Opening Moves (The Red Gambit Series) (57 page)

She spoke soft words in her native tongue to the Goumier, but they were not words of comfort, the venom and hate that they carried obvious to all.

Gathering herself for the effort, Stefka Kolybareva grabbed the man’s genitals and twisted, the new pain washing over him in a wave. But it was as nothing compared to the extreme of suffering she visited upon him as she sliced away at his manhood, removing every tangible sign of his gender before pushing open his scarlet thighs and using his rectum as a scabbard for the bloody blade.

Exhausted, and with huge blood loss, the hideously wounded woman toppled on top of her rapist, falling into merciful unconsciousness.

Haefeli’s medic moved forward and the work to save her life began.

No one noticed the single Goumier turn and walk briskly forward, his target, the back of the senior officer; the man who had shot his brother.

The arm raised, knife about to plunge between Lavalle’s shoulder blades, his revenge was imminent.

When the shot rang out all eyes immediately went to the source of the sound. A bloody hand on the battlements sagged, and the automatic pistol fell from its grasp, bouncing on the stone floor of the Lower Courtyard.

Some intuitive sense made Haefeli check his men’s fire, the wounded Russian clearly no longer armed or a threat.

Lavalle turned at the sound of a fall behind him, the headless corpse having dropped like a rag doll onto the dead Russian prisoner’s.

The wound was immense, unusually removing everything from the lower jaw upwards. It was later discovered that the gun’s former commando owner, against orders and all conventions, had converted his bullets into dum-dums with quartered heads. The destructive impact of Rispan’s shot had put the Goumier down immediately and given no possibility of him fulfilling his act of revenge.

More men were sent to tend to the man who had saved Lavalle’s life.

“A close call Mon Colonel, a close call for sure.”

Even the brave and the bold can be shaken by such things, and Lavalle was no exception. He knew how close to death he had just been.

“Yes Albrecht. I was very lucky.”

Composing himself, Lavalle got his thought processes back on track.

Both men’s eyes locked and silent communication took place.

“Yes. We will deal with these bastards later Albi.” Lavalle did not mean the Russians.

“Now, let’s get some information out to our superiors and find out what the hell is going on here eh?”

Nodding, Haefeli summoned a radioman.

“You do it Albrecht. I think I will take some of the men and go on up.”

He indicated the ramp that led up into the Château, the signs of battle evident, blood and bodies leading up into unseen places beyond.

0657 hrs Monday, 6th August 1945, Château du Haut-K
œ
nigsbourg, French Alsace.

Within half an hour, the Château was declared safe, although armed legionnaires patrolled everywhere in case some hitherto unsuspected hiding place disgorged enemy paratroopers.

2e
Compagnie was still off pursuing the Russians, without much success according to the reports filtering back via radio.

A senior French officer, a Brigadier-General no less, had arrived with the rest of the Goumier Tabor, gathered up the survivors and promised to keep the tribesmen employed in the pursuit of the enemy, as well as ensuring investigation and retribution in equal measure, horrified at the excesses his men visited on the Lower Courtyard.

Lavalle had ensured he understood that the matter would not be left dormant for long.

The commando barracks was now a makeshift field hospital, staffed by a group of doctors and nurses on their way back from a detachment to the Red Cross in Geneva. They made no distinction between their charges, each man or woman receiving appropriate treatment regardless of the uniform, although, unsurprisingly, Stefka Kolybareva received more personal attention than most, the women nurses drawn into her personal suffering by loyalty to their gender as well as their natural caring natures.

Lavalle took a close interest in the Russian officer who saved his life, slipping a note into the man’s ID book and briefing the medical team on the man’s actions.

Much as Ramsey had done a few hours beforehand, Lavalle reflected on the Château around him, fresh with signs of battle, and how a battle here would be fought or, at this particular moment, had been fought.

No less a bloodbath than it would have been in the days of boiling oil and broadswords was his sanguine conclusion.

Already the butcher’s bill was revealing itself in all its true horror. The 2e had lost nearly 20% of its men dead and wounded, the 3e twice as many, with more than two-thirds of them killed outright.

The Goumiers had lost forty men, including those who had not fallen in battle.

A groggy commando officer, sporting countless stitches in his head, was unable to confirm his unit strength, but the strangely familiar Général de Brigade seemed to think it was one hundred and twenty before the firing started, making the commandos roughly one hundred casualties, also mainly dead.

Lavalle was trying to make sense of everything when a figure clad in black walked in carefully, a figure he recognised and who also recognised him.

Without intent to drop into cliché, Lavalle extended his hand.

“Herr Knocke, we meet again.”

The slightly groggy German took the Legion officer’s hand warmly.

“Oberst Lavalle. It is good to see you. Excuse me.”

Wretching violently, Knocke spilled the contents of his stomach onto the floor of the Kaisers Hall.

