Rounds splintered the plywood floor behind the Waco’s cockpit, pinging off the steel tubing and ricocheting out the top of the canvas fuselage.
“Son of a bitch!” Churcher exclaimed as he put the glider into a diving turn, keeping a wing tip to the tower to present as small a target as possible.
The German fired another sustained burst.
The rounds perforated the Waco’s right wing. The air began tearing the canvas off the tubular structure, unbalancing the lift and threatening to flip the Waco over on its back. The shredded fabric was chattering like a jackhammer as Churcher fought to maintain control.
“Get behind me!” he shouted.
Rosenthal scrambled from the copilot’s seat. The weight shift helped settle the Waco down. Churcher put it into a wobbly dive toward a field a few miles away, just beyond a walnut grove. Gnarled branches began racing past the bottom of the Plexiglas bubble. The landing gear snagged the tops of the last row of trees and tore out of the bottom of the fuselage.
The instant the glider cleared the grove, Churcher got the braking flaps full up, and dropped it onto the tall grass. The Waco tilted forward onto the nose skid, and began sliding over the wet chaff. It had skidded about a hundred meters, and was losing momentum when what was left of the landing gear snagged a wire fence. The glider came to a sudden stop, and pitched over into the mud, burying the nose — which was the way out.
Churcher was stunned by the impact. Rosenthal, who had been out of his harness, was trapped in the tangle of tubing that had been the cockpit. But neither was seriously injured. Churcher was trying to get out of his harness and go to Rosenthal’s assistance, when he heard rustling in the grass outside. He pulled his .45 side arm and whirled, just as a bayonet stabbed through the canvas and slashed the fuselage. Churcher held his weapon with both hands and leveled it at the spot where the bayonet continued slashing the canvas to ribbons, making a large opening. Aleksei Deschin’s distinctive face peered into the glider.
“Anybody in here need a shave?” he asked in his heavy Russian accent.
“Yes, but we’re all out of blades,” Churcher replied tensely, training the .45 on him. “You have some we can borrow?”
“The best. Gillette Blue,” Deschin replied, completing the exchange of passwords.
Then Churcher relaxed, and lowered the gun.
“Geezus!” he howled as Deschin and Borsa entered the glider. “You guys should’ve said something before you started slashing. I thought you were Krauts.”
“After that landing,” Borsa teased, “we didn’t think you were in any shape to hear us.”
Deschin and Borsa had been waiting in the walnut grove in a mud-splattered truck. Boulton had alerted Gillette Blue to the glider recon-mission, and arranged for partisans to rendezvous with the Waco and get the crew back to Allied lines. And Churcher had skillfully piloted the crippled glider to the landing zone.
The group quickly freed Rosenthal and took cover in the walnut grove, where Ettore, an old partisan who drove the truck, supplied the Americans with civilian clothes. Introductions were made as they pulled the coarse garments over their uniforms, then the talk turned to the German storage depot.
“You know,” said Churcher thoughtfully, “we were up there for a long time, and nothing. But soon as we made a pass over the north end, whammo!”
This confirmed Deschin’s theory. He and Borsa decided they would drive the Americans back to their lines, then check out that area of the city. But Churcher and Rosenthal insisted on coming along.
“Not until I clear it with command,” Deschin replied.
“No need,” Churcher said. “Jake Boulton and I are buddies. He’ll think it’s a great idea.”
Deschin eyed him skeptically, and began cranking the handle of his walkie-talkie.
“This is Gillette Blue to Safety Razor. Gillette Blue to Safety Razor. Come in Safety Razor.”
“We read you, go ahead,” Boulton replied.
“Nest has fallen,” Deschin reported. “Both birds are safe and want to help locate the elusive worm.”
“Negative, Gillette Blue,” Boulton said. “Repeat, negative. Return birds to friendly nest, immediately.”
Churcher took the walkie from Deschin. He cranked the handle creating static, then replied, “Negative. Transmission garbled. Repeat, transmission garbled. Say again.” He cranked the handle, obscuring Boulton’s reply with static, then clicked off the walkie. “I told you Jake’d think it was a good idea,” he drawled, grinning. “Let’s find us that Kraut depot, Gillette.”
The group drove off in the old truck. They were approaching the outskirts of San Gimignano when the cold rain began again. They left Ettore with the truck, continuing on foot to avoid enemy patrols.
Now, Churcher strode boldly toward Cappella di Santa Fina in the downpour. The others strung out behind him. Deschin was in the rear. His eyes caught a flicker of movement in the stone wall at the top of the street. But there was nothing growing between the stones that might have caused it. Then he saw the gun site tracking them slowly across the slit where the stones had been removed.
“Down! Get down!” Deschin shouted.
The German private squeezed the trigger, spraying the street with machine-gun fire.
Churcher dove to the ground, bullets whizzing past him. He landed in the gutter, muddy water gushing into his face. A round had gone cleanly through his left arm. The flesh burned as if pierced by a hot poker. The pattern of fire moved toward the middle of the street. Countless rounds ripped into Rosenthal in the space of seconds, each snapping him in a different direction. He grabbed at his stomach as it exploded into his arms, and fell face down onto the cobblestones. The deadly burst caught Borsa next, popping into his legs, knocking him to the ground, and continued across toward Deschin, who dove into the bombed out granary. The rounds pockmarked the broken facade, missing him; but flying chips of stone cut his face. He hid behind the rubble until the firing stopped, then craned up, surveying the street.
Churcher was laying motionless in the gutter when he caught Deschin’s look, and waggled his hand to indicate his condition. The Russian pointed up the street, and Churcher turned his head slightly to see the two Germans coming out of the bunker. He looked back to Deschin, who signaled how they should proceed.
The two Germans came down the hill, each with a weapon in firing position, cautiously scanning the street for signs of life. The sergeant looked to the granary. Deschin’s apparently lifeless body hung facedown over the rubble. The private pointed to Churcher on his belly. The Germans concluded both were either dead or badly wounded, and continued toward Rosenthal and Borsa in the center of the street.
The private pushed the toe of a muddy jackboot beneath Rosenthal’s chest, and rolled him over on his back. The young flier’s head flopped back and splashed in a puddle. His eyes stared unblinking into the rain that pelted his face. The Germans stepped over him to Borsa who was on his back, conscious, but in shock. He managed to raise his hands in a defensive gesture. The sergeant angrily knocked them aside with the barrel of his Luger pistol and placed the muzzle against his forehead. The Italian closed his eyes prepared to die.
But the sharp crack Borsa heard came from behind him. His eyes popped open to see the German sergeant pitching forward. The bullet from Deschin’s carbine had cut in beneath his helmet, chipping the paint from the lower edge, and continued on an upward path through his neck, blowing pieces of bone, teeth, and tongue out through a large hole that had been his right cheek.
The second crack followed a microsecond after the first. Churcher had gradually pulled his .45 into firing position, and placed the bullet just in front of the left ear of the German private. He dropped like a marionette whose strings had been cut all in one snip.