The Rat Patrol 4 - Two-Faced Enemy (19 page)

The machine guns blasted again and fell silent.

"Thank you," Dietrich said tightly, hating himself for the position he was in. "I know you are attached to Colonel Funke's column, but I do not know your name."

"Gleicher," the man said with an admirable calmness. "Lieutenant Gleicher. Nasty mess."

"I do not know how it is possible, but it seems to grow constantly worse," Dietrich said frankly.

"The firing at least has stopped," Gleicher said. "I thought we held the emplacements above the pass."

"We did," Dietrich said. "I called Lieutenant Lungershausen who was in charge and advised him we were coming through. A patrol of the enemy must have surprised him. We shall hold the position again, as soon as this infernal rain stops and we are able to operate once more."

"It is odd the enemy seems to move freely about in such weather," Gleicher said. "He managed to blow up that aircraft, did he not?"

"The patrol of the enemy responsible is emphatically extraordinary," Dietrich said and felt a downward tug at his lips.

There did not seem to be so much pressure at their backs and with Gleicher still grasping Dietrich's arm, the two of them began to work their way up the pass with their backs to the wall. A man shot by them in the water, rolling over and over and shouting for help. Dietrich leaned forward with his hand outstretched but the man hurtled by. Another who had clawed his way halfway up the wall lost his grip and fell shrieking. The torrent swept him away. As Dietrich and Gleicher neared the top, they saw weaponless men on their hands and knees straggling against a snarling stream of mucky water that reached almost to their chins. A group of men huddled mutely on the middle of the road at the top of the pass. Others had started walking down the road toward the armor.

Dietrich glanced quickly at Gleicher. The lieutenant still clung to his machine pistol.

"Come with me, Gleicher," Dietrich said, stepping from the road and starting back along the bluff. The worst of the storm seemed to have passed. "We'll not find the Rat Patrol here now, but I want to see what their latest raid has cost."

At the wrecked gun position, Dietrich found five bodies and on the plateau a good distance away, the sixth. The last was Lieutenant Lungershausen. The mortars were missing. Dietrich cursed. He was thwarted, defeated by a phantom handful of men he could neither capture nor kill.

"We'll send for the dead," he grimly told Gleicher. "And I'll send out another crew with a machine gun again, although I am afraid we possess no more mortars for this side."

"I am afraid it may be a while before anything moves through that pass," Gleicher said. "Either up or down."

"Not if the rain doesn't stop," Dietrich agreed.

They walked slowly back the road toward the command post. The water still was ankle deep, although it was running off rapidly through the pass. At the side of the road, the armor seemed to have sunk in its tracks. Although no longer a deluge, the rain was still falling.

When they reached the command area, Gleicher turned in at the tent he shared with seven other officers and Dietrich, drenched, muddy and disgusted, splashed toward the HQ tent that seemed now to stand alone with the communications van moved. He lifted the flap and stepped inside.

"Why can't you leave the flap up for ventilation, Herr Oberst?" he asked irritably. "It's stifling in here."

Oberst Funke glared balefully and sat silent in a dry uniform on his camp stool. A gun barrel nudged the small of Dietrich's back and the flap dropped. The barrel pushed Dietrich ahead and as he neared the middle of the tent, Sergeant Sam Troy of the Rat Patrol came out of a corner with a tommy-gun aimed at his stomach.

"You would not deny us your hospitality on such a day, would you, Captain?" Sergeant Troy said with a pleasant smile. "I am afraid I must trouble you again for your gun."

Dietrich dropped the machine pistol to which he'd clung during the ordeal in the pass and his eyes jumped from the sergeant to the colonel.

"I was changing from my wet clothing," the colonel said helplessly in answer to Dietrich's unspoken question. "In a flash, the four of them were within the tent and all their weapons were pointing at me."

The gun barrel was removed from Dietrich's back and he turned to see the Englishman, Sergeant Moffitt, backing away with a submachine gun still pointed at him. The privates, Hitchcock with the glasses and Pettigrew chewing a matchstick, came from the corners and each sat on a cot.

"What is it you now want, Sergeant Troy?" Dietrich asked coldly although he was burning with rage.

"To win the war, of course," Troy said and laughed heartily. "But more immediately, a place that is safe out of the rain. If anyone comes to your tent, you will send him away. It would be unpleasant if we were forced to shoot our way out because first we should be compelled to dispose of the colonel and you."

