Rhineland Inheritance Page 2

  “There are men like that in every army, sir.”

  “Tell me about it,” Beecham agreed wearily. “So your job, Captain, is to make them care.”

  “Yessir,” Burnes said, rising to his feet.

  “One more thing.” The colonel’s tone turned cold. “You’re going to hear about it soon enough, so I might as well be the one to tell you. There’s a lot of scuttlebutt going around just now about Nazi treasure. You know the SS used Badenburg as a sort of private resort.”

  “I’ve heard the same stories as everybody else, sir.”

  “So you’ve probably heard the tales about them burying everything from the Mongol diamond to Cleopatra’s throne in the hills around here.” The colonel rose to his feet. “I’m not going to waste my breath by ordering you not to go treasure hunting, Captain. But if I ever find out you’ve been in derelict of duty because of some fairy tale about the lost kingdom of Nod, or hear you’ve been out gallivanting on army time, I’ll personally have your hide. You reading me, Captain?”

  “Loud and clear, sir.”

  “You’ll be working with a Captain Servais, who used to be with the Fighting Free French. Good man. Served with the Americans for a time. Highly decorated. You two should get along fine.”

  “I’m sure we will, sir.”

  “I’ve got a woman on my staff who was seconded from the new government staffers arriving in Berlin. Her name is Anders—Sally Anders. They sent her here to act as liaison with the incoming French forces. Quite a dynamo. She’s off somewhere in the city just now, but any paperwork you need doing or red tape that gets in your way, she’s your gal.”

  “I’ll give it my best shot, sir.”

  “That’s what I like to hear.” The colonel’s attention was already caught by something else on his desk. “Have Sergeant Morrows show you to your billet. Dismissed.”

  * * *

  The colonel’s office was in staff headquarters, which was situated in what appeared to be the only intact building on the road leading to town. It had formerly been a large manor house, and its ornate brick and iron fencing was now topped off with military-issue barbed wire. The great iron gates had been replaced by a guardhouse and standard checkpoint crossbar. The large formal grounds were now sectioned off into smaller self-contained units for stores, motor pool, staff quarters, infirmary, and parade ground.

  The main base was a mile farther up the road running away from town, and had clearly been designed for a much larger contingent than the one which now occupied it. The camp was built on a hill overlooking the ruins of Badenburg. The ground had been cleared from the dense forest that surrounded them on all sides. Fresh-cut tree stumps, some of them as broad as six feet across, jutted from the snow-covered ground between the huts. Rutted tracks frozen to iron hardness ran in long straight army lines between the rows of billets. The Quonsets lumped across the hilltop like rows of metal measles.

  Sergeant Morrows drove Jake across the frozen, rutted ground. He stopped before a Quonset, distinct from its neighbors only by the number painted on its side. Beecham’s aide was a heavy-set sergeant who slid and cursed his way over the icy earth toward the entrance. “It ain’t supposed to turn this cold for another three months, so they say. Guess we’re in for one hard winter. You ever seen anything like this freeze, Captain?”

  “I came up via Italy,” Jake replied. “Never had much time for cold weather.”

  “Italy, huh. Fought with Patton?”

  “So they say.”

  “Yeah, I never had much time for the high brass myself.” Morrow’s grin exposed a great expanse of yellow. “You liberate many of those signorinas yourself, Captain?”

  Burnes shook his head. The colonel’s aide was a man to keep as an ally. If possible. “The stories never tell you about how all the signorinas have fathers,” Jake replied. “Or how all the fathers have shotguns.”

  “Yeah? Well, you won’t have that trouble around here.” The sergeant leered and shouldered the door open. “This is your billet, Captain. The whole barracks for the two of you. And look who’s here. Captain Servais, this is your new teammate, Captain Burnes, late of Patton’s army.”

  The man rolled from his bunk in the fluid motion of one accustomed to coming instantly awake. The man walked forward with the cautious gaze of someone who had learned in life-and-death struggles to measure all partners with great care. “Captain Burnes, did I hear that correctly?”

