Forever Man (36 page)

The other officer—the taller one, Bart saw—pushed past the first, his gun thrust out in front of him. Bart dropped and spun, driving the heel of his boot into the man’s gut. The man grunted and doubled over. Bart shot to his feet and grabbed him. The first officer, having recovered from Bart’s attack, joined the fight, swinging wildly with his fists.

Bart pivoted, yanking the gun-toting Nazi around with him. He clutched at the man’s wrist, keeping the weapon pointed toward the sky. The unarmed officer pounded on Bart’s back and head, but without the gun there was little real damage he could do.

As they grappled, Bart saw the other man’s eyes grow wide, his nostrils flare. The pain he was feeling would only get worse.

“
Lassen Sie das Gewehr fallen!
” Bart yelled, ordering him to drop the gun.

The tall officer’s lips peeled back, revealing uneven, yellowed teeth. “
Zur Hölle!
”

“Boy, have you got your directions mixed up,” Bart muttered.

Pulling down on the gunman’s hand, he stepped in with his left foot and swung his own body around until his back was firm against the man’s chest. Still holding tight to the Nazi’s wrist, Bart wrapped his left arm around until he held the man’s arm between his right hand and left forearm. Then he brought his knee up, shattering the man’s elbow. The gun fell from the officer’s nerveless fingers.

Finally, the pain inflicted by Bart proved too much. The man issued another scream, collapsed to the ground, and lay still.

The other officer, seeing his buddy go down, turned to flee. Bart grabbed him from behind and bashed his head into the stone wall, knocking him out cold.

Pausing to catch his breath, Bart checked the plaza. No one seemed to have noticed their altercation. How much longer could his luck hold out?

He hurried over to the door. Locked. “Open up, Al,” he said, pounding on the wood. “It’s me.”

When no one responded, Bart began to worry. He shouldered the door, then kicked it. Nothing. He’d had enough of this. Closing his eyes, he focused on the door, on the wood from which it was made. A seed of heaviness took root in his gut. He allowed it to grow until he thought the door was light enough. He kicked again. This time, the wood splintered around the lock and handle and the door swung open.

Inside, he found Bucky Hatton crumpled on the floor in front of a long serving counter. Blood oozed from a nasty head wound; more blood had pooled around him, mixing with the sawdust that covered the butcher shop’s flooring. His eyes were closed, his breathing uneven.

There was no sign of Al Richmond.

Bart checked Bucky’s pulse. Not good. He looked for something to staunch the blood flowing from the boy’s head. Except for some scraps of jerky in a large glass jar—the label said it was horse, which explained why it’d been left behind—the store had been stripped of anything useful.

Bucky gasped, coughed, and fresh blood trickled from his mouth. His eyes fluttered open. When he saw his CO, his lips moved. Bart had to lean in to hear him.

“Soldiers, they was in here,” he said, his voice wispy. “One took my gun. Another…hit me. They…they recognized the corporal. Took him.” He coughed again. More blood, bright red. His young eyes grew shiny with tears. “My momma, she gonna be waiting for me…and when I don’t…I don’t—” His hand shot out and grabbed Bart’s. “Oh no…!”

Bart held the boy’s hand. “I’ll find her,” he said. “I’ll find her, and I’ll tell her. She’ll know.” Smiling through his own tears, he added, “You’re a hero, son. Now close your eyes and rest. You’ve done enough.”

The private’s eyes slid shut. His chest rose, slow and shallow. And again, a few seconds later. Then, as he let slip his last breath in this world, he smiled faintly, almost sweetly, like a newborn held in the comfort of his mother’s arms.

Robert “Bucky” Hatton had gone home.

Bart Owens allowed himself a few moments with the dead private. He would have to leave the boy here and hope someone from the 761
st
found him later. There wasn’t time for anything else. He had to end this.

The Germans had recognized Al. Bart had to assume he’d also been identified. The word was out about them.

But why
capture
Al? Why not kill him outright? Or them both, for that matter? He could survive a lot, but some heavy shelling from those Panzers would blow him apart, and there was no recovering from that. It didn’t make sense. She would want them both dead as quick as possible, wouldn’t she? Unless—

Kölbe.

