An Owl's Whisper (30 page)

Pruvot’s face went white. He screamed, “Bitch,” and reached to his back, under his jacket. He whipped out the Luger, leveling it at Eva. Before he could fire, a volley of carbine rounds ripped through his torso. His arm flew up and the pistol discharged into the night sky. A moment later all was quiet.

When Anders confirmed Pruvot was dead, Jenks lowered his carbine. “You can put them hands down, ma’am.” He glanced at the dead body. “Sorry you had to see that. Pretty nasty business. All I can say is you’re one tough dame. My old lady see that, they’d hear the hollering all the way back in Cleveland.” He pushed his helmet back. “Say, think you might be able to read what’s on that paper of his? Said you studied German. Might be important.”

“Yes, certainly I will try,” Eva said. Dawson handed her the paper. Eva looked it over, running her finger over the writing slowly, as if reading it was difficult. “
die Operation Wacht am Rhein
means Operation Watch on the Rhine River. These are towns in a line east of here—St. Vith, Trois Ponts, and Lefebvre. It says here they are the linchpins. Here is the word
kritisch
, meaning crucial.
Scheinwerfer
means light thrower—the searchlights, I suppose. Here is
Fallschirm
, the German word for parachute, and this says landing three kilometers west of Malmedy. It’s a village near here. This word is dawn and here is 18 December. Today.” She looked at Jenks and shrugged. “The rest I don’t know.”

Jenks turned back to Anders. “Get battalion on the horn and tell ’em we got wind the Hun’s planning an airborne drop three klicks west of Malmedy. This morning at dawn. Then take the jeep and get this document to G-2 up in Chaudfountaine. Pronto!” He turned to Dawson. “Bring that thermos of coffee over here.” He offered Eva a Lucky Strike, which she declined. He lit it for himself. “When you drove up flashing that SOS with the lights, I didn’t know what to make of it. Gotta hand it to you, toots, you got a shitload, pardon my French, of moxie.”

“If this moxie is courage, then no, it’s not what I have. I only have obligations.”

Dawson brought the thermos. “Pour the little lady a cup,” Jenks said. “She’s earned it. And when Anders is done on the radio, call Rutledge and tell him he’d better get someone over to check on Parker at the other bridge. Warn him what he might find. And tell him I need two more MPs here ASAP. Hold on.” He turned to Eva. “What’s your name, ma’am?”

“Eva Messiaen, sir.”

“Dawson, tell Rutledge we got a Belgian kid named Eva helped us out big time here. Don’t want her to freeze. Tell him you’re fixing to run her back to her home up in Lefebvre.”

Thirty minutes later, Dawson was driving Eva north in Pruvot’s truck. She sat quietly, planning what to say when she saw Henri. She’d tell him Pruvot never came that night. There’d be no one to challenge the story. And if he didn’t believe her, even if he killed her, it would be Mother Catherine taking her in place of Stanley, as she’d offered in her prayer. She wasn’t afraid of that. Hindering the spider and protecting her love were all that mattered.

As they turned up the Ducoisie drive, Dawson squirmed in his seat. “Ma’am, when things quiet down, what do you say you and me go out dancing some night?”

Eva smiled. “I’m sorry. My heart’s already given to a GI named Stanley.”

“Figures.” Dawson sighed as he stopped the truck. “Can’t blame a guy for trying.”

Eva exited the vehicle and went into the house. Madam Ducoisie was still in bed. It wasn’t yet 7:00 a.m. “You’re up early, Eva,” Madam called from her room. “Not sleeping well? Worried for Stanley, I suppose. Or is the loft too cold? Anyway, stir up the stove and add some coal. And make the coffee. Then you can say you’ve accomplished something already today.”

Across From the Tannery

Late December 19th, Stan trekked slowly northwest. He heard lots of banging, coming from down around Bastogne, he figured. He began to wonder if there were any friendly lines to make it back to. “Damn Germans,” he muttered, “we had ’em all but beat. Now they’re everywhere and callin’ the shots. Must’ve tore through our front like W. C. Fields through gin. For all I know, Lefebvre may be back in their greasy paws already.” He looked at the gray sky—how he hated the thought of those paws anywhere near Eva.

