Scorched Earth (24 page)

‘Damn,’ Henderson said. ‘Did she say what kind of tank?’

Luc shook his head.

‘OK. Marc, Luc—’

Henderson got interrupted by a second tank blast. They were too far up the hill to have a view of the bridge or the municipal building, but there was the sound of masonry shattering and a new dust cloud gave an opportunity to move without being seen.

‘Marc, Luc – find sniper positions and see what you can pick off,’ Henderson said, as they all scrambled into the lobby of an apartment building. ‘The rest of us can keep moving downhill, but stay out of sight.’

A German speaker announcement wafted through the dust. ‘Surrender immediately or we shall storm the building.’

Still in his pyjama bottoms, Marc took a sniper rifle and a bag of ammunition clips off Joel.

‘I’m going for the balconies where the old grannies sit watching the kids,’ Luc said.

Marc thought Luc’s idea was smart, but didn’t tell him so. He had to squint as he charged after Luc into the white dust cloud. As they sprinted 60 metres, a couple of feeble revolver shots rang out from inside the municipal building. The pair went through the rear entrance of the last apartment block in their street. They charged up to the second floor and pounded on an apartment door.

It got answered by one of the elderly women who usually sat out watching the little kids play.

‘We need your balcony,’ Luc said brusquely.

The woman didn’t look keen, so Luc forced the door and bundled her out of the way. She made a kind of cackling sound as she fell backwards and slid down the wall.

‘Sorry,’ Marc said as he stepped over her legs and followed Luc.

Dust blew into a sunny living-room as Luc opened the balcony doors. The old woman had found her feet and started shouting about it being her private home and them having no right to charge in.

‘Shut up or I’ll punch you out,’ Luc said, getting his usual kick out of being nasty.

Marc gave the old girl a guilty smile. ‘Just go into the back room. Close the door and try to stay calm.’

The balcony gave a superb view of the municipal building, the riverbank and the bridge. For all his threats, the German commander hadn’t given the order to storm the building because it would involve an open approach across the broad cobbled area that local boys used as a football pitch.

Marc and Luc crept on to the balcony as the tank launched another shell at the building. A couple of 88-mm shells from a heavy tank like a Tiger would have flattened the building. But this was an outdated Panzer, equipped with a much less powerful 20-mm cannon.

The situation looked like a classic stand-off. The Germans had jumped out of their truck and crouched securely behind the low wall running the length of the bridge. The Maquis were all holed up inside the municipal building and if they had any sense they’d have moved to rooms at the rear so they wouldn’t get hit by the tank blasts.

Marc looked at Luc. ‘Any bright ideas?’

‘The Germans might advance using the tank as cover,’ Luc said. ‘Charging in with the truck could be risky, but if they came in at speed they’d only be exposed for a few seconds. Or, they could wait for a heavier tank to arrive and pound the whole place to rubble.’

‘Have they got heavy tanks in the city?’ Marc asked as Luc peered through the scope on his sniper rifle. ‘I’ve never seen one if they have.’

‘Aye, aye!’ Luc said excitedly.

‘What?’ Marc asked.

‘From this height we can get a clear shot through the floor of the truck.’

Marc looked confused and Luc tutted impatiently.

‘What’s below the floor of a truck, just behind the cab?’ Luc asked.

‘Oh,’ Marc said, feeling dumb as he worked it out. ‘We could shoot through the floor and hit the fuel tank.’

Luc nodded. ‘With any luck the Germans will panic when the truck goes bang and we can pick a few off as they scramble away.’

‘Henderson and the others should be in position by now,’ Marc said. ‘You wanna take the shot?’

‘You’re Mr Bull’s-eye,’ Luc said.

It was awkward firing between iron railings from the balcony floor, but standing and taking a shot from the top of the railing would make it too easy for the Germans to spot their position and shoot back. Luc glanced inside to make sure that the elderly woman wasn’t up to anything, as Marc spread out on his belly and took aim.

‘Range three hundred and twenty metres,’ Marc told himself quietly, taking deep breaths to calm his thumping heart. ‘Strong breeze coming off the river from my right.’

