Night of Flames: A Novel of World War II (46 page)

Armed with the drawings and diagrams Jan had provided, Antoine went immediately to the port to take command of the units he had organized to seize the Kruisschans Lock.

Willy Boeynants, driving a borrowed auto, set off in the opposite direction, to the south of Boom, where he intended to intercept the fi rst Allied units and direct them over the Pont van Enschodt. As he sped along the nearly deserted roads, Boeynants gripped the steering wheel, concentrating, focusing all of his thoughts on the upcoming task. Everything was in place for the long-awaited uprising against the German oppressor. The hour was at hand . . . and everything depended on the Allies arriving in time.

The next morning Jan showed the badge identifying him as Ernst Heinrich to the Feldgendarmes and passed through the checkpoint into the park. He fl ashed the badge again at the main bunker and proceeded through the tunnel to the headquarters building.

As he climbed the stairs to the third fl oor he looked out the windows, wondering if today would be the day. It was the same thought that he’d had each of 316

Douglas W. Jacobson

the last three days—the most stressful he’d ever experienced.

Commanding troops in battle had been dangerous, and the killing and maiming had been appalling. But that was a job he’d been trained to do. What he was doing now was something so completely foreign he didn’t know what to expect from one hour to the next. He’d never felt so isolated, so vulnerable, in his life.

Jan entered the command center and gathered up the stack of reports that had been left for him by the night duty offi cers responsible for inspecting demolition emplacements. He glanced around the room. The usual offi cers were going about their usual tasks. The radio was quiet. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Either no attack was imminent, or, if it was, it would take them by surprise.

He put the papers in his briefcase, poured a cup of coffee and walked down the hall to the offi ce that had been provided for him. He stepped into the of-fi ce, set the briefcase on the desk and abruptly turned around, startled by the sound of footsteps behind him.

Leutnant Wernher Graf stood in the doorway. “You look a little jumpy this morning, Herr Heinrich,” Graf said.

“Christ, Leutnant, I didn’t see you in the hall. What’d you do, drop from the ceiling?”

“Well, I guess you
are
a little jumpy. Sorry if I frightened you.”

“
Nein,
you surprised me, Graf. There’s a difference.” Jan took off his jacket and hung it on a hook next to the metal fi ling cabinet. “What can I do for you?”

“It’s ‘Leutnant’ Graf to you,” he said, glancing around the small room. “I’ve come for your notes.”

“My notes?”

“
Ja,
your notes, Herr Heinrich. The notes you’ve been taking the last few days. And all the drawings you’ve been making.”

“What the hell are you talking about, Leutnant? They were just scribbles; what would you want with them?”

“It’s none of your goddamn business what I want with them,” Graf snarled.

He took a step closer to the desk. “Just hand them over,
Jetzt!
”

“I don’t have them.”

Graf glared at him, and a thin smile appeared on his face. Jan sensed that Night of Flames

317

was exactly what the devious son of a bitch expected to hear.

“What did you do with them?”

“I destroyed them, every night in my hotel room. When I was done with my calculations, I burned them. Certainly you—”

“
Verdammt!
Who do you think you’re fucking around with?” Graf shouted.

“You’ve taken notes on a military installation and now you say you don’t have them? I could arrest you for treason right here, you—”

“Graf!” another voice shouted. “What the hell is going on?” Leutnant Rolfmann stepped into the crowded offi ce.

Graf whirled around. “I’ve asked Herr Heinrich for the notes he’s been taking and the drawings he’s made. Now he’s tells me he doesn’t have them.”

Rolfmann seemed perplexed.

Jan looked at him and spoke slowly, trying to stay calm. “I’ve tried to explain to Leutnant Graf that it has been my practice each night to destroy the notes I’ve taken after I fi nish my calculations. I’ve been told that the Resistance is very active in Antwerp and there could be spies anywhere. This is certainly not information I wanted to carry around with me.”

Rolfmann turned to Graf. “Well, Wernher, that certainly makes sense, don’t you think?”

“Not to me it doesn’t,” Graf snapped as he pushed his way past Rolfmann and stalked off down the hall.