  “You speak English,” Jake said, accepting the man’s iron-hard grip. “You don’t know what a relief that is.”

  “Captain Burnes here don’t have no French, but he speaks the local Kraut lingo,” Morrows drawled. “Well, I’ll leave you gents to get acquainted. Anything you need, Captain, and all that.” Morrows turned and stomped away.

  Jake watched Morrows’ broad back retreating. When the door closed, he turned to find Servais watching him with a knowing gaze. “Sergeant Morrows has the ability to find anything, anywhere, anytime.”

  “I figured the colonel wasn’t keeping him around for his charm,” Jake said.

  “Put the sergeant down in the middle of Antarctica, and in thirty minutes he’d have enough gear to equip an entire platoon,” Servais said, motioning toward the hut’s murky depths. “Will you take coffee? I don’t have anything stronger, I’m afraid.”

  “Coffee’s fine,” Burnes replied, following Servais between bunks of rusted springs and rolled-up mattresses. “I can’t get over how well you speak English. You sound almost American.”

  “I spent my summers as a waiter serving tourists on the French Riviera, starting when I was twelve,” Servais explained, placing a battered pot on a small gas burner. “I soon discovered that the English gave better tips if I could speak to them. Then during the war I spent some time with American troops.”

  “Free French?” Burnes asked, dropping his gear beside a bunk.

  Servais nodded. He filled a mug with coffee and handed it over. “Condensed milk there on the table beside you.”

  “Thanks.” Burnes poured in some milk and took a noisy sip. “I heard some good things about the FFF. Never had a chance to see for myself.”

  “Where did you serve?”

  “Italy, mostly,” Burnes replied. “I walked every road from Salerno to Milan, or so it felt at the time. How about you?”

  “North Africa, then here.” Servais glanced at the medals decorating Jake’s uniform. “I take it the pretty ribbons were not earned from the backseat of a command jeep.”

  “Not all of them, anyway.” Jake motioned toward a dress jacket hanging from a nail in the wall, its array of medals glimmering in the glare of the single overhead bulb. “Looks like you carry your own set of stories.”

  Servais had the sort of strong, ugly face that many women would find irresistible—all jutting angles and craggy folds. His nose was a great lump jutting above a full mouth, his eyes black and piercing. He was not a big man, standing well short of six feet and slender to the point of appearing permanently hungry. But he carried himself with the solid assurance of one well used to his own strength. “What do you call yourself?”

  “Jake. What about you?”

  “Pierre.” Servais glanced at his watch. “I’m scheduled for a patrol. But first I have to go by and pick up orders at HQ. You could change into fatigues and join me, if you like.”

  * * *

  As with most army jeeps, the canvas top had long since worn out, there was no heat, and the exhaust puffed through holes in the flooring, nearly choking them every time Servais slowed down. Which he seldom did.

  “I’m splitting my men up so the ones with field experience outnumber the newcomers two to one,” Pierre shouted over the whining motor. “I don’t know how long that will last, if they keep sending in new recruits as fast as they are now.”

  As far as Burnes could see, the only good thing about Pierre’s driving was that he hit the bumps so hard it lifted Jake’s backside off the seat and kept him from freezing solid to the cracked leathe
r padding. “You survived the war just to die now?” Jake asked, keeping a white-knuckled grip on the jeep’s rattling frame.

  “A lot of my soldiers are just barely eighteen,” Pierre went on. “They come from the newly liberated provinces, and they want to show their patriotism by acting tough toward the defeated Germans. I need the soldiers who actually experienced the war to keep them in line. The problem is, my best men are leaving. Their time is up and they’re being discharged. Either that, or they are being rounded up and sent to Indochina. I don’t know how I’m going to be able to handle the new ones without them.”

  The jeep did a four-wheel skid around an icy corner, almost wrapped itself around a tree, caught hold of the road at the last possible moment, and barreled on. Burnes shouted, “It’s amazing you ever survived to fight the Germans.”

