Flames from the Ashes

by William W. Johnstone

  When he heard the news later that day, Führer Hoffman was elated that Ben Raines had been captured. But he wanted Raines dead, not in custody. What sort of game was Peter Volmer playing? He contemplated the possibilities while he sipped a congratulatory brandy. Then he had Volmer contacted by radio.

  “You have Ben Raines. Execute him,” he snapped harshly.

  “Patience, mein Führer,” Volmer soothed. “Consider the opportunities this gives us. By having Ben Raines alive, I have already caused his son to act irresponsibly. He has flatly refused the terms given. He has sworn and acted like a petulant child. We can use that to force the entire Rebel command to surrender in exchange for the life of a single man. One we can then try for war crimes and execute anyway.”

  Hoffman thought on it and began to chortle. “By Wotan and Thor, I like your style, Volmer. You really have him? You have Ben Raines locked up securely where the Rebels can never find him?”

  “Absolutely, mein Führer. He is going nowhere. I have already contacted the Rebels and demanded their surrender.” Volmer omitted the rest of his terms. “By this time tomorrow they will receive a little token of my — our commitment to this course. Twenty-four hours later, I will renew the demands.”

  “What is this token you speak of?”

  “The tip of one little finger belonging to Ben Raines.”

  “A man after my own heart! I’ve a mind to promote you to field marshal, Volmer.”

  “I would be honored and flattered, mein Führer.”

  “Single-handedly you have accomplished more than all my fine generals have come close to doing. Yes — yes, by god, I will. From this moment, Brigadenführer Volmer, you are a Feldmarschall in the New Army of Liberation, with all the privileges and authority of that rank.”

  “I’m — astounded.” And Volmer was indeed. He had not expected this. It made his chances of becoming Führer even better. “I’m also grateful. We will work diligently to insure the immediate defeat of the Rebels, mein Führer.

  “Excellent, Field Marshal Volmer. Oh, one thing. I want you to be prepared to turn over General Ben Raines to General Rasbach, immediately he arrives from Torreon.”

  “But, I . . . “Volmer forced himself to silence. He was not at all happy about this, but he had no choice . . . at the present. “Zu Befehl, mein Führer.”

  Contrary to the long-held belief of Ben Raines that the Rebel cause would survive his loss without a ripple, reaction spread with the same speed as the word of his capture. The troops were stunned. A number reacted by summarily executing a number of prisoners who had been taken without firing a shot. The command structure reeled like a drunken man.

  Cecil Jefferys contacted every field commander individually and in conference calls. Efficiency began to plummet so rapidly that it had a visual effect. Nothing significant got done. Dr. Lamar Chase came to Buddy and Ike with ominous news.

  “Out of your two commands, over three hundred on sick call this morning. Not a blamed thing wrong with any of them. They just wanted to talk to someone about the general being captured. That’s a quote. Some of them actually plotted to get to where those kids are being held and string them up. Now, that’s more in line with Ben’s way of thinking reactions should go,” the portly doctor added, “but hardly suited to the circumstances.

  “The bottom line, gentlemen, is that we can’t afford to have better than two companies turning out for sick call every day until something is done to get Ben out of there, or we acknowledge Cecil Jefferys as the new Commander in Chief.”

  Buddy frowned darkly at the medico’s words. Lamar Chase blinked and cut his eyes from Buddy Raines to an equally stormy-visaged Ike McGowan. “What did I say? Did I say something wrong?”

  “No,” Buddy replied cautiously. “Not wrong. Only something that shouldn’t be mentioned.”

  “Meaning what?” Hands on pear-shaped waist, Dr. Chase looked as though he would pout. Then comprehension struck him and he brightened readily. “Oh. That’s it. You’ve got something laid on, right? About Ben, I mean.”

  “Yes, Doctor,” Ike McGowan, as senior, elected to say. “Only it is not to leave this command post, understood?”

  “Sure. But there’s no such thing as a disloyal Rebel. Except for communications security, we’ve never had such classifications of things as being secret or top secret.”

  “That’s right, Dr. Chase,” Ike agreed. “Of course you’ve heard about the darling little kids we took in? Well, there’s nothing to say that there aren’t more of their kind, and adults, at that, among the civilians that have been filtering in since we stomped the black-shirts.”

