Robert Conroy
Page 31
Tibbetts was pleased that the temporary base was pretty well complete. Men and supplies were housed in a host of Quonset huts. His ground crews had all been shuttled in and he had a full complement of supplies. Even better, the scientists had arrived, and that meant the nuclear material would soon arrive and then be flown to England. He understood that it was coming by warship, the heavy cruiser Indianapolis. Since the Germans had surrendered all their U-boats, the Atlantic was as safe as a pond. Arrival of the nuclear material would end his crews’ period of training and put them into the cauldron. Perhaps, if this bomb worked as the scientists expected, they would be the cauldron itself.
Everyone who knew about the atomic bomb, including Tibbetts, wondered what their target would be. He didn’t think it would be a German city, as they were already pretty well destroyed. He had seen the figures and they staggered him. Bremerhaven was 79 percent destroyed, and Bonn 83 percent, and Hamburg 75 percent. Ironically, Berlin was listed at only 33 percent destroyed by bombing, which was a testimony to the futility of trying to wipe out truly large cities from the air. While he sometimes wondered who went around and counted ruins, he had no reason to doubt the results. The major German cities no longer existed as viable targets. Besides, he reminded himself, we are now at war with Russia, not Germany.
Most of his people had put their money on targets inside Russia, and he had to admit some fondness for that idea. Moscow and Leningrad were everybody’s favorites and there had been some conventional bombing attacks on them. Leningrad was closest and much easier to hit, but there really weren’t many military targets around there, except some navy bases, and the Russian navy, such as it was, had stayed home for this war. Moscow was the capital and contained the military headquarters, and would normally be a juicy target. Unfortunately, it was so far inland and, therefore, so well protected by guns and planes, that the few attempts to bomb it had suffered badly.
There had been three attacks on Moscow totaling 500 bombers that had lost a total of 135 planes. Unacceptable, Tibbetts thought, totally unacceptable. If he were to launch a nuclear assault against Moscow those numbers meant there was the high probability that he would lose a bomber that carried a nuclear bomb, whether it was disguised as a photo plane or not. With so few bombs available, not to forget the highly trained crews, he could not risk the huge cost of failure.
Logically then, that left tactical targets, and they were in a constant state of flux. Tactical targets had the annoying habit of moving.
Tibbetts would have to give considerable thought to what he might suggest as a target. That is, he thought wryly, if anyone would accept targeting input from a mere colonel, even if he was supposed to fly the plane and head the mission. Well, he knew he had access to Ike and he had information about how the bombs might cause damage when they detonated. Perhaps it was time to call in some favors.
ELISABETH WOLF TWIRLED in her skirt and laughed as Logan stared at her white thighs. “Thank you for the razor, Jack. That’s the first time in months that I’ve been able to shave my legs.”
Logan flushed. “You’re welcome.” He still wasn’t comfortable talking strictly feminine topics. First body odor and showering, and now leg shaving. What was his world coming to? Apparently such discussions came more easily to Europeans than they did to comparatively puritanical Americans. The last time Lis had worn the skirt, he had noticed the obvious fact that she hadn’t shaved her legs in a long time. While some of the blond German women could get away with it, a dark-haired girl like Lis could not. He’d been told that many European women didn’t shave as a matter of course.
An airdrop had brought them an abundance of safety razors and blades. More than enough to share, especially since General Miller had not revoked his permission to grow beards. Many of the soldiers, Logan included, had gotten fond of their furry growth, and Miller was keenly attuned to what he could do for his men to make them happy in what was now openly referred to as Goddamn Potsdam.
Once again, they were outside in the warm sun. Elisabeth stopped her impromptu dance routine and sat down beside him on the rickety bench. Technically, he was still on duty but the bunker was only a short distance away and in plain sight. Bailey would call if anything came up. Casual arrangements like this were common up and down the perimeter, and Jack wasn’t the only one in the company doing it.
“You know, Jack, it wasn’t always like this. Once upon a time, my family and I were really quite comfortable. Regardless of where we were and even in the depths of the Depression, we always had enough money to buy both necessities and a few luxuries. Father was high enough in the diplomatic hierarchy to command a decent income, and we had rental properties that provided other money. I never had to do without pretty dresses, nice shoes, cosmetics, books, anything.” She lifted her foot, again showing a little bit of leg. “I was even able to shave my legs whenever I wanted to.” She laughed wryly. “Of course, as a young girl I never wanted to because it burned my skin. I tried to convince my mother that only evil women shaved.”
“Did it work?”
“Of course not. She said if I didn’t I would look like a bear. Did I look like a bear?”
Jack put his arm around her waist and pulled her more tightly to him. “Yeah, and the type of bear I wanted to hibernate with.”
She jabbed him in the stomach. “Be nice. Besides, it isn’t even winter.”
“I just hope we’re not here in the winter,” he said sincerely. Like most of the men in the garrison, he was astonished at the length of time they had been in Potsdam and the fact that no end was in sight to their precarious existence. As he had thought and said so many times before, these days in the sun were a blessing to be enjoyed while they could, since they surely could not last.
