North Reich (62 page)

      
“And that includes American POWs?”

      
“Of course.
 
After what the Gestapo tried to do with shipping Jews to Germany, the krauts are capable of anything, so we’re going to have to act quickly.”

Downing was scheduled to go back to the Pentagon, which did not disappoint him in the slightest.
 
Grant, on the other hand, was surprised and dismayed by his orders.

      
“I thought I’d seen the last of German occupied Canada.
 
The next time I went, I thought it would be with Alicia and as a tourist.”

      
“I can’t blame you, but the army works in mysterious ways.
 
Actually, it isn’t very strange at all.
 
You know the area around Toronto and you’ve actually met with some interesting local types who are very sympathetic to us.”

      
“Am I going in as a civilian so they can hang me if I’m caught, or can I wear my uniform and maybe stay alive?”

      
“Don’t be such a pessimist.
 
You can wear your uniform or civilian clothes or even pajamas as you think appropriate.
 
You’ll be parachuted in where you will meet up with a small Ranger detachment that’s managed to place itself north of Toronto.
 
Once you link up with them, you are to make contact with local talent and make plans to do whatever damage is possible, and that includes freeing prisoners before the krauts can kill them.”

      
“Colonel, you used the word parachute.
 
I’ve never jumped in my life.”

      
“Then try to do it right the first time.
 
Look, I wish we had time to send you to Benning for airborne training, but we don’t.
 
I understand it’s as easy as falling off a log, only it’s a very high log.”

      
“Colonel, sir?”

      
“Yes, Tom.”

      
“Say hello to Alicia and Missy for me and would you very much mind if I invited you to go screw yourself?”

Neumann was depressed by the news from several fronts.
 
Given their enormous numerical advantage, the defeats inflicted by the Americans were not totally unexpected.
 
Worse was the news coming from Europe.
 
The German army was being badly mauled by the resurgent Red Army and was in retreat.
 
Von Paulus had crossed the Ural River on his way to the mountains and had then been attacked by the Reds.
 
It was almost a given that Stalingrad would either be re-taken or surrounded with the German army under siege.
 
Von Paulus had been given a stand or die order by Hitler. Neumann hoped the field marshal had enough balls to die for the Reich, but doubted it.
 
Paulus was a clerk, not a fighter.

      
More important, the Soviet attacks meant that whatever flickering hopes he might have had that German forces in the North Reich would be rescued had just been extinguished.
 
Hitler had also declared Canada a fortress and forbidden surrender, but Neumann had few hopes that Guderian would do the right thing and die fighting.
 
No, he was a coward who would try to save himself by surrendering his army.
 
He would fight a few more battles to show that he was serious, but he was already withdrawing his troops.
 
The men facing Patton in the west were in the process of pulling back a good twenty miles to their next defensive position.
 
Soon they would run out of Canadian real estate.
 
Therefore, it was up to him to see to it that Guderian and the army did fight on to the last man.

      
Neumann felt that he had few trump cards to play, and he would indeed play them.
 
The first thing to do, he decided, is to fill the prison camps with Canadian civilians, and it didn’t matter at all whether or not they were Jewish.
 
At the same time, his Gestapo units would be directed to converge on Toronto and most especially the farm and the prison camps.
 
The Gestapo could be trusted to carry out their assignments no matter how bloody and brutal they might be.
 
He was not so certain of the remnants of the Black Shirts.
 
Those rats were abandoning the sinking ship.
 
Munro now had a hard core cadre of perhaps fifty men and Neumann wondered how long that number would hold.
 
There were close to a thousand American soldiers and airmen who’d been captured and they too would have value when the time came to negotiate a safe trip back to the Reich.
 
He knew that the Americans would not permit their people and innocent civilians to be slaughtered.

Downing threw Grant a bone and Tom grabbed it.
 
Master Sergeant Farnum would be coming with him.
 
Farnum had once been a paratrooper and took it on himself to give Tom a primer on how to jump out of an airplane and survive.
 

“Anybody can jump,” he’d said without a hint of sarcasm, “it’s the landing that creates problems.”

“Sergeant, I’d already figured that out.”

Farnum had laughed and then gotten on with training.
 
He had Tom jump from stacked chairs and taught him to land properly by collapsing and rolling over.
 
They did this a couple of score times in a few hours until Tom actually thought he understood what was expected of him.

They flew in a C47 and were escorted by a pair of P51s.
 
They didn’t think that the Germans would waste their diminishing number of planes on a lone transport, but nothing was certain.

      
They flew from Buffalo, looped over the lake and on to an area west and south of Toronto.
 
It was night and both men hoped the very young pilot could find his way in the dark.
 
The pilot wasn’t worried.
 
He put his faith in radar and his co-pilot’s skill at finding the fires that were supposed to be set as signals.

      
Sooner than expected, they received the order to get up and get ready.
 
They checked their own gear and then checked each other’s.
 
A crewman opened the C47’s door and they were hit by a rush of cold air.

