Double Cross Fire

"Strange reports? What do you mean?"

"The Germans seem to be making some counterattacks against the First Army in Belgium. No one seems to know whether these are just local attacks, or whether something really big is on."

"Probably just local attacks. The Germans don't have much to counterattack with after the beating they've taken."

As they left the restaurant and began walking toward her apartment, Camille asked, "Where do you go from here, Al?"

"Back to my battalion."

"Yes, I know, the 59th Division. But which regiment?"

"The 759th."

"Is it up on the Sarre River?"

"We're a little beyond that one – on the other side of the Blies."

"Then you are already well into Germany?"

"Yes, through the old Maginot Line of the French and approaching the new Siegfried Line of the Germans."

"Where will you be going from there?" With a gloved hand she brushed a tendril from her cheek.

He watched her, wanting to touch that soft cheek and glowing hair with his hand. He answered almost automatically, "They say that Patton is heading for Kaiserslautern and then Mannheim across the Rhine."

"Oh?" By now they were approaching her apartment building. "Well, here we are," she said. "I'll see you at five this evening." She held out her hand.

"I can hardly wait." He ignored her hand and ventured a quick kiss before taking his leave.

A military policeman, spick and span in white-striped helmet, saluted him at the corner. Half a block later, Clark came to a sudden halt, thunderstruck. My God, he thought, how can I be sure Camille is what she says she is? Come to think of it, she did ask me some probing questions. What a stupid jerk I am for answering them. I know better than that! Did that MP see me kiss her? What if she is suspected of being an enemy agent? What if they thought I've been collaborating with the enemy? He looked back to see if he was being followed. He was.

* * *

Another half-hour of fire and brimstone left the companies too shaken and too depleted for any hope of making an effective attack. With the approval of the Regimental Commander, Hughes called off the attack and ordered the companies to pull back to their former positions behind the line of departure for reorganization.

"Let's get back to the CP," said Hughes. Walking out to the village street, he and Clark and the radio operator found Wally Boyd and his jeep and hurried back. Henderson and Joe Smith followed in their own jeeps.

The landscape presented an eerie, cheery spectacle of Christmas, a winter wonderland, scarred by powder burns. Here were soldiers of misfortune, men of good cheer, infiltrated by doubts – men of courage, scared by an enemy within. The whole scene and the whole situation was one which the French might call maussade – cloudy and gloomy and disgruntled with an air of disappointment and sadness.

Hughes broke a long silence. "Al, there's something screwy going on around here, and I don't like it."

"Yes, sir, I think there are several things we need to check out."

Back at the Chateau, Hughes dismissed the driver and told Clark to go get Major Allen. "Let's take a walk," he said when the Major and Clark joined him. "Let's go down and see how the Mortar Platoon is doing."

As they walked down the lane, Hughes struck into the light, dirty snow with his walking stick. "What do you make of it?" he said to neither one in particular. "Our own artillery falling short, and the Germans zeroed in on our line of departure exactly ten minutes before our attack time twice in succession."

"And all our radios dead," Clark added.

"Do you think we've been snake bit?" asked Major Allen.

"Snake bit, hell!" growled Hughes. "Looks like there's something rotten in Denmark!"