Bart’s skin prickled. Kölbe despised Al, had ever since the incident in Prague’s Jewish quarter years earlier. That encounter had left Al with a punctured lung, three fractured ribs, and a broken nose. Kölbe had barely made it out alive, not that he didn’t deserve what he’d gotten. All those young boys, horribly disfigured by Kölbe but kept alive for days, sometimes weeks at a time so they could be the objects of his perverse desires.

But the greatest damage Al had done was to Kölbe’s ego. Already a man of tenuous sanity, the humiliation he’d suffered at the hands of Al Richmond had cracked his mind. Since then, his focus had been on exacting his revenge on the man who had bested him.

Not good at all.

Bart rose to his feet. He gave Bucky Hatton a final look, then moved to the window.

Nothing had changed in the square, except now he could see a German officer striding toward the butcher shop. When the man got close enough, Bart opened the door.

The officer, a captain judging by the insignia on his jacket, came to a halt. He was older, perhaps in his late thirties, with dark hair and a face like a ferret. His nose even twitched as he leveled his gun at Bart.

“If you will come with me, please,
Herr
Owens,” the officer said in passable English.

Bart hesitated. He could easily overpower the man and take his gun—but then what? Kill soldiers until he somehow found Al? No, they were just grunts following the orders of a paranoid madman and his cadre of the lunatics. Besides, if Kölbe wanted him so badly, who was he to disappoint?

“Very well,” he said, gesturing with an open hand. “Lead the way.”

“You will not cause trouble?”

Bart’s lips spread into a humorless grin. “Not yet.”

The Captain led him across the plaza, past the soldiers glancing curiously at them, and toward a cluster of buildings that Bart assumed housed the town’s administrative offices. But before they got much closer, the man veered left into a narrow side street. Frowning, Bart followed.

There were no soldiers in this part of the city. Either someone felt this area was secure, or privacy was the chief consideration. Given the disturbing nature of Kölbe’s activities, Bart was betting on the latter.

He was about to ask where they were going when the officer stopped and gestured with his gun.

Bart lifted his eyes. He stood in front a simple stone building, long and broad with two shorter structures flanking the far end. It had a gabled roof and tall arching windows. Behind it, he could see the tip of a bell tower rising over the rooftop. He recognized the design. Had seen it countless times throughout Europe.

He turned to the officer. “My friend’s in there?”

The man nodded.

“And Kölbe?” Bart asked.

The officer blanched at the name but nodded again.

“Anyone else?”

This earned him a shrug, after which the man jabbed the gun into his ribs. “Inside.”

“Ouch,” Bart said, then drove an elbow into the Captain’s chin, snapping his head back. He snatched the gun away and brought it down hard on the man’s temple, knocking him to the ground, where he lay, unmoving, on the rain-slicked cobblestones. Bart removed the man’s shoes, used the laces to bind the officer’s hands behind his back. Next, he gagged the man with his own socks. Finally, he broke down the gun and threw the parts onto nearby rooftops.

He checked both ends of the street and didn’t see anyone, but he did spot an alleyway. Grabbing the officer by the arms, he dragged him until they were deep in the gloom of the passage. He tossed a few scraps of garbage over the man, then made his way back to the mouth of the alleyway.

The street was still empty. He could hear voices, but they were off in the distance. And the sounds of battle were growing louder. Maybe the 761
st
was making progress. That brought a brief smile to his face. But now he needed to get Al, finish the mission, and get out.

Easing his way out of the alley, he hurried over to the church and slipped through the doors into the narthex. Here he expected to meet some resistance, but the small room was empty. There was another set of closed doors directly across from him, which he assumed led into the nave. He noticed that the stoups, the tiny basins set on either side of the entrance, which would normally contain holy water, were dry. Except the one on the left—it had a smear of crimson across the rough stone rim, as if someone had tried to dip bloody fingers into it.

Al was left-handed.

Bart stepped across to the closed doors. He couldn’t hear any activity on the other side—no murmur of voices, no one milling about. Nothing. His gut tightened. He wanted more time to assess the situation, to know better what he was walking into, but he had been told Al was behind these doors. With Kölbe. Grasping the handle, fully expecting to walk into a platoon of German soldiers with their guns trained at him, he opened the door.

There were no soldiers. In fact, the pews had been removed and replaced with long tables, upon which sat stacks of paper, communication equipment, and several coffee cups, but no one manned the posts. Off to one side, a large map of France pinned to a corkboard showed the placement of the German forces, along with the supposed Allied locations.