The fuel tank was a large target. On a good day Marc could hit a walnut from this range. But the shot was complicated by having to estimate the position of the unseen fuel tank, and there was no way to predict the bullet’s trajectory after it punched through the truck’s canvas awning before hitting the floor.

‘Here’s goes nothing,’ Marc said, as Luc took a slightly higher firing position, ready to blow off any German heads that bobbed up during an explosion.

Marc was about to shoot when he was startled by the tank firing another shell towards the municipal building. The two previous shells had flown high with the aim of punching holes in masonry and frightening the men inside. This one went in a much lower arc, turning the building’s double front doors to splinters, smashing up the staircase inside and creating a shockwave that blew a dozen windows.

‘Looks like they’re preparing to attack,’ Luc said.

‘Shall I shoot now, or wait until they move?’

Luc was about to say
wait
when Marc saw something bob up above the line of the bridge’s side wall. The soldier responsible was trying to keep his head down, as a colleague strapped on a large backpack that comprised two metal cylinders and a long hose.

‘Flamethrower,’ Marc said.

He made a tiny adjustment to his aim and pulled the trigger as the cylinders started going out of view.

The bullet caught the top of a cylinder, knocking its wearer backwards. Nothing happened for a second, but as Marc zeroed back in on the truck’s fuel tank there was a flash of blue flame. The man in the backpack was rolling around on fire and as men ran in to save him, Luc took aim at their chests.

Marc re-aimed his original shot, going for the truck’s fuel tank. A spark ignited the fuel and the canvas awning, forcing more Germans to break cover as they scrambled back down the bridge. The German commander was shouting orders for his men to back off, while simultaneously ordering the tank to come forward and give them cover.

The men crouching on the bridge hadn’t seen where Marc and Luc’s shots came from, but the tank crew had a clear view. They swung their cannon towards the balcony as the tank advanced across the bridge.

‘Time to leave!’ Marc yelled, as he scrambled inside with Luc pushing against his back.

They dived for cover as the 20-mm cannon began pounding the balcony. Wood and glass flew across the old woman’s living-room as rounds tore holes through thin plaster walls and opened a view into the neighbouring apartment.

‘Little bastards!’ the old woman screamed, waving a fist as she leaned out of her bedroom door. ‘I’ve lived here in peace for thirty years.’

As Marc and Luc charged out of the apartment and raced upstairs to find a different balcony to shoot from, Henderson’s ground-level team made the most of the chaos they’d created.

The tank was now moving too fast to continue shooting at the balcony. There was a crash of glass and metal as it smashed the burning truck out of the way. When it broke on to the open cobbles, the tank slowed to a brisk walking pace, with half a dozen soldiers hiding behind its flank. The gunner zeroed in on the municipal building and began firing shells at the French flag.

The Germans assumed they were fighting inexperienced Maquis and perhaps a few locals who’d taken a lucky shot from the balcony. But Henderson had anticipated the possibility of the tank being used as a shield. He’d sent Sam and Joel on a flanking manoeuvre, jumping walls and crossing flat roofs to emerge on the opposite side of the tank.

The brothers waited until the Germans were within 10 metres, then jumped up behind a wall and opened fire with STEN machine guns. These weren’t accurate weapons, but from this range they didn’t need to be.

As the tank’s entourage got ripped apart, 20-mm shells continued pounding the municipal building and a section of its façade turned into a waterfall of rubble.

Back in the apartment building, Marc and Luc reached the fourth floor, where a woman with a baby welcomed them into her apartment.

‘I watched what you just did,’ she told them admiringly, as she grabbed her baby and ran towards a neighbour’s apartment across the hallway. ‘The Germans killed the father of my child and my landlord’s a shit, so let them have it.’

But by the time Marc and Luc reached the young woman’s balcony there was little to do but spectate. Sam and Joel had advanced and taken out a couple of Germans who’d stayed on the bridge. The only surviving German infantryman was retreating to the other side of the river as the tank juddered up the municipal building’s steps and smashed into the front entrance.

Ironically, it was masonry weakened by the tank’s own shells that thundered down and beached it. The tank’s commander threw the tracks into reverse, but the stairs had left the Panzer at an awkward angle and the tracks couldn’t get any purchase.

With no Germans in shooting range, PT sprinted towards the tank and squished a hunk of plastic explosive with a thirty-second detonator on the underside of the running board above the tracks.