“Me neither,” she said. “I want to get back to someplace that’s real. Not just for me, but for Pauli. He deserves a better life than this. He needs a home, playmates, and a school. I may have been spoiled with what we had amid the privations of the Depression, but it wasn’t an evil spoiling. Surely there can’t be anything wrong with having loving parents.
“We weren’t plutocrats,” she added, “just normal people trying to live their lives. Now look at us. We’ve been reduced to little more than beggars living in caves and wearing rags.”
She rested her head on his shoulder. Sometimes she was overwhelmed by the enormity of the disasters that had befallen her, and who could blame her. She was still only twenty, an age when many young women of her social and economic class were still single and in school. Instead she found herself in a refugee camp in a besieged city, wearing cast-off clothing made from curtains, eating a foreign army’s rations, washing infrequently, and being unabashedly grateful when a friend gave her something so she could perform an act of personal hygiene.
Worse was the feeling of helplessness. What would the future bring? For her and the others with her, was there a future at all? At any time a Russian shell could crash down and end any discussions of the future. It was something they had to live with and deal with. Thus, they were relatively unconcerned about sitting outside. If death came, so be it. Otherwise, there was still a semblance of life that had to be lived.
“Jack? Tell me about your home again.”
“America? It’s not like Canada. America’s a magical land that’s full of good things to eat and the streets are all paved with gold.”
“Jack. Please?”
He hugged her and nuzzled her cheek. “Okay.” Softly, gently, he again told her of his life. It had been rough but not desperate. His father had worked for the railroad and spent a couple of years riding the freight trains as a railroad cop chasing off the bums and tramps. He did not tell her what his father had told him of the starving young teenage boys and girls he came across and what they did to survive. That didn’t sound like America. He also didn’t tell her of the times his father had to club a vagrant senseless because he wouldn’t leave, or because the bum wanted to throw his father off the moving train. That wasn’t Amer
ica, either.
He told her how his family had persevered, how they had grown some of their own food, sewn worn clothing, and lived as frugally and as moneyless as they could during the dark years of the early and mid-thirties. Jack’s father had never really lost his job; however, there had been long stretches of time when the railroad “ didn’t need him” and he waited at home for circumstances to change. There really wasn’t much use looking for another job; there weren’t any.
Finally, in 1940, things got better. His father got a job in the administration end of the railroad and they moved to a small house in Port Huron, not far from the tracks. They could see Sarnia, Ontario, across the St. Clair River, which formed the boundary between the United States and Canada. It was easy to watch the cars and people on the other side and wonder where they were going and what they were doing. It was also easy to take a small boat across or take the Bluewater Bridge, which had connected the two countries since 1938. Until the war came, crossing to Canada, either officially or unofficially, was quite easy.
“Did you ever go there, to Sarnia?” he asked.
She shook her head. “Montreal and Quebec, yes, but not Sarnia. And the only time I got to the States was a visit to Niagara Falls when we went across to the American side for a couple of hours. We were disappointed. The best view is from the Canadian side.”
Jack agreed. He had been there too. Idly, he wondered if he might have seen her. They compared dates and found they were years apart on their visits.
“I’ll take you back there,” he said.
“I’d like that.” Her voice was soft and he realized she was falling asleep. He guessed there wasn’t much rest for her some nights in what amounted to a crowded barracks. Sometimes it wasn’t so pleasant sleeping in that bunker with his men when one of them had a bad night or got hold of some liquor. Not all the gardens being grown were for food crops. Some enterprising souls had started making a near-lethal variety of moonshine.
That he could handle. Drunks were easy. But it was difficult to deal with a man his age who had suddenly given in to despair at the thought of ever leaving Potsdam. It was fairly easy to maintain a degree of bravado during the day, but ugly truths and nightmares came out during the dark hours. When that occurred, even the strongest of men was known to cry. No one mentioned it in the morning—their turn might be next.
Jack knew that he had to get Lis and the boy out of Potsdam. He had no illusions. The American army had been defeated and was retreating away from them. Sure, they might come back at some time in the future, but, based on what had happened in the Pacific, that could be years. The Russians would not grant them years of safety and the airdrops could not last forever. Sooner or later the Russians would attack again. Maybe the next one could be beaten off as well, but what about the following one, or the one after that?
As a soldier, he could hold out some hope that he wouldn’t be killed, that, instead, he would be taken prisoner and someday returned to America. He might live, and where there is the possibility of life there is hope.
But what about Lis and the boy? Pauli would probably be lucky. He would likely be killed outright. But Lis? He had heard the stories. Most of the German women in Potsdam had been raped by Russians and had made plans to kill themselves before that happened again.
Lis hadn’t mentioned anything—some topics were still taboo—but he knew she must have considered it. He could not bear the thought of her spread-eagled on the ground while a line of grinning Russians waited their turn.
