Christopher Reich - The Runner

First, he’d dispatched motorcycle couriers to the headquarters of the six US Army groups stationed inside the American zone of occupation in Germany. Each courier carried a photograph of Erich Seyss and a letter signed by General George S. Patton stating his unequivocal desire that Seyss be captured. Instructions were given to copy the photograph and distribute it to all elements of military intelligence, as well as to every unit of military police down to platoon level.

Next, he’d had the same picture transmitted via wire to the editorial offices of Stars and Stripes in Paris and Rome, Yank in London, and the four largest German language newspapers — Die Mitteilungen , the Frankfurter Presse , the Hessiche Post and the Kolnischer Kurier — which together boasted a circulation of three million copies. In twenty-four hours, every GI from Sicily to Stockholm would wake up with a picture of the White Lion on the front page of his favorite paper. And on Sunday, when the German papers appeared, so would a large number of Erich Seyss’s compatriots.

But Judge hadn’t stopped there. He’d spent an hour pleading his case to Radio Luxembourg, an American controlled pan-European station, until they’d agreed to broadcast a description of Seyss and a run-down of his crimes during their nightly four hour German language program. Radio Berlin, controlled by Stalin’s forces, was less amenable.

Finally, he’d arranged for Jeeps mounted with sixteen inch loudspeakers to patrol the sector’s largest cities blaring Seyss’s name, his description, and most importantly, the news that a hundred-dollar reward was being offered for information leading to his arrest.

The net had been cast.

The Jeep crested a small hill offering an unimpeded vista of the surrounding countryside. Fields of saffron hugged both sides of the road, seas of blazing yellow swaying in a gentle breeze. Beyond them, brown hillocks furrowed for cultivation rolled toward the horizon. The burnt carcass of a Tiger tank rested like a desecrated shrine atop a nearby rise. A hundred yards away slouched its target: a barn holed by shell fire, its shingled roof hanging in tatters. Stranger than the scenery, though, was the rancid smell that queered the warm wind. Judge had expected Germany to smell more like gunsmoke than sour milk.

A few minutes later, the Jeep rolled into the outskirts of Munich. What from above had looked like a dead city was, in fact, very much alive. On every corner, American military police supervised lines of gray-uniformed POWs clearing debris from clogged roads. Men and women dressed in little more than rags stumbled over rubble palaces, searching for splintered wood, broken pipes and cracked bricks anything that might be salvaged. Their hooded eyes all flashed the same message of hate and resentment, as if defeat were a shameful illness passed onto them by the Americans. Worst, though, was the smell. The sour odor he had noticed in the countryside had blossomed into a ripe, eye-watering stench. He yanked a handkerchief from his pocket and covered his nose, trying hard not to breathe too deeply.

“Better get used to that perfume,” said Honey. “We reckon over thirty thousand people are buried under all this…” He motioned a hand at the wreckage all around him. “This crap. And summer’s just getting started. That stink’s going to get worse before it gets better.”

Judge remained mute, the sight of so much destruction, so much suffering, robbing him of the ability to speak. Reflexively, he clawed at his wristwatch, spinning it round his wrist. He needed a distraction. Anything. He imagined Brewer’s Row left a pile of rubble. Schaeffer’s, Rheingold’s, Pulaski’s Biergarten, all razed to the ground. The ill-formed pictures made him sick to his stomach.

“It’s okay, Major,” said Honey, eyeing him sympathetically. “If it didn’t get to you, you wouldn’t be human.”

Judge sat up straighter, propping a shoe against the chassis. He wanted to ask something dreadfully stupid like, “Why?” or “To what end?” He saw Francis dead and frozen in the Belgian mud and his pity vanished. In its place blossomed an all-encompassing hatred of Hitler and Germany and the wretched system that could bring such destruction to pass. “Bastards deserved it.”

“That they did,” replied Honey. “All the same, it’s pretty lousy.”

Judge didn’t care to meet his driver’s earnest gaze. “Just get us to Seyss’s house. Twenty-one Lindenstrasse.”

Honey steered the Jeep through the crowded streets, slowing occasionally to consult the road map spread across his lap. They crossed a bridge, then rumbled past a brick wall fronting a mound of rubble and mortar piled as high as a street lamp. On the wall was a large poster of a voluptuous woman in a tight dress flashing them a welcoming eye while slapping her behind. The word Verboten was stenciled in bold letters across her shapely form.

Honey cocked a thumb at the tempting fraulein . “Ike’s number one rule: no fraternizing with the enemy. That’s a sixty-five dollar fine. One week’s salary gone, no questions asked. No talking to them, no drinking with them, and certainly, no frattin’ with them.” He grinned like a naughty teenager. “Of course, you’re a married man. No need to explain General Eisenhower’s rules to you.”

Judge played along with Honey’s sarcastic banter. “Don’t count me out just yet. This ring is just for show. Keeps the girls at the office honest. I’ve been divorced going on two years.”

“Divorced? Sorry to hear that.”

“Don’t be. There comes a time when its best just to break things off. End everyone’s suffering. Know what I mean?” He attempted to smile, but felt like he was sucking on a lemon. For some reason, Honey’s words roiled him, coming off as condemning instead of conciliatory. Judge gazed combatively to the sky. Somewhere up there, Francis was having a last laugh at his expense.

“An unholy of unholies,” he’d taken to saying, while berating his brother from the end of a Jesuit fingertip. It was the argument they’d never resolved. The one issue they could never get around. To Francis Xavier, man and woman, once married, did not divorce. Not when they’d brought a boy into the world. And certainly not, when they’d sat together and watched that boy die. Holy bonds, he’d said. Ties that cannot be undone.

Judge stared off at some broken landmark, wishing that a snap of the fingers could rid him of his guilt. Not about the divorce, mind you. What alternative was there when the sight of your spouse brought back every mistake you’d ever made, every sin you’d committed and the price levied in a young boy’s blood to rectify them? When three years had passed since husband and wife shared a smile or a joke, never mind a conjugal bed? No, Judge didn’t have a shred of guilt about the divorce.

It was Francis who haunted him.

A hundred times before he’d shipped out, Judge had urged himself to apologize to his older brother. Say fifty Hail Mary’s. A hundred Our Father’s. Whatever that all-knowing, self-righteous son of a bitch wanted him to do to make amends. Francis was his only blood relation. What did it matter if Judge prostrated himself before the altar of maternal obedience? But, no, that hadn’t been his way. In his universe, Francis was the only person not allowed to win an argument. The only one to whom an apology was impossible.

Judge forced a bluff laugh, even as he cursed himself for being a stubborn ass.

Honey welcomed the smile with visible relief and took up where he’d left off. “Another thing, Major: stay away from the black market. Germans aren’t allowed to hold US dollars. Their own currency ain’t worth a damn so they’ll trade just about anything they’ve got for some cigarettes or stockings.” He leaned closer, as if to confide a secret. “And remember, the going rate for a carton of Luckies is fifty bucks.”