  Pierre slowed marginally. “These new soldiers are just kids. Full of anger and spite. Some of them feel like cowards because they weren’t old enough to prove themselves. Most claim to have been in the underground. Some probably were. All of them are dangerous. To themselves and the Germans.”

  Staff Headquarters, and Colonel Beecham’s office, was located in one of the few intact houses on the southwestern side of Badenburg. After turning in his duty rosters, Pierre took the time to show Burnes around. The officers’ mess was located in what had probably once been a grand ballroom, although the chandelier had long since been dislodged by a bomb. A few links from the heavy chain still dangled from the ceiling. Directly underneath, the shattered flooring had been hastily relaid with stone. It was hard to find wood these days, as the locals were stealing anything they could find to warm their homes.

  Jake was still looking at the ornamental frieze encircling the ceiling when they rounded the corner, which was why he walked directly into one of the most beautiful women he had seen in two long years. She backed up a step, set her cap in place, said, “You’re straightforward, soldier. I’ll have to give you that.”

  Jake stammered up an, “I’m sorry, ma’am. I didn’t—”

  “Apologies accepted. I wasn’t looking either.” She was lithe and tall, with auburn hair piled and pinned beneath the cap. Her eyes were the color of smoke from a winter’s fire. “Are you supposed to be shepherding this poor lost lamb around, Pierre?”

  “Captain Burnes is quite capable of looking after himself,” Pierre replied. “How are you, Sally?”

  “Busy. You’ll have to excuse me.” She stepped between them. “Nice to have met you, Captain, I suppose.”

  The two men watched Sally as she walked down the corridor and out of sight. Jake realized he had been holding his breath. He straightened and asked, “Who was that that?”

  “Sally Anders.” Pierre’s eyes had not shifted from the point where Sally had disappeared from view. “Also known as the Ice Queen. Late of Ottowa. Secretary to the general staff.”

  “Married?”

  “Her fiance was lost at sea. North Atlantic convoy duty.” Pierre shook his head. “My friend, if I’d had someone like that waiting for me at home, I would have learned to walk on water.”

  * * *

  The three platoons were drawn up under a gray sky that threatened to blanket them with yet more snow. Pierre’s orders were given from the hood of the jeep. Jake Burnes understood not a word. Yet his lack of French could not keep him from observing the casual hold which Pierre maintained over the power of command. The troops listened carefully to his clipped sentences. He lightened them with a joke that brought smiles to most faces. He gathered them together and made them feel a part of something larger. Jake did not need to know the words to understand what was happening. He was watching a leader.

  Pierre jumped from the jeep, said in English, “There’s been a lot of movement down the southern stretch. I thought I’d take them myself today. Care to come along?”

  Jake understood that he was being tested. He knew that it would jeopardize their work together if he pointed out that this excursion was not part of his duty roster. “Whatever you say.”

  Pierre placed a grizzled Belgian sergeant-major on point and two hard-eyed corporals as back sentries, and ordered them to move out. They were soon tramping along paths that were invisible under their mantle of snow, trusting their sergeant’s experience to take them out and bring them back.

  The pace was hard. The ground was broken, with invisible traps for the unwary beneath the white covering. They moved in a silence disturbed only by grunts and heavy breathing.

  Every mile or so they would come upon a guardpost, usually invisible until they were almost upon it, any roughness from the recent construction hidden under winter’s blanket. A half-frozen man would crawl down from his tree house, stamp up and down, slapping feeling back into his body, and make a shivering report. A new man would be assigned to shinny up the tree ladder. Once in place, the squad would be again under way.

  They had been going long enough for Jake to work up a fair lather when the ground exploded at his feet. This time there was no bomb; only a young deer that had taken shelter in a steep-sided levee. The deer bounded upward, throwing up a glorious blast of snow, then disappeared into the woods.

  Jake leaned against a tree, slowing his breath and letting the weakness drain from his legs. Around him the men laughed with relief. Jake smiled at chatter he did not hear, and recalled his last injury, when a land mine had exploded less than a dozen feet away. The point man had hit the trip wire, and had simply vanished. Jake had caught a sliver of shrapnel across his forehead, slicing him open clean to the bone. There had been more blood than damage, and after a couple dozen stitches and one night in the mobile infirmary, Jake had been sent back to his squad.

