Part 10 (1/2)

”By whom?”

There was another perceptible hesitation.

”Christ, I really hate to tell you,” he said. ”I don't want you playing games with her.”

”I think I have to know,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said.

”f.u.c.k you,” Fulmar said. ”You have to know what I G.o.dd.a.m.n well decide to tell you.”

Von Heurten-Mitnitz stiffened. He was not used to being talked to like that. But he kept control of himself.

”Someone you knew when you were at Marburg?” he asked reasonably. And then, when Fulmar remained silent, he added, ”I don't want to sound melodramatic, but I will be here when you are safe in England.”

”Tell him, Eric,” the Countess said. ”As you pointed out, we are not in a delicate business.”

”I don't want you trying to use her, you understand me? Her, or her father.”

”Who recognized you?” von Heurten-Mitnitz persisted gently.

”Elizabeth von Handleman-Bitburg,” Fulmar said.

Von Heurten-Mitnitz's eyebrows went up. The Countess looked at him with a question in her eyes.

”Generaloberst von Handleman-Bitburg's daughter?” von Heurten-Mitnitz asked.

Fulmar nodded.

”Possibly it's meaningless,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said. ”She met a young Obersturmfuhrer whom she had once known. Was there any reason you think she was suspicious? ”

”Her father had told her that I was seen in Morocco in an American uniform,” Fulmar said. ”She knew.”

”And what do you think she will tell her father?” von Heurten-Mitnitz asked.

”Nothing,” Fulmar said. ”She won't tell him a thing.”

”I wish I shared your confidence,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said.

”The only reason I'm telling you this,” Fulmar said, ”is because I don't want you to protect your a.s.s by taking her out.”

”Telling me what?”

”We spent the night together,” Fulmar said. ”Okay? Get the picture?”

”Yes, I think I do,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said.

”If anything happens to her,” Fulmar said. ”I will . . .”

”Don't be childish,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said.

”I was about to say something childish,” Fulmar said. ”Like I will come back here and kill you myself. But I won't have to do that. All I'll have to do is make sure the Sicherheitsdienst finds out about you.”

”My G.o.d!” von Heurten-Mitnitz said.

”I made a mistake in telling you,” Fulmar said.

”No, you didn't, Eric,” the Countess said. She walked to von Heurten-Mitnitz and put her arm in his, then stood on her tiptoes and kissed his cheek. ”Helmut understands that even in the midst of this insanity, people fall in love.”

Fulmar looked through them, then chuckled.

”Well, I'll be G.o.dd.a.m.ned,” he said. ”The Merry Widow in the flesh. ”

IV.

1.

THE MAYLAYBALAY-KIBAWE HIGHWAY ISLAND OF MINDANAO COMMONWEALTH OF THE PHILIPPINES 4 FEBRUARY 1943.

The mountainous center of the island of Mindanao is virtually inaccessible by motor vehicle, and accessible by foot only with great difficulty. It was for that reason that Brigadier General Wendell Fertig Commanding, U.S. Forces in the Philippines, had elected to place his headquarters and the bulk of his force in the mountains: the j.a.ps had a h.e.l.l of a hard time getting in there, and when they tried it, he was always notified in plenty of time to plan his defensive strategy.

Almost without exception, that strategy was to evacuate his headquarters and, from positions in the mountainous jungle nearby, observe how close the j.a.panese had come to finding it.

So far they had failed, although on occasion they had come across outposts or villages where he had stationed small detachments of his guerrilla force. That was, he knew, a somewhat grandiose manner of describing the six, or eight, or a dozen armed men living in those villages and earning their support from the villagers by working in the fields.

When the j.a.panese had proof (or strongly suspected) that a village was harboring guerrillas, they burned it to the ground. They would have shot the village leaders, had they caught them, but the villagers-men, women, and children, as well as the guerrillas-invariably found safety in the surrounding jungle when j.a.panese appeared.

Pour l'encouragement de les autres, the elders of several villages that had not been housing guerrillas had been shot, and their villages burned down by the j.a.panese. The result of this had been to increase the number of natives willing to support U.S. forces in the Philippines. The remaining men would have been happy to enlist in USFIP, but Fertig had neither food to feed them nor arms with which to equip them. the elders of several villages that had not been housing guerrillas had been shot, and their villages burned down by the j.a.panese. The result of this had been to increase the number of natives willing to support U.S. forces in the Philippines. The remaining men would have been happy to enlist in USFIP, but Fertig had neither food to feed them nor arms with which to equip them.

The j.a.panese had quickly learned, too, that their expeditions into the mountains were very expensive-and did little good. They were almost always engaged by Fertig's guerrillas. Not in pitched battles, not even in situations that could be considered an armed engagement. Although Fertig liked to think that he was doing to the j.a.panese what the Minutemen had done to the English on their way back from Concord-causing them serious harm by attacking their formations with accurate rifle fire from the surrounding forests-all he was really able to do was hara.s.s the j.a.panese patrols.

When it was absolutely safe to do so-in the sense that there was a sure escape route into the impenetrable jungle-and when there was an absolutely sure target, two or three or half a dozen shots would ring out from the jungle, and one or two or three sweating j.a.panese soldiers marching along a trail would be killed or wounded.

With some exceptions-there were some guerrillas who had as much as one hundred rounds of ammunition, which they were unwilling to share), most of Fertig's troops had no more than twenty-five rounds of ammunition for their Model 1917 Enfield .30-06-caliber rifles, or their Arisaka 7.7mm-caliber captured j.a.panese rifles, or their Winchester or Savage hunting rifles, or their Browning and Remington shotguns.

Fertig's guerrillas were not equipped to engage j.a.panese forces in battle.

Before long, the j.a.panese, who were not fools, had for all practical purposes abandoned their expeditions into the mountains. Fertig wasn't posing any bona fide military threat to their occupation. He was contained. And they could live with him until such time as the Filipinos came to understand that it was in their best interest to cooperate with the j.a.panese, to enter willingly into the j.a.panese Greater Co-Prosperity Sphere. At that point, they would stop feeding and supporting Fertig's guerrillas, and the threat would be over.

The j.a.panese had turned to winning the hearts and minds of the people. Propaganda detachments, protected by company-size detachments of riflemen, began to visit villages on the periphery of Fertig's mountainous jungle area of operations. The propaganda detachments carried with them 16mm motion picture projectors and generators and gifts of food and candy. They would set up a screen and show Charlie Chaplin and Bugs Bunny motion pictures, along with newsreels of the fall of Singapore, and of Lieutenant General Jonathan Wainwright surrendering to General Homma, and of long lines of American soldiers- hands in the air in surrender-entering j.a.panese captivity.

And then there would be a speech, or speeches, most often by Filipinos already convinced that the future of the Philippine people lay with their j.a.panese brothers. The speeches would invariably contain sarcastic references to General Fertig and his so-called U.S. forces in the Philippines.

Where were they? If they hadn't already died of starvation, hiding out like rats in the jungle, why weren't they attacking the j.a.panese?