On the ground by the river, Sergeant Tyree Wall turned and yelled. “Everybody get the hell out of my bus!”
Ranger First Lieutenant Stan Bakowski slapped him on the shoulder. “Knew you’d get us here safely, Sergeant, that’s why I asked for you.”
“Fuck you. I’ll never do another favor for a white man again.”
Bakowski laughed and gathered his Rangers. With such a short crossing, most of them were close around, although a full truckload was missing. Bakowski didn’t have time to dwell on those implications. His men had to maneuver around the German lines and get into the rear where the big guns were hidden. Planes and bombs could only do so much. Sooner or later, someone wearing combat boots was going to have to go underground and root them out.
Wall’s duck hit the water and headed west. Long lines of American soldiers were waiting for his ferry service. It appeared to him that German fire was slackening. It also seemed there were far fewer landing craft than had set off just a little while before. A mangled body floated face down in the water and he swerved to avoid it. Part of him said he should pull it in but that would have meant stopping and making him a stationery target. Sorry buddy, he muttered to himself. If you looked wounded, I’d take a chance, but you are clearly dead. He hoped somebody downstream would pull the dead GI out.
German fire was still lethal. A duck to his right took a direct hit and disappeared. Water from the geyser washed over him and something soft glanced off his shoulder. It was someone’s foot. He groaned and then threw up. Like everyone witnessing death, he thought that it could’ve been him and wondered why he was still alive. If he survived this, he would have questions that maybe nobody could answer.
As he closed on the west bank, he saw that work was progressing on no less than three pontoon bridges. Even though shells from German guns splashed around them, the engineers kept on. Brave bastards, Wall thought.
He pulled onto the shore. Men ran to get in, prodded and yelled at by their sergeants. “Get in, sit down, and shut up,” Wall yelled at their frightened faces. “Keep your heads down. If we start to take on water, bail with your helmets. Got that?”
One soldier glared at him. “Kind of uppity, aren’t you?”
Wall was about to respond when the man’s sergeant smashed him in the face, bloodying his nose. “Watch yourself or he’ll dump your worthless ass in this fucking river.”
What a wonderful idea, Tyree thought.
CHAPTER 24
Margarete and the others huddled in the bomb shelter that had become her uncle’s pride and joy. The battle wasn’t anywhere near them yet, but it was evident that the Americans were invading to their west and, if successful, would overrun the farm. Now all they had to contend with was the sound of bombs and artillery. Nothing had yet fallen near them. Their move to the shelter was prudence. The laborers weren’t with them. They had their own shelter just outside the barn.
Magda looked at her daughter in the dim candlelight and smiled wanly. “I sure am glad we came here to be safe, aren’t you?”
Before Margarete could respond, her uncle glared at them. “We should be at peace. That fool Himmler should have negotiated with the Allies.”
Margarete was shocked. “I thought you believed in Hitler and ultimate victory.”
Her Uncle Eric sniffed. “I worshiped the ground Hitler walked on but he is dead and Himmler is a pale shadow of the man. I believed all this shit about super weapons and then we’ve used them-rockets and atomic bombs-and what has it gotten us? More death, that’s what. The Americans and British are still coming and we have nothing to stop them with. Tell me, when was the last time you saw a German plane, other than the pissant one Ernst and that boy you like arrived in? No, we have no planes and soon will have no army. The Americans can stand off and destroy us piece by piece and Himmler is letting that happen. If he cannot end the war then he should step aside and let someone who can take over.”
He coughed and spat on the ground. Bertha was about to scold him but saw the look on his face and changed her mind. “And I’ve had it up to here with super weapons,” he continued. “The V1 and V2 rockets were supposed to win the war and they didn’t. Then the atomic bomb was supposed to win it for us, and what has happened? Russia may be slowed down but the Americans are still coming. You know what that means? We don’t have any more bombs. We had one bullet in our gun and we fired it. We may have wounded the wild animal we shot at, but not mortally. Russia will be back and the Americans are here.”
Eric coughed again. The air in the shelter was stuffy. He was about to light his pipe when Bertha smacked his arm. He glared at her but put the pipe away.
“And tell me, little Margarete, what did you think of our army, the Volkssturm? Old men and young boys, wasn’t it? I should be in it. I got a letter calling me up and I ignored it. One war was enough. Half the Volkssturm will be slaughtered while the other half will surrender. It’s already happening,” he said glumly. “Germany is doomed.”
His rage out of his system, Uncle Eric looked fondly at his niece while Bertha remained stonily silent. “I may be an old fool, but I am not so foolish that I cannot learn.”
Himmler and the German high command had retreated to the reinforced bunker complex built for Hitler under the Chancellery. There was fear that the attacks on the Rhine Wall would bring on new and more devastating bombings of Berlin that would cripple Germany like the atomic bomb had wounded Russia.
Von Rundstedt thought the reason for going underground was that Reichsfuhrer Himmler was afraid. In his opinion, the former chicken farmer was himself a chicken. Himmler was pale, thin, and nervous. His hands shook and there was a twitch in his eye. The next few days would determine whether he and the Reich endured or would become footnotes in history.
Rundstedt broke protocol and began. “Reichsfuhrer, we have to make a decision. It appears that our plan to reinforce our troops confronting Patton might have been a mistake based on insufficient information. The Americans to the north used landing vehicles that didn’t need to be hidden. The sighting of American landing craft in the south was a ruse, a kind of Trojan Horse.”
“Why didn’t we see this?” Himmler said. His voice was barely a whisper.
Varner stood quietly against a wall. Because you didn’t want to see, he thought. But what game was Rundstedt playing?
“I’ve spoken with Admiral Canaris,” said Rundstedt, “and he is now of the opinion that most, if not all, of our observers in the north have either been killed by the Americans or turned by them. In short, we were blind but didn’t know it.”
Himmler nodded. “What do you propose?”
“The reserve army must be turned around to confront the American First Army under Hodges and not Patton’s Third.”
Fifty-three-year-old SS General Sepp Dietrich, who commanded the Reserve Army, stiffened as he realized what Rundstedt was proposing. He’d been recently promoted by Himmler to the rank of field marshal, which greatly annoyed Rundstedt who felt that Dietrich simply lacked the experience and qualifications to have such a distinguished rank or command such a large force. Rundstedt had suggested Dietrich, a mediocre general at best, command the Reserve Army, but had not expected the man’s promotion to field marshal. That Dietrich also looked pale and exhausted seemed to confirm Rundstedt’s doubts. But Dietrich was an SS man through and through, which meant that his total loyalty was to Heimrich Himmler.
“Can you do that?” Himmler asked of Dietrich.
“It will cost us,” he answered with surprising candor. “We are now moving our tanks and troops at night to hide from the Americans and are still taking serious casualties. In order to get to the northern targets we will have to move during the day and the Americans will hurt us even more.”