Chapter 16 - The Officer With No Country
The message came on Christmas Eve.
A captured German courier had carried orders signed with one of Major Victor Rusk’s known aliases.
The location was an abandoned monastery twelve miles behind the front.
Captain Warren wanted a reconnaissance team.
Hale objected.
“You want Carter because Rusk knows him.”
“I want Carter because Carter can observe without being seen.”
“He’s also on Rusk’s death list.”
“So am I.”
Eli listened to them argue.
Finally he said, “I’ll go.”
Jack immediately answered, “Then I go.”
Frank said, “Same.”
Tommy raised a hand.
“Unfortunately, I’ve become attached to these idiots.”
Hale swore softly.
Warren looked at all four.
“This is reconnaissance. You do not enter the monastery. You do not attempt capture. You observe and return.”
Jack said, “You really don’t know us very well.”
Warren pointed at him.
“That was an order, Mason.”
Jack shut up.
They moved after midnight.
Snow made every sound dangerous.
Eli and Tommy led.
Jack and Frank followed.
The monastery appeared near dawn, stone walls dark against the white hillside.
German vehicles stood beneath trees.
Eli counted twelve soldiers.
Then he saw prisoners.
Americans.
Five of them.
Hands bound.
One could barely stand.
Rusk emerged from the monastery wearing a German winter coat over an American uniform.
Jack whispered, “There.”
Eli’s jaw tightened.
Even at distance, the silver eagle ring was visible when Rusk raised his hand.
A German officer spoke to him.
Rusk answered in fluent enough German to be understood.
Tommy whispered, “How long has he been doing this?”
“Too long.”
Then Rusk walked to the prisoners.
One American spat at his boots.
Rusk punched him.
The prisoner fell.
Rusk kicked him repeatedly in the ribs and stomach until two German soldiers pulled him back—not out of mercy, Eli realized, but because they still wanted the prisoner conscious.
Jack trembled with rage.
Eli gripped his sleeve.
“Stay.”
Rusk dragged the prisoner upright.
“You tell me where your artillery is,” he said in English, “and your friends live.”
The prisoner laughed through blood.
“You’re wearing the wrong coat, Major.”
Rusk struck him again.
“Coordinates.”
“Go to hell.”
Rusk drew his pistol.
Eli felt Jack move.
He pulled him down harder.
The shot echoed across the snow.
The prisoner collapsed.
Tommy closed his eyes.
Frank whispered, “We can’t leave them.”
Eli stared at the remaining four.
Their orders were clear.
Observe.
Return.
If they attacked twelve Germans, they might all die.
If they left, more prisoners could be executed.
Samuel’s voice came to Eli from years ago.
Getting the man beside you home.
He made a decision.
“Tommy, find the radio antenna.”
Tommy looked at him.
“We’re not supposed—”
“I know.”
They found the wire running to a small communications hut.
Eli studied the terrain.
Fuel barrels near a truck.
Guard tower.
Two sentries on the east wall.
A ravine behind the monastery.
He turned to Frank.
“How much BAR ammunition?”
“Enough to make poor decisions.”
“Good.”
Jack smiled grimly.
“Now you’re speaking my language.”
Eli laid out the plan.
Not rescue.
Not yet.
Confusion.
Frank would fire on the fuel barrels only if German troops concentrated near the courtyard.
Tommy would cut the field telephone line.
Jack would reach the ravine and create noise from the rear.
Eli would cover the prisoners.
“And then?” Jack asked.
“We improvise.”
“That’s the plan?”
“That’s the honest part.”
They separated.
Eli crawled to a rocky ridge.
Through the German scope, he watched Rusk interrogate another prisoner.
“Your division is collapsing,” Rusk said.
The soldier answered, “Then why do you need my coordinates?”
Rusk smiled.
He raised his pistol.
Eli’s finger tightened on the trigger.
A sniper shot at that range would expose everything.
Wait.
Rusk placed the pistol against the man’s forehead.
Eli had no more time.
He fired.
The pistol snapped from Rusk’s hand.
Rusk spun.
“SNIPER!”
Frank opened fire.
Fuel spilled but did not ignite.
Jack threw grenades into empty snow behind the monastery.
German soldiers turned toward the false attack.
Tommy cut the telephone line.
The prisoners dropped flat.
Eli fired again.
A guard tower went silent.
Rusk crawled behind a stone trough.
His eyes searched the ridge.
For one instant Eli saw his face through the scope.
Rusk smiled.
Then he shouted in English.
“Carter!”
Eli froze.
“You always did need an audience!”
Jack heard it from the ravine.
He shouted back.
“He brought one!”
Gunfire erupted from three directions.
The rescue became a battle.
Two prisoners crawled toward the wall.
Frank covered them.
Tommy ran to cut their restraints.
Eli shifted position after every two shots.
The German soldiers began firing at every patch of snow.
Then Eli heard a sound behind him.
A twig breaking.
He turned.
A German soldier stood ten feet away.
Rifle raised.
Before either man fired, a shot came from the side.
The German fell.
Jack appeared between trees.
“You’re welcome.”
Eli stared.
“You abandoned your position.”
“Again, you really need new material.”
They moved downhill.
The surviving prisoners escaped through the ravine.
Frank and Tommy followed.
Rusk was nowhere visible.
Then a jeep engine roared behind the monastery.
Eli saw it break from the trees.
Rusk in the passenger seat.
Jack raised his rifle.
“Take him!”
Eli looked through the scope.
Rusk’s head appeared for half a second.
The shot was possible.
Then a wounded American prisoner stumbled into the sight picture.
Eli lowered the rifle.
Jack shouted, “Why didn’t you shoot?”
“Couldn’t.”
Rusk’s jeep vanished.
Jack stared after it.
Then at the wounded man Eli had refused to risk.
His anger disappeared.
“Right.”
The prisoner looked at Eli.
“Who are you?”
Jack answered before he could.
“The guy who gets people home.”
The rescued prisoners later told Warren that the man Rusk had executed was Lieutenant Paul Henley of Iowa.
Married.
One daughter.
He had refused to reveal an artillery position because more than a hundred American soldiers were gathered there.
Jack heard the story in silence.
Then he asked, “Did his daughter know?”
“Not yet,” Warren said.
Jack looked at Eli.
Another name.
Eli opened his notebook.
Paul Henley.
He wrote beneath it:
Refused coordinates. Saved men he could not see.
Tommy watched.
“You’re going to need a bigger book.”
Eli closed it.
“That’s not something to be proud of.”
“No.”
Warren looked at the four of them.
“You understand why we keep chasing Rusk now?”
Eli shook his head.
“We’re not chasing him because Henley died.”
Warren frowned.
“Then why?”
“So nobody else has to.”
That distinction stayed with Jack.
Revenge looked backward.
May you like
Duty looked forward.
For a man who had spent most of his life reacting to old pain, it was a new direction.
