Gifford was about average height but solidly built, his cheeks covered in reddish-brown stubble. He looked to be in his early thirties. He had two greenish eyes, one a slightly different color than the other. Both eyes burned with intensity as they first swept over Vaccaro and dismissed him, then settled on Cole.
“So you’re the sniper who is gonna solve our problem,” he said, not sounding particularly convinced.
“I reckon.”
Gifford shook his head like he’d just bitten into a lemon. “You reckon? From the sounds of it, you’re a goddamn hillbilly. It just figures. Everybody in this army thinks you have to be a hillbilly to be a good shot.”
Vaccaro spoke up. “Hey, take my word for it, this fella can shoot.”
“If you say so,” Gifford said. Keeping his eyes on Cole, he dipped his chin and spoke over his shoulder to the men behind him. “What do you think, fellas? Twenty bucks says this peckerwood gets himself shot by the end of the day.”
One of the GIs snorted. “Nobody is gonna bet against that, Sarge.”
Gifford turned his attention back to Cole. “The thing is, we don’t need any help to get this sniper.”
Cole shrugged. “Fine by me. Sounds like you can handle it.”
He started to turn away.
“Hold on. Where the hell do you think you’re going, huh? The captain gave an order, and we’re gonna make sure it’s carried out. Now, follow me, and when I say to, keep your head down.”
Following the prickly sergeant, they headed for the northeastern quadrant. The town itself soon gave way to more widespread buildings and a few stone walls that enclosed small fields. In the distance stood a church, the tall steeple providing an ideal vantage point for a sniper. Surrounding the church was more open ground broken up by stone walls and some barns or cowsheds. The forest lay beyond, showing itself as a brooding gray presence.
“This would be a good time to keep your heads down,” the sergeant said as they entered the backyards of small houses on the outskirts of town. “He’ll have seen us by now if he’s looking.”
“I reckon he’s looking,” Cole said, keeping low. “Wouldn’t be much of a sniper if he wasn’t.”
Right away Cole was impressed by the sniper’s obvious skill in being able to reach the steeple without being seen. According to the sergeant, the sniper was also a tremendous shot.
“The son of a bitch never misses,” the sergeant said. Having taken Cole’s measure, he had changed his tune a bit and seemed friendlier. “He’s already shot a few of our guys. This is personal. Think you can get him?”
Cole looked toward the church steeple in the distance. “I’ll get him. I need to get closer to him, which means going out there in no-man’s-land. Make sure your boys don’t shoot me.”
“I’ll pass the word. Listen, when you come back in, the company password is ‘black strap.’ The countersign is ‘molasses.’”
The sergeant left them alone, scurrying back through the alleys and along stone walls to avoid falling under the sniper’s sights. For all his talk, he seemed glad to be getting out of there.
Vaccaro was already studying the church steeple through binoculars. “Not so bad,” he said. “What would you say, three hundred yards?”
Cole studied the distance and gave a slow nod. “Give or take.”
“I know you weren’t blowing smoke just now when you said you could get him. But, you know,
“Where would the fun be in that? No, I’m gonna get him. We’re gonna get him. You and me, city boy.”
“I was afraid you’d say that.”
“I can thread the needle, all right. But you’re right that I need to see the needle in the first place. Hand me those binoculars a minute.”
Vaccaro carried Zeiss field glasses, taken off a deceased German officer. The optics were superior to any US Army — issued binoculars. Back home, they would have cost the average working man at least a month’s salary.
Cole studied the church steeple through the binoculars, looking for something, anything, that indicated where the sniper was hiding. Like many of the buildings in Europe that they’d come across, the age of the church seemed to be somewhere between old and ancient. Even the oldest buildings back home were nothing compared to structures that dated back centuries.
The square tower offered a cold facade, topped with a slate roof. At the very top, beneath the roof, were several long slits. They were intended to let out the sound of the church bell used to summon worshippers, or perhaps to warn of danger, but the openings also happened to make perfect firing slits for the hidden sniper.
The only real sign of age and decay exhibited by the church was that the cross at the top of the steeple was weathered and missing pieces, perhaps thanks to the recent bombardments, with cracks running through it from years of exposure to the elements. One more strong windstorm and it looked as if the damn thing might blow down.
