340
By straining on tiptoe, Ben Raines could marginally see out of the tiny slit that passed for a window in his cell. His view was of the inner courtyard. He saw a solitary, small figure sitting alone on a stone bench. Moonlight from a thin crescent high above gave a faerie glow to straw-white hair. For all his years in combat, Ben retained excellent hearing. He thought he detected soft sobs coming from the silhouetted boy. The shoulders rose and settled in time with the thin sound.
After a moment, Ben realized who this had to be. “Jimmy,” he whispered forcefully. “Jimmy Riggs. Come over here.”
Electrified, the boy sat rigidly upright. “Who? Who is that?”
“It’s General Ben, Jimmy. Come over here.”
“N-no. I c-can’t ever see you again,” Heinz/Jimmy stammered, uncomfortable at this confrontation.
“Why not? You were at the phony execution yesterday.”
“That’s different. I can’t see you because you are a -a bad influence.”
Surprise elevated one of Ben’s eyebrows. What had brought that on? “What do you mean by that?”
Reluctantly, Heinz/Jimmy rose and padded barefoot over to the wall that contained Ben’s cell. He wore summer pajamas, with short sleeves and legs. Hesitantly he knelt down and peered into Ben’s eyes. “I - I got to think—
341 ing about what you said. So I told Pet -Field Marshal Volmer that I didn’t want that any more. That you had said it was per-perverse. He got mad and slapped me and told me I was not to visit your cell anymore. Then he-we-anyway. An’-an’ he demoted me.” Tears ran down Jimmy’s cheeks. “The other kids don’t like me any more. I’m-all alone. Is it true everything about the Nazis is bad?”
“I believe it to be, Jimmy.”
“Wh-why did my folks want me to be one?” came his plaintive query.
“I can’t answer that. I do know that it is not too late for you. You can change. We have schools in Rebel-held country. They teach the truth and you are free to say what you believe. You can grow up normal and happy.”
“But they’re gonna kill you when the Fiihrer gets here.”
“When is that, Jimmy?”
“Sometime tonight, I think. Field Marshal Hoffman ordered the firing squad for tomorrow morning at sunrise.”
“Would you, could you, help me get away?” Ben pressed rather too quickly.
“Oh, General Ben, I would if-but it’s not possible. The guards and all, and I don’t have the key to your cell anymore.”
“Think of something, Jimmy. Think hard. We have until tomorrow morning.”
A sudden flurry of action made Jimmy jump like a frightened animal. Lights began to come on throughout the hacienda and harsh voices shouted orders. “It’s the Fiihrer. I’ve gotta go. But I’ll be back, General Ben. I promise.”
Without any more warning than the sudden appearance of the darker outline of hills against the blackness of night, the ground leapt up and slapped the soles of Jersey’s boots.
“Shit!” she grumbled to herself as she let go at the
342 knees, swiveled hips, and dropped into a regulation PLF. So much for standing landings at night.
Quickly Jersey came to her feet from the parachute-landing fall, ran around the suspension lines, and collapsed her chute. A twist and slap on the quick-release box and she was free of her harness. Thank God she had remembered to guesstimate when to release her GP bag and let it depend below her. With that on one leg, she would have been a case for splints and a cast.
Quietly she rigger-rolled her parachute and carried it in a bundle against her chest while she walked down the tie-off line for the missing general purpose carrier. She found it twenty feet away. A check of the compass on her right wrist and she oriented herself toward the proper edge of the drop zone and headed for the rally point.
“What kept you?” Buddy’s voice teased from the stygian shadows.
“I stopped off for high tea with the Queen of England,” Jersey quipped back.
“Okay. Get that chute in the hole with the others and let’s move out.”
Separated by a quarter-mile, the three teams advanced in parallel lines, zigging and zagging periodically to comply with the indicated locations of their checkpoints and to thwart observation. They covered four times the distance to Villa Ahumada that way. At least, Jersey thought grumpily, they didn’t have to do it on tiptoe to fool anti-infiltration sensors.
