Mac Wingate 9, page 6
The latch of the door clicked sharply and the door burst open. A couple of Germans wearing the death’s-head insignia of the SS Totenkopf stood blinking in the lamplight, MP-40 submachine guns in their hands.
“Hande hoch!” screamed one of the Germans, flicking the muzzle of his gun up and down to indicate what he meant.
Wingate got to his feet and put up his hands. Reluctantly, Manganaro followed him.
The second German clicked his heels toward the woman and gave a stiff little bow. “Danke sehr, Frau Brandt,” he said. “We are obliged.” He came forward and looked at Wingate and Manganaro for a moment. He wore the rank insignia of a Scharführer, and there was a half-amused smile on his big square face.
The Brandt woman lowered the shotgun, propped it against the wall of an alcove and went over to the sideboard beyond the lamp. “Schnapps?” she asked.
“Danke, Frau Brandt,” said the Scharführer, coming as close to charm as his personality would allow him.
Wingate felt him ease. He lowered the muzzle of the MP-40 a couple of inches. The warmth and the prospect of schnapps were beginning to get to him. He could sense that Manganaro, standing immediately to his left, had the same idea running through his head that ran through his own: the moment was coming for action.
The Brandt woman poured two glasses and walked with them across the room. As she did so, she passed between Wingate and the Scharführer.
“Nein!” screamed the German, trying to grab her and drag her out of the line of fire.
He was too late. Wingate had moved. He seized the woman and rammed her at the German, then flung himself across the table at the oil lamp. He hit it with his hands, carrying it with him all the way to the wall. It struck and smashed, as Wingate slid the length of the table and dropped off the far side to the floor. Wingate threw his body over the broken lamp to smother the flame. It would have been disastrous if the spilled kerosene had ignited. The last thing he wanted was illumination.
There was a long burst of machine gun fire behind him, and someone gave a scream and then a long, dying moan. The dog went crazy. He could hear it savaging one of the Germans. The guy was beating it and cursing it with every word he could lay his tongue to. In the guy’s opinion, it hadn’t so much been born as scraped off the wall of a shithouse.
Wingate moved back under the table. There was a body lying in front of the fire and flames from the logs threw other parts of the room into sharp relief. There were a pair of legs just in front of him, and a greatcoat coming down to midcalf. He had the big Colt in his hand again. He was after one of the Schmeissers that the krauts had.
Suddenly, the dog appeared out of the darkness and rushed straight for Wingate. It grabbed his left arm behind the wrist and began to savage it. He could feel the teeth bite into the flesh. The pressure was intense, and he realized with sudden horror that the animal was capable of crushing right through the bone. Where the Christ was Manganaro? Had that first burst killed him? Was that his body lying there in the hearth?
He wouldn’t have risked the gun if he hadn’t been forced to. He would have dropped it, despite the pain, and gone for his knife. But what was there to hide from the krauts now? The dog had already given his position away. He put the muzzle of the Colt right up against the dog’s head and pulled the trigger. The second he had finished, he rolled back against the wall and slid away to the far, darkened corner of the room. As he did so, a burst of Schmeisser fire cut right through the top of the table, and brick chippings flew into his face. That same instant, two enormous explosions almost shattered his eardrums, and a moment later the pair of legs beyond the table folded. The body of one of the krauts slid to the floor, his steel helmet falling off and spinning away into the darkness.
There was absolute silence, broken only occasionally by the crackle of the logs in the fireplace. Huge, shifting shadows, projected by the fire, rose up the walls beyond the table and waved back and forth like ghosts. Wingate lay where he was in the corner, his eyes and ears acutely tuned for any movement, any sound that would tell him what had happened. He held the big Colt firmly with both hands stretched out in front of him. But nothing moved, and there was no sound of human life anywhere in the room. The big dog had its jaw still locked onto his arm. Death had frozen it where it was when the heavy slug had ripped into its skull. For the moment, Wingate ignored it. War had taught him his priorities. The vital thing right now was to stay alive. Everything else was secondary.