As they approached Boom, the Third Royal Tank Regiment came to a halt.

Standing in the open turret of his Sherman tank, Captain Bradley peered ahead to see what had caused the delay. A tall, silver-haired man wearing an armband on his left sleeve stood in the middle of the road, gesturing to the lead tank commander. The tank commander leaned over the side of the turret.

A Jeep roared up the column and skidded to a stop next to the silver-haired man. A scout offi cer jumped out of the Jeep, and the strange man unrolled a map. A few minutes later they both climbed into the jeep and roared off to the east.

Bradley’s headset crackled. The regiment was making a detour.

As the tank column passed behind several large factory buildings, Bradley stood in the turret, glancing around. He was nervous, this wasn’t the plan. A few minutes later they turned north, and barreled at top speed along a gravel 318

Douglas W. Jacobson

road with buildings close by on either side.

When Bradley fi rst saw the bridge ahead of them, he was certain they had made a mistake. It looked too narrow and too old. But, with no hesitation, the Jeep and the lead tank roared onto the bridge, machine guns blazing. As his big Sherman tank bounced along the road, Bradley spotted a group of German soldiers running off the other end of the bridge. A battered wood sign at the base of the bridge read
Pont van Enschodt.

The tank column roared over the bridge and followed the Jeep to the left, through a maze of narrow streets. Suddenly, dozens of men—civilians, armed with rifl es and submachine guns, emerged from between the buildings and out of the ditches along the road. They ran alongside the clanking tanks, cheering and pumping their fi sts in the air, dressed in all manner of uniforms, berets and helmets. But they all wore the same armband as the silver-haired man, a white band with red, yellow and black diagonal strips. Bradley stared at them in amazement, wondering where in the hell they had come from.

They rounded a corner, and Bradley saw another bridge, a huge highway bridge spanning the same river they had just crossed. Suddenly, a burst of enemy machine-gun fi re blasted at the tank column from two bunkers at the entrance to the highway bridge. The lead tanks returned fi re and, in an instant, the German gunners bailed out and scrambled down the embankment toward the river.

The Jeep and two tanks roared onto the highway bridge as another unit of German soldiers fi red at them from the middle of the span. Bradley’s tank was still twenty meters from the bridge when a gang of the civilians wearing armbands ran past him. They charged onto the bridge, fi ring rifl es and submachine guns, and tossing hand grenades. In less than a minute, the German guards broke ranks and retreated off the other side.

The Jeep stopped in the middle of the bridge, and the silver-haired man climbed out, holding some papers in his hand. A second Jeep barreled up from the rear of the column and three demolition engineers jumped out. They looked at the papers then climbed over the side of the bridge.

Bradley stopped his tank and watched. Twenty minutes later an offi cer waved the all-clear signal, and Bradley’s headset crackled. He listened to the message then bent down and yelled to his tank driver. “Turn to the north, Eddie. We’re heading into Antwerp.”

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319

• • •

“I’m concerned about the civilian, Heinrich,” Graf said quickly, knowing that Hermann had no patience for small talk.

“Why is that?” Hermann asked, leaning back in his chair.

“He’s been taking a lot of notes and making diagrams of all of the demolition emplacements that Rolfmann has shown him.”

Hermann’s eyes narrowed, but he didn’t respond.

“Earlier this morning I asked him for his notes,” Graf said. “He told me he had destroyed them.”

“You obviously don’t believe him.”

“
Nein.
As you know, the train wreck was very unusual, and there’s just something about him that bothers me. Now these notes—”

Hermann held up his hand as the signal that he’d heard enough. “I’ve been making some inquiries about that train wreck,” he said, motioning for Graf to close the door. “Last night I received a very interesting phone call. It seems that one of the conductors recalls seeing three Wehrmacht soldiers running from the train right after the wreck. There was a fourth man with them. It appeared to the conductor as though the soldiers were leading the man away from the train.”

“Was the conductor able to describe the fourth man?” Graf asked, sitting on the edge of his chair.

“He said the man was a civilian. He was tall and had blond hair.”