"Don't make a fuss, Hans," the colonel pleaded. "Men desperate enough to invade our headquarters itself are not predictable in their actions."

Dietrich looked angrily at Troy. "Surely you are not insane enough to think you can possibly leave this camp alive," he said.

"That is our intention," Troy said calmly, "and we are considering taking you or the colonel with us. Wouldn't you like to change into dry clothes? I am sure you would be more comfortable."

"That is thoughtful of you. Sergeant," Dietrich said, stepping toward the locker at the foot of his cot where he remembered there was a Colt Forty-five he'd picked up as a souvenir. "If you will excuse me, I believe I shall change."

"One moment," Troy said politely, backing ahead of Dietrich to the locker. He threw back the lid, rummaged briefly and stood with the pistol in his hand. "It would not be wise to attempt anything, Captain. The colonel is right. We are sometimes impulsive."

Dietrich stood uncertainly a moment listening to the rain drumming on the canvas. The private with the red-topped French Legionnaire cap, Hitchcock, stood, motioning Dietrich to the cot. Dietrich pulled off his soggy boots. Troy threw him a towel from the crate with the basin and Dietrich turned his back to the four members of the Rat Patrol and pulled off his breeches.

A blast shook the air followed by a second and third explosion. They were not within the command area, but they were close enough to disturb Dietrich. He swung about, eyes darting to Troy.

"More of your destruction?" he asked savagely. "What is it this time, the armor?"

A smile flitted over Troy's face. "I had not expected it so soon," he said. "Your forces are being attacked from the rear."

"Impossible!" Dietrich cried, but he felt his face blanch. Another charge rent the air.

"Unfortunate they did not hold off until the rain stopped," Troy murmured. "It is comfortably dry here inside, but we shall have to leave now. Please lift the tent flap and call for a staff car, Captain. Do not forget that we are desperate. Lift the flap, stay within the tent so I can face you from the side, call for the car to be brought to the tent. No tricks. Moffitt is fluent in German, you know."

When Dietrich lifted the flap, he saw Gleicher still in his wet clothes running toward the tent. Dietrich's eyes shifted to Troy and saw the man was determined.

"Gleicher," Dietrich called. "Have the colonel's driver run the staff car to the tent at once."

"At once," Gleicher said, stopping. "I was coming to ask, what were the explosions?"

"That is what we shall discover when the car has been delivered," Dietrich said and dropped the flap. Hs saw Troy glance at Moffitt.

The Englishman smiled and nodded his head. "You cooperate very nicely indeed, Captain," he said.

"Now if you will step to your cot, Captain," Troy said. "Much as we would enjoy your company, I am afraid there will be room for only one and the colonel outranks you."

Sergeant Troy ran swiftly through Dietrich's locker, found two handkerchiefs. He wadded one. "Your mouth," Troy said. "Please open." He stuffed the wadded handkerchief in Dietrich's mouth and bound the second over the gag. "Now please he on your cot, face down," Troy said and as Dietrich lay in his undershorts and socks, the sergeant called to one of the privates, "Hitch, will you please tie the captain's hands and legs securely together with your rope? Captain, we are taking the colonel as hostage and shall not hesitate to shoot him if we are pursued."

Again several explosions boomed. They were nearby, Dietrich thought, lying gagged and trussed like a pig ready for the market. It was impossible that the enemy should be shelling so close at hand on the plateau. He heard the Mercedes stop at the tent.

"Colonel," Moffitt said crisply in German. "Call to your driver and tell him to step inside, leaving the motor running."

The colonel did as he was ordered and as the driver came through the entrance, Moffitt dropped the flap and Troy struck him smartly with a chop at the back of his neck. The man sagged limply and started to fall. Troy dragged him to the second cot and removed his jacket and cap which he threw to the private Pettigrew. He slipped into the clothing and dangled his own helmet in his hand.

Again explosions jarred Dietrich. What could the enemy be shelling, he wondered. Where was he firing from? It could not be bombs from aircraft. Although the rain seemed to have slackened, the air still would be too thick for planes.

Pettigrew, still dangling his helmet, went to the entrance and lifted the flap. He looked from side to side, stepped out and Dietrich heard the car door open and close. The car started forward and backed close and flush to the tent opening.