      
“Just remember, sir, you don’t have to count to ten or yell Geronimo anything dumb like that,” said Farnum.
 
“The chute will open automatically.
 
If it doesn’t then you just yank on the reserve chute and pray that it opens.”

      
“And I’m screwed if it doesn’t, aren’t I?”

      
“Absolutely, sir, but you won’t have much time to worry about it since we’ll be jumping from a fairly low altitude.”

      
“Now!” the pilot yelled over the intercom and before Tom could react, Farnum pushed him out of the plane.

      
The wind was like a punch and he was hit a second time as the chute opened a few seconds later.
 
He grabbed the risers and held on for dear life as he dropped towards the ground.
 
It was coming up with terrifying speed.
 
He quickly looked around but couldn’t see Farnum.
 
Of course not; their chutes were dark and hopefully invisible to enemy eyes.
 
Nor could he see the fires that were supposed to have been set as a target for the drop.
 
They were not supposed to actually hit inside the fires, just be close enough so that their hosts could find them.

He braced himself when he felt the ground was near.
 
He hit and rolled over like he was told.
 
Seconds later he realized that he’d survived.
 
He gathered chute and got out of the harness.

      
“I’ll take it, sir,” said Farnum who’d materialized out of nowhere.
 

      
The sergeant hid the two parachutes and they walked west.
 
According to their maps a dirt road should be nearby.
 
It was and they crossed it quickly, eyes out for a German patrol that might have seen them land.
 
There were haystacks in the field and their instructions had been to find one on the northern edge of the field and stay there.
 
Their new friends would find them, not the other way around.
 
Tom understood.
 
If they’d been spotted, let the Germans take them rather than blowing the whole operation and getting locals or whoever was going to help them caught as well.

      
They picked a haystack and sat down with their backs to it. Tom tried to let the tension drain from his body, but with scant success.
 

Farnum checked his watch - the dial glowed in the dark.
 
He squinted and looked around.
 
Tom did as well, but there was nothing to see.
 
“I think it’ll be at least an hour before anyone contacts us, sir.”

      
Tom was about to reply when he felt something cold and hard against his neck.
 
It felt suspiciously like a gun.
 
“Apple,” a voice said in little more than a whisper.

      
“Core,” Tom responded.

      
Landry lowered his weapon and sat down beside them.
 
“Just who the hell thinks of these stupid passwords?”

Chapter Twenty-two

They drove by truck to a rundown warehouse with a number of vehicles parked outside.
 
The sign said “Uncle Sammy’s Used Cars and Trucks.”
 
Tom shook his head in disbelief.
 

      
“Now who’s using bad codes?”

      
Landry grinned unapologetically.
 
“It was suggested by our OSS contact.”
 
He went on to explain that, after telling top brass that he was staying behind after being cut off by the German attack, he was directed to head towards Toronto and that they would be contacted by people from the OSS.

      
This had occurred and they had traveled by trucks and busses that had been acquired by the OSS.
 
Landry said he had no idea whether these were abandoned, bought, or stolen, and that he didn’t care.

      
“My men refused to wear German uniforms, even though some did before when we took the Blue Water Bridge, so people are trying to get us civilian clothes or police uniforms.
 
I favor the latter since my men all have military haircuts and would otherwise stand out.”

      
“I wouldn’t want to wear a German uniform either,” Tom said, “so try to find something else in my size.
 
Do you have a radio?”

      
“Yes, sir, and we keep moving it so they can’t triangulate on us.
 
We think the German army has other things on its mind, but that leaves their Gestapo and the shits from the Black Shirts.”

      
“Any fresh messages?”

      
“One that’s really unsettling, colonel.
 
It may be that the Gestapo is planning to do something awful to our POWs and the Canadians currently held by them."

A few score miles away, Field Marshal Heinz Guderian glared intensely at Neumann.
 
“I don’t believe things are that desperate. I would never consider killing prisoners; nor do I believe that circumstances could ever become so dire as to necessitate it.”

      
“Then you have not been reading your own casualty reports.
 
You’ve lost a third of your armor and planes and about the same amount of you manpower.
 
The Americans now outnumber you by at least three to one and are exerting pressure on all fronts.
 
Patton’s army may be the farthest away, but General Raus’s command could collapse at any time.
 
Then the race to Toronto would be on.
 
You need a strategy that does not require a new army and I am confident that I can stop the American advance in its tracks.
 
All I need is to show them a few bloody American and Canadian corpses stiffening on the ground and they will halt.
 
The Jews who run America would be horrified that Gentiles are dying at our hands and on their behalf.
 
They would do anything to prevent the blood of Christians from making the American people realize that it is the Jews who are responsible for their deaths.”

      
“How and when will you announce this?” Guderian said coldly.

      
Neumann smiled.
 
“At first, quietly.
 
We already have a conduit to the U.S.
 
Not all their embassy and other diplomatic personnel were repatriated when the war started.
 
A number of them remained for a variety of reasons and at least a couple of them are deeply sympathetic to the fascist cause.”