“Then let us follow them. This is taking longer than I thought. The sooner that we catch up to the traitor, the sooner that we can get back.”
But even with the relative speed offered by the Kübelwagen, it became evident that their quarry had more of a head start than they had realized.
It was full dark by the time they reached the end of the lane and the stone pillars leading to the château. The footprints clearly led to the grand old house. The temperature had dropped considerably, causing the snow to crunch under their tires.
“They must have taken shelter for the night in that house,” Messner said.
“Better stop the engine,” Dietzel said. “The noise will give us away.”
Messner studied the château but could see no lights or any sign that it was occupied. “Maybe they kept going,” he said.
Dietzel slipped away to see what he could find out from the tracks. In the quiet of the woods, the only sound was the ticking from the cooling engine. The Jaeger returned a few minutes later, arriving as quietly as he had gone.
“Their tracks lead right to the side door,” Dietzel reported back from his scouting. “I think they are inside, but they are being careful to stay hidden. I don’t see any lights.”
Messner was losing some of his confidence that they now had their quarry trapped, realizing that the solid walls of the château made the old stone house into a sturdy fortress. “Should we rush it?” he wondered.
“I think we should wait for daylight,” Dietzel said. His doubtful expression made it clear that he must have been thinking the same thing as the Hauptmann. “They could be a tough nut to crack if we rush them in the dark. However, they don’t know we are here. We can take them by surprise and shoot them when they come out in the morning.”
“It will be a cold night for us.”
“Not as cold as the grave, Herr Hauptmann,” Dietzel pointed out.
Hauptmann Messner could not argue with that. They would wait until morning to catch their quarry unawares as they left the château.
Slogging along the slush-and-snow-covered road, Brock worried that their journey was starting to feel like a wild-goose chase because they hadn’t yet caught up to the German prisoner or his escorts. Brock was surprised that they hadn’t made better progress.
So far they had lucked out and not run into any other Krauts. They hadn’t run into any Americans either. The general lack of anyone else around was starting to feel spooky.
But not for long. They soon encountered the tank and infantry squad coming from the other direction. This was the same lone Sherman tank that Messner and the Germans had hidden from in the woods, the lone survivor of the fight that had sent Cole and his group running for cover.
Again, the hits that the Sherman tank had taken were evident in its log-covered sides that showed the scarred fresh wood. Thick steel armor was preferred, but the makeshift armor provided by the logs had probably saved the tank on more than one occasion by deflecting the full force of a German shell.
“Let’s ask these guys if they’ve seen that escort party,” Brock said. “At least then we’ll know that we’re still headed in the right direction.”
“You think they’ll stop for us?” Boot asked. “They look like they’re hell-bent on getting to Bastogne.”
Boot needn’t have worried about the tank not stopping for them. When the tank commander spotted them, he steered the Sherman closer to the middle of the road to block their path. The tank stopped short of pointing its gun at them, but the Sherman’s machine gun was now trained on them.
Behind the tank, the infantry squad fanned out, keeping their weapons trained on Brock and his companions.
The engine turned off, leaving an ominous silence in the winter woods. Brock felt his insides give a little flip. He didn’t like the looks of this at all.
“What gives?” he shouted, his voice sounding too loud in the sudden silence. “You fellas are pointing those guns at the wrong guys.”
“Oh yeah, how can we be so sure of that?” the lieutenant in the tank hatch replied. “We hear there are German commandos dressed as our guys all over the place. They speak English. Three men headed the wrong way from Bastogne doesn’t seem right to me.”
Normally, as a battle-hardened enlisted man, Brock felt dismissive toward lieutenants, especially ones who rode around in tanks. However, this lieutenant seemed no-nonsense, like maybe he had been promoted up through the ranks. It didn’t help that not only was Corporal Brock outranked, but he was seriously outgunned.
“We’re supposed to link up with a squad escorting a German POW,” Brock said, deciding that he would tell only half the story. “You haven’t seen anybody like that, have you?”