Finally, a voice whispered from beyond the fireplace, “Mac?”
It was Manganaro. Wingate felt a sense of infinite relief. At least the big gorilla was still alive. But Wingate didn’t reply at once. He wanted to see whether anyone else in the room would respond to the voice. If there was a sudden burst from one of the MP-40s, at least he’d have a clearer idea of what he was up against. Finally, when Manganaro had whispered again and had still drawn no fire, Wingate said, briefly, “Yeah?”
“You OK?”
“So far,” said Wingate, cautiously shifting his position a couple of feet. If anyone was drawing a bead on the sound, he didn’t want to be there when they squeezed the trigger.
“I figure we took care of ’em,” Manganaro called. “I can see the krauts. Where the hell’s that bitch with the dog?”
“Forget the dog,” said Wingate, getting to his knees and starting to stand up.
Manganaro came forward into the firelight and looked around. “D’you think that lamp will still function?” he asked.
“Not the way I hit it,” said Wingate. “Try the kitchen, I’ll cover things in here.”
Wingate started working on the dog. It hung like a sack of sand locked onto his arm, pulling the limb down so that he could hardly lift it. He stuck the Colt in his belt, grabbed hold of the slavering lips and pulled. The jaw didn’t move. Some reflex action had locked it and it would stay that way till rigor mortis set in. After that he was going to need a saw to remove it.
Manganaro came back with a lighted lamp. The soft yellow beam lit up the scene in front of Wingate. The table had been half cut in two by the last burst of Schmeisser fire and little pits in the brick floor showed where the 9 millimeter bullets had slammed into it. The two Germans lay beyond it, one of them face-down on the floor with his MP-40 still in his hand, the other—the Scharführer—in the doorway. He was propped up against the wall, his lank blond hair falling over his bloodstained face.
The body on the hearth was the woman’s. From where Wingate was standing, she looked no bigger than the average sized dog that someone had tossed a few old rags over. There was something odd about her. On the face of it, she’d behaved like the most virulent kind of Nazi sympathizer, yet she had volunteered a hell of a lot of information that she didn’t have to. She could have got rid of them both with the 12 gauge, the minute she saw Manganaro’s uniform. Who would have raised any objection? Yet she had laid off until the krauts came. Had she been trying to give Wingate and Manganaro a break, without putting herself in the wrong with the Germans?
Manganaro began to laugh. “Jesus, Mac!” he bellowed. “I’ve heard of kindness to animals, but this is ridiculous!” He had the lamp in one hand and he was pointing to the dog with the other.
“Shut up,” said Wingate. “Put that lousy lamp down and help me get the thing off.”
Manganaro took hold of the two jaws of the animal and tried to pull them apart. “Jesus!” he muttered. “The damn thing’s welded on!” He spread his feet and used the full power of his arms and broad shoulders. Gradually the teeth came out of Wingate’s flesh, the muscles in the jaw gave way and Wingate’s arm was free. “The thing’s built like a mantrap,” said Manganaro, looking into the open jaws and the double rows of bloodstained teeth. He let it drop to the ground.
“Get out of those clothes,” said Wingate, pulling back the sleeve of his pea jacket and taking a look at his arm. “We’ve got to dump the uniform and we’ve got to get the hell out of here.”
Manganaro took a candle from the kitchen and went upstairs. Wingate took the kettle from the hob, poured water into the kitchen sink and bathed the arm. The limb was almost black with bruises from the wrist to the elbow. There was iodine in one of the cupboards and he dripped it into the wounds with a matchstick. It stung like the devil, making him squint his eyes and clench his jaw. It was the best he could do. If the animal was rabid, that was too bad. Unless he got treatment, he was already a dead man.
Manganaro finally reappeared. In the soft yellow light from the kerosene lamp, he looked like a derelict. He had found a pair of black coveralls that had been built for a basketball player. The bottom six inches of the sleeves and legs had been rolled up, yet they were still too long. He had a black felt fisherman’s cap on his head and black boots on his feet. Under his arm he carried his shoes, rolled up in his Air Corps tunic and flying jacket.
