Call It Treason A Novel

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177

MAR

.1 1 1986

L-16

There were three motives that led Ger-""
man prisoners of war to volunteer for
service behind their own lines as spies for
the American Army "riches and risk and
faith." One of each was involved in the
mission described in this book, in which
three men were dropped by parachute
across the Rhine ahead of our advancing
forces: the Tiger, a Communist with a
greed for power and wealth; Paluka, a
carefree daredevil looking only for ad-
venture; and finally Happy, the son of a
Berlin doctor, who knew that by risking
his life he could hasten the day when the
Nazi evil would be ended.

We follow Happy's progress with
mounting excitement, hoping intensely
that he will get back with his report across
the flaming Rhine, knowing that any
false step will betray him. The author
gives a fascinating and authentic account
of the complicated technique of such a
mission. And as Happy travels through
Ulm and Heidelberg to Mannheim, we
get a startling picture of what Germany
was like just before the end.

Call It Treason is a real and moving
adventure in our modern world, involving
personal danger and individual courage
as stirring as any ever invented in spy
romances.

Treason doth neve% prqspcp; ^wfozfs the^reasan?
Why, if it prospe^^rfeidtir^fzdl ttl*treas&fh

SIR JOHN HARRINGTON, ,156 1 -l6l2

Call It Treason

a novel by George Howe

The Viking Press -New York -1949

: it9 3Y GEORGE HOWE
FIRST PUBLISHED BY THE VIKING PRESS IN AUGUST 1949

X ok THE SAME DAY IN THE DOMINION OF CANADA

BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY OF CANADA LIMITED

Excerpt from the music and the German lyric
of "Lili Marlene" used by permission of the
Attorney General of the U.S. Copyright 1941 by
Apollo-Verlag, Paul Lincke, Berlin SW 68,
vested in the Attorney General pursuant to law.
Excerpt from the English lyric of "Lili Marlene"
copyright 1943 by Chappell & Co., Inc., N.Y.,
used by permission.

PRINTED IN U.S.A. BY THE COLONIAL PRESS INC., CLINTON, MASS.

To

Happy
1925-1945

Call It Treason

Look Backward

The war is over, and for all one can see in the streets or news-
papers, or hear around the cracker barrel or campus or bartop,
it is forgotten. Forgotten so well that it is ready for a repeat, as
old tunes like "Baby Face" have to be forgotten before they can
be revived; or long skirts on women. There are places and
days where it is remembered: May Thirtieth, and behind some
drawn curtains, and in congressmen's speeches at election time
and in the memoirs of generals and in Mason jars of everlast-
ings in country cemeteries; in the country a man has more time
to remember. In Europe they think we have forgotten, as we
did before. It is not forgotten there. In the European Theater
the stars trip in, left wing or right, to a fortissimo of brass, and
pack up at the finale till the managers call a return. The chorus
stays on the job between times, and the battered scenery re-
mains in place.

Some of the numbers are soon forgotten all around. Thus, in
Combat Intelligence, after the target is reached, after the pla-
toon or gun is located by G-2 and destroyed by G-3, there is
no need to record how it was found, or by what agent; or by

3

what trick of uniform or intonation or marksmanship he got
his report through the line on time. No need to remember, for
the circumstances never repeat exactly, and the lesson of one
mission is not much use on the next. And none in another war.

Some of the acts you forget on purpose, and some you never
forget

For all the erasures of time, one question stays with me, un-
answered but unforgotten: why does the Spy risk his life? For
what compulsion, and after what torment in himself? The gun-
point never forced a man to loyalty, and still less to Treason,
whose rewards at best are slim and distant. If the Spy wins, he
is ignored; if he loses, he is hanged.

Not long ago the postman dropped on my drafting board a
letter with a German stamp; when I translated it the puzzle of
two years before returned to tease me, and by writing out my
memory I may have found a key to the Meanings of Treason.
I say Meanings, because it has more than one. Here is the
letter:

Berlin, 10 January 1947
Honored Sir:

From this letterhead you see that I am a physician. We are lucky
enough to live in the American sector (if there is luck in living at
all) where there is still a memory and hope of freedom. Since it
is your sector too, let it serve to introduce me. Its nuns are no
different from those of the Soviets across the Brandenburg Gate.
But the plane which broke our roof in 1945 was a Liberator; so in
Berlin I have a queer distinction over friends who were bombed
out by Stormoviks.

With me live my wife and my younger son Klaus, who is seven-
teen now. My older son Karl is a corporal in the German Air Force.
I still say "is" from habit; though the last word his mother and I
have from him was written in February 1945 from an American
prisoner-of-war camp, somewhere on the Western Front.

That is two years ago, but we have still hoped for his return.

Many German soldiers are still prisoners in Russia, and a few even

in France and England. Sometimes they straggle home to Berlin,

like Hermann Bechthold in the next block, who walked in to supper

4

one night after two years in Siberia, still in his ragged Feldgrau.
Either they did not let him write home, or he forgot. But Karl would
never forget, and yet he does not write.

The trickle is drying up now. It is six months since Hermann
returned.

In spite of my persistence over these two years, and a few tears
of my wife's, neither American -military authorities, nor what is
left of German, nor even the International Red Cross, which cares
for all prisoners, could ever give us word of Karl, till yesterday.
Yesterday the colonel who commands your Denazification Branch
called me to his office. I supposed he was ill, so I ran over from my
clinic. But he was well; he even smiled. He offered me in Karl's
name a medal of bronze, which he calls the Medal of Freedom.
He says it is a prized decoration among Americans. The citation,
kindly translated into German by one of his staff, reads that our
son is "presumed lost by enemy action on a hazardous mission
voluntarily undertaken in the cause of Freedom/' These are long
words. The "enemy" in the citation can refer only to the Nazis, who
were my enemies for twelve years. They were yours for only four.
The citation itself must mean that Karl spied against them for their
enemies, who were the Americans. I should not be ashamed of him,
provided only he risked his life for his own free conviction, and your
army did not force him to it as the Nazis did.

This colonel does not know you and did not know Karl. He was
not even in Europe for the war. But his records show you know our
boy and might tell us something about his hazardous mission/*

The colonel found your address across the ocean, and I venture
to ask you to write me about our son s last days, if you remember
them still. This letter will be my last attempt to learn. You may
understand that the uncertainty which shrouds them lies like a
heavy shadow on our own, and that hope can be as bitter as despair.
Tell me as much as your own country's security will allow, but do
not let your own mercy spare me.

Respectfully,

Gunther Maurer, M.D.

A man is alive as long as he is remembered, and killed only
by forgetfulness. Let Karl Maurer remain a corporal in the
Luftwaffe. I wish I could approach that all-embracing memory

5

of Mrn which is History, if you look backward, but Resurrec-
tion itself, if you look ahead. One man has not the power,
nor even all men together. Here is as much of the story as I
could remake after the two years, from my memory and from
the fading memory of the others. I could not watch it all, but
one man swam an icy minefield in the Rhine with part of it,
and another stammered out some more in a cellar. The Ameri-
can captain who recruited the corporal remembers some, and
so does the sergeant who strapped his chute. The German colo-
nel whose life he saved sells papers now; and the Fraulein
who knit the socks he never wore has married a GI, but her
memory is not dim.

I telescope time, I usurp omniscience in the telling; not to
invent but to resurrect. Let Frau Maurer ask that divination
which is motherhood if those parts of her son's story which
none could watch are not as true to him as the rest Such sym-
pathy is truer than record, and I trust it more than the word of
the Tiger, who stood on the bank with him that February
night in 1945. Credo quia absurdum.

I must start further back, before we knew the corporal, so
that the doctor will understand that his son was not recklessly
sent into danger, but joined a service which had had a long
career and an honorable one, if espionage deserves the adjec-
tive. Where the colonel uses the word enemy he means it, not
personally, but professionally, as colonels have always used it
The doctor should accept the medal as a token of or a release
from a debt which this republic cannot acknowledge that it
owes, nor he in Berlin dare admit his son has earned. And
though the colonel says only that he is "presumed lost," I do
not think his father will see liim again.

One

Seventh United States Army, "born at sea and baptized in
blood/' came a long way before it met the son of tie Berlin
doctor. In 1943 its embryo, First Armored Corps, struggled
across the thirsty rim of Africa, slugging it out with Marshal
Rommel and his Afrika Korps. It chased the enemy into the sea
at Cap Bon. "The enemy" is always singular, never plural.
Seventh stopped up the bung of Sicily and cut across his escape
by bridging the Mediterranean from Africa to France, from
Algiers to Cavalaire and Saint-Raphael, while the Fifth holed
up the alleys of Italy.

The jump to Southern France was Operation Dragoon. Dra-
goon was one of the great invasions of history. Just because it
did succeed so neatly, history forgets that the southern defenses
of the Wehrmacht were as strong and as secret as the northern,
and that as much knowledge and at longer range than across
the Channel was needed to bare them. Only three divisions
landed on the Riviera that 15 August 1944, but they went
through the minefields, after Eighth Fleet had cracked the
artillery, like you-know-what through a goose. If some veterans

7

of Dragoon have a grudge against history's ingratitude, it is
not because the profession has ceased to court obscurity, but
because they sweated out the preparation, and proved it was
accurate.

From the field at Blida, outside Algiers, they launched some
thirty agents, with chutes on their backs and short-wave sets
on their chests, into metropolitan France, then occupied by the
enemy in the north, and by Petain, the almost-enemy, in the
south. Off paper they called them "J oes -" On paper (when they
had to -write) they called them "agents." The British called
theirs bodies." Those who did not know them would call them
spies. Of the four titles, "J oe " *s surely the kindliest.

Most of the pre-invasion Joes were French, for finesse, with
a sprinkling of Corsicans, for ruthlessness. From inside the
M^tropole they radioed back to Africa the location of every
enemy detachment south of Lyon: group, army, corps, divi-
sion, regiment, battalion (that was the last strategic unit of the
Wehrmacht) right down to the single battery and machine-gun
nest Just before D-day someone at SHAEF in London wanted
to know about the anti-tank wall on the Saint-Raphael target
beach. From the reports of the Joes the Team made him up a
structural drawing complete to the size and spacing of the steel
reinforcement: half an inch thick and eight inches apart each
way. (The Joes were right, too, for you can touch your finger
to the twisted steel of that wall today. )

By any code except the laws of war, which are no more than
sounding brass, or brass sounding off, these French men and
girls were not traitors, but patriots. Even by the German code.
They risked their lives among their own people, and for them,
and with their help. When the German police hunted them,
they had only to knock at a farmhouse door to be safe. Even
the Vichy police sometimes hid them from Laval's Milice,
who were the real traitors to France. Only a few French Joes
were ever denounced. The MiHce shot one of them after the
8

routine racking in the prison of the Rtte du Paradis at Mar-
seille, but still he did not blow.

Once dropped inside the Metropole, the Joes lurked in the
furtive half -world of the underground. They slept in the huts
of the Maquis, hiding their radios in abandoned cellars or in
the empty caves along the banks of the German retreat. The
impetus of Dragoon heartened the Maquis, and even brought
them some deserters from the Wehnnacht With directions and
dynamite from the Joes they blew the bridges ahead of the
German retreat. At Montelimar on Route 7, the home town of
nougat, there is still a two-mile row of gutted rusting trucks
and guns flung at the side of the highway like dirty snow,
where the troops of the German Nineteenth Army were caught
one summer afternoon between the light tanks of Task Force
Butler and a river without a bridge. Keeping just far enough
ahead of the retreat for accuracy, the Joes paced Seventh Army
along the coast to Marseille, up the Rhone to Lyon, northeast-
erly to Dijon (where it joined Third), and across Burgundy
to the outposts of the Reich. That is no farther than from
Washington to Boston. It is hard for an American to measure
the narrow scale of Europe, and to learn how the centuries
have forced it to its hatreds, and above all to forgive that even
among the terrors and urgency of that short action some
Frenchmen and Germans aspired from their own expected
victories to no more than a short time of revenge first, and then
of rest. In Europe the state can be the enemy of its citizens,
and everyone must take a side.

East of the Burgundian plain the valleys narrow to defiles
among the Vosges, guarded by ancient cities which for centu-
ries have been the bastions of the Rhine: Besangon, Vesoul,
Lun^ville. In this terrain the Germans had time to cross a
bridge before it was blown, and then blow it themselves. Their
retreat grew slower. They posted machine-gun nests of half a
dozen men, sometimes just burrowed into a foxhole (they called

9

it a wolf -burrow) wifch orders to stay until relieved. And they
did stay, as prisoners packed neck-deep with snow, or as
corpses in the pit, while the garrison itself had time to forage
the country and cut trees to block the roads behind them.

The sleety winter of 1944 came down. No matter how stub-
bornly the German Nineteenth resisted, American Seventh
more stubbornly still crept forward, through and around the
fortresses, from Epinal to Luneville, and even to Saverne,
which looks down on Strasbourg and the Rhine. In December,
far to the north as continental distances go, von Rundstedt
launched the Battle of the Bulge. The threat spread out from
Belgium in both directions along the B.hrne, from Switzerland
to the North Sea, and neither communique dared make a
daim, and the world held its breath. Elements of Seventh had
moved into Strasbourg itself, on the very bank of the Rhine,
but had to get out in a hurry New Year's Day because Bas-
togne, far to the north, way out of their theater, had been en-
circled. It was the time of the Great Scare. Command Post
withdrew to Lun6ville again, leaving the old palace at Saverne
to the more expendable staff of VI Corps, But 101st Airborne
held at Bastogne, and the threat was lifted. Seventh still clung
to their wedge of Alsace, with the Germans south of them at
Colmar, and north of them in the forest of Hagenau. It was a
minor campaign if you weren't there.

With the enemy backed against his own frontier, the French
Joes were no more use to the Team. Its information had to
come out of the Reich itself, and it needed German Joes to get
it, or Joes who could pass for German. A few Alsatians might
have the right accent to get by the Gestapo, but Alsatian loy-
alty was always a riddle to both sides. Any Joe might have
been dropped across the Rhine disguised as a foreign worker,
for hundreds of thousands of aliens, from every country in
Europe, were being shunted across Germany from one work
camp to another. But in their boxcars and underground fac-
tories the labor slaves would have no access to the military
10

news titiat G-2 needed, and no way of bagging it out if they
did.

Besides, the French Joes had liberated their own country
already, and had little ambition to liberate another. They de-
served to rest But the Team could not let them go loose; they
knew too much. Hiring a spy is like compounding with a
blackmailer. His knowledge is never erased, except in the one
way the Team did not care to try. It kept the French Joes on,
with pay and lif e insurance the same as Uncle Sam's GIs, even
when their usefulness was over. As Army advanced, the Team
went a little ahead of HQ, requisitioning a convent or a cM-
teau off to the side of the main convoy route, in a village or
among the woods, for its jeeps and the big radio truck, its
field-safes and disguises and code-pads. Near by, it would
set up a hideout for the French Joes, who must be watched
for any agent might be tempted to double and yet not watch.
The French Joes got up in the morning whenever they felt like
it; took turns at cooking, on whatever stove the dispossessed
owner had left behind, the good rations of the American Quar-
termaster Corps; read all day and boasted all night idle, val-
iant, immoral, and untouchable. The Team called the hideout
the French Joehouse because all the Joes had worked the
Rhone campaign; not only the six Frenchmen but the Pole
and the Russian and the Belgian girL The Russian was Paluka.
The Belgian girl was Giovanna. From talking or dancing with
tiny honey-haired peaches-and-cream Giovanna you would
never guess that she had jumped solo from a B-24 one winter
night, landing upright in a snowbank of the Vosges, or that her
chastity had been the price of the report she brought back.

The enemy had his spies too. You hear whispers of Admiral
Canaris at the Abwehr, but Hitler had fired him in '43. Less
often you hear of Kaltenbrunner, who followed him. But it was
Skorzeny who built the Brandenburg Division of saboteurs
and committed them a team for each sector against the

11

Fremdenheer the foreign armies of the West He kidnaped
Mussolini from his rock. His agents could be anywhere. He
flew a grounded Liberator back across the lines of Seventh
with eight of them inside. By luck she was challenged, and
justice was done. After that the Team's operation planes
flashed recognition signals, with the colors and the code
changed each eight hours. The Team even saw one of Skor-
zeny's parachutes unfold over the pine woods west of Stras-
bourg, one night that was dark enough to hide the plane but
light enough to show the brown-and-green camouflage of the
chute.

"The way I feel about that," said Captain Pete, "it's no won-
der our own Joes are in danger on the other side/'

"It makes your throat tight,'' Fred agreed, as he ran in to
phone the alert.

But they knew he was too late, for the chute was low already
and the forest was thick.

There was a week near the front when the MPs checked
every GI who passed on baseball scores, or the names of
movie stars, or any questions which Skorzeny's agents might
not know how to answer. One Joe, captured at Dachau a week
before the war ended, was confronted by the Gestapo with a
letter he had posted to an American officer in the mailbox
of the Red Cross canteen way back in fipinal. It was lucky
for him that Seventh overran Dachau the next day. In the
Battle of the Bulge Skorzeny dressed his Joes in American
uniform to penetrate the American positions. Once he landed
seven by F-boat* on Long Island. Some Americans may re-
member the scare even now. The FBI caught them, and six lie
in potter's field in Washington. The seventh turned evidence
and is back in Germany again. Another agent was caught at
the Canadian border, just because his dollar bills were the old-
fashioned outsize; even Skorzeny could not learn all about his
enemy. Now that it is all over, Fred and Pete have grown a

* Faltboot the folding rubber boat used by agents on both sides.
12

sort of sporting admiration for Colonel Otto, and are even glad
he was acquitted of the same crime they tried on him. The
court hangs Keitel, a professional soldier, and lets spymaster
Skorzeny go free. Had his false-uniform trick worked, as it al-
most did, and as Fred's and Pete's usually did, they wonder
what he would have done with 109, who was his opposite
number on their side.

They hoped they knew that Skorzeny would find no
Americans to spy for him. It would be hard to find a German
to spy for them. Between a French Joe and a German would
be all the difference between patriot and traitor. But as the
winter ground along, they learned that in the Wehnnacht itself,
besides many Nazi fanatics, there were helpless rebels too. It
may surprise some people now to learn that democracy even
used communism to help win the war. Among the German
troops a few others looked beyond frontiers, and even beyond
life itself, to the last brotherhood of man. They betrayed their
country, and some died doing it, because they were above
country. Some were traitors for self-love, and more for adven-
ture, and a few for the love of others. On the "hazardous mis-
sion" in the doctor's citation there was one of each. Riches and
risk and faith: they are the three decoys of Treason.

The likeliest place for the Team to recruit German Joes was
the prisoner-of-war cage at Sarrebourg in Lorraine: 455th P/W
cage, Continental Advance Section. This building was an old
brick and stone barracks built way back before the First War,
when Alsace and Lorraine had been German. It was a kennel
of war which had sheltered many armies. No one knew how
old it was; perhaps it dated from Bismarck's time. From 1918
to 1939 it had been French. Till Seventh captured it in 1944 it
had been German again, and now is French once more. Its
three stories of casements are barred with iron. Rows of small
chimneys carry the smoke from the pot-stoves which punctuate
the dormitories. The stone corridors have rung to generations
of hobnail boots. Surrounded by a high wall with barbed wire

13

on top, it lay, ominous and hideous, waiting for other wars,
in the center o the plain. A moat of mud encircled it. The
bombed and shuttered houses of the town stretched along the
pitted road. Every tree had been cut for stovewood or road-
blocks, till it seemed that the town itself, like the Kaserne, ex-
isted only for war.

Every afternoon a truddoad or two of prisoners was driven
in from the front to be "processed" for the labor camps farther
back. The cage MPs aS. spoke German; some could hardly
speak English. Over the gate they had built a big white arched
sign with black Gothic letters. It read WILLKOMMEN the
German for "Welcome " Some prisoners would laugh, and oth-
ers cry, when the driver rounded the bend under that grisly
joke, swaying on their feet like cattle loaded for market, as
the crowded truck turned and ground to a stop on the cinders.
Why not cry? It was the time when they had lost most of
France and half of Italy, and the Russians had broken to the
walls of Breslau.

The old drill ground in the middle of the barracks had been
turned into a compound for them. Sniffling in the long gray-
green coats of the German Army, or the dull blue of the Luft-
waffe, stamping their frozen boots in the slush, they waited a
few days in the cage through the formalities of delousing and
interrogation, till they were shipped westward to make room
for more.

At the interrogation it was surprising how litde they knew.
By the Geneva Convention they need tell no more than their
names, ranks, and numbers. Often, it seemed, they knew no
more anyway. But since they all carried their service records,,
the little brown or blue Soldbuch which lists a soldier's or air-
man's past and present units, the Team could get a fair knowl-
edge of German battle order from their papers, without crack-
ing the prisoners* ignorance or rectitude. They did not seem to
care, provided they could keep the identity books when they
moved on. They were not different from battle-tired Ameri-
14

can troops just, on the average, a little shorter and a little
blonder. Most of tibem were sullen, and some defiant, and some
bolder ones happy to be caught. But none showed fear except
the SS men, who more than once tried to scrape the blue-circle
tattoo of their blood-type from the crooks of their arms be-
cause they had been told the Americans shot the SS without
trial.

The Wehrmacht was a unified command long before our
own. That is one reason it won for as long as it did. It was di-
vided into three branches: Heer, Kriegsmarine, and Luftwaffe,
like OUT Army, Navy, and Air Force, with the SS to stiffen the
combat troops. The letters mean Security Squad, but the SS
were an army by themselves. There ought to be a German
word to cover the whole, like "serviceman,'* but the best the
Germans could think up was "Wehrmachtsangehorige," which
is steep even for a German. Hitler was head of the whole Wehr-
macht as well as of the Army. Under him tibe mild-eyed Himm-
ler commanded the SS and the police all kinds of police. The
two main branches of police were Security and Criminal. The
Germans write long but talk short. They abbreviate these titles
to Sipo and Kripo. Kripo had many subdivisions like Schupo
and Orpo and Hipo. The colonel used to say it sounded as if
the Marx Brothers had quintuplets (and the rest of the Team
laughed each time, to please him). Sipo had only one baby,
which was Gestapo. That is only an abbreviation for Geheime
Staatspolizei, or Secret State Police, but you could never tell a
man was in it unless you got a look at his square dogtag, which
he would seldom gracefully allow.

In the compound the services kept apart from each other.
Army grouped in knots separate from Air Force. Both avoided
SS. They all shuffled around the compound in an endless
column of the different arms, whispering to one another in tie
chilly fog which is Rhin eland for winter.

Out of these whispers word somehow spread that a soldier
could, if he were ignoble enough, volunteer in a well-paid serv-

15

ice for his captors. No one admitted to planting the rumor, for
the Convention forbids a belligerent to draft its prisoners. But
if they volunteer, what then? The Team did not ask the Swiss
inspectors. The word must have passed along the dark stone
floors of the dormitories, from sleeping bag to blanket roll,
when the guard's boots pounded low at the far end. Between
two German soldiers it could be uttered only with scorn
and heard with surprise and contempt. But the gossiper who
passed it on with such loud indignation might be the first re-
cruit next morning, or it might be his neighbor on the cold
floor, scratching his lice, blinking in the dark, turning his ear in
the shoddy to hear better, and snoring to pretend he v$as
asleep.

The recruits never came in pairs, or in the open compound,
but singly; perhaps by whispering to the doctor at sick-call or
plucking furtively at the sergeant's arm while lingering over
the garbage cans after mess, with a TPlease, Herr Sergeant" in
broken English, and a hitch of the shoulder or a smile. The ser-
geant had been alerted. Not then, but later, he would call out
his prospect for a detail, with a bunch of other prisoners so
there would be no suspicion that he favored one. He would
lead him to the snug little office in a corner of the barracks and
turn him over to the recruiting officers who waited there. They
spoke German too, as well as he; were German, in fact, by
every standard but a paper and an oath. They had studied
the prisoner's Soldbuch before the sergeant brought him in.
They knew whether it had been faked, as Skorzeny had
tried more than once in order to plant his spies among their
own. The officers may have known the prisoner's home town
or even his family. What temptations, what eloquence they
used to buy his treason only they could tell. Perhaps it was
nothing but a cigarette and the pride of sitting beside an
officer in a soft armchair at the stove; perhaps the lure of dan-
ger or the promise of wealth; perhaps the hope of a better
16

world. Or most likely, since there are even fewer villains than
heroes, a little of all together.

Before he was established for espionage he had to be
checked by Security. Security cabled the German dossiers in
Washington. Simultaneously, certain black-cassocked agents
who traveled between Germany and Switzerland the arm of
109 was long called on the recruit's family or friends in the
Homeland, perhaps with a little package of coffee or even a
note from the boy, tucked in a briefcase. It cannot have been
hard for a priest, to whom all hearts are open even when he is
bogus, to learn whether the Team should trust the boy. But
such trips were dangerous for the Swiss agents, because Switz-
erland was jealous of her neutrality, and so is the Church.
Washington was more cautious still, so it might be a week or
two before word came back from America and Germany and
the two had to agree that it was safe to hire him. Meanwhile
he could not go back to the prisoner barracks to those who
had not seen the little office, who did not know Treason, nor
forward to the Joehouse to those who had given themselves to
it already. He knew too much and, so far, too little to be
trusted. He spent the days of his probation alone in the old
steel cells of the barracks guardhouse.

To house the German recruits the team took over an inn nes-
tled in a clearing among aromatic firs, a mile above their own
chateau half the service called it the Schloss, which is German
for the same and far enough from the French Joehouse so the
two groups could not meet on their short strolls. There were
not more than half a dozen houses in the hamlet of Birken-
wald, each with its orchard and garden. The villagers were
woodsmen. By a law which was older than war, they could cut
only ten per cent of the timber stand each year, and had to
plant 'two trees for every one they cut, for the forests were
worth more than the cropland. In the valley below, the convoy
highway twined and rumbled twenty miles eastward to the

17

Rhine under the load of halftracks and armored cars, but the
creaking of the great trunks and the friction of the snow-bent
needles drowned out the noise of war. The inn was called the
Goldene Brunnen the Golden Well in black Gothic letters
on the peach-colored stucco. On a clear day you could see the
lopsided spire of Strasbourg cathedral beyond the river plain,
and hear the German guns roll from Kehl across the Rhine.

Monsieur Apf el, who owned the Golden Well, ran it as a Joe-
house exactly as he had run it as an inn, except that the Team
chose his guests. When he grumbled that they would not let
him entertain the forester of the D^partement (who only two
months before had been the forester of the Gau) they pointed
out that this official came only in the lull of the battle, and that
if there were no battle he could not expect their twenty full-
time boarders, with American rations enough for his own table
as well. What better could he expect in wartime, in sight of
the battle line? One forester? He chose the twenty liberators.

His wife and daughter transformed the rations into fare
much better than the American mess at the Schloss. He himself
presided at the zinc bar. He had no beer, for the hopfields in
the Rhine plain had all been burned, but there was plenty of
tart greenish wine, and schnapps made of potatoes, and some-
times kirsch or framboise, which looked the same but tasted a
little better, being distilled from cherries and raspberries. The
innkeeper must have wondered why so many men in khaki
chattered German in accents all the way from Austrian to East
Prussian. But like most Alsatians he was neutral, and like a
good innkeeper asked no questions, even though he may have
guessed the answer. The blackboard in the classroom was al-
ways carefully erased. The conversation of the Joes was imper-
sonal; it was their training, as it is a diplomat's, to keep it so.
Like harlots in the parlor, they never spoke of business.

You will understand that the Joes had to be spared self-
reproach. To this end, no one in the German Joehouse spoke
anything but German, not even the Americans. It was an un-
18

spoken (and unspeakable) pretense that the Joes were really

a crack task force of the Wehrmacht itself, specially picked

no one could have said by whom for a mission which the
high command should have assigned them, and perhaps soon
would, when it rid itself of Hitler, Keitel, Jodl, and a few such
others. A mission which would bring victory to the Reich, an
echt-deutsch mission. One was not to forget that the Joes were
working for the real Germany and against the false. Each had
chosen his course among the caverns of his soul, had signed the
deed and sworn the oath to Treason, free and alone; and alone,
a man does what cannot bear the eyes of others. There was
always the danger that he might repent the covenant if another
German learned his name or an American either or if he
met one of the French Joes, the ex-enemy, or, later, at his first
flash of a Gestapo dogtag. If he repented, the whole service
might be blown. That is why the Team compartmented the
Joes, and itself too, like so many bulkheads in a ship.

To his comrades each Joe was known by a nickname. His
real name, signed on his contract with the United States of
America, lay in the locked and guarded field safe. When he
had seen his oath deposited there, his blindfold was replaced,
and he could never come back to the Schloss till his mission
was completed, lest he might somehow give away the location
to Skorzeny and the Luftwaffe. The Team took nicknames too,
for self -protection, and wore the same green coveralls as the
German Joes, without insignia. It was an honor when the Joes
took an American for one of themselves.

Most of the Joes were privates in the Army, but other ranks
volunteered too: a sailor, two aviators, and a converted trooper
of the SS. In civil life they had been butcher and priest, engi-
neer, gardener, chemist, and truckdriver. There were three
Communists. One Joe was a baron, one was the son of a gen-
eral. There were no Jews, because there were none in the
Wehrmacht. They were all soldiers of discontent, and they had
nothing in common but having worn the uniform of the same

19

country and conspired, for whatever reason, to betray it. The
Americans, culled by 109 out of the whole United States armed
forces, were as various as the Germans. They had a chemist and
a butcher in the detail too (there was always a gleam in the
eyes of Gustaf, the German butcher, when Angelo, the Ameri-
can, carved the goose), besides an architect, a banker, a bar-
tender, a locksmith, an actor, and two lawyers.

Stripped of identity in the little office at the cage, dressed in
American fatigues and combat boots, tagged only with a nick-
name, the recruit would be brought up to the Golden Well at
suppertime. They primed his first meal with a schnapps at
Monsieur Apfel's zinc bar. The Joe-handler introduced him to
the comrades around the table in the day room.

This handler was an American infantry sergeant, a second-
generation German from Milwaukee. The Joes called him
"Vati," which is an endearment something like "Pops."

"Boys," Vati would call from the door, "this is Hans" -or
whatever cover-name the recruit had drawn.

He took him the rounds man by man. "This is Harry, Jojo,
Toto, Red, Theo, Ludwig the Second."

The new Joe's eyes always widened when he saw how many
others were ahead of him. Some of them he must have recog-
nized from the cage perhaps the patriot who had just de-
nounced traitors, perhaps a tentmate from before the capture.
The Americans watched for a flicker in his eyes as he went
round, but watched in vain and never asked, for he would
never tell.

Sometimes the shifty-shabby spy of legend slipped by Secu-
rity, but Vati had learned to judge men, and shipped him west
to the work details. The Joes who made the grade were neither
furtive nor boastful. They looked like a score of troops who
might have been gathered in any army, perhaps a little over
the average for discipline and balance and cleanliness. They
belonged to no army now.

According to their natures, they would stand up and grasp
20

the recruit's hand, or turn in their chairs and smile, or merely
mumble and reach for the heaping platter. The silent meal
went on, with the new Joe next to Vati his first time.

They slept two or three together in the guest rooms of the
Golden Well. Some psychologists claimed it would be better
to give each Joe his own billet, or at least each mission, so they
could not talk together at all. Others held that Treason, like
misery, loves company, and there was more chance of a Joe
sticking if he had the others near him. But it was impossible
to keep them apart, for they had to take their training and
their meals together.

Vatfs schoolroom had been Monsieur Apfel's own dining
room. He and his family had to eat in their kitchen now. The
floor of the schoolroom was red tile. In the center stood an oak
dining table, bleached with years of scrubbing and surrounded
by a dozen uncomfortable Alsatian chairs. The door was al-
ways locked, whether class was on or not. At class time the
wood shutters were closed too, and the room was lighted only
by a fluorescent ceiling lamp. Even Monsieur Apfel was not
allowed in this room. The Joes themselves took turns cleaning
it.

Vati had got hold of a big blackboard and some pink chalk
At ten each morning he opened the session with a lesson in
English. First he wrote the German word in script, then the
English in capitals, as:

/Fahndungsblatt BLACKLIST."

He held up a copy of the booklet which the Gestapo issued
every Tuesday, listing deserters and suspected spies.

"They change the color of each issue, adding the new names
and omitting those who have been caught. Keep out of it." Vati
laughed, but the new Joe would be apt to shiver.

Sometimes he drew a picture between the words, as:

TPanzer >^ TANK/'

This may seem elementary, since some of the Joes knew a
fair amount of English, but it was about as much as Vati could

21

teach. Later in the morning the officers and the other noncoms
took over with the important instruction. That was the identi-
fication of enemy weapons and insignia. It was astonishing
how little most of the Joes knew about their army outside the
routine of their own company weapons and drill. They had to
learn the groundwork: that a striped triangle on a signpost
meant division headquarters while a square meant regiment;
that a Panther tank had eight bogies and a Tiger six.

Just above the Golden Well, before the back road from
Sarrebourg to Strasbourg turns sharp from the forest into the
clearing of the little village, the carcass of a German anti-tank
gun lay on its shattered emplacement. The gun had been hid-
den there to ambush American tanks at the turn, like a brown-
green snake alert in the grass. A lucky shot had smashed its
muzzle brake and splintered the barrel lengthwise like a reed.
Its trail tilted crazily against the trunk of a fir. Near by, some-
one from the village had planted crosses over two turfless
mounds on the slope, nailed half a dogtag to the bars, and
hung the two straight-rimmed German helmets of the crew,
camouflaged just the color of the gun itself. The colonel offered
to stand a round of schnapps to the first Joe who identified the
piece, but the only man who knew it was a 5 cm. Pak 38* was
an artilleryman who had served the same model on the Russian
front

A Joe needs head as much as heart. It is not enough to dare
the jump behind the lines; he is worse than useless if he cannot
bring out a clear account of what he sees. The difference be-
tween reporting a battalion and a regiment, or between a 5 and
an 8.8, might mean the success or failure of a divisional attack
or even, Pete foolishly thought, could win or lose the whole
war.

Down the hill the Team set up a training jump in a clear-

* The Wehrmacht calibrated guns in centimeters instead of millimeters.
This is the 50 mm. gun of 1938. "Pak*' is short for "Panzerabwehrkanone"
or anti-tank gun. *Flak" is short for "Flugzeugabwehrkanone" or anti-
aircraft gun.

22

ing among the firs. It was guarded from the curious by two
GIs, night and day. Dropping a man ten feet into a sandpile
through a hole in the platform was not like the real thing, even
with all equipment strapped on. But it was better than jumping
blind for the majority of Joes, who had never even been up.
Buck and Merle, the two dispatchers (in uniform they were
sergeants of the Marine Corps), had so many jumps behind
them that they c&uld tell the Joe every second of his mission
from emplanement rill he landed, buried his gear, and started
on his watch. Yet who but Treason could tell what it would be
to leap on his country's back out of the black night, and sidle
past her spires, her sleeping kinsmen and wakeful geese, to
betray her to the enemy beyond?

One Joe who returned he was going to be a priest after the
war had seen two bodies swinging from a tree near Stuttgart,
and tacked to the trunk a crude sign: so STERBEN DEE VEBRATER
DES VATERLANEES. Thus perish traitors to the Fatherland.

It was harder to get out of Germany than to get in. The dan-
ger of the drop was small compared to the hazard of getting
back through both the front lines. As he crossed, a Joe might
be shot by the Americans for a German patrol, if he had not
been hung by the Germans for an American spy. The colonel
punished the tattler who had seen the bodies and the sign by
exile to the French Joehouse, for talking shop was forbidden
especially that kind of shop. But everyone knew the Joe had
done it from a land of pride, as if to show that his own target
area was more dangerous than the others, and he therefore
braver or cleverer to have returned alive.

TDon't you see, Pre Nod," Fred reasoned (it had seemed an
amusing pun to give a theology student the alias of absinthe),
"not only might you frighten your comrades so they could not
do their work, but among them there may be a Judas who can
betray you after the war if he so much as knows you have been
in Stuttgart?"

"Mea culpa, Lieutenant," Pere Nod answered humbly. He

23

was a learned and merciful young man, but weak on weapons
and battle order, so it was little loss when he was banished to
the inaction of the French Joehouse.

At the same time, the Team knew it could not expect that
twenty Joes, in the comradeship of the dormitory at the Golden
Well, under the danger that awaited detection, could perfectly
maintain the fear, the silence, the distrust, the loneliness which
are an agent's first protection.

Every few days Army G-2, back in headquarters at Lune-
ville, sent down demands for information. They came from the
guarded war room, where a great map of the theater from
Switzerland north to Mainz and back into the heart of the
Reich stretched across one whole wall, hidden by a sliding
black curtain. It required permission from General Patch him-
self to pass the armed MPs and draw back the curtain. Sheets
of plastic overlay were tacked on the map. On the plastic the
operations officer marked every day the symbols the Team was
teaching in the Joehouse twenty miles nearer the front: a series
of crosses, of circles, of triangles in different crayons, tracing
the long retreat of the German Army from the broken Siegfried
Line back to the Rhine. And though no one could acknowledge
the German Joes, it was they who had reported most of the
history on that plastic.

Is there a message center at Osterzell, G-2 would ask, as the
direction finders indicate? What artillery can be expected at
Mannheim? Will the Danube line be manned at Ulm?

The Danube seemed a long way off for troops who did not
yet command the Rhine, and the question was a hard one to
answer even if they got there. To come nearer home, where
was the big gun that had the bead on corps command post at
Saverne itself? It had not hit the old palace yet, but a shell
landed on the motor pool and killed a dozen GIs at once.

A Joe named Antonius he was a sergeant in the Heer
found it for them: a six-inch Bumblebee howitzer on a flatcar,
24

beautifully camouflaged with boughs and netting, on a spur
track just beyond the Hagenau tunnel. Antonius slipped
through the lines in his own Feldwebel uniform. It was aston-
ishing how many people passed through the lines where there
was no natural barrier like a river fanners driving cows to
market, or a midwife going to deliver a baby in the next vil-
lage. It was not hard for Antonius to enter the German lines.
Operations had only to alert the American outposts not to pot
him, going through the hole in the mines.

He swapped rations and Raulino tobacco with the crew of
the Bumblebee. They rolled the flatcar out to show him how
they had cut a hole in the planking to take the steep recoil, and
how fast they could run it back into the tunnel as soon as the
round was fired. The barrel could be elevated thirty-nine de-
grees to lob shells over the hill. No wonder they boasted that
the Yankee planes could not see it, "Though they're hunting
hard enough, God knows," laughed the Kanonier.

"Das war prima!" * Antonius chuckled when he told the
Team next day.

He ran his long schoolteacher fingers through his black hair.
The gun crew had invited him back to watch the firing at six in
the morning, but at five he was spotting the emplacement on a
1:20,000 map for a major of Eighth Air Force. At 0550 two of
the major's planes smashed it up, though they still could not
see it even as they dropped the sticks.

Whenever such a call came through, the Team in conclave
picked one Joe, or at most two, for the mission. Two were more
risky than one, in case they were spot-checked by the Gestapo.
But two had greater life expectancy than one. For missions
deep in the Reich it chose a pinpoint for the drop, from cap-
tured German field maps. An open field or a clearing in the
woods was best, not too near a town. It was often many miles
beyond the Joe's real target, to avoid the charted Flak or to

* "That was tops!"

25

assure solitude long enough for him to bury his chute. Then
the Air Force major had to approve the pinpoint, for he had
a risk as well as the Joe.

To fit the time and place of his mission it created his cover
his false identity and a plausible reason for his trip. It set
up a shop to forge Soldbiicher, travel orders, train tickets, and
ration stamps; to press out the zinc dogtags every German
soldier wore at his neck; and to fake the eagle-and-swastika
rubber seals without which no military paper was valid. The
Wehrmacht called this symbol the Hoheitszeichen the Seal
of Supremacy. The Team called it the bird.

A Joe's dogtag and uniform and trip ticket had to agree with
the entries in his Soldbuch. The Team had a storeroom of cap-
tured uniforms to fit every size and rank, and an old-fashioned
hooded camera for taking the pictures to paste inside the front
cover of the booklet, and a chemical to age them. It had
two volunteer penmen, once company clerks in the Heer, to
forge signatures, and Mike, once adjutant in an Austrian moun-
tain regiment/to make sure that the Joe's travel rations of food
and soap were entered correctly. A soldier could be thrown in
jail for having too much soap in his knapsack, and shot for
claiming too much on his travel orders. Like any German sol-
dier, the Joe had to have a good reason for being on the road.
Sometimes he was shipping from the hospital back to the front,
and then he needed a scar and a wound-ribbon, and the code
number of his illness or wound, on the medical page of his
book, had to match the symptoms which the Gestapo might
order him to describe.

The question he would have to answer oftenest was 'Where
did you spend last night?" To that he must give either the ad-
dress of his Safe House (if the "priests" had found one) where
someone would still dare to lie for America if the Gestapo
checked back, or the name of a town which had just been
bombed, so they could not check back.

All this briefing and preparation took three days, after the
26

Team got going. Documents thought that was fast. G- com-
plained it was too long. They said the intelligence might be
stale if the Joe could not even start after it for three days. But
they did not know how complex and delicate the cover had to
be, if the Joe was to return alive. They had no mercy on a Joe,
maybe because they never saw one; they never understood, as
even Vati did, that, far from being a machine, he was twice as
complex as a man, because he was two men.

On the night of a mission, Vati would slide him out to the
waiting car, to start for the front if he were passing through a
hole, or for the field if he were dropping. A wink after supper,
or a treat at the bar, was the signal, but there was no farewell.
Yet the Joe could not always keep his eyes from staring or his
voice from breaking, no matter how careful he was; and the
others sometimes caught the tension in spite of orders. They
might clasp his hand under the table, or whisper "Hals- und
Beinbruch," which is a queer way to wish a friend luck, for it
means break your neck and leg. The Joe was *MtT to the others
by now. English has no word for the "thou" of Europe, which
means affection or contempt or both at once but never
means respect, except in prayer.

The life behind was erased, and the life ahead was hidden.
He went to a secret as he had come from one. But it was no
wonder if sometimes at the Golden Well he had overheard the
briefing of another Joe was it not his business to spy? or if
in that taut interval just before his mission he confided to one
to one alone, sworn to silence perhaps along the road, per-
haps at night when the Kehl guns crackled, perhaps from bunk
to bunk, what his real name was. Or where his wife lived. Or,
most dangerous of all, where the Americans were sending him.

If only to leave in some German memory the trace of his
existence.

27

Two

One morning early in January three of the Team sat in the of-
fice at the cage, waiting for volunteers. Since the Battle of the
Bulge began, not a single new recruit had joined.

"They're scared/* said Captain Pete gloomily, "and so am I.
WeVe only got three so far. Unless someone breaks through to
Bastogne we may never get another. This ought to be a lesson
anyway. If First Army had planted a few Joes they wouldn't
be in the soup now. Maybe if Washington lets us raise the
pay-"

There was a knock at the office door: three shorts and a long,
the Morse for V.

Before he had time to answer it, the door opened just far
enough to let a slim figure in Feldgrau slip through. His body
stood across the crack, but Fred, from his corner, had time to
see a group of prisoners in the corridor, kneeling with brushes
to scrub the stone floor. The newcomer turned the knob softly,
pushing lightly with his hand behind him till the click showed
the door had latched. He stood his mop against the wall, then
28

saluted Pete gravely in the old Wehrmacht way, with fingers to
cap like the American salute. It had almost gone out since the
Nazis brought in the straightarm, which they called the "Ger-
man greeting/* He was a full six feet, but lithe; he looked hand-
some and urbane as Satan. There was no jauntiness left in the
cage, even among the Americans, and the prisoners shuffling
through the slush outside the window, beyond the wire stock-
ade, wore sacking around their feet and newspapers over their
ears. But his Schiffchen (his boat, as they called their service
cap) was cocked at just the right angle to show the wave in
his glossy black hair, and his Feldgrau, though darned, was
creased and clean, Fred even noticed that there were no spots
on the knees of his pants, proving that he had goldbricked out
of kneeling with the rest of the cleaning detail. He could see
that this Kraut was an old campaigner.

Pete was not a majestic specimen of the conqueror. For all
his beetling eyebrows he was too short and too sloppy. Even
so, the first three German Joes had shaken and stammered a
little when they came through his door. The newcomer did not
seem impressed by him, nor by the sight of the stove and the
armchair and the open carton of Camels. He began respectfully
enough, standing at attention with his feet at right angles as
the Wehrmacht taught Maybe he was too respectful, Pete
thought uneasily. Pete always doubted; that is why he was the
best man in the Team.

"I have heard, Herr Captain,*' he began in German, "that you
offer good pay for certain services to those who have qualifica-
tions like my own. If one might ask what the pay would be?"

He pronounced Pete's rank in the German way: Kapitan.

"Who told you that?" Pete countered, raking him up and
down, or rather up, with his black eyes. "Take off your coat or
you'll get pneumonia, and sit down."

The newcomer waggled his forefinger. "One never reveals
the source. And I am glad to get warm."

29

With a sigh he sat down in the armchair, placed to face the
light. Pete smiled, not without admiration. He offered the
Camels.

"Well, suppose we did. If we did, what are your qualifica-
tions? And further, who are you?"

"I am the Tiger," the visitor began. "Are you sure they can-
not see or hear out there?"

He bent his head toward the stockade. Pete nodded.
"From you I have nothing to hide. Indeed, I have come far
for this moment."

He appraised the cigarette, then took a deep drag and began
his history.

His name was Rudolf Earth. He had been born in Duisburg
in 1917, which made him twenty-eight, if it was true. His
mother had died in childbirth. His father, to forget, moved to
the dockyards of Mannheim, where the Neckar meets the
Rhine. It cannot have been easy for Herr Barth to bring up the
boy.

"All the same, I was his son, so he owed me a little sacrifice.
It was the hard Me after the First War which made him a
Communist. I am a Communist, too, but not for such a cow-
ardly reason. I have reached my faith by long thought, since
I was young. To prove how weak he was, let me tell you that
at the time of the Putsch he switched to the new party. My
father was not a brave man."

"Was? Is he dead now?"

The Tiger shrugged. "Weiss nicht. They did give him a bet-
ter job when he was converted. They set him to organizing the
dockworkers for the party. National Socialist German Workers'
party, indeed!" He rolled the Nazi title off his tongue with
scorn, the whole of it.

u Arbeiter! Why, after that he never worked again, as far as I

could see. And he seemed to hate me all the more. I was the

fastest runner and the highest jumper in the Rotsport. That

was the Communist sport club in the city schools before the

30

party put us out of business. I won the thousand-meter when
the new Mannheim stadium opened."

"You wouldn't do any high jumping if you worked for us,"
Pete laughed, "except downward. But you might have to run.
You look as if you could run fast. How about swimming? You
must know how to swim if you live between the Rhine and the
Neckar."

The Tiger shook his head. "I never took up swimming, but
it would be easy for me to learn. I hold the sharpshooter's
medal. Intelligence work that's what I like best My first job
was to deliver a letter to a girl in Munich. The track coach
gave me the fare third class, the cheap Halunke!* She was
waiting to the right of the station door, as he promised, reading
the Miinchner Illustrierte. She did not look up when I slipped
the envelope between the paper and her fingers, invisibly, with-
out looking at her, like a well-trained agent. I still do not know
what was in that letter. It may even have been blank, to initi-
ate me without any risk to themselves. It shows I am loyal that
I did not steam the flap open to find out. Later we were mar-
ried, when I was just eighteen. I wonder if we didn't get mar-
ried for the sake of our own party. I confess that I ran away
from her a year later to join a circus, and I haven't seen her
since. I trained the animals; that's why I choose the name
Tiger. A harmless vanity. There was good money in circuses
before the war. We traveled all over Europe in boxcars with
strong iron bars. There were many women who came to the
show because they loved animals. I taught them to love Com-
munism. It was a pleasant way to help. One of them taught me
French. Vous voyez, je suis debrouillard." f

He rattled on in his machine-gun Baden accent, throwing in
a little French slang now and then to prove he knew that lan-
guage too.

"Just before the war they called the circus in from France.

*Bum.

t You see, I make out all right.

31

By that time I had worked ten years under the canvas. I was
chief trainer and head of the whole animal convoy, with a good
salary and two dress suits. None of us wanted to go back to
Germany, not even my beasts. That was a sad day when we
had to roll home across the Rhine bridge, with the animals all
roaring with hunger inside the red and yellow cages. They
have probably been eaten themselves by now. I was sure He
planned to start war that summer, and had ordered us back for
the Wehrmacht."

The Tiger smiled pleasantly. You never heard German sol-
diers use the word Nazi; it was always "the regime" or "the
Party/' You never heard them say the name of Hitler, not even
the title of Reichskanzler or Fuhrer or Mehrer.* It was always
"He," as the Tiger used it now, but you knew whom they
meant, for you could almost hear the capital H.

"To keep out of it I got a job in Daimler-Benz: work essential
for the defense of the Reich. On the side I started a new cell.
We called it the Kaiserblume, so they would think we were no
worse than royalists. We carried the patch under the collar to
show each other when we dared, like this" he flipped the tab
of his tunic "a neat blue cornflower. We called the group a
cell because it started out small, and when it grew too big we
split it in half, like cancer. I bet mat's what He thinks we are.
Sabotage is what we loved, because we could not often shoot.
I taught the other workers in my section how to slow down.
Drink some mustard soaked in flour and vinegar. You will
swell up at the joints so you can't work for a week. Have you
ever smoked a cigarette dipped in hair oil?" he reached for
another Camel "It gives you a beautiful rash which the doc-
tors never diagnosed. Believe me, the tanks which Daimler-
Benz turned out have done your troops no harm. But it was no
use; the Army got me in forty-one."

Pete had heard some tall boasting from recruits, but his

* Chancellor, leader, expander.
32

jaw hung open as the Tiger went on. The Tiger had jumped
into Crete four times with the airborne engineers of General
Philipp's Festungsbrigade Kreta the Team pricked up its
ears at that. When the island was secured, they shipped him to
the Russian front, for the campaign was not going too well at
Stalingrad. In Budweis, on the way, he was wounded. He
showed Pete his left hand, with the first two fingers gone.

"I did not want to fight the Russians/' he explained, "so I
used an old Czech pistol I had kept from before the war. It
was easy to make it look as if a sniper had done it. They were
shooting men for losing fingers then, even if it was only by
carelessness. But will you believe me? They gave me the Cold
Storage Medal, as we call it, for service on the Russian front,
though I never got east of Bohemia. Then my wound got in-
fected; I hadn't counted on that. But things usually work out.
They sent me to the reserve hospital at Bregenz across the lake
from Switzerland. When the stumps healed I was released
from active service.

"I was a corporal by then, with a wound chevron and a
sharpshooter's badge and the Iron Cross Second Class and of
course, the parachute badge you know it, the eagle swooping
down with furled wings. Tjiey put me in a company of old-
timers to guard the Antwerjf^apply line from the Belgian guer-
rillas. One day we had a skirmish near Bastogne . . ."

(That very day Bastogne ^as under siege in the snow, and
Skorzeny's men were inside^jp lines in white parkas just like
Quartermaster issue.)

*'. . . and I skipped out when the firing stopped. Worked
westward to join the guerrillas. At tie Luxembourg frontier a
customs guard asked for my Soldbuch. I shot him through the
head and took his badge. That convinced the guerrillas, in
spite of my Feldgrau. They found him lying where I said.
Naturally, I had taken his money. There was quite a lot of it,
too; he must have taken bribes for contraband in both direc-

33

tions. More than a thousand marks, and even one American
dollar. I have kept the dollar for sentiments sake; also because
it is hard money."

He rubbed his thumb and forefinger together in the Conti-
nental gesture which means avarice. From his breast pocket
he drew an old-style outsized dollar bill, the land that had
trapped Skorzeny's man at the Canadian border.

"I have heard that the capitalists in your country frame their
first dollar on their office walls in the skyscrapers. I bet their
dollars are no more honest than this one. Anyway, the guer-
rillas found me a civilian suit and let me marry one of their
girls. She called me Panther instead of Tiger her black pan-
ther. But soon we fell out of love. In the war of the heart dis-
guise is useless. It was time for me to move again.

"I burned my Feldgrau in the stove of our dugout, and even
my Soldbuch. The comrades wished me farewell when I ex-
plained that I had a higher mission. I only kept the little snap-
shot from the front cover to show you that I really am a
corporal. With civilian clothes, it was not hard to work my way
down to you."

He held out the square photo, with his signature and a scrap
of the swastika seal across the corner, as they should be, and
pointed out the double bar on the collar tab, with a black
band and a capital F for corporal of Fortress Engineers. Pete
raised his eyebrows incredulously. -

"You think it is impossible to do such things in Germany,
Herr Kapitan? It is hard, but not impossible if one is nimble
and has the will. I was listed in the Blacklist so long ago that
by now I am given up for dead. I am safer now than ever. For
the Gestapo, I am what they call in Haiti a zombie. I know
that a soldier who travels is supposed to have his papers
stamped each day by the transport office or the mayor, but one
can forge the stamp. It is hardest near the front to do such
things, but deep in Germany where the people do not fight,
but weep for their fighters instead, and in the occupied coun-
84

tries, which hate the regime anyway, one can manage to be
free even in wartime. I can speak like an Alsatian, you see/'
And he drawled "Straws-s-burh" for them in mimicry of the
local accent.

The first time he met an American patrol he threw his arms
in the air and told them in gestures, for English was the one
language he never claimed, that he was a German deserter.
They turned him in at the Sarrebourg cage. Since the comman-
dant could not let the Swiss Red Cross who inspected the cage
think that he imprisoned civilians, the Tiger was given an old
German uniform from the stockpile.

He sidled forward and spat into the stove. "One should not
praise one's wares too highly, lest the purchaser suspect them,**
he grinned, "but you can see you will be well repaid by send-
ing me behind the lines. I suggest Mannheim, for I know it.
If you give me a radio operator too, I can supply you with all
information from that important city, and shall have means of
wiring you for supplies as I need them. Why, if you gave me
enough money I could start a revolution against Him from
there, as the sailors did in the last war from Hamburg. Ham-
burg is no more important than Mannheim. If I convert Mann-
heim I shall have cut Germany in half. You will see, I shall prey
on Him."

"You sound something like Him yourself/' said Captain Pete.
"I think He is more likely to prey on you/'

"Not bad, Herr Kapitan," cried the Tiger, beating his knee.
"A Communist Fiihrer. I thank you for the compliment But
do not think I am all dreamer. I know a cave in the Bensheim
quarries against the cliffs of the eastern side of the river, where
the direction finders will never believe a radio could hide,
no matter what their beams tell them. At Number 27 Wharf
Street in Mannheim is a bunker where we can shelter whenever
we need to. If any of your agents do not deny again that you
have them needs help, let him go to that house, rear room
right on the first floor, knock four times like the V-signal, and

85

say to whoever opens it Greetings from the Tiger/ Schonen
Gruss vom Herrn Tiger. It is my father-in-law's apartment, my
first father-in-law. He is a good comrade too. He knows that
you will come. But don't tell him about the circus.

"I should need at least ten thousand Reichsmarks, but in bills
no larger than one hundred, please, since they trace the larger
bills. Better have planes available later to send in more pistols
and cigarettes, together with sulfa drugs in case of certain dis-
eases which slow up the mobility of a team. I shall recruit
many more when I get in. Not so much from the Wehrmacht,
for the German soldier is a slave, and I do not concern myself
with such details as machine guns and drills, but from the
richer field of politics, like those pioneers at Hamburg. We
shall be your forward army across the Rhine. I shall call it the
Tiger Brigade. Wait, it will be a Communist Biirgermeister
who welcomes the Seventh Army to Mannheim. I can stay out
the war there, no matter how long it may be, undermining Him
more each day. It may be I shall even join the SS for ap-
pearance's sake; who can tell? Perhaps I shall be the last guard
on the Rhine bridge. It is I who shall capture Mannheim for
you, and all the time I shall be safe, safer than among the
Soldaten in this prison/*

"I don't doubt you are in danger from them," Pete inter-
rupted drily.

"And only two requests do I make, except to ask again what
salary you pay. One, that I have twice the usual life insurance,
because I have two wives. Second, that I go home as a ser-
geant. I have earned the promotion. But there, I have given
you all my secrets and my dreams, and you tell me nothing
of yours/'

Pontifically the colonel boomed from the corner. "You have
told us all your hatreds, Corporal Barth, and they are many.
Tell us, what do you believe? 7 *

The Tiger's exaltation flagged. His eyes roamed the ceiling,
then he stood up in deference to the eagle. He smiled urbanely.
36

"If I seem theatrical, Herr Colonel, I tell no more than the
facts. If I mock others, it may be that I mock myself also. I be-
lieve that every man should have his chance. I offer you my
courage so that injustice may be destroyed.'*

There was a silence. Pete pressed the bell on his desk. The
Tiger understood his interview was over. He grasped his mop
as if it were a rifle at ground and waited at attention beside the
door. An MP came in.

"Take this prisoner to the probation cell," ordered the colo-
nel, but only after a pause, as if he were coming out of a trance.

The colonel kept a notebook in his foot locker. That night he
wrote in it: "No. 4 OK for subversive. Physical courage for
ops A-plus. Understanding of issue nil, hence doubt moral
strength for followup."

In the jargon of the Team "followup" meant putting your
finger on a target for the bombers, even if the target was your
own home town. Herbert had shot two lieutenants when they
caught him deactivating a bridge mine, but that was not fol-
lowup; it was just self-defense. Jojo had slipped a stinger and
a dime-sized compass to an American PW. That was not even
so much; it was just comradeship. Antonius had sported the
Bumblebee, but that was classed more as revenge for the
twelve GIs. These missions were all tactical; followup was
strategic. So far, no Joe had had to give the word which would
knock out a division or a city in his homeland.

37

Three

A dozen Americans of Seventh Army Combat Intelligence sat
around the table in the field office at the Schloss that evening
after supper, debating whether to hire the Tiger. The Schloss
was called Station S, as the German Joehouse was G and the
French F. A big map of Western Germany at 1:250,000 cov-
ered one wall, with the sofa below it. Against another stood
the dark green field safe which contained the contracts of the
Joes. Next was a Bechstein grand which someone had liberated
from a Nazi official during their short stay in Strasbourg, and
the fourth was a single casement, bolted and shuttered for
the night, with a big old-fashioned Cremone bolt running its
full height.

Operations was playing the piano softly; he claimed it made
him think better. Documents was studying the map, standing
on the sofa with his spectacles almost scraping the wall.

Pete, who was Recruiting, opposed hiring the Tiger. "He is
the biggest liar I have seen in all Europe or America. If he lies
to his own people he will lie to us. I don't think we ought to
38

touch him. I'd really like to sweat him out and see if he isn't a
super-Skorzeny boy."

The colonel smiled. He fancied himself not only as a com-
manding officer who knew that deserters were slippery, but as
a psychologist who had found the reason why. He wedged a
new candle in the empty schnapps bottle. Station S had no
electricity.

"Pete doesn't realize it," he told them, "but that's exactly the
reason we should hire him. Just because he is such a tall liar, I
mean. The minute a man passes those lines he becomes a liar
automatically, and it's better to have a big one, with some in-
ternational experience, than a petty first-time liar. The Tiger
is clearly the Olympic champion, both for speed and endur-
ance; Pete is right there. But the two Joes who got theirs in the
cafe at Munich last month got it because their lying wasn't big
enough, or fast enough, or both. Anyway, they are no use to us
now, poor kids. In this racket you have to distrust an honest
man, though I don't deny the possibility there might be a Joe
so transparently and ridiculously noble as to make the best
agent of all. I haven't come across one yet. Till we do, I want
to stick to the good old-fashioned double-crossers. It isn't a
question of ethics at all, for which our wives and Sunday school
teachers should be glad. Look at it another way: you might not
want to risk an honest man, but this Munchausen would be no
loss to anyone. The only question is, will he help us or hurt us?
All this on the assumption that Security okays him."

Pete said, "I bet he'd give away the location of his own Joe-
house for a thousand marks that is, after he'd taken our
money first and got across the line with it."

"Yes," the colonel answered, "I think he would, though he
might hold out for ten. However, we'll be moving it soon any-
way, as soon as the push starts. Besides, he's not in a very
strong position to bargain with Skorzeny, if there's any truth
at all in his story. I don't think he can hurt us much; he doesn't
know a thing yet except where Pete's office is at the cage. If

39

they bombed Pete they'd hit a thousand Krauts at the same
time. Not a bad exchange. All I ask is, can he help us?"

"He certainly has a high disdain for those technicalities G-2
pesters us for." Pete smiled. "You know, Colonel, things like
guns and divisions."

"No sarcasm, please, Captain."

But the colonel really liked Pete. They used to work in the
same law firm. It was the colonel who had got Pete his com-
mission.

"No, I wouldn't put him in any spot intelligence. This is
what Washington calls a morale operation. I don't see why we
shouldn't try one. Mannheim must be about ripe now. The
Eighth has done a little bombing around the edges already;
not much, but enough to get on the nerves. Docks and gas
tanks, and objectives like that. The flames have probably
spread. They'd do a little more for the asking, I guess. Does
anyone here know the town?"

Everyone shook his head; but Documents, who took down
the Joes' life histories when they joined, remembered that
Antonius had an uncle there.

"Good," said the colonel. "Send one of the Swiss in to check
that address of the father-in-law. He will be sure to turn up
something. Meanwhile let the Tiger stew. If he has lied to
Pete I will ship him west where he can't do any harm. If he
has told the truth, I am going to drop him in on the chance he
can do a little damage to the Herrenvolk. Not that I expect his
revolution quite yet. The only thing that worries me" he
glanced almost shyly at the captain "is using a Communist. I
don't think it has ever been done, but he should be all the bet-
ter for the job."

"Who's teaching Sunday school now?" Pete crowed. "If you
are set on hiring him, give him double pay and he will become
honest, if that will ease your mind. Who wouldn't? Injustice,
he says! Everyone gripes about injustice. For instance, that
gold leaf I deserve . . ."
40

So the Tiger stayed in the probation cell at the cage. In a
week the report came out of Switzerland that as far as Mann-
heim went everything he had said was true. The cave was in
Bensheim all right a fine place for the radio. The bunker was
underneath 27 Wharf Street, and the father-in-law was up-
stairs. Not only that, but he would do what he could to help
the Tiger or any of his friends, within the limits of his own
safety, They could not ask for more, and wondered in what con-
fidence, where the walls and the very river had ears, the old
Communist had dared give that promise to a stranger in a black
cassock.

The colonel was so elated by this proof of his good judg-
ment that he did give the Tiger double pay and it was plenty
and extra insurance and his "promotion* too. Documents
made him a Soldbuch in the name of Ludwig Kett, staff ser-
geant of Festungspionier Bataillon 6, on mission to inspect
steel reinforcement in the Rhine and Neckar defenses. The
Tiger grinned like a child, though it was rare for him to smile,
when his picture was taken with the silver pip on his shoulder
strap. Pete still grumbled.

"Hell bitch us sure as fate, and 111 get a chewing out from
you for having followed your own advice in recruiting him."

But Finance would give Trim only fifty thousand marks
expense money instead of the hundred thousand he wanted,
Even the colonel had to agree it was enough. "If it takes us a
year to reach the river, he couldn't spend that much on sub-
sistence. I know hell have to do some bribery that may run
up, and these are unvouchered funds, so nobody will know
even if they are wasted. But there is a limit to everything.
Why, he couldn't cany more than five hundred bills in his
money belt. But don't stint his other equipment Drop a sepa-
rate tube if you have to."

There was a good deal of feeling that the Tiger had hood-
winked the colonel. Finance was the only dissenter who got
anywhere; the rest had to obey. The Tiger shrugged eloquently

41

when the fifty thousand in rainbow bills was handed to him
at the dress rehearsal, as if to say you couldn't stint a revolu-
tion, and an unsuccessful one was worse than none at all. But
he folded the bills deftly, disposing them evenly around his
belt so there were no lumps, and smoothing his hips like a
woman with a new girdle. Supply packed a big aluminum
cylinder with a set of grid maps of Baden, a tommy cooker with
a canteen of recharging gas, a box of dog drag, five cakes of
soap, two lighters, two fountain pens, a three-color hooded
flashlight to guide the relief planes, and two sets of civilian
clothes. A long-term mission like the Tiger's might need to
wear uniform one day and civilians the next, but it was fatal
to be caught with both. Down to the soap, this equipment had
to be German, and it was not easy to assemble so much even
by combing the cage and trading American materiel with the
prisoners.

The Tiger moved into the Joehouse to wait till his opera-
tion was laid on. He took training with the other Joes. Vati
and the battle-order captain reported he was a poor student.
Not that he couldn't learn if he tried, but he just didn't listen,
as if military reporting was of no importance. Perhaps, for a
morale operation, it wasn't. But he knew all about the Gestapo.
Vati even had him lecture the others.

"You cannot tell them by their clothes." He laughed wryly.
"Sometimes they come right out with MP uniform, wearing
light blue facings to their collars and shoulder tabs. Sometimes
they wear the straight police uniform with the flat-topped
black helmet. But most often they disguise themselves as sol-
diers like us. No, you cannot tell them by their clothes. Only
by the plaque around their throats, like a soldier's dogtag, but
oblong instead of oval. And who gets a chance at a Gestapo
throat? For big offenders, like Gtraud when he escaped, or the
assassins of Heydrich, they paste up a Steckbrief on every
lamppost. For smaller fry like us," he winked, "they pool the

42

names and descriptions in the weekly Blacklist, alphabetically,
and send them to all provost offices in the Reich. Lucky they
change the color each time; you can see at a glance whether
they're up to date. Sometimes that gives you time to break.trail.
If you want to keep off the Blacklist you need at least two iden-
tities, for if once they link you to a description in it . . ."

He tightened his hands around his neck.

The Tiger never became friends with the other Joes, perhaps
because he was older. They never called him "thou," in spite
of the shows he would put on in the day room. He would make
a cone out of a newspaper, balance the point on his chin, set
fire to the top, and carry it around the room, face tilted, till it
burned right down to the end without toppling or even singe-
ing him, while the other Joes cheered. He soon became an ex-
pert in the jump training, darting over the bars like a monkey
or an acrobat, and turning his somersault on the sand without
ever a bruise or a turned ankle.

"That guy must have been in a circus," said Buck, though
he knew nothing about the Tiger's past. "He lands as soft as a
cat/-
The colonel decided to give him Paluka as radio operator,
and to have him carry the crystal walkie-talkie right in his
pack instead of dropping it in the tube.

"I am sending Paluka," he explained, "partly because he's
our best and most seasoned operator and I'm beginning to
have hopes for this unorthodox operation and partly because
he's Russian."

"Besides," said Finance, "he's on the payroll already at the
French Joehouse. That will help make up for the extras the
Tiger talked you into."

The colonel went on, '1 don't know whether he is a Com-
munist like the Tiger. I doubt whether he himself knows. He
can't speak German, which is all to the good; he'd be sure to
make some blunder if he did. He and the Tiger can get along

43

in French. If the Gestapo catches him, it might save his life to
be Russian. They would expect him to be anti-Nazi, if you see
what I mean."

TPoor penetration of enemy psychology, sir/' Pete broke in.
"They would string him up all the faster for being Russian,
But throw him to the slaughter, too."

The colonel paid no heed. "His friends would expect the
same; to them he might be sort of an advance guard of the revo-
lution. Hands across the continent, so to speak. Besides, he is
getting stale at the French Joehouse, and he is too good to be
wasted. Your tourist missions don't give us a chance to use the
radio the way we did in France. It can't be any fun for him to
cook for those Frenchmen and Poles and Italians; not that he
has to, naturally, but you know Paluka. He loves excitement.
He can't sit still. Also, he is getting too fond of Giovanna, have
you noticed? She is a nice girl and did her stuff for us in France,
but we've got to get rid of one of them,'*

"David and Uriah/* intoned Documents, turning back from
the wall map.

But the colonel went on; he had no interest in Giovanna.
The corkscrew Harvard mind." He smiled to the others.
"Love always makes trouble in a Joehouse. Immorality I don't
mind

'Who does?" Pete snickered.

"In fact, come to think of it, that might be a good reason to
hold on to Giovanna, aside from the difficulty of releasing her.
It keeps the Joes satisfied. But I'm afraid Paluka's falling for
her in the soulful Slavic way. That's bad. There will be an ex-
plosion if we leave them in that cottage together. It's like an
ammo box already. Anyway, he's the only first-class operator
we have left, and he will get a kick out of dropping in again.
He's begged for it many times. He's the only French Joe I dare
send in, with the big push coming up. Ask him what he
needs for himself."