  Lamar Chase looked thunderstruck. “You’re right, certainly. I’ll keep it to myself. I’m glad, though. Glad Ben ain’t gonna get to find out if we can get along without him.”

  Buddy relented and revealed more to the good doctor. “The Nazis who have him aren’t at all shy about using the radio. We’re working on a way to pinpoint Dad’s exact location. When we have that, we do something about it, and damn fast.”

  Jesus Diguez Mendoza Hoffman had not gotten to so high a pinnacle by being ignorant of men and their motivations. It took him less than a day to figure out what Peter Volmer might be up to. Coupled with reports of lowered morale among the Rebels, he made a decision to act in a manner that should ensure the unquestioning loyalty of the troops and the adulation of the people at home. He had not been made aware that General Rasbach had all but been thrown out of South America and that the Nazi governments were in utter disarray.

  “The time has come,” he declared at a general staff conference, “to go on the offensive. Our forces are to start immediate counterattacks at Billings, Montana, and Thermopolis and Riverton, Wyoming. The objective is to push the demoralized Rebels back beyond Miles City and Cheyenne. There are to be no faltering, no defeats, no retreats. Any officer failing to carry out his assigned mission will be shot.”

  “It’s like the old days on the Eastern Front, in the Third Reich,” Col. Jouquin Webber confided to Manfred Spitz, the G-3, after the conference broke up. “My grandfather used to tell me about it.”

  “Yes. We’ve all heard . . . stories. Hitler got a bomb in his bunker for it, didn’t he?”

  “Are you suggesting — ?” Webber blurted back, white-faced.

  “No — no. This is a new Führer, a new Reich, and an entirely different sort of enemy.” Pea-soup-thick mockery could be read in his eyes.

  Hoffman’s new offensive began within fourteen hours. In a lightning strike, Thermopolis and HQ Company got pushed out of Riverton, and then Thermopolis. They regrouped at Shoshoni and reported they were holding what they had left. Colonel West had his battalions scattered from Billings in front of a blitzkrieg that pitted a hundred main battle tanks against his dozen. To conserve precious resources — ground could always be retaken — he was forced to retreat. The ignominious run from the enemy ended on the Custer Battlefield.

  Gen. Georgi Alexandrovich Striganov found out what it must have been for the Germans facing Marshal Zukov outside Stalingrad. Reeling from a continual artillery pounding, his valiant troops wound up with their backs to the rock walls of the Bighorn Mountains, outside Sheridan, Wyoming.

  Gen. Cecil Jefferys, still deeply grieved over the capture of Ben Raines, read the reports of crumbling Rebel resistance all through the northern portion of the Nazi’s vaunted Eastern Wall. That bothered him even more. For all practical, military purposes, he knew he had to consider Ben as expendable and dead. He was spoiling to get into the fight. But he also had to admit he had a great reluctance to assume overall command of Rebel forces.

  “Dammit, Annie,” he blared to his aide. “What’s gotten into these people? They’re actin’ like Ben Raines is all there is to the Rebel program for a new start. Can’t commanders command and troops follow orders and fight?”

  “Don’t ask me, General. If you want my opinion, I’d say it’s you who should be commanding about now. These people need a real leader. With General
Raines — out of the picture, it has to be you.”

  “I want to fight those Nazi bastards. Want it in the worst way. You know that.”

  “I do. But you are still thinkin’ of taking your troops into combat as a subordinate commander. You’re in charge now. Ben — the general would want it that way. He put you here for that purpose. Don’t you think he’s countin’ on your right now?”

  General Jefferys gave her the oddest expression. Then his mahogany face split in a broad grin. “By God, girl, I think you’re right.”

  Dr. Lamar Chase stood in the aisle of the recovery ward of the field hospital outside Las Cruces, New Mexico. In his agitation, he used his clipboard like a conductor’s baton. “You are going to get out of those trousers and get back in bed. Dan, you suffered a fractured skull, severe concussion. Hell, man, you admit yourself to still having moments of blackout.”