They reached the village on time for all the caution. “Hank, make a quick recee of the vil and see if there’s any friendlies in there,” Buddy Raines whispered into the mike of his hand-held radio.
Hank Evans grinned, a flash of white in the waning moonlight. “That’s why we took these gas canisters, eh?”
“Roger that. What we don’t need is a firefight to advertise our presence. You might verify the prevailing wind direction also,” Buddy suggested.
Evans and his team melted into the darkness. Buddy waited for a long count, then bumped Jersey. “Be ready
343 to move to the upwind side of this burg.”
“Roger, Rat. We’re gonna do the Big Sleep number on them, right?”
“You got that right. Rat out.”
Twenty tense minutes passed for the Rebels while Evans’s team did a quick check of the village for any friendly locals. When the sweep had been completed, he keyed his mike and spoke tersely. “It’s clean. Southwest.”
“Roger. From here on, no voice communications. Rat out.”
All three teams had come to within a hundred yards of Villa Ahumada. They took a full half hour to move into position in the southwest quadrant of the village. When each Rebel trooper had reached a suitable spot, the team leaders reported by breaking the carrier wave of their transmitters with a single click of the talk button. Three seconds later, two more clicks.
Buddy Raines reached for his gas mask and fitted it into place, making sure to check the tightness of the edge around his forehead and chin. Then he took a small syrette from the pocket of his utilities and snapped off the protective cover of the needle.
He plunged it into his exposed forearm and squeezed out the contents. Only then did he free one of the two gas grenades on his harness, untajje the safety handle, and pull the pin. In his mind he saw1 the other troopers doing the same. He drew a long, steady, deep breath and exhaled sharply. This shit was so damn scary.
With a soft, explosive pop, the grenade of nerve gas detonated and began to spew its invisible contents out onto the steady breeze blowing into Villa Ahumada. Thirty minutes, Buddy Raines thought, his gut tightening. It would be safe for them to go into town then. Technically they were free to do so now, what with the antidote injected and their masks. But he always considered it wise to let the lethal fumes dissipate before playing loose and personal with an exposed area.
At the indicated time, Buddy keyed his mike once, waited five seconds, and hit three more. The teams ad—
344 vanced into a deathly silent Villa Ahumada. At the edge of town, Buddy found the duty watch on a road barrier sprawled in death. Their features were contorted horribly and they had completely voided themselves. He waved an arm to advance.
Grim-faced Rebel troopers swept through the town. Everywhere the story had the same ending. Dead Nazis lay all around. A rough body count indicated at least two companies. The last place they visited was the radio station.
Lights glowed and to all appearances it was business as usual. Jersey and her team entered first. Immediately they discovered that the air-conditioning system was all too efficient. A groggy Nazi sat at the reception desk. His hand darted toward the rifle leaned against the dividing partition.
“Get him,” Jersey shouted, voice muffled by her mask.
Cooper shot the blackshirt with his CAR-15. The suppressor on the end provided an eerie effect. Slapped back by a silent three-round burst, the Nazi tilted over his swivel chair and tumbled onto the thick carpet.
“Check the other offices, Beth,” Jersey instructed. “Cooper, Corrie, the studios. I’m goin’ to the control room.”
No one in the inner core of the building had been affected in the least by the murderous fumes. Caught by surprise when black-cloaked Rebels burst into the empty studios, the engineers reacted slowly. Ordinarily they were not armed, and this fateful night proved no exception. When the baffle door flew open, they dived for the floor.
One of them died when he hurled a thick glass ashtray at Jersey. Her M-16 sounded loud even through the plethora of soundproofing. “Get up, you cruds,” she snarled. “Hands over your heads.”
That ended the battle for Villa Ahumada. Buddy put a German speaker and a Spanish speaker in the control room to handle any traffic, and the prisoners were herded into the larger studio. Buddy faced them with a
345 cheerful expression and rubbed his hands together.
“The war is over for you ‘supermen.’ So, which one of you is going to tell me where Volmer is keeping General Raines?” When the tough Nazis remained absolutely silent, Buddy swiftly drew his P7M10 and put a .40 caliber S&W Magnum round in the forehead of the nearest blackshirt engineer.