He had to get her out of Potsdam. How? he bitterly asked himself. They were surrounded by a river and tens of thousands of Russians. If she could sprout wings she might have a chance.
“Did you say anything?” she asked groggily, and he realized he must have said something out loud.
He kissed her on the forehead. “Nah. Must’ve been mumbling to myself.”
Elisabeth shook her head and roused herself. “I have to get up and see your dear Sergeant Krenski.”
Logan chuckled. He saw nothing dear at all about First Sergeant Krenski, who seemed to worship Lis. “Why?”
She stood and stretched like cat. “Because I am teaching the nice man how to read. He isn’t dumb, you know. He just was too embarrassed to do anything after he succeeded in leaving school without learning a thing. Really, you ought to do something about your schools.”
Jack swatted her on the rear and she stuck out her tongue. Lucky Krenski, he thought, and what the hell is he doing with my girl?
BURKE AND GODWIN waited in the chill dawn alongside the hastily built airstrip. It was long, very long, and Burke wondered just what the hell needed so much real estate for takeoff and landing.
Godwin was there as a representative of the RAF, and Burke was there because it was presumed he was an emissary from Marshall. Basically, this was an American Eighth Air Force show, and scores of air force personnel ranged the area. Antiaircraft guns pointed skyward, although their crews stood several feet away from their weapons lest there be some tragic mistake.
“I still can’t believe this is happening,” Godwin said.
Burke chuckled. “Hasn’t happened yet, now has it?”
“If this is a trap,” Godwin said. “We are dead.”
It wasn’t a trap, Burke reassured himself. There weren’t that many important people present to make it worth a trap or a betrayal. At least that’s what he hoped.
A large flight of P-51s flew overhead with a roar. They were the van of the escort. Even though unseen, a multitude of other American fighters provided flank and rear support.
Godwin jabbed Burke’s arm. “There.”
A dark shape had descended from the clouds and was approaching the landing strip. Instead of the roar of a propeller plane, this had more of a singing sound. “Oh my God,” muttered Burke.
The strange plane touched down gently, showing the pilot’s obvious skill. “I can’t even get into bed that softly,” Burke said.
They openly gaped at the plane. It more resembled a shark than anything else. And there were no propellers. The plane was a jet, the dreaded ME-262.
Behind the first plane came a second and a third, and others queued up for their turn to land. The hatch of the lead jet opened and a man in his thirties wearing the rank of Luftwaffe general climbed out and jumped down. He looked around and spotted Burke. Godwin stepped behind. The turnover was to be from the Germans to the Americans.
Burke was a little befuddled. He knew what was supposed to happen, but there was an air corps general a mile away who was in the wrong spot and wondering how the hell to get to the right one without losing his dignity. Additional German jets were landing and lining up alongside the first one.
The German held out his hand, and without thinking, Burke took it. He’d never shaken hands with a Nazi before. But then, this general was supposed to be one of the good guys. That is, if there really were any good Germans.
“Colonel, I am Lieutenant General Adolf Galland, and you Americans will soon have all the German jets I commanded. At least those that survived,” he said sadly. “I trust you will use them wisely. I also trust you have fuel for them.”
Godwin responded. He noted that Galland was not shocked by his face. Obviously, the Luftwaffe had its own share of burned wretches.
“General, we have fuel for our own jet program and our scientists are confident it can be modified for your jets.”
Development of the British Meteor jet lagged well behind the ME-262. “I hope so,” said Galland. “If not, we might as well have blown them up on the runway.”
CHAPTER 24
Natalie Holt responded impatiently to the sound of the doorbell. It was ten o’clock in the morning, and she was up and about cleaning the large apartment. Ordinarily on a holiday like the Fourth of July she would be preparing to visit friends, and she still intended to see her mother later in the day, but so much of the time this morning was being spent in busywork to keep her mind off of how much she missed Steve Burke.
“Can I come in?”
Natalie opened the door. Forbes had been with her when they had discovered Walter Barnes’s suicide, and the shared experience had helped an easy bond to form. The fact that neither was too fond of his boss, Tom Haven, was another plus. She noted he was wearing a dark business suit on Independence Day, so the visit was not social.
“Paul, unless I miss my bet, today is Wednesday, the Fourth of July. I know there’s a war on, but don’t you people get any time off at all?”
“Rest is only for the wicked. Not good guys like me.”
Natalie offered coffee, which he accepted, and she slightly regretted that she was dressed so casually in old white tennis shorts and a T-shirt that said U.S. Navy. She had been mopping the floor, not preparing to be a hostess.
“I’m assuming the obvious, Paul, that your visit is official and rather in a rush.”
“Very true on both counts. I got a call at home about an hour ago from your favorite lecher, Agent Tom Haven, who informed me that I had to leave my wife and children and see you immediately, Fourth of July or no Fourth of July.”
“How charming. About what? Have you discovered another closet homosexual or unrepentant socialist in the State Department?”
“I hope not. I want to talk about Steven Burke.”