As the Tiger was greedy, Paluka was modest. All he wanted

44 .

was a set of woman's underwear, besides the standard thou-
sand marks pocket money.

"Cela pour mes propres affaires." He laughed. "Ce n'est pas
trop, il faut convenir." *

"Salaud," Pete growled. "Stinker."

Paluka cuffed him playfully on the ear. Old Paluka, with his
square flat Slavic face, his irgn-gray hair, his wide smile of gold,
his booming laughter, his quick-footed strength! He was like a
clumsy nurse. When he winked, he winked with both eyes.
He was no taller than the Tiger, but he weighed fifty pounds
more. Many times he had risked his life for the Team, but no
one ever heard him say why. He had probably long since for-
gotten the reason himself. He never asked for extra pay. He
never spoke against the Germans, or against the Communists
in his own country.

He risked his life for fun, if such a thing seems possible. Yet
not fun exactly, because the radio operator had the dull job of
sitting bowed in his shelter all day and all night. He had fixed
hours to transmit and receive. Between then he dared not leave
his little square suitcase set, his crystals and code pad, for
fear of missing some unscheduled call, or of being delayed by
an air raid or a police check or any of the breakdowns that
beset Europe at war. If the Gestapo caught him, they asked
no questions; the radio was a death sentence in itself. They
killed him then and there, or, if they were subtle, made him
transmit false messages in his own code, with a pistol at his
head, and waited till his usefulness was over. The Team had
tried ways around that, by using a warning acrostic in the code,
but Skorzeny was not so dumb that he couldn't break it.

The only explanation is that Paluka risked his neck simply
for the love of danger. The other Joes wanted the war to end
for one reason or another revenge or reunion or just the ach-
ing for quiet but Paluka hoped it would last forever, as long
as there was a mission for him.

* 'That's for my private business. You must admit it isn't too much."

45

He had been born forty-five years before at Taganrog in
the Ukraine. That made him even older than the Tiger. His
father, Sergei, had been inspector in the iron mines named after
the October Revolution. His mother, Galina, still lived there,
he supposed. Once he showed Fred a faded picture of her
a wide, shrewd, wrinkled, earthy face just like his own, hair
parted in the middle the same way. Paluka had been just too
young to fight for the Czar. In the letdown after the armistice
he had got two years at the new Soviet technical school in
Alexandrovsk, studying electricity. He served two more in
the new Red Army; it was all the same to him. Then he went
to work in the mines himself, hacking out iron ore for the re-
armament. When his father died in 1922 the new inspector
fired him.

"It was a question of something he called solidarity. The
miners had loved my father; perhaps the inspector was afraid
they would vote to make me inspector myself. He got me a job
as radio operator on an ore ship to ease me out of Russia, and
now me voici. I must always be underground/* and he roared
at his own joke.

The first time the ore ship touched Marseille he jumped her.
Marseille is a tough city, but Paluka was tough too. He picked
up a job at the Potin electric shop, repairing motors. In two
years he was section chief. On the side he repaired radios and
gave night classes at a gym off the Canebiere.

"Swimming and acrobatics I myself taught/' he would say
proudly, stretching the muscles of his enormous arms, "and
boxing. That's how I got my gold teeth."

Though he was Russian, the French Army tried to draft
him. He stalled them off with arguments about his age and
nationality till after P^tain's armistice, when there was no more
French Army. In the few days of 1942 between our African
invasion and the German occupation of South France all the
boats that could do so slipped out of Marseille and headed
across the Mediterranean. Paluka got aboard one of them
46

as ship's electrician. When she reached Algiers he jumped ship
again, this time to enlist for the Fifis.* He was always one leap
ahead of the excitement. But there was no fun serving in an
exiled army and drilling on the warm beaches of Algeria wait-
ing for the reconquest that might never come. He watched the
American Eighth Fleet grow in the harbor, and made a bet
with himself that it would be in action first

"It was really exciting," he explained, "especially since they
had come from so far away/*

About that time the Team opened shop in Algiers itself
and put in to AFHQ for French-speaking radio operators.
General Giraud, who was building up the Free French Army
while De Gaulle was building up the government, released
Paluka with the grade of "infantry reservist." Perhaps he was
glad to get rid of so unorthodox a soldier. Paluka became the
first French Joe.

He made three jumps from Algiers into France with his radio
on his chest. On one of them he got himself a job with his old
electric shop in Marseille, no questions asked, which entitled
him to a German passport as a foreign worker. The night the
Kommandantur issued it to him he pushed out a folding rubber
boat, sculled to an American submarine waiting offshore, and
steamed back to Algiers with the little gray passport in his
waterproof money belt and a couple of gun emplacements
remembered in his thick head.

"Just in case I need a passport when we get into Germany,"
he explained. He still had it with him. It was the only valid
German identity paper in either Joehouse. The rest were all
forged by Documents, but it would have taken an expert to
detect them.

On his next trip, in- June, he spotted the Second SS Panzer
Division, which the Germans called Das Reich, starting north
at night, a few days after the Normandy landings, to help con-

* Slang for "Forces Francoises de Tlnterieur," the title by which De
Gaulle promoted the Maquis (which means brush-heath) from guerrillas
to belligerents.

47

tain the beachheads. It was the flash from Paluka's little six-
volt walkie-talkie that let the Team alert the Air Force and
the Fifis and SHAEF in London, so that between them they
stopped the heavy armor dead in its tracks. If that crack divi-
sion had reached the Normandy battleground it is possible
the Wehrmacht could have flung the whole of Operation Over-
lord back into the English Channel.

Paluka was the only French Joe who had jumped into
Germany. When Seventh Army was halfway up the Rhdne
Valley where you would have thought there was action
enough he had begged for a mission into the Reich itself. He
took off alone from the Marseille airfield and holed up for
a week in the deserted guardhouse of the cemetery at Kaisers-
lautern in the Pfalz. Jumping into Germany, he reported, was
worse (or, as he looked at it, better) than jumping into France,
where an agent had only the Milice to fear. In Germany it was
the whole frightened populace. On that mission his ignorance
of German prevented his learning much, but he slipped back
all right. Perhaps the Gestapo thought him too stupid to be a
spy, but Pete knew that just walking along the road he might
have been picked up and shipped to a labor camp where he
would be silenced for the rest of the war. If he had been caught
with his radio, he would have been silenced too, more per-
manently. Paluka did not mind the risk, but the others did not
want to lose him for nothing. Here in Alsace was his chance
again, with a German-speaking teammate; and it might be his
last, for anyone could see the enemy was beginning to crack.

It would be risky to have the same operation drop Paluka
as a civilian foreign worker and the Tiger as a soldier, for ser-
geants in Germany did not travel with Russian laborers. So
Documents fitted him out with papers as Paul Rosoff, private
in Infantry Battalion 836 of the East Legion, which Battle
Order knew was built of Ukrainian "volunteers." Documents
had to set up the presses for a special Cossack Soldbuch
blank, copied from a captured one, with the entries in both
48

Russian and German. For good measure he printed "in the
name of the Fuhrer" an Award for Valor, second class, in sil-
ver, "as granted to members of the Eastern Peoples'' and Mike,
the Austrian lieutenant, forged the signature of General-Major
von Henning, commander of the basic division of the legion.

Rosoff, Paluka's cover surname, was not so different from his
own. It had to be a little different, not only for his own safety
but for his family's, in case the Gestapo got it in the Blacklist
The Paul was his own, and they left it, for he might have
been too slow-witted to answer to another, if someone called
him in the street Every Joe had three names: his own, locked
in the field safe, his nickname at the Joehouse, and his cover
name for the operation. Paluka was a good nickname. He was
dumb and husky, just like Joe Palooka in the comics. He was a
Joe, and his name was Paul, and the "uka" sounded vaguely
Russian.

"Like 'Babushka,' " explained Documents, who had thought
up the laborious pun. "Etymologically it may not be fully cor-
rect, but it is near enough to be a masterpiece of nomenclature."

At the French Joehouse Pete had to lure Paluka from Gio-
vanna's arms, which hardly went around him in the feather
bed. They both cried, even when Pete told him he had a new
mission and promised them one more night together before
Paluka took off.

At the storeroom Supply squeezed him into the biggest
Feldgrau on the rack, and sewed on his left sleeve an eagle
insignia taken from the same Cossack who had yielded the
sample Soldbuch, and a silver "Ostlegion" on the black arm-
let. Big as the Cossack had been, the uniform was still too tight
for Paluka. He looked down at it and broke into one of his
rumbles. He took up a boxing stance, the seams creaking at
his arms.

"Come on," he shouted in French, "whoever I'm meant to
fight, Americans, Russians, Germans; Nazis or Cocos Das
spielt keine Rolled

49

It was the one German phrase he had learned: "It makes no
difference/' Coco is the slang for Communist

Pete and the colonel took him up to the German Joehouse
to "marry" the Tiger. The mating of a team was important, for
one and one do not always make two. There had been narrow
escapes where one Joe had disobeyed the other, or where,
from either malice or discontent or stupidity, the Joes had told
different stories to the Gestapo. The colonel, a little sheep-
ishly, had warned the Tiger not to speak of his communism;
Pete warned Paluka that the Tiger was captain of the team.
Vati ordered schnapps for both of them at a corner table in
the bar of the Golden Well. The innkeeper knew enough to
leave the room after he had brought the glasses over, and the
Joes knew enough to pretend they were old friends, even with
no one listening in. The introduction had to be in French, the
only language they both knew.

"Thou art going to Mannheim with the Tiger, Paluka, to
transmit for him. Okay?"

He nodded. "Das spielt keine Rolle. When do we start?
Soon?"

"Soon, after the signal plan is worked out."

"He understands I am the boss?" the Tiger asked.

Paluka repeated his indifference, and pointed to the empty
schnapps glass. He rubbed his cauliflower ear.

"Our host is not generous with his liqueurs," the Tiger
agreed. "The glass is like a thimble, and the bottom very thick."

But he nodded, so they knew he agreed to his teammate, and
the colonel ordered them another round. The Tiger was so
sure of his own agility, and Paluka so indifferent to danger,
that the mating went off as well as could be hoped, for two
such different Joes. The Tiger would rather have had Paluka
follow him in later, claiming there was no use risking two lives,
and even the whole Tiger Brigade, by a double drop, but he
was overruled. As the colonel pointed out, there was no use
risking two planes either. It soon became clear that the Tiger
50

planned to use Paluka's radio not so much to send out infor-
mation from Mannheim as to demand arms for his revolution,
as he called it. This worried Supply, who was convinced his
Colt 45s and cigarettes and clothing were simply going to be
funneled into Skorzeny's hands, to be used against Seventh
later on.

"Or else they will wind up in the black market," he proph-
esied. "In any case, the money will go right into the Tigers
pocket. Remember, this isn't like France, where we could drop
to reception committees, with flashlights and all, and trust the
Joe and his tubes would be safe, and even pick him up with a
Lysander if he got lost In Germany the controls are really
tight"

But he couldn't budge the colonel. "You don't realize that
the Tiger is like a kid in a candy store. He wants all he can get,
whether he can eat it or not. That doesn't make him a crook.
Didn't some of our French reception committees eat up re-
volvers and grenades? You never asked them for an account-
ing."

"That is because they were honest men/' put in Pete.

"Listen, the Tiger may not be a savory character, but no one
puts his head in a noose for a carton of cigarettes. He must have
some land of ideal to take the risk, even if we don't understand
what it is. Maybe if s Stalin. Maybe Paluka's is the Czar. You
don't argue about a pair of rayon panties with Paluka, do you?
Even if this one operation fails, there isn't much lost But if it
succeeds it will make a big hit back home, and may even crack
the Rhine frontier right in the middle. Like a blow in the center
of a man's spine."

He leaned back, dreaming of glory.

So it was agreed that if the Tiger, via Paluka's radio, called
for more supplies, Communications would alert the Brigade
they were on the way not only by the scheduled call code, but
by British Broadcasting messages too. They could be picked
up on any short-wave set inside Germany, in case Paluka and

51

his TR-1 were out of touch with the Tiger himself. To be safe,
Paluka would have to stay in his cave. To be useful, the Tiger
would have to move about. It was good for the mission to have
two ways of communication, as it was good for them to have
two sets of identity. The BBC signal would be BREI SCHWABZE

A1ZEN WEKDE3ST BAID BEN HUNB FRESSEN three black Cats will

soon devour the dog. Anyone who monitored BBC during the
war remembers scores of such inane messages. They were ad-
dressed to espionage teams inside the Reich, American as well
as British. BBC had the only wave length that covered the
whole country, and when the Germans dared to listen outside
they listened to BBC. The penalty for tuning in was death, but
they still listened, in attics or caves or under a haystack in the
open field, and the messages got through.

"The marriage of Paluka and the Tiger didn't go off so
badly," the colonel pronounced after the rite. He looked at the
almanac. "Lay the operation on for the sixteenth. That will be
quarter moon. Lay it on in the A-26."

Over the rustle of the firs he listened to the German guns in
Kehl and the American in Strasbourg, dueling across the
Rhine. Seventh American was not yet ready to jump the river,
and Nineteenth German would never be. "Mannheim seems a
long way off from that, but they tell me we're really going to
move in a few days. Good old Paluka; I hope he'll be all right.
The master race is getting jumpy about all Russians, inside
the Reich as well as out,"

"That gorilla is a better American than lots who wear the
uniform," Pete growled, "even if he can't speak our language."

52

Four

This is the way the doctor's son joined.

One night, a week after the Tiger had been signed, two MPs
were making the rounds outside the brick wall of the Sarre-
bourg cage. High up on the wall at each corner was fastened a
big reflector to throw light on the gravel path in both directions.
The bulb was powerful enough maybe five hundred watts
so that usually no part of any path was dark. On the tiresome
fifteen minute beat, pacing with their pumpguns cocked, pa-
trols could see their way to the next corner without danger of
being ambushed by an escaped PW or a native sniper.

But this night there was no moon. A cotton-wool mist,
spongy with the chilling drizzle, swallowed the light only
twenty yards each side of the big corner lamps, and the centers
of the paths were as dark as if there had been no lamps at alL
That is why they heard him before they saw him, as they
neared the southeast corner. A voice, a persistent voice but not
very loud, was singing ahead of them, in English. It was a
few minutes before midnight of 15 January, 1945.

r^rjr

Un - der - neath the lamp post, By the bar - t rack gate

sang the voice.

53

"Probably a drunk," one of the MPs whispered, tightening
his grip just the same.

"Who could get drunk around here?" the other whispered
back. "Besides, he doesn't sound drunk, and no one is supposed
to sing anyway and that's a German song, even if he's singing
it in English. 'Lili Marlene'; I used to hear them broadcast
it from tiie monastery at Cassino. You go ahead."

The first MP sidled warily along the damp brick wall till he
could see the corner through the mist, and the other followed
a few paces behind.

"Hande hoch!" roared the first.

That is German for "Hands up!" In Lorraine it would be un-
derstood by a civilian as well as a PW.

"Hey, BUI, come here."

For the boy's hands were already up. He was standing under
the lamp with his face to it, so anyone could see him from
either of the paths. He wore the long blue-gray coat of the
German Air Force, with the medical brassard on his left sleeve,
a red cross on a white ground. The coat was too long for him,
the sodden skirt of it was ripped and heavy with mud. Water
dripped on his face from the rim of his steel helmet. His fists
were bare and red, stretched way out of the cuffs. They were
clenched to fight the ache of his arms, held over his head in
the gesture of surrender, but sagging from the weight of his
soaking sleeves. When the MP shouted he stiffened them again
with an effort and kept on singing:

*

Fare thee well, Li - li Mar - lene

till the second MP came up and slapped his pockets, under
the cover of the other's gun, to see what the trick might be.
They were empty.

"I speak English," said the boy. "In the Medical Corps we
are not armed."
54

"Okay, Kraut, hands behind the neck and march ahead. Bill,
you better walk backwards. He might have friends out there."

They walked him silently, with one gun at his back and the
other facing him, the hundred yards to the big welcome sign
at the gate, and into the gatehouse where the duty officer sat
in front of the stove. This was not the first German prisoner
who had been brought in to the duty officer singly like this
and in the middle of the night. Before he asked any questions
tihe officer told him in German to lean with his forehead against
the wall and his toes back of the white line chalked on the floor.
In this position a prisoner was helpless. He could not draw a
gun, or even a stinger, without losing his balance.

The MPs frisked him more thoroughly, but he had nothing
on him except the Soldbuch in his left pouch pocket Accord-
ing to page one, his name was Karl Maurer, which means
Charles Mason. In the flap at the back of the book were snap-
shots of a man of fifty with a microscope beside him, of a
woman slightly younger, and of a boy about fourteen. Also an
identity pass of the Luftwaffe Medical Corps and a student
card from the medical school of Friedrich-Wilhelrn University
in Berlin. That was all. He had no money. The dogtag around
his neck was the regular German oval of zinc with three slots
punched in the middle, so that if a man were killed one half
could be broken off and sent home, while the other was buried
with him. It seems to make more sense than carrying two sepa-
rate tags, as GIs did.

His dogtag looked like this:

55

That meant lie was recruited as muster number 225 in the
twelfth anti-aircraft replacement battalion of the Luftwaffe,
and that his blood type was A.

"He speaks English, sir," the MPs said.

"Then maybe he's a spy. Where did you catch him?"

They told him how he had waited for them under the corner
lamp, singing "Lili Marlene." The deputy officer looked at the
boy, who stood before him at attention. More likely a deserter
than a spy, he thought, though he could be both.

"A smart boy to sing in English," he said.

The lieutenant hummed the first line of the song:

Vor der Ka - ser - ne, , vor dem gross - en Tor

"But say, didn't we draw a phony war, when they sing it in
English, and we come back at them in German? He was smart
to take the weather into account too, if he wanted to be cap-
tured alive. You might have shot him, mightn't you, if you had
come on him suddenly out of the dark without hearing his
voice first? A smart cookie."

"Yes, sir, we would have. And, sir "

"Yes?"

"Do you think it would be a good idea to detail a couple of
extra guards for the rest of the night, in case he has friends
out there?"

The duty officer looked from the guards to the boy. "I think
not. The others need their sleep too; but use your whistles if
you want to. Guns likewise. On your way, soldiers."

The MPs saluted and went out to finish their watch.

"At ease, Maurer," the duty officer said.

The boy relaxed, first clicking his heels and bowing to the
lieutenant, who pointed to a wooden bench in the corner of
56

the orderly room where the details sat while they were waiting
for relief. The boy sat down. His coat began to steam on the
side nearest the stove.

"Perhaps it's easier for you if we speak German/' suggested
the duty officer.

The boy nodded.

"You're hungry, I expect."

He nodded again. "Very, sir."

"Reveille is at five, and you'll get breakfast then. Why must
people walk in on me in the middle of the night? Now 111 have
to rout somebody out of the barracks to find you a blanket
roll."

But when he looked at the boy again he changed his mind.
He was a married man, with two sons in junior high back in
St. Louis.

There were some sandwiches wrapped in waxed paper on
the foot locker against the wall, for the guard detail to eat when
they felt like it, and a pot of coffee on the stove. The tin cup
hung on a hook in the plaster wall.

"Help yourself/'

TBitte."

TBitte sehr."

He did not look while the boy ate the sandwiches. He turned
his swivel chair around to the desk and riffled through the
Soldbuch. Air Force books were blue, not brown like the Army
and, he noticed the eagle holding the hooked cross was dif-
ferent too flying, not roosting. He had never seen one from
the Medical Corps before. He pulled the lamp closer to make
out the different entries, most of them in script. The regime
discouraged script, for it was a barrier to the use of German
abroad. But it takes time to reform a nation's handwriting.
The lieutenant liked trying to read script. It was harder than
speaking the language, which anyone could do. This was G-2's
job, not his; he was just fooling around to kill time till the

57

morning. He would turn the book in to them in the morning,
along with the boy.

At last the boy stopped eating. The lieutenant turned
around. He could count that six of the big sandwiches were
gone.

"Where did you come from?" he asked.

The boy started to stand, but the lieutenant motioned him
back to the bench.

"Out o a cellar, sir."

"Here in Sarrebourg?"

The boy nodded.

"Whose?"

"I do not know the name, Herr Leutnant."

"Where, then? I mean if you don't know his name, at least
tell me what house he lives in. We'll have him up for harbor-
ing. There's a stiff penalty for that, and it will be a good exam-
ple to this Godforsaken town. Never trust Lorrainers. Even
your people can't. There's no way of telling whether they're
German or French at heart"

"Most are both, sir. If you pardon, I will not tell where the
man lives who sheltered me, and I repeat I do not know his
name. I did not want to learn it."

The duty officer shrugged his shoulders and yawned. If the
boy wanted to be stubborn, it was still not his job. In the morn-
ing, let G-2 find out where he had hidden.

"You might as well sleep here on the floor, if you want to,
till reveille."

"Thank you, sir.**

The duty officer straightened in his chair, wondering
whether he was getting too soft for a tough job.

"Don't thank me, Kraut," he growled. "This isn't for your
comfort, but so someone from God's country can get a little
rest. They say the Russians don't even take prisoners alive,
still less feed and billet them.**

The boy took off his coat. It was drier now. He rolled it
58

into a pillow and lay down in a corner of the room. In two
minutes he was asleep. The MPs came back to be relieved,
but did not waken him, or even grouse when they saw their
sandwiches were gone. They tiptoed out to change the guard.

When the bugle blew at five the duty officer shook Kim and
turned him over to the reception center. The guard there sent
him out with a German trusty to wash up and eaL At nine he
was back to face the officer of the day, who cursed the boy for
making him start interrogation so early and the trusty for let-
ting the boy into the mess hall without the interrogation.

At this first screening of PWs one man of the Team always
sat in with the officer of the day, to save time kter on. This
day was Fred's rotation. Corporal Maurer gave them his name
again; the lieutenant wrote in on the muster. At "name of
parents," the corporal began to talk. He told them about the
doctor, but the officer of the day could not follow fast enough
to write it all down.

The doctor had practiced in Trebbin for many years, until
in 1939 someone remembered that five years before he had
spoken against the Party. So he was forced to move his practice
to Berlin, hoping that memories there were shorter than in the
country. Even though he was against the regime, and refused to
join the Deutsche Arztebund,* and was over military age too,
he volunteered as a field surgeon when the war came and oper-
ated on the Russian front till a shell fragment tore into his right
knee. And even after he was discharged, lamed for life, to take
up private practice again, he never hid his opposition. It was
only his value to the sick of the city that kept him out of a con-
centration camp. The boy told them about his mother, who
spoke excellent English and had taught some of it to him; and
about his kid brother Klaus.

The G-2 lieutenant interrupted, with his Waterman poised
over the questionnaire. "I don't care at all about your father's
life history, Corporal, or much about your own. I do want to

* League of German (Nazi) Surgeons.

59

know what your unit is and where, and what division it be-
longs to ? and where the division command post is. Answer me
that."

But the boy shook his head. He had torn out the second leaf
of his Soldbuch (the duty officer had not even missed it) as
soldiers were ordered to do in case of capture, but seldom did.
That was the leaf which listed their combat and replacement
history.

"I can't say more than is written in my Soldbuch, Herr
Leutnant."

And the lieutenant had to let it go at that, because of die
Geneva Convention.

"You're deep," was all he said.

It was only later, when he came to trust Americans, that the
corporal told the rest.

He was only nineteen now. At seventeen, like all German
boys, he had been given a draft number and called to serve his
year in the Labor Corps. But because of the training he had
picked up in his father's clinic, they let him volunteer in Air
Force Replacement, instead of digging ditches. Each branch
of the Wehrmacht had two equal forces, replacement and
combat. Replacement inducted and trained the recruits. It
issued Corporal Maurer his dogtag and sent him to a six-month
cadet school at the university to learn first aid and pharmacy.
Before he got through he was eighteen, and old enough for ac-
tive service. He went to combat; first to anti-aircraft at Tempel-
hof Field in Berlin. But the big attacks had not started, so they
assigned him to the 88th Flak Battalion at Cassino as medical
supply corporal. From the monastery on the mountaintop his
battalion fought off the American raiders, no doubt singing
"Lili Marlene" as the MP had heard them, while they swiveled
with the Vierling* and gave Kesselring's artillery freedom to
sweep the defile below. And no GI forgot that German fire
had held up Fifth Army for months at Cassino. Even when

* 20 mm. four-barreled anti-aircraft gun.

60

Eaker's planes pulverized the ancient abbey in March, it was
not till May that the tide of Fifth poured through to Rome.

With the loss of Cassino what remained of the unit merged
with Flak Battalion 852, of the 9th Flak Division. The corporal
was shipped to Pf alzburg in Lorraine only twenty kilometers
from the Sarrebourg cage where he was telling his story.

They had not been there a week before Seventh Army tanks
surrounded the position and cut them off. He was frightened
that day, he admitted. His battery was set up on top of the
gateway in the old city wall. Three Shermans churned around
behind the wall and stood between bfm and Germany, slowly
depressing their sights to blast the strongpoint into dust. The
crumbled pink stone would not have withstood one round, let
alone three, and their pom-poms were no more use against the
Shermans than peashooters against a rhinoceros.

Most of the crew threw up their hands and surrendered to
the tanks. Neither the corporal nor the Team knew it, but the
rest of them had passed through this very cage and were al-
ready mending roads in France before he was walked under
the welcome sign. The old gateway at Pfalzburg still stands.

Corporal Maurer did not surrender. He took a high jump
from the top of the wall, into the town square, and then he
had to run. He couldn't run east into the muzzles, so he ran
west, around the statue of Erckmann-Chatrian. It was almost
dark, and easy to hide in the woods. There did not seem to be
any fixed line such as his father had described from the First
War. Without knowing how, he found himself at the edge
of Sarrebourg next sunrise. American signs and vehicles and
troops grew thicker with each kilometer. He scuttled into the
barnyard of the first undamaged house he saw. He was not
deserting, he was trying to escape capture.

For three weeks he hid in the friendly cellar, living on the
iron ration* in his knapsack and the little his protectors could

* Eiserne Portion, an emergency ration of coffee, rusk, salt, and meat
concentrate.

61

spare him. He still refused to tell which house it was, and G-2
did not press him.

"They even gave me one of your good rations called K/* he
said, "but I could hardly expect it would repeat. I cannot think
how they got hold of such good American food/*

"I can/* muttered the lieutenant.

"Finally there was no more to eat, so last night I was forced
to surrender. That was not cowardly. Please to inscribe me as
a prisoner of war.**

He still stood at attention, gazing defiantly around the shed
to prove his bravery. "Many more would surrender/* he blurted
out, "except for the stories of cruelty we are taught in the
Wehrmacht. But the lieutenant and the guards were kind to me
last night. Besides, my father has always been against the re-
gime. Yet do not think he is anything but true German, as I
am. We have suffered from the regime. Since they came in we
have not spoken English at home as we used to when I was a
child; therefore I have forgotten much, and you must excuse
me."

"Take him away/' the lieutenant commanded.

Corporal Maurer was hardly more than a child now. He had
high cheekbones, the skin over them pink and taut as a crab
apple, and small white teeth like the kernels of bantam corn,
and white knuckles too small for his roughened hands, and
freckles on his crinkly snub nose. He had taken the delousing
bath before being brought in for the interrogation, and the
prisoners' barber had given him a close haircut. His pointed
ears stood away from his wirebrush-cropped skull. The prom-
ise of a sandy mustache struggled on his upper lip, but he
hardly seemed old enough to shave.

He spoke English carefully, with a good schoolboy accent.
He bowed like a schoolboy reciting a lesson he is proud to have
learned. He frowned when he thought and he smiled all the
time he talked, as if he worked things out the hard way first.
After the G-2 lieutenant had listed him in the roster, the trusty,
62

a huge German artillery sergeant, took him to the equipment
shed for his blanket roll and mess kit The lieutenant looked
after him.

"Let him send a Red Cross postcard home first, if he wants
to/' he called Then he turned to Fred. "That lad can't be a
spy; he's too young. Not only that, he's too " he struggled for
the word "too happy. I know I'm supposed to be a ferret, but
a sharp nose ought to smell out the good as well as the bad.
That lieutenant on duty last night has got spies on the brain.
He sees one under every stone. Well, that's my job to judge,
not his. If the kid knows his stuff, why don't they put him to
work in the dispensary? The T/5 has been transferred, and
Doc Brophy needs a man. He could interpret for the sick ones,
and show up the ones who pretend to be sick."

So Corporal Maurer was assigned to the cadre, which meant
he got PX rations like the trusties. Like all the prisoners, he re-
ceived the same pay from Uncle Sam as he had got in the
Wehrmacht in his case, corporal's pay of seven dollars and
thirty cents a month at ten Reichsmarks to the dollar. Besides
that, he earned eighty cents a day for working. He worked
silently and quickly, even sternly. The Germans had left the
Sarrebourg barracks in such a hurry three months before that
their drugs were still stacked on the shelves of the high-ceil-
inged dispensary. It seemed foolish not to use them up.

A unit from the Black Forest had been stationed in the bar-
racks before Third Infantry took Sarrebourg, and the white
walls of the clinic were stenciled with homesick mottoes like
"Black Forest, my homeland!" and "We are the sons of the
mountains." For punctuation marks they used little colored
decalcomanias of an edelweiss.

The boy climbed around the shelves like a monkey. He could
read the German labels better than Doc Brophy, the medical
silver-bar, and translate them into English for him. He was
almost as deft as the doctor himself at wrapping bandages and
he did it with a technique the prisoners seemed to know. Not

63

that the cage got many serious cases from the field, for they
were shipped to the big hospitals, but there were often ac-
cidents and quarrels and even self -mutilation in the cage itself.

The doctors were afraid of an epidemic of dysentery, or
typhoid, or even typhus. The Swiss inspectors had a right to
close the cage down if tihey saw fit. The commandant didn't
want that to happen, with such a good stream of prisoners
flowing through. The prisoners were frightened too; they had
been educated to fear Americans. The shock of capture itself
was enough to terrify them, and how could they know that
the outgoing truckloads passing the incoming at the welcome
sign were not headed for the mass extermination they had all
heard described by veterans from Russia? The whole German
Army believed that Roosevelt their propaganda sheets called
him "Jewboy Rosenfeld" had ordered the castration of any
SS men captured alive, and some penalty, only maybe lighter,
for the ordinary soldiers and aviators.

The cage was dirty and cold and it stank, but they were safe
as long as they stayed in it. Anything was better than what
might lie outside. The PWs often invented illnesses and aches
for an excuse to visit the sick bay and so put off the day when
they would be shipped out. Malingering in German fooled the
American doctors, but the corporal had seen it before and was
not fooled.

"Some are truly sick, Herr Leutnant, but many pretend. Do
not be severe, for it is only that they are a little afraid. In the
Luftwaffe the penalty was a day without food, besides the
shame of being caught. I have been afraid myself so I cannot
accuse them. But when I was fighting against you I used to take
down all names and complaints in the outer tent and put a
small circle on the paper of those who seemed to be pretend-
ing. They did not see my circle, but the doctor inside, when he
saw it, treated them or discharged them as he thought best.
It was simple and nobody was shamed. In the field he did not
have time to investigate all, or to treat everyone who came, or

even to be angry with the pretenders. When he saw a circle,
he just prescribed a day without food as the first part of their
treatment. Soon there were no pretenders/*

He kept the stockroom cleaner than the American T/5 who
had preceded him. Instruments and bottles were always ready
on their shelves, and there were no more empty or corkless
jars, misplaced needles, or dirty dressings. The T/5 had seen
no reason why the prisoners rated American medical treatment
at all, since they had been killing Americans only a few days
before.

But First Lieutenant Brophy, MC, did not think of that side
at all. He was glad to have a German weed out the fakes and
stand by at the real cases almost as good as an interne, be-
sides being an interpreter for him. And if he did not know the
English name of a drug, First Lieutenant Brophy gave the
corporal the Latin name from the pharmacopoeia, and next
day the boy had memorized it in all three languages. When
First Lieutenant Brophy left his struggling practice in Hart-
ford to do his part in the war he had not expected to draw a
PW cage in Lorraine. It was not his idea of men in white, or in
khaki either. He wanted action or home. Teaching his new
aide pharmacy, and learning German from him, gave him a
new interest in the war.

One afternoon at the end of the clinic, when the corporal
had been working a fortnight, he saluted First Lieutenant
Brophy as usual before locking up and said, "If I can help end
the war by going, back into Germany, Herr Leutnant/' he bent
his head to die east, "I should not be afraid. If only to tell them
how foolish to fight against such equipment as you have. He
would never have started this if He had seen what I have. Peni-
cillin, for instance, as much as you want. And spare parts for
vehicles which can be interchanged. Also, I could tell them
that some of you are friends. Please do not take this lightly.
I have thought about it hard, ever since I came to your dis-
pensary. You are the only one I know how to approach."

65

"I know nothing of such things, Corporal," Brophy answered
stiffly, < but I should not like to lose you. And, Corporal, the
British pronounce my grade 'Leftenant/ and the Germans
'Loitnanf as you have just done, but the Americans pronounce
it TLewtenant/ Not that it matters much between us medical
men, but you might just like to know to perfect your English.
And we are not friends/*

The corporal leaned forward on an impulse. "Do you know,
sir, that the German slang for Americans is Amis? In French
that means friends, thought not pronounced the same."

Brophy needed him in the dispensary and could not imagine
how a boy of nineteen could help "end the war." But any
chance to end it was better than none, for he was homesick.
The next day lie walked into the Team's office in the corner of
the Kaserne.

"The rest of us don't know what monkey business you fel-
lows do, Captain," he told Pete. "Except to be sure it is mon-
key business when you pick up our smartest prisoners instead
of sending them to the work details."

"Why does it surprise you? That's the way Uncle Sam picked
us, you know choice of the smartest."

First Lieutenant Brophy swiped at him with a stethoscope.
"I have the smartest kid working for me, smarter than you or
anyone else IVe seen since I left Hartford, and he wants to end
the war. I don't want to lose him, but if he's in your line
maybe I'd better give him up and find another orderly."

Pete nodded. The recruits always wanted to end the war
who didn't? whatever their real motives might be, greed or
fun or faith. He pushed the Camels toward Brophy. "What's
his name?"

"Karl Maurer."

"Oh, yeah, the Luftwaffe corporal who serenaded the MPs. I
thought he must be smart. The one the OD called Happy."

"It's a good word for him." Brophy nodded.

"Fred told me about him. I should have got around to
66

before. I you think you can spare him, we might have a job
for him. But don't ask what kind of job, and if you send him in
he can't go back even if we don't take him."

"You'll take him all right, and a little appreciation to me,
please, for being willing to give up my prize assistant."

"Gee, thanks. Now you won't have so much time to write
V-mail to your girl in Hartford. Such self-sacrifice deserves at
least a Silver Star. Ill mention it to the general next time he
comes to call. Greater love than this hath no man."

Brophy brought him into Pete's office the next afternoon at
closing time, so as to make the visit seem casual, then tactfully
disappeared, leaving the corporal standing awkwardly among
the half-dozen who had heard the rumor there might be a new
German Joe. He looked around the room shyly, like a school-
boy, but proudly, like a soldier of the Wehrmacht in the propa-
ganda books.

"Sit down, Corporal," Pete said. "You needn't be bashful with
us. I want you to feel you are among friends."

He spoke in German. The corporal sat down, not to make
himself comfortable but to obey an order. He sat upright,
with his hands on his knees. He looked respectful and attentive
and alert, wary even. They could tell he was nervous, for his
knuckles were whiter than they should have been. Who
wouldn't be nervous? He declined Pete's offer of a cigarette.
He wanted it, for even the cadre didn't get much tobacco, and
ordinary PWs got none. But he wasn't ready yet to accept a
favor. He looked from one to the other of them like a kid
waiting for the hard question in an exam. Pete blew smoke
rings fromiiis own cigarette.

"Now don't tell me why you want to work for us, Corporal,
if you don't choose to. I have no right to ask" and indeed
this was the first time he had ever even wondered Tbut you
can tell me if you feel like it."

Corporal Maurer shut his eyes and frowned. "I want to work
for freedom, sir," he said, "that's all. Fur die Freiheit."

67

There was an awkward pause. Freedom was a word used in
orders of the day, and sometimes in the editorials of Stars and
Stripes. There is a soldier's vocabulary at each extreme: the
monosyllables he speaks but never writes, and the long words
he reads but never utters. "Freedom/ 7 dropped into that barred
prison room, was as shocking as smut in a parlor, and it was
an American who blushed.

The boy opened his eyes and ended the pause himself. "I
don't want to pull a gun, though I suppose it might be neces-
sary for my own safety sometimes/*

Pete smiled. "It might, but we wouldn't ask you to go out of
your way for sabotage or assassination. We're not gunmen our-
selves. Just information."

"It sounds worse, Captain," he smiled back, "when you word
it that way than when Fritz Gruber sits at the controls of our
Vierling. Before I was captured I kept thinking how little he
understood what he shot at. Since I was captured I have been
thinking that most of your troops, if you will excuse me, know
too little about us. Only what you hear from Doctor Goebbels.
He is not a medical doctor."

"You see/' someone whispered from the shadows, 'Tie wants
to educate us. That's always the way with amateurs."

"You know, I suppose," Pete suggested, "that you would be
a traitor to your own country?"

"Excuse me, Herr Kapitan," he broke out, "I do not agree.
My father would not agree. I should be more loyal to Ger-
many than Doctor Goebbels has been."

"Perhaps not," Pete said drily, "but the Gestapo would cer-
tainly agree, and they are the ones that might count"

"Do you Germans really think you have a chance to win?"
boomed the colonel from his dark observant corner of the
room. "Psychologically it is an interesting delusion, and a
tenacious one."

The boy flushed. He wheeled toward the voice. "I don't
know, sir. I don't think so myself, but that has nothing to do
68

with my being here. If He deserved to win, I should still fight
for Him, no matter what the chances. As to that, the boys in
the battalion think what the officers tell us."

"And the officers?"

"They have to sound confident, sir; it's their business. I have
never heard the true opinion of any officer."

"louche, Colonel," croaked Documents.

"How much pay would you expect, Corporal?" asked Fi-
nance.

"I don't expect any, sir. I could not accept it"

"Oh, yes, you have to take some money. The United States
government won't hire anyone without pay. Our usual salary
is dollars a month. That is Reichsmarks." *

The boy stared. His corporal's pay was seventy-three
Reichsmarks.

"We can keep it for you till the end of the war, Corporal,"
Pete said awkwardly. "It will help you when you get back to
medical school."

"He can't have insurance, though," muttered Finance. "It
isn't regulation unless they have dependents, and he's too
young to be married."

"Pipe down, Shylock," Security whispered to him. "Do you
want to make sure of losing a good man?"

After a moment Pete spoke up. "How do we know we can
trust you, Corporal? Maybe our colleague Colonel Skorzeny
sends you to us."

The corporal spread his hands. It was clear he did not rec-
ognize Skorzeny's name, just as few GIs would have recognized
the name of 109.

"I don't suppose you can know," he answered, "but you
could find out something about my father from the doctors of
France and maybe of America. He is known everywhere. He
even has a friend who lives in your capital. At least, he was a
friend before the war."

* Deleted by request.

69

They pricked up their ears. All of them had taken their
training in Washington and in the woods around it, the same
training they were passing on to the Joes.

"I don't know him myself, but I have heard my father speak
of him. His name is Doctor Schober. He is not a physician but
an economist. I think he works in your State Department."

"And you would be willing to jump into Germany in your
own uniform to find out what information we might ask of
you?" the colonel badgered him.

"Yes, sir. That is what I came to say/'

"And you know you would be shot or hanged if you were
caught?"

He nodded.

"And you would give away to us the location of your own
852nd Battalion? If we didn't know it already, I mean," he
added hastily.

"Yes, sir."

"Knowing that it would be bombed?"

The corporal did not answer, but he nodded, with his eyes
on the ground.

"And without pay?"

"I decline to be paid for it," he said harshly. "If you must
allot money, keep it for my father so that he can buy equip-
ment for our clinic after the war."

At a nod from the colonel, Pete stood up. "Well, Corporal,
write down your father's and Doctor Schober's names and
addresses for us here. We will think for a while. Meanwhile, I
am afraid we cannot send you back to the dispensary or out
into the barracks with the other prisoners. You will have a
room of your own for a week, till we decide. And above all,
don't speak of this conversation to anyone, understand? I
mean not to any American. You won't see any Germans for
a while."

"Zu Befehl," which means "At your orders."

He stood at the door, ready to be guided out. Pete punched
70

the desk bell for the guardhouse. A sergeant of the guard came
in.

'Take this prisoner to the cell on the third floor."

"Yes, sir."

As the door closed on the khaki and the blue-gray, Pete
smiled. "There you are at last, ColoneL The Christlike Joe you
spoke about the other day. The pure-hearted traitor."

"You needn't laugh," the colonel answered. "I don't expect
you know much about music, but Wagner has a phrase that
seems to describe this kid. The pure in heart made wise by
love."

He hummed the theme from Parsifal: "Durch Mideid wis-
send, der reine Thor."

"I don't understand you young cynics." He sighed. "There
are people who take risks for their beliefs, you know, without
thinking of reward or excitement. It isn't stylish, but I hope
my own son may have enough honesty "

"TospyonF.D.R.r

"Watch your step, Captain!"

"Well," shrugged Pete, "we have certainly picked up the
whole range lately, what with a crook like the Tiger and a
Tarzan like Paluka, and now this innocent."

Corporal Maurer walked up the three flights of worn granite
steps ahead of the American sergeant. Through the window
on the landing he could see a thousand compatriots shuffling
in the line to the mess shack, tinkling their zinc kits. Supper
would probably be not much different from the supper thou-
sands of American PWs were getting at the same time beyond
the Rhine, except for real coffee.

The cell itself was built of wattled steel' the two dormers
were barred with iron rods. But it had its own stove, with a
binful of wood beside it, and a real two-by-six cot covered
with United States Army blankets, instead of a roll laid on the
stone floor.

"Das ist primal" The corporal laughed to the sergeant.

71

The sergeant closed the steel door and threw the bolt from
outside, then opened the wicket and leaned on the little shelf.

"Don't worry, buddy. Nobody ever stays in this cell very
long. You can use the bucket in the corner, but put the lid
back. Sony to speak of it to a guest, but some of your pals in
barracks aren't too careful. I'll send you up some chow. But
don't expect sympathy from an American KP like you get
from me. A new set of Uncle Sam's fatigues, too, so you can
get rid of that old fleasack you've been wearing the last few
years."

He clanged the wicket shut. His prisoner nodded absently;
he was gazing down at the crowd in the compound.

That night the colonel made an entry in his notebook: "No. 7.
Subversion NG. Admits fear. Too honest for job? If so, reliable
for followup. Query: mental courage vs. physical?"

Corporal Maurer stayed on ice only four days. Security had
a German Who's Who which told about the doctor and even
named his two sons. Someone in Washington got hold of
Schober, who had a title something like Special Assistant in the
Division of Economic Coordination, and a Canadian wife.
The combination sounded reliable. Switzerland confirmed by
code cable that the doctor was as anti-Nazi as a German could
be and still survive. So his son was in.

Fred spirited him out of the cell the night his clearance came
through, with the Luftwaffe uniform in a barracks bag over
his shoulder. At night, so there would be no prisoners around
to recognize him, and so he could not remember the way from
the cage down to the Schloss and the Golden Well. All traf-
fic on the ten-mile convoy route was blacked out. The jeep
showed nothing but the little cat's eyes. Even if there had been
a moon the firs would have hidden it. The road was full of
potholes tailored to remind the spine that the truck, quarter
ton, has no springs. Sometimes Fred had to get out and make
sure he was really on the road, wondering whether a few lamp-
posts would not have been worth in time and materiel what
72

they might have given away to snipers and the Luftwaffe. A
kilometer ahead of the Schloss he tied a handkerchief over the
boy's eyes. He had to guide him like a blind man up the spiral
stone stairs to the field office. The Schloss was three hundred
years old, but no one had got around to putting a rail on those
stairs; they were a hazard in the dark, even with your eyes
open and a flashlight in your hand.

He took off the handkerchief and sat the boy on the sofa.
The contract was waiting, a contract between Karl Maurer
and the Government of the United States of America which

WTTNESSEXH:

that employer shall pay employe the sura of dollars* each

month while said contract is in force;

that employe shall faithfully perform all duties which may be
assigned to him by the employer;

that employe further agrees a) to subscribe freely and with-
out reservation to any oath of office prescribed by employer and b)
to keep forever secret this employment and all information which
he may obtain by reason thereof; and FURTHER that this contract
is a voluntary act of employe, undertaken without duress.

"Voluntary." The corporal put his finger on the word, smil-
ing up at Fred over the schnapps-candle, as if he had scored a
point in a close deal. He affixed his fingerprints to the bottom
of the sheet, and they both signed it. "In the Reich," he
laughed, "criminals are fingerprinted, not soldiers. I guess I
am a criminal now."

"Maybe so," said Fred, "but we're calling you Happy from
now on, so that no one need ever know your real name. 7 "

He reflected that the officer of the day had chosen the per-
fect adjective, for "happy," like the French "exalte," carries
just that note of vision which adds gaiety to faith.

The storekeeper, without curiosity, carried his barracks
bag to the raftered attic where the GIs slept, to hang with the

* Deleted by request.

73

bags of the other Joes who had joined before. Six of them hung
from the collarbeams, swaying a little when a gust hit the roof.
Like Bluebeard's closet. Next morning he would stencil on the
bag the single name "Happy."

Fred locked the contract and the snapshots in the field safe,
under a new manila file headed with the same name. Happy
had passed from the service of the Third Reich to the service
of the United States. From now on, till he was repatriated at
the end of the war, nobody who did not know the combina-
tion of that safe would know his name was Karl Maurer. From
now on he was anonymous.

"You will take care of my pictures, please?" He smiled as
Fred tied the handkerchief again. "I shall want them when I
come back from my mission. If I should not come back, tell
my father that I volunteered. You did not force me, as the
regime does by threatening one's family/*

"Don' t worry, kid." Fred patted him on the back. "You'll
come back all right. They always do."

But they didn't, not always.

He followed Fred down the stairs again, blindfolded, his
hand on Fred's shoulder, hugging the wall, and into the jeep.
They started the winding two miles up to the German Joe-
house. When they were out of sight of the Schloss Fred let him
take off the blindfold.

"I am not ashamed of signing," he blurted suddenly.

So Fred knew he was, a little. "We couldn't exchange you
back to the Luftwaffe now anyway; you'd have to return to
the cell and wait a couple of weeks for a labor detail, after all
the prisoners now in the cage have been processed. If you
want to do that, let me know before we reach the next house.
After that it will be too late to change your mind. No more
dispensary detail, however you decide. They would not be too
easy on you in the road gang either, if they knew you had run
out on us."

Happy began counting the alternatives on his fingers, keep-

74

ing his eyes open for a house. "But it is plenty tough. If He
should win, it would be the way it is, forever, in Germany.
He can't win anyway, as the officer in the dark said. Without
Him the end will be easier for us. He has done much for
Germany, I don't deny, like building the Autobahns, but it is
slavery. I can't have anyone think, even in the regime, that I
am afraid. You know, don't you, Herr Leutnant, that I am not
afraidr

"Everyone knows you're not afraid; you're braver than I
am."

Fred knew he sounded pompous. He knew Happy was not
afraid of the Gestapo and still less of the road gang. He was
afraid of something in his own mind. He was afraid of the
word spy.

'Well," Happy sighed, "after the war things will be better,
even if you win. My father says that since there are good Ger-
mans and good Amis there may be a real Reich of the world,
as he had hoped to see after the other war."

He had convinced himself all over again. This time Fred
was sure he would stick.

"Ja," the boy murmured, "fur die Freiheit"

The jeep pulled up in front of the Golden Well. The other
Joes were waiting in the day room to start their supper. They
ate late like civilians, not at five like the GIs or the prisoners.
Fred called Vati and introduced the recruit to him.

"Vati, this is Happy. Let's have a schnapps together."

They drank a toast to what they could not utter. Vati him-
self was never to know Happy's real name. Fred left them to-
gether from then on and went back to the Schloss.

The Team all liked to sneak up to eat at the Golden Well
once in a while, for Monsieur ApfeFs cooking was much better
than their own, even though it started with the same ingre-
dients. It was a week before Fred had the chance. They day he
did get up, the Joes were playing baseball That was part of
Vati's instruction. As Fred drove past the orchard Happy hit

75

a double a smart crack of the bat and a fast sprint to second.
The others cheered him, except the Tiger, who never cheered.

In one week the good food had filled Happy out. He looked
taller and huskier; his sleeves, anyway, seemed shorter and too
tight for his muscles. His mustache was almost a real mustache.
He was growing into a man.

He winked at Fred from second base, balancing on his toes,
squatting with his hands on his knees, getting ready to steal
third. He did not wave. It was part of Security's rules that out-
doors the Joes should not recognize any Americans.

Monsieur Apfel rang his handbell from the door of the inn.
The game broke up at once. The Joes trooped in to lunch,
Happy and two others walking together, their arms about one
another's shoulders. Until you heard them speak German, you
would think they were a bunch of GIs off duty.

Each Joe was in special charge of one American, as campers
are in charge of a counselor. Happy was on Fred's list and
Paluka on Pete's. The Tiger, as far as he accepted counsel,
was on the colonel's.

Vati said Happy was the smartest Joe in the classroom, even
though he was the youngest. "You ought to see the act that
the Tiger puts on with him, pretending to be a hard-boiled
top sergeant chewing out a rookie: 'Achtung! Get up! Sit
down! Roll over!' And Happy makes out he's scared to death,
stammering ']awohl, Herr Stabsfeldwebel,' and trying to salute
straightarm every time he rolls. It's a riot. He's smart, so smart
that I put him in the same room with Pere Nod, who is smart
too, but in some different way."

P&re Nod had come back from his week's exile in the French
Joehouse. Paluka's love affair with Giovanna drove him out.
He offered to jump into Germany, or go back to his parish un-
der a priest's oath of secrecy, or wait at the German Joehouse
for assignment. Anything but stay under the same roof with
Giovanna and Paluka.

None of them ever discovered the name of the battle-order

76

instructor; he wasn't really one of them, but came down every
other day from some higher echelon in G-2 and drove back
without waiting for mess. They just called him "Captain." He
could chalk down on Vati's blackboard any German table of
organization from army group to machine-gun squad. He told
Fred that one day Happy approached him after class.

"It seems that you know more about our army than we do
ourselves, Herr Kapitan."

"I don't know about that/* the captain answered morosely,
carefully erasing the blackboard, "but I certainly know more
about your army than I do about my own. Anyway, let's not
call it your army any more. We are both part of Uncle Sam's
army now, my boy, whether you like it or not."

"I will like It better when I get my mission, sir. Now I just
listen to the guns. But I know one must study before he is
trusted alone/*

"I don't know anything about that; it is not my field," the
captain answered stiffly. He raised his harsh voice. "Don't try
to pump me. I don't know that you or any of the others are
going on missions. Remember you are not to talk shop at the
station or anywhere else. Watch your tongue, soldier/*

"Zu Befehl, Herr Kapitan.'*

"But you were right about the crew of the Wiirzburg radar
this morning/* The captain softened. "I should have known
there were three."

"It is only that I happened to take the right wheel and ear-
phones once, when the regular signalman was lolled," said
Happy respectfully.

It was the twelfth of February, three days after Third In-
fantry had wiped out the Colmar pocket and four days before
the Tiger and Paluka were to drop. They were all documented
and equipped. The only thing left was to enter the last-minute
dates on their forged travel papers, so there would be no time
lag on them the morning they landed behind the lines.

Once an operation had been laid on, the Joes who were to

77

drop grew strained and nervous up till the moment itself. You
could tell when they were going to drop by their silence and
by the greed with which they ate, as if behind the lines they
might never eat again. The tension spread to the others too,
without their knowing why. The Tiger was no exception. He
had stopped boasting. He did not open his mouth except to
shovel food into it, and just as soon as the chairs were pushed
back he went to stand by himself, frowning out the big
picture-window that faced eastward toward the Rhine and
Germany.

Only Paluka did not seem to have a care. Pete had literally
dragged him from Giovanna's bed at the French Joehouse and
laughed when he 'described the weight. Paluka felt fine now
that he had left her. He had found that the Saxon artillery-
man who had served on the Russian front the one who had
identified the 5 cm. had picked up a little of his own lan-
guage. Against the rules, the two of them were chattering and
joking in Russian. Nobody else understood them, but it was
easy to see that adventure suited Paluka better than love.

That very evening Pete came down from the cage with a top
secret request from G-2. The colonel opened it in the field of-
fice at the Schloss. It asked where the command posts of 9th
Flak and 25th Infantry Divisions were. Probably somewhere
southeast of Mannheim, G-2 thought. Elements of 9th Flak
had been found supporting rear-guard action west of the
Rhine, but 25th Infantry was only a rumor brought in by a
talkative PW. Neither division had been committed as a unit.
25th Infantry had not even been reported since it was de-
stroyed at Stalingrad; it sounded like a new formation with an
old name, built up in reserve to contain any bridgeheads that
Seventh Army might establish on the Rhine. Perhaps they
were both from the Wehrmacht pool, assigned to combat
'where needed. PW interrogation was inconclusive. Observation
requested, wrote G-2, as to location, strength, and armor in

78

area Ammersee-Mannheim, with report on or before 22 Feb-
ruary.

Happy's battalion bad been part of 9th Flak, which at least
proved that it existed. But he did not know where the division
headquarters was, just as many GIs at the front would not
know Seventh Army headquarters was at Luneville. At that
time the Germans still held all the Rhine bridges except far
north in the swamps of the British zone, and a foothold on the
west bank up to a few kilometers below Strasbourg. The Joe
who went in to find this information would have to parachute
and find his own hole through the line to get back by the dead-
line. He would drop in by plane, but would have to get out by
himself. The Army was moving fast now. Nobody knew where
the line would be by the twenty-second. The colonel hoped
it would not be the river itself, for the Germans would surely
blow the bridges if they had to retreat that far; and then the
Joe would have to swim, and air recce had reported the Rhine
was mined. No Joe had ever had to swim the Rhine.

"It's definitely a tourist mission," he observed. *1 couldn't
trust the Tiger for that kind of information, even if we didn't
have his morale operation so carefully set up already. Whoever
goes in will have to travel solo, and light, and fast. He can't
take a radio because covering so much ground he'd never have
time to set up in a safe place. Hell have to get back on his own
and bring his report verbally. There isn't time to lay on another
flight before the sixteenth, yet I don't want to scrub the Tiger
and Paluka. The only thing I see is to send a third Joe with
them/'

"The A-26 is too small for three," Operations objected, "es-
pecially if it has to haul the Tiger's tube."

The colonel stroked his chin. "Let's cut him down then;
maybe his operation doesn't need quite as much as he thought.
Cram his pack tight. You were right, anyway, a tube drop
isn't safe any more, the way the Krauts are on the watch now.

79

Pick your Joe and get his cover fixed up in time to drop with
the others the night of the sixteenth. So long as he doesn't take
up too much room I can fix it with the Air Force to carry three.
They shouldn't need their rear gunner if they move as fast as
they claim. Find a pinpoint. I suggest this side of the Ammer-
see, then route your man to Kempten and Ulm and Mann-
heim."

He laid his centimeter scale on the wall map. 'That's about
four hundred kilometers in five days; not too fast for a simple
objective."

It took most of the evening to find a good pinpoint on the
1:20,000 captured German staff maps. The best place that
showed up was an open field nineteen kilometers southwest
of the lake called the Ammersee, deep in Bavaria, way beyond
the Rhine. The plane could drop off the Tiger and Paluka at
their pinpoints, only a little east of the river, and carry the
third Joe on to his.

The Team picked Happy for the third Joe, partly because
he weighed only a hundred and thirty, and partly because
medical cover was the safest and quickest. The route was
chosen so he could zigzag from the pinpoint back northwest-
ward toward the river and cross it on the big railroad bridge
connecting Mannheim on the east bank to Ludwigshaf en on the
west. Seventh Army might even get to Ludwigshafen by the
twenty-second. Or maybe, if the Third to the left and First
French to the right had a bridgehead by then, he could cross
at Mainz or Speyer or Strasbourg. At the worst, he would have
to try swimming. It was dangerous to gamble a couple of Ger-
man divisions against the chance of one man getting across,
but the A-26 couldn't carry another. It was too crowded even
with three.

Fred went up to break the news to Happy on the morning
of the fourteenth. They walked out into the apple orchard be-
hind the Golden Well.

"Your chance has come, kid."
80

Happy shook himself a little and gasped, but he looked
Fred in the eye with his crinkly smile. "I'm glad it has. You
Amis have trusted me. After the war, please think of us as I
have thought of you. Above all, don't worry about me, and
for myself I have only one request. Take care of my pictures."

He said it in German "Bitte, verwahren Sie meine Licht-
bilder gut/' as though he didn't trust his English to tell how
precious his family's photographs were.

TDon't worry about yourself, either. We don't often send a
soldier in so soon after he enlists, but youVe learned more in
a week than the others in a month. We don't worry, so why
should you? We know you can swim if you have to, and keep
your eyes open and mouth shut when you're on the road. Well
have a briefing on that road tomorrow morning. Maybe you
will end this war a little ahead of schedule."

It was easy to equip Happy. They simply got down his own
uniform from the bag in the attic it had been cleaned a little,
but not too much and put his own long overcoat on him with
the red and white brassard. They even let him keep his own
dogtag. Usually they stamped out a new one with a fake serial
number, but there was no time to set up the press. Anyway, if
the Gestapo got as far as checking a Joe's dogtag back to his
induction center, he was as good as lost already. Besides,
Happy wanted to keep it, and Fred knew why without his
telling: so that if he were killed his family could find him.

For his family's sake*they did have to give him a new name
and hence a new Soldbiich. They chose Karl Steinberg for his
cover name, with an address on Cecilienstrasse in Magdeburg.
Air Force photos showed the street had been bombed so the
Gestapo could not check And Happy knew Magdeburg well
enough to sound plausible if they questioned him.

Documents and his two forgers copied the entries and signa-
tures from Happy's own Soldbuch. He remembered all the
entries from the two pages he had destroyed. German proce-
dure was to cross out the units when a man transferred, but

81

leave them legible. That far there would be no inconsistency.
Then they forged an entry for HQ Company of Third Flak
Training Regiment in the barracks at Munich, and a separate
transfer, to be hidden till needed, detaching him to combat
assignment with Mountain Regiment 136. One beauty of the
German Einheits-Prinzip, or unity of command, was that they
switched men around, Army to Air Force and vice versa, so
there was nothing strange about this transfer. The Luftwaffe
started the war as the elite service of the three; it had always
been overmanned. Now that it had been knocked out of the
air the ground forces drew steadily on its useless manpower,
not without a grim pleasure.

The choice of Mountain Regiment 136 is where battle-order
scholarship came in. On the eighth that regiment had slipped
out of the Colmar pocket west of the Rhine, and moved north
to Trier. This retreat was so recent and so ignominious that
Flak Training in Munich could not be expected to know it;
yet Happy would not be in danger of running into the regi-
ment he was supposed to join. That was the second worst luck
a Joe could have.

The false Soldbuch was so plausible that Happy thought it
was his own till he came to sign the cover name across the
snapshot stapled inside the blue paper of the front cover. It
was artificially dog-eared and dirty and stained. It even had
a few errors, for it was suspicious to forge too perfectly. In the
back flap Documents stuck an identity card of the Medical
Corps, made out in Happy's cover name.

"Just remember you're still a medical corporal," Fred told
him, "but that your name from now on is not Maurer but
Steinberg."

"Am I likely to forget my own name?" He laughed. "Don't
worry. I'll bring the two divisions back under my cap. Once
you make up your mind, the rest is easy." And he actually
patted Fred on the shoulder to reassure him.

"I just want to be certain that you would let my father know

if anything should happen to me not that it will. He would
not be ashamed of me, but he would want to know.**

"Don't you worry about that, kid. You're keeping your old
tag, the one you wore in combat, and we're keeping your old
book for proof. Only remember the Wehrmaeht has your num-
ber too, so don't show it."

They were worried for him just the same. He was too young
to waste, and some of them, without saying so, even to them-
selves, shared something of the same dream for after the war.
Paluka could take care of himself anywhere, and Fred did
not care what happened to the Tiger, so long as he didn't blow
the others. He could not tell Happy that since he had been in
Germany a month before, the whole country for a hundred
miles beyond the Rhine was on the watch for American chutes.
As Seventh Army plugged closer to the river, the panic beyond
it grew. Every village had an all-night watch. Each forest
guard had a brace of police dogs trained to bark at the hum
of a plane and at nothing else, and to jump for the throat at
their master's nod. That was why Supply issued dog-drag pow-
der. It was kind of a reverse catnip. One Joe had had to kill
a dog with a plank because he had no powder and did not
dare to shoot.

That panic was why the Joes had to drop well east of their
target and work back. With good documents and ordinary
luck a man could average a hundred kilometers a day more,
if he worked the Autobahn and still keep his eyes open. The
colonel had given Happy four hundred for five days.

It was dangerous to fly in full moon because the dogs
barked more in moonlight and the ground watchers could see
the chutes better. It was dangerous in dark moon too, because
the pilot could not see the pinpoint. Even the A-26, though it
was guided by beams from Belfort and Metz, liked to see the
terrain. The sixteenth would b$ quarter moon, which was best.
A Joe had to jump at exactly the right instant. Word had got
round the Joehouse, in spite of Vati, how Red had missed his

83

pinpoint because he did not jump at the signal. Was it careless-
ness? Excitement? Terror? And die dispatcher had to push him
through the hole. He landed a dozen kilometers off pinpoint
not bad at three hundred miles an hour with his shrouds
tangled in a tree outside an SS movie house, just as the show
let out. Red had not come back.

we

Air Force put up the Liberators, and sometimes the
56 for the jump operations, complete with pilot and navi-
or. They based on Harrington in England. Being so small
1 fast a rooftop hopper the A-26 was safer than a Lib-
tor for a fast climb after the drop. But they only had one to
ire, and the Team could not always get it when they wanted
It was the C model, with the transparent bombardier nose
3 four swiveled fifties in the tail. There wasn't a field any-
ere near the Rhine undamaged enough for the take-off. The
d at Strasbourg *was so pockmarked it looked like the man
the moon. The field at Luneville, laid down for Army CP,
s too small for anything but the Cubs and other light planes
jd by generals and couriers. So they used the field at Dijon,
5 hundred and twenty miles back westward in France.
Dn the morning of the fourteenth two cars started from the
aloss to the Golden Well to pick up the three Joes. Fred
>ve the little Simca with Happy's operation funds and docu-
>nts in his own belt and the uniform rolled into a barracks
5 in the rumble. Pete drove the command car behind, with

85

room for the Tiger and Paluka. They parked by the practice
jump, out of sight of the inn. The three Joes, still in fatigues,
waited in the bar with Vati over untasted bowls of coffee,
while the others finished their noisy breakfast in the day room
beyond. When the door opened they scrambled to their feet.
Vati shook their hands.

"Hals- und Beinbruch," he whispered, so the others wouldn't
hear. But as they tiptoed out the tumujt in the day room
dropped, as they say quiet comes over Death Row when a
man heads for the little door.

"They won't pay much attention in class this morning," Vati
told Fred on the stoop. "It's always this way the day of an op-
eration."

The five men piled into the two cars. The Simca led, because
it was more likely to break down than the command car. It
had been taken from a collaborator at Marseille back at the
invasion. It had given good service since then, carrying the
Joes to places where there was no Army motor pool, or where
the Team dared not enter one. In every French village there
was a mechanic who could service a Simca, just as you find
Ford mechanics at home. But the Germans had bombed the
factory long since, and now the little car was held together by
makeshift parts devised by the GIs in the Team's own pool. It
was standard operation procedure to drive two cars to the
take-off, in case of a breakdown. There would be trouble
from MPs and real danger from civilians if a German Joe
should be caught on the road in France.

The little French car, painted olive drab with a white USA
number on the hood, panted up the side of the hill.

"Just remember two things," Fred warned Happy. "From
now on you are Steinberg, and I'm going to call you Maurer
sometimes, too, hoping you won't answer. The other thing is,
as long as you're in France don't speak a word of German.
You and I will speak English; or if you want to practice a little
French, that will be okay too/*
86

Happy nodded. They were already halfway up the side of
the Vosges when they started from the Golden Well. Fred re-
flected that mountains are better barriers between nations than
rivers. When you come to think of it, rivers are not barriers at
all, he decided; they are avenues. Certainly the Alps around
Switzerland and the Pyrenees between France and Spain had
stood off invasion more than the Rhine or the St. Lawrence or
the Rio Grande. But then they had stood off friendship too.
Alsace had been French as often as German, yet the names of
the towns and the language of the people and the look of the
houses in the villages were as German as they were across the
Rhine.

Then, once over the summit of the Vosges, red tile gave way
to slate roofs, and stuccoed walls to stone. They were in
France again, rolling down into the Burgundian plain. It took
four hours to drive back what it had taken Army four months
to fight for in the opposite direction. They passed through the
little towns of Luxeuil and RemiremonL At every stream there
would be a splintered German roadblock on each side, with
stacks of rubble around it and maybe the skeleton of a spire
beyond. MPs signed them through the obstructions and over
the one-way Bailey bridge. The rest of the town would be
empty but intact, with miles of untended farmland till the next
contact point. They came to G6rardmer, the whole town empty
and the buildings unroofed and gutted. They threaded their
way toward the lake through the crazy rubble in the streets.
The wreckage was as bad as anything in Normandy. It must
have been the first destruction Happy had seen since Cassino,
and Cassino had been only a single monastery.

"Who did this?'* he asked Fred in an awed whisper.

The only man in sight was a hunchback raking leaves in the
empty park beside the lake.

"Maybe you, and maybe we. Let's ask the old man. Only,
remember, if we did it, it is still your fault for starting the
war."

87

They avoided each other's eyes. The old man straightened
on his rake when they stopped beside him. He took a Camel
from the pack Fred held forward; then Fred offered him the
whole pack.

"It's the Boches who did it/* he said. "General Haeckel him-
self gave the order. 5 * He pronounced it "fik^r as a Frenchman
would.

"He gave the people one day to move out That was the
twelfth of October. Then he set fire bombs. To make sure the
town was ruined, he fired back into it after you came. Two of
your men are still here, for he left delayed-action bombs as
well"

He gestured toward the end of the park. "Ah, you should
have seen G&rardmer in the old days: opera in the casino, bac-
carat, roulette, everything; and a hundred boats on our beauti-
ful lake. You may think I am cra2y to rake the leaves, but it
has always been my job. I am the first man back, because I
have no family, so I need no house. The stones in the street are
too heavy for me, and there are too many. But I can still rake
the leaves. It was not necessary for Monsieur le General to give
such an order. We had done no harm."

At the end of the park to which the old man pointed, two
American helmets, with the front-line netting camouflage still
on them, hung on crosses like the two German ones above the
Golden Well. Fred drove no closer, for the park might be
mined. Graves Registration would pick them up soon enough.

The road grew flatter. They passed no more ruins. It was
three when they got to Station D, in a village halfway between
Langres and Dijon. Station D was a chateau three hundred
years old and three hundred feet long, a staging area where
the Joes got their last briefing before the take-off and waited
overnight if the operation itself was scrubbed. Many sorties
had to be scrubbed even after the take-off, because of Flak or
weather, or because the pilot could not pick up the pinpoint.
88

One Joe had actually taken eight dry runs before he finally
jumped.

Station D stands about fifteen miles east of Dijon, in the
hamlet of Lux. The little river Tille runs through the meadow
back of the huge stone building. A high wall surrounds the
forty acres, with an iron gate on the village side. There were
never more than two or three Joes in the station at a time, but
even for so few the Team had to maintain secrecy, in spite of
wasting a whole castle on a couple of Joes and a dozen me-
chanics. In a French village where all the able-bodied men
were still either prisoners in Germany or fighting with Delat-
tre's First French Army, it must not be known that the in-
nocent-looking soldiers in American fatigues were German
soldiers themselves.

General Haeckel had used Station D for a signal command
post too, four months before. Two Joes had infiltrated it then
and knew all about the layout even before Third Infantry cap-
tured the town.

"Except in the matter of plumbing," they reported, "Goering
himself could not ask for more." So the colonel put in a requisi-
tion for it himself, as soon as Haeckel got out.

The Joes were forbidden to pass out through the iron gates,
but it was hard to contain them when they had nothing to do
before the drop but play checkers and pitch horseshoes. They
were ordered, if a Frenchman got inside, to say they were
Americans and say it in English or French. Or, better, to say
nothing. The village never suspected they were Germans, be-
cause no one in it understood anything but French. It was as
fatal to speak German in France as it would have been to
speak English in Germany.

