Gods & Snipers: A World War II Thriller

Chapter Sixteen

A couple of the defenders had suffered minor wounds in the skirmish against the Germans. One man was shot in the arm, while another had been shot through the calf. Both men were lucky in that the rounds had not hit any bones or tendons. They could still fight, once they were patched up. The worst-off among the wounded was still West, whom they had carried into town. The poor man was really suffering and wouldn't last much longer without hospital care. A fever had set in and West drifted in and out of coherence.

Nothing much could be done for West or the other wounded, other than making them as comfortable as possible. Unfortunately, their cobbled-together unit lacked a medic or much in the way of medical supplies. For the pain, both men were taking liberal swings from a bottle of French brandy.

As it turned out, Frenchie was showing himself to be a man of many talents. Not only did he speak the lingua franca, but he had also helped his father back home bandage injuries and treat the sick. Never mind the fact that the patients were four-legged because his father was a country veterinarian.

"A horse doctor, I guess you'd say," Frenchie explained, slipping a man's shirt off his shoulder so that he could examine the flesh wound. He dusted the soldier's wounded arm with sulfa powder and then wrapped it tight with gauze. "Also a dog, cat, and dairy cow doctor."

He worked deftly, like someone who had done this many times before. Cole was impressed. "You're a damn sight better than some of the Army doctors I seen. You get out of this mess, you ought to become a medic. They could use you.”

“The funny thing is that I never wanted to be a medic. I thought that I could do more good as a soldier. Guess I was wrong about that.”

“The Army needs all kinds of soldiers, Frenchie. You’re sort of a fighting medic.”

The wounded soldier winced as Frenchie pulled the bandage tight. Finished, he patted the man's good shoulder. He also pried the brandy away from him. "Keep it up and you'll hurt worse from that booze," Frenchie said. "Calvados is potent stuff. You’ve had enough.”

General Tolliver hurried past with the sergeant, taking stock of the situation. They had posted a couple of lookouts. Tolliver knew as well as anyone that the Germans would be back sooner rather than later for another bite of the apple. They were not done yet. Two lookouts had been posted to give them as much warning as possible when the next attack came.

"How are we set for ammunition?" the general asked.

Sergeant Woodbine had already checked with the men. "They've got thirty or forty rounds each. The Browning has maybe one belt left."

Tolliver swore. Somehow, he still managed to look crisp in his uniform. The glinting star on his collar and on his helmet looked conspicuously bright. "We can hold off maybe one more concerted attack. That's if they don't throw everything at us at once, which is what they should have done, instead of coming at us piecemeal."

"Agreed, sir. The Jerries are not always willing to change tactics. They’re stubborn that way.”

The general stood with his hands on his hips in the middle of the square. He looked around the town, taking stock. He seemed to be thinking things over.

Cole looked toward the distant house where the German sniper had been located, then back at the general. He wished that the general would do his thinking someplace less exposed.

He walked over to the general. A timid man would have sidled over, but Cole didn't sidle well.

"General, if you keep standin' there with all them stars some Kraut sniper is gonna shoot your ass." He added, "Sir."

General Tolliver glared at him. "Soldier, I might point out that you have a Confederate flag painted smack dab on your helmet. Not only is that against regulations as recognizing a former hostile enemy of the United States but it makes a damn good target in itself."

"Ain’t nobody killed me yet, sir, so it's good luck, I reckon."

The general continued to glare at him. "I'll tell you what's lucky, Cole. It's the fact that my people fought for the Confederacy. Otherwise, I'd make you take that goddamn helmet off."

"Yes, sir."

While it was true that they were both Southerners, the general was from Virginia, where the oldest families were descended from English cavaliers and still held onto some pretense of being aristocracy. They had owned slaves to till the rich cropland. Cole's own Scotch-Irish people had settled the Appalachian Mountains, where life was hard and luck ran thin as the growing soil. You couldn't get much farther from the Virginia gentry than that.

General Tolliver stalked off, shaking his head and muttering something about dumb peckerwoods. Cole noticed, though, that when Tolliver stopped, he had managed to put the tall fountain between himself and the German position.

Once Tolliver was safely out of earshot Vaccaro said, "Hillbilly, you ought to know better than to go giving orders to a general."

"That general has got some sand," Cole said, a grudging note of admiration in his voice. "But if he gets hisself killed, then the Krauts are gonna come through this town like shit through a goose and take that bridge. The next in command is Sergeant Woodbine, and he seems like a good man, but he ain't gonna hold that bridge."

“You got that right.”