Graf jumped to his feet. “Give me an order, sir.”

Hermann was about to respond when there was a knock on the door. With a look of annoyance, Hermann barked for the person to enter.

His aide, a young Unteroffi zier named Boettcher, stepped into the offi ce and stood at rapt attention.

Hermann motioned for him to speak.

“Excuse me for interrupting, sir, but General Stolberg has called an emergency meeting in the command center.”

“What the hell’s happened?” Hermann snapped.

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Douglas W. Jacobson

“The Kruisschans Lock has been attacked, sir.”

“What? The Kruisschans Lock? Attacked by whom?”

“I’m not sure, sir,” the young enlisted man said. “I heard something about Resistance forces . . . the White Brigade.”

“Mein Gute!”
Hermann burst from the offi ce with Graf running behind him.

General Stolberg stood at the head of the table in the command center. The radios squawked and the telephones rang. The operators furiously jotted notes and passed them to the general’s aides who read them and scribbled responses.

The rest of the garrison’s offi cers were already in the room as Hermann and Graf burst in. The general began speaking immediately. “Fifteen minutes ago, we received a report that Resistance forces have seized the Kruisschans Lock.”

“They’ve seized it? Already?” Hermann blurted out.

“They attacked from three directions and apparently overtook the guard unit within minutes. At least four of the guards were killed.”

A murmuring broke out among the offi cers but stopped abruptly as the general continued. “We’ve also had reports of armed Resistance forces fi ring on Wehrmacht soldiers along the Schelde, the Albert Canal and in the central city.”

Before any of the offi cers could respond one of the general’s aides handed him a radio message.

The general read it and glanced at the aide.

The aide nodded.

General Stolberg cleared his throat and addressed the group of offi cers.

“British armored units have crossed the Rupel River at Boom and are heading toward Antwerp.”

“At Boom? That’s . . . that’s not possible,” Hermann stammered. “That bridge was set for demolition. The guards . . . they had a clear sight line over two kilometers down the road. Graf, isn’t that . . .”

The aide handed General Stolberg another message. He read it and glared at Hermann. His voice was acidic. “They apparently crossed the river on the Pont van Enschodt and circled through the town, taking the main highway bridge by surprise from the rear.”

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321

“The Pont van Enschodt?” Hermann turned toward Graf. “How could they have known?”

Graf pointed his fi nger at Rolfmann. “You took Heinrich to Boom, didn’t you?”

“Yes, of course,” the big man said. Beads of perspiration formed on his forehead. “I took him everywhere. I . . . Oh Christ . . .
nein . . .
he couldn’t have.”

“He took notes! He made drawings!” Graf screamed.

“What the hell are you talking about?” the general demanded.

“It’s Heinrich, sir,” Hermann said. “He’s a traitor. Graf . . . go get that
schweinhund! Jetzt!
”

Chapter 64

Jan’s offi

ce was just around the corner from the command center, and when he noticed a group of offi cers racing down the hallway he knew the moment had arrived. He left the offi ce and headed for the back staircase.

Taking the steps two at a time, he descended to the ground fl oor, where he walked down the hallway to a heavy, fi reproof steel door that led to the lower level and the utility room.

A few meters past the fi reproof door was the service entrance to the building and, as usual, two enlisted men stood guard. Jan made eye contact with one of them. The soldier was young, perhaps nineteen, and thin as a rail. He wore a handgun in a holster strapped around his waist.

“Unteroffi zier! Komm!”
Jan commanded, waving his badge. “I need your help with a crate in the utility room.”

The young man looked perplexed but followed Jan down the stairs.

Jan opened the door to the utility room and stepped into the dark space.

The Unteroffi zier followed him in.

Jan abruptly spun around and rammed his fi st into the soldier’s stomach, knocking the wind out of him.

As the young man crumpled to the ground, gasping for breath, Jan kicked the door closed and fl icked on the lights. He grabbed the towel that he had placed on a shelf the night he found the room and tied it around the soldier’s mouth. Then he took the roll of twine he had also placed on the shelf and bound the stunned boy’s hands and feet.