watch out for your brother, she said. Both were tall orders in Anzio. Dad wrote about lots of overtime waiting for me at Boston PD, and I thought about all the cash I’d have if the army paid time and a half.
I folded the letter and put it in my shirt pocket. As soon as I had Danny squared away, I’d write. I’d tell her he was safe and sound, doing some boring job at headquarters, sleeping inside under blankets. I hoped it would be true.
I relaxed, listening to the familiar chatter of law enforcement. Gripes, complaints, calls coming in, cops going out. It was early, and with the Carabinieri policing the local populace, there wasn’t a lot going on. Until a major burst in to report his jeep stolen. He’d had a . 30-caliber machine gun mounted on it, and he wanted it back, now. Never mind that it was pinched yesterday and he’d been too busy to report it, he wanted action now. A pudgy, red- faced guy, he was with the Quartermaster unit that off-loaded supplies in the harbor, and he cursed and hollered until he got an officer to listen to him. I watched the MPs as they turned away, rolling their eyes at the posturing of a supply officer who needed a machine gun on his jeep. I knew the type, and would bet dollars to doughnuts that he’d have a photograph of himself at the wheel, looking as if he were ready for a raid behind enemy lines. It struck me as strange that even while he was doing important work, in constant danger from German shells and bombs, a guy like him had to throw his weight around and try too hard to impress people.
A couple of MPs donned their white helmets and followed the major out while another radioed units with a description and serial number of the jeep. Good luck with that one, boys, I thought. With a day’s head start, it could be anywhere, and I doubted any MP worth his salt would search front-line units for a stolen jeep, especially for this loudmouthed major.
An hour passed, and then another. I asked the radioman for the tenth time if there were any messages, and he suggested I get some fresh air. He was a corporal, so he said it nicely, but I got the hint. I walked down to the water and watched landing craft ferry in supplies from Liberty Ships anchored in the bay. Antiaircraft guns pointed their barrels at the sky, swiveling back and forth as they searched for targets. A quiet morning at war, almost peaceful, if you didn’t think about all the weapons and rubble about. The water lapping at the rocks along the shore reminded me of Boston, down by the inner harbor. It could be peaceful there, too, until you spotted a dead body bobbing in the swell.
I waited as long as I could, then decided that one of the benefits of being an officer was bothering radiomen whenever you wanted. As I walked up from the seafront, Big Mike pulled up in the staff car, followed by Harding and Kaz.
“He wasn’t there, Billy,” Big Mike said. He sounded worried, more worried than he should’ve been. “He’s been gone since yesterday.”
“Danny as well,” Kaz said, as he got out of the jeep. “Neither of them returned to the unit yesterday afternoon, after they drove to the harbor to get replacements.”
I felt them all looking at me, waiting for a reaction. I didn’t know what to say, or, worse yet, what to do. Flint, loose somewhere in the Anzio beachhead, the sea at his back, the Germans all around, and Danny at his side. I tried not to think about the memory of that floater in Boston harbor as I tried to calculate what Flint’s game was.
“Billy,” Kaz said, resting his hand on my shoulder. “What should we do?”
“I wish I knew,” I said. We trooped inside, and the MPs stood to attention when Cosgrove entered in his general’s getup. He quickly waved them off. Harding spread out a map of the beachhead on a table, and marked the front lines with a red pencil.
“The British are on our left flank,” he said, drawing an arc from the coast up to Compleone, a northward bulge showing where the British had been attacking toward Rome. In the center, the front was a wavy line from Corano to Sessano, south of Cisterna where the Rangers had been cut to pieces. “This is all Third Division, with supporting elements from the 504th Parachute Regiment.”
“Who’s holding the right flank?” I asked, pointing to where the Mussolini Canal flowed south to the sea.
“The First Special Service Force,” Harding said. “It’s a joint U.S.-Canadian volunteer outfit. A commando brigade.”
