James Benn - A Mortal Terror

“Yes sir,” I said. “You need a lift back?”

“No, General Lucas is coming ashore, I’ll go back with him. The general and a whole posse of colonels, so find this killer. Whatever you need, let me know. This is going to be hard enough without looking over our shoulder every ten seconds.”

A snarling growl of engines rose from seaward, and we all turned to watch another formation of fighters head inland to hunt for German reinforcements. Four aircraft, flying low, turning in a graceful arc that would take them parallel to the beach, not across it.

“Take cover!” I wasn’t the first to say it, but I yelled anyway. I grabbed Kaz and pulled him into a ditch with me, looking up at the planes, knowing I shouldn’t. I couldn’t help myself. It was one of those moments when everything happens fast but you see things with crystal-clear vision, small details blossoming out of a blur, deadly but hypnotic. Bright white lights twinkled from the nose. They looked oddly festive in that split second before the sound caught up and the chatter of cannon and machine-gun fire drove all thoughts but of survival from my mind. Geysers of water sprouted in the surf as the Messerschmitts went for the landing craft and the troops and vehicles piling out of them. They pulled up, split into two pairs, and sped away, ineffectual antiaircraft fire trailing them.

We stood up and dusted ourselves off as a gas tank exploded somewhere down the beach, leaving black smoke belching into the sea air. Yells, shrieks, and curses rose from the men on the beach, and I watched Major Kearns trot toward the landing craft, looking over his shoulder. He was going to have one helluva sore neck before this was over.

“Let’s go,” I said. Einsmann piled in back and Kaz navigated, holding the folded map in his lap as it flapped in the breeze. We drove through a cluster of pastel-colored buildings facing the water, the morning sun lighting them beautifully, giving even the blackened, smoldering hole in the roof of one of them a lazy, seaside quality.

“Where are all the people?” Einsmann asked as we slowed around a curve. “No one’s here. You’d think by now the locals would be out to see all the excitement.”

“Perhaps they are still hiding in the cellars,” Kaz said.

“Maybe they’re all die-hard Fascists,” I said.

“Mussolini certainly was popular here,” Kaz said. “He ordered the Pontine Marshes drained, and created farmland between the shore and the Alban Hills. His government built new towns and farmhouses, populating them with his supporters. I doubt many of the locals will be lining the streets cheering us on.”

“That’s good stuff,” Einsmann said. “How do you know all this?”

“Kaz knows everything,” I said, having found that to be true of most everything I needed to know. Ahead, I saw a cluster of GIs around a farmhouse, and pulled over as one waved me down. They were Rangers, and in the dusty courtyard between the house and the barn, the bodies of two German soldiers were laid out. One Ranger was going through their pockets, handing papers to an officer. The rest of them were gathered around six women, a couple of them young and very pretty, the others maybe their mothers and aunts. They were rubbing their wrists, strands of rope scattered on the ground at their feet.

“What’s going on?” I asked. Two Rangers approached, surveying us with suspicious eyes. One American officer, one British officer, and one correspondent in his own ragtag version of a uniform. I didn’t blame them for pointing their tommy guns in our general direction.

“We came up the road from Anzio, and found these two Krauts. First ones we saw,” a corporal said, spitting out a stream of tobacco juice in their general direction. “Then we heard these ladies hollering inside the barn. From what we can make out, a German officer was bringing a detail this morning to execute them.”

“What for?”

“Leaving a restricted area. Seems like anyone left in the coastal zone has to have papers to leave. They took a truck to Rome to buy food on the black market, and almost made it back. The Germans nabbed ’em and were going to shoot them in the morning, once they had an officer on hand.”

“Good thing he was delayed. Kaz, ask them about Rome, and how many Germans are between here and there.”

Kaz and Einsmann went over to the group, and were soon pulled into a swirl of kisses, embraces, and hands raised to heaven and back to ample breasts in thanks. It looked positively dangerous.

“We’re looking for the road to Le Ferriere,” I said to the corporal.

“Keep going, right around the bend,” he said, pointing to a curve ahead. “Sign is still up. Looks like we caught the Krauts flat-footed. Be careful going up that road, though. By now they gotta have heavy stuff moving in.”

“Or maybe that officer and a firing squad.”

“Yeah, be nice to turn the tables on the bastards.” He spit again, sending another splat of brown juice on the ground, as he looked at the women. “Looks like your Limey pal made out okay for himself.”

Kaz returned to the jeep, a young girl on his arm, trailed by the other women, all talking at the same time, mostly to Einsmann.

“I told them he was a famous reporter, and would put their names in the newspaper for their relatives in America to see,” Kaz said. “But Gina has something to tell us. Di’al tenente quello che mi hai detto,” he said, patting her on the arm.

“ Ci sono pochissimi soldati tedeschi a Roma,” Gina said proudly, smiling at Kaz and taking his hand.

“Very few German soldiers in Rome,” he translated. “Mostly military police.”

“They must have come through the German lines,” I said.

“ Hai visto i tedeschi fra qui e Roma? ” Kaz asked her.

She shook her head no and unleashed a torrent of Italian, gesturing toward the two dead Germans.

“None,” he said. “They drove to Rome and back and were only caught when three Germans left their post on the beach and came to the farm to look for food. They caught them unloading the truck, and tied them up in the barn. They told them when their officer came in the morning they would be shot. Then one of them drove off in the truck and these unfortunates stayed to guard their prisoners. Gina says the Germans moved most people out of the area, and let only those who were needed to work or farm stay. The penalty for travel without a permit is death.”

“Seems like the locals are friendlier than you expected,” I said, noticing how Gina had linked her arm with Kaz’s.

“Yes, it appears that hunger trumps politics,” Kaz said. He tipped his service cap to the women, and kissed Gina on the cheek, which raised a howl among the older ladies, who pulled Gina into their midst. I pulled out chocolate bars from a pack in the jeep, handed them around, and all was forgiven.

“That was a story,” Einsmann said, writing in his notebook as the jeep rumbled along. “U.S. Army Rangers rescue Italian beauties from Nazi execution. My editor will love it, the readers will lap it up, and most importantly the army censors will like it. Maybe I can get it out tonight from headquarters.”

“If what Gina said was true, that’s the big story,” I said. “No Germans between here and Rome. I wonder if General Lucas knows.”

“You can’t go by a story a pretty girl spins for you,” Einsmann said. “Not without corroboration. You really think the Germans are dumb enough to leave this whole area undefended?”

“There’s times I don’t think too highly of our own brass,” I said, turning right at an intersection where a faded white road sign pointed to Le Ferriere. “Don’t see any reason why they should be any smarter on the other side.”

The road was straight and narrow, with low-lying fields on both sides. Kaz pointed out the occasional farmhouse, a two-story stone structure, in the middle of a plowed field. At each one, I expected a machine to open up on us, but there was nothing but silence. We passed a farmer turning his field, and he looked at us with indifference. We were uniforms, and uniforms are bad for farmers. They mean crops churned up by tank treads, houses occupied, food stolen, and that was without the fighting. If General Lucas didn’t move quickly, every one of these stone buildings would become a battleground.