The War That Came Early: Coup d'Etat Read Free Page B

treatment—nowhere near good treatment—but better.
    Sarah almosttold the clerk and his boss that her father and brother tried to volunteer for the
Wehrmacht
this time around. But she didn’t want to remind them she was related to Saul Goldman, who was wanted for smashing in a labor gang boss’ head after the other fellow hit him and rode him for being a Jew once too often. On the lam, Saul had stolen papers or got his hands on a forged set, so he was in thearmy now even though the Nazis didn’t know it. The less they thought about him these days, the better Sarah liked it.
    Both men with gold-rimmed Party badges went right on looking unhappy. No matter what Nazi laws said about Jewish frontline veterans, a Jew with a medal and a wound was plainly just another kike to them. “Laborer,” the senior fellow said, and he wrote that down, too.
    “When willIsidor—uh, Moses Isidor—and I hear about getting official permission to marry, sir?” Sarah asked. This wasn’t her first trip to the
Rathaus
. Official policy made everything as difficult as possible for Jews. Marriage was definitely included. The Nazis wished there were no more Jews in Germany (or anywhere else, come to that). No wonder they weren’t enthusiastic about anything that threatened toproduce more people they hated.
    “When?” the functionary echoed. “When we decide you will, that’s when.”
    “All right.” Sarah fought down a sigh. She didn’t want to give the Nazis the satisfaction of knowing they’d annoyed her. They might be pretty sure, but she didn’t aim to show them. She was her father’sdaughter—no doubt about it. She even managed a smile of sorts as she said “Thank you verymuch” and left the window.
    “Well! About time!” said the stout gal who’d waited behind her. The woman started pouring out her tale of woe to the bureaucrats. Sarah didn’t hang around to find out how she fared. Any Jew in Germany had plenty of worries of her own.
    THEO HOSSBACH SUPPOSED he should have been happy that the
Wehrmacht
and its Polish, Slovakian, Hungarian, English, and French allieshadn’t lost more ground to the Red Army during this brutal winter. After all, a headlong retreat would have made it more likely for something bad to have happened to the Panzer II in which he served as radioman.
    But bad things could happen to the Panzer II all too easily any which way. The lightly armed, lightly armored three-man machines weren’t obsolescent any more. They were obsolete, andeverybody who had anything to do with them knew as much. They soldiered on regardless. A veteran crew, which his panzer certainly had, could still get good use from one. And any panzer at all made infantry very unhappy.
    Besides, there were still nowhere near enough modern Panzer IIIs and IVs to go around. When the best weren’t available, the rest had to do what they could.
    What Theo’s companywas doing now was protecting a stretch of front that ran from a village to a small town closer to Smolensk than to Minsk. Just exactly where the village and town lay, Theo wasn’t so sure. A good atlas might have shown him, but he didn’t have one. What difference did it make, anyhow?
    All he really knew was, the front had gone back and forth a good many times. Lately, it seemed to have gone backmore often than it had gone forth. The Ivans were marvelous at slipping companies, sometimes even battalions or regiments, of infantry in white snowsuits behind the German lines and raising hell with them. They weren’t so good at taking advantage of the trouble they caused—which was a lucky thing for everybody who had to fight them.
    Theo still wore the black coveralls of a panzer crewman. Theylooked smart and didn’t show grease stains. No doubt that was why the powers that be had chosen them. But odds were a man in black coveralls running toward a hiding place through the snow wouldn’t live to get there.
    “Got a cigarette, Theo?” Adalbert Stoss asked.
    “Here.” Theo