Inside, the tank commander rocked the tank backwards and forwards, as Henderson and several others shouted at the Maquis, telling them to jump out of the municipal building’s back windows before the charge went off.

Several Maquis were trapped on the second floor and threw themselves from windows into a big tree at the building’s rear. Seconds before the plastic exploded, the tank commander finally found some grip. As he reversed across the cobbles towards the bridge, another huge section of the municipal building’s façade collapsed, throwing up choking white dust.

It was tough to breathe and impossible to keep eyes open. Nobody on the ground saw the explosion at the rear of the tank, but four floors up Marc and Luc got a grandstand view. The orange blast lifted the Panzer’s rear off the ground and shattered its right track. The armour hadn’t been penetrated, but the shockwave from the blast killed the tank’s engine and mangled the exhaust system.

The three-man crew was deafened and found their cramped quarters filling rapidly with exhaust fumes. There were two clanks as one desperate German opened the turret flap and another released an emergency escape hatch in the floor.

‘Please!’ the German shouted as he stood up, making a surrender gesture.

Luc caught the German’s bald sweaty head in his scope and took him out with a headshot.

‘He was surrendering,’ Marc blurted.

Luc gave an evil laugh. ‘We can barely feed ourselves, and in case you didn’t get the memo: the resistance ain’t got any prisons.’

Down at ground level the two Germans who’d crawled out through the escape hatch had even less luck as newly confident Maquis closed in and dished out merciless beatings. It wasn’t clear if the Germans were dead or just unconscious as the jeering lads dragged them up to the riverbank and flopped their bodies over a wall into the Seine.

As the dust continued to swirl, nervous locals came down from their hilly streets to inspect the tank and the remains of the municipal building. Henderson, Joel, Sam, PT and Edith tried making a discreet exit, but their actions hadn’t gone unnoticed and their weapons made them obvious.

‘Hey,’ one of the Maquis lads shouted. ‘Who are you?’

Henderson carried on walking, but several Maquis kept up the chase and he eventually stopped and turned to face five scruffy lads.

‘Name’s Charles.’

‘You have excellent weapons, Charles,’ one of the awestruck young men noted. ‘Your team saved our lives
and
destroyed a tank!’

‘Was anybody hurt?’ Henderson asked.

‘A man named Dominic. He was afraid to jump and got buried in the collapse.’

As the Maquis spoke, Marc and Luc came out of the apartment block with their sniper rifles. They found themselves with their own crowd of admiring teenage girls. Marc was too in love with Jae to care, but Luc was awkward around girls and enjoyed being the centre of attention.

As Henderson turned to walk away, the young Maquis pulled off his FFI armband and thrust it at Henderson.

‘We need a leader to fight the Germans.’

‘What’s your name?’ Henderson asked.

‘Jean-Claude,’ the young man answered.

Henderson smiled wryly. ‘Jean-Claude, you need to go home to your family. Have a shave and a bath. Try and find a decent meal and pray that the Allies get here before the German reinforcements.’

Jean-Claude looked crushed. ‘We want to make a difference.’

For all their naivety, Henderson couldn’t help admiring the balls of young men who wanted to take on the German army with rusty revolvers and a few rounds of ammunition.

‘Well,’ Henderson said, after a second’s thought, ‘I’m not doing anything else, so I might as well do what I can to stop you boys getting yourselves killed.’

‘You’re all dusty,’ Paul said, as PT led the gang back into the apartment. ‘What’s going on?’

Marc cracked up laughing and shook his head as he put the sniper rifle down on the couch and moved into the kitchen to wash his face. ‘You
seriously
slept through all that?’

‘I was knackered after riding to Beauvais and back,’ Paul said defensively, as more dusty bodies came into the apartment. They included Jean-Claude and a couple more scruffy Maquis lads. ‘Mind you, I
was
dreaming that I was in the middle of an air raid.’

‘We didn’t miss you,’ Luc said. ‘You’re shit at everything anyway.’

As Paul jogged back to his room to put trousers on, Henderson stood at the centre of the living-room and looked at Jean-Claude.

‘So, what’s your objective?’

‘To defend our neighbourhood,’ he said proudly.