It soon became clear that the Americans were not entirely on their own in this fight. Five of the village men presented themselves to General Tolliver, offering to join the Americans. None of them was a day under fifty and their hair was mostly gray — if they still had any. Two appeared to be shopkeepers, soft in the middle and a bit stooped. They all carried weapons that could hardly be called adequate. Two were armed with ancient single-shot rifles that had possibly been used in the Franco-Prussian War. The other three carried battered shotguns that might be useful against hawks and foxes. The German occupiers had confiscated most handguns and any modern weapons, but had let the French keep their hunting shotguns. The antique rifles must not have been worth the Germans' attention.

The would-be defenders' designated spokesman was named Pierre, who was also the mayor. This was the same man who had helped to rescue Frankie. He was tall and gaunt, with dark, earnest eyes sunken into his head. In fact, he bore a vague resemblance to Abraham Lincoln. His hands gripping the battered shotgun looked large and strong. In his prime ten or twenty years ago, he must have been a formidable fellow. He wore a tweed cap and a worn corduroy coat. He didn't speak any English, but Frenchie helped translate.

"He says they can help us fight," Frenchie explained.

Ordinarily, Allied forces turned down such volunteers because they lacked training or weapons. If anything, the French volunteers tended to get in the way. The exception would be offers of help from the local Resistance, members of whom had shown themselves to be vicious fighters. General Tolliver, however, was in a difficult position. There were a lot more Germans about to come at them, and not many defenders.

"All right," he said, reluctantly. "Sergeant, get these men into position."

As they marched closer to Germany, Allied forces had been warned about divided loyalties in the towns and countryside. This did not seem to be the case in Ville sur Moselle. The sight of Pierre and the other men joining the fight seemed to galvanize the townspeople. Slowly, they emerged from their houses and cellars, bearing gifts that all soldiers appreciated: food and liquor. They pressed everything from sausages to fresh bread to pies on the soldiers, along with bottles of wine and brandy.

“Thanks for the bread,” Cole said to an older villager, pronouncing the word as if it had two syllables.

Vaccaro shook his head. “It’s bread, not bray-ed, you dumb hillbilly.”

“Be nice or I ain’t gonna share.”

Judging by the fact that the food was simple and sparse, the occupation must have been hard on the townspeople. Still, their generosity was welcome and meant that the soldiers would get some relief from their K rations.

Margot’s brother, Marcus, came running up to Cole, clutching the empty rifle cartridges in his hand. His friend, Simon, tagged along. The boy tried to give the brass casings to Cole, who only grinned and said, "You hang onto those, kid."

Smiling, the boy put them in his pockets and ran off. Cole shook his head. Back when he was a young 'un, he used to do the same thing with his pa's shells. He used to put them under his thin pillow at night because he liked the smell of the gunpowder.

"Get yourselves something to eat," the general announced, accepting some hard-boiled eggs himself. "Then we need to make this village Kraut-proof."

Given the hills surrounding the town, the Germans had just one way to come at Ville sur Moselle, which was to attack straight up the main street in order to reach the bridge.

General Tolliver wasted no time preparing for the next German attack. His plan was to barricade the street. A couple of old wagons and carts were produced to anchor the barricade. Working in twos and threes while the lookouts kept watch, the soldiers added whatever they could pick up and carry to the barricade. Crates, an old door, a section of wrought iron fence, and a wooden bench were soon wedged among the wagons. The soldiers began to carry yet more items out of the houses: upholstered chairs and sofas, mattresses, kitchen tables. Some of the French housewives protested, but Pierre put a stop to that with a few words here and there, some of them spoken sharply.

"What's he saying?" Vaccaro asked Frenchie.

"He told them to stop complaining and start carrying out their furniture, unless they wanted the Nazis back."

"Can't argue with that."

Apparently, Pierre was a man of some authority in town because several of the people did, in fact, begin to help the soldiers by bringing out whatever they could find by way of building materials.

The barricade grew quickly as a result. The old crates and lumber were interspersed here and there with the bright purple upholstery of a sofa or a velvet-covered armchair. None of it would stop a panzer for a second, should one appear, but the barricade would slow down troops advancing on foot.

Cole and Vaccaro joined in. They were lugging an enormous workbench with another soldier when his head suddenly exploded in a spray of blood and brains. The gruesome sight was quickly followed by the distant crack of a rifle. Some of the townspeople screamed and ran for shelter. He and Vaccaro dropped the workbench and dove for cover.

The German sniper that Cole had feared earlier was now at work.