  Col. Dan Gray glowered at the doctor and reached for his shirt. “Doctor, we all have to do what we can to infuse our Rebels with new spirit. I can’t, I won’t, accept the fact that Ben Raines is already a casualty of this war with the Nazis. Dammit, Lamar, we’re losing on every goddamned front but this one. If there’s any way of getting Ben back, do you want him to come home to that?”

  Dr. Chase pondered that a moment. “Jesus, you’re right. But, I’m not authorizing you for full duty.”

  “I don’t expect to return to full duty. I want to coordinate with Ike and with Buddy, participate in the planning. Do something to restore morale. If these kids see a man who is technically still on medical rehab reporting for duty every day, it’ll spark them to new efforts. At least I’m hoping it will.”

  Ben Raines stared at the wall opposite the bunk on which he sat. His left hand throbbed. At least he didn’t have red lines shooting up his arm. The amputation had not gotten infected. He felt drained, weaker and more helpless than ever in his life. His mind snapped out of neutral when he heard the scrape of the bar outside the door to his cell and the rattle of a key in the lock.

  Heinz Gruber/Jimmy Riggs stood in the doorway when Ben looked up. The man and the boy studied each other for a long, silent minute. Then Heinz/Jimmy stepped into the cubicle. He had yet to speak when Ben broke the silence.

  “How can you do it?”

  “What? Keep you prisoner? It’s easy.” Heinz/Jimmy giggled.

  “I mean, how can you wear that uniform, knowing what it represents?”

  “I love what it stands for, General Raines,” the boy glowingly replied.

  “Perhaps you’re not old enough to understand. Your father was yet to be born when Hitler spread his poison over Europe.”

  Heinz/Jimmy’s face flushed. “Adolf Hitler was a god! I didn’t come here to discuss my beliefs.”

  Ben persisted. “What about your, ah, relationship with Peter Volmer?”

  Heinz/Jimmy hesitated, shrugged, would not meet Ben’s eyes. “Nothin’ wrong, I guess. Pet — Field Marshal Volmer got a promotion from the Führer himself. He is a powerful man, a field marshal,” he repeated. “He can — have whatever he wants.” The youngster’s lower lips trembled. “M-my folks sent me to him, to raise as he wanted me to be. Th — they said it was a great honor.” He squared his shoulders, recovered his childish arrogance. “I c-came here to give you the latest news. Your Rebels have lost the will to fight. They are being driven out of every place they captured recently. All — all except the regiment your son commands. They are fighting like crazy men. But even they are not making advances. The Rebels are helpless without you, General Raines. They will soon collapse.”

  Ben stared at the boy, not wanting to believe. His face must have reflected his thoughts, because Heinz/Jimmy blurted suddenly, “It’s all true. It’s not propaganda. I — thought you would want to know.”

  “You haven’t done me any favors, Jimmy,” Ben said sadly.

  “I am Heinz Gruber, Standartenführer of the New American Reich!”

  “Banner Leader, eh?” Ben translated the rank. “No, you are Jimmy Riggs, a troubled little boy. I don’t hate you, Jimmy. It’s your parents I’d like to kill for turning you over to that sick monster, Volmer. And I’m willing to bet your name really is Jimmy Riggs.”

  “I am Heinz Gruber!” Jimmy shouted again, over his shoulder, on the verge of tears, as he rushed through the door and slammed it shut behind him.

  “God help you, boy,” Ben said to himself, and he meant it.

  Long hours crawled by after Heinz/Jimmy left Ben alone. Haunted by the news of Rebel defeats, Ben found himself forced to reevaluate his importance to the Rebel cause. He had been so certain that the Rebel leadership would settle in, after a short period of adjustment, and carry on should anything happen to him. He wasn’t after all immortal. The day would come when he was too old to carry on the affairs of the Rebel state. Or he would be dead.

  Granted, his cold logic told him, that would ideally not happen during the middle of a difficult campaign. War should end some time. Hopefully before he became unable to administer the Rebel army and its territories. Ben recalled his speculation on the hillside in Kansas. It looked now as though he would not live to again see those amber waves of grain.

  No, he had failed the Rebel cause. He had not properly prepared his co-commander and his subordinates for the ultimate time when he was gone. As it stands, he compelled himself to accept, they are not able to go on in a business-as-usual manner.

