David Healey: Ghost Sniper

The second battle for Bienville had begun.

“Here they come!” a soldier shouted.

Cole was sprawled on a second-floor roof, looking down the road, his eye pressed to the rifle scope as he awaited the first glimpse of the enemy.

No one really needed to shout a warning. They had been able to hear the diesel engines and clanking treads of the approaching Tiger tanks for some time, a sound that was as threatening as a distant thunderstorm. There would be ground troops, too.

Let them come on, he thought.

He wondered just where Von Stenger might be. Was he with the advancing Wehrmacht troops? Made up of marsh and water, the countryside surrounding the town did not offer the hiding places of other areas in the bocage. The woods and fields the German sniper could use for cover were at an extreme rifle range. Nonetheless, Cole knew Von Stenger was out there somewhere. Jolie had practically dared—or perhaps a better word was taunted—the German sniper into being there. But where?

He reckoned that Von Stenger hadn’t earned the nickname The Ghost without good reason.

Cole had chosen his sniping position with Von Stenger in mind. It was up high enough to give him the advantage because the shooter with the higher position held all the cards. He would have preferred to be up in the church steeple, which with its height and thick walls would be impregnable. It looked more like a castle or knight’s keep than a church steeple. Lieutenant Mulholland had agreed with the medics that the church should be neutral territory as a makeshift hospital.

He was using the ridge of the roof as a rifle rest so that the slope of the roof gave him some natural protection. All he had to do was keep his head down once the shooting started.

And it was about to start.

It was hard to say how long the beleaguered American force could hold this key town on the road to Carentan. Their best hope would be for reinforcements—or better yet a squadron of P-51 tank busters to magically appear and knock out the Panzers. For now, they would have to depend upon themselves. They were well dug in, and that combined with the fact that the attacking Germans would be channeled down the single roadway into town, gave them a defensible position. The Germans’ superior numbers and firepower might eventually wear down the Americans, but they would go down fighting.

Neville, the lone Brit, was on the second floor at the edge of town with his Tommy gun, while Vaccaro, the lieutenant and Cole had taken up positions on the roof tops of the highest buildings. Jolie and Fritz were in the hospital.

Cole was a little surprised when he heard the sharp crack of a rifle in town and thought someone was getting antsy, firing before the enemy was even in sight. But then he noticed the crumpled figure in the street below, looking as if he’d been shot. Huh . Cole might have ignored that if a second rifle shot hadn’t rung out, the bullet knocking down another soldier. That second shot had definitely come from within town limits, and it had killed a soldier.

What the hell was happening?

A third shot rang out, and Cole was fairly certain it had come from the church tower. The tower was much higher up and directly behind him—he was lucky that it was still dark enough that the sniper couldn’t see him yet.

“Sniper!” he heard someone shouting. “There’s a sniper in the steeple!”

It had to be Von Stenger. The Ghost Sniper. No doubt about it. Jolie had thought she was setting a trap for the German, but the sneaky son of a bitch had turned the tables. Somehow, the bastard had slipped into the town. He had gotten into the church steeple. And now he was picking them off.

On the narrow streets below, men shouted and pointed up at the tower. From one of the slitted windows, Cole saw a stab of flame. There . He aimed and fired, too fast, not thinking through what he was doing. He knew the bullet was wrong before it left the barrel. His hasty shot blew a chunk of rock of the edge of a window slit. The bullet had missed, but it had gotten the Ghost Sniper’s attention. Cole could feel himself in the crosshairs. He flung himself over the ridge of the roof just in time—a bullet pulverized the tiles where he had lain a split second ago.

Damn good shot , he thought in the back of his mind. His next thought was: I’m a dead man if I don’t get off the roof .

With the German in the church steeple above him, there was nowhere safe to be on the roof, though the ridge of the roof itself offered some protection. Keep moving, Cole . He rolled and a bullet nicked the roof tiles near where his head had been a moment before, blasting Cole’s face with shards of slate.

Move. Now.

Cole had climbed up carefully because the ancient roof slates were brittle and slippery with what someone might have described poetically as moss, but which was really more like the algae you found on rocks near the edges of slow-moving creeks.

He knew he had seconds before the next shot killed him. There was only one way to get down, and that was fast. He scrambled toward the edge of the roof, gaining momentum until he was moving feet first across the slick slates like a kid down a snow bank. He tossed his rifle free, catching a glimpse of it pinwheeling into thin air, then tried to catch the edge of the roof to slow himself down. If all went well he could hang down off a gutter and his feet would be six feet closer to the ground.

It didn’t work that way. His hands missed the gutter and he felt his belly lurch sickeningly as he dropped like a wing-shot bird toward the ground.

Helpless, he fell.

He hit the top of a truck parked below, then bounced off and landed on the hood. His next stop was the cobblestoned street, where he landed so hard that it knocked the breath clean out of him. He had a scary few seconds trying to get his lungs working again. Then his breath came back in a gush.

He was out of sight of the German sniper now, so he took his time getting up and taking stock. Nothing broken, but he hurt like hell. Cole glanced up at the roof, which seemed very high above where he sat, aching and bleeding, on the cobblestoned street.

He reckoned he was damn lucky that some French farmer had left his battered truck parked beside the house, though the roof of the cab was more like a metal slab than a feather bed. Still, it had broken his fall somewhat. Otherwise, he would have landed right on the cobblestones and burst open like a watermelon.

Cole looked around for his rifle. He found it a few feet away, and his heart sank at the sight of it. The stock was cracked, the scope busted. He picked it up and a little shower of broken glass tinkled down on the cobblestones like frozen tear drops. Christ on a cross. Here he was with a sniper lording it over town and half the German army on its way, and him without a goddamn rifle. Don’t it just figure. Maybe he could throw rocks at the son of a bitch.

“Have you lost something?”

The French voice came out of the shadows, and he was still disoriented. He spun around, trying to locate the source. Then Jolie materialized as she stepped out from behind the truck.

“Busted my rifle, and damn near busted my ass permanently,” Cole said. “By the way, I reckon that’s your sniper friend up in the church tower.”

“He is not mon ami .” She reached out a hand and helped him up. “Are you all right?”

“Darlin’, I done fell off a roof. How the hell do you think I am?”

“It seems like a reasonable question.”

“Well, I reckon I’d be a lot worse with a bullet in me. How the hell did he get up there?”

Jolie shrugged. “He is the Ghost Sniper.”

Cole did not care to admit it, but he was shaken by far more than the fall from the roof. Jolie had made sure this so-called Ghost Sniper would come to Bienville by practically handing him a party invitation. All things being equal, Cole would have had a good chance of eliminating someone who had been a deadly killer of their own troops. But the German had beat them at their own game.