“We’ll try that again. Where is General Raines?”
Worried glances passed between the remaining two. Each took a deep breath and slowly shook his head. Buddy Raines walked slowly by them, then back. Without warning he turned suddenly and knee-capped the smaller Nazi. Screaming, the man fell to the floor.
“We’re going to find out, you know. Where is he?”
Only moans answered Buddy. He walked up to the standing blackshirt and put the hot muzzle of the autopistol squarely in the center of the trembling man’s forehead. Auf Wiedersehen,” Buddy said quietly an instant before he triggered the round that blew out half of the blackshirt’s brains.
“I’ll tell you,” the remaining Nazi blurted. “The general is being kept at the big hacienda west of town. It’s twelve kilometers out there.”
“That’s the truth, right? You’re sure?”
“Yes -yes. Only they are going to shoot him in the morning. Please get me to a medic,” the man sobbed.
“You don’t need medical help,” Buddy told him casually as he shot the last American Nazi through the heart.
“That’s cold, Colonel,” Cooper stated in shock. “That’s damn cold.”
“Unless you’ve forgotten, they are all under a death sentence. Their actions put them there, even if my father hadn’t ordered it. And we can’t leave them behind alive. Let’s get out of here.”
Dawn had yet to become a pale pink band on the sawtoothed horizon when Buddy and the teams reached the hacienda. The area had been thoroughly scouted, and surprisingly no OPs had been located. Every Nazi in
346 the area had gathered in the hacienda. Buddy Raines considered his first moves in brooding silence.
“Well set up two 2-man mortar positions. One here and one half a click away to the east. They’ll provide cover for the exfiltration.”
They had relieved the Nazis in Villa Ahumada of two old 60mm mortars and ample ammunition. Buddy lapsed deep into thought again. The aerial photos did not provide any info on the layout of rooms inside. His dad could be anywhere. And he had to move damn fast. Perhaps only minutes remained for his father to live.
“Hank, your team will provide the cover fire. Jersey, you and Dad’s team go in first; we’ll be right behind you. Now let’s make tracks while there’s still some darkness down there.”
Buddy Raines jolted along a shallow ravine that ran in the general direction of the hacienda. Jersey and Ben’s team pounded along ahead of them. They reached the walls of the hacienda without detection, though the predawn glow grew steadily. Soundless, on tiptoe, the Rebels entered through a small gate they located in the north wall.
Immediately a drowsy sentry at a small table ten feet away snapped alert and reached for his rifle. “What are you doing out there?” he demanded, confused as to the identity of the troops who so suddenly appeared.
Buddy extended his left arm in a waving gesture that distracted the guard’s gaze and stepped closer. His right hand whipped the Ka-Bar from its sheath and drove it between two of the Nazi’s ribs and into his heart. He caught the body and eased it back onto the chair. With a quick jerk of the bloody knife, he sent the Rebels to spread out through the courtyard.
Jersey found another sentry at a small recessed doorway on the far side of the courtyard. She took him out with a garrote. The dead blackshirt had a set of keys on his belt. Jersey quickly surmised what that might be. She gave a low whistle to the others and started going through them for the right one.
347 By the time Buddy and the rest of Ben’s team arrived, Jersey had the low door unlocked. She went through it bent double, M-16 leading the way. Cooper followed with his suppressed GAR-15. Instantly he shot over Jersey’s head and splattered a blackshirt against a stone wall. The man died outside the cell assigned to Ben Raines.
In a rush, Jersey went to it and turned the key in the lock, threw aside the bar. The door creaked when she drew it open. The cell was empty.
“Well, General Raines, it is through the goodness of the Fuhrer’s heart that you had this comfortable room to spend your last night on earth,” Peter Volmer spoke oilily, his personal distaste evident in his tone.
“Tell him I am grateful beyond belief.”