  Ben didn’t like the conclusions he reached. But after hours of reflection, he had to accept, at least intellectually, their validity. It gave him cause to do something else he had been neglecting to do. He had to plan an escape.

  TWELVE

  Three guards came to Ben Raines’s cell with Peter Volmer. Volmer seemed subdued, his bald dome shiny with sweat when he removed his black SS hat. His manner was somber, too, not so ebullient as before.

  “You’re coming with us,” he announced to Ben.

  “I have a choice?” Ben prodded.

  “Don’t fence with me, Ben Raines.”

  “Where are we going?”

  “You are going to make another radio broadcast. A very important one. It has become evident that resistance continues, albeit lacking the spirit with which you fired Rebel hearts, General. So, it is time for all of North America to hear of your captivity.”

  Volmer and his SS guards took Ben from the hacienda. In an Argentine model of the Kugelwagen, they drove across the flat mesa top to the distant town of Villa Ahumada. There, a tall steel-girder antenna mast advertised the presence of a commercial broadcast radio station. At Ben’s appraising look, Volmer elaborated on the station.

  “This is not any mere jerkwater Mexican broadcast studio. Oh, no. Here we have a one-hundred-thousand-watt clear-channel station. I have made arrangements for other transmitters on your Rebel tactical nets to be available also. You will speak into a battery of microphones. Quite impressive, wouldn’t you say?”

  “What if I refuse to speak?” Ben taunted.

  “You’ll speak, or you’ll scream for mercy.”

  Inside the building, they went through a thick double-door baffle into a small studio. An array of microphones faced the slant glass window of the control room. Volmer began speaking to the men at the console.

  “You may begin the music now.” An aide handed him several sheets of paper.

  Two SS thugs positioned Ben beside Volmer behind the microphones. Ben wondered how anyone could look so smug, yet have deep worry furrows on his brow. Volmer scanned the typed lines on the page and looked up for his cue. A red light flashed on and beside it a sign that read ON AIR. An SS man in white shirt and black tie raised his arm, elbow crooked, then snapped his forearm down, index finger pointing at Volmer.

  “This is Field Marshal Peter Volmer of the New Army of Liberation. Today you will be witness to a momentous occasion. The notorious war criminal, General Ben Raines, has been brought here to announce his capitulation and the end of the so-called Rebel government. I give you, now, General Ben Rai
nes.”

  Ben remained silent. Volmer shot him an angry look. Ben gave Volmer a crooked smile. After an embarrassingly long period of dead air, Volmer snarled angrily at Ben.

  “Get on with it, General Raines. You will order your troops to lay down their arms. You will order all Rebel civil authority to surrender their territory to representatives of the New American Reich. Do so at once!”

  “You can go to hell,” Ben said levelly. Then, speaking rapidly, Ben had his own message for the Rebels. “I call on all Rebels to rally around your commanders and fight to your utmost, using all means at your disposal.”

  “Get him out of here!” Volmer shouted, completely off balance.

  “Fight as though I were there beside each and every one of you,” Ben continued as the SS guards dragged him away.

  Out in the corridor, after Volmer had attempted to regain some of the effect he had hoped to create, Ben faced the shaken new field marshal. Volmer was white-faced with rage.

  “You’ll not do that to me again,” the American Nazi chief declared. “I’m going to break you, Ben Raines. I’m going to turn your mind to pudding.” To his aide, he barked, “Get on the radio to the hacienda. Tell them to prepare the sensory-deprivation chamber.”

  Fuck this! Cecil Jefferys decided. He had heard the broadcast and Ben’s message. Heart surgery or no, if Ben wanted the Rebel army to go balls to the wall, he had to be in the field.

  “Dr. Chase has given strict instructions,” Cecil’s doctor protested. “You are not to resume full duty status for at least another month. General Jefferys, I simply cannot let you return to full duty, let alone lead a force into a combat situation at present.”

  “Sorry, Doc, this time you have nothing to say about it,” Cecil told him, dark face alight with his eagerness to get into harness. “Ben Raines is a prisoner of that Nazi scum, they’ll probably kill him for that broadcast. That makes me Commander in Chief of the Rebel army. I intend to take that army all the way to fucking South America if I have to in order to snuff out every last one of those bastards.”