by David King
"Dumkopf," Dietrich rasped at Kummel. "Do not tell me the room could not have been entered when it was. One by one, I will answer your obtuse questions. First, you have heard of passkeys. Second, Hansteuffel was alseep on the floor the first time we returned. This Hansteuffel of yours is undoubtedly a man of many talents. Among them must be the ability to sleep on his feet with his eyes open. As for the guard at my door, I would not put it past him to have checked this office a time or two for a swallow of brandy during the many times this night we have been out and in. Third, or whatever point this may be, have you heard of confederates? We know the Rat Patrol operates by pairs. Two or more of them came into this building and concealed themselves while the two dressed as Arabs lured all of us with the exception of your sleeping beauty, Hansteuffel, away. These are the only answers, verreicht? Take Hansteuffel out and shoot him."
Kummel flushed and sat as straight as if someone had rammed a broomstick down his back. He brought his feet together flat on the floor.
"No one was hidden in the building, Hans," he said evenly. "With three guards always on duty, it is impossible."
"Don't you listen to me, Kummel? Are you as crazy as the others? At first perhaps they were not hidden in the building but only near it. While we searched for the two of them, the entry was unguarded. I told you, that is when they entered. With your Hansteuffel here, nothing is impossible." Dietrich pounded the table with his fist. "It is the way it happened."
"Ja, Herr Hauptmann Dietrich," Kummel said between clenched teeth.
"Then have him shot at once," Dietrich ordered. "And another matter, where was your guard at the entrance that the town suddenly is overrun with Americans? Have him shot with Hansteuffel."
"If the captain will permit me to point out," Kummel said in a tightly contained voice, "we cannot spare men for a firing squad if we are to organize a thorough search for Wilson and the others."
"Ah, the others," Dietrich said with a steely glint in his eyes. "You are chief of my security, Kummel. Where is Wilson? Where are the others? Why have they not been found? How many do they total? Four? Six? A dozen? Tell me, Kummel, how many Americans are there wandering like tourists about my headquarters?" Both fists pounded the table. "Where are they, Kummel, where are they?"
"They have not left the town, mein Herr," Kummel said.
"Ja, of that I could not be less certain." Dietrich's eyes narrowed dangerously. "We need a new security officer here, I think, perhaps."
"The entrance has been guarded, Herr Hauptmann," Kummel said, face crimson. "The walls cannot be leapt over as you would a hedge and the Americans we chased were not carrying extension ladders. The walls are patrolled at night both inside and out. Within the hour every man in the unit will be organized for a building to building search of the entire community. I already have sent for my deputy, Lieutenant Emil Bemdt, who will conduct the operation under my direct supervision. He will report here any minute."
"Every man in the unit!" Dietrich screamed through his hoarseness. "May I remind you, Kummel, that I am planning a new offensive? Are you telling me the war must halt while my troops become policemen?"
Kummel pressed his lips together until a white line showed about them. He did not say a word. He could not. Dietrich fell against the back of his chair, took a deep breath and held it a moment before he expelled it in a tired sigh.
"No reason we both should suffer apoplexy. A little brandy, Wilhelm," he said wearily, motioning toward the half-filled bottle that fronted two emptied bottles. When he had gulped the full glass of liquor Kummel placed in his hand, he looked at Schmitt, standing at attention with his chin tucked in the folds of his underchin. "Oh, for God's sake, relax, Schmitt," he said. He reached into his pocket and tossed a ring of heavy keys that landed with a clatter on the table. "Take Hansteuffel and lock him in the interrogation room. Detail a twenty-four-hour guard. We will deal with him when the Americans have been captured and we learn exactly what took place."
Schmitt bent as if he were making a formal bow, picked up the keys, shot his right arm and palm forward and said, "Heil!"
Dietrich glowered at him and handed his glass to Kummel for a refill. When Schmitt had marched Hansteuffel from the room, Dietrich looked at Kummel.