A few hours after nightfall, he came out of a long stretch of woods to a narrow field. Across the field was a hard surface road. Broken clouds galloped across the moon, each pass bedimming the luminous landscape. During one of these dark moments, he hustled through the field and ducked under the low branches of a lone fir tree near the road. He surveyed the area. Directly across from his tree there teetered a brooding, barn-sized building. When the moon reemerged, it revealed a time-blanched sign,
Tannerie Letisse S.A
. The building had lost most of its siding and many roof tiles, so that it seemed a gaunt skeleton only waiting for the
coup de grâce
that a strong wind or perhaps an artillery shell might deliver. He tried to picture the building new—sturdy, bright, bustling—but he couldn’t. Like an old schoolmarm, its youth was unimaginable.

Across the road, in an open, moonlit space, movement caught his eye. Two figures darted toward the building—an adult and a child. Leading was a stout woman in a long dark coat. Her red scarf had slipped back off her head. With one hand, she pulled along a young boy in a blue coat and cap. The child skidded on the snow, but the woman kept him up and moving. In her other arm, she carried a bundle. A baby, Stan figured. As if swallowed by it, they disappeared into the wooden hulk. Stan looked down the road and saw no one pursuing them. He wondered if he should help, but what could he do?

Stan was about to move on when he heard footsteps. A moment later, a German soldier passed by, left to right, on his side of the road. Soon another trudged by, right to left, on the far side. From then on, German sentries shuffled by at roughly three-minute intervals.

Stan couldn’t chance crossing the road. He was about to slip back across the field when he heard vehicles. He froze. The noise got louder. Riding abreast, two motorcycles,
K-rads,
rolled past. Up clanked one of the huge, whitewashed panzers, like the one that had destroyed the two Shermans. Its gun silhouetted against the sky, the beast was just forty feet from Stan. The gigantic treads croaked an eerie duet of hoarse rumbling and chirping creaks. He felt the ground tremble. Though the moon was covered, he could make out infantrymen riding on the deck. He could see the glowing tips of their cigarettes. As it passed he smelt the exhaust.

Right after the first tank came another. Same sound. Same cigarette tips. Same smell. Then a single troop truck, a three-ton Opel, with a white canvas cover over the back.

Next came a Kraut jeep. It pulled to the side of the road and an officer jumped out. He signaled, slowing the convoy.

The breath froze in Stan’s lungs.

A half-tracked truck with high metal sides on the rear, an Opel Mule, clattered by. Stan could tell it was open on top as he saw helmets bob up and down with each bump in the road. Five more of the half-track Mules loped by. Next came a dozen
K-rad
cycles with their dozen sidecars. Then sixty or more troops on bicycles, their rifles strapped across the backs of their white tunics. There was some space and then came more panzers—smaller ones and more boxy than the first two. There were eight of these, each slapped with whitewash and each with troops riding up top.

After the panzers creaked by, there was a fuel wagon drawn by an emaciated pair of horses. On the back of the rusty metal vessel was stenciled, “
Benzin 7,000 lit.
” and “
Nicht Rauchen
.” Next came several small halftracks, each with a pod of four large caliber machine guns pointed skyward. Finally there were trucks, at least thirty, all brandnew three-ton Opels, with white canvass covers over the backs. As the string of trucks rolled by, Stan shook his head and wondered, My God, where’s First Army? Where’s the Air Corps? The whole damn Wehrmacht’s pourin’ through here. I’m fucked. We’re all fucked.

The last truck had a wooden shanty on the back. The shanty had a tall stovepipe belching gray smoke. As it approached, Stan smelled food. It reminded him how hungry he was.

The officer signaled again, and the parade halted. As Stan watched men pour out of the trucks, he wiggled deeper under the fir boughs. Down dropped the wooden tailgate of the shanty truck, clearly a mess wagon. Men streamed by, taking trays of steaming chow. They went off in small groups, laughing and talking. Some tromped into the field, behind Stan. Some ate squatting. Some stood. Some sat on their gray woolen greatcoats or their rucksacks. So many smoked that the still air hung blue. There must have been five hundred soldiers milling around.