“Come, General, no sarcasm. Your uniform has been cleaned and pressed and awaits you. The Fiihrer says that you have proven a worthy adversary. He feels you are entitled to a good rest, a shave and bath, and a good breakfast before your, ah, date with the firing squad.”
“He is too kind,” Ben grated out, mentally counting his last minutes.
“Well, enough of this,” Peter Volmer said lightly. “Ill leave you to your ablutions and a hearty meal. We’ll meet again … for the last time … before the pareddn - the firing wall, as I’ve learned from my Latin American friends.”
Volmer left the second-floor room where Ben Raines had been confined and walked along the as-yet-silent corridor. Dawn had not streaked the east and he had his own early breakfast to attend to. What a day! This day would be the ultimate test of Rebel resolve. He had no doubt that they would weaken in the end and give up. The fighting would at last be over and then, soon after that, a tragic accident to Jesus Hoffman would make him, Peter Volmer, Fiihrer of the American Reich.
What a future to contemplate! It put a lightness in his step. Too bad about little Heinzi. But there were other
348 beautiful ones from which to choose. First get rid of Ben Raines, then he would reward himself.
“He’s gone,” Jersey gulped, filled with the awful vision that they had arrived too late.
“It’s not daylight yet,” Buddy Raines encouraged. “We will have to get ahold of someone and find out where Dad
is.”
“If there’s time, any time at all, I say do it,” Cooper added his support.
“All right, spread out again and bag someone who has some knowledge,” Buddy ordered.
“How about the cooks?” Jersey suggested. Her teammates looked at her as though she had farted in church. “No, hey, listen up. People get fed, right? No matter what is going on, right? And who knows who gets what and where better than the cooks?”
“The cooks it is,” Buddy decided.
Two more Nazi guards died on the search for the kitchen. The Rebels found it at last and burst inside to thoroughly frighten four rotund Mexican women. Their shock set them to gabbling rapid-fire in Spanish. At last, Jersey quieted them enough to ask the important question.
“El General no esta en la celda,”one chubby woman replied soberly to Jersey’s question.
“We know he’s not in his cell,” Jersey answered patiently. “Where is he?”
“Arriba,“‘the moon-faced cook replied. All three women pointed to the ceiling.
“Elsegundopiso?“‘Jersey asked. They all nodded enthusiastically. “All right, gang, we go upstairs,” she told the team.
Buddy, Jersey, and the team found the upstairs deserted. Limpid light glowed from skylights above. Jersey caught her breath when she saw it. They all took different doors, weapons ready, and began to search. Jersey and Buddy came to the arched portal at the end of the hallway first. The door had not latched tightly. Buddy threw it
349 open and Jersey rushed inside, bent low, M-16 ahead of her.
Empty. A corner room, it had windows that opened on the north and west sides. The glass had been raised out of the way, which gave access to the ornately carved and colorfully painted wooden grillwork that blocked the openings. From the one on the north side, recessed in an arch, with a small balcony outside, accessible by French doors to one side, voices rose from the ground below.
“General Benjamin Raines, Commander in Chief of the Rebel forces, you have been tried by the High Reich Tribunal and found guilty of insurrection against the Reich,” came the high, thin voice of Fiihrer Hoffman. “You have been duly and properly sentenced to death by firing squad. It is our duty to carry out that sentence. Have you any last words?”
There followed a familiar and beloved voice that made Jersey’s heart flutter. “Cut the bullshit and let’s get to the chase.”
“Very well,” Fiihrer Hoffman replied tightly. “Hood?”
“You might need it yourself. I hear you get squeamish at the sight of blood.” Ben taunted.
“Enough,” Hoffman grated.
Quickly he and Field Marshal Peter Volmer marched to their assigned positions. The firing commands began.
“Firing squad…Attention! …Present! …Load! … Take aim! …”
Right then, Jersey knew that time, which had been their enemy in this campaign since Hoffman’s invasion the previous spring, had run out. She squeezed closed her eyes and bit her lip to keep silent the sobs, and whispered a farewell prayer for Ben Raines, the man she secretly loved more than anyone else in the world.
350 William W. Johnstone
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