"Detain the guard who was on duty at the entrance last night," he said harshly. "We will find out exactly what took place when the Americans are apprehended. They will talk, you understand? It is your assignment to interrogate them." Then Dietrich leaned an elbow on the table and rubbed his palm over his face. He was exhausted. He smiled wanly and said in a friendly voice, "Fill your glass, Wilhelm, and tell me what you plan. Then let us each have an hour's sleep. There is an extra bedroom here I will let you have."
"Ja, my captain," Kummel said, unbending a little. When he'd swallowed some brandy, he shook a Camel package at Dietrich and again slumped in his chair. "Ach, vas eine Nacht," he exclaimed and dragged hard at his cigarette. "Very well, Hans, I will tell you what has been done and what will be done. No one has left Sidi Abd, not even a true Arab. The entrance has been closely guarded from the moment of the first alarm and the patrols about the wall doubled. When Lieutenant Bemdt reports to me—" Kummel frowned and consulted his watch. "He is long overdue. Well, when Lieutenant Bemdt reports to me, I shall order him to conduct a thorough investigation of every building, every rat hole, garden and rooftop. Groups of buildings as they are cleared will be sealed off by patrols so the Americans will not be able to find a refuge by doubling back. Before the sun has leached its zenith"—he extended his fingers and slowly clenched them in a tight fist—"we shall have the swine in our grasp like that. And believe me, Hans, I am filled with gratitude at the opportunity to conduct the interrogations. This has become a personal matter."
Dietrich's lip curled. "With me also, Wilhelm. I want them taken alive at all costs. When you have finished with them, I would like a few days of conversation before I turn them over to the Gestapo." He finished his brandy and placed a hand on the table, half rising. "Well, shall we get a little rest?"
"You go on, Hans," Kummel said. "Tell me where my bed is. I must talk with Bemdt, you know. I wonder what can be keeping him."
"I am so tired already it had fled my mind," Dietrich said and stood limply. "All right, Wilhelm, I leave matters in your hands. The first door to your left in the hallway. In one hour, I shall see you downstairs in the diningroom."
In his rooms, Dietrich tugged off his boots, removed his belt and tunic, loosened his collar and breeches and fell back on the divan that served him as bed. His eyes were closing before his head touched the silken pillow but it seemed not a moment had passed before someone was shaking him from his draggedlike sleep.
"The hour has passed already?" he asked groggily and then his mind alerted itself. He sat bolt upright. "You have found them!"
Kummel stepped back from the divan, cold blue eyes like agates and thin lips grim.
"The hour has passed," he said and his voice was metallic. "I have waited until the last possible minute to tell you this. One of the sentries from last night has disappeared."
"The Americans?" Dietrich shouted.
Kummel did not answer this. Instead he said, "And Lieutenant Bemdt is gone as well."
7
Troy scuttled sidewise like a crab from his rooftop observation post near the entrance along the back line of crooked buildings. His eyes were sore and bleary but they wandered without ceasing: left, front, right; right, front, left. Forgotten were cold, cramped limbs and a stomach that growled with hunger. Dawn was plucking away the veil of night and the roofs no longer offered shelter. Not only was the entrance guarded but Jerry patrols now ringed the wall. He'd sent Tully and Wilson back to the building against the Jerry headquarters as their safest haven while he'd spent the dark hours prowling and probing, following the movement of the patrol from above the soldiers' heads, and returned to watch the entrance for new activity. If only they had brought a scaling hook, he thought again as he had all night, th
ey could have been out of the enclosure before the dawn. Now the light of day would disclose them unless he could quickly find a place to hide, some manure heap, compost pit or kitchen oven.
He slithered over one wall after another, running ahead of the patrols he knew the day would see fanning out to pluck burnoose and veil from every Arab, to prod every bundle of rags with bayonet, sweep every rooftop clear of heaps of refuse, salvaged tins and wooden crates. A scaling hook, a scaling hook, the phrase ran through his mind like an obscene refrain. Last night it would have meant escape. This morning it might mean safety, the means to reach the one place he could think of where they might hide, and he was not even sure of that. Where could he find or how could he fashion, a scaling hook? And do it right now before patrols entered Sidi Abd and every wall and roof was under watchful eyes.