  As he stood and gathered himself, Jake glimpsed something moving rapidly to one side of his field of vision.

  “There!” he shouted, then was up and after the running figure.

  The man raced through the trees in great leaps that lifted him clear of the clinging snow. Jake felt the air pumping in and out of his lungs as he pounded after him. The man was carrying a dark sack, that much Jake could see in his fleeting glimpses as he chased him through the woods. Twice the sack caught in low branches, each time granting Jake a breath’s span to close the gap. Behind him he heard whistles and shouts and crashing sounds, but he had no time to look around. No time for anything but the challenge of the chase.

  Then the shot blazed out and smacked the tree beside him, throwing a cloud of snow into his eyes. Jake’s war-trained reactions reasserted themselves. He was down and rolling, then crouched and searching, pistol in hand without knowing how it had come free from the holster.

  Pierre crawled up beside him, breathless. “Did you see where the shot came from?”

  Jake made a vague gesture forward and to the right. “Somewhere up there.”

  Pierre motioned for two soldiers to head over, the others to fan out. Then forward. Careful, now. Cautious. But as fast as possible.

  They caught the man’s tracks and followed them until it began to snow. Dusk was gathering, the men were cold, the quarry had vanished. Somewhere up ahead, the Rhine River marked the border with France, but without proper night gear they would find it by falling in.

  Pierre was preparing to turn them around. But Jake wanted to press on. Had to. Someone had shot at him. Wasn’t the war over?

  Then in the last light of fading day, Jake caught a glint in the snow ahead. Cautiously he approached, bent over, and with wet woolen mittens pulled it from the ground. The sight was so incongruous he stared at it for a dozen breaths before realizing what he had.

  “What is—” Pierre came up close enough to see. He stopped cold, whispering, “Nom de Dieu!”

  “Gold,” Jake whispered. And it was. A solid gold cross, as heavy as his pistol, attached to a thick gold chain and studded with gemstones. “Gold.”

  Chapter Two

  “Your first day on the job,” Colonel Beecham said, bristling. “What happens? First you run down the best secretary in the Sixth
Army right outside my door.”

  “Sir, I can—”

  “Then you hook up with this French johnny, go gallivanting out in the woods in the exact opposite direction from where your responsibilities lie.”

  “I can explain, if you’ll just—”

  “Then you start an international border incident by leading an entire squad right smack dab into the middle of an ambush.”

  “—let me tell you—”

  “And wind up the day by picking a treasure out of the snow and getting the wind up of the entire division.”

  “Please listen to my side of the—”

  “Not to mention the rumors you’ve stirred up. The last thing I heard, it was a treasure chest so big it took fifteen pachyderms to cart it home. Don’t ask me where you found fifteen grown elephants in the middle of the Black Forest. Left over from Hannibal’s crossing, I suppose.” Frosty eyes riveted him to the far wall. “Well? What’ve you got planned for this evening. An invasion of China?”

  “Nossir,” Jake surrendered.

  “Glad to hear it. Did you bring that good-for-nothing malcontent Servais with you?”

  “He’s just outside, sir.”

  “Bring him in.”

  Jake hastened to the small annex one door down from the colonel’s office, where he found Pierre leaning over Sally Anders’ desk. Pierre straightened from his position and wiped the smile off his face as he caught sight of Jake’s pallor. He followed Jake back to the colonel’s office, marched smartly through the doorway, saluted, and announced, “Captain Pierre Servais, reporting as ordered, sir!”

  “Cut the malarkey, Servais,” Beecham snapped. “I’ve got about as much time for you as I do for your friend here. Now what were you doing out on patrol?”

  “Checking out some new men, sir.”

  “Don’t you have sergeants for that work?”

  “Not really, sir.” Servais turned serious. “I lost four just this week on postings back home. And the requests for men to be promoted to fill their places haven’t been granted yet.”