Pete's command car rolled in the gate just behind the Simca.
It wasn't often that the two cars on this trip could stick to-
gether so well. The Tiger and Paluka piled out of the big car
and Happy out of the little one. Paluka turned a cartwheel on

89

the grass. Happy stretched out his arms and touched his toes
to get rid of the cramp from the long trip. ~

The American cars,'* observed the Tiger, "are -worse than an
oxcart with square wheels. Now how about something to eat?"

The American mechanics and radiomen and dressers who
manned Station D piled out of the row of French doors with
Lieutenant Jack, who ran the place, when they heard the cars.
Two Joes were there already from Station G, Antonius and
Toto, waiting for good flight weather. The Germans shook
hands all around, greeting each other in French or English,
There was no use now in hiding what they were there for.

"Thou makest France seem less new to me." Happy smiled
at Antonius.

Lieutenant Jack heard the Tiger grumbling. He had no use
for grumblers. "Nobody eats in my cMteau until he washes,"
he decreed. "There is no water in the place except what you
bring up in a bucket yourselves, but we have a perfectly good
river. Toto, get some soap and towels from the PX. Then the
bodies can wander down and take off some of the dirt before
they come inside."

By "bodies'* he meant the three Joes; he affected British
phrases.

The five of them walked around the tower and across the
courtyard to a tiny dock jutting into the Tille. Tall horse chest-
nuts leaned over the bank to dip their buttons into the water.
There was a dam only a hundred yards downstream, where
two housewives of the village were scrubbing their laundry.
You could sit on the stones of the dock and wash up. By dip-
ping into a narrow slip, made to berth some long-forgotten
canoe,, you could soap and rinse your face and arms and hands
without getting your feet wet. The river was near the freezing
point Only the sluggish current, bearing down toward the
dam,, held off the skimming of ice. The Tiger slithered a hand
into the cold water, drew it out with a grimace, passed it over
his face as a cat washes himself, rubbed off the mud with a
90

towel, and spat eloquently between his teeth at a leaf floating
downstream. Happy stripped off his OD undershirt, knelt over
the slip, washed, and rubbed himself dry. Pete and Fred fol-
lowed. But Paluka took off everything.

"Mes amis, we should get used to swimming wider and
colder rivers than this.'*

He dove flat into the Tille, circled, and climbed out on the
dock with a grin of his gold teeth. He rubbed himself with the
little OD towel, no bigger than his own chest. He lowered his
voice. "I mean the Rhine. You notice that the blanchisseuses
do not so much as turn their eyes at my nakedness, toward it
or away. Helas! to be ignored at forty-five.''

Everyone laughed.

"Thou, mon ami," purred the Tiger, "art the triumph of mat-
ter over mind."'

They walked back to the cMteau. Lieutenant Jack had the
table set, with red and white Burgundy in GI enamel pitchers.
Fred told him he had no right to such a racket, when all they
got near the front was raw Elbing.

'Why not?*' Jack said. "Unvouchered funds, and we're in the
heart of the vineyards. Would you refuse milk at a dairy farm?"

"Don't joke," Pete growled. *Td give all the wine in Bur-
gundy for a pitcher of cowjuice."

The barracks bags were already upstairs on the three new
cots set out by Toto and Antonius. Fred expected that the five
Joes, on the eve of jumping, would not be able to help show
some excitement, if not about their own missions, at least
about the war. But the talk was as impersonal as in a boarding
house. Happy hardly spoke at all, for he did not know French
well enough to keep up. They chattered about wine and cars
and women and Happy's two-bagger, but where such talk in a
boarding house would have been emptiness, among the dozen
foreigners in an alien country, with a French cook passing the
Spam, it was plain discretion. The Joes had been well trained.

After supper the Tiger played solitaire at the table, glower-

91

ing and muttering at the cards. Paluka threw darts into the
cork board on the wall. The rest lounged in front of the fire-
place, which had a double-deck marble mantel with a relief
of a naked Diana and her stag. The Americans caught up on
old numbers of Yanfc and Stars and Stripes. Toto brought in
an armful of sticks for the fire. Antonius tuned in the radio to
BBC news. That day, BBC broadcast, the Russians had sur-
rounded Bresku and three thousand bombers had attacked
Berlin. When he heard that, Happy jumped up from his arm-
chair.

"Can we go outside for a little while?" he whispered.

The Team had got in the habit of whispering. Fred nudged
Pete to come along. It seldom snows in Burgundy, but the
dampness bites into the bones. Through the drizzle, daylight
had sunk imperceptibly into dark. They made Happy put on
an OD knitted cap, the kind GIs wear with their helmet liners.

"You treat us as carefully as race horses, don't you?" he
mumbled through the wool, and his face came out with a grin.

The Tiger seemed to understand. Pete sometimes wondered
whether he didn't know more English than he let on.

"Up till the day of the race," he muttered in French, turning
over a card. "After that it is every man for himself. I have
heard that the American parachutes are made of paper."

We knew the Tiger didn't mean it; that was his way of
showing fear. But Paluka whirled, threatening his teammate
with a dart poised in his hairy hand. "Shut up, type of a
camel," he ordered hoarsely. "You know it is a lie."

"Pardon, messieurs," the Tiger purred. "I am only teasing the
boy/' He put the queen of spades over the king of hearts.

Pete opened the glass door, as big as a shop window at
home, and the drizzle swept right into the room. The three of
them walked out on the broad stone stylobate of the chateau,
to keep off the slushy grass. Fred closed the door behind them.

"I couldn't listen to the radio," Happy blurted. "I cannot
92

bear to think that German cities are bombed and that I shall
guide the planes. My own family lives in Berlin/"

Pete patted his shoulder. "They'll be all right, lad. The
bombs aren't aimed at civilians. Berlin has the best warning
signals and the best shelters in Europe. Just the same, we
know how you feel."

"Do you mind, sirs/* asked Happy shyly, "if I call you *thou/
as you call me when we speak in German, and do you mind if
we speak a little German now? It will make me feel better/"

"Why, sure, kid, go ahead. There's nobody around.**

But Fred paused just the same to make sure the kitchen
window was closed and nobody was listening from the shad-
ows outdoors.

"I hope you won't forget/* Happy started in German, "that
I am a German soldier still. When the colonel asked me at the
barracks whether we would win the war I tried not to answer.
I know we won't. The high command must know it too, but I
could not bring myself to say it. There are many German sol-
diers who think as I do; they tried twice to get rid of Him.
Though they failed, there are others who will try again. They
hoped that our freedom would come from inside the country
before the destruction spread too far. Three thousand bombers
over Berlin! It is getting late, while He still sits safe in His
bunker. The peace will come for us all only when He is de-
stroyed. If we cannot do it by ourselves inside the Reich, we
should help you do it from outside, as German soldiers. But
it is hard to be so lonely. That is why I ask to call you both
*thou/ After the war, when the Reich of the world comes
after the horse race, as Herr Tiger says do not leave Germany
alone as I expect to be alone till then. America must be in that
Reich too, not like the First War. My father says that is how
He got power, because you went away. Wenn man viel ist,
dann kann man viel tun.** *

* We can do a lot if we stick together.

93

"The man who left the bomb at His feet on the twentieth of
July/* Pete pointed out, "was a good German soldier, a regular.
I remember he was a colonel. Thou hast no cause to fear, it
will not be as hard as it seems. Within a week thou wilt be
back with us."

"I know about that bomb/ 7 Happy said slowly. 'Two of the
patriots who made it were my friends. They were caught be-
cause they failed. In the cadet school they made us watch
movies of their execution. It was in the Plotzensee prison. They
were garroted by means of a leather collar tightened around
the neck, while flashlights from the guard tower played on the
two chairs, and the cameras turned. The briefcase in which
the bomb was left at His feet belonged to another friend of
mine, who luckily was killed in the explosion. My three friends
are three reasons why He must go, even if we lose the war,
even if many lose their lives. But do not think a German sol-
dier likes to lose either."

Pete and Fred were worried just the same, for that kind of
compunction is what they dreaded most. Nobody could blame
a Joe for being afraid of the jump, or even for holing up when
he reached the other side, to keep himself safe, and giving no
information, or false, when he was overrun; but a conscience
like Happy's, stalking his treason, could, if it overtook the
quarry, ruin their whole racket. It was not unthinkable that
it might take him right to Skorzeny himself.

They walked back through the door; Fred ran ahead to
switch off the BBC. They sat down together on the sofa. Pete
threw another log on the dying fire. The room was empty; the
Tiger and Paluka had gone up to bed already. They poured
Happy some whisky for a bracer and looked across Kim, hop-
ing to read in each other's eyes that his outburst was just the
normal funk before a Joe's first jump.

"It's funny," Pete mused, "that you should have to start so
far back in order to land so far inside the Reich."

"Ja, like taking a long run before the big hurdle. I only wish
94

I had time to see more of France. It is very like our own coun-
try, but different somehow. I don't see so many animals, and
certainly there aren't so many men. You will say because they
are all in Germany. That old man in Gerardmer might have
been raking leaves in the park in Berlin outside our front door*
I used to pass such a hunchback there when I was a lad, on
the way to school. I hope that when the Amis take Berlin
they will try to spare our street. You know the name and num-
ber, for it is in my old book, but I will not speak it now. If
they at home do not loll that madman first and put an end to
the trouble He has given the world! Then you would not need
to take it."

He sipped the whisky in silence, staring at the burning twigs.

'Well,'* Pete yawned, getting to his feet, "let's turn in and
think of something else. We're all getting stale. Well go over
it all in the morning just to make sure nothing is forgotten, but
let's rest now. Take thyself a little luminal from the bottle on
the shelf, there at the stag's feet, to get some real sleep."

Happy shook his head. "Do you think I need to be drugged
to keep my word?"

He meant it pleasantly enough, but the answer would have
been, **Y es, maybe." He had put his finger on a lesson they had
to learn fresh each time, that the dispatching of a Joe had to
be built up to a crescendo. He must be keyed up more and
more for the moment of the jump, like tightening a string to
raise its pitch. If he faltered the pitch was lost, and the riskiest
spot was that wakefulness the night before his drop.

They dragged their feet up the stone staircase and left
Happy at the door of the room where the other Joes were
sleeping. He shook hands with his schoolboy bow.

**Gute NachtT he said, and they answered, "Cute Nacht."

The others lay on Army cots under the lighted bulb set in the
Idfty ceiling, asleep in their GI shorts beneath GI blankets.
Paluka grinned in his slumber; the Tiger snored softly, his self-
mutilated left hand twitching on the outside of the olive drab.

95

Pete and Fred went back to make sure the doors were all
locked. It was an excuse for another drink.

"Do you think the kid seems all right?" Pete asked. "He's
your baby, you know."

"Yes, I do. That kind of talk gets you worried, but you have
to weigh the human factor, as the colonel says. In fact, I don't
think he would be as smart an agent unless he did have a touch
of doubt, and I'd rather have him get it out of his system be-
fore the jump than after. Don't worry about him. If the Tiger
came out with any talk like that I'd scrub him on my own,
regardless of the colonel, but Happy will be all right. He's
got to be all right. We'll be up the creek if he doesn't bring
back those two divisions on schedule. Anyway," Fred yawned,
"I'm going to bed now. Yes, I'm convinced he'll stick."

"I'm convinced so too, I guess, but it always seems to be
my job to do the worrying.'*

"Listen, Pete, that kid's crossroads is now, before the jump.
If he is sure tonight, he is going to be plenty surer when he
comes down in that potato field. He'd better be sure then."

<c Well, if it makes him happier to think he's doing it for
Germany rather than for America, it's all the same by me."

"But he thinks he's doing it for both; don't be so dumb."

"Oh, I'm not as noble as you and Happy," Pete yawned,
"but I'm not as crooked as the Tiger either. Frankly, Paluka
is the kind of Joe for me."

They fell asleep, hoping for clear flying weather, because it
took a well-seasoned jumper to withstand the letdown of hav-
ing his operation scrubbed, or flying a dry run. Toto, the Joe
who had had eight, was so unnerved when he did drop that
the dispatcher had to push him through the bomb bay. Be-
sides, when a jump was laid over, they had to remake the Joe's
travel orders for the new date. There was a locker at D full of
blanks and birds for just this purpose, but no American could
forge the simplest script signature as plausibly as Mike could
do it at G.
96

It dawned clear and cold. If the weather held the operation
would take off as scheduled that night They spent the morn-
ing checking the boys' cover stories. It wasn't a hard job, for
they had been well rehearsed at G. They entered the final dates
with the movable German date stamp. Paluka was returning
to Mannheim he was supposed to be stevedoring for the
776th Landesschutz Battalion after leaving the breechblock
of an 8.8 at the Kramag underground repair shop in Wiirz-
burg. The Tiger was headed for the same outfit, to check the
steel in a new pillbox. They were traveling together, the Tiger
to see Paluka didn't skip, and Paluka to orderly the Tiger.
Since both were in the Army, that was plausible. In both
cases their destination was marked on the trip ticket only by
a field post office number, a letter, and five digits around the
bird. There had been plenty of research to get that number
right. In the old days of the war German company clerks
spelled out the name of a man's unit on his travel orders and
Soldbuch, but since the landings Wehrmacht standard oper-
ation procedure was just to stamp his postal number, so that
if he were captured the enemy could not tell where he be-
longed unless he chose to tell, which sometimes happened.
But Documents had got around making a separate stamp for
each entry on a man's papers by designing a brass seal with
movable pins for the numbers, and if Battle Order didn't know
the right numbers they would press five at random and smudge
one or two, so the Gestapo couldn't check. Still, it was safer to
know.

The Tiger and Paluka were dropping at N060945, nord de
guerre grid. That is a clearing fifty miles northeast of Mann-
heim, near the highway from Wurzburg. It was a small clear-
ing, but they were lucky to find any so near the target. There
would have to be a couple of seconds between the two drops,
to avoid fouling, and at the speed of the A-26 that might
land them a kilometer apart. The Tiger agreed to meet Paluka
at the crossroads in Oppingen, in case they missed each other

97

in the woods, for either of them might be delayed in burying
his parachute and striptease. Since Paluka was really, as well
as ostensibly, a Russian, he could pass for being stupid enough
to stand at a crossroads for hours and wait there till his boss
arrived. Then they would travel westward together.

Happy's pinpoint was much farther east. He was carrying
a sample of blood for test from the field hospital at Munich to
the base hospital at Bregenz, near the Swiss border, the same
hospital where the Tiger had convalesced. The Tiger had
briefed Fred on this hospital, and Fred had passed the de-
scription on to Happy. From the shelves of the dispensary at
the cage Happy himself took an empty glass tube encased in
aluminum, and enclosed in turn inside a wooden case stamped
HEEKESGUT army property. It was part of the stock the re-
treating medical unit had left behind. Without knowing what
it was for, First Lieutenant Brophy had got a sample of blood
from a GI leukemia patient in the base hospital at Luneville,
so that in the unlikely event that a guard was so careful as to
check by microscope, he would find something wrong with it,
to justify the trip. Mike had forged a letter of transmittal from
Munich to Bregenz, sealed and stamped with the field hospital
seal; Documents had printed the letterhead and seal from cap-
tured samples. Sentries seldom dared open official mail, but if
one of them did he would find the trip in order.

So that he could break trail, Happy carried another travel
order detaching him to his new regiment, the 136th Moun-
tain, crossing the Rhine westward at Mannheim. Happy's cover
was one of the simplest they had ever had. Except for his
name, he was traveling as himself. Yet it was impossible to
foresee every detail. The best they could expect was to give
the Joe a plausible story for the first day after his drop. It was
usually enough. After that, any Joe with wit and courage
bluffed his own cover story as he went along.

The take-off was laid on for 2330 hours that night. The Joes
would have to be at the field, dressed and ready for strapping
98

on the chutes, at 2200. As the day wore on the Tiger grew
more irritable. He objected to meeting Paluka at any place so
public as the Oppingen crossroads.

"It would have been better," he claimed, "if he jumped a
few days after me, as I told the colonel, and came to my
bunker. Thus I could prepare the way for him/*

They tried to shut him up, for any last-minute friction in a
team might break a Joe's nerve. But it could not break Paluka*s.

"Don't bother about me, young man," he answered loftily.
"This will not be the first parachute I have buried. You for-
get that I have taken these risks before."

They made the Tiger repeat the address of his father-in-law
in Mannheim, so that if they failed to meet at all, or if the
Tiger should desert, which Fred and Pete both thought pos-
sible, Paluka would know where to run him down.

"Right hand door, first floor rear, 27 Wharf Street. Knock
four times like the Victory signal. That will be the password
of the Tiger Brigade. Then say 'Greetings from tibe Tiger/
You must say it in German: 'Schonen Gruss vom Herrn Tiger,*
for my father-in-law is an ignorant man who understands no
language but his own. Mannheim? I know it like that" he
held out the mutilated hand "and it is waiting for me."

Paluka rehearsed the familiar signal, tapping on the table
the three dots and a dash of the Morse code for V, and re-
peated the German words in his fuzzy Russian accent.

"This begins to be like the old days." He grinned happily.
"Though I do not speak perfectly, I shall be understood by
those who wish to hear."

"The signal is a secret between us, hein?" said the Tiger anx-
iously. "And the address. No one else is to know, not even other
comrades like the young Happy in the next room. Such might
betray us to the Gestapo, from fear of torture perhaps, or even
from what is called conscience. I should then have the right,
should I not, mon capitaine?" he appealed to Pete, "to . . .**

He drew a finger across Paluka's throat Pete nodded. It was

99

true that the leader might eliminate a teammate who endan-
gered the mission.

"Provided when you return you prove to us that it was need-
ful. Otherwise . . J 9

Pete drew his own finger across the Tiger's throat, and they
all laughed.

"You do not trust me/* Paluka tipsily accused the Tiger.
TDo you think if the Gestapo should arrest me for a stupid
Russian that I would denounce you to save my own skin? Be-
fore that I should swallow my tablet. My loyalty has been
proved before yours,"

He made a motion as if he were biting into the cyanide
tablet L which a Joe could carry in his cheek in case of
capture. Tablet L was cased in rubber, so he oould swallow
it and remain unharmed if, at the final moment, he chose to
talk. Paluka smacked his lips with a grin. The Tiger shrugged,
packing money into his belt. "That would be less pleasant for
you than for me/'

Station D put on a special dinner for drop nights, chickens
which the cook had swapped for Spam with a farmer, and three
bottles of Montrachet, the finest white Burgundy. They ate
early, to allow plenty of time for dressing the Joes. Paluka was
half drunk already. He kept the others laughing with stories
about his health club in Marseille, how the weaklings would
totter in from the Canebiere for a buildup, and the incredible
feats they could perform after a single hour on his mats.

"Migraine, weak back, I'alcoolisme, impotence," he roared,
"all are cured by le systeme Paluka."

Even those GIs who couldn't speak French had to laugh,
till Jack looked at his watch and signaled to start the dressing.
He closed the shutters and switched on the lights in the two
equipment rooms, closing one door on Paluka and the Tiger,
and the other on Happy. Paluka squeezed into his borrowed
uniform with hardly a glance at it. The Tiger studied his in the
mirror* He made Corporal Chuck, the six-foot-three boss
100

dresser, tighten the red, white, and black ribbon for the Iron
Cross, which he had really won, and straighten his marksman's
badge and the wound chevron which was to justify his muti-
lated hand. He adjusted the Schiffchen to the right angle, pat-
ting the cockade and the eagle to be sure they were tight.

Happy's uniform was his own; Chuck made no change in it,
just checking that the red-piped shoulder straps and the
caduceus patch and the silver eagle on the collar tab were firm.
It was complete down to the special Medical Corps first-aid
kit at his belt. He filled each canteen with German brandy
which had been captured at the 169th Volksgrenadier officers*
mess in Kaiserslautern. It was lucky any was left. In the flap
of each Soldbuch he clipped a few extra ration stamps, the
brown and white squares issued to traveling German troops.
In each knapsack he stuffed a cake of unmarked chocolate and
four sandwiches, two sausage and two cheese, made with the
darkest French bread he could find. He had crossed France to
Carcassonne for some captured Wehrmadbt hardtack, and could
have split a can between the Joes, but it was more apt to crum-
ble at the drop. Gray bread was bootlegged so widely in the
Fatherland that there had never been danger in carrying it.

There was no room for more, for the knapsacks were already
loaded with the Tiger's extra requisition, which the colonel
had decided not to drop by tube. Chuck strapped a mess kit
and a corrugated gasmask tin on all the belts. On Happy's he
clipped the leather first-aid case, and on Paluka's and the
Tiger's the sheathed infantry bayonet. Into one compartment
of each he tucked the square German issue compass with lumi-
nous dial; into another half a dozen Benzedrine tablets, al-
ternated with aspirin, for Benzedrine was American; and into
a third, at the opposite side, the single L tablet, in an envelope
marked GIFT, the German word for poison.

Happy winked at Fred to show he saw the irony of it. "I
fear the Amis bearing gifts." He smiled.

Their steel helmets were strapped outside their knapsacks,

101

and they wore on their heads only the peaked cloth Schiffchen,
like the GI overseas cap, over which the jump helmet would
fit Paluka and the Tiger carried regulation Walther .38s at their
sides. Since medical personnel do not carry sidearms, Supply
had found Happy a little Walther 7.65, the police model they
call the Olympia, to fit in a shoulder holster under his tunic.
It fired seven .22 cartridges.

Over the uniforms Chuck zipped the heavy eggplant-colored
coverall, called variously a zoot suit or a Mae West or a strip-
tease. The legs were bulky enough to fit over the black three-
quarter field boots and heavy enough to anchor a man once
he landed. He folded a jointed shovel, wrapped in the issue
overcoat, inside the seat pocket of each Mae West. This was
safer than strapping it to the front shrouds of the chute where
it might come loose in the drop. This shovel was the most use-
ful equipment a Joe carried, because unless he could bury his
chute and striptease he might alert the whole countryside be-
fore he had time to get away, and in that case no cover was
strong enough to withstand the questioning of the Gestapo.
Chuck tucked a Colt .45 in each right leg pocket, ready to draw
in the air, for a Joe could never be sure where he might land.
He was supposed to bury it with his chute, for every German
knew it was an American weapon and coveted one. For this
very reason the Joes seldom did bury it. Antonius had had the
nerve to sell his to a Luftwaffe sergeant, boasting he had cap-
tured it from an Ami in Lyon. He got five hundred marks, so
it was sure the Tiger would not bury his.

They were crowned with padded rubber jump helmets,
which would have to be buried with the rest of the gear. Pa-
luka's head was too big even for the larger of the two sizes;
Chuck slit it up the front. The small size was a little too big for
Happy, so he fastened German adhesive tape inside the band.
The helmets were strapped to the chin and anchored to the
webbing on both sides of the Mae West. It was essential that
a Joe should not lose his helmet on the drop, for he could
102

crack his skull without it if he landed, or was dragged, against
a tree or stone wall at the tumble. Chuck tied a parachute-
model American knife to the striptease and tucked it in the
outer sleeve pocket so it would be on hand to cut away the
chute on landing. In addition to the German compass, each
Joe carried under his glove a dime-size American one for quick
reference if he needed it in a hurry at the getaway.

It was so cold that each Joe wore two pairs of German Army
mittens, and a wool helmet under his cap. Paluka disdained
the use of ankle wraps, knee guards, heel pads, or any other
protection against the tumble. They were just in the way, he
said; you had only to flex your knees ahead of time, then roll.
Besides, they left marks on the skin that might give you away
if you were searched.

<c When I jumped in Crete," boasted the Tiger, "I feared
neither search nor anything else."

"Then tonight you will need twice the courage of a German
soldier," Paluka told him grimly.

It was lucky that Happy was dressing next door.

Paluka was the only one to carry a radio. He insisted that
the little box, the discovery of which would hang him, be fas-
tened openly to his chest instead of on his back, so he could
protect it with his hands at the tumble. On one operation a
Joe's radio pack had loosened at the drop; the dispatcher had
had to slash it clear, and the radio fell to earth, wasting the
whole operation and warning the Flak to open up on the
plane when it had turned back.

Paluka held the radio against his chest, to show how he
wanted it fastened. 'This way I can hold it clear and repack it
in my knapsack before I start marching. Without my radio I
do not exist. La radio, c'est moi. The crystals and code pad
you may hang in their felt bag about my neck."

Each of the Joes got a wristwatch with a luminous dial.
Happy's and the Tiger's had come in the same shipment from
Switzerland, but Paluka's was French. It might alert the Ges-

tapo to find the German sergeant and the Russian private with
the same make of watch. Chuck was careful to scratch the
backs of the cases, and the crystals, to make them look long-
used, using two different knives and one of the cook's hairpins,
and to trade some of the Team's own sweated leather straps
for the new ones.

When the Mae Wests were finally adjusted the Joes looked
like the rubber man in the Michelin tire advertisement, and the
chutes were still to come.

"Thou must gain flesh, little one," the Tiger said to Happy.
"The frozen earth will be hard to thy bare bones."

"Then I shall not land as heavily as you or the Cossack."

At least, Fred thought, he had not lost his nerve yet, to
speak up like that. But Fred was beginning to lose his own.
The pinpoint was as safe as any pinpoint could be. Happy
had been briefed at G on the terrain for five miles, in case he
landed off. He had rehearsed the cover of the blood sample
and knew how to break his trail. He would neither cringe nor
swagger, for the Gestapo knew that both showed fear. But
Fred still worried. It was not in the rear or at the front that
danger lay, but at the barrier between them: the Rhine. To
cross it, with two divisions under his cap, Happy deserved
every tip that Fred could give him, no matter what Security
had ruled.

On the impulse, Fred called him back to the little room and
shut the door behind them.

"If you meet difficulty at Mannheim, Corporal," he said, sud-
denly regulation and dropping the "du," "you may perhaps
find the others at 27 Wharf Street, right rear first floor. Knock
as in V. The password is 'Greetings from the Tiger/ and do
not say I blew it/'

Happy lifted the edge of his jump helmet to make sure he
heard. He repeated the address. "The German first floor is the
American second. Is that the one?" Fred nodded.

Jack knocked at the door. He beckoned with a glass of co-
104

gnac in Ms hand. It was part of the buildup for the moment
when the bomb bay would open. On the table in the big room
lay three OD blankets and three GI overseas caps. Chuck
wrapped the blankets around the Joes to hide the striptease,
in case anyone looked through the windows of the cars. He
perched the caps on their jump helmets. It was not much of
a disguise, but the French were not critical of American mili-
tary tailoring. They looked enough like three fat Indian chiefs
to satisfy a quick glance from the Dijon connoisseurs, some
of whom believed the Americans had whole Indian regiments
equipped with feathers, tomahawks, and Navajo blankets.

Toto and Antonius had been scrubbed again, because of
icing over their target. They shook hands dolefully and gave
the Hals- und Beinbruch to the lucky three. The Simca and
the command car were still parked in the forecourt. The moon
was just beginning to shed a cold glimmer over the four peaked
turrets of the chateau.

"We look like an escape from the Bastille." Happy grinned.
"Good-by to France."

They piled into the cars in the same order as the day before,
but Happy was so padded with his gear that he could hardly
squeeze through the door of the midget Simca. Merle, who
strapped chutes at the field, followed with Chuck in his own
jeep. Benny, the communications corporal, locked the iron
gates behind the three cars.

They wound through the single street of Lux and got on the
main highway to Dijon. In half an hour they were threading
through the Place Darcy, and a few minutes later filed up to
the MP at the gate of the airfield on the west side of the city.

"Cigarette," prompted the MP, with his head inside the car.

"Machine," each driver whispered back.

That was the password for the day, up to midnight.

The A-26 was in the far corner, warming up. The propel-
lers shone and the engines roared in the cold moonlight,
squandering Mr. Ickes* gas. Chuck and Merle had got in

105

ahead. They were already pacing the steel mat beside the
plane.

I've checked the bomb-bay doors/' Merle said. "They work
all right. I wish there was room for me to go along. It wouldn't
be a bad idea, you know, with a first-time jumper."

They re crowded as it is; you'd better stick around."

The pilot and the navigator from Eighth Air Force were
inside the operations shed studying the weather report

"Well, Sergeant," said Pete, "while they're doing that you
might as well strap on the chutes."

Merle nodded. He led the Joes into the little dressing room
where he stored his gear. Dijon was a main transfer point on
the north-south line for shipments to the front. The hangars
had been destroyed by Seventh Army action while the Ger-
mans still held it. So the planes had to stand out all night. But
the administration building was not too badly wrecked. Air
Transport Command had an operations shed off the waiting
room and had given the Team another to dress in.

It was Merle's special job to fit the chutes. They were the
British type which open by themselves from a hook above
the bay, without a ripcord, and they had less opening shock
than the American. More than that, they distributed the weight
so that the straps left no mark on a Joe's skin. The first thing
the Gestapo did was to strip a suspect and look for strap marks
on his chest and thighs. There was a theory that the British
chutes spun in the air. No one knew where it started, but
the Joes had never been troubled with spin on the way
down, even though one or two had been unconscious
when they dropped. It was the automatic opening that saved
them.

Fred left the Joes with Pete and Merle and Chuck in the
crowded shed. In a few minutes the pilot and navigator strolled
out of their own. They were a major and a captain, both with
silver parachute wings on their breasts and the winged figure
eight on .the sleeves of their Eisenhower battle jackets.
106

"How is England?" Fred asked* They had flown over that
morning from Harrington.

< The same old pea soup." The major laughed. "I must say I
like to get over to France, if only for some decent black-mar-
ket food. There isn't much black market in England, you know;
even when you find a good menu I guess the British just
don't know how to cook. It's colder there too.**

"Well/* the captain put in, "I don't think well have much
trouble tonight. Just routine. Last trip, icing forced us back
thirty miles short of the checkpoint. Next time we broke out
at a thousand feet but couldn't catch the checkpoint at all.
Believe it or not, this is flight five hundred for the old 856th
Command, and maybe there's luck in round numbers. Another
squadron reported Fkk over Stuttgart last night, and pretty
heavy reaction at Munich, but we travel well north of Stutt-
gart and don't go as far east as Munich anyway. Do you want
to check the pinpoints in the ops room? WeVe got a little
Scotch there/'

Outside of their planes these flying officers were the most
casual people in the world, without any worries or even any
caution. It wasn't always easy to correlate the Air Force charts,
which were in degrees and minutes, with the Team's own
ground maps laid off in coordinates; and 1:100,000 seemed a
small scale when the Team had sweated out a landing point
at 1:20,000. The Team would point out that the twenty-thou-
sandth maps, being captured from the German staff, could not
help being more up-to-date than anything printed in America
, or England, but Air Ops were not impressed. They were
proud of the vaster scale of their own element.

With the help of the Scotch, and by spreading the two maps
on the table, Fred could follow tie course with his fingers:
northeast and over the Rhine between Strasbourg and Col-
mar; over the Black Forest between Stuttgart and Frankfurt
to the Spessart; then make their first drop. That was the Tiger
and Paluka. There are not many towns in these mountain

107

forests, and by the same token not many flat landing fields.
Fred always liked to pinpoint the drop right down to six dig-
its, which means a square one hundred yards each way. The
Air Force laughed at that.

"We can try to hit N060945 for you, if you insist," the ma-
jor said, with his finger at the gap in the green, about the
middle of sheet 173, T^ut you understand we're subject to con-
ditions in the air. We may get icing of the wings over the Black
Forest even tonight, though it isn't likely. When it comes to
setting your man down in one particular back yard we just
can't promise it. Even when we're right on the beam, even
when we see the back yard perfectly from the air, which you
boys seem to think is easy at three hundred miles an hour
even when we see it and gauge our speed to drop him at the
right instant, we can't possibly foresee the drift his chute will
carry hfm. I hope your bodies are prepared to land a little off
that dot you're marking on the chart. By the way, rub it out.
And repeat the color code, please."

"Red and blue."

"Roger. That goes for eight hours, and well be back by then.
Don't forget to phone it on."

The wind was from the west, as usual that time of year. They
would drop the first two off with the wind, then bear south-
east toward Munich and drop Happy off at his pinpoint. The
trip was close to the maximum range for the A-26.

Y488114, on sheet X5, Happy's pinpoint, was a bowl-shaped
clearing among the hills, behind two farms. The two lakes to
the east would make a checkpoint in the quarter moon. It
was long enough for an easy run-in, even dropping from as
high as four hundred yards, as they liked to do in the hilly
Allgau. But the Team had learned to doubt perfection. One
building, besides the farms, overlooked the bowl. It was the
old weather tower on the Peissenberg hill. Air Ops reassured
them on that too; they knew there was no Flak in the tower,
and if there was any radar the A-26 was too fast for reaction.
108

Then, having dropped Happy, their third piece of cargo,
they would turn around and return to Dijon by the base of
their triangle, hoping they had alerted no Flak on the way out.

The Joes came out of the dressing shed. The chute pack
and harness made them even bulkier. To clear the pack, Chuck
had restrapped the steel helmets Happy's was Luftwaffe
gray-blue and the others f eldgrau to the centers of their chests,
like a huge single tit. Paluka had his radio strapped under his
helmet, making his front still more grotesque. The bomb bay
of the little plane hung open like the trap of a scaffold. A short
stepladder waited below, as a concession to amateurs. The
noise of the engines was so loud they could not hear each
other speak, standing so close to it Happy waddled toward
them, fumbling into his belt for a cigarette.

"Don't waste them, Corporal," Fred advised him, drawing
him away from the blast of the slipstream. *Those are German
cigarettes, and youll need them tomorrow morning. Take a
Camel."

He thrust it into his mouth and lit it for him. Happy turned
his back to the others, but still fumbled in his harness. At last
he brought out the rubber-clad tablet of cyanide. He handed
it to Fred, spitting out the cigarette so he could talk.

'Take this back, please," he said. "I shall not need it. If I
did, I should never use it. Don't forget I am a corporal in the
Luftwaffe, and please remember it when the war is over and
you have gone home with the other Amis." His eyes wandered
over the foreign field. "Tonight is like a Christmas card, isn't

Fred noticed for the first time how much quieter the sky
was than near the front; no rustling of the fir trees and no
rumble of the guns. The stars danced and winked, the moon
just threw its first glow over the horizon, and the snow was
crisp and powdery under the hobnails of their boots. Where
they stepped off the steel apron, the frost had just begun to
harden the tarmac.

109

The aviators came out of their shed, elegantly casual. They
wore scarves of orange ammo silk around their throats. There
were no stiffeners in their caps. They did not look at the Joes,
and of course they spoke English.

"Well," said the major, standing on the ladder, "it's H-hour,
as Stars and Stripes would say. I suppose these characters
know the commands. Right after Action Stations we give them
the red light from the panel at the run-in and they move for-
ward to the bay. My navigator here will pull the lever for
the hole, and when the green light flashes he will shout *GoV
on the intercom. And they go!"

Pete translated this into French and Fred into German, to be
sure all three understood. They nodded. Buck had given them
plenty of this instruction at G already.

As Happy was last out, he was first in, after the plane crew.
Walking toward the hatch in the belly of the rear gunner's
compartment, he passed under the wing. He lifted his flipper
and traced the white and blue star on the underside, the new
symbol of the American Air Force.

"Never been so close to one before," he shouted.

He walked directly between the leaves of the hatch. "Auf
WiedersehW He waved, and they called back, "Auf Wieder-
sehn."

He ignored the stepladder. He hoisted himself on his padded
hands up into the belly like a gymnast on parallel bars. It must
have been the marrow in his will that hoisted such a heavy
weight, for the others had to use the steps. The Tiger mounted
without a glance backward. Paluka waved a fin and flashed
his gold teeth. The three Joes were all aboard.

Merle climbed in after them to attach each pack-thong to a
ceiling hook in the order of the drops, making sure there was
not enough slack to tangle if one of the Joes should move out
of series. He came out sweating.

*1 hope it's okay, but it would be a lot better with a dis-
patcher aboard to hook them up separately," he grumbled.
110

No one took the hint. Merle pulled the stepladder away.
Through the transparent nose they saw the pilot pull the lever
which closed the hatch. The roar of the twin engines stepped
up. The plane turned slowly on her rubber tires, shuddered
Tinder the unaccustomed load, and headed leeward down the
mat, gaining speed. When they thought she must surely crash
into the wall at the far end, she paused, roared for the take-off,
and rose like a dappled bird. Her tricycle gear snapped into
the nacelles and the fuselage. Lightless, and after a minute
soundless, she vanished eastward toward the moon.

Pete ran into the shed to phone Benny at the chateau that
she had gone^ Benny would radio headquarters from his truck
to confirm the color code, so the ack-ack would not open up
when she returned. It was more businesslike than in September,
when Skorzeny's Liberator got through.

She would not return for at least two hours. They had to
wait till then. They hoped she would return empty; but in
case the weather or the Flak interception forced her back still
loaded, they had to be ready at the field with the blankets
and cars to drive the Joes back to D after one more dry run
like Toto's.

"Well/* said Pete, "I don't see why we might not as well
polish off the Air Force Scotch. It's sure hard to find in France,
and they can get all they want in England/*

They walked into the ops shed.

"Just one nightcap for me," said Merle, "then I'm going to
take a little shuteye."

It was 0150 when she came back. Merle was snoring across
two chairs. Pete and Fred and Chuck were half asleep. They
did not hear the roar until she taxied almost past the windows
of the hut. They stretched themselves and ran out into the
snow. The blue and red recognition signals were still blinking
from the belly of the plane. The aviators cut their switches.
Through the top hatch they climbed out on the wing. They
lacked out the ladder and climbed down methodically to the

111

earth. When they hit it, they became as casual as when they
had left. They looked around and under the plane to see that
everything was in order, and left her on the mat as carelessly
as a taxi driver would park his cab beside a curb, with the
propeller still slowing itself down into separate yellow-tipped
blades.

"How did you make out?" Pete asked.

"Oh, it was simple/' said the major. "We had no trouble at
all. No Flak, and we could see a big fire to the left that may
have been Frankfurt."

"Did the boys jump all right?"

"Why, sure. The big husky one went first. Their pinpoint was
only fifty miles over the river, but it took us an hour with the
zigzag course we followed, and with slowing down for the
run-in. Had to feint a little, so close to the Rhine. When he
opened the compartment door I could see him in the mirror,
taking a swig. I could have used it myself. That man has a
gold mine in his face. He was flashing it at the others. He
settled in over the bay. When my navigator here gave him the
Go he jumped feet first like an old campaigner. The thin one
was right behind. He slid to the hole, but he wasn't scared.
Just careful. He went out sitting down. We could see them
both swinging under the chutes, but the wind was twelve
'and I bet they drifted."

"How did the little one do?" Fred asked.

"Oh, he was all right," said the navigator. "We had to go a
little farther for him, you know, and he must have sat alone
after the others jumped. But when we gave him the light for
the run-in he broke out the door. He lifted up a V to me in the
mirror you know, the way Churchill does, but with both
his arms. Then he stood up and at the green light, when we
gave him Go, he dove right through the hole as if it were a
swimming pool. That kid has got nerve."

"I don't suppose you could see whether he landed or not?"

The captain looked at Fred with pity. "Why, if we hung
112

around long enough for that we would have the whole G<
man Air Force on our tail. No, we just gained altitude as fe
as we could and hotfooted it home."

There was only a finger of their whisky left, but they did E
seem to notice.

"What do you think of that bunch, Major?" asked Pete.

The major yawned as he said, "To me they are just freigl
pal; I don't even look at them. A postman doesn't read yo
letters, you know."

And the captain put in, "Especially that land of mail."

He did not want to admit they were spies, even though th
worked on the right side. It was the same pretense as in tJ
Joehouse itself. A German soldier had to be loyal to the Wei
macht. If he switched, the Germans paid him the tribute
terror and a savage revenge. The Americans, except the fe
who had reached into the secret of his treason, ignored
scorned him, whether he had switched for riches, or risk,
faith.

113

Six

There was no reason why Happy should have dived headfirst
through the hole, instead of springing out with his hands
clasped over his head, the way the Luftwaffe taught. It was
not the way the sergeants had taught him on the practice rig
either. Through the panel, with the slack from his own hook
held in his glove, he watched the others jump. The cold night
roared into the bay. Paluka had crouched briskly to the edge,
turned back to smile, and simply walked out of sight into
space. The Tiger had eased himself along the deck of the
plane to the hole, sat on his hams for an instant, then cau-
tiously let go. It seemed to make no difference either way. Both
times the leather thong of the static line tautened from the hook,
and the threads which held the chute flap unraveled in a twin-
kling. The man dropped with his chute, just as a berry falls
when you pinch the hull. Buck had said the chute would open
at twenty yards.

The jaws of the hatch closed after the Tiger. When they
opened again Happy did not know why he stood as he did,
bent over as close to double as the padding would let him, and
114

then tumbled like an inexperienced swimmer into a pond. Un-
consciously, perhaps, he thought that to start headfirst would
break him more cleanly from the speed of the plane to the im-
mobility of the waiting earth, that by tumbling down head
over heels he would somehow make the transition more com-
plete between speed and station, between air and earth, even
between America and Germany. It was strange that the Luft-
waffe did not give jump training to all its recruits, even the
ground force, but then there are many sailors who cannot
swim.

He pressed his eyes shut. The chute opened without his
knowing it His first sensation was the sway. He might have
been floating in the water. He felt a little swing as his heavy
boots turned him around upright, and then a Jerk, it could
not even have been called a wrench, as the padded straps of
his harness tautened under his thighs and armpits. He opened
his eyes. The chute unfolded segment by segment, like a
bud; he was swung in the air as its silk flower blossomed,
swung a little westward with his feet and eastward with his
head, for the wind was still from the west. It was as if he were
the weight to the vast pendulum of his shrouds. Suddenly
he remembered what the Tiger had said: the chutes were some-
times made of paper. He clutched at the forward lift web in
panic, but the slow drift downward did not vary. He con-
sciously shut out sight and sound as he had seen the wounded
do on the operating table when he first poured the anesthetic
into the cone. Through the padded helmet he no longer heard
the roar of the plane. It was only when he felt warmth creep-
ing up to his body from below, and heard the returning rustle
of the earth, somehow more audible, more insistent just be-
cause it was less loud than the plane, that the gulf was crossed.
He looked upward. The eggplant-colored silk bell of his chute,
translucent like smoked glasses, blotted out the shape of the
moon but filtered its light through. It seemed impossible that
so vast a skymark would not be seen by the watchers. It was

115

Germany below him, watching from the ground. Try as he
would to make himself heavier by pulling at the shrouds, to
hasten the safety, or the danger, of the earth, he could do
nothing but sway and drift at the mercy of the chute. It eclipsed
most of the sky, and his chest padding blocked any sight of the
earth.

Suddenly he felt the impact of a bough against one leg; he
supposed it was a bough. He kicked at it angrily as a swimmer
kicks against a snag. He raised his arms they seemed like
lead and tugged at the leeward web to carry him over the
obstruction. He cleared it and knew he was almost on ground.
He spilled the chute, as Buck had taught him, loosening the
windward edge to shorten wind and ease the shock of the
tumble. He flexed his knees and pointed downward with his
toes, to keep the impact off his heels. He let go the web to
clasp his gloves above the helmet, getting ready for the roll.
The earth reached up to stroke his soles, and at that moment
he dove forward to the ground, rolling behind his chute, side-
arm to shoulder to back and over. The frozen soil grated along
his thick boots, ripping down the legbag of the Mae West. It
was strange how much faster it was to drag on the ground
than drop in the air.

He grabbed again at the webs below the painted cords,
braking himself to a stop. He lunged forward with his torso,
trying to hold the anchorage of his knees to the ground.
Still dragging, he rolled to his back, gave a half-turn to the box
on his chest, and tapped its lid. The four straps disengaged.
The wind slipped the harness ahead of him and the silk col-
lapsed on the frozen stubble as a sail collapses from a mast.
He dared not rise, but he could feel with his elbows that he
lay in the furrow of an open cropfield. Winter potatoes; a
withered stalk pressed against his cheek. Turning his head
without raising it, he could see over his shoulder the woods
he had just managed to clear, the white birch trunks gleaming
among the dark pines. Still nearer, and in front of him, was a
116

woodpile, the man-long billets stacked together lite a wigwam.
Dragging the deflated chute under him, he twisted along the
furrow toward the woodpile, then eased himself to the left
over one potato-hill, to hide on the side where the moon cast
its shadow. There was no snow on the ground as there had
been in France. He could tell from the pressure of the earth
against his thigh that it was frozen too hard for digging. He
did not even try the shovel; the woodpile was easier anyway,
a miracle of luck.

Like a dog burrowing in the sand he eased the base of two
logs apart. He stuffed the chute, the rigging, and the straps
into the harness and pressed down the flaps. The bundle was
twice as big as an infantry pack, but he forced it between the
logs into the hollow of the woodpile and wedged an armful
of stalks across the opening. He unbuckled the jump helmet
and unzipped the striptease, with the folded coat and shovel
still in the tailflap and the Colt in the legflap. He slid the
steel helmet over his shoulder from chest to back, to free his
hands.

Holding the cap in his teeth, he ripped off the wool helmet
altogether, for ears are meant to listen with. He wondered why
the alarm did not break from a steeple or forester's tower, and
the police dogs bark. Then he did hear the dogs, two of them,
baying deep-throated and vengeful from higher ground some-
where back of him to the west, the direction he had to take.
Then two shots from a gun, then silence. He could not tell
how long the dogs had barked; the wool helmet would have
muffled the sound.

He forced all his American equipment, except the Colt,
into the cracks between the timbers, wedging it in place with
some potato stalks and fist-sized stones which lay in the fur-
row. Without rising from his knees, he struggled into his
overcoat. He could just buckle the Gott Mit Uns belt and
fasten the two top buttons, but he did not dare to stand for the
lower two. He slapped the pockets to make sure he had stowed

117

everything foreign. Nothing was left but the dime-sized com-
pass, which nestled under his mitten, and the Colt .45, with
the catch ready. Still kneeling, he ground his knees around to
face the woods. He crept back to them on all fours, as a
hunted animal creeps. At the edge of the pines he listened
again, then dove into the underbrush and stood up.

He slid the little American compass from his palm, leaning
against a trunk to steady the needle, for his hand shook. Then,
as a landscape emerges at dawn, gradually but leaving no
void, the briefing map took shape around him. He suddenly
saw that he had landed exactly at pinpoint. He remembered
this very field on the 1:20,000 Wehrmacht staff chart. He
could tell without looking that a lane ran up the woods be-
tween two farmhouses, no more than five hundred yards, till
it hit the road to Bobing, which could not now be more than
five kilometers ahead of him.

Eastward a cotton mist floated in front of the woods; that
would be over the farm pond which the map had shown. He
was lucky to land between the pond and the woodpile. He
had an odd feeling of being himself reduced to one twenty-
thousandth. He felt that he could crawl like an insect over the
black and white surface of the map, striding along the single
black hairlines which meant ^passable country road" or the
double stroke of the engraver's pen which meant "metaled
highways six meters broad," and climbing the gray hadhures,
each contour line rising ten meters.

Peering back at the plowed field from his lair among the
pines, like a fox at a farmyard, he was tempted to dash back
into the burrow he had made in the stack, curl up, and hide.
His Benzedrine had begun to wear off; he gulped another
tablet. Then he wondered if he might have left some telltale
knife or cord unburied at the base of the stack, and whether
he had dropped his Soldbuch where it could be found by the
fanners in the morning. Yet he dared not go back the fifty
yards, even if he had. It was his very existence to put as much
118

distance behind him by sunrise as he could. He dared not even
take the lane, for fear tihe farms had heard the plane. He struck
uphill to his left between the fir trunks, out of sight of the
houses., following the N on his compass; then down a flat field
to a snow-hedge of dwarf spruce, and found himself, sure
enough, at the edge of the narrow clay roadway which he re-
membered on the map.

He looked carefully both ways before emerging. There was
no one in sight on the road. He would have seen anybody
if there had been, for the moon was only just beginning to
override her height. He felt in his tunic; the money belt was
still around his waist, the Soldbuch still lay in his left breast
pocket with the false letter in its flap, the specimen case was in
his hip pocket and the little Olympia still reassuringly solid
in its holster under his arm. He threw the Colt and the tiny
compass into the woods, for they were foreign. Now that he
was oriented, he pretended to rebutton his fly, so that if any-
one should be watching he could say he had stepped into the
hedge for decency's sake. He jumped across the gutter and
started trudging to his left.

He thought of the sandwiches and chocolate in his knap-
sack; he was not yet hungry, but there might be a sort of com-
panionship in eating them. He did not know when he might
find more food, even with the ration coupons in his pocket, and
cigarettes were still harder to come by on the road. So he con-
tented himself with swallowing half the brandy in his flask.
The brandy was a hazard anyway, because noncoms, even
medical, were not often lucky enough to pack it

He looked at his watch. It was 0030 hours on Saturday, 17
February, 1945 that he had returned to his homeland from
the sky. Y488114; he knew that sheet so thoroughly that he
could dig a mark with his heel at the point on the road where
the 48 grid crossed it

Strengthened by the liquor, he strode boldly along the
pebbles. The silence, the pines, the astringence in the sub-

119

alpine air were not like his country, so far to the north, or
Cassino, so far to the south, but once again he was treading
the German earth he loved. To his left the snow-capped peaks
of Bavaria paraded across the horizon, blue even in the moon-
light

Now, he thought, I have earned a parachutist's badge. Not
many in Medical could boast it. He did remember one staff
surgeon in the training battalion who was always boasting that
he had jumped with the Sixth Airborne in Crete. And then he
heard a voice so dose behind him that he turned, so close the
speaker might have been on his own shoulders. No one was
behind him. The voice was his own thought, and he knew he
would hear it again many times in his five days. It was a hol-
low otherworldly voice, like the Devil's stage whisper to Faust.

"Ja, but you jumped for the enemy. No wings for you, but
only a placard on a tree."

He shook his shoulders to throw the gremlin off.

In half an hour he passed through the hamlet of Bobing. He
knew, as if he had really been crawling on the map, that there
was no way to avoid it, not even a footpath, but he had no
tremors as he strode through the sleeping town. A cow lowed
from a barn, and a gaggle of sleepy geese hissed at him as he
passed. Otherwise the village was silent. Perhaps, after all,
the dogs had not barked for him. To prove that he had no
fear he stopped in front of the white plaster church with its
onion dome to shift his knapsack and light his first cigarette
and straighten his Medical Corps brassard. That band was
good protection. The fraternity of medicine has no frontiers.
He smiled wryly to himself, patting his own left arm.

I am exactly as I should have been if I really had picked up
my specimen in Munich, he reminded himself. I am taking the
shortest route to Bregenz. Then I am going back to my new
regiment. I am crossing the Rhine at Mannheim, for after
Bregenz that is the nearest bridge to German-held territory.
No matter who combs through my Soldbuch, I can tell him
120

when and where each entry was made, and whether the officer
who made it is fat or thin*

He even recalled with a wave of comfort that a nurse from
his father's clinic at Berlin worked in the Red Cross canteen
in Munich. Her name was Irma Grimm. So if they asked Kirn
where he had eaten supper, he would say in her canteen; and
if they should show her his picture in the Soldbuch, or take
him to face her, she would lie for him, even under the name of
Steinberg, for his father's sake. And even, he thought, if she
knew why he wanted her to lie for him, she would do it just
the same. There was nothing to change from the face of truth
except that his name had become Steinberg instead of Maurer.
He whistled as he strode along.

He would have his orders stamped each day at the trans-
port office or the town hall. He would draw his rations like any
casual of the Wehrmacht and sleep in the camps or bunkers
wherever the officers directed him. He would find his two
divisions as naturally as any traveling soldier might, by bum-
ming rides in trucks and Volkswagen,* by sitting around the
canteen between trips, by boasting to other soldiers about his
own unit and letting them boast about theirs. He would find
them and get back to the front with all the speed the Wehr-
macht would expect from Steinberg and the Amis from Maurer.
He would not pretend to glorify the regime, for only civilians
and the SS did that. But he would not attack it either. If any-
one gave him the Heil Hitler he would give it back.

He was Karl Steinberg, corporal in Third Flak Training, but
soon to be assigned to 136th Mountain across the river via the
big bridge at Mannheim. And he had only five days. It was
stamped on his second set of orders by a mythical Leutnant
Buhl, and in his mind by Captain Pete. Five days, and his
feet had begun to hurt already.

But at five o'clock when the sun rose behind him he had
covered eight kilometers without seeing a single traveler. He

* German equivalent of the jeep.

121

passed a three-story Hof, one of those patriarchal farmsteads
where whole generations live together under the gable, and
stock and crops fill the ell. The old men who faltered into
the sunrise to chop faggots, and the women who scrubbed
clothes with the soap made from the wood ash, looked up and
waved to him but showed no curiosity.

"Griiss Gott!" they called, after the manner of South Ger-
many. The Hof was more populous and wider awake at five
than the stretch of France had been at noon. This was home,
where people were used to hard work. If there were no more
able-bodied men than in France, at least there were more
animals. Not many horses, though; they had been taken for
the field artillery but every farmstead retained at least a cow
and the inevitable troop of high-neck geese, tramping unani-
mously like a squad of infantry, and adding their green drop-
pings to the mud.

Happy was really hungry now, but he could not lose time
by unpacking his sandwiches. Over the next hill was the high-
way, where a soldier would not be suspected for resting and
eating. The highway ran up to Schongau, and at Schongau there
was sure to be some sort of a canteen, or a restaurant where he
could cash his ration stamps. At worst he could eat his sand-
wiches where it was warm and get a cup of hot barley coffee.
He might get a ride before then, from some convoy on the
road.

Near the top of the slope, well beyond Bobing and before
he hit the highway, he overtook his first traveler. It was an
elderly man walking slowly up the path. He carried a cane in
his right hand. With his left he puffed at a pipe; the blue smoke
curled over his head. An old-fashioned shotgun was slung
across the back of his prewar Army overcoat. On his head was
a green cloth hunte/s cap with a feather stuck in the left side
of the band. Two black police dogs trotted tandem ahead of
him, Happy did not like to overtake the man, who must be
some sort of forest guard or Landwehr patrol to be out walk-
122

ing with a shotgun so early. But he could not afford to slow
down to the same pace. He noticed that the old man's shoes
had no heels at all; they were worn down flat to the soles.
Well, Happy thought, if I have to face him, it may be good
practice for later.

"Morgen," he panted as he came abreast.

The old man turned around with his whole body, not just
his head. He switched the cane to his left hand and held out
his right The dogs squatted on their haunches, their yellow
eyes darting up at Happy, their long tongues hanging between
their sharp teeth.

"Good morning to you," he said. He spoke slowly as the
aged do, not to reflect, but to spin time out **Ah, an airman,
a bird whose wings are clipped. A flying doctor, like Mercury
on earth, with wings on his heels. Walk along with me for
a while if you are going to Schongau. We don't often see avia-
tors down our way."

He nodded his approval, puffing at the yellow pipe, which
had stained his mustache yellow too. "Where do you come
from, young man?"

"Why," Happy answered, taking a breath, "from Munich,
from the Flak barracks, and now I am going to the big hospi-
tal at Bregenz, on the lake, with a blood sample for analysis.
It is from a major who is ill."

The old man clucked sympathetically. "But you have a long
trip to the Bodensee, and even if you must walk instead of
fly you choose a roundabout road."

"Oh, I know it would have been shorter by the Buchloe

_ V9

train

"Seven hours via Kempten," cut in the old man sharply,
"that is, to Lindau. Then only twenty minutes to Bregenz,
if the trains run*"

"There were bombers over Munich last night, and so many
refugees crowding out of the city that I did not know when I
could get away by rail."

123

The old man plunged his pointed stick in the ground and
turned to shake his fist at the sky in the east, toward Munich.
~Der f eige Tommy; they are all cowards. God will punish them
for bombing a city like Munich and dropping their death on
women and children. It is said the Biirgermeister of Munich
has killed himself because the regime will not make it an open
city, but that is only Klatsch.* They don't even pretend to aim
at military targets any more. They fly so high, to keep away
from our Flak, that they can't really aim at all. But never
mind, the papers say that London has got it back a hundred-
fold; did you know London is three-quarters destroyed? They
can't keep this up much longer."

He picked up his stick, still shaking with anger, and plodded
along beside Happy. As with most Germans, his enemy was
England; sometimes they hated Russia, but hardly ever Amer-
ica or France.

"We had Yankees against us in Italy, where I was stationed
last year," Happy told him.

"Ah, the Americans! I have never seen one. Perhaps they
are better."

Happy had thrown his coat back, it was so warm climbing
the road. The old man peered at the red Flak piping on his
collar tab and Schiffchen.

"Ah, you are like me; you are not a flier, but you destroy
enemy fliers. Let me have the honor to present myself; I am
Leopold FidI, veteran of the Kaiser's war and now air-raid
warden for the district from Bobing to Schongau. Thus I can
claim to be of the Flak like yourself, and though I shall be
seventy next month I walk my beat each day. And your name?"

"Karl Steinberg, at present of the Third Flak Training Regi-
ment/'

Herr FidI stuck his stick in the ground and his pipe in his
mouth, and pumped Happy's hand with both of his, in the
middle of the road. He did not seem in any hurry to reach

* Gossip.
124

Schongau. Happy pulled his cigarettes from the canteen belt
around his waist and offered one to Herr FidL The warden
looked at the cigarette, then narrowly at Happy. It was not
often that one was given a cigarette for nothing, especially
a Neuerburg. He smelled it, muttered a thank you, and
wrapped it carefully in his oilskin tobacco pouch.

"I will smoke it later, if you permit, in my pipe, so that I
will not lose the tobacco at the tip. Only profiteers can afford
to smoke cigarettes and soldiers."

He smiled, and they walked on in silence.

"I live in Bdbing, you know" as if Happy could have known
where he lived "and it is my duty to climb the church tower
at night to watch for raiders. Some say that the Tommies drop
spies, and then last night" he paused portentously ^ast
night I saw a small plane fly in from the west, though God
knows all planes are big. It was not of the Luftwaffe! I know
this because I have studied the chart which they issue to ward-
ens. No one else would know it, for I keep the chart locked
in the sacristy so spies cannot learn about our planes. There
is also a chart of enemy planes, but this one came so fast I
could not see its shape. It had a star. We do not have many
planes here, thank God'* he crossed himself. They were pass-
ing a roadside crucifix "of either the Reich or its enemies.
That is a comfort of the Allgau. But let me return to last
night. When this plane approached the pine woods between
Bobing and the Ammersee I saw it circle. A little later a para-
chute unfolded with a tiny dot of a man slung beneath it. In
a few moments he was out of sight beyond the ridge. It is too
bad we do not have an observation post on the Peissenberg
likewise, though it would be too high for my strength to climb.
Well, I think this occurrence so important that I am now pro-
ceeding to Schongau to report it to the Kommandantur, who
will no doubt notify the competent authorities."

"Ah, Herr Fidl," Karl said, "if we should meet any spies
from the Americans or the Tommies, you and I could take

125

care of them. I see that you have a long shotgun which you
doubtless aim straight, with your experience. Though we in
the Medical Corps are not supposed to cany weapons, I have
here tinder my left shoulder a toy with which I have practiced
almost as much as you have. I can whip it from the holster
in an instant in less time than you could unsling your shot-
gun. I can shoot very straight with it, and if we should meet
such a spy we could take him into Schongau together/* He
patted his shoulder holster.

The warden pulled on his pipe. ""Yes, and my dogs would
tear his throat if I nodded. Would you not, GerdaP The bitch
growled at her name.

"You were telling me," Herr Fidl went on, "how you came to
he on this lonely road, so far from your destination."

**Yes. When I despaired of boarding the train, my cousin,
Fraulein Grimm, said I had better get a ride with the first car
which came through in my direction. She is chief helper in the
Red Cross canteen at Munich, and consequently knows all of
the truckdrivers. They come to her bar for coffee. It is always
easier for a soldier to travel by truck than for civilians. So a
few minutes later in came a sergeant who was taking a track-
load of most important cargo to Garmisch. I believe that great
things are brewing in your mountains of Bavaria."

The warden nodded his head without taking his pipe from
between his teeth. "Ah, then, you do know somebody in Mu-
nich- One cannot be too carefuL For a moment I suspected
it might be you who had jumped from my plane. 9 *

Happy said reproachfully, "Do I look like a Yankee gang-
ster? Do I talk like one?" They laughed together at the absurd-
ity.

"It is true," Herr Fidl resumed, "all sorts of supplies for de-
fense and even for luxury are being moved into our Bavarian
Alps. One does not know exactly where, or for whom, but they
say for the use of an important personage, a very exalted per-
sonage indeed. One sees the covered trucks heading south on

126

all the highways." He stared stolidly ahead of him, but Happy
thought he had winked.

"Anyway/* Happy said after a pause, "since I have to leave
the specimen at the Bregenz laboratory, I had the sergeant
drop me off at what I thought was the shortest road to the
west. But I must have made a mistake, for the road kept climb-
ing and getting narrower until finally it went only to Bobing,
which has the honor of claiming you as a resident But do not
worry. If the spy should unexpectedly jump out of these
bushes, I will help you dispose of hinr> with the little toy
which I may not display/* He patted the Olympia again.

The warden clucked his gratitude. "In a moment," he said,
"we come on our right to the steep ravine known as the
Krummengraben. At its foot is the paved highway which leads
over the river Lech to Peiting and Schongau. For Bregenz you
should turn left in Schongau; for Augsburg go straight ahead.
My knees are so brittle that I cannot run down the valley as I
used to; thejpath is indeed only for goats. I shall take the good
road by Rottenbuch, though it is longer. So if my infirmity is
delaying you, I beg you to go ahead without me. At the bot-
tom you will be sure to find a ride. Even if you must walk a
little, it is only six kilometers to Schongau. There is a canteen
which is run by the ladies of Strength through Joy. My wife,
who is one of those ladies,** this time he winked openly, "works
there two days a week and is awaiting me now. She tells me
that they furnish all soldiers with a coffee which is not too bad.
If you get there before me, tell her I shall be along soon. She
did not see the parachute last night, as she was not in Bobing."

Happy shook hands solemnly with the disquieting old man
and started ahead, eager to leave him but reluctant to offer a
target for his blunderbuss. As he started down the crest, Herr
Fidl called out to him, "Auf Wiederseh'n. Next time, make
sure beforehand whether you are really in a hurry for Bre-
genz."

Happy turned down the brink of the eroded defile, so steep

127

and irregular, as the torrents had cut it, that he had rather to
leap than to run. At each step he thought he might turn his
ankle. His knapsack, his helmet, his gas mask slapped against
his bade. I should not have given h my name, he thought. I
need not have given it; hut I am gkd I showed no fear, and
the next time I shall not even be afraid inside.

When he reached the foot, he looked back. The warden was
resting on his cane before attempting his own painful descent
down the road, the shotgun still slung across his back. His
dogs looked up at him hungrily, but he waggled his finger at
them. Happy waved up from the foot of the ravine.

The old man shouted in a voice which echoed between the
banks like a mountain horn, 'The wicked flee where no man
pursued!,* and waved back Then he disappeared down the
steep road, one step at a time, as a cripple descends a staircase.

Happy stood on the highway, looking right and left. It was
still early, even for military traffic. He started to the right, for
the six kilometers to Schongau. The grass at the side of the
roadbed was easier walking than the pebbly mountain path.
He was so hungry now that he broke open the oiled paper
package and devoured two of his sandwiches, one sausage and
one cheese. He finished the brandy in his flask. He refilled the
flask from the brook along the roadside, dashing cold water
on his face afterward. He would have liked a cup of coffee,
even from Frau Fidl, and an armchair in her canteen, for his
shoulder blades were sore from the slapping of his Klamotten
all the equipment, like gas mask and helmet, that the Wehr-
macht hung on a man. He had walked only a kilometer when
an Army motorcycle with an empty sidecar drew up behind
hi. The driver was an Army courier. He lifted his goggles.

To Augsburg?" he asked impatiently.

"Only to Schongau, if you cart drop me there. 9 *

The courier grunted, easing his leather belt and resetting his
goggles. Happy climbed into the sidecar. In Skre minutes they

O OO tfS ;,

128 "*

had passed through the village of Pelting, where the single-
track railroad crosses the highway at grade. The track was
rusted and the station boarded up, with a sign wimratfnLFE
nailed over the door. It was a collection point for the Winter
Aid, where people could bring any spare supplies to help the
destitute. As if everyone were not destitute. The motorcycle
bumped across the concrete bridge over the Lech, and Happy
saw that it was not mined. The railroad bridge ran fifty yards
to his left. The two debouched on a little square, facing a bar-
ber shop and a sawmill. The town of Schongau pyramided
above, huddled around the monastery at the crest. In the
square a sign pointed forward to Augsburg and left to Kauf-
beuren. A steel signal tower protected the grade crossing, with
a stone foundation at its base. On the stone sat a corporal of
artillery and two privates of the Mountain troops, with the
edelweiss embroidered on the left side of their peaked caps.
The Mountain were the only troops' whose caps had visors.
Happy glanced, without seeming to, at the regimental number
on their green-piped shoulderstraps. It was 96, out of Garmisch.
One wore the silver medal of the Narvik campaign on his chest.
Their barracks bags stood beside them against the stone,
and Happy saw part of .a white Mountain snowsuit at the
mouth of one, where the knot was loose. Mountain troops were
as proud as motorcyclists; when the courier braked to a stop
they whistled the chorus they knew would get under his skin:

If you drive a machine youll Wer gut Krad fahrt wird Unter-

rnake corporal, offizier,

But we are too dumb to under- Aber wir, die sowas nicht ver-

stand one, st^hen,

So we're content to be gunners. Sind viel gliicklicher als Kano-

The cyclist frawiaed, his feet tapping the ground beside .his
machine. He pqlbleS to the left. TPickup point for the West,"

he told Happy pompously, pretending not to hear the troop-
ers. Happy climbed out of the sidecar. The artillery corporal,
seeing it empty, called out, "To Augsburg?"

The cyclist nodded, and the corporal took Happy's place.
Couriers pretended to be important, but even they had to
offer rides to soldiers on foot. The machine started again; it
roared up the hill and out of sight through the village. Happy
noted that it carried the striped fanion of a division staff on
its license plate, with the number 367.

He strolled over to the empty place on the stone beside the
Mountain troopers. One of them was reading a comic maga-
zine; the other sucked idly on a straw, his cap tilted back and
his coat open to the morning sun. They nodded lazily.

It would be comfortable to sit on the warm stone, more
comfortable than in the sidecar, but Happy did not dare to
wait at the crossroads for long. They had told him at G to keep
moving, not fast enough to look eager, but fast enough to
look busy. It was possible, he thought, that the warden had not
suspected him at all; possibly he suspected him but was against
the regime himself. Though when it came to spies everyone
was a patriot. Most likely he had suspected him but not dared
to make the arrest alone, and, knowing Happy could not es-
cape, was even now telephoning from Peiting to alert the
police in Schongau.

"Can a Landser* hope for a ride to Kempten from here?" he
asked the Mountain troopers.

One of them looked at him, taking in the medical brassard
on his blue coat. "Yes, you are just in time; that's what we're
waiting for ourselves. The broken-down old bus should come
limping around the corner any minute now.**

Yes, but at any minute the warden and his dogs might come
over the bridge* Happy forced himself to his feet.

"Well," he yawned, "I think 111 walk along the road. The bus
will stop for me, won't it?"

* Wehrmacht slang for ground troops, like our "GL 3 *
130

The others nodded.

Til get a little exercise." Happy smiled. "I slept too soundly
in that sidecar. 7 *

"The yawn is plausible enough/* whispered his gremlin, **but
soldiers never walk when they can sit down."

The Mountain trooper laughed. "Exercise of the tail there,
ja, but not of the legs. You'll find it's the same in our dear old
bus. Look, Herbert," he nudged his comrade, "the ground force
of the birdmen* must always travel so fast Perhaps they think
they are fliers that way."

The trooper knew where to hit, for the Flak were notori-
ously jealous of the fliers. Happy flushed. He almost let out
that he was assigned to Mountain himself after the hospital
errand.

"Ne, ne," the trooper laughed, "do not be angry. I am only
kidding. If you develop leg muscles you can perhaps become
a Mountain soldier like us, if you do not become a bird first
When we ski we fly as fast as a plane. But have no fear, Junge,
the bus will stop for you when it comes along in God's time.'*

The road westward was paved too, but emptier than the
north-south road he had left He walked along as jauntily as
his aching legs would let him till he had rounded the bend out
of sight of the troopers. They could not see him, but from
where he stopped he could watch the bridge. He sat down on
the first kilometer-stone and thought of Monsieur Apfel's food.

"If they suspect an honest German cigarette," the voice whis-
pered, ~what will they think of gray sandwiches when they
have nothing but black themselves? With all the victories of
your friends, might they not have given you a can of Wehr-
maeht black?"