"Quickly now," Moffitt told the colonel whose dewlaps seemed to be quivering. "Into the front seat."

Pettigrew had both front and back doors of the car open and Hitchcock and Troy crawled from the tent onto the car's back floor. Troy handed Dietrich's forty-five to Pettigrew. Moffitt slipped to the back seat floor and Tully closed the back door and then the front door as the colonel sank into his seat. Pettigrew glanced into the tent, loosed the flap and in a moment Dietrich heard the other car door slam and the car splashed away through the mud.

Dietrich struggled with his bonds. He was tightly bound. He rolled off the cot and thumped to the ground with a bump that shook him. Clumsily, arms and legs hurting, he rolled to the entrance. As he pushed through the flap in his undershorts and socks into the cold, wet sludge, the area was smashed with another series of blasts.

"All clear," Tully said only a few moments after the car had started off.

Troy, Moffitt and Hitch pushed from the floor in the back seat of the Mercedes and sat back into the soft cushions. Troy looked out the back window and saw they had cleared the tent area and were driving south on the road that still ran with water. Tully was driving with Dietrich's pistol in his left hand resting on his chest and pointing at the colonel. The fat German officer was sitting rigidly, staring straight ahead. The back of his neck was red.

"What were those explosions, Sarge?" Hitch asked. 

"You were quite calm and collected, Sam," Moffitt said with an amused smile. "Congratulations. Did you realize what they were at once?"

"The first two or three had me stumped," Troy said. "Then it came in a flash. It had to be the charges we planted."

"How could they go off by themselves?" Hitch asked. 

"The pressure of the water and the shifting surface of the road was enough to do it," Troy said.

"They had Dietrich fooled," Hitch said, laughing.

"Well, old boy," Moffitt said. "What now?"

"We run," Troy said with a grin. "We get the jeeps out and we run."

"How?" Tully asked. "We couldn't get a mile in the desert before we'd be stuck."

"We're going straight south on the road," Troy said. "Hey, Sarge," Tully flung over his shoulder. "The road's going to be full of holes where the mines have gone off and you don't know that all the charges we planted have exploded."

"Tully," Troy said, "you're going ahead in this staff car with the colonel. We didn't plant the charges all the way out to the edges of the road. You're going to keep two wheels on the roadbed. I'll drive your jeep and Moffitt and Hitch can follow. We'll be in four-wheel-drive. If you get stuck, we'll push."

"Whyn't we dump the colonel and this car?" Tully asked. "He'll just be in our way, and with you and me both driving, you've cut our firepower in half."

"If we're caught in the jeeps, Tully," Troy said, "you take off like a big bird for Bir-el-Alam with the colonel. He's our trading goods. If we're not caught, that's fine. A colonel is a pretty good prize."

"He's the division commander," Moffitt said. "Colonel Matthe Funke. It was on some of the papers on his table."

"Well," Troy said, pleased, "it's been a fair day's work so far."

"Providing we get over that chunk of road," Tully drawled.

It was not going to be as easy getting over the road with its craters and charges as he'd passed it off, Troy admitted to himself as he helped Moffitt and Hitch roll the drums off the jeeps once more. The floors and seats of the jeeps were wet, but Troy was so thoroughly soaked he didn't feel any additional discomfort. The motor coughed protestingly twice, but then it fired into life and he drove away from the dimness, looking over his shoulder toward the CP. No pursuit was yet on the road.

Hitch followed Troy out of the drums and Tully in the sedan raised his hand. The Mercedes started down the edge of the road. The route had been badly damaged by the charges and ragged deep holes had filled with water although the roadbed itself built up from the desert was draining rapidly. Tully had planted his two left wheels solidly on the road. He pulled ahead in second gear with the right wheels sinking quite deeply in the soft, slanted shoulders. He drove steadily for almost a mile and then slowed to a stop. Looking around the side, Troy saw that the burned and wrecked aircraft littered the road with debris. The ship had lurched to the side and a crumpled wing frame blocked the way.

Leaving his motor idling, Troy jumped from the jeep and ran around the sedan toward the plane. The fuselage and wing members were twisted and bent and the engine nacelles dangled, shapeless masses of metal. Troy walked into the spongy desert and around the tip of the wing. His boots sank into the wet sand. He ran back to the second jeep.