“That’s a long stretch of canal for three regiments to cover,” Big Mike said.
“German activity is sparse on that flank,” Kearns said. “They’re covering the approaches to Rome on the north. Besides, these Force men are damn aggressive. The Krauts pulled back a mile or more on the other side to avoid their patrols.”
“Is there a general in command?” Kaz asked.
“Yes, Brigadier General Robert Frederick, recently promoted. I doubt anyone could get the drop on him,” Kearns said. “Even without hundreds of his men around him, he’d be tough to take. A real fighting general.”
“Boyle, what do you suggest?” Harding said.
“Let’s have the MPs check the hospitals, in case they got caught in the bombing last night. And send out a bulletin with their names and description to every checkpoint. And to the Carabinieri as well.”
“Billy, Flint may have got himself aboard one of the ships. He could be halfway to Naples by now,” Big Mike said.
“Danny would never desert,” I said. “And if he hasn’t turned up, he’s still with Flint.”
“Sure,” Big Mike said, turning his attention to the map, not saying what we all thought. Danny could be dead anywhere, his body hidden under rubble or weighed down and tossed in the harbor.
“Okay, Boyle, I’ll get the MPs looking for two men, traveling by truck. I’ll contact Naples, and have MPs waiting there. If Flint gets off one of those ships, they’ll grab him,” Harding said. “Then we’ll organize another tour for our general.”
“I’m sure it would be possible to board a ship in all the confusion at the docks,” Cosgrove said. “But staying hidden, and getting off safely in Naples? I doubt it.”
“I agree,” Kaz said. “We need to think like this madman. What would he do?”
“And why?” I said. “What does he want?”
“To win the game,” Kaz said. “To get his general, fill the royal flush, and beat you, Billy.”
“He has Danny,” I said. “I’m counting on him keeping him alive until he finds a general to take. Which means he has to have a story, something that would convince Danny to go along with him.”
“So boarding a ship to Naples is out. But how many places are there to go within the beachhead?” Kaz said.
“I don’t think he’d head for the British sector. A couple of Yanks would stand out. Back to the Third Division front? They’d be nabbed and sent back to their unit,” I said. “It doesn’t make sense, there’s nowhere to go. What does he hope to accomplish?”
“Okay, we gotta slow down and think like detectives,” Big Mike said. That wasn’t hard for Big Mike; blue flowed in his veins. He still carried his shield from the Detroit Police Department wherever he went. “When’s the last time you saw Danny and Flint?”
“Yesterday, mid-afternoon. I brought some supplies out to them; I was supposed to be leaving since we’d found the killer. We took some artillery fire, watched the Carabinieri haul off some Italians, had some chow, and then the company CO told Flint to go down to the docks to grab replacements. The ones for his platoon had been killed in the shelling. It was probably five o’clock by the time they got there.”
“How was Flint acting? Like something tipped him off, maybe?” Big Mike said.
“No, he played it cool. He’s not a guy who rattles easily.”
“So something happened between there and the docks. Something that caused him to skip town with Danny.”
“That was about the time I came ashore,” Kaz said. “Could he have seen me?”
“What if he did? It wouldn’t mean anything to him,” Big Mike said.
“Oh no,” I said, the sequence of events becoming clear in my mind. “I think I know what it was. Stump. The guy we supposedly had in custody as the killer. Doc Cassidy was going to transfer him to Naples with the wounded. Damn! I’ll check with Cassidy, but I bet Stump got on a ship yesterday afternoon.”
“And Flint saw him, and knew the jig was up,” Big Mike said. “Then he comes up with a story that Danny will buy, and takes off to parts unknown.”
“But there are no parts unknown here,” Kaz said, pointing at the map. “The beachhead is nothing more than an open-air prison, with the Germans guarding all sides.”
“Maybe he’s planning a jailbreak,” Big Mike said. I stared at the map, trying to put myself in Flint’s shoes.