"A mistake of Chuck's," Happy admitted. "IT1 warn him
when I get back, for the sake of the others."

*The bus will come round the bend at any moment now,"
the voice reminded him.

* His slang for the Luftwaffe was "Fliegerei."

131

With Ms heel Happy dug a hole in the grass behind the
stone. Since he might not have time to swallow the sand-
wiches, he dumped the cheese and sausage fillings on the
round-topped stone and licked the margarine off the bread.
He buried the treacherous gray slices in the hole and scuffed
them over with his foot.

"You must be careful of everything," the voice commended
him, "from parachutes to sandwiches."

He rewrapped the sausage and cheese in the waxed paper.
They could not possibly be identified. He crumbled the cake
of chocolate, though it was unmarked, so nobody could guess,
even from the size of the tablets, that it was foreign. He
slipped all the food back in his knapsack; he did not really
have to eat quite yet.

He trudged along for five hundred yards more, to get away
from the fresh-turned earth. The sputtering of a motor burn-
ing wood the Holzgas that took the place of gasoline came
around the bend behind him. He turned to hail what looked
like a mail bus. It was camouflaged green and brown, but still
carried the curved horn of the Post Office painted on the sides.
The bus drew up for him, and he climbed aboard. The driver
was a woman in the uniform of the NSKK, the Nazi motor
corps. She had a thin brown face, her hair was stringy under
her field cap, and she gritted her teeth when she changed gear.
Apparently this bus was a carryall for any soldiers who had
travel orders, and a freight service too, for the back of the cab
was piled with mail sacks and packages.

"Name and rank," snapped the woman, whipping a pad and
pencil from the bag at her belt.

"Steinberg, Medical Corporal, Third Flak Training.'*

"Where to?"

"Bregenz*

"Well, I'm not going that far, but 111 take you as far as
Kempten. An hour out at Kaufbeuren to eat, and several stops

132

on the way. From Kempten you won't Lave far to Bregenz.
Where from?"

But before Happy had to answer she had chalked down
Schongau on her pad. She did not ask for his Soldbuch or even
for a ticket.

The two Mountain troopers were laughing at him from the
back bench, in front of the cargo. They were the only passen-
gers so far. They were always kidding; Happy knew the type.
But they meant no harm.

"Physician, heal thy bunions," one of them called. And even
the sourfaced woman laughed as Happy dropped down on the
longest bench.

"Is it permitted to sleep?**

"No," said the driver.

"Yes," said the Mountain troopers. "Let the kid sleep, Frau-
lein/*

"Scharfiihrerin,** * corrected the driver.

"You go to sleep, birdie. We will watch out and wake you
up if any officers come aboard. Even if you are Saurpruss, we
will look out for you.** Saurpruss is what Bavarians call a Prus-
sian. It sounds like "sourpuss" and means the same.

Happy took off his leather belt. He rolled up his overcoat to
make a pillow. The gremlin whispered that he must not sleep
till he was out of danger, but he shrugged his shoulders and
stretched out, his legs hanging over the slatted bench. The
Holzgas heated the bus like a stove. He fell asleep as his head
touched the coat. Twice the bus stopped for refueling, but it
was the Mountain troopers who volunteered to take out the
ashes and shovel in the short chunks of lopwood. They did not
wake him. While he slept the driver stopped to pick up more
passengers or to leave off some of her packages. The trip took
three hours instead of one, because of stoking up and ice under
the worn tires and oxen on the road. Bavaria never hurries,

* Squad leader (female) in the NSKK.

133

even in wartime. It was noon when the bus drew up at the
white railroad station in Kaufbeuren. The troopers shook him
awake.

The benches had filled with soldiers by now soldiers on
leave, they were the ones who laughed, or returning from
leave; soldiers like himself on military errands, soldiers singly
or in pairs. Two were standing in order to leave him stretched
out on the bench. Happy jumped to his feet. The two soldiers
would remember him for lying on the bench while they stood,
but would remember him more clearly still and so would
the other troops and the driver if he apologized. An agent's
safety, he had been taught, lay in being unnoticed, for being
noticed led to questions; but luckily there were no officers
aboard to ask them. He smoothed out his tunic without even
thanking the two, rubbing his eyes to seem sleepier than he
was. The others lifted their rifles from the luggage rack. He
walked through the ticket room with the crowd and out to the
platform.

In the buffet beside the near track a Strength through Joy
canteen was set up ersatz coffee brewed of barley and chic-
ory. He had forgotten how bad it was after drinking American
coffee so long. Some sort of beef stew. And a soggy cake for
dessert, a kind of Strudel with synthetic frosting. .He reached
in his Soldbuch for the forged ration stamps, and changed a
ten-mark note to pay for his lunch. A priest was handing out
wooden rosaries, leaning against the wall in one corner of the
room. He did not actually sell them, but he had a tin box into
which everybody who took one dropped some kind of paper
bill. Happy was not a Catholic, but he took a rosary just the
same. He would give it to Pere Nod, his roommate, when he
got back to the Joehouse. He dropped all his change into the
box. The priest gestured a blessing.

"Too much for a fifty-pfennig string of beads with a cross at
the end," the voice told him. "Now the priest has noticed you
too:'

134

Kaufbeuren is the main stop on the railroad from Kempten
to Augsburg. There were a hundred troops or so at the station,
mostly infantry, but of many different regiments. On the plat-
form a staff sergeant was rehearsing them in close order drill.
Their uniforms were shabby; many had no rifles. One or two
appeared to be still sick or wounded, with bandages and canes.
Next to them another group, in civilian clothes, was being
lined up in squads. They were mostly older men, but there
were a few younger than Happy. Just kids, he noticed, with
the Hitler Youth pin still on their jackets. He wished his father
had let him join the Hitlerjugend in Berlin, so he could have
gone on their hikes in the woods. Hiking would not have done
him any harm, any more than baseball at the Golden Well. It
would have been fun, even though the meetings were non-
sense, with all the slogans that had turned Hermann Bechthold
into a gangster.

Young or old, the recruits all wore the white brassard of the
Volkssturm reserve. Most of them were armed, but with the
obsolete Mauser or with old-fashioned fowling pieces like
Herr FidTs. On the center platform, beyond the underpass, a
group of Russians lounged on their sacks, in feldgrau uniforms
with the eagle of the Cossack Legion like Paluka's own dis-
guise and with no weapons at all square-faced, stringy-
haired, slant-eyed, filling their mess kits from a pot of their
own. The Germans paid no attention to them.

These three detachments were clearly all awaiting transport.
Happy sensed the train-time expectation in the waiting room
and on the platform. He was the only airman in the crowd. A
pair of guards with fixed bayonets strode up and down the
platform and through the station, but ignored him as if he were
Russian too. The girl who drove the bus was still eating at the
buffet

Kempten, where he was headed, was on the way to Bregenz,
where he pretended to be headed. The voice warned him that
the Gestapo might suspect him if he did not take the fastest

135

route. He wondered whether he could get to Kempten faster
by the troop train than by the bus, but he didn't know when
it was due nor which direction it would head. He didn't dare
ask the guards, so he asked the girl.

~Oh.r she told him indifferently over her Strudel, "these fel-
lows are returning from the hospitals to the front. They go the
opposite way from you, to the Reppo Depot at Augsburg,
where they will be shipped to their own units again. Or to
whatever unit needs them most. That's the way it is nowadays.
You won't get a train to Kempten till some time tonight, if
then. Better stick with me. Only I warn you, you'll have to
stoke my furnace. The Mountain did it all morning; it's your
turn now. And I can't have troops sleeping all over my bus. I'm
starting as soon as I finish this delicious lunch. Even though I
have to go out of the way to leave some packages at Aitrang,
111 get to Kempten long before a train will. Better go out and
get a seat, because I may be filled up when I leave. Remember,
don't go to sleep; I might have officers aboard this time.'*

He bought a copy of the Allgauer-Tageblatt on the way,
and got in the bus. Sure enough, there were only two or three
empty seats left. In a few minutes the driver came out and
started her car. Happy sat at the back, where he could look at
the addresses on the packages. Without appearing to study the
tags, he could read the names on several, like 36th Supply Bat-
talion, Kempten, or HQ 375th Artillery Regt, Memmingen via
Kempten. He read as many as he could see from his bench
without exciting the attention of the engineer corporal sitting
beside him. But he did not want to try to remember too many,
lest he should forget them all; so he concentrated on the three
or four addresses nearest Seventh Army sector on the Rhine,
repeating them to himself with his eyes closed till he would be
sure to remember without having to write them down.

He wondered why the bus was going out of its way to so
small a town as Aitrang, till he noticed that half of the mail
sacks bore the name of a prisoner-of-war cage, Stalag 206/B.
136

They were the regular civilian bags, the color of potato sacks,
but made of strong hemp, and longer, with Deutsche Eeichs-
post stenciled lengthwise, and a lead seal at the end. There
were half a dozen, all bulging with packages. In the time he
had been in the Ami cage at Sarrebourg, with all its thousand
prisoners, there had never been more than one mail sack of
packages a day.

The bus left the main highway and nosed southward along a
narrow dirt road. After five or six kilometers this road ran par-
allel to a double-track railroad, the line from Kempten to
Augsburg which he had just left at Kaufbeuren. The train
which was to pick up the troops for the front passed them on
an embankment, the half-dozen small boxcars, unpainted for
far too long, swaying behind their wood-burning engine,
grinding their flat bumpers together over the rough neglected
roadbed. Then the bus turned left under a stone overpass and
drew into the village of Aitrang. It stopped in front of a big
two-story stucco building with a Turnverein sign across the
front It had been the regional sport club before the war. The
playground beside it was surrounded by a double steel fence
three yards high, with barbed wire stretched on top and rolls
of barbed accordion between. At the far corner of this com-
pound was a tower, in the window of which he could see the
muzzle of an HMG, sited to sweep the packed cinders below.
Across the front of tibe building itself was a big sign, just the
same as the tags on the mail bags: Stalag 206/B.

An SS stormtrooper stood rigidly at the door. On ids garri-
son cap, instead of a soldier's cockade, he wore the death's-
head of the Totenkopfverbande, Himmler's special guards who
ran the PW cages and concentration camps. The double-light-
ning sign of the SS was on his black collar tab. He did not relax
nor change expression when the bus stopped, but inside the
bus the driver called, "Someone help me throw the fodder to
the swine, please."

The troops laughed; the two front men got out to help. They

137

opened the side door of the bus and carried all the sacks into
the prison office, past the death's-head guard.

The prisoners had been playing baseball. Happy counted
twenty of them. When they heard the bus drive up they
threw down their bats and gloves and pressed in a row against
the links of the inner chain fence. The muzzle of the machine
gun in the tower moved a little to the left.

It's the mail, boys," Happy heard one of them call in Eng-
lish.

When they saw the sacks being carried from the bus into the
guard room, they turned from the fence and formed a line at
the side door of the gym. This was a Dutch door, with a ledge
on the lower half. The upper half was open.

But the voice of another guard inside the office grated in
English, with an accent Happy thought was not as good as his
own, '^Prisoners will have to wait. We shall inspect for contra-
band."

The door slammed shut. One of the Amis flung his cap on
the graveL Teah, and then we may get a little bit of what's
left over, 5 * he grumbled.

The trooper at the door heard him. He eased the Luger from
his belt holster and moved toward the outer fence. It would be
easy for him to shoot across the two, and the GI, seeing him,
picked his cap up and followed the others to the diamond.

They were dressed in fatigues exactly like the ones Happy
had worn at the Golden Well, but with USA stenciled on the
back. He wondered whether the Wehrmacht had had them
made that way, or whether Seventh Army had sent them in via
Switzerland, as the mail must have come.

All the German troops had piled out of the bus to stare at
the prisoners. They leaned against the outer fence with their
fingers clawed between the links, watching the flight of the ball
in the unfamiliar game, till the stormtrooper growled at them
to keep away from the wire, as a keeper might warn against
standing too close to the cage in a zoo. Happy lingered,
138

tempted to whisper to the centerfielder, who was only three
yards inside the fence. He had tossed his glove in the air, and
now was passing the ball with the catcher as the others took
their places on the bases. Happy could have whispered, "I am
in the American Army too, and I can bat." The guard, at that
instant, could not have heard. Happy wondered whether the
fielder would miss his catch if he heard those words through
the wire. He wondered who shagged the ball if a fly went over
the fence. Certainly the death's-head guard would not, and the
prisoners could not. The ball would probably be confiscated;
then they could play no more till the bus brought a new one
from Switzerland. At the Golden Well there was no fence
around the diamond.

But the moment to whisper passed, for the driver came out
of the office, tucking a receipt for the mail sacks in her belt
bag. She picked him out where he stood lingering at the fence.

"Hey, Corporal, you have ridden free long enough. YouVe
been dreaming for an hour. Come back and throw some wood
in my boiler. We have to get places."

Happy obeyed. He shoveled out the ashes, stirred up the
bed of fire, and threw a dozen chunks into the grate, closing
the firedoor when they had kindled. Then he climbed aboard.
Each soldier was sitting in the same seat as before the stop. His
own seat was waiting for him, beside the engineer corporal.
Looking backward, against his judgment, as the bus sputtered
and lurched forward, he heard the crack of the bat The pris-
oner who had thrown his cap down had hit a two-bagger;
Happy saw him digging his toes into the cinders to round the
bases. The gunner in the tower, who probably did not know
the difference between a two-bagger and a riot, traversed his
machine-gun barrel after the runner. The team whistled and
cheered, as Happy himself had been cheered at the Golden
Well. The two prisoners who were working on their knees
against the far side of the compound looked around and whis-
tled too. They were getting a garden ready for spring. Gaiety,

139

that was what the Americans had, even in prison; and he
remembered the dejected shamble of the German prisoners
around the compound in Sarrebourg. Baseball was a good
game, Happy thought. After the war he would teach Klaus
how to play, and they might get two nines together in the Tier-
garten at Berlin. The death's-head guard had resumed his
stance at the door, not bothering to look at the game. Happy
knew the guards were correct by the Geneva Convention,
maybe more scrupulous than the Ami guards at Sarrebourg.
But he felt all the same an odd sensation that the prisoners
were freer than their captors, who must envy the liberty be-
hind the wire fences, under the muzzle of the machine gun, as
a housewife must sometimes envy the canary in her kitchen.

The cannoneer in the seat behind the driver muttered that
it was a dirty trick for ^m t a sergeant in the German Army, to
have to cany smokes and chocolate to American prisoners,
who had probably been bombing German women and chil-
dren only a few days before. The crowd grunted agreement.
The troops sat silent and moody, swaying as the bus pushed
on. From the crest of the first hill Happy, looking back, saw
USA in huge white letters on the tiles of the Turnverein, to
warn the enemy against bombing their own side, and maybe
to protect the SS.

*The Wehrmacht pays every attention to the comfort and
welfare of its guests," growled the engineer corporal in the seat
beside Happy, with his eyes closed. "The best cuisine, hot and
cold running water, beautiful waitresses, sports, gardens; noth-
ing is too good. It makes one envious of the Schweinehunde."

"At least,* Happy laughed, "they don't have to worry about
our shellfire any more."

The engineer opened his eyes. He looked full at Happy.
"Unless they are spies. I wish one of them was my guest; he
would taste a little. Did you know they dropped a spy last
night over by the Ammersee? See if it is in the paper yet You
have one right in your pocket."
140

Happy looked back at him. He knew the engineer must
think it curious for him to have sat with the newspaper folded
in his pocket, unread, for two hours. At the same time he could
not appear to have read it already, because if it told about the
spy he had not been indignant soon enough. He pulled the
single sheet uncomfortably from his pocket and started to
read, conscious that the engineer still looked at him sidewise.
Luckily, the story was not yet in press, so the engineer related
it himself as he had heard it on the radio, while Happy shook
his head in indignation.

Herr Leopold Fidl, he said, the air-raid warden of Bobing,
had seen a plane fly low over the woods east of his village. It
had dropped a parachute. The warden's dogs had barked at
the plane; he himself had fired, not with any hope of hitting
the jumper (though this, the engineer explained at length, was
clearly permitted by the laws of war), for he was too far away,
but to arouse the village. A few farmers had waked up in time
to see the chute drop out of sight. Rather than waste time on
what seemed like a useless hunt, Herr Fidl, though infirm, had
walked fifteen kilometers to announce the news to the Kom-
mandantur at Schongau. He had recognized the plane as
American and suspected that the spy might be headed south-
ward toward certain installations near the Austrian border.

Sowthtoard, thought Happy; Herr Fidl is trying to protect
me. And why Ami instead of Tommy? The unuttered friend-
ship warmed his confidence for the first time since the jump,
till the gremlin reminded him that the Gestapo was laying a
trap for him by feinting the wrong direction.

Anyway, the Kommandantur had called for an alert in all
directions and was sending a posse with dogs to comb the re-
gion where the plane had circled. Turn in all suspicious per-
sons, it ordered, no matter how clear their identity might
appear; the enemy forged the most impeccable German pa-
pers. Be on the lookout, it warned, for any stranger, whether
soldier or civilian, who spoke with an American accent. Happy

141

listened, muttering his anger for the engineer corporal to see,
but not too angrily to be a real soldier, and turned back to his
newspaper.

The Wehrmacht communique in the paper spoke of heavy
losses inflicted on the Russians in a successful effort to shorten
the German lines west of Breslau. It announced that thirty-two
Anglo-American terror-bombers had been shot down over the
Westmark, but admitted a few local penetrations in that sec-
tor. Happy knew it was trying to gloss over more defeats. He
wondered whether Seventh Army had launched the attack
which everyone at the Golden Well expected. If so, it must
have begun that very morning. At the Golden Well one never
saw the German papers and it did not seem right to listen to
the German radio. Vati did not forbid it, as the regime forbade
BBC, but in some way it would have been disloyal to him.

The rest of the sheet was devoted to announcements of party
meetings in Kempten and Kaufbeuren, to movie programs at
the clubs for soldiers, to the latest speech by Dr. Goebbels, and
to a quarter-page of death notices: deaths of heroes, with an
Iron Cross printed beside the name; deaths for Fatherland
and Fiihrer; deaths for Fatherland alone; deaths by terror-
bombs; and mere deaths in descending order of importance.

In a box at the top, over the death notices, was a poem:

THE PEOPLE'S LEADER DBS VOLKES FUHRER

The German saying has it, Es geht die deutsche Sage:

When great the people's need, Wenn gross des Volkes Not,

When hostile armies threaten Wenn drauend Feindesplage

Without the gate, and Death, Vor'm Tor steht; wenn der Tod

Lifting his lance on high, Mit hoch geschwung'nem Speere

Sweeps through the German Durchs Land der Deutschen

land; zieht,

When from a thousand fires Wenn rings aus tausend Flam-

men

The sudden horror springs; Ein jah Entsetzen spriiht,

Then the forest thunders, Dann drohnt es in den Waldern,

Then the German earth Dann gart es tief im Schoss
142

Starts in her holy bosom, Der heiTgen deutschen Erde,

And then, steel-hard and mighty, Und eisenhart und gross

Stands forth the people's leader, Ersteht des Volkes Fiihrer,

The man whom God has seat, Der Mann von Gott gesandt,

The hero of all power, Der Held der grossen Starke,

The savior of our land. Der Better uoserm Land.

When Happy finished the paper he offered it to the engi-
neer. "Your spy wouldn't learn much from reading this paper."
He grinned. "And I don't believe he'd learn much from travel-
ing this road. I wish we'd get to Kempten; I'm hungry again/*

"No news is good news for the AUgau/* the engineer said
solemnly. "But if he were riding this bus and he might be,
you know tie would have seen the Stalag. He may be recon-
noitering to raid it ? the way Skorzeny rescued Mussolini from
the cliff in Italy. That was a real masterpiece, that little trick.
He would have seen that regiment of White Russians that in-
fest Kaufbeuren. I don't trust *"

Happy put his hand on the engineer's sleeve. He pointed to
the cardboard sign tacked across the front of the cab, over the
driver's head. It read DER FEJND HOET :&rr.

"The enemy is listening, you know."

The engineer grimaced and smiled. ""You're right. My wife
tells me I talk too much anyhow."

He went back to sleep. The bus plodded along the snowy
forest roadi stopping each few kilometers to drop or pick up
passengers. Now that the freight rack was nearly empty, they
all stacked their rifles in it to make more elbow room on the
benches. Each man who left had to stumble over Happy's feet
to pick out his rifle.

The bus joined the main road again at Obergunzburg, where
the driver stopped to refuel her woodbin from a locked shed
behind the town halL The engineer corporal helped Happy to
carry the four-inch chocks for the Holzgas boiler. Then, with
the sun still shining, a hailstorm descended, as happens in the
Bavarian February. The driver braked at the head of the steep

14S

slope down to the Iller. Happy shoveled sand from the road-
side sandbox so that she wouldn't skid. That way they lost an
hour.

It was five o'clock and almost dark before they crossed the
steel bridge to Kempten. A cold rain was falling. The bus
stopped in front of the post office on the Adolf -Hitler Platz,
across from the railroad station. The soldiers picked out their
rifles and slung them across their backs before stepping down
to the curb. The driver checked each man off on her pad.

She looked up at Happy. "Corporal Steinberg, Schongau to
Kempten?"

"Yes, Fraulein Scharfiihrerin. 7 *

She checked him off and folded the list in her leather BeuteL
He was the last man off.

"Corporal, give me a hand with these last two mail sacks,
will you, since you aren't carrying a rifle?"

He shouldered the two together, following her into the Post-
amt. As he dumped them on the floor of the corridor, he saw
her hand the pad through a wicket to the civilian clerk in the
office, and saw the clerk look meaningly at the clock. It was
half -past now.

'Thanks/* the driver called back to Happy. "Leave them
there. Military transport is over at the station. Too late to get
today's stamp* here; they'll do it over there and put you on a
hospital train to Bregenz. Plenty of them these days."

He heard the wicket slam as he strode out the door of the
Postamt. It was lucky her pickup was civilian; that gave him a
little more time in case Herr Fidl changed his mind. Already
there were five who remembered Corporal Steinberg and
could identify him: the warden and the bus driver, the two
standing soldiers, and the engineer. And maybe the priest. As
soon as the door closed he ran across the square to the station,
pulling his Schiffchen over his eyes.

In one day he had traversed the base of his Z. There was not

* Tagesstempel, the checkoff marked on all travel papers each day.

much to report from this stretch: the PW cage, a few troop lo-
cations from the mail sacks, which he could not verify, and the
Russians at Kaufbeuren. But even negative information was
useful. It would be news that there was little troop movement
in the Allgau, and no bombing damage. That would come
when he headed north.

Kempten lies in a sort of weep hole for the Alps. To the
southwest they climb steeply to Lake Constance, where a tiny
bit of the Reich abuts Switzerland: Bregenz, where the big
hospital was, and Lindau, and Friedrichshafen. From Kemp-
ten the railroad winds up through the mountains to reach these
towns, but the main double track turns north toward the heart
of Germany, with a good highway parallel to the railroad. It
was up this highway, the bar of his Z, that Happy was to
search for his two divisions. It passes through Memmingen
and Ulm and Aalen. At Crailsheim it turns west, like the cap of
the Z, hits the Neckar at Heilbronn, and descends it until the
river flows into the Rhine at Mannheim.

Every Joe was briefed to break his trail, whether he believed
himself suspected or not; for the Gestapo struck without warn-
ing their victims. The station at Kempten was none too soon
for Happy, who on his first day had already been noticed. It
was not practical for the Team to make two Soldbiicher in
different names, for the forging of a Soldbuch is a long proc-
ess. So they would issue two sets of travel orders in the same
name, but for opposite destinations.

Herr Fidl and die bus driver would remember he was Cor-
poral Steinberg; they would also remember he was headed for
Bregenz. Rolled up in Happy's spare socks was the other
travel order, undated, because no one could foretell how long
the first leg of his Z would take, detaching him from Bregenz
on four days* convalescent leave, then to report to his new regi-
ment via Mannheim. With it was a false seal of the Bregenz
hospital and a revolving date stamp. The paper and the seal
were hot; he would have to use them soon or throw them

145

away. Kempten was certainly not too soon. He decided to get
out that night, so that when the hunt to the west began he
would already be headed north.

The transport office, or Frontleitstelle, was usually in the sta-
tion at important railroad towns. Happy pushed open the cur-
tained glass door to the ticket room. On the landing of the
double stairs a sergeant stood inside a circular desk, with a
sign over his head.

The sergeant was stamping the travel papers of a long line
of soldiers. Happy sauntered past and noticed through the
open wicket of the desk that he had a wooden leg.

"Forwarded, forwarded!" growled the sergeant. "That's what
I do all day long; just stamp 'weitergeleitet' on other men's pa-
pers. They go out of here convalescent and come back again
sick or wounded all over again. Why doesn't someone forward
me? I wish I could see a little more action myself instead of
forwarding others into it or out."

Self-consciously he flicked an imaginary speck from his row
of ribbons* He wore the bronze medal that meant twelve years*
service.

"You Twenty-fifth Infantry are going to Aalen tonight," he
called out through the loudspeaker. Happy heard the division
number, but did not turn his head. "The train will be along in
an hour. The 619th People's Regiment to Heilbronn. Same train
but stay aboard longer." He switched off the speaker. "Now
I'm not too old or too crippled to be in the Volkssturm myself
and carry a rifle with you. Forwarded, forwarded! Ach, mein
armer Kopf I" *

Happy pushed past, up the steps to the waiting room. Half
the ceiling bulbs were out, to save electricity, and the smoke
of many cigarettes made it still dimmer. A crowd of troops of
all arms milled through the cold high-vaulted room or clus-
tered around the tile stove against the far walL Strength
through Joy was selling a fragrant onion soup at the buffet

* Oh, my poor Lead!
146

As at Kaufbeuren, the Volksstunn, or People's Reserve, were
either too young or too old to serve in the regular Army. They
were the last line of defense. In theory they were not sent to
the front at all. They wore civilian clothes. Their only identi-
fication, to mark them as soldiers instead of snipers, was the
white brassard on the left sleeve. But the Team did not forget
that the year before the Wehrmacht had denied the same privi-
lege to the Fifis. At Combknchien, near Station D, where the
Fifis attacked a convoy, the SS had herded the whole village
into the church, set two HMGs at steady fire, and burned the
church down on top of the dead.

Happy strolled over to the crowd around the bulletin board.
There was an announcement issued that day and marked:
"Only for the service: not to fall into enemy hands.**

It warned all servicemen to watch for spies, and reported
that one had been seen near Schongau. A description would be
posted later. "The enemy is listening/* the bulletin ended
"Der Feind hort mit."

Happy wondered whether Fidl was laughing to himself way
back in his village, playing with 1-nrn like a cat with a tethered
mouse, knowing that since he had his name and destination in
his mind, he could pounce on him at will, anywhere in the
Reich, with the long arm of the Gestapo. Or whether the "other
watchers'* who had seen the A-26 had given the alarm, and
Fidl, who alone had seen him., was suppressing his name for
some reason he could not guess.

He went into the troop latrine. It was the kind they had in
Italy, with two corrugated gray islands for your feet in a sea of
porcelain. He locked the door, hanging his knapsack on the
hook. Unbuttoning his tunic, he drew from his wallet the first
trip ticket, from Munich to Bregenz. He had not needed to
show it, but it had served its purpose by being ready to be
shown. He chewed it to a ball, then spat it down between his
feet. From his knapsack he unrolled the alternate, shipping
him from Bregenz to the front He dated it with the revolving

147

date stamp: 17 Feb. 45, Documents had already forged the
staff surgeon's name, as supplied by the Tiger. He opened his
Soldbuch to page eight, where an airman's hospitalization is
recorded. Steadying the book against the panel of the door, he
entered with his own pen the code number seven which he
knew meant pneumonia, and dates for his entry and discharge:
S Feb. and 17 Feb. It was just what he had often done legally
for others. He attested them with the false bird of the hospital,
and forged another name the Tiger had given to Documents:
Assistant Sturgeon Moller. He had practiced the slanting letters
of that signature at G from the Tiger's model. Though it was
third-hand, it should fool the sergeant in the half-light, in case
he checked the order. His convalescent leave was already at-
tested on the travel order; since it ran less than five days, it
need not be entered in the Soldbuch. He poured the blood
from the sample tube into the drain, and crushed the wood
and metal cases on the corrugated island with his heel till they
bent small enough to pass the trap. Someone was knocking
impatiently at the door. He had to get rid of his fountain pen,
so that nobody could discover it had the same ink as on his
hospital entry. It might be too big for the drain, but he did not
know how to empty it, and dared not crush it on the island
for fear of leaving an inkstain, and he dared not flush more
than once. He took a chance at worst he could pretend to
have dropped it throwing it with the date stamp and seal
into the drain, and pulled the heavy chain. Luckily they all
passed the trap. He buttoned his tunic and opened the door
with an apology to the soldier waiting outside. He strolled
back into the waiting room. He had broken the trail

The crowd was thicker and noisier now, their hobnails
scraping over the tan tiles of the floor. All the benches were
filled with tired soldiers, their rifles stacked against the wooden
bench-ends. Many sat on the floor, leaning against the wall. He
found a corner where his medical brassard would be hidden
against the wall, for if Fidl should denounce him, that red
148

cross might blow his identity at once. Yet he dared not take it
off till he was out of sight. He would rest a minute so they
would not think he was hurrying. He sat down, his helmet and
canister clanking against the wall. His head fell down between
his shoulders and he was asleep.

When he awoke the waiting room was almost empty. A
hand was shaking his shoulder. His terror was like waking out
of a nightmare, but he was waking into one. It was the crip-
pled transport sergeant who shook him.

c *Where are you headed for, Junger**

Happy tried to conceal the armband without betraying him-
self. He pretended to be sleepier than he was so he should not
have to stand up and reveal it.

"On four days convalescent leave, Herr Feldwebel, then to
my regiment via Mannheim. The 136th Mountain.**

"Got your orders stamped for today?*

"JawohL*

Happy nodded and reached cumbrously for the Soldbuch
Inside his tunic.

That's all right, youngster.* The sergeant smiled. TDon't
bother getting them out I don't suppose you want to hurry too
fast. God knows when you could get a train to the north any-
way. The last one out of here has gone. I can get you put up
at the dub across the street if you want You look tired; I see
so many like you here, released from the hospital too soon.
That's why I let you sleep. But Yd change pkces with you just
the same. Zuriick zur Front!** he sighed. "Back to the front*

"No," said Happy, shaking himself, Tin not tired A little
weak after the pneumonia, that's alL My leave is so short that I
haven't time to get home to Magdeburg anyway, so I think
111 take it easy these four days. If there was an inn up the road,
it would be a relief from canteens and Aimy food. Do you
know a little inn somewhere, quiet, like peacetime? I don't
know this country."

He sighed. The sergeant sighed again too. "Well, I envy that

149

leave of yours. I don't blame you for wanting to spend it out
of sight. To think my job is shipping sick lads like you to the
front! Look, if you can pick up a ride outside or if you'll wait
a while 111 find one for you get off at the next town. That is
Dietmannsried, nine kilometers up. There is a nice Gasthaus
there, just beyond the town, and the innkeeper will put you
up if you give my name: Sergeant Hugel. Here, 111 give you a
note to him. He knows my writing/'

He scribbled on a scrap of paper. To Happy's relief, he did
not ask his name. But the brassard would show when he stood
up.

"I think 111 walk if it's only that far. They want me to get air
and exercise after being in the hospital." He stumbled to his
feet; useless to try hiding the brassard.

"Well" said Sergeant Hugel, "I see you're a medical man
yourself. If you think it won't do you any harm, go ahead. The
rain has stopped now. Good luck, and Heil Hitler!"

Happy pushed open the swinging door, trying not to drag
his feet The sergeant held it for him, switching out the lights
first, and followed him down the stairs to the square.

"We're getting a vestibule built so the Tommies can't see the
light when the door opens. This curtain on the glass isn't
enough. Take the road to the right. But when you're on leave,
remember, if you talk to civilians, the enemy is listening. Heil
and good night!"

He went back to lock up the station for the night.

After the plane and the bus, Happy was so tired he could
hardly walk, but somehow he managed to make the five miles
to Dietmannsried. He had no trouble finding the inn. The
moon had risen; it lighted the sign across the shuttered stucco
housefront; Zum Ochsen At the Sign of the Ox Emil Lie-
bert, Proprietor. Emil Liebert opened the door to his knock
after a long wait, in his nightcap with a candle in his hand.
Everyone went to bed early nowadays, since there was no light
150

to sit up by. He kept the candle back of the door and shut it
as soon as Happy had entered. He read the note from the ser-
geant. He beckoned Happy to the desk and made him sign
the register: Karl Steinberg, Corporal of the Luftwaffe. Happy
looked at the names above his own. Only two other guests had
signed that day: Gunther and Hubermann, secretary and con-
stable of the Criminal Police.

"It is good you brought the note from the sergeant," F.mfl
Uebert whispered, "otherwise I should not dare take you in
after the curfew, with gentlemen of the Kripo upstairs. Do not
let them see you- 3 *

"Could one ask for a little something to eat?* Happy asked.

"I have only bread and cheese. I suppose you have ration
stamps?"

Happy laid the brown stamps for fifty grains of cheese and
two hundred of bread on the counter. He unwrapped his re-
maining slices of sausage and made a sandwich with the crum-
bly black bread. The innkeeper reached below the counter
and brought up a bottle of schnapps and two glasses. One he
handed to Happy and the other he lifted to his own lips.

"An den Sieg!" he toasted mournfully. "Now hurry upstairs
before the Kripo hear you. Pay my wife in the morning.**

"To victoryP Happy repeated, wiping his lips on the back of
his hand.

The innkeeper took his candle from the counter and led
Trim up the stairs to a room at the back of the house* He shut
the bedroom door behind him.

"This way you won't hear the trucks that rattle along the
road all night,'* he said kindly, "and the bed is comfortable. The
cover is made from feathers of our own geese. What time will
you start off in the morning?"

"I have been sick for a while. Will you let me sleep till I
wake up?"

Unexpectedly the innkeeper patted Trim on the back. "That's

151

all right, flier. Come down whenever you feel like it. Perhaps
the police will be gone. My wife will give you coffee or what
passes for coffee today."

He kindled the candle beside the bed from his own.

'With the shortage of coal these days we do not use much
electricity. Schlafen Sie wohl."

"Sleep well," Happy repeated. He hung his damp overcoat
on the wooden pegs set in the wall. He lifted his shoulder belt
to hang beside the coat, with the helmet and gas mask con-
tainer still attached. He stripped down to his shirt and shorts.
His feet were so swollen that he could hardly pull his boots off.
Under the soft down pillow he slid his revolver in its holster,
but he kept his money belt around his waist. He looked be-
hind the bed, but there was no microphone. He sank into the
yielding feather bed and blew out the candle. In a moment
he was asleep, for the third time since he had come home.

152

Seven

When he awoke there was hardly more light in the room than
when he had gone to sleep, for Herr Liebert always closed the
shutters of the Ox on the chance of a terror-attack. He looked
at the radium dial of his watch. It was just eleven. He had
slept the clock around.

He threw open the shutters to the sunshine. Below him was
the Bavaria of picture postcards. Across the left horizon pa-
raded the blue spine of the Alps, smaller and paler than yester-
day morning. The houses of Dietmannsried huddled like sheep
in a storm who keep their tails to the cropland. In Bavarian
villages there are no power poles; the wires run from jack to
jack on the tile ridges. Frost glittered on the west flanks of the
beech trunks in the wood patch and weighted last season's oak
leaves, and there was snow in the hollows of the crop strips;
but a woman in a white kerchief and black skirt, with a tan
apron across her knees, profited by the winter warmth to har-
row her flax lane. The Iller gurgled northward, fencing the
barnyard of the Ox, and at the back door of the ell Herr Lie-
bert himself was jackknifing at the galvanized pump to siphon

158

liquid manure from the pit into the barrels of his spreader.
Under the pear tree below Happy's window a girl sat on a
stone benck She was knitting a pair of socks from a ball of
blue-gray Luftwaffe wool. Beside her leaned a long willow
switch to keep her geese from straying on the highway. Happy
threw on his shirt and leaned out of the casement with his el-
bows on the stone still.

"Are you making those for me, Fraulein?" he called down,
then ducked back into the room.

Over the edge of the sill he could see her look up at the
empty window in surprise. But she turned back to her knitting
without an answer, and her silence reminded him he should
not have called so loud, for lie had forgotten the Kripo. If they
were still in the inn they might have heard him; it would not
be wise to be noticed by the Kripo. Softly he closed the shut-
ters, leaving a crack open so he could see to dress. He washed
his face and hands in the big china basin of cold water on the
washstand, then set it on the floor and rinsed his feet in it
They were still swollen, but not as hot as last night He put on
a dean pair of socks from his knapsack. He tied his necktie in
front of the mirror; the necktie was part of dress uniform.
"Schlipssoldat" he grinned at the mirror meaning necktie-
soldier. Onfy the Luftwaffe and civilians in uniform wore ties.
He stroked his mustache. He rubbed his fingers over his chfn,
but it was not yet his day to shave. Over one arm he threw his
overcoat^ his knapsack, Trig camouflaged helmet, and "hfe Sam
Browne, and lifted the heavy black boots in the other hand,
with yesterday's socks inside them. He went downstairs in his
stocking feet

Frau Liebert was busy over the stove in the little enclosure
which doubled as kitchen and office, behind the zinc counter.
She looked friendly in a spare judicial way, with a topknot of
gray in the old-fashioned style on top of her sparse hair.

'Good morning. Heir Corporal," she called. **! hope you slept
wdL*
154

"Perfectly, Frau Hostess."

"Well, there can't be many airmen who sleep till eleven on a
beautiful day like this."

"Ah, this is the first day since I enlisted in the Luftwaffe that
I have not been wakened by someone else/*

She laughed. ^Vell then, I must get you a good big break-
fast."

"Bitte. Give me as much as you can, because I did not have
much supper last night I got in so late, and now it is past
breakfast time yet still too early for lunch, so make me enough
to count for all three meals. I have to travel a long way today.
Maybe 111 get nothing more until supper at some canteen,
wherever I happen to be. I know it won't be as good as yours."

She clucked with satisfaction like a hen, a strumming on the
roof of the mouth so expressive of sympathy, so unlike the
northern way of speech, that he wondered if it wasn't some
kind of dialect of the Allgau. He had heard it somewhere be-
fore. Then he remembered; Herr Fidl had clucked just that
way.

"Ill do my best," she called gaily. "But the shortages! You in
the service can't guess what they are nowadays. Go and listen
to the radio while I scrape up some breakfast. We haven't got
the paper yet today; the mail gets slower every week. Turn on
the Frankfurt station. They have good war news this time of
day. If any war news is good."

'Tes, Frau Hostess, but could I ask one thing? May I rinse
out thfg pair of socks which I tramped in so long yesterday?"

"Gewiss, gewiss!" she cried. "There's a pump just outside the
door with a basin which I cleaned out myself only a half -hour
ago. Run the water on them to rinse, and when they are really
dean I will call my daughter. She will darn any holes they may
have. If you are anything like my two boys, who are in the
Luftwaffe also, you can't wear socks a single day without get-
ting one hole at the big toe and another at the heeL"

She chuckled again. Happy padded out to rinse his socks in

155

the spurt of the pump. He left them to soak in the basin and
came back to the table pulled up in front of the tile stove. He
tuned in to Frankfurt-am-Main. It was the daily communiqu^
of the high command. The same story as yesterday: in the east
containment of advanced enemy spearheads, destruction of a
hundred Soviet tanks, successful shortening of a flank to pro-
tect Neumarkt. It never stated that Breslau, thirty kilometers
east of Neumarkt, had fallen; but any schoolboy who listened
would know it must have. In the west we have had to yield
Forbach temporarily, after an attack by overwhelming Ameri-
can forces which cost them heavy losses and the town wanton
destruction at their hands, but we have regrouped in a favor-
able position on higher ground beyond; new terror-attacks on
Munich and on Mannheim with the toll of forty-six American
planes; in England severe reprisals by V-2 bombs on the city
of London, which, it could now be confirmed, was three-quar-
ters destroyed.

"Forbach already!" the inner voice exclaimed. "Your friends
have started to strike us. And more bombs on Berlin, did you
hear?"

Happy switched it off. He could not listen to the Wehrmacht
news. Forbach was on the Siegfried Line.

"Is the news good today?" Frau Liebert called.

"It's not that, but I'm on leave. I have four days. I would
rather spend them without hearing about the war at all, good
or bad."

She sighed, and he knew she meant that she too did not want
to listen to the war.

She brought a tray over to the table: a big blue saucer of
preserved pears from the orchard behind the house, four slices
of bread that were no blacker than the ones he had buried,
with plenty of margarine and a whole dish of jam, a quarter of
Miinster cheese, a two-cup pot of coffee which smelled better
than he knew it could taste, even a glass of milk. One had not
156

seen milk in Germany for over a year. And under a china hen
two soft-boiled eggs.

"Marshal Goring could not ask for more." He laughed.

They smiled at each other a little guiltily, for the Marshal was
supreme commander of the Luftwaffe, and one should not joke
about his appetite.

"Well, don't tell anyone that I gave you the milk and eggs
and cheese, or theyll arrest me for hoarding, and I should be
besieged by others on leave like yourself. I should not dare if
the gentlemen of the Kripo were still our guests. Luckily they
left at dawn. I do it for you only because my two boys are in
the Luftwaffe too. Oh, your poor boots!" she cried, catching
sight of the ^wrinkled leather which Happy had set beside the
stove to dry out "I will have my daughter, Maria, patch the
socks, and look after the boots myself while you eat up your
good breakfast."

She ran to the back door to call Maria in from the garden.
He could hear her whispering advice at the threshold like a
stage prompter. Maria curtsied to him when she came into the
room. She held his socks, wrung dry, in one hand. He won-
dered whether Ami girls ever looked as pretty as this, with hair
so blond it was almost white, and eyes as blue as the bottom
of his saucer, and cheeks as pink as fruit blossoms before they
opened, with a dimple on the left side. She had no stockings
of her own, but she knitted them for others. She wore a home-
made dirndl and bodice of black linen, without ornament, and
her shoes were wood.

Out of her workbag she brought a darning egg. Without
speaking, she sat down across the table and began darning his
socks.

"It is just as I thought," her mother chuckled, "a hole at each
end of both."

Frau Liebert produced a tube of Lodix shoe polish from un-
der the counter. She joined them at the table, rubbing away

157

at his boots while he finished his luxurious breakfast. A white
cat purred in the window, between the pots of geraniums,
thumping her tail on the red tile.

After the war, Happy decided, when he had got his degree
from the university, if any university was left, he would like to
practice in a village like this, instead of in the city. He pictured
himself sitting in the Ox ? smoking and drinking Pilsner with
the village priest and the lawyer and Herr Liebert, while
Maria knitted beside the stove. In the country people were
simpler and kindlier than in Berlin, and a doctor need not be
a specialist.

"Now," Frau Liebert announced, "I am going to give you
something that I keep for my boys. Since you are in the Luft-
waffe too, you shall have a little of their foot powder. They
never have any when they come home though God knows it
is more than a month now since they have had the shortest
leave. I don't know why the Wehrmacht doesn't issue such
powder to everyone." She sprinkled the powder inside his soles,
from a blue can on the shelf behind the stove.

"Why don't you stay with us a day or two, if you have so
much leave? We could give you the best room, now that the
gentlemen of the police have left.'*

"All my thanks, but with only four days to get back to my
unit at "

He checked himself, for she was shaking her finger at him,
warning him not to tell her.

"Well, anyway, I can say it is across the Rhine. I don't dare
to risk getting back late, for the rules are stricter now than
early in the war. Not even we in the Luftwaffe can be sure of
getting a ride. If I find I have any time left over, I should
spend it at the other end, not here. I have been sick in the hos-
pital" Maria looked up from her darning "and they want
me to walk as far as I can without getting tired, to bring back
the muscles. I will just take it easy, spending the nights in the
shelters, wherever the curfew happens to catch me. They will
158

not be as comfortable as the feather bed at the Sign of the Ox.
But" he leaned forward impulsively "I promise to come on
my next leave and spend it all with you, if you still have the
room."

Maria looked up again. Frau Liebert shook her head. "Fliers
promise much, but that next leave never comes."

"Then after the war, when we all have leave. Perhaps it will
not be long now."

He spoke softly. The women looked up, frightened.

"God grant," murmured Maria.

"You won't have any trouble getting a ride on this road,"
Frau Liebert said briskly, as if she were shaking off the confes-
sion that the war might end soon (since one knew from the
radio it could end only one way ) . "It goes straight up through
Ulm, and then the trucks which are going to the Rhine turn to
the left on the Autobahn. Those are wonderful roads. They
are the best thing the Fiihrer has done for us. They say that
where the road passes over a valley He has even sometimes
built storerooms underneath for the farmers, to hold wheat
and potatoes and beets. Someday I hope to see an Autobahn,
but we have not been able to drive anywhere since the war
started and they took our car. But then, even if we had it, we
could not buy gasoline."

"Well, it can't be much fun to hike on an Autobahn," Happy
laughed, "even if it were not verboten. I'd rather take the long
way, by Aalen and Heilbronn, and down the Neckar. My fa-
ther hiked that road when he was a student in Heidelberg. He
says it is the most beautiful part of Germany."

"Our Gauleiter said in a speech that Germany is the only
country which is beautiful and modern at the same time. Eng-
land and France are beautiful, but they axe decayed. America
is modern but has no beauty. Russia is merely barbarous."

Maria glanced up at her mother. Happy felt she had heard
that sentiment many times before.

Frau Liebert sprang up. "But look, if you go by Heilbronn,

159

could you not stop to see my boys in the Ninth Flak? I know it
is at Crailsheim oh, I shouldn't have said that, should I?" She
clapped her hand over her mouth. "The enemy is listening. But
now that I have, could you not at least drop a note to them as
you go by? It is hardly out of your way to pass Crailsheim.
They are nice boys and you would like them: Hans and Wifli.
You could tell them you have seen Maria. They are a little
older than you, but you could talk about the Luftwaffe to-
gether. I write them, but only to a field post number, and I
never know whether the officers censor my letters or not. I do
not dare to write them direct from the post office here; I
should be denounced if anyone found out I knew they were at
Crailsheim, but I am sure you would not betray me. They are
good boys, but bad letter writers. Perhaps the letters we send
them never get through. Anyway, I'll write one now, and if
you have a chance, stop to see them, or put the envelope in
a mailbox somewhere. You can read it first, to make sure there
is nothing I should not say. It is always better to have news of
loved ones by the mouth than by the pen, if one cannot have
it by the eyes. Do you not think so?"

Happy felt a little sick. Third Flak Training, which his Sold-
buch said was his last unit, was a component of 9th Flak Divi-
sion, and he should have known the division headquarters was
at Crailsheim. He would certainly not stop to see her sons, and
knew it was verboten to put a town name on military maiL
Just as certainly, he would detour by Crailsheim to make sure
9th Flak was there. She took her steel pen and a bottle of nut-
gall ink from the drawer of the counter. She scratched a few
words on the back of a postcard of the barracks at Kempten.

'We have the 91st Training Battalion here, you know. These
barracks are so modern; I wish my boys could be here. Such
clean showerbaths, I hear. There I go again, with my mili-
tary secrets. I shall put the card in an envelope. The war will
never reach Kempten, though."

Before sealing up the card, she showed it to him. "My dear
160

sons, this will reach you by the hand of a friend, who will tell
how we miss you. We are all well, sad only that you do not
write. Hearty greetings from father, mother, and sister."

She stuck two purple six-pfenning stamps of Hitler's head
on the envelope and put it in the side pocket of his overcoat,
playfully patting down the flap to make sure it did not fall out.

"Now you must leave us your own field post number so that
Maria can send you a pair of socks. Would you not like to knit
socks for the corporal, Maria?"

Maria blushed and said solemnly, "It would be a great
honor/'

"Fraulein Maria knits beautifully. I wish I had socks like
hers."

"She will make some man a good wife one of these days."

Maria blushed again. She did not ask his size, but held his
socks, which she had rinsed, heel to toe with the other pair she
had knitted for Hans. She pursed her lips and nodded. Her
needle flew a little faster, but she did not look up.

Happy wrote his address on a slip of paper: San. Uffz. Karl
Steinberg, FPN 33148. Every Joe had to know the right FPN
of his pretended unit. That and his lodging for the night be-
fore were the first tests of the Gestapo, before the stripping to
look for strap welts. He handed the slip to Maria, who tucked
it in her bodice.

"Did you hear about my cousin?" Frau Liebert asked.

Happy shook his head. Maria sighed patiently. "How should
the corporal even know your cousins? Everyone in the Allgau
is a cousin."

"It is my mother's cousin, Leopold Fidl," and Happy almost
let out that they were friends, as you do to please strangers
whom you like. She did not give him time.

"It is he who found the spy," she went on without a pause.
"Did you not hear? An American plane dropped some danger-
ous saboteurs a little this side of the Ammersee. There are said
to be a dozen. My cousin Leopold is the air-raid warden. He

161

lives in a village called Bobing. Others saw it as well as he, not
only at Bobing but at St. Nikolaus. His wife did not see it,
which will make her angry at him. But it was he, my own.
mother's cousin, who walked all the way from Bobing to tell
the Kommandantur at Schongau, since they have no telephone
in his village. It is thought they may be a troop trying to kid-
nap the Fxihrer from Berchtesgaden, if that is where he is; not
that I know, of course. Poor Cousin Leopold, he is quite lame,
and it is a long walk down that steep mountainside. They al-
ways laughed at Leopold a little and thought he was a trifle"
she tapped her forehead "touched in the head.* In fact,**
she whispered heavily into Happy's ear, "we always used to
think he was not quite serious about the regime. This will clear
him of such slanders. Yet, instead of thanking him, there are
some now who blame him for not having caught the spies.
That is what his wife will say too. By flying in a parachute him-
self, I suppose! Oh, but it makes me shiver with horror to think
they are at large. They cannot escape, though. If they hide,
they cannot eat. When they come out of hiding they will be
caught, for anyone would recognize the speech of one who is
not true German. The Gestapo will throw a net around them?
Perhaps our guests of last night are hunting them even now.
They are close-mouthed, the police. That is one way of know-
ing they are of the police, for I believe they do not always wear
the badge. If they catch the spy, I should enjoy tearing him to
pieces with my own hands."

Happy stood up. 'Well, I must start now. Many thanks, Frau
and Fraulein Hostess, for the pleasure you have given, but
first let me pay my bill and give you my ration stamps. I shall
not have many left after such a feast/ 7

Frau Liebert had figured it out ahead. "It will be twelve
inarks fifty. And you'd better give me your ration stamps to
separate. There are so many different lands of Reisemarken,
I have never seen a soldier yet who could understand them. I

* Himverletzt
162,

shall not take stamps for the eggs and cheese and milk; they
are our secret" She winked, and again she resembled her
mother's cousin.

He handed her the wad of stamps from the flap of his Sold-
buch, and she took them to the counter to separate. Maria
rolled his socks in a ball. He pressed her hand as he took them,
and was sure that she pressed his.

"Will you really knit me a pair of my own?" he whispered.

"I promise. If you promise . . /*

"For my next leave," he swore, clutching both her hands in
his. There was just time to brush her lips before her mother
looked back. Maria turned her face, busying herself with his
boots. He saw a tear fall on the shiny black leather, and hoped
she would not wipe it off.

He would not let either of them help him with the boots.
They slid on easily, thanks to the powder and the warmth of
the stove. Herr Liebert came in from the garden to join the
farewell, taking off his own boots at the door.

"Auf Wiederseh'nl Auf Wiederseh'n!" they all murmured,
shaking hands.

"Yes, till my next leave. I have already promised Maria/*

They waved from the threshold as Happy started along the
highway to Ulm.

It was a beautiful morning for February, almost like spring.
A few more days of sun would open the chestnut buds. He
touched the lips that had touched Maria's and whistled as he
strode along the edge of the blacktop. Yesterday's danger was
as unreal as a nightmare, growing more remote with every
step. He had not done badly his first day, which was the most
dangerous of the five except maybe the last, his voice cor-
rected him. He was out of reach of Schongau, and had broken
his trail at Kempten. For some reason Herr Fidl had not de-
nounced him, and was not likely to give the Gestapo his name
after withholding it a whole day, that would put him in dan-
ger. Even if the Gestapo made him tell, the new Blacklist

163

would not be issued till Tuesday. That was what the Tiger
had told the class. In all his service, Happy had never seen a
copy. He wondered what color this week's would be. By Tues-
day he would be halfway to the Rhine, anyway. No, he
thought, he had not done badly. But it was lucky he had not
told Frau Liebert that he knew her mother's cousin, just the
same; and his uneasiness returned.

Medical Corps of the Flak was too rare a uniform not to be
noticed by everyone. As soon as he was out of sight he un-
pinned the glazed white medical brassard from his sleeve. He
folded it carefully and laid it with the two safety pins in one
of the leather cases on his belt. It was just inviting trouble to
show it, and there would be no suspicion to his taking it off.
If he ran into a spot-check, he would say he had taken it off to
keep it clean. Without it, he could pass as a combat soldier,
even without a rifle. He would not be incriminated by travel-
ing unarmed, because even the veterans were short of sidearms
now, to say nothing of rifles.

The traffic along the highway was thick for a part of the
country so far from the front. Every few minutes he was over-
taken by a truck or an armored car or a Volkswagen, which is
like the jeep but with the engine to the rear and the spare
mounted on the sloping hood. All were crowded, to save fuel,
but they always had room to offer "hfm a ride. He refused each
time, for he could not watch so closely from inside a car as
from the roadside, and he had plenty of time left before his
deadline. There were many soldiers on foot like himself. Com-
ing southward the traffic was mostly ambulances, the sides
screened by heavy field-gray canvas, and tall carts drawn by
oxen or horses. The soldiers headed north; the civilians and
fie wounded headed south. Yes, he repeated to himself, so far
he had done pretty well. He had thrown off the scent; he had
learned where his two divisions were, and now he was going
forward to confirm the locations for himself, at Aalen and
Crailsheim. He had found Maria, and as soon as the war ended
164

he would come back. Someday, when one could laugh about
the regime, he might tell her he was the spy Heir Fidl had al-
most caught and her mother would have liked to tear apart
uith her own hands.

"Yes," the gremlin reproached him, *T>ut her brothers are at
Crailsheim now. You are going to deliver them to the enemy.
When the American bomb has killed them, will you tell her
you planned the raid? You have a letter to them in your pocket
now/*

Cold as it was, Happy's hand sweated as it fingered the
paper.

"Won't one division be enough for the little captain?" the
voice wheedled. That is the way the Devil starts, by a compro-
mise. "Germany has not many to spare. Let's give him the
Twenty-fifth, and be quiet about Ninth Flak"

Happy shook his head to blank his mind about Crailsheim
and what he would do when he reached it and after he crossed
the Rhine. He trudged along, outwardly one of hundreds of
thousands of obscure German soldiers tramping the highways
of the Reich back to the defense of her borders. He shook his
head again to rid it of the thought of yesterday, when he had
been one of the enemy, and of four days hence, when he would
become one again, to rid it of the very existence of Maurer, as
Frau Liebert had shaken her head to rid it of the war. He must
become Steinberg. It is not easy to be two men at once.

Germany tilts like a plank from the Alps to the North Sea.
The rivers flow north, with the single exception of the Danube,
which stretches crosswise, flowing to the east, like a crack one-
third down the face of the plank. He had thirty kilometers to
Memmingen, and he was sure he could cover them before dark
without getting tired enough to ask for a ride. He had thirty
more to Ulm, and then he would have reached the Danube.

Thousands of troops like Steinberg were tilting down the
slope to the Danube, not only toward Ulm, but toward Donau-
worth and Ingolstadt and Passau, leaving Kesselring to hold

165

the passes of the Alps behind them against the American Fifth
Army. Kesselring was a marshal of the Luftwaffe, and its dar-
ling. Germany could count on him. Then the troops would fan
out from the Danube, east or west, to hold the bulwarks of the
Oder and the Rhine. The two-front war was draining Germany
of its blood, leeching out its middle-aged and its boys, down
to its sick and wounded. They ebbed away at a hundred
wounds around the whole periphery, coming back not at all
or coming back behind the closed tarpaulins of the wood-burn-
ing ambulances. The war drained off even the livestock; the
horses plodding up to haul the artillery because no gas was
left, and the cows, driven from the farms to feed the troops.

Halfway to Memmingen, at a point where the railroad hugs
the highway, he saw a signal train of four boxcars and a loco-
motive, with aerials strung across the roofs, and on top of the
embankment behind, the great bowl of a Wurzburg radar. It
had no anti-aircraft protection. The only crew seemed to be
women, in the same black uniforms that railroad workers wear
all over the Continent. Two of them squatted in the swivel
seats, earphones at their heads and the traverse wheels in their
hands. Another stood by with a telephone, and the fourth fin-
gered the dials of a field radio. Over those wires the announce-
ment of his pursuit might be broadcast from Schongau or
Kempten, unless the Americans knocked the train out first. It
was just like the Wurzburg at Cassino, as he had told the Ami
expert, but now the crew were women. He noted the location
carefully, so he could spot it for them on the map. He hurried
past, pacing the distance to the next kilometer-stone. He won-
dered if he had not already seen too much to remember. His
feet were getting sore again, in spite of Frau Liebert's powder.
But he did not accept the lifts he was offered so often, or even
fall in with any of the single soldiers trudging in the same direc-
tion. He could see more on foot and alone. It was six when he
got into Memmingen.

The soldiers* club was on the highway, across from the sta-
166

tion, with a big white SOLDATENHEIM sign across what had
once been the Hotel Weinsigel. He went through the door in
the pink stucco front The lounge, which must have been
the hotel dining room, was filled with troops sitting at round
tables. Two crystal chandeliers hung from the molded and
cupid-painted ceiling, with half the bulbs screwed out The
great round-topped windows were covered with blackout cur-
tains. Happy dropped into a chair at an empty table. He let
all his Klamotten slide to the floor beside him, his knapsack
and helmet and gas mask At a counter in the corner women
passed out food and beer under the eye of a fat SA trooper
who sat behind the cash register. Happy sat panting for sev-
eral minutes before he realized he was hungry as well as tired.
He still had two slices of cheese left, but he was going to keep
them till the Wehrmacht food gave out.

He went to the counter and paid two marks for a plate and
a glass of beer. He carried them to his table, ate and drank,
and went back for more, hoping the Helferin at the counter
would not notice he had been there already, A boy threaded
his way among the tables selling newspapers. For twenty pfen-
nigs Happy bought a copy of the Heideriheimer Zeitung, the
mouthpiece of the regime for the district He spread it out on
the table, eating his potato sandwich while he read the tiny
type under the faint light from the ceiling. In a box headed
T^ews from the AHgau* he saw what he had feared.

From Schongau it was reported that a farmer had found the
spy's empty parachute, with his helmet and coverall, hidden in
a woodpile on his field. He had notified the Kommandantur.
With the help of Air-Raid Warden Leopold Fidl of Bobing
they set a brace of dogs on the scent They tracked the spy
' along the country road through Bobing and down the Krum-
mengraben ravine, but lost the scent on the highway six kilo-
meters south of Schongau. Continuing into the town, they
picked it up again at the bridgehead square. It led them six
hundred yards westward toward Kaufbeuren. At the first kilo-

167

meter-stone the dogs pointed, pawed in the ground, and dug
up. four slices of gray bread. Five hundred yards to the west
the trail stopped dead again. It was suspected that the spy had
got a ride from here in an automobile or a cart, as well as
across the first stretch where the dogs had lost the scent.

To have been given a ride, he must have worn German uni-
form, and must have passed along the very path which Herr
Fidl himself had followed the day before, when he came down
to report the plane. In fact, two sets of footprints were found
along this path, one of which Herr Fidl admitted were his
own. The other bore the hobnail pattern of the Luftwaffe, steel
toes and many large nails on the sole, steel rims with four
small nails on the heel. Luftwaffe boots were different from
Army. The Kommandantur was making a careful check to de-
termine which pair of boots had passed over the path first
unless, which could not be believed by those who knew
Warden Fidl, they had passed over it together. Meanwhile,
any citizens or soldiers who might have been at the Schongau
bridge early on the morning of the seventeenth were asked to
notify the Kommandantur by collect telephone if they had
seen any suspicious characters. The driver of the bus from
Schongau to Kempten would check the names of passengers
on her pad as soon as she returned to Kempten, believing she
could identify by name the passenger whom she had picked up
at the point where the dogs had lost the trail. The Hitler Youth
were helping in the search, and Herr Fidl was being closely
questioned to refresh his memory. It was hoped that the name
and description of the spy could be broadcast to the police
and security troops of the whole Reich in Tuesday's issue of
the Blacklist

It would not do to stare so long at one corner of the page. He
turned it over. On the back of the single sheet he read this:

SUCH WOULD BE THE FATE OF THE GERMAN PEOPLE. MILLIONS
SHOT. OTHEBS DELIVERED TO SLOW BUT SURE STARVATION. PRISONERS
OF WAR ENSLAVED TO THE BOLSHEVIK HANGMEN. WOMEN AND GIRLS

168

DELIVERED TO THE ALLIED SOLDIERY, OF ALL COLORS AND RACES. LET
NO ONE BELIEVE THAT THE NORTH AMERICANS ARE BETTER THAN
THEIR BOLSHEVIK BROTHERS. ONE IS AS EVIL, AS THE OTHER, AND BE-
HIND BOTH STANDS THE JEW.

An infantry sergeant dropped into the other chair, unshaven
and as dirty as Happy himself. He propped his rifle against the
counter behind him and laid his knapsack and helmet on the
floor beside Happy's.

"You are reading about the spy/ 9 he observed. "I wouldn't
want to be in his shoes if they catch him, and they will catch
him all right/'

"Or in Leopold FidTs shoes." Happy forced himself to laugh.

"That Blacklist is thorough all right. I was in a spot-check
near the front once, when the police were looking for a man
whose name was on the list They held everyone up. It took
five minutes to check each Soldbuch,"

"Did they catch him?"

"Not there anyway. That's what I mean by their being thor-
ough, that they didn't catch him there. But I bet they caught
him somewhere. Tuesday is the big day for spot-checks. They
held our column up an hour at the barrier. Well, I'm going
to wolf a little supper. Want me to take your plate back for
more?"

Happy nodded. The sergeant went away, returned, and
munched his sandwiches in silence. When he finished he
looked at Happy.

"Back to the front?"

"Yes. Convalescent leave."

"A fine way this is to spend leave! I've been at a class in
Friedrichshafen myself for Panzerfaust training. That's the
weapon to stop tanks, surer than ditches or dragon's teeth or
roadblocks. Replacement companies are getting nine of them
from now on. The Yankees have one too, called the bazooka;
what a funny language! We had a captured one at the class.
But it's not as good as ours. Ours will go through three centi-

meters of steel at thirty yards, and the flame shoots back three.
I can see the farm boys gawping at it already. Only why didn't
ordnance invent it sooner? It's like the V-2, good stuff but a
little late. I finished the course yesterday. So now I'm going
back to HQ to pass it on to the recruits/*

"Where is that?" Happy asked. Queer how frightened he was
to ask the simple question.

The sergeant pointed to the patch stenciled on his knapsack,
a white shield with a flaming sword in red,

"Twenty-fifth Infantry Division, of course, at Aalen. Don't
you even know the patches? Oh, well, you're in the Air Force;
perhaps they don't know so much. Well, at least IVe got my
own Volkswagen to drive, so I don't have to walk. It's out-
side in the parking lot now, but I don't want to drive it in the
blackout. There's enough of that up forward. I think I'll spend
the night here; they must have bunks somewhere."

"Believe 111 do the same." Happy reflected. "I've been walk-
ing most of the day."

"You wait here, then. Ill go see if they have any bunks."

The sergeant walked up to the desk, leaving Happy to look
after the gear. When he came back he was carrying two mugs
of beer.

"The old Brownshirt says the dormitory here is full, but
there are places to sleep in a bunker. He seems proud that
Memmingen has a bunker, as if it was really in the war. He
told me there's going to be a movie here in ten minutes too.'*

"Let's wait and see it, what do you say? Ill pay for the next
beer."

"I'm broke myself, but if you pay for two more rounds I'll
give you a ride in my Volkswagen tomorrow. You must be
going at least as far as Ulm; it's the only way to the front from
here. I go on to Aalen. Come all the way if you want. Sup-
posed to be there tomorrow, but they didn't say what time.
Let's drink up and get the other beers before they turn the
170

lights out. I'd like to watch a while, then turn in. I need to get
some sleep/'

Happy said, TPrima," and went over to the counter for four
more beers.

Surprisingly enough, the movie was American, an old pic-
ture they must have saved from before the war, with Harold
Lloyd, and German subtitles. Happy did not let on that he
understood the English soundtrack. Sometimes it was hard
not to laugh between the subtitles, but the sergeant never
laughed at all. Halfway through he whispered, "I suppose Ger-
man pictures aren't good enough for the Brownshirt What do
you say we turn in?"

They stood up, and the other soldiers shouted at them to
keep their heads down. They crouched across the aisle to the
counter where the Brownshirt watched the movie, his mouth
agape.

*Tve got to get my papers stamped before I turn in," Happy
told the sergeant.

"So do I."

The Brownshirt seemed to be transport officer as well as
manager of the dub. "Why didn't you have me do this before,
while the lights were on?" he grumbled.

He turned his flashlight on the pair of travel orders and
muttered, "Soldbucher!" Happy fumbled long enough with
his pocket so that the sergeant had his book ready first. The
Brownshirt compared the books with their faces, and with
the trip tickets, and stamped "Forwarded" on the orders, with
the date. The boys threaded their way around to the back
of the hall, ducking to keep out of the beam.

They turned left around the streetcorner, as the Brownshirt
had directed the sergeant, and through a brick arch into the
court of the old city fortress. The bunker steps were marked
by a sign planted in the heap of sandbags, with a white arrow
and the letters LSR for Luftschutzraum. The shelter was under-

171

ground, in a kind of natural dungeon, shored up with balks
of timber. There must have been a hundred others there al-
ready, mostly the jittery civilians who sleep in bunkers before
there is any danger, with a few late soldiers like themselves.
A curtain separated the women from the men. Beyond the dim
light of a single bulb wedged in the rotten rock at the foot of
the steps, they heard the coughing and tossing on both sides
of the curtain. The floor was gravel. An old woman gave them
each a blanket and took ten pfennigs from them. The venti-
lation was bad, the air was rank with ammonia, and they
could hear the water trickling in the latrines.

"Small-town bunker after all, you see?" the sergeant said.
"Have you ever seen the ones in Berlin, with air conditioning
and tiled washrooms? Better than home, and built above
ground, four stories high and so thick you don't even feel the
blockbusters."

"I have civilian friends in Berlin," Happy said. "It does not
seem that any bunker could be safe in the heavy raids."

"Berlin? It's the safest city for civilians in the Reich, pro-
vided they take cover soon enough. By the way, I'm Heinrich
Scholz. Headquarters Company, Twenty-fifth Infantry."

He held out his hand. Happy mumbled "Steinberg" into a
cigarette, cupping his palms over the lighter to blur his name,
but not daring to give a false one in case the sergeant had seen
his papers, or might see them tomorrow. "Corporal, from
Field Post Number 33148." He smiled, straightening up to
shake hands.

"Pretty careful at the front, aren't you?" Scholz laughed.
"Well, you're right not to give away your outfit to strangers.
For all you know I might be that spy; or no, because his
footprints were Luftwaffe. But you might be."

He looked down at Happy's boots. They both laughed.

They took off their boots, standing them against the damp

wall. Happy placed his so the sergeant could not see the soles.

He spread out the blanket and took off his overcoat to put

172

over him. He used his knapsack for a pillow. Sergeant Scholz

lay down next to him.

"It was in Paris a year ago tonight." He sighed. "Chauffeur

for a colonel at the Hotel Continental Some difference! Never

mind, my wife and I will be going back there soon if you

fellows only shoot down enough Ami planes."
"Or you knock out enough Ami tanks."
They chuckled cozdly, and Scholz started to snore.

173

Eight

When they woke up it was only five, but already a few other
soldiers were lining up in front of the latrine, or washing their
faces under the pump reserved for them, with the hard sandy
soap the Wehrmacht issued. Nobody wasted any soap. Happy
and Scholz had breakfast back in the club. Afterward they
walked out to the guarded parking lot. They climbed into the
Volkswagen, dropping their gear in the back, where the ba-
zooka lay in its long oilskin case, Scholz filled his tank at the
Aral pump. He gave back his receipt to the guard and started
up road nineteen to Ulm. It was colder than yesterday, but
just as clear. The Volkswagen rolled gently downhill across
the rich Danube valley. The snow flurries of the hills were over.
There were no more poles at the roadside to mark the shoul-
ders in a blizzard, and Swabian pine and beech succeeded the
cathedral pink-pillared firs of the Allgau.

