Night of Flames: A Novel of World War II (12 page)

“Yes, I hope . . . and I pray,” Jozef said. “But what if we lose, what then?”

“Jozef, I don’t understand. Yesterday you were certain that the French and British were coming to our rescue.”

“Ah, you know how I get when I’m around Wawrzyn. Maybe they will, maybe they won’t—who can tell? If they don’t, I think we’re in big trouble.”

Bujak took a gulp of beer and looked around at the other tables. He leaned forward and whispered, “I’ve heard talk of a Resistance developing.”

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“Heard talk? Or, started talk, Jozef?”

“What’s the difference? There’s talk. It’s starting.”

Thaddeus stared at him for a long moment then picked up his glass and took a drink.

“It’s very quiet,” Bujak continued. “But it’s starting.”

Thaddeus set his glass on the table. “Why are you telling me this?”

“Because you need to know.”

Thaddeus wrapped both hands around the beer glass and stared down at the table. “This is very dangerous.”

“Can we count on you—when the time comes?”

Thaddeus’s head jerked up. He glared at Bujak. “This is very premature, Jozef. We haven’t lost the war yet. You said it yourself. The Allies could still come in and—”

Bujak reached across the table and gripped his arm. “When the time comes, Thaddeus. Can we count on you?”

Thaddeus leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. Good God, he thought, where was this heading? He hadn’t seen Anna in almost two weeks and he had no idea if she was even alive. Jan was out there somewhere fi ghting the Germans. And now this. He knew what it meant. Once he started down this track, there would be no getting off. He fi nished his beer and stood up, looking into his friend’s eyes. “Yes, Jozef—when the time comes.”

Chapter 11

The Twenty-ninth Uhlans had been moving fast. For two days following the debacle at Walewice Jan led the regiment in relentless pursuit of the retreating Wehrmacht infantry, outfl anking them at every turn and infl icting heavy casualties. When the enemy sought refuge in the marshes, the cavalry troopers drove them out. When they hid in barns, they kicked in the doors.

They had the enemy on the run.

But it didn’t last. The German commanders recovered from the surprise of the counterattack and regrouped. They brought in reinforcements and moved their artillery units to the outskirts of Glowno.

Early on the third day, the Twenty-ninth Uhlans joined the rest of the Wielkopolska Brigade trying to force their way into the city. But the reinforced German 210th repelled every thrust. For twenty-four hours it was a standoff.

Then the panzer units moved in.

Lying in the grass at the top of a small hill, Jan adjusted the binoculars, focusing on the line of German tanks that seemed to stretch all the way to the horizon. He scanned slowly, left to right, trying to get a count, diffi cult because of all the dust they were kicking up. They were spreading out into attack formation. He shoved the binoculars back into the leather case and slid down the hill. It wouldn’t be long now.

He paced along the perimeter of the regiment for a last-minute check. The Bofors anti-tank guns were set, the horses had been moved to the rear and the rifl emen were in position. They were as ready as they could be—if the Bofors guns had the range to actually do some good.

Jan crawled back to the top of the knoll, pulled out the binoculars and swept the horizon again. The tanks were closing in, engines growling, steel tracks Night of Flames

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clanking and squeaking. Through the cloud of dust he spotted German infantry troops plodding along between the rows of tanks.

A fl ash of light caught his eye, and he squeezed the binoculars. Another fl ash, then a dozen more burst from the line of advancing tanks. Thunderclaps of cannon fi re echoed across the fl at plain, and a mountain of dirt fl ew across his fi eld of vision. They were out of time.

He turned and shouted at Peracki, “Commence fi ring!”

The Bofors guns erupted with a deafening noise, and Jan struggled to hold the binoculars steady, following the tracer smoke. The shells were falling short.

The gunners fi red a second salvo, and a tank burst into fl ames, black smoke spewing out of the open hatch. A second tank was hit and shuddered to a halt.

But the line of clanking machines continued to advance, maneuvering around the wrecks, strafi ng the regiment’s lines with cannon fi re and machine guns.

There were too many of them. They were moving too fast.

Jan scrambled down the hill, shouting at the squadron commanders and gun crews, “Fall back! Fall back!”

It didn’t help. The tanks closed in before they could set up, and the fusil-lade of incoming fi re escalated into a torrent of paralyzing noise and blinding fl ashes. Polish troopers bolted for cover.

