Dig Two Graves: Revenge or Honor (11 page)

“What about you and your men? Can you keep quiet? One more, just one more screw up and I’ll forget why I need you. See that you don’t make any more decisions, captain. It wouldn’t be healthy,” John said. “Bury those bodies and get to work on another pit for the crates.”

As they walked away from the pile of bodies, Christos said, “You have made a bargain with the devil, my friend. Take care he doesn’t take your soul.”

The
Basileiades Machine Works delivered
locomotive No. 147 to the Greek Royal Railway in May 1909. The line converted her from coal to oil in 1923 and assigned two new men as her crew. These men were proud of their engine’s record and of their decades operating their small reliable engine. They were confident they knew their machine inside and out. However, today, the two Greeks were nervous. The water was low, the oil tank had less than 20 percent, and there were several conflicting groups of people on their train. When the Veria yard came into sight, the two tired, filthy railroad men didn’t know whether to be relieved or more frightened.

As No. 147 eased into the yard throat, the area where their single track branched into a dozen lines, the tired old engine slowed. The dirty-faced engineer looked at the two uniformed soldiers in the cab with tired watery eyes.

Solaris turned to Pantheras and said, “Leave this to me.”

“Be careful captain. Don’t forget I speak Greek and German,” Pantheras said, aiming his Thompson menacingly at the man, as he ducked out of sight.

As the engine eased up to a checkpoint, a German soldier emerged from a guard shack.

“Good day, Hauptman, your transit papers please,” the sentry said reaching up to the locomotive’s cab.

“Certainly. We have come all the way from Athens. It’s been a long trip. It will be good to stretch our legs and get some food,” the captain said, reaching into his tunic. Is
Leutnant Schmitt on duty today?” he said casually. “I have a message for him.”

“
There is no
Leutnant Schmitt….”

Before the sentry could finish his reply, George Zabt, who had slipped behind the guard post during the brief exchange, closed the distance to the guard. He covered his target’s mouth with his left hand. He bent the man backward as he twisted his
Fairbairn-Sykes fighting knife into the right side of the
German’s neck. The sentry died without a whimper as the tapered, diamond-shaped blade severed his
carotid artery.

Zabt dropped the sentry inside the guard shack, wiped his knife on the dead man’s tunic, and closed the door. He swung up onto the locomotive as it began to creep away.

“Neatly done, sergeant,” the
captain
said to Zabt as he climbed into the cab. Turning to Pantheras, he said, “Lieutenant, there are about six more men over there.” He pointed to a dilapidated caboose parked to their right. Grey exhaust came from a rusty smoke jack and the small windows and a door stood open. “It’s used as a barracks for the sentries. We can drop some men as we pass by.”

Pantheras looked at his lead NCO and said, “Can do?”

“Can do, L-T,” Zabt replied. Zabt quickly dropped off the slow moving engine, the train between him and the makeshift barracks, to muster more men.

“Go to the water column,” the
captain, said to the engineer.

The fireman quickly dropped off the moving locomotive and ran ahead to the switch leading to the
water column. He threw the switch, and the engine changed direction and then rolled to a stop next to its water supply. The fireman pulled the hose for the water column over the tender. The engineer had the tank’s lid open and expertly placed the hose in the opening, pulled a lever and water began to flow.

“This will take a while. We’re almost empty,” the engineer said. “We need oil, too.”

Just as the captain was about to reply, there was a burst of automatic weapons fire from the German barracks. A moment later, Zabt stepped out of the door and signaled all clear.

The operation at the rail yard turned out to be simple. There had been only six German guards. Eight railroad employees, who were anxious to escape, helped refuel the engine and prepared another train for immediate departure. It took a little convincing to get a crew for the train to the coast, but an engineer and fireman agreed when Pantheras offered them gold. They each decided they would take a gold bar. The Jews, now refugees rather than hostages, transferred to the only two passenger coaches in the yard and four boxcars for the next leg of their trip. As they weren’t under threat of harm, this portion of the journey would be much more pleasant.