Memmingen's little airfield was on a plateau at the edge of

town. They saw three Heinkel 5s and a Dornier 17, old-type

planes which looked as if they had not flown for months.

There was no ground crew in sight. The tires were stripped

174

from the landing wheels. "Decoys for the Amis," Sergeant
Scholz explained. As they drew near the Danube, toward noon,
they began to pass more carts, drawn by horses or oxen or
even by a man and his wife, loaded with family possessions,
heading south. That was the only sign they were approaching
the action area. Sergeant Scholz looked at the refugees with
contempt

"There are cowards in every country, I guess, even in the
Reich. You know, I was over in the Westmark last month. We
were driven out of a little town one day by the Amis, but took
it back the next. You'd be surprised; in the few hours that we
were out the whole town had been filled with sheets and white
flags. The Halunken did not dare surrender the place while
we were there to watch, but the minute our backs were turned
they gave up. Our captain treated that town rough. He caught
one man on a roof, lifting the white flag, and he shot him from
the ground with his Luger. I can tell you those sheets snapped
in the windows after that. The swine P He spat toward one
cart as he passed it. "Our job is hard enough even if the civil-
ians appreciate what we're doing for them, but when you feel
they will sell out for their own safety you don't see why we
should risk our skins. That was the only bad taste I had in
Paris too. The Frenchmen never dared to make trouble, but
you could tell from just walking down the street that they
hated us. Even the whores, I am told by those who tried
them. Well, we had to give up Paris but it was fun while it
lasted. We weren't driven out of France, you understand, but
it is just part of the high command's policy to withdraw from
territory we don't intend to keep after the war is won. So we
shortened our lines pretty successfully and, believe me, we
caused the Amis a lot of damage in the process. I was in the
campaign way back when we took Paris, and I know what
that kind of easy advance really costs an army. The farther
the Yankees advance the more they pay. Well, now we have
a solid line on the Bhine, and I guess we have one in the east

175

too. The Russians have never been any good outside their
own country. So I imagine He is going to bleed them all to
death. The Americans will never get across the Rhine, you
mark my words. Do you believe in prophecy? Read this."

With his left hand he pulled a folded typewritten sheet from
his breast pocket. "Someone slipped it under my door at the
Continental last April, probably a pacifist."

It was headed "Aus dem Weltgeschehen" From World
History.

Napoleon born 20 April 1760

Hitler born 20 April 1889 129 years later

French Revolution 1789

German Revolution 1918 129 years later

Napoleon in power 1804

Hitler in power 1933 129 years later

Napoleon invades Russia 1812

Hitler invades Russia 1941 129 years later

Peace in Vienna 1815

Peace for Germany 1944 129 years later

For 1944: Stalin assassinated; armistice in Moscow; peace without
victory in the fall; Japan invades Australia; England and America
at war.

"Yes," said Happy, "but this is nineteen forty-five, not nine-
teen forty-four/'

The sergeant shrugged. "Maybe you're a pacifist too. Any-
way, it's only February, and what are a couple of months in
world history?"

*Tve never been in France myself," Happy said, "except

just with my old battalion last month into Alsace, before I

got pneumonia. Now when I get back across the Rhine I'm

not sure where I'll find the new one. I guess they'll tell me

176

when I get to the Mannheim bridge. That's what my orders
read, to cross by the Mannheim bridge."

"So you're headed back to the front! Don't worry, they'll see
you get there soon enough. And no true German says Alsace is
in France. That is just temporary. I can't take you any farther
than Aalen. That's thirty kilometers beyond Ulm. Between you
and me, our division is being re-formed up there out of what's
left of several others. We're taking a new number, the Twenty-
fifth, so as to make it sound as if we were adding troops instead
of losing them. I guess I shouldn't say that, should I? Where
are you from, anyway? 7 *

"Magdeburg," Happy told him. "I bet you're from Berlin.'*

The sergeant nodded. 'That's right Potsdam, anyway; right
outside, you know. Not so far from you, I used to be a gar-
dener in the Sans Souci palace, and look at me now."

He laughed harshly, as sergeants do when they indulge in
self-pity. "Well, anyway, take a look at my wife and kids."

He handed his Soldbuch to Happy, to look at the pictures
in the back flap. A plain girl, he thought, holding a tiny baby
in her arms. A two-year-old clung to her skirts.

"Isn't she sweet?"

"Prima! Some people have all the luck."

The sergeant smiled fatuously. "After the war we're going
to start a plant nursery. My wife will do the paper work. There
will be a good demand for stock, so much has been cut for
firewood or destroyed in the bombings."

He smiled to himself, but kept his eyes on the road to avoid
the foot traffic. Even sergeants liked to describe what they
would do after the war, when anyone would listen. He shook
his head and looked sharply at Happy. "How come you don't
pack a rifle? Is even the Luftwaffe short of weapons? Usually
they get the best of everything."

"No, it isn't that, but I'm in the Medical Corps and we
don't show any. Something in the Geneva Convention."

"Well, the Geneva Convention ought to let anyone shoot

177

the spies and terror-bombers at sight. When you get close to
the front they're going to wonder why you don't carry a gun,
might even pick you up at a spot-check for being without
one. I was going to say, I've brought this bazooka back from
school, so I'll sell you my rifle if you want it. I think I could
get away with the trade all right. It's a good 98k, with a sling,
and only weighs four kilos, the short model, you know; easy
to carry and in good shape."

Happy shook his head. "They'd say I stole it, since there
isn't any entry in my Soldbuch. If they meant me to have one,
they'd issue it."

"Listen, bub, no one gets in the Blacklist for having a gun,
not even a chaplain. Think it over for a hundred marks. You
won't get another chance close to the front. I haven't got any
more right to sell it than you have to buy it, but you know how
dizzy everything is these days. This new CP is the dizziest
yet. They can't crowd the whole division in the grounds, even
though it isn't up to strength. What matter so long as everyone
has a gun?*

He sighed. "I guess the Army is always the same. Here I
really know something about the Panzerfaust, enough to teach
recruits anyway, but after a couple of days I bet they'll ship
me out as a truckdriver, and it will be back to the front after
all for me too. I miss that school at Friedrichshafen already.
Right on the water. You look across the lake and there is
Switzerland with the lights blazing all night like before the
war. Someday I want to take my wife there to get a closer
look You married? No, you couldn't be. 7 *

"No, but I will be, right after the war. I met a girl
yesterday *

"Ach, mein armer Kopf; don't tell me about her."

They eased past a work camp "for the Eastern peoples,"

read the sign on the gate with wire and towers like the cage

at Aitrang, and rows of camouflaged shacks. Most of the slaves

had marched to work, but three, too weak to walk, gripped at

178

the wire with their claws, staring silent at the Volkswagen. The
gray tower of the minster rose ahead of them, across a glimpse
of the narrow green Danube winding between stone banks and
steep roofs.

They had come to the fringe of tibe war. Defense began at
the Danube, as if the high command knew all was lost once
the enemy crossed the river. They had come close already;
many houses at the bridge-ends were roofless and gutted.

"That's their phosphorus bomb/* Scholz told him. They
dropped them nine days before Christmas. Don't look so
funny; you'll see lots worse when you get forward.*

Under the direction of a fat Brownshirt with a rifle, a group
of prisoners from the camp sweated at building a roadblock
across the near side of the streetcar bridge. They dug the
foundation pits, harrowed the concrete in, lashed the log up-
rights with cable, and braced them with seven-inch steeL

'Won't do any good," Scholz decided. "One hit, and the
tanks will walk through. Even if we blow the bridge, the Amis
will build another. Now if they issued a few Panzerf aust . . ."

On the roof of the slaughterhouse, off to the right, Happy
saw a battery of Vierling, but these half-way defenses, he had
to agree, would be useless against the American armor.

The bridge itself was mined, but not guarded. When you
cross it you cross from Bavaria into Wiirttemberg. The planks
rattled under the Volkswagen, and Happy was one province
farther from Leopold Fidl. He had come two hundred kilo-
meters from the woodpile and had as many more to go, but
he was nearer safety with each kilometer-stone he passed. The
city was crowded with military traffic moving north. Hipo
cops, with the brassard on their jackets, stood at each corner,
draining the stream of wood-burning and horsedrawn vehi-
cles through the series of roadblocks. Scholz's Volkswagen was
one of the few that burned gas, ersatz gas from Leuna, which
didn't give much mileage or power, but still gas.

This is HQ for the 151st Field Artillery. For a while any-

179

way." He grinned. "That's their patch you see everywhere, the
red T on the white shield. I don't know what the T stands
for, but your spy might give something to know they're in
Ulm."

In contrast to the struggling and jostling of the troops, the
civilians seemed apathetic. They stared into shop windows
where there was nothing to buy, or loitered against the sand-
bags of the air-raid shelters, without looking up as the convoys
rumbled across the cobbles.

A Hipo pointed out the way to the canteen. The sergeant
looked at his watch when he had parked. It was eleven.

"Ever been in Ulm before?"

Happy shook his head.

*Tve got an idea. If this is going to be our last day before
we eat army rations again "

"Not my last day."

** well, mine then. Let's look around this town for a while
and eat late in some good restaurant Around two. It's about
seventy kilometers to Division. We can make it easy in an hour
and a half, then you can eat and bunk with us and take a look
at that rifle. IVe got some extra Reisemarken, even if I have
no cash."

"IVe got both"

"God knows what we will find, but it couldn't be worse than
my division mess at Aalen. When I get there 111 say had a
breakdown. They don't check up the way they used to; that's
how I can sell you my rifle. Even the Gestapo is bogging down.
Notice our papers weren't checked at the bridge? TheyTl never
catch the spy that way. Red tape is all right while it works, but
once it tangles, better to have none. The good old German
thoroughness is kaput The adjutant at Aalen doesn't even
know I have a car; for all he knows, I may be hitchhiking like
you. Let's stay. And thou mayst call me Hetnrich."

Happy reflected. He felt safer now that he was over the
Danube, and the new Blacklist was still two days off. Even if
180

it was only to sell him the rifle, the sergeant was calling him
"du," like the Joes at the Golden Well. Some of them must be
sergeants too. Besides, he couldn't think of any good reason
why a soldier on leave should refuse the chance.

"Okay. I have three more days" leave, and I'd like to see the
place. But let's not get our papers stamped till we start; other-
wise they may forward us now."

"Thou art not so dumb as I thought.'*

He tucked the receipt for car and weapons in his Soldbuch,
and they left their knapsacks at the checkroom in the canteen.

"They've hardly tasted the war here yet," Heinrich said,
frowning professionally, "but they're getting ready for it**

"Well, I hope they don't taste any more than they have. They
can count on the Luftwaffe anyway. This place is like a history
book. It's like Italy. Let's get a map so as to see all the sights
without repeating."

They loafed along the river till they came to a stationery
store facing the quay. Heinrich bought some lemon candy and
a plastic jar of Blendax toothpaste. Happy bought a city map
and a pencil. As they wandered through the streets, he marked
their route with his pencil, frowning as he checked the street
names from the lampposts. But wherever he saw a roadblock
or one of the mobile steel pillboxes he put a little dot in the
course, which nobody but himself would notice.

(This was only to protect the Americans when they came,
he told himself, before the gremlin had a chance to whisper.
It was not to betray the city. Steinberg could watch and listen
in all innocence; but it would be only Maurer who could be-
tray it, and he was not yet Maurer again.)

They spent two hours like tourists, lounging through the old
cathedral and staring aimlessly at the traffic over the bridge.

"The beautiful blue Danube!" Heinridi sneered. "It looks
to me like the liquid manure they pump on the fields." He
hummed the waltz and spat into the swift green current.

Then they drank beer on the terrace of an almost empty

181

hotel, where they could look up at the lacy gray tower, the
tallest church spire in the world. When they grew hungry
they found a cellar cafe" near the cathedral, on Adolf -Hitler-
strasse. For lunch they had rabbit goulash which wasn't too
bad, and some Neckar wine, and a custard pie made of corn-
starch. An old phonograph with a morning-glory horn played
tangos and the inevitable "Lili Marlene," about three to one.
There were three bedraggled girls at a single table who danced
with any soldiers who asked them.

*Tfhey're on the Wehrmacht payroll just like us/' Heinrich
whispered with a wink. 'They need a boost in their make-up
ration. But it would take more than paint and stockings to
hook me. No, Junge, Paris spoiled me. Besides, I'm married. Go
ahead if you wish, but Td rather watch the movie."

"Me too.** He was thinking of Maria, who was going to knit
him a pair of socks. You couldn't think that the Wehrmacht
prostitutes were the same species as a girl like Maria, or even
the same sex. They did not even disgust him, for he had
served time in the pro station the Sanierstube next door to
the Air Force brothel in Berlin, collecting the dogtags from
the cadets before they went upstairs, and injecting perman-
ganate (because there was no penicillin), and signing their
little white certificates after they came down.

The girls slipped out a back door with three privates of the
151st, but were back at their table in twenty minutes. That
was just another function of the body.

The lights dimmed for the matinee, and it was better than
the night before insofar as Cristina Soderbaum is better to
look at than Harold Lloyd, and German dialogue better to
hear than English. It ended at four. Heinrich and Happy
hurried back to the dub to have their papers stamped for the
day, and climbed into the car again. Happy was glad he had
stayed over. There was a land of security to traveling with an
old campaigner like Heinrich, instead of alone, like a spy.

North of the Danube Germany rises again, rolling up to the
182

plateau of the Black Forest before tilting downward to the
North Sea. Heinrich turned up the cobbled hilL Six kilo-
meters out of Ulm this old road crossed the new Autobahn,
part of the great double-lane network which the Labor Serv-
ice had built and the regime paid for in the war budget.
Mostly there is a grass lane between the strips of roadway
on the Autobahn, but sometimes the lane is concrete long
enough for a plane take-off, and parking space is hacked out
of the woods on each side. The Autobahn bypasses all the
cities, but there are exits to each over a cloverleaf which leads
the traffic out, so there are no grade crossings. At the Ulm
junction the old road climbs over the new on a concrete bridge
with iron rails, resting on a pylon in the lane. Eastbound
traffic to Augsburg turns onto the Autobahn short of the bridge;
north- and westbound pass over, the north to go straight and
the west to take the cloverleaf. As they approached the Auto-
bahn the traffic grew thicker. Happy put his head out through
the side curtain.

TTou needn't look," Heinrich groaned. "I know what it is.
First spot-check of the war zone. They don't have them in
the rear; they don't have them at the front. Just in between."

He had to slow the car down to a crawl behind a horse-
drawn 7,5 light infantry howitzer; its stubby muzzle faced
them from the rectangular barrel. In the triangle at the foot of
the bridge a lieutenant sat at a big table off to the side of the
pavement with a shelter-half stretched on poles over his head
to keep off the weather. The span of the overpass rose ahead
of them. There was a big white Gasthaus on the far side.

"Wish we could stop for a glass of dark." Heinrich laughed.

A far-spaced column of camouflaged tanks was clanking
westward on the Autobahn, the crosses on their sides scarred
by shell splinters, their crews, standing in the open cupolas,
grim-faced under their netted steel helmets, their black tunics
open at the neck because of the heat inside. Tigers, Panthers,
even one lumbering Ferdinand, heading from some last ord-

183

nance reserve to defend the Rhine. Happy could spot the
model by counting the bogies, as Heinrich waited his turn in
the check. The last tank in the convoy, way off to their right,
was towed by oxen, for even the Panzer Corps ran short of
Diesel. Between one tank and the next, boys of the Labor
Corps shoveled gravel into the potholes cut by enemy strafing.
"I bet you," Heinrich said, "that they're staging this check so
nothing can get on the Autobahn to slow up the tanks. I hope
that's all, anyway. Now I wish I hadn't cheated the half -day in

The 7.5 turned up the bridge and swung down the clover-
leaf to join the column of tanks. Heinrich inched his car for-
ward to the sentry, who put his head in the window and said,
"Soldbiicher."

The two boys handed him their books. The sentry looked at
Heinrich's first, since he was a sergeant, compared his face with
the picture in the front cover, and returned it. He did the same
with Happy's and said harshly, "If you are Medical Corps, why
don't you wear your brassard?"

"I took it off to keep it clean,'* Happy said humbly.

He fished it out of his belt, where it had lain two days, and
fastened it around his arm with the safety pins. Heinrich had
to snap the pins shut for him.

"Marschbefehler

They handed him their trip tickets, both of them stamped
for each day since their separate trips began.

"On leave/ 7 mocked the sentry. "I wish they would give us
leave sometime. Well, enjoy it while you can; you haven't got
long. See that you report on time, and from here out all troops
wear helmets.'*

He carried the two orders over to the lieutenant, while the
boys sheepishly fitted their steel helmets on and tucked the
caps in their knapsacks. The lieutenant, like the sentries, wore
blue facings and GFP in white on his shoulder straps. The let-
ters stand for Secret Field Police they are the field branch of
184

the Gestapo. But the word "geheim" on documents does not
quite mean "secret" as the dictionary says; it is more like ^con-
fidential." As long as he wore the letters, the lieutenant was just
on routine duty. After glancing at the two travel orders he
thumbed through an oblong green-bound paper book Happy
saw that he ran his finger down only a single page; that must
be because Steinberg and Scholz both began with S.

^That's the Blacklist/* Heinrich whispered. "I see it's green
this week Last week it was purple. By the time they issue the
new one tomorrow the spy may be out of the country.'*

But the lieutenant did not find either name. He stamped the
orders with the inevitable "Forwarded/* and the sentry handed
them back He gave them the German greeting, the Hitler
straightarm, and they returned a head-salute.

On the incoming side of the road, to the left, the other sentry
stood guard over two civilians handcuffed beside a horsedrawn
cart. It was piled with furniture. Their horse sniffed at the
withered grass along the cobbles. Perhaps they had been
caught smuggling contraband. They seemed to await the lieu-
tenant's leisure to be punished. But military traffic had priority
over black marketeers. Heinrich did not wait to see; he drove
straight through above the Autobahn as soon as the sentry re-
turned their papers.

This Autobahn would pass Stuttgart. It would veer to the
north again at Karlsruhe and cross Happy*s own route on the
plain just short of Mannheim, and then disappear somewhere
down the Rhine. What civilian traffic there was the sentries
would shunt straight through the overpass after them; nothing
but an old man driving a cow, a girl with a flock of geese, one
or two farmers with heavy sacks on their shoulders. The line
was still waiting to be checked when the sentry waved the
Volkswagen forward. But even civilians had to show the Kenn-
karte, the little gray identity card with picture and fingerprints
which everyone in Germany had to carry, down to those four-
teen years old.

185

Heinrich wiped his forehead, tilting the helmet hack. *1 don't
know why those checks scare me so. I must have been through
a hundred, and there is never anything wrong with my papers;
but they certainly put the fear of God into me. You never
know how much they know about you. Well, I suppose only
the guilty can complain, and 111 be at Division before long,
where at least they forgive a man's sins, or anyway don't sus-
pect them."

Having passed the crest of the Danube Valley, the road
sauntered gently downward through woods and farmland.

Ts funny how little traffic there is,* said Happy, "compared
with the Autobahn."

The Army uses the Autobahn as far up as it can, but near
the front the Yankees have knocked it out We're not that far
forward yet. Then the tanks have to pull in to side roads like
tibis. You will see them again after Heilbronn. But there's
plenty of armor in these Mia that we can't see and the Amis
can't see either. Take these men on foot were passing. They
may look pretty old to you, and some just like kids, but they're
all going up to join the Twenty-fifth. If we have uniforms for
them, they'll be wearing shoulder straps like mine within a
week. When we get closer you'll see there are barracks along
the road too, because we can't get the whole strength of the
division into a single camp. Good idea to disperse anyhow, in
case of air raids. Well, Junge, we had a good time loafing, but
when you come down to it there's nothing like getting back
into the Army groove."

Happy chuckled. He was beginning to feel that way himself.
"That's right After a few months it's home, even if you switch
to a new outfit like me. I'm getting homesick for it myself. Still
and all, I haven't even written a postcard to my family in
Berlin Magdeburg, I mean since I had this leave. lH have
to do that tonight"

He caught his breath at the slip and wondered whether to
explain it But Heinrich had not noticed.
186

Happy thought back to his own groove: how Fritz Gmber
and he had made plans for after the war, under the vaulted
ceiling of the dormitory at Cassino, till the bugle rang the raid
alarm and everyone ran out to action stations. He \vas going
to finish medical school, but Fritz was getting married and
hoped for leave even before the victory. How they had made
up the longest German words they could put together, when
neither the present nor the future could be talked about.

Happy had given

HOTTENTOTTENFOTENTATENTANTENTINTENATTENTATER

which means "one that libels the aunt of a Hottentot poten-
tate."

On the blackboard Fritz had changed TINTEN, which means
ink, to TTTTEN, which means in German what it sounds like in
English- He had clasped two helmets to his chest and saucered
out his Up like a Ubangi and pranced around the stove in his
shorts, while the rest of the dormitory rocked with laughter on
their cots. Heinrich was right; you got homesick for the Wehr-
macht.

Twenty kilometers out of Ulm they began to pass the scat-
tered barracks of the new division, a few temporary huts off
the side of the road, camouflaged brown and green like the
gun at the Golden Well; sometimes a farmhouse requisitioned
for a troop billet; and always in the yard a drill going on, dose
order drill for the infantry, or a noncom showing recruits how
to use the rifle or bipod machine gun, Happy noticed that the
recruits themselves had no weapons. In the drill they were
using brooms or sticks cut from the boughs of the ash trees. In
the classes there was only one rifle to a squad. Heinrich twice
showed him a big 8.8 camouflaged in its round emplacement
and so located that it controlled the slopes below and on each
side, and even when he pointed Happy had to look hard to
make out the guns among the netting and branches. These
guns were used for anti-tank or anti-aircraft, depending on the

187

ammo and the elevation. They were the deadliest guns in the
German Army, And once he saw the five snouts of a Nebel-
werfer poking above a hedge of artificial bushes. This was
Katyusha, the smoke and rocket thrower which the Germans
had copied from the Russians after they had seen her at the
siege of Stalingrad. The dogfaces called her "Screaming Mee-
mie/*

The roadcheck had held them up so long that it was half-
past six when they got to Aalen, but Heinrich never stopped
talking all the way.

"Now, Junge, you'd better come in with me, because it's so
late. IVe given you as long a ride as you are likely to get be-
tween now and the Rhine. You won't find another tonight.
Maybe tomorrow morning someone will be going your way
from our HQ."

He chuckled. "I hope to get a promotion out of that course. I
passed tops in it. They ought to embroider my Litzenspiegel."
He fingered the double bar which every soldier wore on his
collar. "If those Halunken we saw by the road can instruct drill
and machine gun., I ought to stand pretty high, because I can
instruct the bazooka. Something tells me we're going to need
them to knock out a few Ami tanks before many weeks are
over. The idea of our division being on top of the hill here
is that we can cover the whole stretch from the Neckar to the
Danube. We can turn up this highway we're on now it's a
good road, though it gets pretty winding along the Neckar
or we can send out detachments back to the Autobahn and
spearhead them straight to the Rhine. That's the road the
Yankees will try to take if they should get across, because it's
so fast Unless they knock it out completely first so they can't
use it themselves. Remember, when we go down to meet them,
whichever road they take, they will be fighting uphill and we
will be fighting downhill, and we know the terrain and they
don't, unless the spy betrays us."

"You haven't much confidence in us over the Rhine." Happy
188

laughed. "I admit our Vierling won't do much against tanks,
but the enemy can't get them across without his planes, and
our job is to drop those planes."

"No, I don't have much confidence, 111 be honest with you,
because JVe seen myself how the Amis forced us back just a
little to the north of Mannheim. We withdrew over the bridge
at Mainz and, believe me, we got across just in time. We had a
raid there. It was only on the third of this month, just before
I went to the bazooka class. I had to hand it to the gangsters,
they laid the city flat in half an hour. But they didn't harm tke
cathedral, just blew the windows out. I don't know how they
could miss it and still kill eight thousand civilians. Your Luft-
waffe didn't do so well against them up there. But here we are
in a better position. Just wait and see, they can't do anything
with their planes because we are too widely dispersed on the
hills. We knock out their tanks with our Panzerfaust, and when
everything is ripe our infantry moves in, Man for man, the
German infantry is better than theirs."

"Have it your own way," Happy said. "I don't think youll
even be here. I think they'll have you in that Blacklist for hav-
ing stayed half a day longer on the way than you should.**

The sergeant chuckled again. "What a joker! Listen, you
have three more days' leave. Come on in and look my place
over. Ill show you my rifle at work on the range. You might as
well spend the night; I can get permission for you. Otherwise
you must start walking as soon as you leave me, and you might
not be able to find a Gasthaus before the curfew. They're strict
about curfew around here, account of the raids.**

"Okay. Your general can only kick me out."

"The general isn't there; he's away at some strategy Klatsch
with the Gauleiter. It's only Colonel Forster now. What does
that mean, "okay'? I heard you say it once before. 5 *

"Oh, that's Yankee slang. I learned it from the Ami prisoners
we took."

"Can you speak American?"

189

"A little bit I had it in school at Magdeburg."

They reached the headquarters of the 25th Infantry Divi-
sion, in a big park enclosed by a low stone wall. There was a
sign at the gate with the striped triangle which meant division,
and an Arabic 25 below it. A sentry stood at the gate; the
same sword-flame patch as on Heimich's knapsack was sten-
ciled on the gable of his box. Back of him, inside the wall, was
a sort of gatehouse converted into the orderly room, with
DiENSTsnELUE 25 INF. Div. on a banner over the arched stone
doorway. Through the trees Happy saw a three-story stone
institution, with tents and wood barracks spaced around it in
the park.

"It used to be a forestry school,'* Heinrich explained.

The hooked-cross battle flag, with the stripes both ways on
the red field, floated in the late afternoon sun from a pole inside
the gate. It was still light, for the Reich was on daylight saving
all the year round. Heinrich drew up his Volkswagen at the
edge of the paving outside, leaving room for other cars to
dear.

*Tfour pass,** the sentry demanded woodenly. Then, recog-
nizing Heinrich, "Oh, It's only thou. Scholz, who knows all and
steals all. I see thou hast gekriegt a car, even. It's about time
thou came back."

"Listen. It is not for the watchdog to bark at his master, nor
for a sentry to question one who instructs in the Panzerf aust.
I have a comrade with me, a corporal of the 'Luftwaffe, who
will eat with me and sleep here. He is on leave. Wilt thou
pass him in?"

The sentry might joke on duty, but he did not unbend. He
did not even raise the brim of his helmet to look at Happy,
who still sat in the jeep. "Wie heisst er?"

"What did he say his name was? Come out, der Karl!"

Happy jumped out of the car. "Corporal Steinberg, to 136th
Mountain."

"Well," said the sentry, "I can't let him in without permission
190

from the duty officer. You stay here, Corporal, while Sergeant
Scholz takes your papers in for permission,"

Happy handed the false papers to Heinrich, who carried
them inside. While he waited, a dozen other men and boys
straggled up from both directions. They handed their pink in-
duction slips to the sentry, who nodded them in after Hein-
rich. A charcoal-burning bus loaded with recruits came in from
the north. None of these men, except the bus driver, wore uni-
form; but among the trees inside the park Happy could see
figures in Feldgrau moving in squad, and hear Army boots on
the gravel paths.

As the sun set a bugle rang out from the base of the flagpole.
The tramping ceased, even the clacking of typewriters from
inside the orderly room paused. The battle flag was lowered
from its mast. The sentry presented arms. Someone inside the
park started to sing "Deutschland iiber Afles," and one by
one the whole crowd joined in, even the recruits at the gate,
and Happy with them. Beside the Volkswagen he stood at at-
tention till the last words of the old national anthem died
away: 'Tiber Alles in der Welt 3 * He turned his back on the
sentry to wipe his eyes.

Heinrich came back, striding importantly, sergeanthlce,
among the recruits*

'The lieutenant says maybe it's okay," he told the sentry.
*Thafs some American I learned from the corporal. You talk
to the lieutenant," he said, beckoning to Happy, "while I run
the car over to the parking lot. It wiH be safe to leave our stuff
in it till after supper."

Inside the orderly room two girl clerks typed entries on the
long muster roll, while the recruits stammered answers to their
questions. There was a stack of short wooden signs leaning
against one wall of the room, each with an arrow and the sym-
bol of a division unit: line-and-dots for the machine-gun com-
panies, a rhomboid for the tank park, a horseshoe for the
corral, a horn for the post office, and a circle for the switch-

191

board. Happy could not see them all There were twenty or
more, freshly painted, ready for setting out as the division or-
ganized. A lieutenant sat working at a desk covered with pa-
pers. Happy's Soldbuch lay open before him. Happy stood at
attention until the lieutenant looked up.

"At ease," the lieutenant ordered. "This request to have you
as our guest is most irregular, to introduce into our midst a
man from another unit, and even from another arm of the
Wehrmacht. However, Sergeant Scholz is a reliable soldier,
and if he vouches for you I am willing to make an exception.
I do it, however/* he went on in a monotone, implying vast
duties ahead and vast experience behind, as if he could not
waste any emphasis on such a routine problem, "for a consid-
eration. In return for our hospitality** there seemed to be a
sneer in the word "I request that you exercise for a 'day or
two some of the skill in your branch of the service" there was
surely a sneer in that phrase "on one of our officers. Our sec-
ond in command, to be exact. He has greatly hampered the
formation of our division by falling ill He has certain idiosyn-
crasies about his own care which normally could not be re-
spected in spite of his exalted rank. But in this case we have
not yet been assigned a surgeon for the division, and our only
medical personnel is a corporal like yourself, whom the colo-
nel executive has seen fit to send to Augsburg for medicine
which he insists he needs immediately. If you would be kind
enough to attend to Colonel Forster*s wants until this corporal
returns, we shall be grateful I shall be glad to see that in case
you overstay your leave on this duty a notice to the effect will
be sent to your commander from this staff.'*

"At your command, Herr Leutnant/* Happy bowed. He
could not have refused this "request," even if he had wanted
to. The lieutenant snapped the Soldbuch shut and indicated
that Happy could pick it off the desk.

"Sergeant Scholz will take you to his own mess, and after
that show you to the colonel's quarters/*
192

Happy saluted and turned outside the door, where Heinrich
was already waiting. The clerks looked up at "Mm, but did not
stop pounding their typewriters. They knew, if the recruits
did not, how conspicuous an Air Force medical uniform was in
an infantry division headquarters. The lieutenant went back to
the papers on his desk

Heinrich led Happy toward a portable camouflaged bar-
racks where a line stood with rness kits in their hands, waiting
for supper. They unclipped their own as they walked along
the path.

"See how many different trees there are." Heinrich waved*
They must have been planted by the forestry school. I expect
well have to cut most of them down for firewood."

All the trees had labels with Latin names on them.

"The big stone building is the divisional office. The brass*
sleep upstairs. It used to be the administration office for the
woodchoppers. You should see the officers* lounge. It's all pan-
eled with wood from the Black Forest and the Odenwald, oak
and beech and all that; and there are so many stuffed heads
on the wall it looks like a real zoo."

Happy could have seen the division was just being organ-
ized even if he had not been told. There seemed to be no sys-
tem to it. A line of EPs brought wood into the cookshed from
outside; apparently they just hunted for it on the ground in
the fading light. There had been no mess call. The men
seemed to straggle in whenever they were hungry or had free
time. Supper was potato stew with floating bits of ham,
chopped cabbage, black bread, and ersatz coffee. There was
no soap in the caldron of water where the mess kits were
washed, and the fire underneath it had gone out. They ate in
silence, at a long table only half-filled by troops.

"You needn't tell me this isn't like tibe old Army," Heinrich
said irritably. "I know what you're thinking. We've got to tele-
scope a training division into a combat division. It doesn't help

* **Bonzen" was Heimich's slang.

193

any that the executive got sick while I was away. Watch out
for him; he's a man-eater."

When they went out there was still a little light. Recruits
with barracks bags or potato sacks wandered about asking the
way to their barracks from others who themselves did not
know. At least Heinrich knew his own. It was almost empty,
a long shed with a stove in the middle and folding army cots
drawn up against each wall. They dropped their gear before
the first two bunks and went out again to look for Colonel
Forster's quarters.

Try thirty-eight on the top floor/' suggested a captain who
was hurrying down the steps of the big stone building. There
was not even a guard at the entrance. The corridors were dimly
lighted by open bulbs. When they found the right number on
a door, Heinrich knocked.

"Come in/* a voice called instantly.

TT1 see you at the barracks when you're through/' Hein-
rich whispered. He tiptoed down the corridor, leaving Happy
alone.

Happy pushed the door open. The room was almost dark.
The blackout curtain was not drawn. He made out the figure
of a man sitting upright in the iron bed.

TPuIl the curtains, please, and then turn on the light," or-
dered the harsh voice.

When Happy switched on the ceiling bulb he saw that the
patient was a man of about fifty, about his father's age, with
jet-black hair and a square unshaven face. A monocle was
screwed in his right eye. His cheek was crossed with dueling
scars. He sat in his undershirt, with pillows behind Mm and a
blanket over his legs. On his knees he held a plywood tray
covered with papers. His uniform hung neatly on a hanger
from a nail driven in the plaster wall. The gold pips and silver
cording of his shoulder straps were burnished, and the white
infantry surround was immaculate.
194

are you?" asked the colonel. "Is there an air raid? I
didn't hear the bugle."

Without giving Happy time to answer he muttered to him-
self, "The Luftwaffe is the only uniform we haven't collected
in this division yet Good idea! I must request a couple of bat-
teries from Ninth Flak at Crailsheim. Imagine trying to form a
division without air cover!"

He made a note on the pad in front of him. Then he raised
his voice, 'Well, answer me, please. Who are you?"

Happy stood at attention. *1 am not in the division at all,
Herr Oberst I was traveling on the highway with one of your
sergeants. The lieutenant at the gate told us you were ill and
directed me to take over the place of your orderly until he
returns, to make you comfortable through the night I am on
convalescent leave, reporting from the Luftwaffe to my new
unit, which is the 136th Mountain Regiment My name is
Steinberg."

"You may relax. Corporal This is indeed fortunate for me. It
is not often that things happen so well nowadays. I have a
recurrence of heart congestion. There is no need, however, to
call a surgeon from elsewhere. It is only a question of the drug.
I have kept the prescription in my Soldbuch for three years.
I require nothing but an injection of digif olin, one cubic centi-
meter, in the upper arm. Here is aE that remains, left in the
syringe by my orderly before he left. You will see that I need
it only when my chest begins to pain me; hoffentiich, that will
not be before he returns in the morning with more. But I never
know when the attack may occur. One struck me this after-
noon, after many months of relief. We must really attach a
surgeon immediately." He made another note on the pad. The
personnel which we recruit nowadays is so old, if not actually
wounded or ill, that the Medical Corps must do at the begin-
ning of a battle what formerly they had to do only at the end.
They have also subjected me to the humiliation of a bedpan,

195

which you will find underneath my cot. I cannot yet ask a
nurse to assist me with this, although ladies are the only re-
cruits still plentiful in the Wehrmacht. So I am doubly grateful
if you can help me with such masculine details. There is, how-
ever, a private bathroom adjoining these quarters, and so far
I have had no trouble reaching it. I should greatly appreciate
it if you would sleep in the corridor outside, or better still in
this room. I think you can get a blanket roll from one of the
other orderlies. Thus I could command your attention at any
time in the night if I am in need. I hope it will not be neces-
sary. And it will be a comfort which I did not think an old
soldier like myself would ever welcome to have someone be-
side me, if only to listen to my bear-growls."

"I hope, too, that the Colonel will have a good night's rest,**
Happy answered. "However, I do not need a blanket rolL If
the Colonel permits, I will sleep on the floor. I have left my
knapsack at the barracks with my friend. With the Colonel's
permission I will fetch it at once. If the Colonel wishes to use
the bedpan now, I suggest that I can empty it at the same time
that I return with my Klamotten."

The Colonel would indeed prefer to use it in solitude, when
he must use it at all, which is not at present necessary. And
please do not salute me each time you enter and leave, for I
have too much to do to answer such formalities. And in Gottes
Namen do not use the third person, especially when discussing
bedpans."

He laid his monocle on the table and smiled at Happy.
Happy set the tray of papers on the deep window sill, brought
the colonel a glass of water from the bathroom, and put it on
the table beside the syringe. The colonel's P38 was also lying
on the table, cocked, with the red circle showing above the

grip-
He groped his way across the compound to the barracks.
The belt flashlight Chuck had given "him guided him down the
stairs. Heinrich was already curled up asleep, with the Panzer-
196

f aust and the rifle both slung from nails above his head. Happy
picked up his own knapsack and helmet from the next bunk
and carried them back to the colonel's room.

"There is an extra blanket in the locker," the colonel told
him. "Use it for your bed."

Happy reached it out and stretched it lengthwise on the
floor between the locker and the door. He laid down his knap-
sack to serve for a pillow. He could cover himself with his
Mantel when he turned in.

"Would you like me to get you some dinner, Herr Oberst?"*

"I had hoped that someone would suggest the idea. I sup-
pose one has to live, even if he has no appetite. Yes, you may
go down to the officers* mess and ask them for a tray for me."

The officers* mess was simply the curtained-off end of the
troops* main shack, but that was as far as fraternity went
There were curtains in the windows. The cook set china dishes
on a tray for the colonel and picked out the choicest two slices
of veal. His bread was whiter than the soldiers*, his coffee
smelled deliciously of chicory, and there was a whole cone of
sugar for his Strudel. The troops standing in line sniffed and
glowered as Happy carried it past, but when he got it upstairs,
the colonel looked at it distastefully. He ate it without either
relish or complaint.

"Also in the locker is a bottle of Niersteiner," said the colo-
nel. "You could perhaps find a glass in the bathroom, for I do
not relish drinking good wine from a mess kit I may enjoy a
glass later; for the present I am not in the mood."

Happy set the bottle and glass on the table. He helped the
colonel get ready for the night, wondering at what hour he
would feel "in the mood." He hung the monocle on the nail
over the uniform. He pulled off the colonel's undershirt and
helped Ihfm into a pair of blue and white striped pajamas.

"This is a folly I permit myself," the colonel laughed, "when
I am sure no one will tease me. I fear that even my own orderly
gossips about it with, his comrades. My wife gave them to me

197

at the beginning of the war, and I have carried them, little
used, through all my campaigns since. I tell her they look like
the uniforms of the riffraff imprisoned at Dachau, but she is a
woman of little humor. She only shakes her head and says that
we are all prisoners. It is well that we should turn in early like
this; you, so that you may start early in the morning on your
interrupted leave when my orderly returns from Augsburg;
and I, so that perhaps my heart will behave itself when I am at
rest, and I shall not need the drug. But you had better leave it
ready on the table anyway. If I need it I shall call you; or if
you hear me breathing too hard plunge the needle in my arm
anyway, even without the command. Leave the dinner tray in
the bathroom; no need to carry it back in the dark through a
strange camp. I assume you know a little about the heart. The
doctors may not all be quite sound as to the new Germany we
have built, but mine little realizes what service he has done to
me, and thereby, perhaps, a little to her, by writing out this
prescription. We were classmates in Bonn long ago. I should
have died often since then were it not for his Latin hen-tracks."

Happy looked at the dog-eared prescription, but did not rec-
ognize the signature.

"See, Herr Oberst, I am putting the digifolin, already in-
serted in the syringe, in a basin of Sepso which I dissolve from
my medical kit. With your permission, I shall prepare tourni-
quets in case of an attack. They are not on the prescription,
but I know they are part of the modern treatment. By limiting
the area which the blood must supply, they increase its pres-
sure. I have some ready in my kit, also some aspirin. Would
you not like to take two tablets with some water? They may
help put you to sleep."

The colonel nodded. Happy took two tablets from his kit,
counting past the American Benzedrines which looked like
aspirin. The colonel swallowed the tablets and drank the wa-
ter. Happy laid four strips of linen on the table.
198

"And your pistol, sir. Shall I replace it in the belt of your
tunic? I can even clean it for you now, if you wish,"

"Leave the pistol beside me/' said the colonel gruffly. "Do
not disturb the papers on my tray under any circumstances.
They are all matters for my signature. I ought to attend to
them now, but I am too tired. First thing in the morning, per-
haps. There is so much for me to do and so little time to do it
in! Orders, operation plans, punishments. I must sign the war-
rant to execute a traitor tomorrow morning, but perhaps he
and I shall both sleep better if I postpone it till then/ 7

"A traitor, Herr Oberstr

"Yes. A civilian from the next village north of us. We have
mined all the bridges, of course, between here and the Rhine,
ready to blow them if General Patch should cross the river,
which God forbid! This miserable farmer was caught cutting
the wires of a culvert across his acre, so that if our engineers
should prepare to activate the mines they would not explode.
He even spliced the wires in such a way that the break could
not be seen in advance. If bridges over cattle troughs are not
safe from sabotage, what of the bridges over the Rhine? What
of Remagen, Mainz, Mannheim, Speyer, Kehl? I dislike to or-
der this shooting. They are messy affairs; even the firing squad
is apt to get sick, but there must be an example. There must be
a stand made. The death of this one traitor will save the lives
of many good German soldiers. If the Wehrmacht cannot main-
tain discipline in the heart of our own country, where can it do
so? And if the execution is to be at all, it should be where sol-
diers and civilians alike can witness iL The paper is ready for
my signature, and tomorrow morning at eight, outside our
gate, justice will be done."

The colonel turned over heavily and fell asleep, exhausted
by his tirade. Happy stretched out on his blanket, fully
dressed. But he could not sleep, thinking of the new Blacklist
to be issued next day and of the saboteur who would be shot.

199

He hoped that he could get past the execution post before it
happened, or stay inside till it was over. He would have to pass
the place directly. Even now, over the noises of the night, he
thought he heard the firing squad hammering the stake into
the ground. The fanner, he thought, had probably cut the wire
with the knowledge of others in the village, to save the village
itself from the fire of the Ami tanks. They might even have
drawn lots, and the risk had fallen on him. Corporal Steinberg,
loyal soldier of the Reich, could not deny the execution might
be necessary. Corporal Maurer could plead with the colonel
for a reprieve or it was a crazy idea inject too much digi-
folin, or too little, so that the colonel could not sign the colo-
nel would himself be dead. Karl Maurer, he told himself, does
not exist. But the more he repeated the insistence to himself,
the more the voice inside him reminded him that the farmer's
treachery was less heinous than his own.

He thought of the colonel's prescription. For digifolin to
ease the congestion, the colonel should have been saturated
with it already, without missing a single day's injection. Even
then it would not take effect promptly. The colonel's breath
was labored and his lips bluish, and, for a colonel, he was too
amiable; but otherwise he seemed all right That was the trou-
ble with three-year-old prescriptions; they were out of date.
He decided to wait for an attack and judge for himself. Maybe
the orderly would get back before treatment was needed. But
he left his leather kit open on the floor beside his blanket.

Suddenly the colonel turned in his bed. He leaned over the
edge. Happy heard him vomit into the bedpan. He gasped,
fighting for his breath.

"Hilfe!" he choked between the spasms. "Help!"

Happy jumped up and switched on the light. He lifted the
loaded pistol gingerly to the window sill. Now the colonel had
fallen back on his pillow, his whole body motionless to save
strength for the final struggle locked within his chest. The
parted lips began to foam. The eyes did not blink, eyes which
200

stared straight at Happy in the envy, the reproach, with which
the dying look upon the live.

"Hilfe!" he gasped again, more faintly. Standing over him,
Happy could see that the word was formed only with the
black tongue inside his open jaws, as a parrot speaks without
moving its beak. The colonel clacked the word, so that the
heart might not waste a milligram of its reprieve by a motion
of the lips. It was less a human syllable than the groan of an
animal in pain.

Happy knew pulmonary edema when he saw it The colonel
was drowning. Even his fingernails were cyanosed. Happy ig-
nored the digif olin in the colonel's syringe. He threw a quarter-
grain of morphine from his own kit into the wineglass and
poured in a spoonful of the wine to dissolve it He rolled up a
sleeve of the striped pajamas, sucked up the morphine in his
own syringe and plunged it into the arm. He laid a tablet
of nitroglyceiin from his own metal tube under the colonel's
tongue. He twisted the four tourniquets, two round the arms
above the elbow and two round the thighs as high as he could
roll the pajamas. The lips began to move, and though the cry
of "Hilfe!" was repeated, it came out of the moving lips now
more intelligibly, as a horn sounds more clearly with the lift-
ing of the fog. In ten minutes the spasm had subsided.

It was as his father had often described the relief of acute
edema which occurs when the water in the blood fills the
lungs as he had even seen it once himself on a hospital bed
in Berlin; but this time not by his father's hand. In a sense, not
even by his own hand, since he denied his own name, but by
the hand of a corporal with the false name of Steinberg. By a
hand which could a moment before, if it chose, have withheld
or multiplied the drug, and so taken the Me before him and
saved the Me to be taken in the morning, and with it many
lives who could tell how many? in the dissolution of the
whole division. And if he, this ghost of soldiery, were to be
tied at sunrise to the infamous stake, after the colonel had been

201

found dead from too much or too little of the drug, if he were
to be shot (as though one could shoot a ghost) nobody could
either rightly praise his sacrifice or gloat over his punishment
until a steel safe, four hundred miles away in an enemy coun-
try, was opened when the war ended. And Maurer might not
even suffer when the bullet struck, since it would be Steinberg
who was shot. But the thumb which pressed the syringe had
gone just far enough and not too far, with calm and care, to
save what might have been better lost. Professionally.

The taut hairy-backed hands on the field-gray blanket un-
clenched. Happy remembered the mutilated hand of the Tiger
on his olive-drab blanket in France. The unmoving eyes no
longer stared into death. They drew back into aliveness and
hardened into pride, pride that they had not been found afraidL
They held no gratitude to the corporal. After the breathing
eased they paused a moment longer, still unblinking, to mark
their renewed command. The eyelids fell on them, the colo-
nel's head leaned to the wall, his whole body relaxed, and he
slept again.

The corporal emptied the pan and went back to his blanket
Maurer had penetrated to the living heart of his target, and
Steinberg for the time had spared it Before he knew he had
slept, the colonel roused him.

"Are you awake, Corporal?"

Happy stirred. He looked at the luminous dial on his wrist
It was 0430, before the heavy blackout curtains were even
tinted by the sun, before any bugle sang.

"Yes, Herr Qberst"

*1 am well again, thanks to your promptness. Do not turn
on the light again, but pour a glass of my wine for each of us.
You will find another in the cupboard. First give me time to
set the safety of my Walther."

"I took the liberty of moving it myself for fear you would
jog the trigger by mistake. It is in the window."

The colonel laughed mirthlessly.
202

In the dark Happy groped for the bottle on the bedside
table, for fear he might jolt it off. He found the glasses and
poured them with a finger at the edge, so they would not over-
flow. He held one toward the bed. The colonel's hand met his.
The glasses touched.

"To Germany," the colonel breathed heavily.

To Germany/' the corporal repeated.

"Lie down and let me talk, but do not look at me. For what
it is worth, you have saved my life, even though you acted
against orders. A man who is just reporting from the doorway
of death has a right to the second luxury of talking about him-
self, while he is still as naked as at that moment. Perhaps he
reports to himself, or perhaps to God, or perhaps to a visiting
casual corporal whom he will never see again and who will
now promise on his soldier's oath not to reveal the indignity.
Do you promise?"

"Yes, Herr Oberst"

"Say 'On my soldier's oath/ 7 "

"Auf meinen Fahneneid," Happy repeated.

"No, but repeat it in full with me. It will do us good to hear
it again/' They intoned together the oath of the German sol-
dier.

"I swear before God this holy oath, to offer unquestioning
obedience to Adolf Hitler, leader of the German State and
People, and to lay down my Me as a brave soldier to fulfill this
oath/'

"Good,** pronounced the colonel. "Now I want to record with
you who have just seen me at death's gate that I was not afraid
of it. I record it with surprise and pride. You have read that
Samsonov, the Russian general, shot himself at the defeat of
Tannenberg. I will confess that is why my pistol has been on
the table tonight

"I have been in the Army many years and am not afraid to
die. It is insane to claiin that we can press back the horde of
savages from the east and the west But tomorrow, to my divi-

203

sion, I shall claim it. It is folly to think that this division which
I am building out of papers on a tray can meet any other fate
than the three divisions of which it is the remnant We call our-
selves a combat division! We are not even a good training
camp. There is no more time to be thorough now. Think of it,
eight 15s and twelve 7.5s to a regiment; one HMG and three
lights to a company. And of course only two regiments where
there should be three, but one is used to that. These new Pan-
zerfausts of ours will be like pikes in the hands of a rabble,
against the armor of the Americans. So far, not even any Flak
to protect us. The German Wehrmacht was designed for at-
tack, not for defense."

His sandpaper voice rose, as Hitler's did over the radio. tt Un-
til the ruin strikes, we shall be as stern and as brave as we have
been to win the greatest victories in history. And I tell you the
ruin will not tarnish them. The place of honor is in the heart of
the flame, as the safest spot in an earthquake is within the very
frame of the door. You will see that when the Fiihrer dies no
German officer will want to live. You were not even born at
the other defeat. It was not a defeat; it was a betrayal. But
your father, if he is living, will remember the shame which
Germans bore for twenty years because they had been tricked
out of victory. Since ruin must come, let it be complete. Let it
be a purification, as our triumph was a purification too. Let the
barbarians who reject us fight among themselves over their
kill. History will never forget these five years when no Ger-
man soldier has swerved from the path of honor, in Tunisia or
at Stalingrad or on the River Plate, or in Norway or France or
Holland, in the air or at sea or on the ground. They quibble
about ghettoes and concentration camps. I brush aside their
wailing, and history will soon forget it. It is nothing compared
to the cleansing, I can even call it the consecration, of a whole
great nation. A hero is killed but his heroism lives on. Only a
day later the coward dies and is forgotten with his cowardice.
I don't know whether you ever read Shakespeare. I am very
204

fond of him, for I feel his soul is German. I cannot read Eng-
lish well enough to understand the original, but must rely on
SchlegeFs translation. There are two lines which I have re-
peated to myself in every campaign of the war. One where
the king says:

*If we are marked to die, we are enough
To do our country loss . . /

Do you know it?**
"Yes, Herr Oberst,

. . . and if to live,
The fewer men, the greater share of honor/

It is from Henry the Fifth. I read it in my English class at
school."

"And the other," went on the colonel, "is what he says of
Cawdor:

'Nothing in his Me
Became him like the leaving it:

Well, my boy, you have done some small service to your coun-
try in saving me, if only for the grand finale, and I apologize
for having cut short your leave, if I have done so. It cannot
have been so pleasant to nurse an old man as to spend one of
your few precious evenings in a cozy tavern, with good food
and drink and maybe the innkeeper's daughter in the night;
anyway, looking out on a countryside so far untouched by the
war, and thinking only of your pleasure and your youth. In
half an hour now they will be after me to face the day. Before
they come I want you to tell me what reward I can give you
for this night. Shall I ask your commander to give you a day or
two extra leave?"

Thank you, no, Herr Oberst I have a duty at the front also.
There is only one thing."

205

"A promotion? You handle yourself as deftly as an expert
would have done. That trick of the tourniquets. I must tell our
surgeon about it, when we get one/*

"No, my Colonel, there is only one thing; perhaps this is
foolish of me but if you would have mercy on the farmer and
put him in prison instead."

Happy stood at attention, facing the foot of the bed. His
hands were clenched at his sides. He knew that his voice shook
a little. The colonel looked up at him sharply from the bed.

"No, no! that request I cannot grant. I know that your pro-
fession is to save life, even the unworthy. Remember that mine
is to take it, even the worthy. I can give no quarter there, and
you have heard me say why. Do not ask me that. Indeed, were
it not for the indignity, I should give the coup de grace my-
self."

Happy unclenched his fists. He felt the color drain from his
face. He knew now that the colonel had truly not been afraid
of death, if he would send the farmer to it, having himself been
so lately spared.

**! feel as well as ever," chuckled the colonel. "Now I am go-
ing to get up and shave, even dress. You may need to take my
elbow the first few steps, till I make sure. Then I shall treat
myself to breakfast in bed before my own orderly gets back
with the ampoules of digif olin, and before tibe adjutant comes
in with the roster for the day. It is thinking of all I have to do
that makes me dizzy, not my heart, which you have made as
good as ever. Go down and get your own breakfast and bring
me back a tray like last night, if you will. I shall be shaved by
the time you return."

Happy took the colonel's elbow as he stepped out of bed,
but the officer shook him off. "You see? I walk as well as ever."

Happy picked up the supper tray. He left the colonel splash-
ing water in the basin and staring into the mirror, and heard
him mutter as he lathered his face, "There I can give no
quarter."

206

"And you, Corporal," he called, "get your gear ready so that
you can go right after breakfast My orderly has orders to be
back half an hour from now. If he isn't, 111 take the time from
Tn'm and give you double. Get your gear as soon as you have
brought my tray. If I were in your shoes, with two days before
me, I should walk down the Neckar to Heidelberg, as I have
often done in my youth. Just because you've missed your night
there is no reason you should miss your day, and you can get
a ride up to Heilbronn in a division car without any trouble.
I had to ship a detail to the Rhine yesterday, untrained as
they were, to contain an unexpected thrust. Ill see if we haven't
got one going your way today.*

207

Mine

But Happy had to get out the gate before the execution, with-
out waiting for breakfast or for a ride in the divisional trans-
port. He fetched the colonel's breakfast without thinking of his
own. This early in the morning it was six o'clock there were
only half a dozen officers in the mess hall, all of them lieuten-
ants, eating at a single table behind the curtain. Among them
was the one who had been duty officer the day before. They
all looked up at the sight of a Luftwaffe corporal carrying
a tray through their mess. They turned stiffly, moving their
shoulders and their heads together, and holding the coffee-
cake poised for a moment over the bowls of coffee. Happy
saw the duty officer whisper an explanation, and they turned
back to the silent meal. The duty officer called him over from
the counter. Happy stood rigid, with the loaded tray in his
hands.

"How is the colonel doing this morning, Corporal?" he
asked pleasantly.

"He is in excellent health, Herr Leutnant."

"Prima. I was tired last evening when you came in, as one
208

gets sometimes; I hope you did not repeat my words to him,
for I did not mean to be disrespectful of his rank or even of
his illness. Gentlemen, this is Corporal Steinberg" Happy
saw that each officer registered the name in his memory "who
kindly consented to attend Colonel Forster last night, as a way
to earn his bread and butter."

"Butter!" one of the lieutenants muttered sourly.

'The colonel's orderly has just returned from Augsburg, I
checked him in a few minutes ago when I came off duty, so
you may feel free to continue your leave as soon as the colonel
releases you. The division is grateful for your kindness. On the
way out stop at the orderly room for today's stamp."

"Zu Befehl!** Happy answered. He bowed as well as he could
with the zinc tray in his hands. He returned through the cur-
tain and across the troops* mess hall. He hurried across the
compound as fast as he could without spilling the bowl of
coffee. When he reached Room 88 the colonel was already
fully dressed, sitting at his table with the beribboned tunic
buttoned on, and gazing at the trayful of papers through his
monocle. His peaked cap and service belt, with the Walther
back in its holster, hung on the nail. He had already signed
some of the papers.

"Ha/* he called jovially, "you have moved quickly to get
to the mess hall and back in so short a time. I have taken
an aperitif of paper work, to fit me for the day.** He pointed
to two papers in the out basket.

"I thought the Colonel would be hungry, so I postponed my
own breakfast until he has the kindness to dismiss me.**

The colonel did not seem to notice the lapse into the third
person. He did not refer to his confidence of the night. It was
as if the monocle were a screen between the officer and the
man.

"You have been both kind and competent.** He smiled, hold-
ing forward a slip with the swastika seal of the division. "I
have written this commendation, which may save you some

209

difficulty in the forward zone. It states that you have been of
service to this division, and bears my signature with the seal
of Twenty-fifth Infantry. Now I suggest that you may pack
your Klamotten and get as good a breakfast as our quarter-
master can provide. Growing boys must eat. Then start on
your way, for it is a long trip, and you may get slowed down
by police checks as you approach the Rhine. You are wise to
enjoy the scenery on foot. My own orderly has just returned
and is eating his breakfast now, but you need not wait for him
to relieve you. See, he has brought me enough of the drug to
last till the day of victory/*

He held up a new carton of digifolin ampoules. He handed
the commendation to Happy, who took the slip of paper with
a word of thanks, folded it, and put it carefully in the flap of
his Soldbuch. He leaned down to pick up his knapsack and
refold the colonel's blanket. He buttoned his overcoat, and
was ready to salute good-by when there was a knock at the
door.

"Come in," the colonel ordered.

It was not the orderly who entered, but a divisional mes-
senger with a handful of papers and dispatches, and an oblong
book bound in orange paper.

"The officer of the day sends up the new Blacklist, Herr
Oberst Will you kindly initial this receipt and return the book
to the orderly room at your convenience."

The colonel rolled his eyes in mock despair at this addition
to his day's work. He looked at Happy. "Here's some more
Shakespeare for you, Corporal:

*When sorrows come, they come not single spies,
But in battalions/ "

Tes, Herr Oberst; From Hamlet"

The messenger laid the booklet on the table. The colonel
did not open it, but signed the receipt
210

"In a little while. I'd like to glance it over first. And before
you go, Melder/* * he said, "here is my signature for the exe-
cution.''

He held forward the square of white paper which con-
demned the saboteur. The messenger turned to leave. He had
not once looked at Happy.

"Just a moment," the colonel called. "A word with you alone
Brst"

He rose and followed the messenger into the corridor, clos-
ing the door behind him. Happy heard them whispering out-
side. In two soft steps he was at the table. He opened the
bright covers of the Blacklist, stamped just like the bulletin at
Kempten, "Not to fall into enemy hands." His fingers turned to
where the S page should be. He had only time to see the name
STEINBERG, KABL before he heard the knob turn behind him. He
sprang back and was struggling with the straps of his knap-
sack when the colonel re-entered the room. Before the door
closed he heard the messenger call back, in that tone which
with all soldiers is the acknowledgment of a command, "At
once, Herr Oberst. Sofort."

Someone had given him away at last. He hoped it was the
bus driver, not the old warden. But if it was he, Happy
thought, I cannot blame him. It would be hard to be silent
under the questioning of the Gestapo. If he has put me in
danger, did I not do the same to him? Let us forgive each
other.

"Good-by, Corporal,'* the colonel was saying, "and many
thanks."

He held out bis hand, letting the monocle fall from his eye
to smile. Happy jerked to a salute.

"My thanks to the Colonel, and best wishes for his recovery."

"And best wishes for our victory," growled the colonel.

Happy opened the door and went out. He hurried, but did
not dare to run. He strode directly to the barracks. Heinrich

* Messenger.

211

was just getting out of bed. His rifle still hung on the nail above
his bunk.

"Oh, the flier." He yawned. "I bet you didn't sleep as well as
I did; the Volkswagen is good exercise, but that colonel is
trouble enough even when he isn't sick. Junge, Junge, how
sleepy I am! Let's go get some breakfast. Then you can come
and watch me train the rookies with the bazooka."

He pulled the boots over his trousers and struggled into his
tunic. The other troops in the hut were dressing too, clustered
around the stove.

"No, I've had my breakfast," Happy lied. "Besides, I'm on
leave, and I don't want to see any more Army till I have to,
and I'm in a hurry. Listen, you told me yesterday you would
sell me your rifle. Ill give you the hundred marks."

Heinrich was awake at once. He narrowed his eyes, as a
seasoned soldier does when he considers a trade. He pretended
to be reluctant ""Why, you said yourself that Medical don't
carry them."

"Yes, but I'm on the last lap now, and, you see, I can't tell
what I might meet between now and the end."

"Well, it's true one shouldn't take that trip without some
kind of weapon. This is an excellent rifle. But might they not
pick you up for carrying it?"

Happy shook his head. *Tm taking off my medical armband
anyway, so I won't be drafted into any more duty like last
night"

The sergeant raised his hand to the rifle, teasing Happy to
raise the price.

"A hundred and twenty marks," he bargained.

"Okay, only hurry and let me get away."

He fished the money out of his belt The sergeant sighed.
TLift it down from the nail, then. I'm not supposed to do this,
as you well know. They might fine me that much for losing it.
This rifle was entered in my Soldbuch nine months ago, but
I suppose I can always claim I turned it in to the school when
212

I got the bazooka, and lost the receipt. It's easy to cross it off
the page, anyway, and I don't think there's ever a chance they'd
check up on that one, do you?"

"Never," Happy assured him impatiently. "Well, thanks for
the ride yesterday and getting me put up for the night, I didn't
have such a bad time after all, though it's not the way you
want to spend a leave. I'm starting off now, so wish rne luck.
Ill see you in Berlin after the war."

"Or Magdeburg."

They shook hands. Happy slung the self-loader over his
shoulder. He strolled to the barracks door, but quickened his
pace as soon as it slammed behind him. It was 0750. He no
longer dared wait till after the execution. Even if he had to
watch it, he must be through the gate before the colonel found
his name in the Blacklist He headed for the main gate, pass-
ing the soldiers who hurried along the path to the mess hall.
It was a gamble to try the gate with a rifle, when he had come
in without one; but there would be a different sentry and it
was worth the chance to pass as Infantry instead of MedicaL
Yet he dared not take off his medical brassard till he was on
the road.

The swastika flag whipped on its mast again in the clear
breeze. The soldiers who were not making for the mess hall
were making for the gate, like him, and he saw there was al-
ready a big formation packed in front of the orderly room.
Yet they did not crowd forward; indeed those on the edge
seemed to ease backward, away from the opening between
the stone piers. He knew why; it was the detail which was
ordered to witness the execution. There might still be time for
him to get out first, but he knew the sentry would not pass
him till the duty officer stamped his orders. He pressed to-
ward the orderly room, trying to edge past the fringes of the
silent crowd. He had to step around the roots of the ivy that
cloaked the little stone house. He wedged himself up the two
steps and through the door.

213

The same two clerks were pounding at their Erikas, but a
new lieutenant, the one who had grumbled about butter at
breakfast, sat at the desk. Happy held his trip ticket and the
colonel's certificate toward him. Behind him, a soldier came
in and lifted out one of the stack of signposts, carrying it
back outdoors. Happy heard the Herangetreten signal outside,
which was whistled five minutes before a parade. The lieuten-
ant stamped Happy's paper in silence, without looking at him.
When he had impressed the cross-and-eagle he glanced up.

"Since you are returning to the front, Corporal Steinberg,
the colonel has sent down orders that you halt outside to wit-
ness that justice is still done behind the German lines. You can
report so at the front"

"No," Happy blurted.

The lieutenant reddened but, becaSSe the colonel had rec-
ommended the boy, said no more than, "That is a word the
German soldier does not use, Corporal."

Happy wanted the lieutenant to look up, but he had already
bent his head over the papers on his desk. The typewriters
clacked on. Happy could do nothing but open the door to the
platform. The crowd had grown so that he could not even
step down to the ground, where he might have hidden his eyes
among the others.

"Achtungr a voice called from the compound back of the
crowd.

Four men came down the path toward the gate, preceded
by yesterday's lieutenant of the guard and followed by a
Pfc carrying the cross-shaped wooden signpost. Two others
dragged the prisoner between them. He was a short man, sixty
perhaps, in the torn faded trousers of a farmer, with a blue
shirt, open at the throat. His worn velvet braces crossed the
shirt. His horny hands dangled over the arms of his execu-
tioners. His stubbly face looked upward. His feet dragged be-
hind him. The angle of his body was like the leaning forward
of a plowman pushing at the handles of his plow while his feet
214

lag in the furrow, and the wide expressionless stare was that of
one who looks day after day between the heads of oxen for the
distant turn. If he was not beyond consciousness, Happy knew,
he was at least beyond fear.

The crowd parted before the squad. Happy saw that the
sign on the file closer's shoulder read: so STERBEN DIE, VERRATER
DES VATERXANDES. Thus perish traitors. The words were the
ones which Pere Nod had seen at Stuttgart, and Happy thought
of a picture in his parents' room at Berlin: Simon at Calvary,
carrying the cross for Another.

He could not help looking outward, over the heads of the
crowd. He saw that traffic had been roped off in both direc-
tions on the highway. He saw the four-foot post on the oppo-
site side, where he h$d heard the hammering in the night. He
saw the two privates bind the prisoner to it and knot a blind-
fold from behind his head; and he saw the signbearer bore the
stake of his inscription into the ground at the side. He turned
his face away, looking up into the sky above the camp and
the hooked-cross banner. They could not punish him for turn-
ing his face away.

A horse neighed, but the crowd was silent; the soldiers in-
side the gate and the civilians to right and left of them out-
side surrounded the stake like an amphitheater. He heard the
feet of the squad shuffle in unison, their rifle butts striking the
pavement together, heard the snap of the bolts at "Fertig,"
and at the lieutenant's "Feuer!" heard the instant roar of the
four rifles and the creaking of the cords as the traitor lurched
forward, and then a murmur of satisfaction in the crowd, and
the sound of someone being sick. The typewriters in the office
behind him had not stopped.

The crowd of witnesses parted before the returning white-
faced firing squad. No man looked at the others.

Happy made his way out the gate as leisurely as he could
pretend. The unaccustomed rifle dangled awkwardly across
tie back of his long coat, the barrel striking his steel helmet. It

215

was lucky that the sentry who glanced at the stamped paper
was not Heinrich's friend of the day before, for he might have
noticed the rifle. This sentry looked too sick to notice anything
except the heap across the road.

The feet had slid together at one side. Happy saw that the
shoes had soles of wood instead of leather. The blood already
made a pool about the stake. The head hung forward with the
blindfold downward. The arms which had passed Happy so
inert a few minutes before now flapped in posthumous spasm;
they were more alive in death than in Me. Cross-shaped, the
black and white verdict of judgment, as neatly lettered as a
"Keep off the grass 9 * sign, was driven into the ground beside
the post, and it was splattered with red. Red, white, and
black, he thought, the colors of the regime, as they had been
the Kaiser's.

The ropes across the road were down. The crowd of civilians
hastened on to the south; the recruits stepped northward a
few paces past the barrier and turned into the division gate.
Horses strained at their harness, women pushed at the laden
handcarts while the old men grunted and took a whiter grip
on the shafts. The procession of the dispossessed moved on.
Some looked at the sky and some at the ground, but none at
his neighbor and none at the stake.

Happy darted between them to the opposite side of the
road. He ran toward the left. They could not punish him for
running, either. He ran along the gully till he reached a bend
in the road where the stake was hidden from him, and when
he was out of sight he let himself cry a little, wiping the grimy
tears on the cuff of his Mantel.

"They are all the same," he told his voice. "In spite of then-
words they are all the same. The colonel's display is as brutish
as the garroting at the Plotzensee."

However gently the voice told him that they might have
been right as soldiers both times, Happy's last conversion was
there on Route Nineteen at Aalen.
216

He had to put as much ground behind him as he could. At
any moment now the Blacklist would go down from the colo-
nel to the orderly room. Any one of the lieutenants who had
heard him called at breakfast might see his name in it, even if
the colonel did not; indeed, it was their duty to look for it
when his papers were stamped, and he had been saved by a
freak of timing. He had not been able to read the whole
citation in the book, but he had seen the words "medical corpo-
ral" after his name, and knew the brassard was his most staring
identification, and the first that would betray him. He took it
off and folded it away in his belt He did not dare throw it
away. Now, with the infantry rifle on his back, the only way
the pursuit could tell he was Medical would be to strip off
his overcoat and find the blue oval caduceus patch on the
left sleeve of his tunic. He dared still less to rip that off; it was
sewed to the uniform. He had no way to sew it back, and
would surely be suspected if it were gone. Least of all did he
dare throw away his Soldbuch, for there were heavy penal-
ties for traveling without one. The soldier who lost his book
had to report at once to the nearest post for a duplicate, and
that would have been suicide. He found Frau Lieberfs en-
velope to her sons at Crailsheim. He split the envelope aad
read the card through again. There was nothing in it which
would identify him; she did not give them his name. But he
burned it with his lighter, for she had signed her own.

He hoped a truck or bus would overtake him and hurry him
along the road; but he feared to hear its motor, lest it be sent
to take him back. He dared not lose time waiting. He ran for-
ward as fast as his straggling topcoat and his bumping equip-
ment and his shaking knees would let him. When he got on the
straightaway, he could see what vehicles came from each direc-
tion. So far he saw nothing but the slow refugee carts; but
even in sight of them he dared not run, for fear they would
think he was in flight. A truck roared past; he recognized
the fanion of 25th Infantry with the red sword-flame on the

217

shield, and had time to duck behind a tree. But the rider in
the front seat, though he carried a rifle across his knees, did not
seem to be in search of anyone. Happy wiped his face on his
sleeve; perhaps the alarm had not been broadcast yet He ran
ahead.