Jan crouched behind one of the gun crews, screaming at them to hold their position, when a messenger on horseback charged up from the rear, dismounted and ran over to him, shouting in his ear, “Fall back! To the Stanislawow Woods!

The brigade is regrouping—”

A thunderous BOOM!

A shower of dirt and rocks!

Darkness.

Nothing.

Then . . . deep in his brain . . . a ringing noise . . . and a smell . . . acrid, foul.

Jan blinked and rolled over, his head pounding. He staggered to his feet and stared at the crater. Barely visible under the rocks and smoking pieces of twisted metal were the remains of the gun crew. He stepped back and stumbled over the messenger crawling on his hands and knees. Grabbing the terrifi ed boy under the arm, he jerked him to his feet and shoved him after the horse that had bolted away.

Jan wiped the dirt from his face and ground his boots into the sandy soil, 70

Douglas W. Jacobson

struggling to keep his balance. Through the smoke and haze, he spotted Stefan running toward him and waved him off. “Forget the Bofors!” Jan shouted. “Get the men back to the horses!”

In the Stanislawow Woods, halfway between Glowno and Walewice, Jan and the rest of the brigade’s remaining offi cers crowded around a wagon in the middle of a stand of scraggly pine trees. General Abraham stood in front of the wagon, his uniform rumpled and soiled, his face streaked with dirt. When he spoke his tone was clipped and short. “Gentlemen, we’re calling off the assault on Glowno. The situation farther north is deteriorating. Within the last hour we’ve learned that the German Fourth Panzer Division is moving toward Brochow.”

A staff offi cer unrolled a map on the bed of the wagon and pointed to Brochow, forty kilometers to the northeast.

The general continued. “If the Germans take the bridge over the Bzura River at Brochow, the Poznan Army’s entire northern fl ank will be exposed and the counterattack is fi nished.” He stepped back and nodded at Colonel Romanofski.

“The brigade has been ordered to pull out of here and get up to Brochow,”

Romanofski said. “Our mission is to secure that bridge before the Fourth Panzer Division gets there. Get your units together and brief them. Bugle call to saddle up is in thirty minutes. Dismissed.”

The Wielkopolska Brigade’s remaining cavalrymen charged out of the Stanislawow Woods, heading northeast through the rural countryside toward Brochow. The main road followed the path of the Bzura River in an east–west direction to Lowicz then north to Brochow. But there was no time for the easy route. With red and white banners fl ying, the brigade galloped in a straight line over fl at, open fi elds and farms. They charged through tiny hamlets, sending villagers scurrying to get out of the way.

Darkness was falling as the brigade approached Brochow from the west side of the river. The Twenty-ninth Uhlans were the fi rst to arrive, and Jan led the regiment thundering across the bridge. The town was set back half a kilometer from the river with fl at, open terrain in between. In the gathering gloom, he could just barely see the outline of houses and buildings.

He didn’t spot the tanks until they opened fi re.

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Jan jerked his horse’s reins and led the galloping regiment in a wide arc to the north hoping to outfl ank the tanks.

A second panzer unit emerged from the town, cutting them off.

From two directions the tanks closed in, driving the Uhlans toward the river.

In another few minutes they’d be trapped. Cursing their bad luck, Jan shouted at the bugler, “Sound the retreat!” and turned his horse toward the bridge.

The Uhlans charged back across the bridge, dismounted and raced along the riverbank lugging machine guns and handheld anti-tank guns. As the brigade’s other regiments arrived they dismounted, spreading out to back up the Uhlans.

When the fi rst panzer unit reached the middle of the bridge, Jan gave the order to commence fi ring, and the two lead tanks erupted in fl ames. Their hatches fl ew open and frantic German crewmen scrambled to escape the fi ery deathtraps, but a second line of tanks lumbered up from behind, shoving the burning wrecks over the side of the bridge.

The next hour was chaos.

The German tanks that managed to cross the bridge bulldozed through the ranks of Polish troopers, turrets swiveling, machine guns rattling, crushing the Uhlans and their anti-tank guns. German infantry units followed the tanks over the bridge, and the battle quickly degenerated into a hand-to-hand bloodbath.