Below in the alleys he heard the shambling feet and spiritless grumbling of the night patrol returning to the tent area and he scrambled ahead. On the crazy corner where the alley turned its flank to the entrance, Troy's smirched and tattered robe caught between his knee and ankle and he tripped, falling backwards, wrenching himself forward just before he toppled from the wall. He damned the disguise. Disguise? No longer did the burnoose and robe offer concealment. But the garments might throw the searching parties off the trail for a few minutes. He pulled off the cloth and headpiece, wadded them and flung them far down on the opposite side of the passageway. They settled and draped neatly on the sill of an open window. Troy grinned and ran unimpeded in his thin, bleached khakis. His canteen bumped lightly at his hip and reminded him that he was thirsty. He would drink soon enough but where to find a scaling hook? What Arabian implement, what piece of Jerry equipment could he use to fashion one? The Jerries probably carried a stock of scaling hooks to use on walled towns such as this but he had no idea where their supply dump was and even if he had, there was no time to go there.
Wilson was sleeping with his head on Tully's shoulder against the wall of the building that housed the German headquarters. The Bowie knife was bare in Tully's hand.
Troy snorted, "Were you going to take them on with that, a whole patrol?"
"I got better sense than that, Sarge," Tully said, shaking his head and smiling bleakly. "If they'd found us, I was going to slit Wilson's throat so he couldn't tell them nothing."
Troy nodded his head approvingly.
"What's the scoop?" Tully asked.
"They'll be sifting the town with a sieve in minutes," Troy said. "We'd have a chance if I could find a scaling hook."
"Over the wall?" Tully asked.
"Uh-uh, too late for that." Troy pointed to the roof of the two-story German headquarters building. "You'd spend the day up there."
"Hell, Sarge," Tully said. "You still got the rope. If you think we'd be safe up there, we don't need no scaling hook."
"I'm no fly," Troy said tartly.
"Well, now look," Tully said. He stood and Wilson started to fall to the side, caught himself and sat up sleepy-eyed. Tully stood away from the wall with his feet apart, leaned forward with his back inclined and forearms against the wall. "Now you climb up on my shoulders and brace yourself. Wilson can walk right up us like a stepladder."
Troy measured off thirteen or so feet to the top of the parapet with his eyes.
"I believe you're right," he said. "You could just about reach the top of that wall with your hands and pull yourself over. Come on, time's a-wasting, let's move. Only thing, Wilson's on the bottom. You next. I'm going over. Someone's got to anchor the rope for you two monkeys."
Without a word, Wilson assumed his stance against the wall.
"Just a minute," Troy said. "Tully, shed your robe."
He took the clothing, rolled them together and ran to the back side of the tiled rooftop. He hurled them into the narrow passage at the rear they had used the night before. It was, he noted with a wry smile, a cul-de-sac ending at the blank wall of a building.
Wilson and Tully both were in place and Troy crawled up Wilson's back and from his shoulders onto Tully. The ladder was shaky but it did not collapse. Standing wobbly-legged on Tully's shoulders, Troy reached for the parapet. His fingertips were short an inch. He lifted on his toes and could get his fingers on the ledge but not with enough purchase to draw himself up.
"Give me another inch or two," he said.
Wilson slid his feet ahead, used his forearms to help his straighten and Tully did the same. Troy gripped the top of the wall with the lengths of his fingers, did a slow and trembling finger pullup, heaved and slipped one arm over the parapet. He got a grip with his other hand and lifted himself up and over.
"Whew," he said and lay on the roof, gulping air to stop the quivering in his arms. Then sitting beside the reservoir for added support, he threw the line, still looped about his waist, over the wall.
"Wilson first," he called softly and braced his legs. Tully must have boosted Wilson from his back because the unbearable, sweat-popping, dead weight pull of the lift lasted only a few seconds. With Wilson helping, they brought up Tully and then sat with their heads hanging between their knees until they had their wind back. When Troy lifted his head, Tully was studying the top of the reservoir.
"What's that?" he asked, pointing up.