He had gone two kilometers when he heard another car
behind him. This time he turned to face it. It was a ton-and-
a-half supply truck, camouflaged green and brown like the
other, but with a license plate marked WL, for Wehrmacht-
Luftwaffe. At least it did not belong to 25th Infantry, and he
would be less conspicuous in an Air Force truck than an Army,
or alone on the road. He waved both arms; that is the hitch-
hiker's signal on the continent, not the cocked thumb and bent
elbow. The driver, a quartermaster sergeant, pulled up for him
and opened the door. It was good to see another blue-gray uni-
form like his own.

"Get in, gunner," he called. "I'll take you as far as Heilbronn
if you're going that way."

Happy felt safer if even a Luftwaffe sergeant didn't recog-
nize he was Medical. He mounted the high running board.
The frayed edge of his coat caught under his heel. The rifle,
which he did not know how to handle, jammed across the
door. The sergeant laughed.

"Get out and try it all over again. Take it off before you try
climbing in these cabs. We're not used to infantry weapons.
Throw it in the back with the potatoes."

If the division truck had not been on his trail, still less likely
that an Air Force supply truck would be, especially as the
Blacklist was issued only to provost units and the Gestapo.
The sergeant must have passed by the gate at Aalen just after
the execution, but he could not have heard Happy's name.

"I'm Herbert Behrend," he introduced himself, holding

out his hand, "from Diisseldorf. Quartermaster to the Ninth

Flak. Believe me, I've had a time getting even what you see in

the back for the boys to eat. I hope the other trucks have

218

better luck. We're really not Quartermaster Corps any more.
They don't have any food to issue. We're Forage. We live
off the country, you know, and I carry second class mail
besides. Versorgung instead of Nachschub. I pick up and de-
liver all along my beat. Even the farmers are stingy. When
they have any provisions, they hide them. Anyway, I get
enough for myself, such as it is."

He did not ask Happy's name. "Where are you headed,
Junge? You are young to be a corporal."

"I'm assigned to 136th Mountain, at the front They'll put
me on a Vierling, I suppose."

"Oh, you poor devil," the sergeant groaned.

He threw in the clutch and started the truck along the rough
road. He could not have helped seeing the body of the old
farmer, but did not speak of it. Perhaps, Happy thought, he
talked so fast just to avoid speaking of it.

"That's where you're going, Kamerad; where are you com-
ing from?"

"Oh, I'm on leave, coining back from the Alps,"

'Worse and worse," grimaced the jovial sergeant, "to leave
the corn-fed beauties of the South just to swing around in the
saddle of a Vierling, popping at and popped against. Well,
that's war. Anyway, Fm glad to have your company; I'm tired
of this round. What do I call you?"

"Karl"

That satisfied him. Happy looked longingly at the wide floor
of the truck, bedded with potato sacks and bags of flour and
packages of mail tied with strings. The tailboard stood about
a foot above the level of the cargo. The back curtain was rolled
up.

After a while Happy ventured, "Sarge, how about letting me
stretch out on your produce? I'm tired and I want to get a
little sleep. I won't even nibble at your potatoes."

"All right, Excellency, your bed awaits. When shall I call you
for lunch? If the old wagon holds out, we get to Crailsheim

219

about noon. That's where I leave most of my freight Mean-
while, I've got a little something in my kit, if you want a
snack."

"Listen, Sarge, III buy you lunch in return for the ride.
There's no way to use money where I'm going, and IVe got
enough left over from my leave. If you know any black-mar-
ket restaurant on the road, stop and see what we can find.
The blacker the better. We ought to get a bottle of wine any-
how. All I have in my own pocket is two slices of cheese two
days old, and I missed breakfast this morning."

"All right, Herr Reichsbankprasident Schacht, I'm not sup-
posed to do it, and they might clip one of the wings off my
collar tab if they caught me eating black market, but when a
thing is free who can refuse? They don't have many patrols on
this road any more everyone is at the front and the regula-
tions are kaput anyhow, so let's try eating about eleven, what
do you say? I know a little place well reach by then. And
say, if you're going to feed me later, you might as well help
yourself to what IVe got in my Beutel." He handed Happy
a package wrapped in greasy newspaper.

Happy climbed in the back, stretching out comfortably
among the sacks with his face to the rear. He ate the contents
of both the packages, piling his slices of cheese inside the
sergeant's two ham sandwiches. He ate the few remaining
crumbles of his chocolate. He washed his breakfast down with
water from his own canteen, which he had filled at the colo-
nel's washstand. He pulled off his topcoat and spread it to
ease the knobs in the sacking, but lay on his left side so the
sergeant, if he looked back in his mirror, could not see the
caduceus patch on his sleeve.

This highway had been the main road from the Danube to
the Rhine before the regime, but now it was little used ex-
cept by the townspeople along it, for the Autobahn was so
much straighter and wider. The rubberless tires of the farm
carts, the caterpillar treads o tractors and of the division
220

tanks and naif -tracks, and a little casual strafing by American
planes had pocked the surface with potholes which no one had
bothered to repair. The sergeant did not even try to avoid
them. The tarpaulin of the back was rolled up; the tailboard
was fastened with chains at each side. By stretching out full
length, with his elbow braced on top of his Mantel and a sack
of flour wedged against his back, Happy could cup his face in
his hands and just look over the rounded edge of the tail-
board at the road disappearing behind him, through the smoke
of the big cylindrical HoLzgas boiler.

They met more carts headed south, hauled by horses or
oxen or manpower, and loaded with the possessions of the
frightened civilians. The only military vehicle going in their
direction was a motorcycle driven by a courier, with a fat
officer jouncing in the sidecar. Happy ducked when it ap-
peared over the hill behind him, but the courier only waved
as he sped past the truck, bumping the officer over the pot-
holes. Happy smiled to himself; if Fred had been there, he
would have called the officer "Fatso/*

"We may not have any springs, but he's got too many."
Sergeant Behrend laughed. "I know that captain. A little
shakeup will be good for him. I thought he must be chasing us,
he came so fast. You done anything naughty? I have, just last
night. The women are another good feature of our racket Of-
fer them a little food; if that doesn't work, threaten to take
away the food they have.'*

Happy's eyes drooped, his forearm finally slid down, and
he fell asleep with his head on a bundle of circulars tied with
twine. He woke as the truck braked jerkily to a stop. Instantly
his hand slid over to the rifle beside him, and he peered over
the tailboard. But there was no one behind him.

"Could you deign to eat a bite now, Field Marshal?" asked
the sergeant, leaning back. "Sorry to be late, but I had to
stoke up. You never moved. It's twelve o'clock and that's when
I have to eat no matter where I am or what field marshal is

221

my guest Aha, a medical marshal; you made me think you
were of the Artillery/'

He had seen Happy's caduceus patch. Happy wormed into
his coat without rising from the bed of sacks. They were pulled
up under a big tree at the side of the road. A kilometer ahead,
through the windshield, he could see the spire of a village
church.

"Where are we, Sarge? Don't stop on the open road; pull off
somewhere where we can eat. That restaurant of yours "

"The Field Marshal perhaps has indigestion. That is a little
place called Stimpfach ahead of us. What's biting you, any-
way?" He dropped his banter.

Happy still lay on the floor, clutching the rifle, his eyes
peering over the tailboard at the road behind them.

"Anyone would think the Gestapo was on your trail. Sure, I
know a restaurant I just want to make sure you're going to
pay for lunch as you promised, before I turn off. I don't have
any money myself. They don't pay us messengers much, you
know, compared to the value of the stuff we haul."

"I promised, didn't I? So hurry and get off the road."

"All right, flier, take it easy. I was thinking of the widow
Bense, right in this town. A little old for us but not bad look-
ing. She plays the black market She isn't supposed to run an
inn, and hasn't got any license. But she's a good friend of a
good friend of the party," he winked, "so no one denounces
her. I'm not supposed to eat there any more than she's sup-
posed to feed me, but it's off the main road so I'll take the
chance again. Look, I'm shaking as much as you."

He turned the truck off the highway to a side street of the
hamlet He parked behind a tall privet hedge and padlocked
the wheel. He climbed out and went to the door of a well-
kept stucco house. It looked like a widow's house, Happy
thought, still crouching in the back; neat and demure. The
sergeant looked in through the window and beckoned to him
222

over his shoulder. There was no sign to show it was an inn.
The sergeant opened the door without knocking.

Inside, a woman was sewing at a table in the living room.
She sprang up when they entered. She had been cutting and
sewing some white sheets. She pushed them into her wicker
basket, but not fast enough to hide what they were.

"Cutting up your sheets, Frau BenseF 7 The sergeant smiled
politely. 'They will be too small for that big double bed if you
do. Maybe you are going to sleep alone for a change," he
laughed at his own wit, "or maybe you are making some white
flags. If so, you should lock your door beforehand."

The woman grew pale. "I'm sorry, Herr Feldwebel," she
stammered, "but I haven't anything to give you today. With
the shortages, I don't know what our poor country is coming to.
Nothing, nothing, 7 * she moaned.

She held out her empty hands and shook her head, standing
in front of the table with the basket on it.

"Don't worry, Frau Bense. I haven't come to forage for Ninth
Flak this time. I just want a little lunch for my comrade and
myself. I know you could find us a chicken somewhere."

"Oh, in that case," she laughed, relieved that he was not go-
ing to denounce her, "I can scare up something. One sacrifices
everything to the gentlemen of the Luftwaffe who defend us
poor farmers in Stimpfach from the gangsters." She included
Happy in her smile.

"If the gnadige Frau can find one chicken," he put in, drop-
ping into Behrend's satire, "perhaps she can find two. I am
on leave, so I could take the second one with me to eat on the
road."

"Ach, he should have been in the forage service with me,
don't you think, Frau Bense? He requisitions in quantity and
thinks of everything beforehand like a good soldier of the
Versorgung. Maybe you have a drop of schnapps to start with,
and a bottle of white wine to go with the bird,"

223

TTwo bottles." Happy laughed.

The woman filled two tiny glasses with schnapps from her
cupboard. "I have a brace of Niersteiner which I had been
saving for my name day; but for the Luftwaffe/' she shrugged
unhappily, "one would give all. You will find them on the shelf
in the well. Why don't you fetch them in, while I see if there is
a chicken left in the cellar/*

The boys drained off their schnapps. Frau Bense went
through a door to the back of the house. They heard her
climbing down the cellar steps. The sergeant put his finger to
his lips. "Hark/' he whispered. In a moment there was a flut-
ter and a clucking from the cellar below them. They heard
her whisper furiously, "Shut up!" at the hens, and slap at them
with her apron. Miraculously, the hens did shut up.

Laughing, they went outdoors to the well. Sure enough, on
the stone shelf half a yard below the rim of the curb, just
above the water, were two bottles of the greenish wine, dewy-
cool. The sergeant lifted them out lovingly. A pair of cheeses
lay beside them.

"Miinster cheese also," he gloated. "We may as well take
them, you know. She can get more where they came from and
we can't Sometimes she even has butter here, but I guess she's
hidden that. If she had any, she'd never let us find it ourselves.
Ill see if I can pry it loose. She's frightened, you see, because
we caught her cutting those sheets. You know what that means,
don't you? Surrender. She'd be shot if we denounced her, in
spite of her friend in the party. She's probably got twenty
chickens in that cellar; that's why she's trying to keep them
quiet. I shouldn't be surprised if she even had a pig. I could
take them all if I were hardhearted, and she couldn't say a
word. You get to learn about people in the Versorgung. Frau
Bense and I understand each other. I take from her but don't
dare denounce her because of her friend. She gives to me but
doesn't dare denounce me because of the ration board. Today
224

I'm one trick up on her, that's all, on account of seeing the
white sheets."

Sitting on the well curb, they smoked two of Happy's Neuer-
burg cigarettes in the sunshine. The sergeant looked curiously
at Happy.

"These cost twenty marks around here, but I won't ask you
where you got them. Even the Versorgung can't promote
Neuerburgs any more. Give me your butt when you're through.
I save them for my pipe."

Happy shifted uneasily on the stone ledge. Two cigarettes
a little better than Army issue were enough to rouse suspicion.

"A colonel gave them to me, a grateful patient. Where he
got them I don't know. Maybe colonels always smoke Neuer-
burgs. Let's go in and eat. Usually all I get is Salems."

He thought back at what he had told the sergeant when he
got in the truck While he had implied he was a gunner, he
was certain he had said nothing to deny he was Medical.
He lifted his topcoat out of the truck and put it on to hide
the caduceus patch.

They walked inside. Frau Bense had plucked the pullets.
They were in the oven of the wood-burning stove.

"I could almost eat the smell.'* The sergeant laughed. "Let's
have another schnapps while we wait, Frau Bense, and this
time let's really lock the door."

He turned the huge key in the lock. Frau Bense motioned to
the schnapps bottle still on the table. Her sewing basket had
disappeared. They each poured a drink. In half an hour the
chickens were ready. She checked the door herself before
bringing one of them to the table, with half a loaf of bread and
two pats of margarine. The bread was darker than Chuck's.
The sergeant pushed the margarine away in disgust.

"White bread I do not ask for, Frau Bense. Nobody eats it
but profiteers or foreign spies, like the one who had so much
he could bury it behind the stone down in the Allgau. But

225

margarine! Why, when I was in Paris, and the French were
starving to feed their German conquerors, after their British
friends had stripped them first, even a little restaurant like the
Bitz was able to scare up one pat of real butter. You would
not like to have the Air Force think your restaurant infe-
rior to the Ritz, would you?"

Fran Bense could not keep back her tears. She stared ven-
omously at the sergeant, then went to the back of the house
and returned with two squares of real butter. The sergeant
uncorked one bottle of the wine with a pocket corkscrew. With-
out looking at them, Frau Bense wrapped the remaining cheese
and chicken in waxed paper, with the rest of the loaf of bread.
When they had finished their feast, Happy reached in his
money belt.

The bill, please," he called to her where she sat knitting a
pair of socks, with her back to them.

~That will be twenty-eight marks," she said sullenly, without
turning around.

TPut your money away, Corporal," the sergeant commanded.
Trau Bense has said she makes every sacrifice for the Luft-
waffe, and the sacrifice of money is the greatest she can make.
Even greater than the sacrifice of her chickens or her sheets, to
say nothing of her virtue. She would be ashamed to take
money from a soldier returning to the front."

"Nein, nein," Happy protested. "That is asking too much of
Frau Bense's patriotism. I insist on paying."

He laid thirty-five marks on the table. The sergeant whistled.

"You must be an Ami in disguise, to have all that money
and Neuerburgs too. Shall I ask her to give us a receipt listing
the delicious food she sells? My lieutenant will be glad to
know where the Air Force can buy chickens and Miinster
cheese."

Frau Bense burst into tears. "Take your money, Corporal;
for you I really give it free."

But Happy left it on the table, and she unlocked the door
226

for them. As they climbed into the truck again, they could still
hear her sobbing inside.

"Sit in front this time, Junge; you can't sleep all day. Put
your knapsack in back, but mind you lay it with the bottle
on top, because we've still got some rough driving/'

Sergeant Behrend threw the chain and padlock on top of
his provisions and backed the old Steyr from behind the hedge.

"I suppose we should have refueled while we were waiting
for lunch," he said as he turned into the highway again, *but
someone might have seen the ashes in her yard. I like to pky
fair, and she needs the wood as much as my Imbert* We've
got enough steam to reach Crailsheim, and I can get the
Halunken in the motor pool to stoke me up. It isn't right that
a corporal or a sergeant should have to do the dirty work. You
know, it's just as illegal for me to eat there on a service trip as
for her to feed me. With you it's different, because you are on
leave. Nowadays everything is so kaput that it isn't much of
a chance to take, promoting a real feed once in a while. She's
the one that would catch it, selling us chickens and butter. She
might even be shot which makes me think; now that I'm
one trick up on her she might give me a tumble. That's one
thing that isn't rationed. The Wehrmacht used to have too
much organization. Now it hasn't enough."

"You mean she might be shot for that meal like "

"Yes, like him back there."

They were both thinking of the stake at Aalen and said no
more. They drove in silence for half an hour.

*T have a pretty good beat as long as it lasts," Sergeant Beh-
rend said. He could not be silent for long. "I carry second-class
mail from the Kommando at Stuttgart, and pick up and leave
packages and rustle supplies around my circuit. Aalen, Crails-
heim, Heilbronn, and then down to Stuttgart again. It usu-
ally takes me a couple of days, and I can bunk with any unit

* A gasogen of Swiss manufacture which burns wood chunks instead
of the usual charcoaL

227

I like along the road. They all know me. Last week I had a real
bed in the hospital at Gmiind, with sheets. I like to sleep there
or at the Ninth Flak CP in Crailsheim. They're the two safest
The gangsters have enough decency not to bomb a hospital,
and I guess they're scared of attacking a Flak division. Either
that, or they don't know it's there. Tonight I'll be back in Stutt-
gart, and that means a night in the bunker. Mind you, I don't
carry top secret stuff like the couriers, but there's an awful lot
of paper that has to go the round, like those circulars and
Blacklists. You might say I carry more paper than food. Well,
here's Crailsheim. I'm leaving some of both here. Want to drive
in with me to the CP? I won't be long. It's that big castle on
the hill," he pointed to the right, "only a kilometer up, and I
won't stay longer than to leave my cargo and get stoked up.
Then 111 take you to Heilbronn."

Happy saw the turrets of a Schloss through the trees on
the hill. The hooked-cross flag floated from one of them. A
Junkers 52 was towing a target balloon around the crest of
the hill, and he could hear a Vierling rattle in target practice
as the plane whined close. It made no hits, he noticed; prob-
ably manned by recruits. Driving the towplane was the risk-
iest job in the Luftwaffe, next to parachuting, especially with
rookies pumping lead at the balloon behind your tail. He
watched the practice as the truck approached the turnoff.

**You go on up," Happy answered the sergeant. "I don't
want to see any more of the outfit till I have to. I want to
write my girl a letter anyway, and this may be my last chance.
Ill be waiting at this lamppost with the mailbox on it."

Writing your girl a letter was an excuse for anything. The
sergeant laughed with that tolerant scorn which sergeants put
on when corporals write letters to their girls. Happy climbed
out of the truck, slinging his rifle and knapsack on his back,
and the sergeant attacked the hill in low grade.

The sidewalks are narrow in Crailsheim; the cobbles run
almost to the walls of the houses. Happy walked along a row
228

of shop fronts. At the dead end, where the road divides for
Heilbronn or Niirnberg, there was a stationery store. The win-
dow was taped with adhesive to keep the glass from blowing
out in case of a bomb-burst A few dusty books lay behind it:
M ein Kampf, Albert Benary's Panzer Varan!, a History of the
Growth of the Reich., and a little green Guide to the Neckar
Valley. There was a stack of blue Luftwaffe handbooks, on
uniforms, drill, and weapons; and the inevitable portrait of
the Fiihrer, framed in the national colors. Happy opened the
door, his rifie barrel brushing against the jamb. Three airmen
were inside, riffling over the comics on the shelf and turning
the rack of postcards over the glass counter. They glanced at
him, perhaps wondering whether he was stationed on the hill
and why they hadn't seen him before, but they did not speak.
The bookseller came from behind a curtain, and Happy caught
a glimpse of a cookstove and an open trapdoor to the cellar
left open, he supposed, for a quick descent in case of the siren.
Many people in Germany lived that way, beside open cellar
doors. Happy wanted to write his parents, but he did not dare,
for the mail might be censored.

"Can I have a packet of letter paper, please, and two stamps,
and the use of a pen? And how much is the guidebook in the
window?"

He had edged to the back of the room. Though the guide-
book was on public sale, he did not want the soldiers to hear
him ask for it

The bookseller seemed to understand, or at least Happy im-
agined he understood. "I cannot let you have a whole packet,
Herr Unteroffizier; we are short of paper. For two stamps, will
two sheets not be enough?"

He lifted two sheets of thin ruled paper from the top of a
box in the showcase, wetting his thumb to make sure of taking
only two. He laid them on a table under the rear window > and
detached two twelve-pfennig stamps from a strip in his wal-
let The pen and a bottle of ink were on the table already.

229

This is our writing room." He smiled wanly. "Many from
the castle use it when for some reason they wish to avoid the
censorship of the Feldpost, where you need no stamps. So I
leave the pen and ink available. For the guidebook, it is three
marks fifty, if I remember. There are not many hikers along
the Neckar in wartime. If you will wait till I attend to these
gentlemen, I will bring it from the window.**

Happy saw that one of the soldiers, a Flak corporal like
himself, with the silver band around the eagle on his red col-
lar tab, bought a book of jokes. Another, after long hesitation,
lifted a postcard from the rack. Happy could see it was a pic-
ture of soldiers in a dugout, writing by candlelight The title
was ''Good Night, Mother,'* and there was a poem beneath
the picture. The soldier looked back, as if hoping to address
his card at the table, but seeing Happy with the pen in his
hand he shrugged, took out his own fountain pen, and ad-
dressed it on top of the glass showcase. The three soldiers went
out. The bookseller, who was lame, laboriously opened the
inner glass window of the shop front to reach out the guide-
book. While his back was turned, Happy wrote his letters,
shielding the paper with his arm. He disguised his handwriting
by printing them in capitals not to protect himself, for he
would be over the line when they were delivered, but to pro-
tect Maria and her brothers. To the Gebriider Liebert at the
Schloss in Crailsheim he wrote:

A COMRADE OF THE LUFTWAFFE WABNS YOU TJSLA.T THE AMIS
WILL BOMB IN THREE DAYS.

To Maria he wrote:

KNTT SOCKS ONLY FOR THY BROTHERS UNTIL HE WHO LOVES
THEE RETURNS.

The envelopes were sealed, face down on the table, by the
time the bookseller returned with the guidebook. He presented
it to Happy with a bow.

The Odenwald Klub published it, Herr Corporal. It de-
scribes all the points of interest on both sides of the Neckar
230

all the way down to Heidelberg. It is from before the war, but
our river and forests do not change, and I have not changed
the price. It even shows the inns, and see, there is a fine fold-
ing map with all the shelters the Hub maintained for hikers.
Though no one hikes now, unless it is refugees or troops on
leave. Perhaps the Corporal is on leave; I do not remember
seeing him before among our clients from the Schloss."

Happy did not answer; he paid for the book without open-
ing it and slipped his two letters inside it, holding the enve-
lopes so the bookseller could not read the addresses.

"At least it is better to read a guidebook than a jokebookT
sighed the bookseller, opening the door.

Happy turned left, back to the red mailbox on the corner
where the sergeant had left him. He could just remember
that before the regime the mailboxes had been yellow. He did
not hear the shop door close, and knew the bookseller was
gazing after him. He turned the corner a few steps, then
turned again, and when he looked back the bookseller had
retreated into his store. No one was in sight; he whipped out
the letter to Maria's brothers and dropped it through the flap.
Just as the lid fell back, the sergeant rounded the corner to
pick him up. He could not have noticed. Happy left the letter
to Maria in the guidebook. He did not want it to carry the
Crailsheim postmark when it reached her.

The back of the truck was empty now, except for two pack-
ages of circulars. The orange Blacklist was tied on top of each
package. The other package and all the rations had been left
at the command post of 9th Flak.

"Now we shall really bounce," the sergeant laughed as he
ground into gear, "without our ballast."

To their left lay the little airfield of the town, carefully
terraced up from a flat field, but long ago made useless by
a dozen bomb craters. There was no other damage in the
town. The sergeant waved at the field. "I suppose the Yankees
thought they were knocking out tihe Luftwaffe when they

231

wasted bombs on that patch of weeds," lie scoffed. "The planes
they thought they were hitting were dummies. The whole field
is a dummy just a Scheinplatz. If they knew where the real
division is, up on the hill, they could do a lot of damage."

"Even that can't be much of a target," said Happy, "if it
only has enough men to survive on your few sacks of potatoes."

"Oh, we aren't up to strength, probably only a thousand
men; that's the way every division is now. And others besides
myself bring them rations. Besides, they farm the Flak pla-
toons out to protect other outfits. I heard at Aalen, for instance,
that we are going to detach two batteries there. But on paper
it's a full division, and we have three 8.8s, along with plenty
of dummies, right around the Schloss."

The road swings around to the left and heads westward
through level open country, but before Hall it hairpins down
the valley of the Biihler. Farmers had started already to prune
the vines. The sergeant left one of his bundles, with the Black-
list on top, at the Rathaus in the square, lifting it out of the
tonneau. That left just one more.

It was four o'clock when they reached Weinsberg, where
their highway joins the almost finished Autobahn running up
from Stuttgart. The roadbed stretched off to their left. Happy
half expected to see the same line of tanks that had passed
below him at Ulm the day before. It might well take the slow
monsters a whole day to move up the eighty miles. Only
four or five kilometers beyond him to the west he saw the
spires and smokestacks of Heilbronn, where the Neckar flows
in from the south and veers northward on its long fall to the
Rhine. The big buildings of a sanitarium were on their right;
to the left the wooded Reisberg rose a hundred yards in the
air.

The sergeant drew up at the junction, crinlding his eyes first
toward the city and then leftward along the Autobahn to the
south. He hesitated.

"If I didn't have to leave that last Blacklist in Heilbronn/*
232

he thought aloud, "I could turn off here and get home to
Stuttgart for supper. The surface on the Autobahn isn't poured
the full length, and a couple of bridges are missing, so the
tanks can't use it. But it's the perfect shortcut for a bus like
mine. Otherwise 111 have to take Twenty-seven the other side
of town through all the villages. Takes me an hour longer, be-
sides the time 111 lose in Heilbronn. I'm scared to drive black-
out with all these carts on the road; they don't carry lights, of
course, and they aren't even supposed to be out after dark.
But nobody bothers them any more. How would it be if you
take my paper work in to Transport for me? You've got to go
in town anyway. It's only five kilometers, and you may get a
ride. Then I can roll along home to camp on the Autobahn
without having to get supper on the way or drive in the dark,
and I won't have the death of any civilians or animals on my
conscience. How about it, Junge?"

Happy thought fast. He did not want to go into Heilbronn
at all It was a town of sixty thousand, and control point for
the whole Wehrmacht in the Neckar valley, right down as
far as Heidelberg. But he knew there was no way of bypassing
it. If he had to go in, he would rather go on foot than in the
truck. You never knew when the Gestapo might spring a spot-
check, and their favorite place was just outside the big towns.
If he were in the truck there would be no chance of escaping
it without alerting the sergeant. But if he were on foot, he
might see the barrier in time and lie low till it was lifted, or
take a side street to get past it. Anyway, his forged Soldbuch
had passed the check at Ulm, and now he had the colonel's
certificate besides^ which was almost enough by itself. And then
he suddenly thought, Heilbronn hasn't got its Blacklist yet.
Here it is, being offered to me.

"Okay, Til take it, but you'd better give me a slip of paper
to prove I haven't stolen it, in case I run into a check."

"Good kid," said the sergeant, scribbling on a leaf from his
notebook. He stamped it with the eagle seal in his Beutel and

233

handed it to Happy. "It goes to Corporal Ernst at the counter
in the station. That's across the big bridge; you can't miss it
Ernst is the sour-faced one; you'll know him from that. This is
like that black-market restaurant; a year ago I wouldn't have
dared trust my papers to anyone. But now, if they question
me, 111 say I was trying to save the Wehrmacht a little fuel.
They'll like that. You'd better sign a receipt for me too, just in
case/'

He scribbled again, and Happy had to sign "Steinberg,
Corporal" on the slip, so the sergeant at last knew his name.
He held the paper against the windshield, pretending to cramp
his arms, so that he could disguise his handwriting.

"Now you do something for me, Sarge." He pulled his guide-
book from his pocket and shook out the letter to Maria. "Mail
this for me from Stuttgart, will you?"

The sergeant looked at him round-eyed, turning the en-
velope over in his hand. "You want a fake postmark, eh? Writ-
ing in capitals, too, so they won't know your handwriting?
What's the idea?"

Happy felt himself blush, which wasn't bad cover either. He
winked at the sergeant. "Haven't you ever wanted a girl to
think you were some other place than where you really were?"
the sergeant smirked "and the capitals are on account of
her old man. He doesn't think I'm good enough."

The sergeant laughed, clapping his hand on his thigh. "You're
not so dumb as you look, Junge; all right, I'll do your dirty
work, since you're doing mine." He slipped the envelope be-
tween the covers of his Soldbuch.

"Now show me the station on the map," Happy asked him,
as he unfolded the plan of Heilbronn, but the sergeant did
not look at it.

"You can't miss the station, what's left of it Turn right over
the river and follow the big tower. That's the post office, next
door to the station. If you think Ulm is kaput, look at what
the Amis did on Christmas Eve/'
234

While he reached back for the Blacklist, Happy glanced
through the rest of the guidebook Later, when he was alone,
he might not dare to open it It contained a plan of Heidel-
berg too, and a long folding chart of the Neckar with the
shelter-huts marked by black lozenges.

The sergeant handed him the packet; he buried it with the
guidebook at the bottom of his knapsack under the clothing
and food. He climbed out of the cab, thanked his superior,
and saluted him with the German greeting. The sergeant
handed down his rifle, said "Auf Wiederseh'n," and shuttled
left down to the track of the Autobahn, leaving Happy alone
on the concrete.

Happy slung his rifle across his back and headed toward the
city, with the Blacklist and the bundle of circulars in his knap-
sack. The instant the sergeant left him he regretted having
accepted them. If he left them at the transport office, he would
certainly have to give his name. Corporal Ernst, "the sour-
faced one," might glance through the Blacklist and come
across it, even as he handed it to him, face to face, On the
other hand, he did not know how to get rid of the book. It was
too bulky to tear up or burn, and he did not dare throw it at
the roadside, or even open it in sight of the busy traffic. He
trudged along, turning the problem over in his mind. Then he
decided that, after all, they would have to search him before
they found it, and the Gestapo didn't search at a spot-check
unless they suspected you already. And there was a sweet
and secret justice in stealing what might be the only copy of
his own death warrant between here and the end of his mis-
sion. Somehow he would find a way to destroy it, after he had
studied his own entry more carefully. Meanwhile, the safest
place for the Blacklist was on his own back. He shook his head;
there was danger in worrying too much, just as there was in
not worrying enough. As he trudged through the outskirts of
the city, he tried, by an inner concentration, to turn himself
into a good soldier of the Reich on his last two days of leave,

235

heading for Ms regiment at the front in a coat too long for
him, with a pack too heavy. If he could think of himself that
way, perhaps the passers-by would too.

He had to get transportation at the station, as any combat
soldier would. He had only two days left, and fifty miles to go.
The last day would be the hardest, when he had to cross the
Rhine from Mannheim to Ludwigshafen and on through the
line. From this side he could not even tell where the line might
be, for the papers no longer printed situation-maps. He did
not dare trust a pickup to get him down on time; his luck had
been too good already.

Behrend was right. The city was half ruined by the blaze
bombs. The Ami planes might have dropped them on the
military targets, but the flames had carried with the random
wind. The timbers had caught, the roofs had fallen in, all the
hollows of the stone shells were black and spalled, as dead as
if artillery had pulverized them. Deader, for they would have
to be pulled down before they could be rebuilt.

He crossed the four-lane bridge over the Neckar, from the
medieval town to the modern. The city was crowded with
party members and officials who had fled across the Rhine, on
bicycles and in carts, before the American Seventh Army. It
was crowded but silent, for the refugees were not welcome
where there was so little to eat already. Red pennants two
stories high hung on the undamaged buildings, with the swas-
tika on a white circle in the middle. The street names were
painted in black letters on -white on the faces of the curbs, to
guide drivers in the blackout. He had no trouble finding the
station. When he drew near it he saw a big banner across the
clock tower of the post office: HEELBRONN STEHT. Heilbronn
stands firm. The bomb had hit the station first, but the wind
had been east on Christmas Eve, so the post office next door
was untouched.

Coming or going, troops always gathered in the stations
even when there were no trains, as a family groups around the
236

chimney even when there is no fire. This Bahnhof had looked
like the one at Kempten, only bigger: a brownstone pediment
between brick wings. The roof was down and every window
blown out, but the Labor Corps had repaired the tracks. An
ersatz station of wood was built inside the carcass of the old.

Happy pushed open the swinging doors of the blackout
vestibule. A round counter in the middle of the waiting room
encircled two noncoms of the Transportation Corps. They
answered questions and stamped travel orders under the
FEONTLETTSTELXE sign. Happy spotted Corporal Ernst at a
glance "the sour-faced one" Behrend had said and smiled
to himself.

A hundred soldiers and reservists sat on benches beside a
long row of trestle tables, or slept huddled against the walls.
He could tell which troops had come from combat by the
netting on their helmets and by the vacant stare in the eyes of
those who were awake, and the exhaustion of those who had
flung themselves down to sleep. He could tell which were go-
ing forward. They were the ones who read and reread the
tattered papers on the tables, who paced the floor impatiently,
who looked up each time the door opened, who crowded the
canteen as if they would never eat or drink again, who warmed
themselves by stamping on the tile and flapping their arms
across their coats. The soldiers wore Kopfschiitzer under their
steel helmets like*the one he had worn on his jump. The Volks-
sturm wore eartabs under their melon-shaped hats, and rustled
when they walked, from the newspapers padded under their
braces. Across the opposite end of the shack stretched a green
curtain., to cut off the groans and the smell of disinfectant be-
hind. Combat troops were in there too. He had worked behind
such curtains himself.

The Rhine was fifty miles away, but Happy felt the enemy's
distant pressure in the furrowed haste of the Strength through
Joy helpers at the canteen, with no time now to be pleasant or
joke about the war; in the pitying soft-eyed kindliness of the

237

sergeant at the desk, and even in the sullen impatience of
Corporal Ernst beside him. The troops who lined up around
the counter asked no questions, as if they dared not hear, or
the noncoms utter, what the answers might be. They held out
their travel papers; the noncoms stamped them in silence:
Weitergeleitet Forwarded, Heilbronn, 20 Feb., 45.

Hung from the rafters just above their heads in the middle
of the shack, and printed on both sides so it could be seen by
everyone, floated a huge cloth sign reading THE ENEMY is
LISTENING. Each time the outer door opened and a soldier
came through the blackout vestibule it swayed on its ropes a
little in the half-light.

Happy had completed his mission already. It had been as
simple to find the divisions as walking down to the corner to
look for a mailbox. Most of the soldiers in the waiting room
knew where the headquarters were; many belonged to 9th
Flak or 25th Infantry themselves. Given time enough, he
could have found out their whole armament and TO. Any
casual in uniform could have found them as easily as he had.
Yet the enemy he called the Americans that, just as Steinberg
should thought his news so important that with great cun-
ning and some risk they had created the very Steinberg who
observed it; would even time their attack on the strength, of
what their fiction reported, hazarding the annihilation of the
two divisions, just because one spy had seen them, because
under the steel helmet of Corporal Steinberg were the watch-
ful eyes of Corporal Maurer.

Without seeming to watch, Happy waited for a break in the
lineup around the booth, for a moment when no one would be
near him to listen. When he saw it was empty at last, he
strolled across from his bench. He laid down his trip ticket,
stamped falsely at Bregenz for four days' leave and endorsed
truly at Memmingen and Uhn and Aalen. Corporal Ernst,
a stocky man with thin lips and glacier-blue eyes, stamped it
once more, automatically. He wore the runic symbol of the SS
238

on Ms collar, like this: l*L . Then he looked at the paper more
closely, almost incredulously.

"Look, Sergeant," he called to the other noncom, Tiered an
aviator who is on leave. Do you not suspect an airman who
takes leave? I wondered why the Yankee bombers have been
getting through lately. It's because Corporal what's his name?
Corporal Steinberg has been absent all this time. He has
been absent from a battery which might have defended the
tracks, enjoying himself in the Alps. Now he has decided to re-
turn via Mannheim. Perhaps he has been skiing, since he has
chosen himself a Mountain regiment, as if the Luftwaffe were
not good enough for him. Shall we offer him a special limou-
sine, or attach. Marshal Goring's ivory car to the troop train
that is taking his comrades to the front?"

He slid the travel order sourly along the linoleum counter,
turning back to stamp the papers of a newcomer. Happy
stepped along with it. He laid his reference from the colonel
beside it, in front of the sergeant.

"Oh, leave the kid alone," and even to Ernst the sergeant's
voice was kindly. "He's going back to the front, isn't he? Look,
he's even got a kind word from Colonel Forster. Isn't that
enough for you?"

He turned back to Happy, gazing myopicafly at the colonel's
signature through rimless spectacles.

"You can go on the train with the others tonight, Corporal,
if you want. Ill fix it up. You are in luck, because we haven't
got a train through in the last week, and I don't know when
we can again. Pay no attention to this Halunke. He's sore be-
cause he's going to the front himself. Just give me a minute
to think it out."

The sergeant was surrounded by even more papers than Cor-
poral Ernst. He scratched his fuzzy head with a pencil in what
appeared to be thought, but which Happy knew was only the
delaying of thought. His gaze was kindly but absent, as if he
postponed the routing of his troops while considering the

239

larger question of whether there was any use in routing them
at all. He does not seem like a sergeant, Happy thought; maybe
a ringer from the party. He picked up one of the rubber
stamps, frowning at the reversed lettering. He pounded it
on die travel order after Ernst's "Forwarded" and slid it
back to Happy. The stamp read "By express train to combat
station."

"Yes, for the first time in a week we have got together enough
rolling stock and fuel on the same night that the line is clear.
Even so, the train doesn't go right to the Rhine, but only as far
as Heidelberg. But there, with that stamp you can get aboard
with the others at eleven.

"Beyond Heidelberg," said the sergeant, shaking his head
and speaking low so that Ernst could not hear, "the tracks are
kaput. Yankee bombers, you know. No use the Labor Corps
repairing them, for the planes come over just as soon as they
finish work."

No, Happy thought, that doesn't sound like a party man;
more like an old timer impressed by a colonel's signature.

At Heidelberg the cliffs of the Odenwald suddenly drop to
the flat river plain which stretches on fifteen kilometers to
Mannheim and the Rhine itself. There was no cover whatever
on the plain. It would take the train all night to get even as far
as Heidelberg, the sergeant confided, because it stopped to pick
up recruits from many stations on the way. They would have
to get what rest they could in the train, eat breakfast the next
morning in the Heidelberg station, where the Red Cross would
have a canteen, and cross the plain on foot, for just yesterday
a plane had cut the trolley tracks.

"The gangsters haven't hit Heidelberg yet, you know. Maybe
they have some conscience after all. The train should get in at
four. You can cross the plain in darkness, if it is on time."

Nowadays when there were any trains at all in Germany,
they ran only at night, so as to escape the air raids. This train,
after unloading its passengers before sunrise, would steam back
240

to spend tomorrow in one of the tunnels under the steep cliffs
of the Neckar, out of sight and range of the Yankees.

"So you may as well hop on the same train, Corporal. They'll
feed you breakfast in Heidelberg, and you can march into
Mannheim with them afterward. There will even be a baggage
truck. It's only about three hours from Heidelberg, over good
flat ground."

Happy wanted to reach Mannheim as fast as he could, but
not by being shanghaied into a strange unit that might not let
him go when he got there.

"But look, Sarge," he broke in, "I have two more days' leave.
I don't have to report till day after tomorrow. See? It says so
on my trip ticket I'd like to see a little of the country. How
about stamping me to stop over in Heidelberg? As far as sleep
goes, I don't need much. Then I could take a hike through the
woods tomorrow and report in the next day, when I'm sup-
posed to."

The sergeant smiled indulgently. "Well, I don't see why not,
but don't turn the war into a Cook's tour. We don't have such
things as tickets on this train. You've already got the Tages-
stempel for today; get it in Heidelberg for tomorrow, and
check in the day after. But be sure you get there on time. It's
hard to give anyone special treatment these days, even officers,
and I wouldn't do it except for this reference from Colonel
Forster. Anyone who can get a kind word out of him deserves
the best. Just to make sure, 111 stamp *on leave* for you."

He pounded one more seal. Corporal Ernst was listen ing;
the three were alone at the counter again.

"In what branch of the Air Force is the Herr Tourist Cor-
poral?" Ernst asked softly.

The sergeant frowned. He would be the first to admit that
one must be vigilant, but it was not necessary to be cantanker-
ous. Without being asked for his Soldbuch, Happy laid it on
the counter between the two noncoms. Corporal Ernst pounced
on it. He studied it page by page.

241

"Steinberg, Steinberg," he muttered. "What a name for a Ger-
man soldier! I have heard of Jews named Steinberg. He is in
the Medical Corps, and yet he does not wear its armband."

Happy reached in his belt and pulled out the folded bras-
sard with the red cross on it He pinned it about his left arm;
the sergeant snapped the safety pins for him.

"The Tourist Corporal is in the Medical Corps, and yet he
appears to be carrying a rifle." Ernst riffled through the book
to page fourteen. "But I do not see that this rifle was issued to
him by any officer of the Wehrmacht See, there is no entry on
the page."

Laying the Soldbuch face down, he fished in a pigeonhole
under the counter and brought out his copy of the Blacklist. It
was green, like the one at Ulm. It was last week's. He turned
to the S page, but he did not find Steinberg on the list of the
hunted. He replaced the book, muttering, "A good soldier does
not ask for leave."

The sergeant whispered across, "Wouldst thou make him a
better soldier if thou sent him to the front without a rifle, for
the sake of the book?"

"It is last week's list. That Behrend, our mail orderly, is he
not of the Luftwaffe too? They hang together. He should have
brought the new one this afternoon, but nobody is on time any
more."

"Except thyself," mocked the sergeant, rolling his eyes at
Happy.

Not because this exchange had been overheard, but just be-
cause Happy had stood so long at the counter, a small crowd
began to gather. A soldier who had been sitting for an hour at
a wooden bench opened his eyes and strolled over. Another
followed, throwing down the torn copy of Die Wacht he had
already read through. (That was the daily of Nineteenth
Armee.) Then others, because the first two had moved.

The knot of soldiers looked dully at each of the noncoms in
turn as he spoke. Suspicion flickered in their eyes, reflecting
242

Corporal Ernst's suspicion. One of them felt for the bayonet
at his side, but let it go when the sergeant smiled at Happy.
Ernst was not convinced, but he did not dare risk a showdown
in front of the other troops. He shook his hands over his head
in defeat and hunched down over his stack of papers.

"When the new book comes, we shall see, 77 he muttered, but
he did not use the word Blacklist in the hearing of the others.

"Nobody is himself at such times, Corporal/' the sergeant
smiled to excuse his colleague, "not even I. The train comes in
at 2215 hours and leaves at 2300."

He closed the Soldbuch and returned it to Happy. The
crowd dissolved, returning to the benches. "Twenty-two-fif-
teen" was whispered from one man to the next, way down to
the end of the shack. They turned away, looking at Happy with
respect. He strolled to a bench, unstrapped his rifle, and fell
asleep, with his head resting on the knapsack which contained
the stolen Blacklist.

When he woke, the blackout curtains were drawn, The train
was in. The men, in columns of twos, were marching to the
platform. They were marching to defend the Rhine, some of
them in mountain hats with feathers in the bands, or in wool
scarves instead of hats, in hunting jackets or ski overalls, some
bending under lumpy sacks, some holding nothing but a greasy
paper package of food. The moon shone through the glassless
filigree of the steel trusses over the trainshed, but there was no
light on the platform itself except the glare from the locomotive
boiler, which a stoker fed with logs of wood, his bare torso glis-
tening in the orange light from the firebox. The eight boxcars,
with DKUTSCHE REiGHSBAHN stenciled on the sides, waited with
gaping doors. The troops did not break rank to enter, but
climbed in pair by pair, each man laying his gear on the slats
and helping himself up by gripping the doorjambs. Sometimes
the young had to help the old. The cars were filled in order, the
later ones standing empty till the first were full. The two non-
coms ran silently along the platform, sliding the doors shut

243

and ordering the men inside to throw the bolts. For fear of air
raids, they did not lock the doors outside. There was none of
the peacetime confusion no shouting, no whistling, no fare-
wells.

There was no light inside the car either. Happy found by
touch that three tiers of slat bunks were hinged to the wall, and
that straw was spread on the floor for those who found no room
on the bunks. He jostled against someone as he reached for a
bunk; the other man was reaching for it too, and Happy heard
him sigh with fatigue. It was the last empty bunk.

"Bitte," said Happy, releasing it, and lay down in a corner
of the straw, straining his eyes toward the square of the still
open door. And Corporal Ernst, as he slid the door shut, stared
straight at him, and the moonlight came through the trusses
full on his face. Then someone dropped the throwbolt. The
men settled to sleep in their clothes, just as they were, jostling
each other in the dark.

The train started. It crept jerkily along the bank of the
Neckar, stopping at the towns on the way, where Happy could
hear the reinforcements climbing into the cars behind him. It
was passing the castles and terraced vineyards of the ancient
river, past Mosbach, and Eberbach, and Hirschhorn.

Someone started to hum "Die Wacht am Khein"; another
took it up, and soon the car was shaking to the roar of forty
voices which drowned the swing and pound of the wheels.
Happy sang it with the others, shouting it up to the echoing
tarred vault of the catrlecar from the clump of straw under his
head.

There strikes a call like thunder- Es braust ein Ruf wie Donner-

clap, hall,

Like clash of swords and beat Wie Schwertgeklirr und Wogen-

of waves; prall;

The Rhine, the Rhine, the Ger- Zum Rhein, zum Rhein, zum

man Rhine, deutschen Rhein,

Who will guard the sacred Wer will des Stromes Hiiter

stream? sein?

244

When the chorus reached that line someone cut in,
TDie Funf-und-zwanzigste." The 25th Division. Everybody
laughed. The chorus ended and the men drifted off into their
uncomfortable sleep.

245

Ten

Happy slept too. Though the train backed and shunted over
spur tracks to skip the damage on the main line, though it
roared and smoked in the frequent tunnels, and though the
recruits who boarded at the 'river stations shouted and cursed
in the dark, he did not waken till the tracks crossed from the
right bank of the Neckar to the left on the truss-bridge at
Neckargemtind. The creaking of the wheels on the sharp S turn
roused the whole earful.

"The bridge is mined," someone whispered. "That is why we
have to take it slow/'

But they could not see outside, for no one dared slide the
door without orders, and the sun had not risen to shine through
the chinks in the siding. The men on the bunks clambered
down to the floor, stumbling over the men on the straw. The
men on the straw groped to their feet like cattle stxmibling up
in a barn. Even when all were standing there was hardly room
to move. They swayed helplessly, like the PWs Happy had seen
at the cage. He peered at the luminous dial of his watch; it was
half -past four. The train was still ten kilometers short of Hei-
246

delberg, and the sun would be rising soon. That meant the
column would have to cross the plain in daylight.

At one end of the car was a primitive wooden box-latrine.
One of the Volkssturm drew a farm lantern from his sack and
hung it on the wall above. In the center of the opposite wall a
Lister-bag of water swayed from a hook in the ceiling. Happy
pulled out the flashlight Chuck had given him. He held it to
light the men who wanted to drink and flush their faces with
the water, but it was still too dark to see his way between the
two points of light in the sealed boxcar. He had to stand to
avoid being stepped on, and grope for the next man's shoulders
to find his place in the lines.

The tracks skirt Heidelberg through a tunnel under the south
slope of the town, and emerge to the station through a stone
arch at the west end. When the train stopped, they heard Cor-
poral Ernst barking "Aufmachen," so they slid open the doors.
The cold half-light of the dawn flooded the car. The reservist
blew out his lantern and stowed it in his sack. He pulled out an
old-fashioned stem-winder.

"Two hours late,'* he announced.

From the tightened lips and furtive glances of the others,
Happy saw that they knew as well as he that they must cross
the plain without cover of darkness. No one spoke. They
climbed out in pairs just as they had climbed in. Coughing and
cramped, they formed a double line on the platform in the
same order as the night before, the first half in uniform and the
second in civilians, with the Volkssturm brassard on their arms
and packs on their shoulders. Corporal Ernst was already
standing opposite the center of the train. He held a pennant
with the sword-flame of the 25th. An infantry lieutenant stood
behind Trirr> on the concrete platform, against the brick wall of
the station. Happy fell in at the end like a file closer, the only
man there in the blue uniform of the Luftwaffe.

The others did not notice him, thinking he was assigned to
the column for first aid. But when the corporal called the roll

247

the two men next to him stared, seeing that his name was not
called. The corporal gazed at him too, then wheeled to the lieu-
tenant. His voice was icy.

"All present, Herr Leutnant, and one casual on leave, who
has managed to get permission to travel by this train/'

The lieutenant returned his salute. The wire gates at the end
of the tracks had been closed behind the train, locking the
troops inside the station. The corporal ordered them to break
ranks and carry their baggage to a truck waiting at the north
exit to the courtyard. The lieutenant announced that the trip
across the plain to Mannheim would be made on foot, with
squads spaced a hundred yards apart, for dispersal in case of
air attack. Even as he spoke, Happy heard the distant gunfire
begin. The sun had risen.

When the men had piled their baggage in the truck they
crowded into the waiting room, where Red Cross aides had
set up a canteen for breakfast.

"Red Cross at the front, Strength through Joy at the rear,"
someone muttered.

The luckiest troops were those who had no baggage, for they
reached the counter first. The others stood three deep, with
mess kits open waiting their turns. Happy carried nothing but
his knapsack and his rifle, yet he waited too. Everybody had
as much as he could eat: porridge, ersatz coffee, and black
bread with margarine and jam.

But one man, about fifty years old, in a threadbare civilian
coat with the brassard on his arm, did not even try to stand in
the crowd at the counter. He hobbled to the bench against the
wall and sat down. He caught Happy's eye, beckoning to him.

"Herr Corporal, as you are of the Medical Corps, will you
look at my right foot, please? It is so blistered that I cannot
walk. I came forty kilometers from my farm to Heilbronn yes-
terday. That would be nothing if I were younger. And we have
been trained only on Sundays."

Happy knelt on the floor, standing his rifle against the
248

wall. He unlaced the manure-stained boots. Though the uppers
looked sound, the soles were made of pieces of crudely shaped
wood with a layer of burlap nailed against the vamps all
around. The heel, the ball, the toes of the reservist's foot were
three separate blisters which had burst, leaving the raw flesh
to press upon the splintered sole. The sock was worn through.
What other socks he may have had were in the baggage truck.
Happy opened his own knapsack and drew out a pair of his
blue Air Force socks, pushing the orange Blacklist to the bot-
tom first. They were the ones Maria had darned. The man
stared at the clean pair.

"Will they punish me in the Army for wearing Luftwaffe
socks?" he asked. "There was no Luftwaffe that I knew of in
the other war."

Happy laughed. "No, and they are certainly more regulation
than the ones you have. Change the other sock yourself if you
can, and you'd better rinse them both, for the wool will come
in handy for darning mine when they give out again."

The reservist smiled shyly down at Happy. "The Army isn't
so bad after all, is it?" he said. "No matter how we old timers
complain."

His hands were gripping the edge of the bench to keep his
foot from the pressure of the floor. He did not wince when
Happy covered the skinless patches with Sepso and wrapped
them with gauze from his kit Then he sighed with relief .

"Thank you, my son; that feels better. I could even eat a lit-
tle breakfast, but I did not think to bring a cup from the farm.
In the old days the Army issued mess kits the first day. Perhaps
later, in Mannheim, I shall receive one."

"I'm not hungry yet. Look after my rifle for a moment, and
111 bring you something."

He unbuckled his own zinc mess kit and stood in the back
row of hungry soldiers. When the sister filled the containers at
last, he turned from the crowded counter, elbowing his way
back across the room. Through the glass door to the platform

249

he caught the eye of the infantry lieutenant, who beckoned to
him. He set his full plate and cup on the bench beside the
fanner. He pushed open the door to the platform and stood
before the lieutenant.

"Who are you?" The lieutenant looked him up and down, his
hands behind his back.

"Corporal Steinberg, Herr Leutnant, from Bregenz Hospital,
on convalescent leave, reporting to the 136th Mountain Regi-
ment at the front.'*

"Leave!" the lieutenant burst out. "When my troops have to
walk fifteen kilometers across the unprotected plain, you are on
leave from the Air Force. Leave! The very train that brought
you here has to hide in a tunnel all day because the Air Force
is too weak to defend it Do you know that no leave has been
granted on the whole Rhine front for the last three days? That
*s how serious things are. Leave! And yet, for all that, you bind
an old man's feet."

"Yes, sir, I don't think he can walk as far as Mannheim."

"Very well, Corporal; if you so advise I will order him to ride
on the top of the baggage. Tell me, do you always minister to
strangers without orders?"

"Well, sir, I didn't see you in the waiting room."

"And even to the enemy, perhaps?"

"We have done so, sir, at Cassino when we shot down Ameri-
can fliers."

"Ah, there were days when our Flak shot down the gang-
sters," said the lieutenant heavily. "One forgets. You will see
that they have spared Heidelberg for some reason. Eat your
breakfast and resume your leave. I cannot command you to
join us, if your orders give you a stopover; but do not be late
to your regiment. In you the Reich has not only one more liv-
ing soldier, but the many more whom you may save. Get your
travel order stamped today. Here, I'll stamp it for you now."

He signed the "Forwarded, Heidelberg" seal. It was the last
check Happy would need.
250

"Allow plenty of time to reach die Rhone bridge, for there
will be gunfire. As a single traveler you may perhaps get a ride
in a truck if you wait till nightfall, while I must let these poor
devils march because I have no transportation for them. I
thank you, Corporal. Heil Hitler!"

He turned his back, still holding his shoulders square.

Happy returned to the waiting room. He picked up "his mess
kit from the bench beside the veteran; he washed it at the
pump built into the wall over an iron drain in the floor, and
scoured it with his piece of sandy soap. The others had finished
breakfast; they waited for the order to fall in. They sat on every
available inch of the bench around the hall. The Red Cross
aides were cleaning up. Happy was hungry, for he had had no
supper the night before, wanting to save the chicken and
cheese for his last day. He crossed to the counter. One of the
sisters looked at him in surprise.

"We cannot give seconds, Corporal. Did you not have
enough before?**

"That was for a comrade, Sister."

She shrugged her shoulders; she did not believe him* But the
other women were not looking, so she filled his cup with coffee
and ladled porridge into the kidney-shaped plate, with bread
and margarine and jam on the side. He ate it standing alone at
the counter, his back to the roomful of troops. He heard some-
one grumble, 'The Luftwaffe has all the luck.* 7 He finished it
standing by himself, the only airman in the crowd of infantry.

Then the grumbling ended abruptly; the rattling of mess kits
and shuffling of feet ceased. They heard the wail of an air-raid
siren and then the whine of a plane flying low, growing louder
as it came in from the west Happy knew the sound. He had
heard it, shivering inside the bomb bay, and dropping through
the air, and staring up from the ground beside a woodpile. The
plane was an A-26, higher-pitched than a Liberator as a wasp
is shriller than a bee. The troops fell silent, though the windows
were still locked and curtained. Even the Red Cross sisters,

251

who must have fed many combat details before, froze with the
unwashed dishes in their hands. They were silent, thinking
the silence could hide them, as a hen lies still in the dust when
she sees the shadow of a hawk.

There was no reaction from the German Flak; he felt that the
others accused him for its silence. The A-26 is a rooftop plane.
Perhaps it flew too low for the Flak trajectory, which can de-
press only five degrees. Through the curtains he could not tell.
Then the whine soared and died away as suddenly as it had
come. They heard the belated chatter of their own Flak, so
dose to them that the windows rattled. The all clear sounded,
and the whole roomful sighed out their pent-in breath. Happy
did not dare to turn and face them.

He hoped the fall-in would be given before he had to turn,
but he could no longer delay sopping up his plate, for the sis-
ters stared at him, waiting for him to finish so they could clean
up and escape to the shelters during the lull. They need not
stare, he thought; it was only a reconnaissance plane and had
dropped no bombs. There would be no harm to Heidelberg
till it did drop the bomb, as there was no harm in what Stein-
berg saw till Maurer told it to the enemy.

He had to turn around and face the silent crowd. He found
himself looking straight into the eyes of Corporal Ernst, who
sat at the end of the bench beside the platform door eyes that
stared at him without blinking. Happy felt himself redden; he
could not shift his own. Just then the lieutenant leaned in and
touched the corporal on the shoulder. At once the corporal
sprang to his feet and gave the order to fall in.

The covey of recruits rose with, a swish of coatskirts and a
rattle of tinware. They filed in pairs through the double doors;
they formed in the courtyard in the order of the night before.
Happy picked up his rifle and followed them, not knowing
what else to do. The place of the reservist with the blistered
feet was empty; he himself was looking back at the column
from the top of the baggage piled in the open-backed truck,
252

The corporal ordered the left column one step forward to fill
the gap.

The older reservists were first in the line, the youngsters next
Corporal Ernst brought up the rear, a rifle on his back and the
pennant in his hand. The lieutenant faced the column from the
head, a saber over his shoulder, marking time. The column
lifted its feet in unison with his "Eins, zwei." Happy marked
time with the rest. The lieutenant wheeled. *Abteilung, ohne
Tritt, MarschF * he commanded. The baggage truck moved
forward at the head. The column swung into step behind it.
They filed through the pink stone arches of the courtyard, leav-
ing Happy alone on the paving.

He felt deserted, as he had in childhood when the family left
him alone in Trebbin if they went to the city for the day, turn-
ing the big key in the front door while he watched with his
chin on the window sill.

He heard the stationmaster lock the platform door. The three
sisters came out in their raincoats, and he locked the waiting-
room door behind them with another big key from the bunch
hung on his belt.

"Bitte sehr. w Happy smiled to them, waving them through
the arch. They looked at him sharply, but did not answer.
Happy passed out behind them into the square. They disap-
peared together around the corner of the station, with a last
glance over their shoulders. They would run to the Komman-
dantur, he knew, to report him; a single suspicious airman loose
in the city, left behind by the combat troops, and not attached
to any formation as far as they could see. A sign across the
square read: "Hotel Europe Victoria, Radium Sol-Bad." He
could do with any kind of bath after his night in the troop
train.

He followed the column leftward to the river, but no farther,
for he was on leave. He leaned on the stone parapet. The
Neckar burst through the dike of cliSs to his right; to his left

* "Column, forward march!"

253

the impatient stream grew still, softening from the reflection of
the beech-carpet to mirror the silver dawn, and broadening
byetween flat sandy banks to wander westward to the Rhine.
The city was behind him. He could hear it waken. The sounds
of morning came from inside the shuttered houses. Geese cack-
led to the rumble of the distant gunfire. Somewhere a donkey
brayed. The few people who had emerged outdoors, from the
cellars or the air-raid shelters, moved close to the walls. Those
who walked eastward stared down at the sidewalk, hunching
their shoulders as if to ward off a blow from behind. Those
who walked westward turned their faces to the sky. They lis-
tened; everyone in Germany listened, as one listens in a
thunderstorm, counting the seconds between the flash and the
clap to judge the distance of the bolt.

The troop slogged straight north across the New Bridge, so
he guessed they would hug the shelter of the Odenwald cliff
before breaking left across the plain to Mannheim. He turned
right toward the Old Bridge, where sightseers always go. He
walked through a stone arch between two pink towers, and
was on the river. The marble statue of some forgotten elector
gestured on the parapet, with two fingers chipped off. Where
had he seen a three-fingered hand? He did not stop to remem-
ber. Beyond the bridge spread a smaller square, and behind it
the great palisade of the Odenwald paraded out of sight to the
north. At the top of the first hill, which makes the river's shoul-
der, he saw a watchtower. He turned to the left along the base
of the gorge. From the map he had bought in Crailsheim he
knew it was the Bismarck-Turin. A double-hairpin road bucked
up the cliff to it. This road, he saw on a sign, was the Philo-
sophenweg: the Philosophers* Walk. Happy clambered up it,
his equipment slapping and rattling on his back, between the
clumps of fir and leafless beech. They climbed the road with
him, clutching their footholds in the brown grass or green moss
between their roots. There were iron railings at the side for
support, but many of the bars had been wrenched out for their
254

metal. His father had told him Heidelberg w#s the most beauti-
ful town in Germany, and the Philosophers' Walk its loveliest
woodpath.

At least he was alone. If you had to define a soldier, he
thought, it would not be as a man who carries a rifle. Many of
the Volkssturm had no rifle. It would be as a man who is never
alone.

Beyond the first houses the woods on each side of the zigzag
path were thick and dark. Crosspaths led off at intervals, but
he remembered that the black lozenge of the Odenwald Klub,
on the signs at every junction, would lead him to the plateau
and the tower at the top. When he reached the summit he was
panting from the climb. In spite of the cold, his whole body
sweated.

The tower stood in the center of an untended clearing. Seed-
lings of beech and fir had sprouted from the matted grass
around it; The red stone cylinder rose twenty yards among
them, pierced by slit windows, to a balcony at the top. It
seemed to be empty. There were no wheelmarks on the ground
and no wires overhead. He wondered why the Flak had not
set up a battery, or at least an observation post, at such a van-
tage point Perhaps just because the enemy would expect it.
The Bismarck tower was an easy target

Before he entered the tower he walked carefully around the
whole fifty-yard plateau. Though an agent must ever be watch-
ing, he must never be seen to watch. It is not easy. He walked
softly, but without purpose, stopping to pick a checkerberry or
chew a twig of young birchbark, and searching from the cor-
ners of his eyes for whatever might lurk in the underbrush.
Then round again, close to the base of the tower, as aimless as
before.

The studded door in the base sagged loose. He wondered
why it had not been salvaged for scrap. The lock had been
pried off. The floor inside was stone. A stone staircase angled
its way to the platform at the top, the dust thick on the treads.

255

The light from the slit windows filtered down through cobwebs
and drifted leaves. A round millstone on a pedestal served as a
picnic table, but if there had been any benches they were gone
now, probably stolen for firewood. He creaked the door shut
and wedged his rifle into the keeper so that no one could open
It from outside.

He kid a few leaves from his guidebook on the floor. He kin-
dled them with his lighter, cupping the blazing paper to be
sure there was a draft up the shaft of the tower. He laid his
knapsack on the millstone and lifted out the stolen copy of the
Blacklist from the bottom. He turned to the S page. He read in
full what he had only dared glance at in the coloners room:
STEINBERG, KARL, so-called Medical Corporal of the Luftwaffe.
Believed to be an enemy agent, parachuted near Schongau
17 February. May be armed. About nineteen. Deliver alive to
nearest station. Height one meter ninety, eyes gray, complexion
ruddy, mustache fair.

He ripped out the page and set it afire on the floor, stamping
the curled gray ash when it had burned. He had to run tibe risk
that the smoke might be seen outside. The rest of the book he
ripped in half, for it was too thick to burn in one piece.

He fed the fragments on top of the S page, throwing them to
the fire as fast as they would burn, with the sergeant's circulars
for fuel. It took minutes, for the book was thick, with the
names of hundreds who were hunted. It charred from the bot-
tom; the orange binding was the last to blacken. The flame
caught a cobweb in the corner; the cobweb withered and
curled. He shivered; but with the Blacklist burned at least the
evidence against him was no longer on his own back. He
stamped on the ashes again.

No panic, he warned himself. He unbuckled his knapsack
wide and drew out the cheese and the chicken. Spreading Frau
Bense's waxed paper on the millstone, he cut the food in half
with his bayonet. Each half would make one good meal. He
wrapped one to eat tomorrow, for he could not be store of get-
256

ting back to the Golden Well in time for the Ami mess. He ate
the other with his fingers to avoid dirtying his mess kit there
was no water in the tower threw the bones in the corner, and
licked his fingers clean. He ate the cheese in its rind. The bayo-
net point pried out the cork of the Niersteiner. He filled his
canteen first, then drank the rest and stood the empty under
the stairs.

No panic, he repeated, but he climbed the stairs two at a
time, steep as they were. At the top he pushed open a door. He
was on the little balcony which ran around the peak Heidel-
berg clustered far below him to the left, its tile roofs so close
together they seemed like a red carpet flung on the opposite
hill. Even now there was no smoke from the chimneys, and
what sound there might be did not float up. Above the town,
and almost on a level with his tower, stood the ruins of the old
castle, with the sunlight staring through the sashless windows
of the sandstone walls which the French had gutted two cen-
turies ago. But the Schloss seemed no more lifeless than the
paralyzed living city lying intact below it. Before him the river
plain stretched westward to the Rhine and out of sight to north
and south, checkered with fences and hedgerows, pitted with
swamps, dotted with toolsheds and barns. This plain is the
truck garden of Western Germany. The soil is too fertile to
waste on trees, as the forest at the Golden Well was too valu-
able to cut for crops, and the few farm villages hug close to-
gether to leave room for tobacco and strawberries and aspara-
gus. On the left bank of the Neckar he saw the white ribbon of
the Autobahn sweep out of a wood, veer west with the river
and north again at the Mannheim bypass, to disappear intc
another wood. He saw where the coupled trolleys had been
bombed. The staves and journals of the carriages sprawled on
both, sides of the track like a neatly split lobster shell. The rails
twisted and clawed upward. It had been a bull's-eye hit There
were pits peppered along the Autobahn too, like pictures of
the craters on the moon. He could understand why trains no

257

longer moved in the unprotected valley, why tanks and trucks
near the front could not use the Autobahn but had to stick to
sheltered roads, and why the lieutenant had led the column
under the hillside though Happy could not see the foot to
the shelter of the farmlands, instead of across the long bright
target of the highway. He could see no defense, yet an 8.8 em-
placed on the crest below his tower, with its range of sixteen
kilometers, could have commanded the plain as far as Mann-
heim and itself been invisible from ground or air.

The Rhine plain was a painted deck where nothing moved:
no cattle grazing, for they had been slaughtered; no trees bow-
ing to the wind, for they had been cut for firewood; no sheets
flapping in the sunshine, for the farmsteads were deserted or
shut tight; no refugees escaping across it, for they dared
not travel in daylight Patches of windblown snow flecked the
checkerboard of brown hedges and yellow fields. Then, as his
eyes grew used to the distance, he saw his column of troops
crawling across it like an inchworm, from the lee of the cliff,
the corporal's pennant at the tail, and far ahead of them, almost
as far as he could see, the smudge which must be Mannheim*
He might not have made out Mannheim at all except for the
gunfire which darted toward it at intervals like those neon
arrows which urge you into a bar. The smoke-pall which co-
cooned the site of the city puffed and sprouted, now black,
now yellow, now at one end, now at the other, to the same
cadence as the flashes. Though he could barely see Mannheim
and not hear it at all, he could smell it; for the lazy strata of the
upper air freighted across to him the distant sickly scent of
decay, out of reach of nostrils on the plain. It came, he knew,
from bodies under the rubble, piling higher even while he
stared. He had smelled it from the other hilltop at Cassino.

Out of sight on the far horizon, he knew, stretched the left

bank of the Rhine, as broad as the right, where the Hardt

marches opposite the Odenwald and the Vosges opposite the

Black Forest From the windows of the Golden Well, even

258

now, the other Joes could almost look down to Mannheim and
across to him. He was looking at the Rhine as he had looked
at it five days before, but from the opposite side, as if he had
circumnavigated the earth and returned to where he started.
Steinberg looked across the battle to Maurer.

Then out of invisibility came the sharp droning of a plane,
the flash of her wings, the whine as she dove, and then the chat-
ter of her guns. The A-26 was back, with eight fifties spitting
from her nose and four from her tail. She was dipping to rake
the column on the road. They had seen the danger first. The
black rods of the inchworm, each of which was a squad, scat-
tered into dots which were men, running to each side and roll-
ing into the gutter under the hedgerows. Even before the first
of them melted into the earth he heard the answer of the Ger-
man Flak, to right and left of him along the cliff below. There
was a battery after all! They were the Vierling 2 cms. he had
heard so often before, like his own platoon's. The four snouts
spit eight hundred rounds a minute. The clatter-back of the
quadruple breeching, the creak as the carriage swiveled with
the range finder, and the whipping of the belt against the
shield as the piece took up they were sweet to his ears, and
he sniffed the cordite and the hot grease. He could not see the
guns through the trees, but from the sound one piece seemed
sited on the hill across the Neckar, back of the Schloss, and the
other on the wooded crest somewhere to his right. A sapling
in the forest below him groaned and split, sawn through by a
blade of bullets, but he could not tell whether they were Ger-
man or Ami. The arc of its fall crossed the outskirts of his
vision; the tree tottered and crashed among the rest, but he
ignored it, trying to keep his eyes on the attacking plane.