“What do you make of that?” he asked, tossing a picture on the table.
It was a photograph. It showed the Brandt woman and a man, and it was dated 1940.
“Man and wife, would you say?” said Wingate. “A last portrait together before the husband goes to war?”
“Yeah,” said Manganaro. “But look at the uniform the guy’s wearing. He was a captain in the Dutch army. Does that look like the picture of a Nazi sympathizer?”
It fitted in exactly with what Wingate had been thinking about the woman. “We ought to check out this Jan Kroon character,” he said, going over to the corner where Manganaro had been and picking up the shotgun that he had used to drop the Germans. “She mentioned a Norwegian coming in through Kroon. He must know something about Erikson.”
He lifted the apron from the woman’s face where she had fallen. She had been hit three times in the head with the Schmeisser, and there was blood oozing out from the lower part of her body as well. Poor old crone, he thought, as he put a hand under her neck and lifted her up. He got hold of her left hand and wrapped it around the barrel of the gun, then put her right hand on the stock with her finger on the trigger. He lowered her back to the floor, making sure that her hands stayed in position. As she moved, she gave a long drawn-out croak.
“You going to leave her there for the kid to find?” asked Manganaro.
“There’s no alternative,” said Wingate. “We can’t bury her, there’s no time. I know it’s tough, but it’s better for the kid to know the truth than to spend the rest of his life wondering why she suddenly disappeared. This way, she might do us some good. She’ll make the krauts wonder who really shot their boys. Some shooting that, by the way. I owe you.”
“Mac, you always owe me,” said Manganaro with a sudden grin.
“I’ll remind you of that,” said Wingate. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”
He crossed the room, picked up one of the Schmeissers and went out the door. Manganaro followed him, picking up the other and slamming the door behind him. The vehicle the Germans had arrived in was a standard Type 82 Kübelwagen, with a canvas roof, pressed steel sides and a front end shaped like a wedge. Wingate got in, spent ten seconds getting acquainted with the controls, then hit the starter. The air-cooled engine gave a couple of rasping farts, then clattered into life.
The lighthouse, according to the map that Manganaro had been using in the Walrus, was west of them. It lay on a long promontory of sand and scrubby vegetation that ended in a little outcrop of rocks, rising ten or twelve feet above the sea. They turned out of the cobbled yard and found the coast road and made a left. The wind had dropped and there were a couple of watery stars to the north, but the night was bitterly cold.
“Is that all you could find?” asked Wingate. “That coverall? You’re going to freeze to death.”
“Are you kidding?” asked Manganaro. “Do I normally look this size? Listen, I’ve got a couple of sweaters and an extra pair of pants under this. You worry about yourself.”
The road was straight, and flat as a pool table. On either side, the headlights with their metal hoods picked up the looming shapes of dunes. From time to time, a gaunt, square building appeared out of the blackness, held for a moment in the restricted light beams, then slid past into the night.
“Westerly didn’t mention any German camp, am I right?” asked Wingate.
“Right,” said Manganaro.
“He didn’t mention any stream of guys coming onto the island from outside?”
“Right again.”
“What the hell are they up to?” Wingate mused. “I figure we’re way beyond what Allied Intelligence knows. It looks like the place is a regular depot for getting enemy agents from London back to Berlin. Somebody ought to do something about it.”
“Don’t tell me who,” said Manganaro. “We’ve got enough to worry about—a couple of enemy agents in civvies, this far behind the lines. You know what’ll happen to us if they take us? Phttt!” He gave a half-whistle and drew the side of his hand across his throat.
“That only makes it easier,” said Wingate, lightly. “If we run into trouble, what do we have to lose? If we kill a couple of hundred krauts, they can’t do any more to us than they’ll do already. But if we had a choice, maybe we’d hesitate. That could be fatal. You ever wonder how many guys get killed through having a choice? Choice is a terrible thing.”
“Jesus, Mac,” said Manganaro, leaning back in his seat a little wearily. “You missed your vocation. You should have been a lawyer. One of those real shysters you see in the movies. You could talk your way right out of death row at Sing Sing.”
