, and then joined her. Her fingertips tingled.

  “This is exquisite, is it not? The artistry is exceptional for the eighteenth century. The best Sweden offers.” His Swedish sounded too formal. He had a trace of an accent. German? Had Rafe sounded like that? “By the way, my name is Lars.”

  If the Germans monitored every British plane that landed in Stockholm, they would have noted her arrival. Watchers would have seen her coming and going from the legation. Phyllis was right. They were compiling a dossier on her. This man must think she was so stupid she’d fall for his charm and spill all her secrets. Except his charm was akin to scratching fingernails on a blackboard.

  Don’t make eye contact with a predator. Excellent advice, but knowing who she was dealing with took precedence. Jennie risked a quick glance. A shock wave reverberated all the way down to her toes. The man wasn’t looking at the display. He stared at her with a calculating gleam like a dog licking its chops over a T-bone steak unattended on the grill. Her gaze dropped immediately back to the case as she inched away.

  Jennie pointed at the placard on the case and pitched her voice higher than normal. “Actually, these are Italian artifacts from the seventeenth century, acquired by Gustav III during his travels.”

  She tapped her fingernails on the glass twice. With a brisk “Good day,” she turned and strode toward the exit.

  Did he still follow her? She couldn’t look back. He might interpret that as coy interest. She burst through the door into the cold, still winter air. Breathing deeply, she paused at the foot of the stairs, setting her reticule on the balustrade to button her coat. Through the veil of her hair, she watched a man exit. Same wide-brimmed fedora, same wingtips with a serious scuff on the left toe, same oversized coat that gaped open.

  Her heartbeat quickened as she snatched up her reticule, leaving two buttons undone. She couldn’t return to the legation with him on her tail. The Grand Hotel was practically next door, but she hadn’t scouted it for exits.

  She turned the other way and started walking. Across the inevitable bridge was Skeppsholmen. That island lacked the urbanization of the rest of Stockholm. Was that good or bad? Were there trails to hike? Wait a minute. Hike? Dressed like this? She ran a hand over the plaid skirt she’d purchased in Leuchars. She’d have to stroll, and be overtaken by Lars.

  Before crossing the bridge, she glanced down the side street that curved around this little peninsula
. And then it curved around the Nybroviken inlet and she’d be at the legation. No, head for the island.

  She was nearly across when footsteps gained on her. God in Heaven, hear my prayer. Keep me in thy loving care.

  He drew abreast. “We meet again.”

  “Hardly surprising since you’re following me.” She quickened her pace and looked everywhere except at him. Where could she lose him? The small island contained several military buildings and little else. Coming this way had been a mistake. Stupid, stupid, stupid of her.

  “How do you know so much about the Italian artifacts?” The guy stuck like glue.

  He must also be a moron. “I read the placards describing the displays, as anyone who wanted to know more about them would do.”

  “You’re not Swedish, are you?”

  What gave her away? Her accent? “Are you?”

  He hmphed. She fought a smile. Score one for her. She could keep secrets.

  “What did you like best at the art museum?”

  Little information of value could be obtained from such a question, unless he wanted to put her at ease. Jennie mustn’t tell him of her art background. That would score one for him. She cast him a sidelong glance. A wicked scar cut across his left cheek. What had someone said just last week in the legation about upper class Germans and their pride in dueling scars? If this were one, it meant he didn’t mind danger and pain, a bad combination.

  “Actually, I prefer Chinese Ming vases, Peruvian Inca gold jewelry, and Russian Fabergé eggs and nesting dolls.”

  That shut him up for the moment. And hallelujah, deliverance came into sight. A tram trundled toward them. She raised her hand out of Lars’ view and lifted one finger. The tram operator shifted his gaze from her to the man beside her and back, and slowed. She jumped aboard. Collapsing on a bench seat, she dug in her reticule for the fare with shaky fingers.