She banked and wheeled round after the single volley, un-
hurt, and in less time than he could have told it she was out of
sight again in the west. The miserable dots crept back to the
road again as one of them it must have been the lieutenant
danced left and right to urge them forward. The column re~

259

formed, but this time in single file, thinner and longer, hugging
the left side and creeping faster they were really running
toward what shelter they could find in the village of Ladenburg
ahead. The sunlight struck a blade; the lieutenant was beating
them forward with his sabre. Yet Happy was sure that the big
dot of the pack truck was left behind, and that a smaller one
SL man was still lying in the hedgerow.

He had a job to do. He clattered down the stairs. He seized
his knapsack from the millstone and wrenched his rifle from the
door, swinging them both over his back. He pushed open the
sagging door, strapping his steel helmet as he ran across
the clearing.

The black-lozenge signs flashing past him led to a ravine that
would drop him down to the valley. He skirted some ivied
ruins; the guidebook had said they were an ancient basilica. He
panted to the last lozenge, at the head of the steep path, as
steep as the trail down which he had fled from the warden.
The soles of his boots grooved on the pebbles as he slid down
it. The tail of his too-long overcoat caught on snags. His hands,
blistering even through the mittens, grasped at the saplings as
he slithered down, then let them snap back when he found a
new footing. A millstream tumbled downhill beside him; there
were seven mills on seven terraces, but the wheels were not
turning and the water sluiced past them and on down the cliff.

Within a quarter of the time it had taken to climb Philoso-
phers' Walk he was at the foot of the Odenwald, in the village
of Schriesheim. It was as smokeless and shuttered as Heidel-
berg. Through the slits in the tops of the shutters there must
have been eyes which had watched the attack and which,
watched him now, and in the hidden batteries above were the
eyes of his own Luftwaffe. Without glancing to the side, he ran
across the cobbles between the houses. In a few minutes the vil-
lage street led him out to the checkerboard of gardens. The
road stretched ahead of him between the hedges, as straight
as a ruler. In half an hour, running all the way, he could see
260

the place of the dive bombing. Ahead of him, in the gutter to
the left, the baggage truck was tilted to its axle. It must have
been struck, though from the distance he could see no damage.
Perhaps a slug had hit the motor or the tires, he thought, and
put the truck out of action without destroying it. The baggage
was scattered on the road, and the old man was gone.

The straggling line was fading out of sight toward the pall
of smoke that hung over the river city. It had lost all discipline,
lost even the form of a column. Some of the stronger ones were
still running; the older ones limped behind as best they could,
keeping off the center of the road, hobbling in the gullies and
along the wire fence, making their way across the plowed fields
in the shelter of the hedges. As Happy crossed the millbrook
he saw the column pass into the undamaged village of Laden-
burg. One terror-stricken soldier was beating at the door of
the first farmhouse, but the door did not open; and in a mo-
ment the lieutenant, bringing up the rear to force the stragglers
ahead, drove him forward with the others. If a soldier stum-
bled or strayed into the fields to escape, the lieutenant threat-
ened him with his pistol. Twice Happy saw him fire over a
coward's head. The lieutenant -was merciful not to kill him, yet
if it were not for the pistol, Happy knew, the whole mass
would have fled backward to the protection of the cliffs.

As he drew nearer to the farmhouse he saw that it was de-
serted not only silent like the houses in Schriesheim and Hei-
delberg, but abandoned. The farmer must have driven ids
stock before him and fled with what possessions he could, at
night, across the no man's land of the plain to the towns which
sheltered under the palisade of the Odenwald. A few panes of
glass were broken, a few shutters unhinged, a few tiles tilted
off the roofs, but otherwise the house was not hurt. Frost
coated the old manure in the yard. Some of the slugs from the
plane's machine gun scattered across the road, along with the
steel splinters of the Vierling shells which had burst on impact
and the yellow cases of those which had not. In air attacks,

261

enemy fire and friendly can be equally dangerous to the
ground.

The place where the truck had stalled was a kilometer be-
yond Ladenburg. Happy hurried forward; he saw why the
truck had foundered. A shot had ripped the left rear tire. The
driver had skidded across the road into a culvert. The truck
leaned over to its left axle-ends, resting on the dented cylinder
of corrugated steel. Nobody was in sight.

As he paused and he knew he could not pause for long a
shot cracked behind him and a bullet sang past his ear. He
leaped around, his rifle slapping his buttocks. It is not easy to
locate a shot instantly, and the nearer it is, the harder to tell
the direction. He scanned the hedgerow from left to right, and
then he saw the source. A wisp of smoke still hung in the air a
hundred yards behind him, curling from under the branches of
a dwarf spruce tree. Staring at the truck, he had not noticed
when he passed the man. Happy dropped to the ground, rolling
instinctively into the gully on the left side. The shot was not re-
peated. In the opposite ditch, under the smoke, he saw a man.

He edged backward on his stomach to the shelter of the rear
wheels of the truck, as he had backed away from the woodpile
the morning of his jump. Cautiously he tilted his helmet and
looked back. A Luger, still smoking, lay in the powdery snow
on the shoulder of the road opposite him.

Happy rabbitskinned the strap of his rifle over the crown of
his helmet. He cocked it with the catch at Teuer." The man
was lying with his head to the west. Happy crept on his belly
along his own ditch far enough so that if his enemy should try
to shoot again he would have to face the sun.

Happy stood up warily, his finger still on the trigger. He
crept toward the Luger. Corporal Ernst lay in the snow which
had drifted into the gully. His own blood had melted a depres-
sion about him and lay as jelly lies in a mold, taking its shape
from the hollow of the dish. His field-gray coat had been torn
open, and the left leg of his trousers torn down by a projectile
262

from the A-26. Happy saw the end of the splintered femur,
protruding through the skin of the thigh. From a wound below
the corporal's chest more blood still leached into the puddle.
The foreleg, living, beat in spasm like the arms of the dead
saboteur at Aalen. The right arm lay angled upward over the
edge of the ditch above the pistol it had dropped, already in-
capable of flexion. The steel helmet had fallen back from Cor-
poral Ernsfs face. His lips were closed over the clamped jaws.
His breath fluttered shallow through his distended nostrils,
sparing his wound the pain of motion.

Happy tossed his own rifle on the ground. It made no noise
in the drifted snow. He rolled back the sleeve of the corporal's
right arm. He fumbled in his kit for the hypodermic needle.
This was his own needle, which he had refilled with morphine
after the colonel's shot. It could not save the corporal now, but
it would ease his pain. The corporal's eyes rolled slowly to the
right, but he could not move his head with them. All he could
say was, "Corporal Steinberg."

His very pause before Happy's alias put it in the quotation
marks of falsehood.

Happy put his left arm behind the corporal's head, and the
corporal could not resist With his right hand he unbuttoned
the collar of the coat, then of the tunic, tiben of the shirt, to let
the corporal breathe. On a chain around Corporal Ernst's neck,
instead of a soldier's zinc oval, hung the oblong silver dogtag of
the Gestapo, with his number on one side and the words
"Secret State Police" on the other.

Happy pulled the flask from his belt and unscrewed the cap.
He held the flask of wine against the clenched teeth. But the
corporal, with his last breath, spat the wine back between
them, mixed with his own blood. His head, his rigid arm, his
shattered leg went limp. His mouth still closed and his eyes
still open, Corporal Ernst died in Happy's arms, never to tell
what he had guessed, or how.

"Kamerad," Happy breathed.

263

He stood up, shading his eyes from the glare o the roadside.
It was empty in both directions; the sky was empty. He un-
strapped the corporal's steel helmet and drew his wool Kopf-
schiitzer down to cover the face. He could drag the body to
the shelter of the truck, but it was too heavy for him to lift in-
side. The corporal had no rifle; the others in the column would
have been crazy not to take it when they left him. But the
sword-flame pennant lay beside him in the snow, trampled by
muddy boots. Happy drove the pointed brass tip of the staff
into the frozen ground with hammer blows from the dead
man's helmet. When it was secure he wound the chin strap of
the helmet over the staff for a signal. As soon as the sun faded,
the refugees would start out of the city. They would have carts;
they could carry him to a soldier's burial. Lastly he pulled out
of his knapsack the wooden rosary he had bought in Kaufbeu-
ren for Pere Nod. He folded the corporal's hands across his
tunic with the rosary between them.

He stumbled ahead toward Mannheim again, trotting as long
as he could, then walking to regain his breath. His rifle slapped
against his back when he ran. The road passed under the Auto-
bahn. As he had seen from the tower, the paving at the under-
pass was pocked and heaved by the shelling. If the Amis had
dropped the bridge, they would have blocked both roads.
Water welled up into the bomb craters through the ruptured
earth, and the snow melted down into them. There was an un-
finished roadblock at the underpass. He picked his way through
the passage left for the carts of the refugees.

At the suburb of Wallstadt the road swung to the left. The
half-timbered gables of the farmsteads began to give way to
the sandstone and stucco of the city. He was approaching the
Neckar bridge into Mannheim itself. Many roads funnel to-
gether from the plain at the Neckar bridge. Across the ap-
proach lay the carcass of the Brown-Boveri electric factory,
and next it a big drill ground and barracks behind a stone arch.
The arch was lettered KAISER-WELHELM KASKRNE in old-fash-
264

ioned Gothic carving, but the arrow by the driveway bore a
square flag-symbol and the abbreviation "69th Hy. Arty.
Repl. Regt." There was no sentry in the box. Through the arch
^ a PP7 saw & at & e windows of the barracks were blown out,
perhaps by the same blast that had wrecked the factory.

But 69th Heavy Artillery was no longer there, and was not
his assignment anyway. He kept on toward the bridge. From
all the roads that debouched to it, soldiers were marching to-
ward the city, singly or in pairs. There were never enough
together to form a squad. It was four o'clock. A big engineer
sergeant, half a head taller than Happy, swung up behind
him and fell into step.

"Where are you going, Junge?" he asked jovially. "You look
out of place for this action. Still, if the city had seen a little
more of the Air Corps and of the Medical Corps, it wouldn't
be the mess it is today." He slowed down to match Happy's
shorter steps, easing his rifle to a more comfortable angle on
his back.

"Tm crossing the Rhine to report at Neustadt," Happy told
him. "But I didn't know I'd run into anything like that." He
nodded his head toward the clouds and smoke of the bom-
bardment.

The sergeant laughed sourly. "Well, you'll have an exciting
trip, but you're safe till you get to the Rhine. At least the
gangsters are aiming away from the center of town. This is not
what the Tommies call a Baedeker attack."

**My last day of leave." Happy grimaced.

The sergeant whistled. "You've got nerve to keep going for-
ward, but I suppose you have to. If I had orders like that I'd
just hide out. You must have had a good long leave, not to
know how things have changed in the last week. Have a ciga-
rette? Ill roll one for you. The tobacco is grown right on this
plain. Some of us are working on a roadblock out toward Bens-
heim, where the brass is set up in a cave. A farmer gave us a
kilo of his tobacco between us. It isn't so bad at that."

265

With one hand lie rolled the cigarette, holding his pouch in
the other and his gloves between his teeth.

"Wait a minute; don't take off your mittens. If s too cold. I've
got a lighter. 9 *

It was good that Happy did not have to take them off, for
his hands were wet with the corporal's blood. There was a
little on his cuffs and some on the skirt of his overcoat, but the
sergeant did not notice as he set the cigarette between Happy's
lips. Bloodstains do not show up on the blue-gray of the Luft-
waffe.

"I'm lucky," sighed the sergeant. "I spend the nights in
the air-raid shelter just off the Bismarck-platz. Some of the
fellows still have orders to cross the Rhine, like you, to the
shelters in Ludwigshafen. Ever been here before? No? That's
Mannheim's twin city, on the far side of the Rhine bridge if
the Yankees haven't captured it today. I don't say there isn't
any artillery damage inside Mannheim, because they're past-
ing Ludwigshafen hard. Some of the overs hit the town the
same as shorts hit it when they got the Brown-Boveri. They
would claim that was an accident, I suppose. They've knocked
out the port pretty well and cut the sewer and water mains.
The shelling you hear now is on Ludwigshafen. And of course
the fire bombs have been dropping for a year. Well, 111 cross
the Neckar with you and walk up Frederick Street till we
reach my shelter. The bridge we cross is named Frederick too,
and we have to detour for it because one of those 'accidents' hit
the Adolf -Hitler Bridge right ahead of us/'

"There is something named for Him in every town, isn't
there?" Happy said. "Even the smallest Where they have a
river they can name a bridge for Him. Down in the Alps where
I've come from they've even named a mountain for Him."

"Well/' said the sergeant, "that's no treason. He's done some-
thing for every town in the Reich, hasn't He?"

"Jawohl," said Happy hastily.

They slogged along. As they neared the gunfire they had to
266

raise their voices. They talked more to cover their nervousness
than to exchange any thoughts. Strangely enough, the shelling
did not sound as loud as it had from the tower; perhaps his
ears were getting focused to it

"Mannheim is a funny town," the sergeant rambled on. "Be-
fore the shells hit it, the port was one of the biggest in Ger-
many. It's the farthest upstream that big riverboats can travel.
They spent plenty in the last fifty years on building up the
quays and straightening the riverbed. Youll see when you get
across. It's the transshipment point for downstream traffic on
both the rivers. A barge comes down the Neckar once in a while
still, but there's nothing moving on the Rhine since we mined
it. I saw an old map of the city in a bookstore once. The city
was fortified in those days wish it was now. It looked just
like a beetle straddling a blade of grass, with its tail here at
the Frederick Bridge, and its head at the old Schloss clear at
the opposite side of the peninsula, or the blade, so to speak
Bight at the head of where the Rhine bridge now stands. In
those days they even had pontoons across both rivers. I sup-
pose the electors were nothing but pirates, charging tribute
to everyone going up or down either river. They filled in the
fortifications long ago, of course, but you can see the outline
in the shape of the boulevard that runs around the center of the
town. We call it the Ring. All the old buildings are inside the
Ring, so naturally we put the air-raid shelters there too. It's
the only part the Yankees don't shell. Historical monument, I
suppose as if they had any history."

"What do the numbers on the streetcorners mean?*' Happy
asked.

The engineer laughed. "I guess Mannheim's the only city in
the world where the streets don't have names. The blocks are
numbered instead, like A-l and B-2 and so on, so a stranger
can always tell where he is, so long as he doesn't go outside
the Ring, where the streets are named like anywhere else. Any-
way, the shelters are safe enough. I guess the villages on the

267

plain are too, for the Yankees don't waste ammunition on use-
less targets. The only trouble with the plain is that they have
a nasty habit of buzzing the traffic. The mayor won't let the
refugees out till after dark. One was at it this morning. Come
to think of it, I don't know why we have any troops in the city
at all, because there isn't any artillery there except a little
Flak on the Rhine bridge. The heavy stuff is down at Sand-
hofen. Maybe we're afraid of a spearhead crossing, but believe
me, we could blow the bridge any time we feel like it. Maybe
afraid of spies trying to set a few charges themselves."

"The time to blow the bridge would be when the first Yankee
tanks are in the middle of it/' Happy shouted above the din.

The sergeant nodded. They had walked a dozen blocks up
Frederick Street from the Neckar. Mannheim was hit as hard
as Heilbronn. The whole front of Q-l had fallen in when the
phosphorus burned away the joists. Bathtubs hung head down
in the air, anchored by their piping to the black walls. An ele-
vator clung in its guide rails three stories up, but the third
story had dropped to the basement like the rest. Yet the Con-
cordia Church across the street was untouched.

"Well, Junge, here's my shelter. You walk straight ahead.
That big ruin you see at the head of the street is the Schloss.
You turn around it, either way, and you find the Rhine bridge
just beyond it on a line with this street. That is, if you still
insist on crossing. Otherwise come in with us; no questions
asked. Good luck to you and es lebe der Fiihrer." *

Happy waved to him. "Es lebe Deutschland," f he called.
He looked at his watch; it was 1620.

"Make it fast," the sergeant ran after him to say. "If you can
get across the bridge at all, try to do it before five. That's
when they let the refugees move this way out of Ludwigs-
hafen. Once they start, you can hardly get through, there's
such a crowd of them."

* Long live the Fuhrer.
t Long live Germany.

268

He turned between the sandbags into a staircase marked
^Wehrmacht only." Happy plodded on up the street. He
looked back over bis shoulder and saw that most of the sol-
diers turned into the same bunker, while a few continued like
him, apparently on orders to cross the Rhine bridge into Lud-
wigshafen. He limped along the cobbled street toward the
fagade of the burned-out Schloss at the end. The city was al-
most empty. There were long-handled water pumps at some
corners, where a few housewives gathered with buckets. An
occasional streetcar clattered down the tracks; women and
boys on bicycles close to the curb, sometimes an army truck
with tarpaulins closed that was all the traffic. Someone had
daubed on a wall '"Victory or Siberia," and on another "Better
Death than Slavery." There were no red banners of defiance
as at Heilbronn, but no white banners of surrender either. The
familiar warning sign stretched across the tower between the
twin balls of the Bismarck-platz: THE ENEMY is LISTENING.
Mannheim was not defiant; it waited.

He passed other shelters; the iron grills were closed, and the
civilians waited in line for them to open, leaning against the
sandbags, the women knitting and the old men smoking.
Only the Wehrmacht could go below in daylight. Others clus-
tered outside the churches with blankets and pillows, even
with cookstoves, knowing that the Americans did not shell
churches at least on purpose. There might be a little more
risk in a church, but many preferred to sleep on the stone
floors under the high vaults, rather than in the steaming cav-
erns underground.

He overtook a Volkssturm man limping up Frederick Street.
He wore a shabby black civilian overcoat with the white bras-
sard on his left arm. When he drew abreast he saw the man
was not more than thirty. One of his legs was wood, but he did
not use a cane.

"I thought I was out of the Army for good," the reservist
laughed, "when I lost this'* he slapped his wooden leg "but

269

I can still use this/* And he gripped the stock o his rifle. "Well
never let them into Mannheim, nicht?"

He smiled gaily as they pressed toward the growing roar of
the guns. He thought that Happy, like himself, was heading for
the defense of the factory city across the river. They both
wanted company. He walked so slowly that by the time they
reached the square in front the Schloss eight more soldiers and
reservists had caught up with them. When they rounded the
pink stone palace, turning right under the circular alley of
chestnuts, a squad had been formed. They all seemed to know
the reservist, and they took the pace from him. He had become
the Fiihrer of the squad. A German feels better with a leader
ahead of him. When he started to sing, they all joined in "Wo
die Westmark."

Where the Westland slants down to the Rhine,
Where Ludwigshafen lies in ruins,
Where stone no longer stands on stone,
That is my country, and I am at home.

In Ludwigshafen where the ruins lie,
Where so often we hide in the shelter,
"Where bombs crash on so many a house,
That is my country, and I am at home.

Where the bombers swoop nightly from the sky,
Where up and down the city burns,
Where the sirens scream and the lights go out,
That is my country, and I am at home.

Where the cowardly Tommy murders woman and child,
Where so many victims are mourned,
Where the weary eyes are heavy with tears,
That is my home, which I love so dear.

And shouted together, with faces raised in the song:
270

Where misery cries to the Wo soviele Note auf den Himmel

heavens, schrefn,

Where good folks' houses are Wo in Triimmer liegen vieler

fiat, Burger Heim,

Where so many lose all they Wo soviele opfern miissen Heim

own, und Gut,

Ludwigshafen, my home, fights Ludwigshafen, Heimat, kampft

with German courage. mit deutschem Mut.

The bulk of the Schloss still hid the Rhine and what lay be-
yond it. When they circled the right wing to the bridgehead
park they saw the water lapping the opposite bank, and Lud-
wigshafen sprawled along it, palled in smoke under the sun-
set.

"Watch," said the reservist, "the bridge is going to be
crowded with refugees when they ring the bell. Since tie all-
wise Doctor Todt let the Autobahn bridge fall in at Franken-
thal, there isn't another bridge that way before Mainz, or up-
stream before Speyer, and they're both thirty kilometers. Well,
what is hard luck for German travelers is hard on the Amis too.
No one knows bow they got so close, but well throw them
back."

The cupola of the Schloss had been sheared off like the top
of an eggshell, but the battle flag of the regime still flapped
from the parapet. At orders from the reservist, the squad
swung briskly past the balustrade of the Platz, past the sentry-
box at the bridgehead, and under the double arch to the bridge
itself. An allegoric statue of Germania reclined across the
pylons above them. The left arch carried the railroad, and the
double tracks were as rusty as the single one at Peiting. They
took the right lane. As the sergeant had said, the bridge was
mined; Happy saw the hundred-pound beehive charges of
plastic on each side of the pylon, and the detonator wires run-
ning to the arches at each. end. The top of each arch, on either
side of the stone goddess, mounted a Vierling, and two gun-
ners were swiveling in the seats, while a noncom tilted his

271

head to look upward into the range finder. Between the guns
stood a sixty-centimeter flashlight for night defense.

A yellow cloud belched up from Ludwigshaf en, lighter than
the skein of smoke which shrouded the rest of the city, and
puffing in spurts as if it were stoked every few seconds from
below.

"A hit on the Farben," groaned a soldier behind Happy.
That must be the sulphur vats."

When they were halfway to the center, a whistle blew. A
white barrier like a railroad gate was being lowered ahead of
them, across the farthest arch. Happy twisted his head to look
back; another bar was being lowered behind them by the
sentry at the Mannheim end. The two cut off the bridge be-
tween them.

"Spot-check!" shouted the reservist over the noise of the ex-
plosions. "Papers out, everybody!"

They reached into their pockets, the men in uniform for the
Soldbuch, the reservists for the piece of cardboard which was
all the Wehrmacht had time to issue nowadays, giving their
name and age and the words "Is a member of the German
Army/* followed by a signature and a seal. Everyone was used
to showing papers, even the youngest boy recruit The squad
did not break step, did not even look down from the jagged
silhouette of the burning city ahead. As they advanced to the
banier, another shell hit the big chemical plant off to their
right The impact was no louder than a word spoken close to
the ear, but at its command a concrete-skeletoned factory
unroofed itself and cast down the tile filler of its walls. The red
squares were shaken loose in blocks and shattered only when
they crashed on the concrete floor of the city, with a burst
which drowned the rushing of the stream and the crackle of
the flames and the voice of the shell itself. In spite of the new
freshet of dust and smoke, the setting sun shone clearer now
through the concrete ribs of the skeleton. Still the squad kept
272

time. Happy forced his gaze away from the destruction, down
to the floor of the bridge.

Through a crack in the planking underfoot he saw the olive-
brown water rushing northward, and the icicles clinging like
beards to the under side of the trusses. The Rhine is the mirror
of its own banks. Past both abutments of the bridge it flowed
tranquilly, tinged on the Ludwigshafen side with the pearl of
the smoke and the yellow of the flame, and on the Mannheim
side with the reflection of the pink and brown buildings front-
ing the quays. The blue of the late sky blended the two banks.
But when he looked through the cracks of the planking he
could see the Rhine for what it was a rushing, turbid, sullen
torrent, without reflection, tossing with pans of melting ice
and the flotsam of other bombardments- far upstream: splin-
tered pilings, shattered brandies, and once the hull of a
stove-in ferry skiff, twirling and aimless in the flood of white-
caps. A yard below the surface he saw the black belly and ugly
horns of an underwater mine, with the cable ready for detona-
tion from the shore like the charges under the planking of the
bridge itself. The steel grillage of the side rails was too close-
knit for a man to escape by jumping through; and even if he
could have jumped he could not have reached the quay on
either bank, for both were faced with steep-sloping stone re-
vetments a good two yards above the water. This double wall
stretched downstream as far as he could see in the dusk. Along
the top of it on each side ran the freight sidings of the
twin cities, straddled by a parade of bombed-out cranes, their
twisted fingers clawing wildly at the sky. He was in a cage
which contracted with each stride that the squad slogged on,
toward the waiting Gestapo at the western span.

The reservist called for halt and left face. They brought their
rifles smartly down to the deck of the bridge. Just beyond the
barrier, in the Ludwigshafen Square, seethed the crowd of
refugees, waiting for the wooden gate to rise. Over the slope

273

of the bridge deck the mass of humanity and animals was
dammed back far into the converging streets. It was the same
collection he had seen so often already: old men, women and
children, heavy sacks of clothing, geese held by the feet with
their heads in a bag, goats tethered tight to a leash; the splay-
sided farm wagons drawn by an old horse or an ox or a tired
man, and piled high with every kind of movable possession;
and perhaps the mother and her child perched on top of the
mound. There was even an ancient streetcar crowded with
anxious passengers, who leaned out the windows to see why
they were delayed.

The shells were only a minute apart now. At each impact a
groan rose from the crowd and the sea of heads turned back-
ward in unison to watch the burst, then quickly away again,
and the compaction of humanity pressed even more closely
against the bar, as white foam is urged against the shore by
the ripples of a tide.

Two soldiers with a tripod HMG stood on a platform strad-
dling the steel fence between the railroad tracks and the high-
way. The perforated cooling jacket of the gun circled over
the crowd; the belt of cartridges coiled down from the maga-
zine. Between two such threats, the shelling behind and the
machine gun ahead, only a German crowd "would have main-
tained the discipline to stand without stampeding not like
the hysterical Italian crowd Happy had once seen bracketed
on the road below Cassino. In spite of the panic in their faces,
there was no sound except the whinnying of the horses and
the cackle of the fowl.

Out of the camouflaged sentrybox stepped a stormtrooper
and a second lieutenant of the SS, with the double lightning
bolt on their helmets and collars, and the black armlet of the
Leibstandarte of Adolf Hitler.* They carried sidearms; in
the lieutenant's hand was a copy of the orange Blacklist.

The SS ranks are Stunmnann and Obersturmfiihrer. The Leibstandarte
was Hitler's original bodyguard regiment.

274

As the column was faced, Happy was the first man in the
rear rank, and thus trapped between the machine gun and the
rest of his squad. If he could have dropped his Soldbuch into
the river between the cracks of the planking without being seen,
he would have done so^ Then he could have chosen his own
name neither Steinberg nor Maurer and claimed he had
lost his book in combat They might jail a man for losing his
book, but they could not shoot kirn here at the very front But
the open planking had given way to solid concrete at the final
span. There was not a chink in the surface beneath his feet, and
the bridge was too wide to throw the book over the rail, even
if he had not known the guards "would shoot binni as he raised
his arm for the toss.

The lieutenant took his station at a high slant-topped desk
with a rack of rubber stamps fastened to the back shelf. He
laid the Blacklist on the surface, beside his left elbow, with the
orange cover on top. The check started at the rear of the line
instead of at the front; Happy would be the last Each soldier
held out his book. The storm trooper compared the picture in
the front with the face of the soldier himself, nodded, and
carried the book, with the travel orders Inside, over to the lieu-
tenant's desk. As he wheeled he called out the soldier's name
and rank. It was just like the check at Ulm.

The lieutenant was methodical; he had pasted a tab at the
page where each letter of the alphabet began. He opened the
Blacklist at the tab of each soldier's fnfHaT and ran his finger
down the page. When he had made sure tie soldier was not
listed he nodded, closed the book, and stamped the travel
orders with the "Forwarded" stamp from the rack. Happy
knew, and the Wehrmacht knew, that once on the west side
of the Rhine many deserters would try to find their way across
the combat to the safety of the American cages. Nobody, he
thought, except a fanatic like Forster would toss this helpless
troop against the barrage that pounded Ludwigshafen and
trust them not to desert. But it might be as heroic to desert as

275

to stand safer to snipe from a strong wall than to carry a
white handkerchief on your bayonet into the field of fire.
Whether to surrender or resist, a man's legs cannot carry him
into the mouth of armor; and that is not from fear. Crossing
the no man's land of Ludwigshafen was a risk Forster had
ordered for the others and Happy for himself; for tomorrow
was his last day. He stared at the city as a horse stares at his
burning stable and strains at his halter to return to the flames.

"Alois Gunther, Gefreiter! Herbert Schaus, Pionier! Hans
Bachschmidt, Obergefreiter!"

As the stormtrooper returned them, each man stowed his
papers, advanced four paces to the rail of the bridge, and
about-faced. So the double line reformed.

A flame burst out of a tile roof in Ludwigshafen not the
Farben factory but a house. An instant later Happy heard the
whine of the trajectory and the shock of the fall. Neither
the lieutenant nor any of the squad turned his head. In a
few seconds a boy climbed out on the roof which had been hit,
hanging a white sheet on the chimneypot Still the squad did
not shift its eyes. But the lieutenant saw the sheet, and his face
went red with anger. Two children' were playing between the
hoofs of an old gray horse, just beyond the barrier, while their
mother whispered to her neighbor.

"They have blue and white stripes on their shoulders, the
Amis," he heard her say. T saw them creeping down our road/*

And he smiled, for that was the 3rd Division patch he had
seen on Chuck, and he wondered how they had got so close.

When the reservist in front of Happy received his papers he
strode briskly, in spite of his wooden leg, across to the railing
with the others. Happy was left alone facing them, as he had
faced the roomful at Heidelberg. His hand did not falter when
it stretched out Steinberg's false Soldbuch. Alone, he stood a
little more stiffly, his heels a little closer together. He gave his
automatic jerk of courtesy as he held out his papers. In the
interval of the few steps while the stormtrooper carried them
276

across to the lieutenant, his gaze swept around his trap. The
Rhine and its bridge were German, but the gunners and mines
were Hitler's. The twin cities were German, but the red flag
over the Schloss, and the ruin of Ludwigshafen, were Hitler's.
The soldiers across from him and the refugees at his left were
German, but the uniforms of one and the misery of the other
were Hitler's. He was German, but the lie on his papers was
Hitlers.

The lieutenant had his left hand on the cover of the orange
Blacklist He held the "Forwarded" stamp in the other.

TCarl Steinberg, Medical Corporal!'' called the trooper.

The impact of a shell cracked like a whip at the far end of
the square. From the height of the sound, Happy could tell it
must have struck the tower of the flourmill at the far left corner,
where the refugees were still crowding to escape. The lieu-
tenant did not move, but the sweat broke out ca his forehead
in spite of the cold wind. The studded leather collar of the
draft horse pressed forward, bending the wooden bar. The
two children whimpered, and their mother gathered them
under her skirt. For a second the crowd held its breath, then
let it out in unison. There had been no explosion.

"Dud!" shouted the reservist from the rail. The trooper spun
to rebuke him for speaking, but the lieutenant smiled and
mopped his forehead,

"Medical, did you say? He's needed at the barracks. Direct
the others to the command post in Ludwigshafen. I'll take
Corporal Steinberg back with me. He will not need his rifle;
give it to the squad leader."

Happy slung the rifle over his head into the hands of the
trooper.

The lieutenant's finger had been on the S tab when the shell
struck, but he did not open the Blacklist. He slammed it into
the desk drawer. He shoved Happy's papers into his breast
pocket. He glanced at his wristwatch.

"Not quite five,* he said quietly to the trooper, "but today

277

you may open the barrier a little early, without checking those
who wish to cross to Mannheim." He exchanged the Deut-
scher Gruss with the trooper and with the squad.

The barrier was double, with striped planks swung from a
counterbalanced iron standard at each side of the roadbed.
Between the ends of the two tapered bars there was just enough
width for the streetcar. The ancient vehicle stood with its
single eye unlighted, abreast of and between the bars. Duck-
ing under them, the lieutenant led Happy to the forward plat-
form, where passengers were forbidden to ride. The rest of
the car was too crowded to make room, even for an officer.

Happy saw the trooper bend to crank up the standards.
The squad right-faced on the narrow sidewalk. The reservist
gave the Gleichtritt, and it quickstepped into Ludwigshafen
as stiffly as if it were on parade. Happy's rifle went with it,
on the reservist's back.

"Ill get you another somehow," the lieutenant promised.
"He will need it more than you."

278

Eleven

At the same moment, the flood of humanity and animals broke
forward to the safety of ruined Mannheim. The motorman
stood on the pedal of his gong to clear his path. He turned the
lever a full circle to sprint ahead of the stumbling laden ref-
ugees. It was almost dark, but he dared not light his head-
lamp. The cyclops lens rushed blindly toward the home bank.
When he had outdistanced the mob he slowed down the car.
He squinted into the dusk to see the tracks below him. On the
platform to his left was a potato-sack stuffed full of his own
belongings. The handle of a saucepan stuck through the twine
at the neck.

"That's all I have left." He shrugged. "I live in Ludwigs-
hafen, so I guess this is my last trip. At least I don't have to
carry my pack on my shoulder.**

The SS lieutenant, standing at his right, stiffened at his
impudence. Happy was straddling the edge of the platform,
with one foot on the running board and his hands on the
stanchions. The lieutenant looked straight over his head.

279

"Medical Corps," he murmured. 'What unit did your book
say?"

"Assigned to 136th Mountain, Herr Obersturmfiihrer. I am
to join them at Neustadt tomorrow."

<f We made a strategic withdrawal from Neustadt last night/'
said the lieutenant heavily. "I cannot tell where you might find
them tomorrow. Anyway, you will be more useful in the field
hospital than hunting for them. I shall check your papers when
we reach the hospital and return them later, if you should be
able to join the 136th Mountain/'

TBut Herr Obersturmfiihrer, tomorrow is my last day."

"Don't worry; I shall be responsible. I will notify your com-
mander that you are necessary here for the defense of the city.
If I can find him. We may even learn that he is a patient of
yours in the hospital. There are many badly wounded now.
You will not have cause to regret my order, Corporal Stein-
berg."

At the end of the bridge the streetcar swung to the left; on
the bend Happy clung tighter to the stanchions. Then it curved
right again along the Schlossgartendamm, between the two
halves of the castle park, with the chestnuts and lindens on
each side through which he had marched in the opposite
direction only an hour ago. In the twilight he could see the
peaks of the city blocks ahead. There were no lights in any
windows or on the streets, but the setting sun and the fire of
Ludwigshafen reflected from the top windows of the block
ahead of him. That was B-5, he remembered, with a tall new
apartment house facing the Platz. It was the highest building
in Mannheim, except the spires. The reflection on the blacked-
out glass of the corner windows and the smaller windows
between, where the bathrooms must be, built a ladder of red
above the tops of the trees in the park. These trees were the
last cover a man would find above ground in the whole penin-
sula of the city, except the churches.
280

Happy had watched the route of the car tracks on his march
out. When the streetcar cleared the park it would swing around
to the front of the Schloss, then turn straight down Frederick
Street, past the city hall, past the bunkers, and past the shop
where he had fallen in with the reservist. It would cross the
Frederick Bridge over the Neckar, on which he had entered,
and then the lieutenant would order him out and walk him a
few blocks to the right into the hospital gates. Happy had seen
them on his way in. Then the lieutenant or an idle clerk or a
patriotic nurse would find his name in the Blacklist Beyond
that he would not think.

The lieutenant chose a gold-tipped Regie from his cigarette
case. He drew a lighter from his breast pocket. He turned his
back to Happy, sheltering the flame against the motorman's
shoulder to protect it from the draft of the open door where
Happy stood, half in and half out.

At the moment when the lighter, ablaze, touched the tip of
the cigarette, Happy took both hands from the stanchions and
pushed the lieutenant with all his strength against the right
arm of the motorman. He turned and sprang from the running
board out into the cover of the park, toward a dark clump of
spruce banking the north wing of the gutted castle. He ran as
a riderless horse would run, not seeing the ground below him,
hampered yet goaded by the useless gear on his back. He
veered into the deepest and longest shadows. A shot split the
bough of a plane tree above his head. He did not even wonder
whether it was the lieutenant's Walther or a stray from the
Amis across the river.

His arms pumped at his sides. Behind the verge of the
clump he knelt on the ground. His legs were too weak for him
to crouch. He peered backward below the tufts of needles,
between the mother-trunks of the spruce. He heard a spate of
voices, over the stifled cry of children even the children in
Germany had learned not to cry too loudly. Then the angry

281

voice of the lieutenant commanding, and the stubborn voice
of the motorman demurring, and then the lieutenant's deci-
sion, above the frightened silence.

'Well, he can't get away. We can pick him up any time. He
is unarmed."

The streetcar, which had ground to a stop, moved on, but
for all the urgency of the search the motorman dared not turn
on his headlight in the blackout. He twisted his lever and drove
on to clear the range of strays from the enemy guns across the
river.

Another slug harrowed the sod ten yards from Happy, and
he did not know whether the lieutenant was firing from the
platform of the moving car or had jumped off it to prowl the
garden.

By now the refugees had reached the pylon of the Rhine
bridge. In the light of the flashes Happy saw them rushing to-
ward hirr^ panting, grunting, but without words. He heard the
rumble of the farm carts on the planking; soon they would be
loud on the cobbles. They would swarm into the garden, turn-
ing right or left around the castle. Those in the first rows had
seen him on the bridge.

He pulled the steel helmet off his head and threw it in the
bush. He swung his knapsack from his shoulder and threw it
after, with the chicken and cheese inside, snatching out only
his field cap and his guidebook, with the map of Ulm between
the covers. He stood up and tore off the heavy overcoat which
impeded his running, with the brassard still pinned to it. He
ripped the caduceus patch from the left sleeve of his tunic,,
down to the blue threads, and threw it with the rest of his
identity under the thick branches of the spruce, as he had hid-
den the chute and the striptease in the woodpile. The coat, the
armband, the helmet, and the knapsack had been Corporal
Maurer's for two years. He had fought in them from Cassino to
Lorraine, surrendered in them at Sarrebourg, donned them
again to drop through the air, and carried them back almost
282

to France again. If he wore them any longer he might even
be hanged in them. Corporal Steinberg threw them on the
ground.

The fleeing column would skirt the castle to one side or the
other, or both. His only safety was between. It would hurry,
for the check at the bridge had cost an hour. Curfew struck
at seven; it was six already. It would stream down to the
Neckar behind the streetcar, and over to the plain, whence it
could make its way in the dark to the shelter of the Odenwald
cliffs before dawn brought the danger of the Yankee planes. It
would pass Corporal Ernst and the upturned pennant.

Unless the lieutenant still stalked Happy in the park, he
would soon, under a hooded light at the hospital or the Kom-
mandantur, find the name of Steinberg in the Blacklist Al-
ready he might be alerting the patrols. No disguise would help
Steinberg; he was doomed by the Soldbuch in the lieutenant's
hand. His only chance was to be anonymous.

As he edged away from the discarded clues to his treason,
he 'became a nameless corporal, with no sign to indicate his
branch. He still wore a single witness to his identity; his dog-
tag. It bore no name, nothing but his serial number and his
blood type. It was the number in Steinberg's Soldbuch, but
the number also in Maurer's. Two identities; that was the dan-
ger. Through his collar he fingered the metal disc, debating
whether to throw it after the rest. He might need that identifi-
cation if he crossed the Rhine, and the voice whispered, "Thou
wilt likewise need it if thou dost not 37 He left it on the cord, for
wearing it could not add to his risk.

As fast as silence allowed, he crept along the west wall of
the castle to the center, a hundred yards from where he had
dropped his gear, like stolen goods dropped in flight He
reached into his tunic for the contraband revolver contra-
band because, being miniature, it was not standard issue. He
cocked it and stood at bay at dead center of the Schloss wall.
He listened for the tiptoe of the lieutenant's boots. The shefl-

283

fire tad stopped. He heard the crackle of flames across the
Ehine ? like mice gnawing in the night, and the footsteps of
dead leaves across the park. He could not stay long, for the
patrols would search the park first of all; but till the mob of
refugees had passed he dared not leave it to cross the Ring.
Back of the castle to the east the moon was rising on the heels
of the sun's afterglow. It streamed through the sashless win-
dows above him and lighted the twisted trusses of the station
across the Ring to his left; like the factory, the station had
been precision-gutted by the planes.

Falling back into the shadow that was blacker than an
absence of light, he waited. The mob of terror poured from
the bridge. The massed treading on the planks gave way to
each man's clatter and shuffle on the stones as the column
divided the animals first, jerking the wheels of the carts be-
hind them, then the strong, and last the weak or too laden. He
saw them spread, like horses on the stretch. Half swung to his
left past the station, and half to his right through the park. On
the dark island between he waited (but must not wait too
long), his pistol cocked, at bay against the ivied stone walls.
The double stream of fear ceased at last, echoing behind him
down to refuge.

If the Frankenthal Bridge was down, as the sergeant had
said, he would have to try the Rhine bridge again, this time
without papers and already hunted. He tried to tell himself
that the spot-check had been only an accident of chance, for
the Gestapo did not have enough men or time to control
every traveler on every bridge; that the sentry would have
been relieved by now. He was not convinced, yet if he was to
take the chance he must take it before the curfew rang. He
hesitated, about to step forward from the protection of the
shadow.

Then a bugle rang out from one of the towers of the bridge.
It sounded the air-raid warning to which he had drilled at
cadet school:

284

He heard the hum of a plane. The white flare of a Very light
burst over the river before him. For a second it lighted the
ruins of Ludwigshaf en and the span of the bridge and the gar-
den where he stood and himself silhouetted against the wall of
the Schloss as clear as sunlight Even before it began to fade
the searchlight on the bridge caught the plane in its beam and
clung for the kill. The plane was another A-26. The blue and
white star of the AAF twinkled below the wing as he had
seen it in France. Happy guessed it had flown out to photo-
graph the result of the day's barrage. A year ago the Junkers
88s would have attacked it. Now there was nothing left of the
Luftwaffe but the Flak, and not too much of that. The Vierling
on the bridge opened with tracers, and then with a double
stream of four-ounce shells. When they struck, the flashlight
loosed its prey, for the plane spiraled down too fast to follow,
as he had often seen them at Cassino, a torch of fire that
needed no light, a roar of black smoke plunging down to be
quenched in the furnace of the Farben factories across the
Rhine. The flare still burned after the plane that launched it
had been destroyed.

The chatter of the Vierling stopped abruptly., and the night
was quiet again. But the searchlight swung on its mount to
clear the sky, then lowered to rake the Mannheim dockside
and the Schloss, as a man glowers about the room after an
argument. For an instant it held him in the blinding beam as
it had held the plane. His only chance was to stand it out with-
out moving, his eyelids clenched against the impact of the
glare. He heard the command "Licht aus/' and all at once he
stood in darkness again, his eyes still tingling. He leaned
against the wall to shake the blindness out, but now he had to
run, for the sixty-centimeter light had revealed him. It would

285

be suicide to try the bridge again. Yet he had to cross the Rhine
tonight. Tomorrow would be his last day, and daylight would
be suicide too. He remembered the horned black mines in the
river, and the steep stone bank on each side. He tried to fool
himself that the sentry must have changed, and that dropping
his coat and helmet and armband would disguise him anyway.
It was no use; the alert must be out already. He must either
swim the river now, risking the floes and the mines and the
bank, or fail his mission. If he hid in the city and where was
there to hide? he failed. He could reach the near bank in a
hundred strides, and could easily slide down the smooth stone
facing. If he met the horns, it would not be long to bear. Scal-
ing the Ludwigshafen bank was harder; if he slipped then, the
whole mission failed and his divisions would not be delivered.

Before he could choose, the booming of a great bell brought
his heart to his mouth. It shook the wall of the Schloss at his
back: seven slow bass notes. It was the clock, clinging askew in
the skeleton cupola above his head, but miraculously striking
the curfew. From now until dawn, whatever civilians were
left in the blacked-out smoking city and he had no idea
whether it was the full quarter-million or only a handful of the
brave or greedy must stay where they were, in the bedrooms
of their houses or underground in crypt or bunker or cave, like
the game of Still Pond No More Moving.

The seventh note ebbed out, and the pistol shook in Happy's
hand. He lifted his foot, not knowing in which direction it
would lead him. He thought of the bridge at Heidelberg,
which had been so easy to cross, and of the three-fingered
stone hand of the statue on the rail. And then, before his boot
met the earth, the breath caught in his throat, for that hand
reminded him of the Tiger. Happy remembered the Tiger for
the first time since he had seen him slide into the sky from a
hole in the floor of the plane; remembered the address he
should not have heard but, having heard, should not have for-
gotten. Twenty-seven Wharf Street, Fred had told him.
286

Now, Happy sang to himself, with the curfew, the Tiger
must be in that bunker. His knees trembled. Paluka's radio
would be there too, or at least within reach. The Tiger could
get him across the Rhine bridge. I not by the deadline to-
morrow, it still made no difference, for Paluka could flash his
message faster than he could pass it himself. So whether he
crossed the bridge or not, Fred would know that he had
found 25th Infantry at Aalen and 9th Flak at Crailsheim; he
had completed his mission and was safe.

He would find no civilians to direct him to Wharf Street, for
the order to the patrols was strict: shoot them at sight after
curfew. He would not dare ask a patrol; he must find Wharf
Street himself. Since it had a name instead of a number, it
must be outside the Ring, from the sergeant's description of
Mannheim. That saved exploring half the city, and the most
dangerous half at that. He guessed that Wharf Street was
downstream, along the port, rather than up. As he stood, that
was to his right.

The moonlight dappled the park around him with moving
tracery as the breeze swayed the boughs of the lindens and
chestnuts. He tucked the Olympia in its holster. He darted
from the shadow of the wall to the nearest tree, paused, and
then on to another, just as they used to play Red Indians in
the Tiergarten at Berlin. He knew the creaking of the boughs
would muffle the scuff of his boots on the withered grass and
drifting leaves, and the lieutenant and his patrols would find
it hard to spot a man among the swaying of the black shadows.

He could run faster now, without his heavy coat He circled
away from the pile of clothing he had hidden, like a discarded
snakeskin, under the spruce bush; the lieutenant might have
found them and be lurking to ambush his return, knowing that
one did not waste chickens and Minister cheese. Zigzagging
from tree to tree so there would be no continuous motion, he
reached the avenue where he had jumped from the car. Before
crossing it, he peered along the tracks, left and right, from be-

287

hind a tree trunk. Nobody was in sight. He ran across it, full
in the moonlight for a moment, and made shelter again in the
Frederick Garden on the other side. He avoided the gravel
paths which wound through the garden. He kept clear of the
casino and the little lake which reflected it, for one could never
tell when a news kiosk or comfort station might be a pillbox
or machine-gun nest in disguise. The Camouflage Corps was
Wise with plywood and netting.

The north side of the Frederick Garden butted against the
first section of the Ring, called the Park Ring. Beyond it stood
a single row of houses, which fronted on the Ring and backed
on the ship canal connecting the Rhine and the Neckar. The
canal was once a branch of the Rhine, and the port beyond it
only a triangle of marsh, shelving a kilometer downstream to
the tip where the rivers converge. In the days of the electors,
their subjects climbed down from the fort to fish and trap
on the marsh. Now the triangle was solid with sidings and
docks and warehouses down to the city gas tanks at the tip.
Between the houses Happy saw the destruction: the shattered
parade of cranes, straddling the web of torn spurtracks, the
bomb craters on the quays, the skeletons of the warehouses,
the burned-out cylinders of the tanks. The Ami bombs had
nibbled judiciously around the perimeter of the Ring, sparing
the old city inside but blasting the industry around the edge,
just as a housewife trims a piecrust. This was the precision
bombing of which they boasted.

The Ring was round, following the curve of the old fort. The
canal was straight. Happy had to walk a hundred yards with-
out shelter before they began to diverge. He tried not to walk
too fast. Then he reached the fork where the Ring swung right,
and the canal, with its single row of false-front houses, ran
straight ahead. The blackout sign on the curb he could just
make it out in the light of the half moon said the dockside
street was Hafenstrasse: Harbor Street. From its name he
288

hoped that somewhere in the spandrel ahead of bim he would
find Wharf.

On the Ring a flashlight was moving toward him. It was still
half a block ahead. It jogged on and off as the patrol checked
the doorways on at the doorways and off between, to save
the battery. There were two guards in the patrol; he heard the
click of four boots. Just in time, he ducked into Harbor Street.
He crept along the right sidewalk, where the houses fronting
on the Ring cast their black shadows. As the street moved
down to the Neckar the triangle widened. The backs of houses
became the fronts of more factories.

A single figure was approaching him, up the street on the
same side. Like him, it was hugging the walls. He stopped to
listen, for it showed as no more than a stirring of shadow, and
he gripped the butt of the Olympia in his pocket. Standing still
again, he was cold without his coat.

He breathed more easily when he heard that the figure wore
shoes instead of boots. As it drew nearer, he saw that it ran
from doorway to doorway, darting into the shadow at each
vestibule as he had hidden behind the trees in the park, pad-
ding on soft soles from shelter to shelter along the concrete
sidewalk Then he understood; it was more frightened than he.
Its terror gave him the confidence to march down upon it, sol-
dierly again, without hurrying even when he crossed the open
intersection of Church Street.

It was a woman. She stiffened rigid when she saw him. He
stood against the wall of the warehouse, halfway between two
doors, looking down at her.

"Excuse me, Herr Officer/ 7 she panted, and he say/ that she
could hardly speak for fear. "I know I should not be in the
street, but my baby was cut with glass in the last terror-attack.
I have come out of the bunker for only a moment to run home
for some iodine. Don't turn me in; look, I have a little money."

She thought Happy was a patrol himself.

289

He had forgotten there was still one piece of equipment
which marked him as in the Medical Corps; the leather first-aid
kit hung on his belt. He wrenched it off the japanned clips. He
thrust it into her hand, pushing back the bribe she offered him.

"There's iodine in here/' he said gruffly. "Go back to the
bunker. You have no business on the street after curfew/*

She looked from his face to the kit, turning the leather con-
tainer over in her hand.

"Where is Wharf Street, please?" he -whispered close to her
ear.

She jerked her thumb down the street toward the Neckar,
and held up one hand with four fingers outstretched.

"Four blocks?"

She nodded. Without thanks, without even surprise (for war
had dulled surprise) she ran on ahead of him and turned out
of sight to the right at the first corner, up toward the bunkers
in the King. Happy ran too, frightened again as soon as she had
disappeared.

Wharf Street runs off from Harbor, but farther down, just
before Harbor dead-ends against the arches of the Jungbusch
Bridge over the Neckar. There was only one bridge across the
Rhine, but three across the Neckar. The whole squalid north-
west quadrant of the city was called Jungbusch. But the bridge
sprang higher up, from the plateau of the Ring, and spanned
the docks and sidings of the quarter for which it was named.

The mouth of Wharf Street opened between a flourmill and
the workshops of a shipyard. Happy saw the sign: SCHIFF-UND-
MASCHINENBAU A. G. The shops were on the right side of Har-
bor, and the ways on the left, stretching out into the canal.
They were empty except for the carcass of an assault boat
which had taken a direct hit. The same bomb which flattened
the boat had glanced the shipyard's crane, now crazily strad-
dling the street, had ripped the front off the workshop, and
torn the flank of the mill silo on the near corner, as lightning
claws down the side of a tree.
290

The cylinder of the silo was empty; cobwebs shimmered in
the concrete hollow, and he could see that though the blast was
fresh, there had been no grain in the elevator for a long time
before.

He turned up Wharf Street between the two ruins. It was
the shortest and narrowest alley in Mannheim, dead-ending
even before it reached the Ring. Someone had half-heartedly
filled the worst craters in the paving with small pieces of brick
and tile; there were new footprints in the clay of the potholes.
The blocks of concrete and ribbons of corrugated roofing
which the blast had dislodged had been pushed aside to the
sidewalks of Wharf Street, leaving only a footpath. An electric
cable, unmoored by the bomb, swung its sputtering tip idly
across the narrow passage in the rubble.

The single block rose steeply. It did not seem possible its
few flimsy houses could have escaped the destruction of the
shipyard and the mill. Fragmentation of the bomb had gouged
out of their stucco walls some pieces as big as Happy's hand,
pebbling the sooty yellow surface with pocks of clean white,
and a crack zigzagged across the wall of the nearest house. All
the shutters were closed, but as the whole city was blacked out
he still could not tell whether anyone was left inside.

Number 27 was three doors beyond the silo. The number
was stamped on a blue enamel plaque beside the entrance
archway. The house was four stories high, with three windows
on each floor, the center tier staggering the sides. Those center
windows, alone of all in the block, were unshuttered. They
must light the staircase, he thought; and because they were un-
shuttered he feared he would find the house empty.

The door itself hung ajar, under a round transom. He
creaked it open, sliding his feet forward cautiously on the
gritty surface of a tile vestibule. He swung it back again, but
the bomb had jarred it too loose to latch. He turned his
hooded flashlight along the walls. The wainscot was painted
in imitation of marble a poor imitation in graining of red and

291

green. Ahead of him four steps rose to the level of the main
floor. To the right hung a directory of tenants who lived, or
had lived, in the eight apartments, with their names penciled
or printed on greasy cardboard in brass slots above the empty
mailboxes. He read them one by one, saving first floor rear till
the end. They were unassuming surnames: Biihler, Heurich,
Schmidt except for one card pretentiously engraved SA GRUP-
PENFUHRER KOPPEN. How are the Brownshirts fallen, he
thought, since the days when they hounded my father out of
Trebbin to Berlin, that a group leader should have to live in
an alley like Wharf Street.

He remembered the night the SA squad had tramped into
the study at Trebbin, though he had been only nine that year.
It was before the Purge. He remembered looking through the
door with his arm around Klaus, just as his father stood with
his arm around their mother, facing the squad of three. When
the Fuhrer of the squad spoke his ultimatum join the party
or leave the town the doctor had bowed to him without an-
swering. The squad wheeled and marched out, leaving the
front door open. His mother had cried he had never seen her
cry before and his father had kissed her. Next week they had
moved to Berlin.

First floor rear read simply OPFER, a word which means sacri-
fice or victim. A curious name for the Tiger, he thought, who
would never knowingly make a sacrifice or become a victim.
Then he recalled that the apartment belonged not to the Tiger
but to his wife's father. The name seemed more fitting for the
Tiger's wife. Herr Opfer: Mr. Victim. Fraulein Opfer: Miss Sac-
rifice. He chuckled. Strange he did not know the Tiger's own
name; it was locked up in the field safe like his own. One might
almost picture that the Tiger had no name. Like myself,
thought Happy; when you have too many names you have
none.

He felt his way gingerly up the long flight. The stairway was
not wide; his left hand glided along the wooden rail and his
292

right slid up the scaly plaster of the wall. At the landing, as he
had guessed, a window looked out on Wharf Street. The moon-
light guided him, shining through the uncurtained sash.

At the first floor he tiptoed to the back. The window threw
just enough light to make out the corridor between the two
halves of the tenement. Still on tiptoe, he worked back to the
door on the right. He listened, with one hand against the jamb.
From inside he could hear a slow heavy breathing, a labored
recurring sigh rather, like an old man awake in the dark. He
was glad to hear the sigh; he had feared to hear nothing. It
was an old man awake in the dark. The Tiger's good Commu-
nist father-in-law, Mr. Victim.

Happy knocked four times as Fred had told him, the last
rap a little stronger like the dash in the V-f or- Victory. Abruptly
the sighing ceased, held midway on the breath. A bed creaked.
There was silence.

"Schonen Gruss vom Herrn Tiger." Happy breathed the pass-
word through the keyhole. Greetings from the Tiger.

After a full minute the sigh was completed.

"Unten im Bunker." Down in the cellar.

Each man breathed more easily on his side of the door, hav-
ing feared worse.

Happy had seen no cellar door when he entered, but if he
got back to the vestibule he could hunt for it. He stole back to
the stairway. Moonlight fingered through the dirty casement
on the landing, casting his shadow gigantically down the well.

As he crossed the level the window lit with a moment's flash,
as when a lamp is turned up inside a house, but oddly re-
versed, as if he were outdoors and the watching, listening city-
ful were within.

An instant later the blast almost loosened his grip on the
handrail. The wooden casement shook beside him. The lash .of
sound, striking from the west (like the gunfire, but sharper
and nearer), split and ebbed into the separate sounds of rend-
ing metal, hissing steam, tumbling water. It seemed that the

293

whole city shuddered and grew still in that moment. He knew,
as if he had watched them from the Schloss, that the Wehr-
macht had blown the Rhine bridge to cut the passage of the
Americans. And his own.

He clattered down the stairs, his hobnails pounding unheard
on the treads. Before he reached the foot, he groped the flash-
light out of his belt again. He deflected the hooded beam
around the floor of the entry. It found the crack of a secret door
under the main flight of stairs, with the marbleized wainscot
painted across its flat steel face to match the other walls, and
even across the escutcheon of the flush lock. Except for this
lock, there was no break in the surface. The hinges were sunk
in the jambs to be invisible. He snapped out his light. He
rapped with his left knuckles against the smooth metal four
times softly maybe too softly, he thought, to be heard
through a shelter door. As soon as they behind it could have
translated his call he rapped again more loudly, and then he
heard the whispering beyond the door only by hearing that it
had ceased.

The sheet of metal swung outward toward him, with dark-
ness on both sides. One invisible arm caught his elbow, another
drew the door closed, sweeping him forward in its arc, and the
two lifted him down the steps. Someone planted him against a
wall and lighted a candle. It was Paluka bulking in front of
him.

"C'est toi!" he cried. The two French words bubbled out of
a flood of chuckles. Paluka's square leathery face opened in
a flash of gold. He set the candle on the floor to free his arms.

"It is thou!" he repeated. He clamped his great hands on
Happy's elbows and stared him up and down from arm's
length. He seized his fists, pumping them in welcome, and
kissed both his cheeks like French generals in pictures. Happy
blushed; a German would never have done that.

Paluka wore civilian clothes: white rope-soled sandals and
heavy black breeches and an open blue shirt belted outside as
294

Russians wear them, and a holiday coat of green with leather
cuffs and collar.

"Thou has come back from thy first mission! It is the reward
of our profession, next to one's own adventures, to welcome
the comrades home. Especially the beginners. We old ones al-
ways come back, eh, Monsieur le Tigre?**

In the glitter of the candle Happy had not seen the Tiger. He
was sitting in the dark at the end of the shelter at a table, with
his cheek cupped in his hand.

"It is thou," the Tiger echoed in German. He took Happy's
hand with a smile.

He was wearing civilians too, with a fleece-lined jacket over
his shirt. On the long table in front of him was a heavy pair of
three-branched silver candlesticks. Paluka lighted one candle
in each and upended a block of wood at the mahogany table.
Happy sat down across from the Tiger.

With the added light he saw he was in a wine cellar with a
cinder floor and a vaulted stone ceiling. Against one wall were
a score of two-hundred-liter casks, two layers high, built up on
chocks to keep them from rolling. The casks lay a yard from
the wall to clear the curve of the vault. Along the opposite side
stretched a shelf and a pole, from which hung a dozen uniforms
and civilian suits. The sweat of the stone had glazed to ice.

"Offer our guest some dinner, Paluka, of which we have too
little; and some wine, of which we have too much/'

Paluka dived behind the casks. He returned with a hambone
on a silver platter and half a loaf of black bread. He set them
on the mahogany. He filled three silver steins, bunched in one
of his big hands, from the bunghole of a cask.

'Welcome to the Venice of Germany/* toasted the Tiger. His
gesture included the two rivers and all the canals in the port.
With a silver knife Paluka flipped one slice of ham between
two of bread. He offered the sandwich to Happy, who was
suddenly hungrier than he had known.

"Have you completed your mission, Junge?" the Tiger asked.

295

"It will not be completed till I report what I have seen,"
Happy answered between swallows. "But I have seen what I
was sent for. Twenty-fifth Infantry is indeed at Aalen, in the
old forestry school. Colonel Forster is executive to form it. But
already he has had to send out detachments without training,
just men of the Volkssturm. Some crossed the bridge into
Mannheim before me this afternoon."

"What armor?"

"Not much. Write it down, please, before I forget Eight 15s
and twelve 7.5s to a regiment. One HMG and three lights to a
company. And a class in the Panzerfaust; there will be nine to
a company."

The Tiger pulled a sheet of lined paper toward him and
copied Happy's report in script as fast as he poured it out,
omitting nothing, for he knew the momentous can hide in a
trifle.

"Not enough small arms. Ninth Flak is in the castle at Crails-
heim, with only a thousand men, many of whom they detach
to man Vierling at the roadblocks and bridges. They have little
to eat, and many of their guns are dummies, though I did not
let on I noticed. I have two friends there, who I hope may es-
cape before the raid. I have maps where I can mark what I
have seen." He opened his guidebook and unfolded the plan
of Ulm.

"Mine are better," suggested the Tiger.

He unrolled the gridded maps he had carried on the drop.
Happy traced his route with a pencil on the six sheets of U.S.
1:1,000,000, boring dots where he had seen the signal train,
the spot-check, the 8.8s, the Heidelberg Flak, the two CPs. The
Tiger could read coordinates fast.

"Bavaria we do not care about. The war will end before your
roadblocks in Ulm are manned. But you have not done badly."

He nodded judicially, imitating the famous picture where
Keitel explains a field map to the Fiihrer and Goring. Then
he looked up sharply.
296

"Why have you come here? You are not of my team. One
more guest is one more mouth and one more risk."

"Because I am in the Blacklist, Herr Tiger."

The words echoed back to him from the vault of stone.
Paluka looked around; he remembered the word "Fahndungs-
blatt" from Vatf s class.

"And you have come to enroll me in it too? It is not healthy
to put me in danger. Who even told you I was here?"

"It was one of the Amis/' Happy hedged.

"Then it was the tall Fred, who never gave me justice. He
should know that the safety of a team is more important than
its reports. The Americans have artillery which is more elo-
quent than words. By what folly did your name get on the
list?"

"It was not my fault only that I met an old man, and the
next day my parachute was found. It was near Schongau."

"That far away? You have come a long way from Schongau;
there is little to fear. Burn your Soldbuch in this candle give
it to me and tell them, if they check, that you lost it in com-
bat. Here at the front that happens, and they do not punish a
man as they do at the rear where living soldiers are not so
needed. Who can ever know your name?"

"The lieutenant who took my Soldbuch at the spot-check
on the bridge knows it. He wanted me to tend the wounded
at the hospital, but I jumped off the car and have hidden till
now."

"That is indeed bad. Without a Soldbuch, one can at least
pretend it has been lost in combat But if the Gestapo have it
and send out patrols, then beware. The patrols would rather
hide than walk their beat, but even now no one disobeys the
Gestapo. The block leader who patrols the Jungbusch is com-
ing tomorrow to join my brigade. I will sell him a suit from the
rack in exchange for his uniform and what money he can bring
me. But, coward that he is, if he found you here he would not
dare to hide you, even though no one remains on Wharf Street

297

since the bomb but Paluka and myself and the old man up-
stairs, who cannot be moved. We were not frightened by the
bomb, and in this profession the reward is to the brave/' He
fondled the chasing on his stein. "Where are your armband
and helmet and coat?"

"I threw them in the castle park, Herr Tiger, for I feared the
lieutenant would identify me/ 7

"I see the snake-patch is gone from your sleeve, and next you
will say you have thrown away your kit."

"I gave it to a woman, for her baby/'

"And your dogtag?"

"I have it on my neck. It is not only the dogtag of Steinberg,
but my own since the war began, given in my true name of "

"Do not ten me," whispered the Tiger. "It is not right that I
should know your name, or you mine. We can bury the tag, or
sink it in our wine. Did you hear, old Paluka?" he broke out in
French. "An airman walks about Mannheim. His name is in
the Blacklist, and his papers are with the Gestapo who make it.
He throws his insignia, and even his overcoat, in the garden for
them to find, and comes to us for help. So that he may have
companions at the shooting stake, I suppose, like the two
thieves at Calvary. You who are a good Christian of Holy Rus-
sia understand me. They are brave men, the Russians."

He switched back to German, turning to Happy. "I have seen
them knock out one of our big Ferdinand tanks. They lay down
in the field before Ferdinand, and when he had passed for he
could not crush so many, and perhaps his eyeslits did not see
them all the survivor threw his Molotov cocktail at the crew
from the rear. Before the Yankees are in Mannheim, the Rus-
sians will take Berlin. You, who live there do not He to me, for
I know the accents of Germany tell your family to flee before
it is too late. For the columns of the fleeing which you see here
will be nothing to those who scuttle from Berlin. What few
spoils my brigade has seized in Mannheim will be nothing
298

against the spoils of Berlin. If I could be there on that
day . . r

Paluka filled the steins. The Tiger broke into his wry smile.
He leaned forward to pat Happy's arm.

"Nay, I am only teasing to frighten you. I cannot help my
game. We shall keep you here with us till the Amis come. We
are not so badly off, but what good are silver candlesticks if
one does not have food? We ate our iron rations yesterday
pfui! Such as it is, we shall share our food and our danger with
you, lest you betray us to the man hunt outside. It will not be
for long. The Wehrmacht has wasted our old Rliine bridge in
vain, for the Amis have already started to throw pontoons
across at Frankenthal, where they can use the Autobahn. I saw
their smoke screen this morning/'

"I know I cannot cross the Rhine bridge, Heir Tiger; I heard
it blow myself. That is why I give you my report, so Paluka can
send it on his radio. Tomorrow is my last day."

"Radio! 57 groaned the Tiger. "Do you think that if we had
contact I should be hiding like a rat in the cellar? I should have
delivered Mannheim already, with the supplies a radio could
have brought me. But he broke the crystals with the impact of
his fat body when he landed; even the spares. Why he did not
break the neck from which they hung I cannot understand.
Where are the three black cats who would so soon devour the
dog? I could devour either now. Paluka's radio, indeed! But he
has been a good headwaiter, hast thou not, Paluka?^

Paluka heard his name and smiled happily, though he did
not understand what the Tiger said. He filled tibe steins again,
while the Tiger rocked with bitter mirth.

"In truth, Junge, you cannot radio your message, and you
cannot cross the Rhine with it Shall I tell you what to do?" He
leaned his smiling face across the table. "Stay here with your
comrades. In such a case, there is no dishonor."

Happy clenched his hands in bis lap, so they should not

299

strike the smile. "If I cannot cross the Rhine I shall swim
through it. I have promised to bring the report tomorrow. I
will take the only way that is left."

The very quiet of his voice, and the set of his chin, told the
Tiger he could not hold him. He shrugged and leaned back,
his smile gone. He beckoned to Paluka.

"Do you understand, Paluka? Here is one who will swim the
Rhine through the minefield to make his report to the little
black-haired captain. You and I shall stay in our nest. But to
see that he does not betray us by falling to the hands of his
hunters, I shall guide him through the patrols to the bank."

Paluka grinned down at Happy. He clapped him on the
back. "Voila!" he cried. "That is courage for you, and from a
German too. But let it be me who swims, for I am twice as
strong."

The Tiger shook his head. "You would be as dangerous out-
side as he, vieux camarade, and besides I need you here. I
would keep him to protect us all. But if he must go, let it be at
once, before he needs to eat again."

"Enough," Paluka cried, glaring at the Tiger. "Let the boy
sleep. He has walked all day, and it is not easy to walk and re-
member at the same time. Never, even for Captain Pete, could
I remember what he has remembered. You and I will plan his
baptism while he sleeps."

He lifted Happy to his feet and began to lead him to the far
end of the cellar. "This end is my home," he whispered. "Let
the Tiger talk on; here you need not listen. I know the Tiger
now."

"From here to the take-off," mused the Tiger aloud behind
them, "he can wear any uniform except that of the Luftwaffe.
It is lucky for him that I have other clothing, for my brigade.
There is a good civilian suit which should fit him. Lay him
down, Paluka, while I think. When he wakes I shall have de-
cided how he must be dressed and where he must enter the
water."
300

Sleepy as he was, Happy heard. He turned on the gritty floor.

"No civilian clothes for me," he called. "I am a soldier of the
Reich. I came to it in uniform. When I go out I must wear uni-
form too. And my own dogtag/'

"When you leave its shore tonight, Landser, you will wear no
clothes at all. You will be naked as at your birth. But for the
walk to the shore, wherever I decide, no matter how near, you
must be clothed. Uniforms? In four days I have found enough
to suit all sentiments. With time I could make you a general.
But not of the Luftwaffe, which you have betrayed. You may
choose between the Army, with 'God With Us* on the belt
buckle, and the SS, with 'Honor Is Faith/ Does it matter to
you? Or to me?"

Paluka guided Happy to his own corner. From the rack of
clothing he lifted down an armful of Army uniforms. He laid
two on the ground, beyond the last cask.

"Lie down/' he commanded softly. "A man must sleep well
and long before the contest. Remember one thing: to swim
upstream, diagonally across the current. Then one may land
opposite his start, with luck. Otherwise he is carried down and
may not reach the other bank at all. It should take no more
than fifteen minutes, or twenty at the most, even with the
strong current of water. For you? Well, it might be a little bit
longer."

He smiled, laying the other two overcoats over the lanky
boy, who was asleep already.

"I will wake you when it is time," he whispered. He tiptoed
back to the Tiger's council table and nodded as the Tiger ex-
plained his plan for the operation. Spread out on the table in
front of him was the German General Staff map of Mannheim
which he had carried on the drop. The Tiger penciled an X
through the Rhine bridge to show it had been blown.