Wingate slowed suddenly and put his face right up against the windshield. “Let’s hope so,” he muttered. “You see what’s up ahead? We got real big trouble.”
Chapter Five
Fifty yards ahead, someone was standing in the middle of the road waving a red storm lantern. The light lit his legs and feet and threw weird shadows up his face.
Wingate continued to slow, trying to figure out a line of action. The road was too narrow to make a U-turn, and if he tried to go around the guy he would drive up to his axles in the sand. He could drive right over him, but was there a roadblock and half a dozen guards waiting in the darkness beyond him? There was no real choice. He slowed to a stop a dozen yards from the light.
The guy with the lamp didn’t move. The headlights of the Kübelwagen, restricted by the blackout hoods that were designed to prevent any upward escape of light, illuminated the man up to his waist. He was wearing the dark-colored pants of a German noncommissioned officer, but above the waist he was invisible.
“What do you think, Mac?” whispered Manganaro. He had his Schmeisser across his knees, the muzzle pointing toward the man ahead.
“Hold it,” said Wingate. After a moment, he muttered, “Cover me,” and got out of the vehicle.
He walked slowly forward, keeping his hands away from his body. He could feel eyes watching him from the darkness beyond the red circle of lamplight, and he could sense fingers on triggers.
“The Scharführer,” he called in German, a quality of urgency in his voice. “They need help back there. They need it right now. A group of workers have broken out of the camp. They’ve got your men pinned down in the Brandt place.”
The red light didn’t move. Then the man came up to Wingate and held up the light to see him. The face Wingate saw in the red lamplight wasn’t human. The eyes were crimson, the sockets sunk deep in the skull. The shadow of the nose lay in a great triangle across the forehead and up the front of the helmet.
Wingate stood still during the inspection. The man had a Luger in his other hand and it never lost contact with Wingate’s body. Had the bastard fallen for the story? Would he go forward and examine the car, wanting to know how it was that a civilian was driving a German military vehicle? And if he did go forward, how would Manganaro react? If there was any shooting, Wingate was going to be right in the middle of it, stuck here in the center of the road.
Finally, the German seemed satisfied. He turned around and called behind him. As he did so, the light from the lantern fell on a motorcycle and sidecar combination standing to one side of the road. In the sidecar, a man crouched behind a heavy machine gun covering Wingate.
The two Germans were uncertain what to do. Wingate sensed the situation. They had been posted across the road to do a particular job. They hadn’t the rank or authority to make decisions. They couldn’t go back to the Brandt farm and abandon their position, not without orders from higher up.
Finally, the one with the lantern turned to Wingate and said, “We’ll use the transmitter in the car. We’ll get in touch with headquarters.”
He was still cautious. He had the Luger covering Wingate again, and when Wingate hesitated he gave him a sharp prod in the belly with it.
Wingate led the way to the car. As he walked, he said loudly, “I didn’t notice any transmitter. Are you sure the thing’s got one?” He wanted Manganaro to be quite clear what was happening. He could feel the heavy MG-34 mounted on the sidecar, trained on his spine. He didn’t want Manganaro making any move that would spook the krauts.
“Around the back,” the German with the Luger growled.
Wingate passed the open door on the driver’s side of the vehicle. The engine was still ticking over. He took a glance out of the corner of his eye toward the passenger seat, but there was no sign of Manganaro. He had gotten into the back to hide. The minute the kraut lifted the canvas flap he would find Manganaro curled up with his Schmeisser.
The German reached past Wingate, grabbed hold of the cord that lashed the rear canvas flap into position and gave it a sharp tug. It came loose at once. He pushed the Luger into his holster and took hold of the canvas flap. Wingate dropped his hand and grabbed the knife from its scabbard. He was going to put six inches of good American steel into the bastard the minute he discovered Manganaro.
The light from the red lantern illuminated a couple of bedrolls, a stack of ammunition boxes and the big radio transmitter/receiver on the left. But there was no Manganaro. He had disappeared.