But at the altar, where the crucifix would normally hang, there was an oversized portrait of Hitler, the frame draped with a German flag. And just below that—

Bart gasped. Oh dear Jesus, no!

The missing crucifix…it now stood before the altar, upside down, its upper end shoved into a broad metal stand, its base sharpened to a crude point. And Al Richmond, his friend and aide-de-camp, the man whose smile could put anyone at ease—Al had been impaled on the crucifix, his mouth stretched open by the pointed end of wood jutting up from his throat.

Although Al’s eyes were open, bulging from their sockets and bloodshot from the unbelievable pressures generated by the shaft of wood going through his body, his friend was obviously, mercifully, dead.

A man stepped out from one of the chancel rooms next to the altar. Dressed in a black Gestapo uniform, the man had short brown hair and a hint of beard. He was smiling, though his eyes shone with hatred.

“Do you like my new sculpture?” Kölbe asked, his words heavy with a German accent. Gesturing to the grotesque display beside him, he said, “I’m thinking of calling it ‘Ode to Futility.’ No, wait. Maybe something shockingly simple, like ‘Dead Negro.’ Which one do you favor, Bartholomew?”

Bart ignored the man’s taunts. The muscles of his jaw worked as he fought the urge to kill Kölbe where he stood. But he knew this wasn’t over yet: Kölbe wouldn’t risk facing him alone. There was a threat here he hadn't seen yet. And he knew who that threat would likely be.

“He was a good man,” said Bart evenly. “Nothing you can say or do will change that.”

Kölbe’s grin faded. “I create an amazing piece of work, and you can’t even say something nice about it?”

“A three-year-old with pencil and paper would be more artistic. You’re just crazy.”

“This is brilliant.” Kölbe pointed a finger at Bart’s dead friend. “Stakes and saints! Don’t you get it?”

“The symbolism isn’t lost on me,” Bart replied and began walking up the nave toward Kölbe. He could now hear something, a faint hiss, but he couldn’t make out where it was coming from. “It’s crude. And cruel. And, truthfully, not very accurate.”

Kölbe’s pale cheeks flamed with anger. “Wait until the world sees what I do with
your
body, old man.” His eyes flicked to a spot above Bart’s head. “I will be heralded as the greatest artist who ever lived.”

Bart stopped and spun around. There was a balcony! That was where she was hiding! Quickly, he searched the shadows above him, looking for a shape, some movement, but he could see nothing.

There was no one up there.

Turning to face Kölbe, he said, “I think you have a problem.”

Kölbe blinked, then frowned. “That’s not right.” He glanced fearfully at Bart. “What did you—?”

“He didn’t do anything,” said a new voice. It sounded thin, tinny, as if the words were spoken from a distance. “I simply decided to leave.”

Kölbe’s eyes darted to a piece of equipment on a table in front of him. It took Bart a moment to recognize it as a short-wave radio.

“Hello, my dear Bartholomew,” the woman continued. Bart recognized the voice. He hadn't heard her in a long time. “I expect Kölbe finally understands the danger he is in.”

Bart saw that she was right. Kölbe gaped at the radio. The man was trembling, his eyes wide with fear.

“No, this isn’t right! You promised! You said I would get to help you kill him!”

“You’ve lost your touch, Kölbe,” her disembodied voice said through the hissing static of the radio. “I find myself having to fix more and more of your mistakes. I don’t have time for that.”

“But—but you—” Kölbe backed away from Bart. “I still have work to do!”

“I have to go now,” she said. “He’s all yours, Bartholomew. Do with him as you wish.”

“No—wait!” Kölbe yelled, but he was too late. The static hiss was gone. And so was she.

Bart advanced on Kölbe.

“You can’t do this!” Kölbe pleaded. “I know who you are! I know
what
you are! You’re not allowed to kill!”

“I
prefer
not to,” Bart said as he came up next to Kölbe. The other man had backed himself up against the altar. He had no room to maneuver. “But in some cases, it’s unavoidable.”

As Bart reached up and grasped his head, Kölbe flinched. “Won’t you at least grant me absolution?”

“I think not,” Bart said, then snapped Kölbe’s neck quickly, cleanly. The man’s lifeless body fell to the floor. “You will have to answer for what you have done. May God have mercy on your soul.”