"The shortest way is not always the surest," he pronounced.
"The stone bank in Ludwigshafen is too steep for a swimmer
to climb, especially in low water as we have now, before the

301

thaw. Even if he could climb that bank, it would not be safe
for him to try crossing the tracks, for the Farben doors open
right on the rails. Farben is the Americans' real target, and we
soldiers are only incidents when wealth attacks wealth. He
must take off from our side far enough downstream to land
where there are no buildings, and above all no stone bank. That
means crossing the Neckar by the Jungbusch Bridge and the
Old Rhine by the Diffene, and running across the Friesenheim
Island to the new channel. Thus when he swims title Rhine he
will land below the Farben; but he must watch for mines in
the water they will be active now, with the Rhine bridge
blown and swim close to the surface. There are bushes at the
side of the highway where he lands how many times have I
lain among them with the girls! From them he can watch for
the Amis. And he must remember how to approach them: head
down, hands up, and shout some Ami slang. Otherwise they
may shoot."

"At such times," said Paluka, "I have always called 'Oh, my
aching back.* I do not know the meaning, but the sentries
laugh and do not shoot. Ah, I could weep to think of my bro-
ken radio. If I had my little set, I could send his message back
for him, and he would stay safe in the bunker with us till they
come to liberate us. I am twice his age "

"Thrice."

** but I should not like to swim in this weather with nothing
on but a dogtag. This is not like that little creek in France; the
Rhine is four hundred yards across."

"And six deep. Do I not know the width of the Rhine?"

With his pencil the Tiger marked on the map the route he
had decided: up to the Ring, over the Jusgbusch Bridge, past
the transformer station on the left and the Lutzenberg gas-
works on the right, over the Old Rhine to the island by way of
the Diffen6 drawbridge, work north of the sewage pumphouse
and across the filter beds to the river. About four kilometers, or
two and a half miles, half of it empty terrain, and not much
S02

chance of being challenged late at night. And so across the
main stream of the Rhine to the wooded shore downstream
from burning Ludwigshafen.

He rinsed his mouth with the dregs of his winecup and spat
them on the earth floor. Paluka straightened the hangers on the
rack.

"All the same/' he said simply, "you envy Happy. You envy
him because he is not afraid. You are jealous because he is
good."

"No," the Tiger laughed, "I envy him because he is afraid
and yet controls his fear. I do not envy one like you who knows
not what fear is. All the same, you are not the cretin that I
thought And only a Russian or an Ami could think that one
envies goodness."

"Monsieur le Tigre, you are the chief of the mission. Now I
may spit in turn." He spat out his wine.

"I am glad that you know it." The Tiger smiled. "Each of
your words is more brilliant than the last. Now tell me, what
shall we give our guest to wear?"

"Since he may not wear his own uniform of the Air Force, I
wish that he may wear mine of the Cossack Legion."

The Tiger cocked his head, considering. Paluka's uniform
was too big for Happy but, on the other hand, it had a Sold-
buch to fit, which might be useful if they were challenged. He,
the Tiger, would wear his own sergeant's uniform and carry
his own Soldbuch, and hope that because of his shoulder-pip
neither of them would be questioned. The uniform was too
small for Paluka. And if it seemed a little too big for Happy,
why not? They would not expect a Russian's uniform to fit.

Paluka had another idea. "Let him not carry a rifle, of which
we have so few; let him be wounded, with a bandage on his
head, and the guards will never stop him nor ask for his book.
If they do, is he not Russian by my book? Therefore he need
not understand. German guards are kinder to the wounded
than Soviet guards are. On my last mission I wore a bandage

303

to get away from my cemetery at Kaiserslautern. When the
German officer saw it he even wanted to send me in an ambu-
lance to the hospital. I did not like that, so I told him we Rus-
sians cannot fight unless we smell our own blood. He under-
stood Russian, and let me go without even asking for my
book."

"Still good/' the Tiger nodded thoughtfully, "and even better
than you know, for there was a camp for the Eastfolk on the
island. It was in the Griin and Bilfinger lumberyard by the
Diffene. It was half a prison and half a hospital. That gives us
an excuse to cross, if we should need one. The only thing is,
even if your uniform should fit, the Soldbuch shows your aged
ape-face inside the cover, very different from our guest's. Let
me see your book. You can still spare it, having also the work-
er's passport."

He tore the snapshot of Paluka from the cover; he wrote in
ink on a scrap of paper: "The bearer, who speaks no German,
may travel without photograph." He signed it with an illegible
name and "Leutnant" underneath, and stamped it with the
eagle seal they had given him at the Golden Well. He smeared
one of the five digits in the field post number just enough to be
illegible too.

"If the Gestapo should turn to the second page they would
read that the bearer is forty-five years old, with a jaw full of
gold teeth. But we need not carry caution too far. At night no
guard would ever turn the page, especially with a wounded
veteran. Besides, the bandage will make him look older. Find
him a cane; I shall have him limp when anyone comes in sight.
What a joke if the guard should insist on taking him to the hos-
pital for his wounds! Anyway, for the last precaution, let us
shave off the so-called mustache of which he is so proud,
against the chance that they might know him from the bridge.
I shall put on my uniform now. You must help me with the
boots. After that, wake our guest and prepare him for his bap-
tism"
304

The Tiger slipped into the aisle behind the casks. He kept
his own cache of clothing in a narrow locked cupboard which
he salvaged from the hit on the shipyard four days before. He
was proud that his uniform was always on a hanger, properly
well-worn but always clean and darned. That was Paluka's job,
as well as polishing his boots with the scraps of wax from the
candles. These candles were an unexpected windfall from the
same bomb; he supposed they were meant to be placed in
the assault boat for emergency. There was no electricity in the
cellar and no daylight, and flashlight batteries do not last long.
He hoped the candles would not give out before the Americans
came.

In the bunker there was one rifle, which he kept locked
in the cupboard, and one revolver, which he wore strapped
around his waist, whether he was in uniform or civilians. Like
his money belt, it had not left his body since the jump. The
other weapons of the team he had hidden under his father-in-
law's bed, where Paluka could not reach them. Even Paluka's
own two pistols, the Walther and the Colt, were upstairs. The
Tiger had borrowed them the day they arrived for what he had
told Paluka was "an operation against a certain sentry/' to be
carried out only by himself and another German.

'We lost them in the struggle, mon vieux/* he explained sadly
that night. "Otherwise the operation -was successful. We should
not begrudge a Walther and a Colt/'

So Paluka was unarmed. While the Tiger was out of sight
behind the cask, he cautiously cut two slices of ham, slipping
them into the pocket of his own overcoat, which Happy was
to wear. In the other pocket he dropped two Benzedrine tab-
lets from the team's medical kit. He filled the canteen with
wine, and snapped it to the leather belt. He shook out his own
Army tunic and trousers, hoping they would not be too big for
the boy. Better that he should wear his own boots than mine,
he thought, for his feet are much smaller. It was important for
boots to fit. From the shelf over the coatrack he lifted down

305

the package of woman's underwear he had brought on the
drop. He chuckled. There had been no chance to offer that
bribe, since he could not even leave the cellar to see what
women there might be. The rayon stepins he wrapped again
in the newspaper; they would not make long enough strips for
a plausible bandage. He could bring them back to Giovanna to
prove he had been faithful. The slip he ripped into a dozen
two-inch strips to wrap around Happy's head. He stroked the
smooth rayon; he was sad to waste it thus.

He opened his clasp knife and sterilized the blade in the
candle flame. Then, sitting on the bench and bracing himself
against the table with his left hand, he cut a gash in his right
calf without wincing. The blood welled to the incision and
dropped to the thirsty floor. He pressed the strips of rayon
against the gash, letting them stanch it long enough to soak a
wide stain on each. He spread the bandages on the table to
dry. The shortest remnant he clapped against his leg to halt
the flow. He filled the basin with water from the hand pump
in the corner of the cellar. They were lucky to have this pump;
it fed from an old well beneath the very floor of the wine cellar.
Too bad not to have hot water to shave in, the first time. The
Tiger, he knew without asking, would not let him use one of
the alcohol cubes to heat the water in the tommy cooker. He
set out his own Rotbart safety razor and shaving soap. They
were both Wehrmacht issue.

The Tiger came out from behind the vats, fully dressed in
his engineer sergeant's uniform. The black kneeboots he car-
ried in his hands. He sat on the bench with his legs stretched
forward. Paluka, leaning sideways, pulled up the boots. The
Tiger buttoned his topcoat, buckled the leather belt about his
waist and over his shoulder, made sure that his pistol was in
the holster and the canteen and gas mask clipped to the belt.
He drew on his knitted gloves; he adjusted the wool helmet
over his ears and set the steel helmet on his head. He looked at
his wristwatch. It was quarter before two. He sat down in his
306

chair behind the council table, where the map was still spread
out, weighted by the bases of the candlesticks. He stood his
rifle against the stone wall behind him.

'Waken the boy," he ordered. "This is his last day."

But Happy was already awake. He lay in the shoddy at the
back of the wine-vault, his closed eyes turned upward to the
stone arch. He wondered whether the column from 25th In-
fantry had got across into Ludwigshaf en before the bridge was
blown. Perhaps even now some of them were swimming back
across the Rhine, through the jostling ice pans. He might even
meet the one-legged reservist in the water. He wondered how
a man could swim with a wo^en leg. He fell asleep again,
dreaming that by mastering the Bhine tonight funny that it
was Germany's frontier after so many years he could some-
how erase the destruction of Gerardmer and of Ludwigshafen,
of Mannheim, and even of Cassino; could float the crashed
American plane in the air again; and set the saboteur of Aalen
on his feet behind his plow, and Corporal Ernst behind his
counter.

He jumped up as soon as Paluka came to arouse "him.

"I will trust tie Tiger/' Happy whispered, "and I shall not
need my pistol on the other side. It is for you/*

He took off his blue Luftwaffe tunic, behind the cask, out of
sight of the Tiger, and stripped down to his blue shorts. He
lifted the strap of the shoulder holster over his head into
Paluka's hands. Paluka slid the weapon out of sight under the
first cask. The Tiger had not seen it They winked at each
other.

*Your own father will not know you as a Cossack." Paluka
laughed aloud. "Let me look once more before the transforma-
tion. And don't be afraid of the Gestapo; they will not recog-
nize you either. Now, first, the uniform of your comrade/'

Happy slid into the baggy feldgrau trousers and tucked the
cuffs into his boots. He slipped on the shirt and tunic, with the
eagle shoulder patch which was the symbol of the Cossack

307

Legion, and the black armlet with Russian letters which he
could not read. The uniform was roomy, but not suspiciously
outsize. He buckled the belt two holes tighter than Paluka had
worn it. The steel helmet was much too big but would fit all
the more comfortably over the padding of the bandage.

"Then your mustache/* Happy walked over and sat at the
table, opposite the Tiger. Paluka leaned his Wehrmacht pocket
mirror against the candlestick Happy's breath clouded the
cold glass.

"Your mustache is not that of Stalin, or even of our Fiihrer."
The Tiger smiled. "It is more like that of my late mother-in-law.
While inconsiderable, it might be remembered for the very
reason that it ought not to exist"

Happy flushed. He picked up the razor and dipped it in the
basin. It was true that the mustache shaved off too easily to be
a serious one.

"Stand up for inspection, Private Rosoff. But remember to
speak no German. I was right; the uniform is too big. But it is
true that all sorts of scarecrows are loose in the Fatherland
these days, and you are no worse than the next. Perhaps it is
worth the risk in order to have a matching Soldbuch. But tuck
your shirt in at the waist and pin the sleeves shorter under the
arms. We will take your own uniform in trade for Paluka's. It
will hang on the rack until you lead the Amis into Mannheim;
we shall not give it to our brigade. The conqueror should not
return to his homeland in the coveralls of the enemy."

"And now the wound of combat," said Paluka. He clumsily
tried to wind the blood-soaked strips about Happy's head.

"Give it to me," Happy interrupted in his halting French. "I
can turn a better bandage than that."

He wound the strips about his head in such a way that the

bloodstains were all on one side, while Paluka held the mirror

in front of him. He bound the cloth as deftly as a Hindu winds

his turban, and on top of it he planted Paluka's steel helmet.

308

He bent to look in the mirror. Just enough of the bloody cloth
showed beneath the brim.

"On approaching the Americans," Paluka reminded him,
"keep your head low and your arms in the air as prisoners do.
Do not wait for them to see you, for they might shoot even a
naked man. They are as frightened as the Germans, being at
the very front. When I came out at Kaiserslautern I shouted
'Oh, my aching back/ as Captain Pete had said, though I did
not understand the words and still do not."

"They are like 'Ach, mein armer Kopf ,* " Happy translated.
"They are a proverb among them."

"It is true," put in the Tiger in German, "that the American
is as light-fingered with his rifle when he is sober as the Russian
when he is drunk."

"Do not be frightened when they close in with their rifles or
Colts," Paluka added, "and be sure to shout 'Soda G-2' when
you wade out, even if you do not see them. Voila; I have shown
my two American speeches, though I still do not understand
them. And here is a stout cane for the wounded hero, who must
not forget to limp even when he does not think he is watched,
for this night is full of eyes."

He hung Happy's Luftwaffe uniform on the hanger where
his own had hung. He filled the three steins from the cask.

"Do not forget either," commanded the Tiger in German,
"that I do not know you and you do not know me. I am help-
ing a wounded ally of the Reich to reach the first aid. But if we
have the bad luck to be challenged, and the guard suspects
you, I too shall suspect you. And if you run, or worse, if you
tell him of me," he patted the holster at his belt, "remember
that I am a sergeant and you a Russian conscript I have shot
men before."

He finished his Rhine wine; they all stood up together. The
Tiger slung the carbine across his back.

"Well, Junge, tell the little captain that his friend Paluka

309

broke the crystals, but I do not think we need replace them at
this late day. We shall meet him with the city corrupted by my
brigade. It will not resist but ask him, if the artillery must
fire on Mannheim, to spare 27 Wharf Street. Now let us go."

Paluka blew out the candle. He tiptoed ahead up the nine
steps to the steel door. Happy, and the Tiger behind him,
leaned against the stone wall till Paluka gave the signal. Softly
he drew the slidebolt to the right The chink widened; he
peered into the vestibule. It was empty; he reached back and
plucked the Tiger's sleeve. The Tiger plucked Happy's. The
two slipped through the doorway into the silent house. As
Happy passed through, with the cane in his left hand, Paluka
patted his back.

"It will not be long," he whispered as he eased the door shut
again and slid back the heavy bolt.

Outside the Tiger took from inside his mitten a key to the
flush cylinder lock. He turned it in the barrel, locking Paluka
in the bunker.

It was wanner on Wharf Street than in the empty house.
Through the half-open door the moonlight shone on the tile
floor, and the crisp air of the night eddied into the entry and
curled up the stairway like the draft in a chimney. They heard
the occasional spit of a rifle off to the west, but the artillery had
ceased. Mannheim waited behind her moat of the Rhine, and
the enemy on the other side was sated.

"Your arm about my shoulder, thus," whispered the Tiger.
He lifted Happy's right wrist across his own shoulder.

"Do not forget to limp. Limp and be silent, that is all you
need do."

They walked out into the deserted street and turned to the
right up the hill.

"I lock the big bear in the bunker for fear he will talk if I let
hfrn outside. The Volksgenossen fear their Russian guests, as I
confess I feared you. Tonight it would be more dangerous for
you to speak than for him, for you are worse than a real Rus-

sian; you are a false one. Even though I have altered you to
the eye, I cannot change a good German voice to Russian."

To reach the Jungbusch Bridge over the Neckar the Tiger
did not have to expose them to the open space of the Ring. At
the end of Wharf Street he guided Happy leftward along Beil
to Fraher, which was the ramp of the bridge itself. Happy re-
membered to limp, though nobody was in sight.

The approach to the bridge began to rise, mounting between
the back of the shipyard on the left and an ice factory on the
right, with its evaporating pans still intact. The ramp of the
Jungbusch Bridge overleaped the freight sidings and revetted
quays on each side of the Neckar. On the far side it sloped
down again to the suburb of Neckarstadt. It was narrower than
the Frederick Bridge by which Happy had entered with the
engineer, and still narrower than the Rhine bridge by which he
had hoped to escape. These two were monuments; over them
the traffic from beyond the two rivers converged into and
through the city. But the Jungbusch marked no axis; there was
no grandeur to its approach. It had been built long after the
others, as the growing dockyards overflowed the peninsula and
spread to the east shore of the Neckar. It was a freight bridge.
Downstream to the left were the docks and basins of the port,
and ahead the overflow of Neckarstadt, and beyond Neckar-
stadt the Friesenheim Island.

Friesenheim was a man-made island. Once it had been a
promontory of the Rhine's west bank, washed by a half -circle
coil of the river. Then the dredging of the Rhine ship channel
cut it adrift, and now it belongs more to the east, for the Dif-
fene draw joins it to Neckarstadt, spanning the coil of the Old
Rhine. The Old Rhine is what they call the original riverbed,
winding each side of the new channel as the snakes on Happy's
caduceus patch coiled around the staff.

The island which he had to cross spread below them, a two-
kilometer disc of sand. It grew one clump of trees, off on the
far quadrant. The only two large buildings on it, the electric

311

station and the margarine factory, were bombed hollow. It
was checkered by filter beds and irrigation ditches. It was
the cesspool of Mannheim.

"Sewage and strawberries/' the Tiger said out of the side of
his mouth. But Happy did not dare turn his head, lest someone
might see that he understood the German words.

"The island is empty/' the Tiger went on. "I will take you
over the Diffene and guide you to the far side, right to the bank
of Father Rhine himself. We shall skirt the sewage station. That
is one reason why Mannheim is deserted too, that the Yankees
have blown the lid off the settling basin. Follow any of the
paths, or walk across the fields, and in twenty minutes you are
at the river. Once beyond the shadow of the pumphouse there
will be no danger. Even if there should be outposts on the is-
land, who would shoot a wounded soldier?"

Happy squeezed the Tiger's arm. "Cheer up, Landser, and
don't mind that you live in Mannheim," he mumbled with a
smile. "After the war the Amis will rebuild what they have de-
stroyed, with our German help. Everything will be good after
the war, dost thou not think so? What we do now is shameful,
but for the good of Germany and the Amis too. One does it for
both."

It was the first time he had called the Tiger "thou. w

"I do it for neither."

"After the war we shall be brothers again."

"Would you be my brother after the war?" the Tiger asked
him curiously.

"Yes; thou hast shared my danger."

"After the war it will be better, I agree; but not as you think.
Perhaps the Amis will make me Biirgermeister. I shall have
fifteen thousand marks a year and a car of my own. Let us walk
faster, now that we have passed the river. No need to limp so
slowly. Take your hand from my shoulder, for we shall meet
no sentries now, unless it be at the bridge to the island."
312

They swung down into Hirten Street, which ran parallel to
the basin of the Old Rhine, but a little in from the edge of the
docks, behind the big boiler factory. Happy had trouble keep-
ing up with the Tiger, for his legs ached and his long coat
dragged. He had walked twenty miles since Heidelberg. When
they came abreast of the ruined gasworks and neared the Dif-
fene the Tiger stopped short. His left hand gripped Happy's
arm, for a sentry had suddenly walked out of the dark under-
pass that led to the draw. With bayonet set, he barred their
way.

He was not SS, like the sentries on the Rhine bridge, but a
reservist, in a long civilian overcoat and a steel helmet too big
for him, and the familiar white Volkssturm brassard on his
sleeve.

"Achtung!" he shouted.

"Shut up and duck," whispered the Tiger.

Happy lowered the brim of his Stahlhelm again to throw
shadow across his face.

"Soldbuch!" the sentry demanded.

The Tiger disengaged his left arm from Happy, but as he
did so he pressed Happy's hand against the holster at his waist,
to warn him.

"The Cossack was wounded in Ludwigshafen this evening,
sentry. He was crossing the Rhine bridge just before we blew
it. A woman tore off her slip to wrap his head. He doesn't seem
to understand a word of German. These Russians! They are
evil as enemies and useless as friends. I found him at the
bridge. Since I am going on to the battery at Sandhofen myself,
I have volunteered to leave him at the work camp on the is-
land. You will want to see my Soldbuch, naturally."

He spoke with authority, just like a sergeant. He made
himself sound more watchful than the watchman. He reached
through his overcoat into his tunic and pulled out his little
brown book, holding it open to the sentry for inspection.

313

The reservist studied the picture, then looked up. He nodded
and returned the book. "Very good, Herr Sergeant," he said re-
spectfully.

He stood his rifle against the granite wall of the underpass,
as no trained sentry would have done, and pulled from his
pocket the orange-bound Blacklist.

"Kett, Kett," he muttered, thumbing to the page of K.

He was more like a ticket-taker than a sentry, Happy
thought below the helmet At the beginning of the war a sentry
who let go his rifle would have got three days KP. At the begin-
ning of the war, in fact, there would have been two sentries
instead of one.

"We have to look up the names/' he apologized, wetting his
thumb as he turned the leaves. "There is an alert for a Luft-
waffe medical corporal, or rather a spy in that uniform. You
haven't seen such a uniform since the Rhine bridge, by chance,
Herr Sergeant?"

"No; I heard about him over there and have been on the
lookout, but I have passed no one till meeting you. I suppose
they issue Russians Soldbiicher too; do you want to look at
my patient's?"

"Yes. If I'm not thorough I won't be following orders. This is
an important junction. You see, we have opened the draw from
the island so that if parachutists or boats land there they can-
not get across the basin to the mainland. Opening the draw is
just as good as blowing it. Anyway, even the Russians were
shipped out today because of the danger, so the camp is empty.
I do not know where they were carted."

"The draw is open?" The Tiger caught his breath. "That is a
good precaution. Then I shall walk him to the big bunker at
Waldhof, where they will take him off my hands. But what if
some of our own should have to get out of Ludwigshaf en over
the island? It must be almost as bad to swim the Rhine and
pick your way across the island, and then have to swim the
314

basin too, as to be captured by the Amis. On a night like this I
should not like to cross the island in wet clothes."

The sentry looked at him mournfully, his finger in the Black-
list. "There were two squads who came from Ludwigshafen
just an hour ago; one Flak and one machine-gun. But they had
not swum the Rhine; they had a boat which they have left on
the far side of the island. Perhaps they cannot swim. Now they
are marooned on the island. They shouted across for me to
close the draw, but I do not know how. So I told them to bunk
down in the pumphouse till my relief comes on in the morning.
Surely the Americans would not bomb the plant again. The
settling basin is already kaput They cannot swim the Old
Rhine anyway here, you see, because of the concrete banks. If
they want to swim it they must go downstream below the
draw. They're over there now, resting up in the pumphouse. It
doesn't smell very nice does it?" He laughed. "Yes, I'd better
see the Cossack's Soldbuch. I wish I could get the poor fellow
a ride, but there's no traffic at this hour, it seems."

He stretched out his hand to Happy, saying, "Buch, buch,"
as if a Russian could be expected to understand German.

The Tiger whipped his Walther out of the holster and struck
the man a blow on the chest with the butt, as hard as he could
hit The sentry crumpled from the knees, falling to the un-
tended grass at the side of the granite abutment as if he knelt
to pray, then tipping heavily to his right side. The rim of his
steel helmet rang on the flinty earth, but Happy knew the
leather sweatband would protect him from concussion. The
Tiger looked down at him, hen at Happy.

"AgainF'

Happy caught the Tiger's wrist. "No."

The Tiger picked up the orange book from the sentry's side
and whipped it into his own pocket

"You take his head and III take his feet"

The sentry weighed surprisingly little for his height. They

315

swung him around the corner of the underpass, out of the
moonlight. The Tiger seized Happy's hand.

"Now you've got to run, Junge. Throw down your cane/'

A few steps beyond where they left the sentry, the road
curved to pass under the Frankfurt railroad tracks. A freight
spur ran left at grade level through the underpass leading to
the Diffene. They could see the iron truss of the Diffene draw,
pivoted on the stone pier in the center of the basin, and swung
open parallel to the estuary. The spur track ran to the open
edge.

"Now you must swim two rivers, Junge/' the Tiger whispered
between his teeth. "Stick close to me and keep out of the moon-
light Throw your cane away, idiot. It's only a hundred yards."

The sprint was a short one. The highway curved to the
right, past the wire fence which surrounded the docks. But
Happy could not keep up with the Tiger's long strides, and the
Tiger did not wait for him. Just beyond the fence, where the
dock enclosure ends, there is a clear space between the last
houses of Neckarstadt and the first of Waldhof. The road is
clear on both sides no factories or houses on the right, and
the currentless stretch of the Old Rhine only fifty yards to the
left, over a shoulder of matted grass sloping down to the water,
beyond the last slip.

The Tiger hared around the corner of the wire fence with
Happy after him, sprinted across the open grass to the edge
of the water, and dragged him down under the overhanging
sedge where the dredging of the basin had cut the bank away.
He laid his hand on Happy's arm.

They listened, but it takes time to be able to listen after a
hard run. Happy's tongue lay forward on his lower lip. He
stretched it upward, tasting salt sweat where his mustache had
been shaved off. He breathed through his mouth, fast and
short, to cleanse his hearing for other sounds, or for the silence
he hoped for. The night was more silent than sleep. It was as
if the whole city, like themselves, strained its eyes and ears
316

across the water. The idle backwater at their feet did not even
lap the sand. Across from diem lay the island, with the open
swing-bridge half blotting out its roofless factories and its sin-
gle clump of trees.

"Clothes off," the Tiger whispered. "Remember I must risk
getting back around the sentry whom you would not let me
kill. By now they may have found "him."

He did not replace the revolver in his holster, but laid it on a
flat stone. Happy pulled off his steel helmet and ripped the
blood-spotted bandage from his head. He unclasped the buckle
on the belt of trig overcoat.

"The meat in the pocket is for you, Herr Tiger; you need it
more than L"

The Tiger helped him pull off the boots. His trousers fell to
the ground. Before taking off his shirt, he pressed it on his
sweating body to cool off.

"Did I hit the old man hard enough?" the Tiger asked. "I
must get back over the bridge before he wakes, for he will re-
member my name and put it in the Blacklist tomorrow. I am
too soft-hearted."

"You hit him hard enough. He may remember nothing.
Could I not have shown him the book? He was friendly to us."

"Friendly!" repeated the Tiger, spitting on the sand. "You
have no friends; in our game there is no friendship. You play it
as hard as I do not excuse yourself but not as well. What
poison in you held my finger from the trigger now, that I did
not shoot him? I shall do it on my way back. Before you reach
the island your friend will be silent for good, and never can he
add my name to the orange book."

He clapped the Blacklist in his pocket. "Yet this list will be
the German Hall of Fame when the Americans come. They
will give medals, and even money. Perhaps I shall spare your
friend after all, so he will add my own name to it. It will not be
long before they come. Down where the stream is narrow they
are lashing their square-end pontoons and laying the wooden

317

tracks between the ends of the Autobahn where the all-wise
Doctor Todt let his own bridge fall in. Your friends? They will
forget you as soon as they have heard your news, because you
are not one of them. Listen, Junge, you will not dare tell what
you have done, even to your father, even in years to come to
your wife. I myself am not your friend, though I risk my life to
send you to your friends.

"Your friend! I could shoot you in the water if it would save
myself, as I may shoot the sentry who endangers me. Lean on
my shoulder if you wish, to enter, for the bank is steep. Tell
the Americans that the Tiger delivers Mannheim to them. Each
of my eight recruits will find eight more of his own, like the
cells I spoke of in the prison camp. The cells ripen and spread,
and the city falls. Do not shiver. The climate of Mannheim is
the mildest in the Reich, under the lee of her two mountain
walls. It is the Rhine itself which will be cold, for the sun does
not have time to melt the ice from Switzerland as fast as the
current swirls it down. Are you not afraid?"

"I am not afraid," Happy answered into his face.

<0 rhen let us meet in Berlin at the dawn of your new Ger-
many."

While he spoke he had scooped out a hollow in the sloping
sand -with the long nails of his good hand; and as Happy took
off his clothes he laid them in the burrow and sprinkled sand
to cover them.

"Did you do thus with your parachute? Just a little more
carefully, eh, and your name would not be in the Blacklist.
And now what have you left? A dogtag for identity. That
money belt for riches you will not need among the Americans,
who are so rich themselves. Besides, it will impede your swim-
ming. Paluka yes, perhaps Paluka is your friend may find
us a goose to buy with your useless marks, if I unlock the
bunker door for him."

'There are eight hundred and forty-two left, Herr Tiger,
From the thousand. Give Paluka enough for a goose to feed the
318

mission till the Amis come. Send the rest for me to Maria Lie-
bert at the Sign of the Ox in Dietmannsried, near Kempten.
Inside the envelope just write 'from KarF in capitals. Do not
say Karl Steinberg, for she will understand. You are right; I
shall not need the money any more."

TPaluka and his pantalettes! You and your hopechest! His
grunts and your sighs! What sort of agents are you? Shall I,
who have loved as neither of you could, be pimp for both? But
I shall do as you wish, if the Reichspost still empties its mail-
boxes and I can tip the flap unnoticed. Give me the money
quickly."

Happy started to loosen the buckle of his money belt, but
his bare arms were covered with gooseflesh and his hands shiv-
ered. The Tiger reached up impatiently; he ripped the belt
from Happy's waist and stuffed it into his own side pocket.
Happ/s courage, which was the last injustice, he had not de-
stroyed.

"Quick., into the water now!" Still crouching back of Happy,
he threw his arms forward as one launches a skiff.

*"I shall wait till you reach the other side/'

Naked except for his dogtag, Happy slid down the short
bank sideways, like a crab. He dipped his foot in the water. He
smiled wryly at the Tiger, shivering, with his arms clasped
across his chest. The dogtag glinted as he shook his head.

"Make for the clump of trees," the Tiger whispered into his
cupped hands. "There is no current here. Auf Wiederseh'n,
KameradP

As he flattened out in the water Happy raised two fingers
over his head in a V. His body blended into the dappled water.

The Tiger smiled; every German knew that in English V
means Victory, even if he spoke no English.

As Happy waded ashore to the flat bank of the island a pri-
vate of Task Force Zeisler, left on watch in the water tower
of the damaged brick pumphouse while the others slept below,

319

caught, through the shellhole where his carbine rested, a move-
ment of white against the dark clump of trees. It had been
another bad day for him being forced to cross the Rhine with
his magazine still full and having to spend the sleepless night
in a sewer because an idiot sentry could not close the draw. He
was tired and irritable. He did not wait to see what moved;
perhaps a sheet of paper blown in the gust. The last thing he
expected was a naked swimmer heading west to the hell the
squad had left. He pumped the trigger blindly.

At the shots from the island the Tiger wheeled. When he
saw the smoke from the shellhole and heard the alarm echo in
the hollow pumphouse, when he saw the white figure fall, he
dropped his rifle to the ground and fled as fast as he had come.

320

Twelve

Back at the shelter, Paluka lingered at the head of the steps.
Happy might trust the Tiger, but he knew better. A purpose
stirred inside him. Though he had failed Pete, he would make
sure that Happy did not fail Fred.

The bolt was still drawn back. He pressed his weight against
the door, but he knew it was no use. The Tiger had locked him
in again. He relit the candle with his lighter, holding the flame
close to the door. He studied the sheet of steel. It matched
the outside, which he had studied the first day, but it was
unpainted and scabby with rust. The core must be wood, for
when the door opened behind the Tiger it swung more lightly
than the solid metal of the cell in the Sarrebourg cage. It could
be locked only from the outside, for the barrel did not run
through the core. It could be bolted only from the inside. If
the Tiger could keep him in, he could keep the Tiger out, but
that was small comfort. The sound of the turning key was still
fresh in his ears. He knew exactly the height of the cylinder.
He penciled a cross on the inside to mark the point.

No matter how often the Tiger locked him in, the clicking

321

of the key outraged him anew. He had spent the whole five
days in this dark cellar. He had unbolted the door for the Tiger
and his recruits, and tonight for Happy, but not once had he
gone through it himself. Not so bad if he could have used his
radio; he would have been content then, as he had been in the
cemetery guardhouse, to send and receive twice a day, and
sleep between times. But to sit in the dark with his broken
crystals and useless code pads, that was not justice.

Twice a day the Tiger went out that door and upstairs to
the old man's room on the second floor, taking the meals which
Paluka had cooked over the spirit-stove. Two trips, always
in the dark one just before sunrise, and again just after cur-
few. Only a few minutes before Happy knocked on their door
the Tiger had returned from upstairs, bringing down the plate
from the morning for Paluka to wash at the pump. Paluka
wondered who had taken care of the old man before the
bomb.

On the night sorties the Tiger merely said he had "business";
and each time he came back with a suit of second-hand civilian
clothes or some silverware like the candlesticks; but only once
with food.

The deserters whom he suborned, two each day since the
bomb had dropped, arrived in the uniform of the Army, or
even of the SS 7 when the sun had set or before it rose. After
long whispering in the language Paluka did not understand,
and poring over maps, they gave the Tiger some money and
changed the uniform for one of the civilian suits from the rack.
It was part of Paluka's job to fit the suits and make any adjust-
ments with his sewing kit, and to beat the dust out of them
with a Wehrmacht issue clothes-beater, so they would look
tempting to the buyers. This beater, the Klopfpeitsche, was
half a dozen thongs bound in a wooden handle. The Tiger
would laugh when Paluka belabored the clothes. "Thou hast
the air of a Cossack beating peasants."

Paluka laughed himself; the beater did look like a cat-o'-nine-
322

tails. Then, after it grew dark, but before the curfew, the Tiger
would escort the recruits up the steps, unbolt the door, and
watch them disappear into the night.

It was no fun to stay all day in the bunker, but there was
plenty to do keeping it neat. Paluka could never recruit a de-
serter, since he spoke no German. He admitted that without
his radio he was useless to the mission, and his imprisonment
was perhaps a just punishment for breaking his crystals. But it
was a needless disgrace to lock in an agent who ever since
Algiers had transmitted messages which he knew were valued
by the Americans.

There seemed no end of waiting in the bunker, yet he had
waited only five days. It was not as if there were a deadline for
their return, as there was for Happy's. They must stay in Mann-
heim till the Americans overran them. Paluka could only guess
the course of the battle from the number of recruits who came
in to buy civilian clothes, and by the volume of the gunfire he
heard when he listened at the ventilator. "They'll cross any day
now," the Tiger boasted negligently. He seemed to be in no
hurry for the end. But tonight Paluka knew there was no need
to boast, for the blowing of the Rhine bridge meant the Ger-
mans had given up the west bank. As the end drew near, he
grew impatient. Between Giovanna and himself there was noth-
ing left now but a steel door and a few city blocks and a river:
the river, perhaps his last adventure of the war.

Late as it was, he would not sleep before the Tiger returned.
He carried his candle to the back of the bunker. He lifted
Happy's shoulder holster from its hiding place under a cask.
He took off his jacket and shirt, fitted the holster over his left
shoulder and under the arm by lengthening the strap two holes.
The Olympia was beautifully designed to lie flat. The Tiger
would never know he had it, and the space between the but-
tons of his shirt was just wide enough to reach his hand in for
a quick draw. He slid the Olympia from its holster and turned
it over on his hand. It was no bigger than his palm a beautiful

323

toy. He chuckled as lie pressed out the magazine, slipped the
catch to Feuer, and pulled the trigger once for each o the
seven cartridges. He wound a last snip of the rayon underwear
round a sliver of wood to clear out the barrel. When he sighted
through he saw it was clean and still well oiled. He carried it
back and up the steps to the steel door. He held it against the
cross he had marked; he had heard the key click too often not
to be sure of the exact position of the lock on the outside.

Whistling to himself, he walked past the clothes rack to his
own end. It was time for his three o'clock QRX, when the di-
rection finders outside were least watchful. Tonight was one
more chance. He opened the fiber case behind the cask. He
plugged the battery, laced the ground wire to the fins of the
ventilator, extended the antenna. He set the dial to nine mega-
cycles, to match the crystal on the transmitter box. He could
do all this in the dark, squatting on his hams. Then the dial lit.
The square of quartz, no bigger than a stamp, stood on two
pins like little legs, and the crack was like a wink across its
face. He stood up to close the louvres. Between the fins, from
far off to his right, he heard faintly the clatter of an MP-38. He
had heard it often enough to be sure. He frowned and flipped
the ventilator shut. He cupped the earphones of the TR-1 to his
head.

The first four days there had been contact of a sort, a kind of
squeak which must have been his own call. He could read
Morse as fast as Benny could send it, but there were no da-dits
to that jerky squeak. He had tried each of the six crystals in
turn, hoping that one band length might get through, and had
tapped the QRX to all of them. Neither side dare hold the air
more than ten minutes. The squeak had ended abruptly each
time.

Tonight there was no sound at all. Benny had given up, and
he gave up too.

He had already encoded a message on a sheet of the one-
324

time pad. Now he pretended to send it, though he knew
the tapping of the key would reach no farther than the staves
in the cask beside him. NR 23 VCFGK IXRYY, it began.

If Benny had received it to decode and translate, it would
have read:

KARL'S MISSION SUCCESS RPT SUCCESS HE RETURNS TIGER WATTS
PALUKA GREETS YOU.

The game only made him feel worse. He jumped up from
the bench. With the shovel he used for digging the daily latrine
he scooped out a hole in the gravel, between two casks. The
Tiger had found this shovel in the wreck of the flourmill. He
smashed his radio with the flat of the shovel and stamped the
fragments of metal and fiber and glass into the depression,
with the crystals and code pad on top, smoothing the gravel
over their grave. He drew a steinful of wine from the cask.

The pad where the Tiger had written Happy's report lay on
the table. Paluka looked at it with the respect of incomprehen-
sion. He could not understand the German words, and the an-
gular letters all looked alike, for the Tiger wrote in script. But
he saw the two numbers nine and twenty-five, which he knew
were the numbers of Happy's divisions, and many series of six
figures which he guessed must be coordinates. These words
which he did not understand were important, and they be-
longed not to the Tiger but to Happy.

His money belt was lined with oilskin. He ripped out the
lining at the seams, folded the sheet, and laid it inside the oil-
skin. Heating the blade of his knife at the candle, he sealed
down the edges of the packet to make it waterproof, leaving a
selvage through which he bored a hole with the point of the
knife. He strung the packet on the neck-cord with his dogtag.

"And I," he said aloud in Russian, "I, the veteran, like a
mushroom in my cellar! To break my crystals! It is as if I did
it on purpose. It is as if I had mutilated myself, as the Tiger
shot off his own fingers. And though thy old comrade has not

325

the wings of a carrier pigeon, he has arms and legs to swim.
Between us, young one, we will bring the message through on
time."

Breathing faster with the new excitement, he traced his
heavy finger over the path which the Tiger had penciled on
the city map: over the two bridges and across the island, and
swim the Rhine down where the sloping stone walls of the
quayside had ended and a man could wade out of the water in-
stead of dragging against the steep embankment. To make sure
he remembered the route, he closed his eyes and repeated the
street names aloud: Wharf, Beil, Fraher, Hirten. He could read
the Western alphabet, even if he could not pronounce the
words. Four hundred yards would not be hard for an athlete
in good trim. Adventure was beginning again; he whistled to
himself.

He poured himself a cup of the tart wine, to keep himself at
the right point of tension that he knew so well.

"Now to my exercise," he grunted, "to limber up for the
morning/*

He went through his nightly gymnastics, the candle magni-
fying his shadow on the stone. Twenty times with fingertips to
toes; twenty times kicking out his legs from the crouch with
arms folded, as in the Czardas dance.

"I am not yet too old," he panted.

But the gravel hurt his bare feet, calloused as they were, and
the tension on his calf broke open the gash he had cut in it for
Happy. He wrapped himself a new bandage, having tipped
the cut with iodine from the first-aid kit. With the candle in his
hand he walked back to the far end of the cellar his end. He
blew out the light and reopened the ventilator. The crisp night
air filled his lungs; after the staleness inside it was better than
the wine. He listened, but no sound came through the fins.

He lay down between the blankets of uniform where Happy
had rested, but he would not sleep till the Tiger knocked. He
should be here soon, he thought. His bare feet ached from the
326

dancing. His ankle-boots, which alone of his uniform Happy
had not worn, stood beside him for the day. He lay on the
ground fully clad, still in civilians he had never undressed
since the first day's bomb his mind swept clear of thought* his
body resting but alert as he had trained it. Something Oriental
in Palulca inured him to time as a yogi can inure himself to
pain. He had no idea how long he waited for the knock. But
at the instant of the four raps which were their signal he was
on his feet and up the steps, sliding the bolt. The Tiger had
not complained about the bolt, for Paluka slid it as fast as he
could fit the key outside. The Tiger and he knew each step of
their bunker so well that there was no need to light the candle
till the door had closed again and the fins of the ventilator had
been shut.

"Is he safe?" he asked in the dark.
. "Light the candle."

Paluka lit the candle. The Tiger sagged onto his bench. His
jaw dropped, stretching the flanks of his cheeks between the
blue stubble and the black mane. His eyes stared ahead. He
was too tired tonight for the raking glance with which he had
always cased the bunker before he spoke, too tired to see that
the sheet of script was gone. He gulped the wine which Paluka
set before him.

"You saw him swim safely to the American side, at least?"

"The draw of the Diffene was open; I confess I should have
known. He had to swim the Old Rhine first, to the clump of
trees on the island. Like this."

The Tiger's long fingernail pointed to the clump of trees on
the map, where he had told Happy to aim. Paluka nodded.

"Then," Paluka pondered, "he had only to run the twelve
hundred yards across the island; see, it narrows at the end
where he swam. He would be cold, and the frozen ground
would be hard to the feet, but not for long. Then swim the
Rhine. If I could be sure the island was empty, I should have
no fear."

327

The Tiger turned on his bench. He dared not tell Paluka that
Happy had fallen, almost within sight of the end.

"A dozen soldiers were sleeping in the pumphouse," he ad-
mitted irritably, "but see, that was far from the trees."

"Through the ventilator I heard a volley which sounded
from beyond the Neckar," Paluka persisted.

The Tiger spread his hands. "I heard it too. Though I was
nearer than you, I cannot tell whence it came. But now I must
sleep."

When Paluka crossed to the cask, the Tiger pulled the
orange Blacklist from his pocket and slid it under the roll of
maps.

"Go to sleep also. In two hours I must carry the bread
and meat to the old man. Your friend returns this."

He laid the slices of ham on the table. Paluka left them, and
the Tiger staggered to his feet.

"I will wake you," Paluka promised.

"Ah," the Tiger groaned, "will he upstairs never die, and
must we always be hunted? This breakfast may be our last,
unless the recruits should bring some in the morning."

"We are also the hunters, Monsieur le Tigre." Paluka
laughed. He turned toward his own pallet.

Before he got there, the rustle of paper caught his ear. Still
in his bare feet, he blew out the candle and stole back. He
peered between the casks at the Tiger, who stood stripped to
the waist before the locker he had salvaged from the shipyard.
The second candlestick was on the floor beside him. He had
two money belts in his hand, his own of Feldgrau and the other
which Paluka recognized as Happy's because it was blue. It
took a few moments for Paluka., crouched in the shadow of the
cask, to understand that the Tiger had Happy's money. When
the bills were folded lengthwise in the Feldgrau, evenly spread,
and when the Tiger had laid the empty blue belt in the locker
and strapped the fat gray one about his own waist, Paluka
328

knew. He rose to the half -bend stance of a wrestler, his arms
swinging and his hands unclenched.

"It is you who shot/' he roared.

Through the alley between the casks he lunged toward the
Tiger, but his toe stubbed on a wooden chock. The Tiger was
too quick for him. Putting one foot on the shoulder of the
lower cask, he vaulted to the top of the upper one with his
pistol in one hand. With the other he strapped the buckle of
the money belt tight, his Walther leveled at Paluka.

Paluka ignored the black muzzle pointed at him from a yard
away. He set his shoulder to the lower cask, trying to topple
the Tiger from his perch, but there was too much wine in it
for his strength to move. He stood back panting. The candle
guttering on the floor threw its light full on his left leg. He
stood, breathing hard, gathering strength for another assault
on the cask.

The Tiger, with careful aim, sent a bullet which barely
grazed the skin of his calf and buried itself in the black gravel
floor. He had always boasted of being the best shot in his Engi-
neer regiment.

"That will teach you not to roar so loud, great bear," he
whispered from his perch. "Also that I am chief of the team, as
the Amis appointed me. Do not forget the marksman's badge
on my tunic. Now your legs have two wounds, one for yourself
and one for your chief. I think you will feel they are at exactly
the same height on each leg. Mine will not hurt unless you
rebel again. But wrap the last strip of your useless woman-bait
about it to make sure. You have twin garters of honor and you
smell of woman. It was not I who shot your friend, but the
sentry in the pumphouse. Crawl back to your den now, and
sleep, but you need not wake me. Do not fear, I shall be watch-
ing with the pistol cocked beside my hand, lest you break out
to endanger me anew."

He climbed down from the cask. With what courage re-

329

mained from the bridge, the Tiger struck Paluka's open mouth
with the back of his left hand. Paluka lurched forward, ignor-
ing the Walther in the other hand. But he fell back, as the
Tiger knew he must, and crept around the cask to his pallet
with both hands clutched around his calf. The Tiger blew out
the candle and lay down on his own pack of coats at the foot
of the steps. Paluka stretched up one hand to open the damper.
Neither of them slept. Through the dark they listened to each
other, each, though his eyes were closed, turned toward his
teammate.

By the luminous dial of the wristwatches it was 0455. The
curfew would lift in five minutes. Paluka turned, pretending to
toss in his sleep. He touched his mouth. He felt the holster un-
der his armpit better when he lay on his side, but he knew it
was not yet the time. Through the barred ventilator, no bigger
than a brick, he could see the beginning of the dawn. He
dared not risk the street before the great bell struck five, with-
out his uniform.

At the Tiger's end, the hooded flashlight wove back and
forth; it shone on the two slices of ham, and Paluka saw him
cut a piece of bread for the old man's sandwich and draw a
cup of wine, the pistol still in his hand, holding the metal close
to the bung so the wine would not splash. Then he cut a slice
for himself; Paluka knew it, for he heard the knife scrape the
bone. Still Paluka did not move. He heard the Tiger back up
the stairs and slide open the bolt with his elbow. The metal
door swung to let him through. A dimness of dimness, bor-
rowed from -the arch over the street door, grew and was gone.
The key clicked in the lock.

Paluka was on his feet before the Tiger had taken the four
steps to the ground floor. He pulled the boots over his feet.
The boots of the Cossack Legion fastened with a strap. He
cuddled the shoulder holster under his armpit. He patted the
worker's passport in his pocket. The overcoat on which he had
slept he tihrew over his shoulders like a cape, thrust his arms
330

through the sleeves in a single motion. It was the Tiger's civil-
ian coat with the sheepskin lining. Before buttoning it, he
reached through his shirttails to unbuckle his own money belt.
The oilskin lining was gone, but the thousand marks of the
Americans were still in the canvas. As he tiptoed past the table
to the steps he tossed them down.

"Since that is all you love, assassin, take mine," he whispered.
"It may console you for your comrade and your coat/'

At the foot of the steps he listened. He could hear the Ti-
ger tiptoe up the stairs above. He had bolted this door often
enough behind the Tiger to know that after the four steps from
the vestibule there was a flight of eighteen, divided by the
landing, then twelve steps down the hall to the old man's
room. He pressed his ear against the jamb to count. When he
heard the Tiger take the last, he tapped his own door lightly
four times as the Tiger should be doing at the door upstairs.
He reached in his jacket for a nonexistent key, turned it as the
Tiger would be turning his. He waited long enough for the old
man's door to open and be closed again. He turned his flash-
light on the cross he had penciled on the steel. He drew back
the slidebolt so it could not jam.

He whipped Happy's Olympia from its holster and wrapped
the barrel in his handkerchief. He held the muzzle two inches
from the pencil mark and fired.

He had figured it right; the tumblers of the lock fell forward,
the pin jarred loose, and the wide strike fell back from the
keeper. He pushed the door open; it did not even creak. He
stepped into the vestibule.

With one foot he pressed the steel door shut behind him, the
white smoke and sharp odor still hanging at the hole he had
drilled. With one hand he drew open the outer door; then he
was in the street. Either the Tiger had not heard, or he was not
quick enough to catch him. Paluka thrust the pistol in his
pocket with his finger still on the trigger. He turned sharply to
the right, hugging the walls so that if the Tiger should open

331

the staircase window he would have to lean way out for the
raking shot. But Paluka did not look back. He hardly hurried
as he climbed the half -block to Beil Street.

Even in the easy dawn he had to blink his eyes after five
days in the darkness of the bunker. He saturated his lungs with
the crisp cold air, as he had often, when pursued in France,
drunk water from a spring, drawing as long as his breath
would hold. When he turned the corner toward the Neckar,
out of sight, he knew he was safe at least from the Tiger. The
Tiger would not dare pursue him to the open street; still better,
might not miss him till he had crossed the bridge or even till
he was swimming the Old Rhine. The Tiger always stayed a
good half-hour with the old man, talking Paluka knew not
what memories or plots. Or maybe only watching him die.

It was hard to smother the smile on his face and the lilt in
his walk as he passed the few troops and civilians who were
out so early. They walked without speaking to one another,
with eyes staring straight out from their bent heads all blink-
ing like himself from the darkness of the shelters, and all, even
the troops, bound for the hand pumps, with buckets in their
hands. They hugged the sides of the shuttered houses as he
had done, as if the walls could protect them from the splinters
of shellfire.

When he reached the Jungbusch Bridge he looked with the
same curiosity as Happy at the damage the Americans had
done to the ruined docks below him, at the tanks and ware-
houses and cranes on the spit, at the gasworks and transformer
station at the far end of the bridge. He could see the hits on
the island all the way from the bridge rail. In the dawn he saw
farther than Happy and the Tiger could have seen by moon-
light By turning his head from the Jungbusch he could look
back to the downstream end of the great Farben factory
across the Rhine at Ludwigshafen, with the cranes and pipe-
lines twisted crazily above the steep causeway and the spurs,
and the great river rushing past below. The shoulder of the
332

city behind him hid the blown Rhine bridge, but he pictured
its grilled trusses and cables obstructing the water like a weir,
and fretting the surface into eddies and whitecaps which the
sun would soon tinge with pink. The daylight grew brighter
ahead of him, but one band on the left horizon stayed dark. It
was the smoke screen behind which the Americans were float-
ing their bridge, five thousand yards downstream.

He felt happily in his pocket for the little gray booklet he
had carried all the way from Marseille two years ago: the pass-
port of a Russian laborer. This civilian cover was better than
the military; the Germans were frightened of their Russian
slaves, but still more of their Russian conscripts. He hoped he
would not be caught in a spot-check, just the same. The ques-
tioning and examination of papers would waste time. It was
good to be a Russian, for then you could not answer their ques-
tions.

Where Hirtenstrasse twists under the bridge trestle, he saw
the empty sentrybox. The reservist., still unconscious., lay in
the indentation of the granite wall, but Paluka did not stop.
Nobody stopped any more for what he saw lying in the road.
The Rhine tossed and twinkled clear in the sunrise, for the ice
from Switzerland kept it colder than the air. But wisps of
vapor hung over the warmer water of the Neckar and the Old
Rhine. On the Friesenheim Island, at the far side of the Dif-
fene, he saw the German soldiers shouting and beckoning to
be let across. The valve box which controlled the turntable
was still locked; the sentry's morning relief had not come on.
Paluka waved back at them with a smile, shaking his head and
waving his hands to show he did not understand and could
not help. He played deaf and dumb to them, as he would have
done if they had challenged him on the road. He pointed first
back at Mannheim, then at himself, then ahead to Sandhof en.
As he strode along their shouts faded out of his hearing. The
Tiger might sneer, but sometimes it was wise to be stupid.

Along the fence where Happy and the Tiger had scuttled he

333

strode easily, whistling softly to himself. The Germans could
not expect that a Russian farmhand should be intelligent, or
even that he should try to help them. He strode past the
Aachen Glassworks, past the bumper on the commercial sid-
ing, past the last post of the wire fence. He turned left off the
highway to the fifty-yard shoulder that sloped to the Old
Rhine, just where the Tiger and Happy had turned. He did not
hurry; he did not bother to crouch. At the brink he took off
the sleek overcoat it was too good for a slave laborer, but he
cared no longer. He tossed it on the bank, over the very bur-
row that covered his uniform, left behind by Happy. He saw
the rifle on the sedge and wondered for the first time why the
Tiger had come home without it. He broke it open; the maga-
zine was full. For once the Tiger had told the truth.

He stripped to his shorts and his ankle-boots. He did not
bother to hide the rest of his clothes as the Tiger had hidden
Happy's, or even his passport. The boots were a little heavier
than he liked for swimming, but better than crossing the island
in bare feet. The shorts would not hinder a good swimmer,
and he might be able to dry them in the sun.

Without a backward look he flattened into the Old Rhine to
swim across to the island, the same course the Tiger had given
Happy. He did not swim the crawl, for the soldiers might no-
tice the splash. The breast stroke was quieter. He knew the
mist would hide his head from so far away as the drawbridge.
It took him fifteen minutes, at a guess, to swim the currentless
estuary the same time he had allowed for Happy. Like
Happy, he aimed for the clump of trees, for the air was warm-
ing up and soon the sun would burn off the mist. Then he
might need concealment, for his head was too big a target to
give the soldiers.

Once within the shelter of the poplars, he looked back to the

Diffen bridgehead. The draw was closing, turned by a hand

which must just before have touched the feet of the sentry to

see if he were still alive. The double truss of the draw rotated

334

into its notch. The soldiers formed as carefully as if they had
been on a drill ground instead of fleeing for their lives. As he
watched they marched across the Diffene in column, and he
was alone on the abandoned island, dripping and shivering
and almost naked in the morning gusts, but laughing to him-
self.

The soil of the Friesenheim Island is the silt of centuries*
deposit, a checkerboard of truck gardens which grow the
best asparagus and strawberries in the Reich, The island is cut
by the arms of irrigation ditches from the Rhine, and by the
leaching trenches of the sterilized effluent from the city filter
beds, both helping the crops to grow. A cart path for the crop-
pers turned from the Diffene bridge and swung northward
past the pumphouse. It crossed the downstream third of the
island within a few yards of the grove where Paluka stood
watching. Now he had only to sprint along the path. He could
cross the island in ten minutes* run. Then there would be
the main Rhine to battle, where the current would be running
strong. He had better hurry too, he told himself, for if there
should be an artillery duel between the Americans, now at
the very brink of the Rhine, and the Germans, placed some-
where on the high terrain beyond the eastern plain, or even
who could tell? camouflaged in the houses of Sandhofen, he
might be caught in the middle. And though the island was a
worthless target, and he worth still less to either side, one never
could tell where a short might fall. The gunners would soon
have finished their breakfast, and he had not yet eaten his.

He limbered his legs for the sprint. The -squishing boots
would chafe his heels, but it would not be for long. The path
curved toward the north tip of the little island, instead of run-
ning straight across, but it would be quicker for him to follow
it than to scramble across the swampy ditched garden patches.
He lumbered out into a trot. The ruts of the cart wheels, im-
printed since last fall, were drifted over with the windblown
topsoil.

335

He dogtrotted across sturdily, professionally, not so fast as
to waste his strength for the test of the river, yet not so slowly
as to endanger him if any soldiers were left, or to gall the
kibes of his ankles against the sodden boots. His elbows jogged
comfortably at his sides; he found the pace at which his wet
skin tempted the cold wind least, and stuck to it.

Halfway across the island, when he was opposite the very
tip, a spot of dark and a flash of metal caught the corner of his
eye, off to the right. They caught it only because the rest of
the soil was a monotone of ochre. The dark was an oblong of
earth newly opened in the nutrient loam which lay below the
winter cover soil. He would not have halted at a mound of
earth any more than he had halted beside the sentry at the
Diffene, for the time was growing late now, had it not been
for the wink of metal above the dark mound. When he looked
closer he saw the crude driftwood cross at one end of the ob-
long. The sticks of the cross were corded together, not nailed,
for nails had grown scarce in the Reich. The two slats were as
neutral as the soil itself, only weathered to gray instead of
yellow.

It was not until he was a yard from the cross of stakes that
he saw the shape of the tag at all, so small it was, hanging by
its cord at the joint of the stakes. The pierced zinc oval was no
bigger than the ball of his palm. It was one of five million dog-
tags. It was the size and shape of the dogtag around his own
neck. He lifted it from the stake and held it in the palm of his
hand to read it, not daring not to hope. Into the top half was
pressed A for the blood type, so that if the owner lost blood
anyone else with A could transfuse to him. Paluka had never
even thought to look for the type on his own zinc tag which
the Americans had made for him three weeks before in Alsace.
He lifted it over his neck, with the oilskin packet attached to
the cord beside it. His blood type was A also.

The Wehrmacht took care to bury its dead quickly, lest they
give the impression of defeat. But the squad in the pump-
336

house had been too hasty. They had forgotten to break the
dogtag. Paluka split it along the perforations with his hands.
Only a strong man could have done it in one snap. He wrenched
the stake from the hard earth. He set half the tag on the hole.
He unstrapped his left boot and pounded the stake, using
the heel for a hammer, back into the hard ground over the
half -moon of zinc.

He gazed at the other half of Happy's tag. It looked like
this:

Ftak Ers. Bat
225

He put it in his mouth, with the toothed edge at the back,
where it could not rasp his tongue.

From the German side of the Rhine, somewhere near Sand-
hofen, a low shell whined lengthwise down the river toward
the smoke screen at Frankenthal. It was a short; Paluka saw
the splash in the water where it fell. Another echoed from
below; it was an over, and splashed near the first. The Ger-
mans were enfilading the pontoon bridge. Even as Paluka
hammered the cross, a barrage of mortars broke out of the
American side, probing the Viernheim woods east of Sand-
hof en for the camouflaged German artillery. The morning duel
had begun.

Paluka reached the Rhine in five minutes, at a bank exactly
like the bank where he had landed. A hundred yards to the
left he saw the soldiers' skiff beached against the sedge. He
could have crossed in it himself. But he did not want to row;
he wanted to swim. He hardly paused to glance at the skiff. He
plunged into the swift current, belly-flat, to miss the horns of
the contact mines. He headed ten points upstream, knowing
the current would bear him down, so with luck he would land
opposite his starting point. He saw a clump of willows ahead
of him where he could wait for the American patrols. His feet

337

churned into the water, his arms flailed ahead of htm, as if he
would punish the Rhine for Happy as Xerxes whipped the
Euxine for his drowned soldiers.

A second lieutenant and four GIs of 3rd Division, armed
with carbines, were reconnoitering the river road on the west
bank between Ludwigshafen and Frankenthal. The blowing of
the Rhine bridge the night before must mean the Germans
had no organized resistance on this side, but they were taking
no chances on snipers and booby traps. They were the first
Seventh Army troops to pass over this newly won stretch of
road. The sergeant drove slowly, with the sawtooth mast of
the jeep raised on the hood in case of wire. It was a German
trick which had caused a lot of damage, to string an almost
invisible wire across the road at neck height. If a motorcyclist
or a driver with the windshield down came along too fast and
did not see the wire in time, it would behead him. The Lieu-
tenant in the front seat kept his eyes glued to the metaled pav-
ing, watching for the wooden covers of schu-mines. The three
privates trained their carbines to the sides and rear of the open
jeep, on the lookout for snipers in the grass or among the
trees. They were passing the suburb of Oppau, where the
highway is only twenty yards from the water. It was at 0745
on Thursday, 22 February, 1945 that the right-hand private
called "Hold it, Sarge, there's someone in the river."

The jeep slowed to a crawl, but did not stop till it reached
the next clump of bushes. The other two privates jumped over
the tailboard to cover the bobbing head from both directions.

"First replacement from out of the Rhine/' one said. "That
must be some kind of record."

"We see this big ape scrambling for a foothold in the mud,"
the lieutenant told the Team an hour later. "I don't think he
caught sight of us yet, but as soon as he makes footing and be-
fore he wades in, he puts his hands back of his head and climbs
ashore as if he is ducking gunfire. All the time he is repeating,
338

'Oh, my aching back/ I wouldn't have understood him unless
he did repeat, his accent is so funny. When he reaches solid
ground he unclasps his hands and stands up to shake himself
all over like a dog. He has nothing on but a German dogtag
and a pair of quarter-boots, and skivvies just like they wear.
That is when we close in on him, though there wasn't a place
he could be hiding a weapon. When they bring him up to me,
believe it or not, he spits out half another dogtag and says,
'Guard, guard!' Here it is. Then he salutes just like a GI and
says, 'Soda G-2/ But I see all his dogtags are oval, not square
like ours. Then I knew he must belong to you.

"I have the sergeant back the jeep around. We throw a
blanket over him and set him on the hood, where he squats
with his hands hanging on to the mast till we get him down
here, complaining all the time in some chatter that I don't
understand. He keeps pointing back to the island, shouting a
name like Happy, till a pothole in the road makes him grab
the mast with both hands. It wasn't that we were scared of him,
but he was too damn big and wet to fit in the jeep with the
rest of us. Besides, for all I can tell he's nothing but a straight
Kraut prisoner. Well, now he's yours; I've got to get back to
work.'* He laid the oilskin pouch and the split dogtag on the
colonel's desk, saluted, and went back to his jeep.

As Paluka himself had said, the payoff for an operation was
the debriefing when the Joes came back, and the lyric instant
of it was when they opened the door of Station S for the first
time since they had signed the contract. Pete poured half a
bottle of his own cognac for Paluka; Vati brought the bar-
racks bag from the attic and helped him into his old fatigues.
Before Paluka, crying, laughing, and shivering, had finished
his story, Battle Order had transcribed his sheet of paper and
sent it on the way to the plastic map in the war room.

Two days later Eighth Air Force knocked out the Schloss at
Crailsheim and the forestry school at Aalen. From then on
there was no reaction from 9th Flak or 25th Infantry at

339

Mannheim or farther back. Happy may have saved what was
left of the city, for the American artillery ceased Ore when it
met no resistance. Maybe he saved Maria's brothers too, for
they are helping Herr Liebert now on the farm behind the
Sign of the Ox. Mannheim withered on the vine.

Remagen, far to the north, was the first Rhine bridge to fall.
That was March seventh. But orders to crack the Rhine did
not reach Army yet. It was not till March twenty-sixth, with the
west bank buildup complete, that they crossed the Franken-
thal pontoons. H-hour was 0230. The banks at the bridge were
steep. The 8.8s in Sandhofen sank four amphibians, and even
after the dogfaces took the town they lost it again. When re-
sistance ceased, the 937th Field Artillery Battalion, wheeling
to the right, trundled all the five miles upstream to Mannheim.
They passed the Friesenheim Island; the Diffene draw was
standing open again. They crossed the Neckar by the Jung-
busch and eased into Frederick Street, with the town hall at
their left and the Schloss and the Rhine at its far end. Air re-
connaissance had reported that the Schloss was a roofless shell
and that some of the blocks inside the Ring looked like so
many empty beer-racks from aloft. But Mannheim never got
an artillery pasting like Mainz, which resisted; and Heidelberg
got none at all.

This is the way German cities fall. One afternoon the streets
look normal; empty, of course, with the shutters closed on all
the houses, but normal for behind the lines in wartime. The
next morning every house has a white flag flying or a sheet
draped between the buildings that is, every house where a
human could hide. Every house, as if they are afraid the Ameri-
cans will shoot up any that do not show the way every store
on a block in the United States has to have a neon sign, or
people will think it is broke. They must have been cutting and
sewing those sheets for months behind the shutters, like Frau
Bense in Schimpfach; then suddenly, in a single night, the
340

white breaks out all over the city. Does the Wehrmacht give
the order, or does panic break out o a quarter of a million
people in a single eruption? Yet, if that is the way, what Ger-
man would be the first to show his white?

There are still no people outdoors, till the starved towhead
kids show up in pairs, braver than their elders, holding each
other's hands and looking scared and begging, "Kaugummi,"
for chewing gum. Then in a while the old people walk out and
start about their business, pretending they didn't know there
was a war on.

As the column passed through the hanging symbols of sur-
render, an officer it happened to be the same second lieu-
tenant who had brought Paluka home noticed down a side
street that one white flag was being shaken from its staff
by a hand invisible behind the window. He detailed two pri-
vates to reconnoiter. One of them spoke German. That private
hoped to get a commission, just because he had been born in
Yorkville.

The Tiger, his debonair smile still hanging to his bones, met
them at the door of 27 Wharf Street. He clasped his hands
behind his neck.

"Oh, my aching back," he began, "Soda G-2."

But that was all the English he knew. One private slapped
his pockets for a weapon. The other, covering him with his
carbine, said, "Das spielt keine Rolle, Landser; wir konnen
Deutsch." *

"His money belt rustles, that's all," the other reported.

Their search led them down to the cellar. The iron door
stood wide now, and the light streamed down the nine steps
that had never been lighted before.

"Man, man," said one private when he saw the casks. "Think
of liberating this."

To make sure the house was not booby-trapped, they

* "No matter, soldier; we speak German/'

341

searched it all the way to the top. In the right rear room up-
stairs they found an old man dead in his bed. The Tiger waited
in the bunker under guard.

"Listen/' he told the German-speaking private, "I could
give you valuable information. The Twenty-fifth Infantry Divi-
sion is at Aalen and the Ninth Flak is at Crailsheim/' He un-
rolled a map on his council table and put his fingers on the
two towns.

"That's old stuff, Kamerad; Eighth Air Force took care of
them a month ago. We wouldn't be here now if they were still
in business. Someone else risked his neck to spot them while
you were hiding down here with the wine. Let's have one drink
to whoever it was/'

The Tiger ignored his ingratitude. He filled his three silver
mugs with wine and solemnly toasted Happy with a "Pros't."
Then he pulled the orange Blacklist from his pocket.

"Here is the list of those who have worked for the victory
of Freedom. You should take it to the general for whatever
rewards he wishes to make. And the mayor of this city/* he
went on with dignity, "is hiding at the pumphouse on the
Friesenheim Island. If you give me a guard, he will surrender
the city to us all/'

And so he did.

That evening the two privates looked down from the ruins
of the Schloss on the ruins of the Rhine bridge, humping across
the river like a school of porpoises.

"Say, this town is laid out like Manhattan, with the two
rivers."

"Yeah. Mannheim. Maybe they stole the name."

"The Krauts blew that bridge in one minute, but I bet it
takes them five years to rebuild."

"Well, with a demolition that took one minute they held us
up one month. At that rate they might have won the war."

"Yeah, might have. But we're here just the same/'

342

Look Ahead

That is the story, pieced together from all we can remember
and a little we can presume, of three Joes who took their
chance; one for riches and one for risk and one for faith. I
wrote it to the doctor, and he has answered me:

Berlin, Easter 1948
Honored Sir:

This is the Resurrection Day. Your letter at the same time takes
Karl away from us forever and brings him back to us. We should
rather have our son than his medal, but can truly say we should
rather have our freedom than our son, as he would wish. We shall
accept the medal in his name.

The brotherhood for which he risked and lost his life seems farther
away than ever, even than in the time of the regime. This city, the
third in the world, is a ruin of souls as well as of stones. But man-
kind, least of all we Germans, cannot live among the ruins of either.

Klaus is now eighteen, as Karl was when we saw him last. He will
take the same risk as his brother, if this hour makes it necessary, for
freedom and America are his two ideals as they were Karl's. Can
only the young have ideals? My own is the rebuilding of the sick.
But the ruin of souls is such that the nations who freed us will not

agree to the starkest necessities of medicine and bandages. I must
often use newspapers for dressings, and it depends on the sector
where I buy them whether my patient is healed by Russian or by
American propaganda. In Berlin, paper survives stone. The hospital
requires that patients must bring their own bandages, for the hos-
pital itself has none. They can buy in the black market, but at a
cost more than the operation itself. Though linen is scarce for this
reason, my wife has embroidered two blouses for your daughters,
with our good wishes.

It is not often that an old man survives his son, and not easy to
be his disciple.

We are both grateful to you for having seen as deep into our boy's
heart as only we had seen. We find comfort and strength in the
lines of Goethe which seem written for Karl:

All is given by the gods, the im- Alles geben die Gotter, die un-

mortal ones, endlichen,

To those whom they love ihren Lieblingen, ganz;

They withhold nothing: Alle Freuden, die unendlichen,
All joys, unendingly, alle Schmerzen,

All pain, unendingly die unendlichen, ganz.

They withhold nothing.

Respectfully,

Gunther Maurer, M.D.

12 January to 5 June, 1948, at Emergency Hospital, Washington
"That the bones which Thou hast broken may rejoice"
344

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