A group of five soldiers sat near Stan, arguing. Suddenly one jumped up, pointed to the weathercock atop the tannery, and shouted, “
Der Hahn, da. Drei mal!
” He tossed his cigarette dramatically and aimed his rifle.
Pop, pling. Pop, pling. Pop, pling.
The soldier laughed riotously, as did his comrades. They each slapped money into his hand.

A moment later another of them jumped up. He fired a burp gun from the waist, shooting just to the side of the mess truck.
Tat, tat, tat, tat, tat.
He hit the
Tannerie
sign. Some of the siding clattered down, kicking up a cloud of dust. The soldier in the mess truck cursed. Lots of others laughed. Stan was thinking about the woman and her children inside.

A sergeant bellowed, and men began sauntering back to the trucks. Stan was thinking he might have lucked out, until a German came running toward him. The big fellow unslung his rifle. Stan held his breath.

The soldier leaned his Mauser on a bough of Stan’s fir. He began singing, in English, “We’re in the money. We’re in the money. We’ve got a lot of what it takes to get along.” The accent was thick, but he had the words right. As he sang, he unbuttoned his fly and began to piss on the tree limb. Urine splashed on Stan’s face and hands, but he didn’t move. He barely breathed. When the soldier was done and had buttoned his fly, he reached for his rifle and bumped it. It clattered down, under the tree limb. “
Scheiβ
,” he muttered.

Stan stared at the muzzle, just inches from his face. It was like being eye-to-eye with a rattler. The air in his lungs burned.

The German moved the branch to reach his rifle. Stan watched his gloved hand move in and grab it at the small of the stock. He watched the rifle barrel slip away. And he watched the German turn and amble off like a bear to one of the trucks. Stan exhaled.

There was more bellowing by the sergeant. Up and down the line, engines started up. Stragglers came running, one pulling up his pants as he dashed. Before hustling to his truck, a soldier scraped what was left of his chow onto the ground next to Stan’s fir. Soon all the soldiers had remounted their trucks, their bicycles, their motorcycles—whatever brought them. Then the parade moved on.

Except for his shaking, Stan didn’t move a muscle for five minutes. Sentries were still patrolling. They were back to their three-minute intervals.

After one sentry passed, Stan reached out and grabbed a fistful of the food the German had dumped near his tree. It was a glob of gluey, wide noodles with a few peas and carrot pieces in brown gravy. It tasted wonderful.

Another troop convoy came by a half hour later. This one was all Opel trucks, and it did not stop. Its last truck picked up the sentries. Then everything was quiet.

Alone, cold, frightened, Stan thought about the good men he had seen die in the last two days. Especially Sgt. Harkin. He figured Maxwell went out so well, doin’ what he loved—couldn’t feel too bad for him.
But Harkin—Dang, in the space of a few days the guy became like a pa to me.
Stan didn’t know much about Harkin’s personal life, just that he wasn’t ready to die. He whispered, “Didn’t even know his first name.” Nestled under his fir tree, he shivered and tears rolled down his cheeks. At some point, he drifted off to sleep.

Stan woke at dawn. The road was quiet and he snuck from under the tree and found several piles of dumped food. He spied an untouched tray of chow next to a large rock and was walking to it when he heard a sound behind him. It was a skinny dog with the same idea he had. Stan said, “It’s OK, fella, there’s plenty for both of us.”

An instant later Stan heard voices. He scrambled back under his tree. Three soldiers approached, walking down the center of the road. As they got close, Stan realized the trio was two Germans with a GI in front, his hands on his helmet. The Germans followed him, one with his weapon trained on his back and the other carrying two rifles.

Stan remembered Harkin saying, “You kill when you have to kill.” Saving another GI counts, he figured. He saw no one else around. As the men passed, he silently slipped off the safety on his M-1 and put the rifle’s sights on the center of the back of the German covering the GI.
Steady now. Hold your breath, Stan.
The world, except for the center of his target’s long gray coat, blurred.
Just squeeze that trigger. This’s for Harkin.