Shouting over the clamor, his eyes watering from the smoke, his head pounding from the deafening noise, Jan desperately tried to bring some order to the regiment’s battle lines, but it was hopeless. The only thing possible was to pick out a target and kill it before it killed you.

The tide of battle turned steadily against the Uhlans as a continuing stream of German tanks, armored cars and infantry units rumbled across the bridge.

A bugle sounded the inevitable retreat and Jan, aching with fatigue, hobbled along the riverbank searching for his squadron commanders. He found Peracki, then Stefan. “Where’s Bartkowicz?” Jan shouted.

Stefan looked around and shouted back. “I don’t know. I think they went in closer to the bridge.”

“Get your men out of here. I’ll be right behind you.” Jan jogged toward the bridge then stopped when he realized Stefan was right behind him. “I told you to get your men out of here.”

“Brody has them, they’re heading out. Let’s go.”

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Douglas W. Jacobson

Running toward the bridge, they stopped dead in their tracks at the top of a rise. Fifty meters ahead, in the middle of a fl at open area, dozens of bodies lay scattered among gaping craters and piles of smoking rubble. The silhouettes of three tanks moved off in the opposite direction. A group of Polish troopers stumbling up the slope emerged through the smoke. “Where’s Kapitan Bartkowicz?” Jan yelled as the fi rst trooper made it to the top of the rise.

The dazed boy looked at him with a blank expression and shook his head.

“Goddamn it, where’s Bartkowicz?”

A second trooper pointed to the bodies in the open fi eld. “He’s dead, sir.

Over there, the tanks . . . Oh, shit he’s . . . they’re all . . .” The exhausted trooper fell to his knees.

Stefan grabbed the boy under the arms, helped him up and shouted at Jan,

“Come on, let’s get out of here.”

Jan stood motionless, staring into the open fi eld at the smoking debris and dead bodies.

Stefan gripped his shoulder. “Jan, they’re gone, let’s go.”

Jan turned and looked at Stefan. His friend had lost his helmet. His black curly hair was matted with sweat and his face streaked with dirt and blood.

Jan wondered if he was hurt. Then he blinked and shook his head. “Yeah, let’s go.”

Chapter 12

Anna dropped the garden rake and held her hand over her eyes, squinting at the massive bomber formation fl ying overhead. A few moments earlier she had been perspiring in the heat of the sun, but now she was cold. The rivulets of warm, soothing sweat running down her back turned to icy fi ngers of fear.

She wrapped her arms around her chest and watched the droning airplanes disappear over the northern horizon. It was the sound, the thumping vibration, that brought back the memory of that horrifi c early morning in Warsaw.

In the peace of the Berkowicz farm it had almost been possible to believe the war wasn’t happening. She was regaining her strength, the headaches had all but disappeared and the work in the gardens had lifted her spirits. But the bombers brought it all back. The thundering formations, heading north in the morning and south in the afternoon, brought with them the memories of death and destruction.

As she reached down to pick up the rake she heard someone shout, “Anna!”

and looked up to see Leizer on a horse-drawn wagon entering the farmyard. The elderly farmer called out again and waved her over as he climbed off the wooden seat. She waved back and stepped carefully through the garden to the stable.

“I have some news,” Leizer said as he unhitched the mellow, dappled gray gelding. “I heard a report on the radio at the post offi ce. A counterattack is underway.”

“A counterattack? Where?” Anna asked, following the old man as he led the horse to the stable.

“North of here, along the Bzura River, near Kutno and Brochow.” He opened the door to the stall and gave the horse a pat on his massive hindquarter. The 74

Douglas W. Jacobson

animal trudged into the stall, and Leizer turned to Anna, looking her in the eye. “The report said the Poznan Army and the Wielkopolska Cavalry Brigade are involved.”

Anna stared at him. The icy fi ngers returned.

“They’re brave lads,” he said, “heroes. Don’t you worry.”

Anna heard a shuffl ing behind her and turned to see Irene and Justyn. “You heard?” Anna asked.

Irene nodded. She put her arm around Justyn and they walked away.

The next day Anna rode into town with Leizer. Sitting on a bench at the post offi ce, gripping the arm with white knuckles, she listened to the announcer read a disjointed fl urry of reports from the battlefi eld. “ . . . Wielkopolska Brigade . . .

battling the Fourth Panzer Division . . . Brochow . . .” Her stomach heaved.