The Losing Role (16 page)

The other MP was circling their jeep. He came around
the back. Passing Max he gave a lazy salute and said,
“‘Tenant.”

“Afternoon.”

The MP corporal flipped the papers over, rereading
everything, his lips pursed. The other MP stopped at the hood.
Zoock pointed and blurted, “Hey, hey, sorry about the Dixie flag,
gents,” giggling. “Had a good ole’ boy in our unit, he done it.
But, well, he bought it yesterday. He was a sailor . . .”

The other MP stared, his rifle barrel resting on the
hood.

“You see, since yesterday we cannot find our unit,”
Max said to the MP corporal.

“Uh huh.” The MP corporal slid Max’s papers into a
pocket. He nodded toward the back seat. “You got a radio in the
back there. Shouldn’t be that hard. Sir.”

“That’s just the thing, Jack,” Felix said, showing
himself at Zoock’s shoulder. “Can’t receive shit in this damn
forest.”

The MP corporal was looking at Rattner. Rattner,
wild-eyed, hugged at his stomach and gave a cheap little groan. The
MP kept staring—the man could stare as long as he wanted. Probably
make a great actor if America gave him half a chance, Max thought,
and for some reason this thought terrified him. His heart raced,
thumped.

They heard thuds of artillery, and the dull rattle
of faraway machine guns.

The MP at the hood called over the other two MPs,
and the three of them spoke within full earshot of Max. Max didn’t
understand their speech and, he suspected, many Americans wouldn’t
have either. They wore natty gloves with the shooting fingers cut
off. They were unshaven. One chuckled at the Confederate flag, but
another was glaring at the hood. This one said to Zoock: “Say now,
driver man, what’s that big ole’ scratch on the corner the hood
for? New too—metal still shiny.”

“Oh, that—like I was saying, the lug who did it is
dead anyway, see.”

The MP corporal gave his three men a nod, and they
spread out to the four corners of the jeep—one at Max’s side of the
hood, the other two at the rear corners. Only the canvas top stood
between them and Felix and Rattner.

The bombings neared and they heard shells screeching
in, probably hitting the town down the road. The MPs crouched and
clutched their helmets on their heads.

And Max realized something that both terrified and
inspired. By the looks of them, these MPs might too have lost their
way.

The MP corporal looked beyond Zoock, over at Max.
“Here’s the rub, Lieutenant, sir. Our field radio went dead—we’ll
have to use yours. That all right?”

There were only four of the MPs, and four of them.
The MPs had clunky Garand rifles, they had tommys, and the
bombardment would cover the noise. Max only hoped Rattner—and
Felix—had not realized this. He shrugged. “You are welcome to try,
Corporal,” he said to the MP corporal and then turned to Rattner,
who’d stopped groaning and holding his stomach. “Private, why don’t
you reach me that radio from the back,” he continued to Rattner, in
a monotone.

Rattner’s face hardened. He didn’t budge.

Felix blurted: “I got it, sir,” and handed the radio
up through to Max, who handed it to the MP at his side. The MP
stood the radio at his feet.

“Thanks.” The MP corporal took a couple steps back.
“Good. Now, a few formalities compliments of the boys in G-2.”

G-2 meant Counter Intelligence. The other MPs
stiffened and raised their rifles.

“Fair enough,” Max said. “Shoot,” Zoock said. “Can’t
be too careful,” Felix said.

“What’s Sinatra’s first name?” the MP corporal
said.

“What? Oh, it’s Frank,” Max said. “Mister Frank
Sinatra.”

“The capitol of Oregon?” said the MP corporal.

Silence. “Portland,” Felix said.

The MPs eyed each other.

“Who knows Oregon—it’s Salem,” Zoock said.
“Portland’s the big city.”

The MP at the hood said, “Where do you find a tight
end?”

No one spoke. The MPs raised their guns, grasping
them tight. The MP corporal said, “Here’s an easy one—how much is a
postage stamp?”

Any true GI would know this. Stamps and letters kept
them human. Max had no clue, and he was sure the rest didn’t
either.

“Three hundred dollars,” Felix whispered. He had
placed three one hundred dollar bills on Zoock’s shoulder so that
only the MP corporal could see them.

Zoock froze still, as if a toxic spider had dropped
onto his shoulder and he was deathly allergic.