A ledge about a foot wide extended skyward at a forty-five degree angle on all four sides.
"To catch rainwater," Troy said. "There are holes for it to run into the tank."
"You don't think they'll look for us up here, Troy?" Wilson asked. He seemed to be taking it calmly enough and for once, he wasn't trying to run the show.
"Of course they will," Troy said, "but it's going to be the last place they look and they won't search so thoroughly. Now give me a hand, Tully, and we'll see how our luck is running today."
He gripped the ledge that ran around the five-foot-high reservoir and swung himself on top of it. When Tully followed, they gripped the iron ring that was fitted into the cistern cover. After the weight of Wilson, lifting the concrete lid was like uncapping a bottle. Troy spread-eagled on the top of the tank and reached his arm into it. He did not touch water.
"Our luck is running," he said and grinned at Tully. "Now you hop in and tell me how deep it is. Wait, wait, I just remembered something." He pulled the rope up from the roof and slung it around his canteen. "Might as well fill up our canteens before you jump in the bathtub." He let the bottom of the canteen touch the floor of the reservoir, then brought the rope up and measured the wetness here on it. The water was about a foot deep. Troy filled Wilson's and Tully's canteens after he had filled his own.
"All right," he told Tully. "Get in there and sit down. Wilson, you hop in after Tully."
"We going to be able to breathe all right in there, Sarge?" Tully asked.
"It's not airtight," Troy said. "I told you about those holes for the rainwater."
"Uh, Troy," Wilson said. "You've done first rate up to now and I don't want you to think I'm complaining, but haven't you forgotten one thing?"
"What's that?" Troy asked.
"Once the three of us are inside, how are we going to get this lid back in place?"
"That could be managed," Troy said. "We'd leave the lid halfway in place and then a couple of us just edge it in the groove. But the three of us aren't going to be in there."
"No?" Wilson said with lifted eyebrows.
"No," Troy said. "I'm staying out. I'll be in the neighborhood. If they come up here and it looks as if they're getting warm, I'll hoot and holler and draw them off."
"You're going to get caught, Sarge," Tully said.
"Probably," Troy agreed and grinned. "But there's nothing in my head that's worth a damn to them.
"There's one thing," Wilson said quickly and furrowed his forehead. "You know where we are and they'll try to beat it out of you."
"Don't let that fret you," Troy said sharply. "I'll say you went over the wall with two other guys last night.
"But when you do get caught, all you've done is dela
y the end," Wilson said. "We'll not get out of here."
"I'll do my damnedest not to get caught," Troy said scornfully and turned to Tully. "All we want is to buy more time. Moffitt will be in tonight. When it's dark, the two of you lift off the lid and come on out. Work back toward the entrance on the rooftops. No telling what Moffitt will try to pull but keep alert for him. Now in with you."
Tully lowered himself through the hole and after he'd splashed, Wilson followed doubtfully. Troy shoved the cover almost into place.
"Oh, Tully," he said. "You know what to do if they should discover you?"
"Sure, Sarge," Tully drawled. "I'll take care of the CO."
"Boys," Wilson said and although his voice echoed hollowly in the tank, it was choked a little. "I just want you to know that I've never seen men so devoted to their commanding officer."
"Sure, Wilson," Troy said and pushed the lid in place. He started to gather the rope around his waist and then grinned. Leave the Jerries a trail to follow and they would not think of looking in the cistern. He untied the loop from his waist and tied one end of the line in a square knot to the iron ring. He threw the rope over the wall and went down it.
Crabbing on arms and knees, he lay at the front of the one-story building and saw, striding from headquarters the same officer who had watched Tully and him at the tavern. The German's face was set and gray in the bleak light of morning. He walked rapidly down the alley that led toward the entrance. A guard was stationed in front of the German headquarters but there seemed to be no patrol activity yet.
Troy had no illusions about the hounds and hare game he proposed to play. He knew the consequences. He would be tom to bits if the hounds caught up with him and he did not propose to sacrifice himself if it could be avoided. He retired to the rear of the building next to German headquarters to study his surroundings and the course he'd take when the chase started.