Gus Kasseris found Pantheras in the dispatcher’s office going over maps with Christos, Zabt, and the yard foreman.

“L-T, I was able to use the kraut radio to raise HQ. They said wait one hour for a reply,” Kasseris said.

“Excellent. It’ll take us that long to fuel up the second train.

Thanks, Gus. Let me know when you hear back from them,” Panthers replied.

“Will do,” Kasseris said as he left the office, and headed back to the radio in the converted caboose.

“Your Excellency,” the yard manager said to Pantheras, “It is 560 kilometers to the Igoumenitsa. Corfu is 15 kilometers off the coast from the town. There is a rail yard at Igoumenitsa, maybe a little bigger, and a small German garrison in the town.”

“Will we have any trouble unloading our passengers?” Pantheras asked.

“No, your Excellency,” the foreman said, “I’ll write a message to the man in charge. He’s my cousin. He has helped others escape.”

Turning to Zabt, John said, “You’ll have to take care of the sentries, but be quiet about it. There’re sure to be more krauts in town than there were here. Work out with Christos how you’ll handle it ahead of time.

“I wish you’d let me come with you, L-T. We’ve had a lot of luck together. We’re a good team. I don’t know how I’ll catch back up with you,” Zabt said.

“George, you’re getting out, going on the boats.”

“No, L-T, I’m not.”

“I need you to get these people out and take care of Ceres. He goes, too,” John said. “You’ll have to explain to HQ what we’ve run into, how we’re going to handle it, and make the case for the transport we need. It’ll be better in person. Here,” Pantheras said, handing the sergeant a leather pouch, “take this, too. It’s all those damn After Action Reports and a letter for the Major. You understand your mission?

“Yes, sir,” Zabt replied tersely.

“Any questions?”

“No questions, sir.”

“Cut out the sir stuff, will ya?” John said extending his hand.

“Sure, good luck …. John,” Zabt said, shaking his commanding officer’s hand.

“You too, George. Now get moving.

George was right. They were a good team,
John thought, as he hustled down the office steps toward an open boxcar.

He looked at the crates then broke into one with a pry bar.

John whistled and said aloud. “The krauts are gunna go nuts when they find out this stuff’s missing.”

John stared in amazement at easily two hundred pounds of mixed gemstones, thousands of pieces, maybe hundreds of thousands.
No wonder the crates were so damn heavy
, John thought.

“Well, this isn’t what I’m looking for,” John said aloud. He quickly hammered down the lid and went to work on another box.

He opened a second crate and was shocked again, this time by the sight of a dozens of irregular gold bars. Each one appeared to be about ten inches long, six inches wide and perhaps three inches thick, and
had numbers and the Nazi swastika and eagle stamped into it. John let out another low whistle as he marveled at the cache of gold.

After a moment’s contemplation, John put three bars in to a heavy leather mailbag he’d found in the dispatcher’s office. He added four more bars, but he couldn’t move it. John put the additional bars in a second bag and nailed the crate shut.

Dragging the bags to the car door, he jumped to the ground. He wheeled a luggage wagon to the door and heaved the heavy bags on to it. John pushed the cart ahead of him, as he headed back to the dispatcher’s office. He found the two crewmen chosen for the train to the coast sitting outside the office, looking very worried.

“OK, my friends, here’s something to change those frowns,” he said, opening the leather mailbag to reveal the men’s gleaming bribe. The gold had the desired effect as both men broke into a giant grins. “Keep those hidden. Each of you take one of these bags,” he said, pointing to a pile of heavy canvas sacks, “and put one bar in it. It’s yours,” John said.

The two train men jumped to their task. They grunted and groaned as they struggled to move the bars. John laughed inwardly, thinking the bars weren’t that heavy.

“You have your reward. Now get that train through,” John said.

“Thank your Excellency, this is more than we imagined,” the engineer said. The fireman simply stood there with a huge grin.

“Get those people through to Corfu. Do that and you’ll have earned it,” John said.