“Afraid that’s a little high,” the MP corporal said.
“Out of the jeep. All of you. Now.” He’d said it calmly, as if
routine. Was it really ending here? Max thought. Perhaps the man
only thought they were deserters.

“All right. Out of the jeep, men,” Max said. He
began to step out, but the shells fell closer, a shrieking fury of
rockets, mortars and artillery that shattered the woods along the
road with a sound like breaking glass. The earth rocked and
rolled.

Max recoiled, his head down. Squatting, the MP
corporal waved them out.

Orange bursts lit up the cab. Rattner and Felix were
firing out the back through the canvas. The two MPs dropped, their
blood splattering snow. Hot shells clanked and bounced at the metal
floor. Zoock had his Walther on the MP corporal. He froze, his
hands up. Max’s MP fired a shot, it bounced off the hood, and he
ran. Max fumbled for his Colt and leaned out aiming. The MP was
yards from the trees. Max had a clean shot.

He shot for the treetops. The MP lunged behind
trunks and sprinted off.

“
Nein schiessen, nein schiessen
,” the MP
corporal said in broken German. Bitter gunpowder smoke had filled
the cab. Rattner and Felix climbed straight out the back, through
the tears in the canvas. They tumbled out onto snow and stood over
the MP corporal, their legs stomping like pistons, aiming and
screaming, “Hands up hands up!”

“They’re up—don’t shoot him!” Max shouted in
German.

The shells kept falling just out of range, killing
all other sound. Once they caught their breath, they worked
fast—their training had made them automatons. Max and Felix dragged
the two corpses off into the woods to cover them with underbrush
and snow while Zoock parked the jeep off to the side of the road.
Felix stammered: “I had to shoot, I had to.”

“You did the right thing,” Max said. Anything to
keep Felix levelheaded now.

Felix rummaged through the dead MPs’ pockets but
only found letters, photos, and two half-smoked Lucky Strikes.

Rattner moved the MP corporal beyond the tree line.
He sat him up against a tree trunk, facing into the woods so he
couldn’t be seen from the road. Brandishing the tommy with one
hand, he’d tied rope tight around the MP’s arms and chest. The MP’s
face had lost color, revealing more of the freckles. He grimaced at
Max and Felix as they trudged up.

Rattner struck the MP across the chin with the gun’s
butt. It was his show now. He ordered Felix and Zoock to keep
watch—Felix out by the road, Zoock farther into the woods behind
them—and told Max to translate while he interrogated their
prisoner.

“I’ll tell your boss all I know,” the MP told Max,
“but it’s not out of fear, understand? Uncle Sam been giving us
little reason to die for him.”

He spoke with his chin high. A couple stray units
had holed up in the nearby town, he revealed. They had been the
only GIs on this road. The whole sector might have been cut off,
but they weren’t sure because their radio had gone kaput.

Max would have mistranslated any of it to help
himself, but none of it could help him now. As the questions
dragged on, the MP began to gasp for words, so Max demanded that
Rattner loosen the rope around his chest. Rattner snarled but
obliged.

“That MP who escaped—could he bring reinforcements
our way?” Rattner asked.

“Little chance of that. That boy’s sure to have run
back into town. He’ll stay put with the rest.” The MP paused. He
added to Max, “That’s the good news for you. The bad news? The boy
saw your faces.”

The bombing had stopped, bringing an eerie quiet.
Farther off, shattered trees creaked and snapped, and crazed birds
fluttered in branches. Rattner left Max with the MP and went to try
the radio. He’d handed off the tommy. Max slung it on his
shoulder.

The MP shook his head at Max and gave a grim toothy
smile. “So, looks like a good ole’ fashion lynching. Eh, boss?”

The word was the same in
German—“
lynchen
”—meaning a cruel and unjust vigilante
murder. It had been borrowed from American English for lack of a
German equivalent. Then the Nazis came, and the strange American
word wasn’t so strange anymore. Max shook his head. “No, not if I
can help it—”

Rattner was back. He shoved Max out of the way and
grabbed the tommy. Felix and Zoock moved closer so they could hear
the interrogation.

“How did you know about us?” Rattner barked.

The MP waited for Max’s translation. “Know
what?”

“That we were Germans.”

“That was easy—you were traveling four to a jeep. I
was trying to finagle the radio out of you so we could call for
help. We’re cut off—out in left field—got me? You know how that
is.” The MP added another grim smile.

“I do,” Max said.

