Hanging on

if all the Germans want to wash up? Is there enough water in this pit to draw baths for a dozen officers?”

“No,” Kelly said. “But we constructed a crawl space under the house so a man could keep check on the water supply and add to it as it's depleted.”

“Who?”

“Lyle Fark's handling that.”

“Good man,” Beame said. He looked around the kitchen, nodding happily. “We're going to fool them. I know we are, sir.”

Beame seemed almost normal. He certainly was not indulging in a lover's daydream right now. “What's happened to you?” Kelly asked. “Did you decide to forget about Nathalie?”

Beame frowned. “No. But I've realized that this hoax isn't going to work unless we put our hearts into it. And if the hoax doesn't work, I'm dead. And if I'm dead, I can't ever have Nathalie.”

“Wonderful!” Major Kelly said, clapping his hands in delight. “Now you're talking sense. You sound just like me.”

“And we will fool the krauts,” Beame said. “I feel it in my bones.”

“I'd feel better if you felt it in your brain,” Kelly said.

“We will fool them.”

“If we can maneuver General Rotenhausen into choosing the rectory for his headquarters,” Kelly said.

“We can do that.”

“And if we can keep the Germans from looking into any of the other buildings except the finished ones — rectory, church, convent foyer, village store… ”

“You'll do it, sir. You'll outfox them.”

Kelly hoped the lieutenant was right. If a German went into one of the other buildings, then the whole scheme would come crashing down around their heads. If the Church's immunity from search and seizure did not protect them tonight, nothing would. And Kelly would never get to put it to Lily Kain on a brass bed. Or on anything at all. “I don't think we have a chance, Beame.”

“I pray we do,” Beame said. “I pray to God you're wrong.”

“Don't pray,” Kelly said, running a finger around his tight clerical collar. “I'm an atheist.”

“This is no time to be an atheist,” Beame said, leaning on the kitchen table.

“It's the best time to be an atheist,” Kelly said. “If you pray, you get the idea someone's listening. When you get the idea someone's listening, you get the idea someone cares. And when you think someone cares, you're soon sure that your prayers will be answered. And when you think God is going to answer your prayers, you get careless. And some kraut blows your head off.”

While Major Kelly was putting on his ecclesiastical suit and while the men were finishing the last few jobs that would make the false community complete, Lieutenant Slade secreted himself in a dense clump of underbrush on the edge of the forest. He settled down to wait for the Panzers. He was not supposed to be in this place at this time. According to Kelly's master plan, he should be spending the night with three other men in one of the false houses. But Slade was not going to play their game anymore. He had plans of his own…

As he lay there, his thoughts drifted and, though he did not want to think about it, went inevitably to the disastrous assassination attempt he had made on Kelly just last night.

Christ, what a mess!

When he had collided with the major, his heart had nearly stopped. Then, in his frenzy to escape unidentified, he had crashed headlong into that oak, sustaining one of the four worst injuries of the night. Turning from the tree, certain that Kelly was reaching for him, he had taken only a few steps when his ankles caught in a ropy vine, and he fell full length into those milkweed plants. Several swollen pods had burst, spewing thousands of sticky seeds all of which were topped by puffs of airy cotton for the wind to catch and blow away. By the time he had stumbled erect, the milkweed fluff had sheathed his head, filling the eye holes in the potato sack, and totally blinding him. Panicked, he slapped at the stuff, not fully aware of what it was. Behind him, Kelly shouted, so Slade ran again. And that damned branch had slammed across his throat and nearly knocked him to his knees. That was the second of the four worst blows. He felt as if he were being throttled: his ears rang; his tongue popped out of his mouth; and his eyes watered like hydrants. That might even have put an end to his flight if Kelly had not shouted again and reminded him of his danger. Pushing away from the tree — well, he had fallen over that treacherous projection of limestone and rolled down that hill into the blackberry bushes, where he had become tangled in thorny vines. He imagined he heard Kelly again, and he pulled loose of the brambles, turned, and ran. He went some distance before he fell into a lovely half-acre pond in a moody sylvan setting… Sodden, shivering, spitting mud and pond scum, he got up and banged his head into an overhanging limestone shelf. That was the third of his four worst injuries of the night. When he eventually crawled out onto the shore, he was so relieved to be done running, so shattered, prostrate, demoralized, and out of gear that he flung himself flat on his back — and cracked his head on a stone as large as a pony. That was the fourth of his four worst injuries. After that, things got better. In two hours, he reckoned his way out of the forest and back to his tent. There, stripping out of his muddy, bloody, shredded clothes, dropping his disheveled burlap mask into one of his boots, he collapsed on his cot and slept like a dead man.

This morning, upon waking, he had destroyed the burlap mask.

He realized now that he had been thinking like a coward. He should not hide behind a mask when he murdered the major. The act should be open and straightforward. Later, when he won his medals, no one would be able to say he had been devious. He was not just a modern Brutus. He was a hero!

Furthermore, Slade now realized that murdering Kelly yesterday would have been strategically foolish and premature. He had no guarantee that the other men in the unit would fall in behind him and fight the krauts once the major was out of the way. Most of these bastards were as cowardly as Kelly was. They would have insisted on finishing the fake community and trying the hoax without Kelly.

A mosquito buzzed around Slade's head. He crushed it against his cheek, and wiped his bloodied hand on a patch of thick grass.

Out in the phony village, someone risked another lantern in order to have light to work by.

Slade leaned back against a tree trunk and thought about his new plan. It was much better than the old plan… He would wait here in the woods until the Germans had settled in for the night. If they didn't see through the hoax at once, he would bide his time until they had posted guards and gone to sleep. Then he would come out of the woods and thoroughly reconnoiter the village. He would learn the position of each sentry, the placement of the main body of troops. He would formulate a plan of attack. And only when that was done would he murder Major Kelly. Then, when the men saw that their situation was desperate, when they had no choice but to strike at the krauts as he ordered — or let him strike alone and less efficiently — they would fall into line. A commando team would slip into the rectory and slit the officers' throats while they slept. Next, they would quietly remove all the sentries. And next… well, anything could happen then. But whatever happened, they would be real heroes.

“We'll fool them,” Beame insisted. He pointed at the sink, pumps, and cabinets. “Who'd ever suspect this was all thrown together in four days?”

Father Picard, nee Major Walter Kelly, shrugged. He walked over to the kitchen hallway. “I'm giving the town one last inspection. Want to come?” He hoped Beame did not want to come, for the lieutenant's optimism made him uneasy.

“Sure,” Beame said.

“It's almost eleven-thirty. The Germans will be here soon. Let's go.”

Beame extinguished the kerosene lamp on the table by the front door.

Outside, they crossed the porch, went down the four steps to the brief lawn, which, much abused during the construction, was the least convincing thing about the rectory. The night was muggy and overcast. The crickets were silent.

The rectory stood on the corner of the bridge road and B Street. B Street was one of the two north-south lanes Danny Dew had made with his D-7 dozer, and it was the farthest east of the two. A Street, sister to B, also paralleled the river but was one block closer to the bridge. The two-lane bridge road had become their main street, and diagonally across it from the rectory stood the enormous, three-story, weathered gray convent. To the west