Despite being weighted down by their newfound wealth, the fireman and engineer had a spring in their step as they headed off to prep their locomotive. John wondered what it felt like to carry a new life in your hands.

John took one last bar out of the first leather bag and transferred it to his haversack. He put it on the luggage wagon with the remaining mailbag containing four bars.

John slipped a piece of paper from his pocket, stared at it for a moment then tossed it in the office stove. Standing by the stove, watching a piece of paper burn, he tried to imagine the future.
Would his plan work? What he’d missed, some eventuality he hadn’t counted on
. He couldn’t think of anything. The train to the coast was set. He would ride toward Thessaloniki with Solaris until they caught up with the trucks. He’d send Solaris to deliver the ultimatum while he and his men hid the gold. John knew just where he was going to hide it, too. He’d worked out a simple code leading to the gold’s location. The original was now ash in the stove. He’d put the coded message in his notebook. He planned to give that to Ceres so he and the secret would be out reach of the Germans. Yes, he had it all worked out, John thought to himself.

Christos slipped quietly into the office as John looked up and smiled. “Thank you for going on the train. I know those people will be safer with you on there,” John said, getting up to shake his friend’s hand.

“I should stay with you, John. You have the most dangerous part.
Solaris is the devil. Don’t turn your back on him. You saw what he did to his German friends,” Christos said with moist eyes.

“I’ll watch him. You be careful, too. Watch that train crew, too. They might leave you if they think they can get away with it,” John said.

“I will, my friend. Until we meet again,” Christos said as he embraced the American.

“You’re a good man, Christos. It’s been an honor to fight with you,” John said.

“And you as well, my friend. I have not known you long, but I think of you as a brother. Farewell,” Christos said and then, biting his lower lip, he turned and left without another word. 

Permission to send the refugees to Corfu came within an hour as promised. Three boats would arrive in two nights’ time to take the Jews safely to Italy. Arrangements for subsequent evacuations were in the works. John drew a sigh of relief. Now he had to set his plan in motion.

“Lieutenant, thank you for all you have done and are doing for our people,” Hiram Solomon said as John approached. 

The two men shook hands. “Don’t thank me yet Mr. Solomon. You aren’t out of the country,” John said.

“Just the same, we’re very grateful.”

“You had better take this,” John said, picking up a heavy mailbag from the cart and handing it to the Jewish leader.

Hiram wrinkled his brow then said, “What’s this?” taking the heavy bag in his arms.

“You’ll need it when you get to Italy,” John said.

“You’d better get going. Have a safe journey. I hope we’ll send many more people after you,” John said as Solomon mounted the steps to the coach.

“Good-bye, lieutenant. God bless you,” Solomon said as he disappeared into the coach car.

John saw George and Christos waving from the locomotive that they were ready to go. He returned their wave but turned when he heard running feet behind him.

Ceres ran up to John, tears in his eyes. “L-T John, why are you making me go?” the boy cried as he threw himself into John’s arms. “I want to stay here with you.”

“Look, Ceres,” John said as he hugged the boy, “I need someone I can trust to get these people through. You’re the best man for the job.”

“But Sergeant George, he goes, and Christos. I stay here with you,” the boy sniffed back more tears.

“No, Ceres, I want you to go. It’s important,” John said as he lifted Ceres up into the boxcar, where several others were waiting. The boy’s hands slipped off the big American who said, “You have to tell our story.”

“No, L-T John, no” Ceres cried, reaching out for his friend.

John remembered the haversack and shrugged it off his shoulder. He fished his black notebook out of his pocket and dropped it into the bag then heaved it into the car as it began to roll.

“This is for you. Take care of it,” John said.

Ceres reached out for John, but a woman in the car held him back. His struggles pushed the haversack right to the car’s edge. It caught in the door track as the car’s momentum moved the boxcar’s heavy door. It slammed shut on the bag, and an object fell from the car. John could see the end of haversack flapping in the breeze as the car picked up speed and Ceres’ cries faded.