Max translated the rest. Rattner wanted to know more
about what gave them away. It was the four-to-a-jeep more than
anything, the MP said. That was the dead giveaway. No one travels
four to a jeep behind American lines. It weighed down the ride and
was an easy target. Apart from that, it was just like G-2 had told
them—look for code letters on the hood, any funny speech,
suspicious wads of money, and any colored handkerchiefs—as worn by
Felix. Any one of Max’s crew fit the bill to a tee.

The MP continued to Max: “I’m only telling you this
in the hope you’ll spare my sorry behind. Tell your captain that,
will you?”

Max told Rattner. Rattner grunted. “What tipped off
your intelligence?”

“You mean in the first place? You really want to
know?” The MP smiled again. “Captured a German captain with
detailed documents, maps, everything. Just yesterday morning. Now
those cowboys from G-2 are out looking to nab you all. One passed
by here before we got cut off, heading east for your lines. Know
what the man said? ‘Thank God the krauts keep good records.’”

Max translated. Felix and Rattner exchanged sickened
glances.

“Maybe you’ll get to meet the man,” the MP said to
Max.

“Perhaps not, with any luck. I’m finished with this
war.”

The MP nodded. “Hey, hasn’t your captain forgot
something?” he said to Max.

“What’s that?”

“My name, rank, and serial number—”

Rattner pulled a knife. The MP writhed, screamed.
Rattner slit his throat, a thin line of red and a rush of dark
blood hit the ground like a bucket being emptied. The MP opened his
mouth. He could only wheeze. He was staring at Max. Then he was
still.

Max’s heart seemed to stop. The world stopped. He
couldn’t stop staring. Someone was yelling at him but he couldn’t
hear it.

It was Rattner: “Cut him down,” he squealed. “Then
search him.”

Max shook his head. “No, no. You do it. You lynched
him.”

Rattner lunged and pushed Max to the ground. Max’s
Colt tumbled out of his pocket. It lay at Rattner’s feet. Rattner
shouted: “Who you talking back to? Has-been know-it-all actor, eh?
Well, I got your number, Kaspar, had it all along. Now I got proof.
You tried to give up our radio back there. You let that MP run off
too, and I saw it—”

Rattner’s head erupted in a flare of red and flesh.
He dropped on his side.

Felix had fired. He stood only feet away. His
overcoat was bundled around his tommy to quell the noise, and his
GI tunic was half-open to show his SS uniform. Hot steam pulsed
from his tiny mouth. He grinned at Max.

Max scrambled to his feet.

“Relax, Kaspar. You’re safe with me. Now get his
gun.”

“Right.” Max pulled the tommy from Rattner’s
clenched hand.

“Wait. Shit. No . . .” Felix’s grin fell away. He
was peering through the forest, crouching and pivoting in all
directions. “Bert!” he shouted. “Ignatius, where are you?
Goddamnit, Zoock, show yourself.”

Fourteen

Felix and Max spread out to search for Zoock but it
was little use in the dim and hazy forest light. After a few
minutes slogging through snow and underbrush, Max found Zoock’s SS
tunic tossed in the cavity of a rotting log. He didn’t bother
telling Felix. Back at the lynching tree, Felix lit one of the half
Lucky Strikes Rattner had taken from the MP corporal. They worked
in silence. Felix cut down the MP corporal and lay him next to
Rattner while Max gathered branches to cover the two corpses. Soon
Max smelled a metallic bitter-sweetness. He had fresh blood on his
overcoat, his hands, his thigh. He touched it. It was sticky, like
glue firming up. A sour tang clung to his sinuses and throat, like
syrup. His head spun and he had to lower himself down against a
tree trunk. He strained to take long, deep breaths. He pulled off
his helmet.

“That’s the shock wearing off. Your senses want to
punish you now.” Felix sat next to Max. He cupped snow in his hands
and washed the blood from them, seemingly unfazed by the icy cold.
“Here, now turn to me.” Felix took off his blue handkerchief. He
dampened it with snow and rubbed at one of Max’s cheeks, a temple,
and an ear. “Had some on your face, too,” he said.

“Thanks.” Max put his helmet back on. “This must be
the scene where I thank you for saving my life.”

Felix chuckled. “I was saving my own. You were just
in the way.”

“Captain Rattner was in the way, you mean.”

“Perhaps.”

The crazed birds and creaking trees quieted down. A
whirling wind rushed through the branches above, like a thousand
brushes scrubbing.