Lavalle swept up some napkins from the table, passing one to Knocke, and covering the sick with the others.

“My apologies Herr Oberst. I took a blow in the stomach and I can’t stop doing it.”

Steering Knocke to a chair, Lavalle acknowledged a new arrival, a man he now recognised as the shadowy intelligence officer he had once seen at Army Headquarters.

“Thank you for your timely arrival Colonel Lavalle. I fear we would have all perished had you and your legionnaires not got here so quickly.”

Lavalle could do no more than shrug at De Walle, as it was undoubtedly true.

Given that the senior officers were now all within the Kaiser’s Hall, it became the focus of activity, the place where reports went and people came in search of information.

Von Arnesen was next in, stopping the regulation distance in front of Knocke before clicking his heels and reporting in the old Prussian style, before he remembered the circumstances and place, and his wounded thigh reminded him he needed to relax his posture.

“Sir, Mademoiselle Valois is now in the hospital. The medics say her wounds are painful but not threatening. She asked me to thank you.”

Knocke inclined his head, acknowledging De Walle obvious joy and encouraging his stalwart to go on with his report.

“DerBo will live, although he may yet lose his arm. The doctors are unclear.”

A nod acknowledged another comrade had been spared.

“Von Hardegen isn’t scratched but he does have concussion.”

A moment’s interruption as a Legionnaire walked in, saluted, and presented De Walle with a report.

“Menzel may not survive. He is next to be operated on; they could tell me no more Sir.”

Knocke made a mental tick in the other column as a white-faced De Walle passed the report to Lavalle.

“Confirmed dead are Matthaus, Olbricht and,” Von Arnesen paused and cleared his throat, “Schmidt.”

The mention of Schmidt’s name brought a look of true sorrow to Knocke’s face. A comrade of many years lost. One of many for sure but Schmidt had been there for what seemed like forever.

“We cannot find Treschow at this time, but it would seem likely that he has perished.”

Lavalle silently sought permission to pass the report onto Knocke, which De Walle granted with a simple nod of his head.

“Herr Knocke, perhaps you would like me to read this to you?”

Haefeli burst into the room, his timing impeccable.

“Have you heard?”

De Walle held out a hand to silence the excited officer, permitting Lavalle to proceed with due gravity.

“We were asking ourselves what this is all about. Now we know.”

Knocke rose to his feet, his need to be professional overcoming his present weakness.

“This is from SHAEF, the Allied headquarters, addressed to all units. What it roughly says is this. At 0530 hrs, units of the Soviet Army, Air Force and Navy launched mass attacks throughout Germany and Austria, and in the Baltic and North Sea’s. We are now at war with the Soviet Union.”

In a Château filled with the freshly slain dead of both sides the information seemed, at first, superfluous. Nevertheless, in the thoughtful silence that followed, all those present realised that here was just the start. Some of the minds present also worked the issue that someone on the other side knew of the colloques and felt them important enough to target in a first wave attack. Two minds present suddenly wrestled with fighting an old adversary once more. The same two minds then wondered how that would be politically accomplished.

Knocke broke the silence. As was his habit, he pulled his tunic into perfect place and moved his hand to pull out his side cap, suddenly remembering that it had been lost.

“I must see to my men. If you will excuse me General De Walle?”

Saluting, Knocke left the room with a firmness of step that he ordered himself to find, suppressing the feelings of nausea that arose when he started to move.

“I meant to ask him what happened to Anne-Marie. Damn it.”

Von Arnesen spoke with the authority and knowledge of a man who was there.

“He saved her life, Herr General. Threw himself on top of her to protect her from a grenade.”

“Go on Monsieur.”

“She got some shrapnel in her shoulder and arm, nothing bad, just superficial I think but I’m no expert Sir.”

“And Herr Knocke? He seems unwounded.”

“These things happen in war as you will know. By rights, he should be dead, but not one fragment struck him, except for a lump taken out of the heel of his boot that is. What you see now is the blast effect. It will pass Herr General.”

Major Marion Crisp strolled in, his uniform in good order, very little outward sign of the recent combat, until he opened his mouth.

His hearing damaged, he spoke as he felt in reasonable volume, whereas he shouted loudly.

The comedy of it was not wasted on the French officers and they took in it good heart. As the only American combat soldier present, Crisp had little by way of official duties, so had taken it upon himself to pick the remaining commandos up and get them back on the horse. His volume and pidgin French had both helped ease tensions with the French troopers, and they were lifted when it became clear that Dubois had survived the attack with nothing more than a messy but relatively minor wound.

Crisp concluded his report and the hall echoed with his words for a few seconds.

De Walle shouted his thanks back and indicated the jugs of water that the surviving orderly had placed there to quench thirsts and drive away the dust of battle.