Impasse (The Red Gambit Series) (34 page)

The Churchill was slow, very slow, something that Braun had not factored into his timing.

However, the
farmer’s bridge was still there, and his lead armour was close to it, the Panzer IV’s placed on the right flank, away from whatever the defenders of Brumath could hurl at them.

A contact report crackled in his ear and
he immediately acknowledged it, checking his episcopes.

Dissatisfied with the vision, he pushed himself upwards and raised his eyes above the edge of the cupola.

“Schiesse! Tank at eleven...hull down behind the small rise...see it?”

Braun
’s gunner mumbled a positive response.

“
On.”

“
FIRE!”

The 75mm belched its shell and Braun stayed in place to watch the results.

A mass of earth and bushes suddenly rose up in his field of vision.

‘
Short, dammit!’

“
Up seventy-five.”

“
Target tank. On.”

“
FIRE!”

Another miss, but it was almost directly on target.

Something in his brain was trying to get Braun’s attention, but he was blocking it as he fought his tank.

“
Target tank. On!”

“
FIRE!”

A flurry of sparks indicated a hit but the white streak soaring high into the sky told them that it had not penetrated.

The nagging continued and broke through.

‘
They’re not firing at us!’

Switching to the command net, Braun gave his orders.

“All stations Dora, all stations Dora, press in now, and do it quickly. They’re not firing at us. Repeat, press in close now.”

Switching to Durand
’s channel, he requested that the RDM stayed tight to his tanks.

The Churchill
VII bridge layer was shifting as fast as she could, but it was still pitifully slow. On a good day, and with a decent tail wind, the bridge layer could do fifteen miles per hour on a road, compared with the Panther’s noteworthy thirty. Across country, the Panther was even more superior.

This meant that Braun
’s tanks were at the small river before Johnson brought the bridging tank up.

“
Dora Zero One to Dora. Find cover and continue to engage. Out.”

Still not a single shot had been aimed at the Panthers, although Durand
’s halftracks had experienced the spectacular destruction of one vehicle, struck by something very large and unforgiving.

Braun
’s Panther slewed sideways into a small depression, the turret half masked by a hedgerow.

“
No target.”

The gunner was the absolute master of the deadpan unflustered voice, something that greatly endeared him to Braun.

He found the man another one and it was probably whatever had killed the RDM’s halftrack.

“
Two hundred metres behind the same hillock we just shot at. See the building there. Wall to the right.”

The turret shifted
, and the gunner found his prey.

“
You sneaky bastard. Target, gun. On.”

“
Fire. Load HE.”

The Panther fired a solid shot at what both Braun and the gunner had identified as a large field gun. HE
would have been a better shell with which to kill the 152mm artillery piece,but it wasn’t needed. The AP shell struck the front of the right side trunnion and sent the barrel whirling from its mount. The heavy lump of metal acted like a scythe through corn when it mowed through the crew tending it. The barrel smashed through a small outbuilding, and finished its journey in the ammo lorry that had been hiding behind the flimsy structure, with spectacular results, also bringing about the loss of the Soviet artillery battery’s radio links.

The diversionary attack had done its job, up to a point, but the delay getting over the Zorn was a huge problem
, and no amount of screaming down the radio could make the Churchill move faster.

The light was failing, the snow had started again in
earnest, and everything seemed to be going wrong.

Braun and Durand had their forces exposed, although part of the RDM had angled towards the bridge, ready to follow the Panzer IV
’s that now broached the crossing point.

A huge flash preceded the bang, and many eyes watched as the
farmer's bridge and lead Panzer went skywards.

‘
Fuck it!’

“
Dora Zero One to Dora. Take cover. The panzer brücke will be here soon, and then we can cross. Hang on, Kameraden.”

Durand
decided to send his infantry forward on foot, and Braun could not oppose the idea.

Looking for another target, Braun noted the legionnaires dismounting and charging the river.

Tracers leapt out of the failing light and men dropped into the snow, adding scarlet to the white blanket.

The Churchill rattled by, heading to a point where a small track terminated on the opposite bank.

The two AVRE’s followed suit, the three tanks creating a spear point, an armoured triangle, inexorably advancing to conquer the Zorn.

The
bridge layer halted on the riverbank and quickly set its bridge in place.

Then
it was hit.

The whole front of the Churchill disappeared in a deadly whiteness as a huge HE shell struck the vertical glacis, its 152mm armour plate sufficient to resist penetration
, but not to deny the concussive effect of such a large explosion.

The driver and hull gunner were reduced to jelly, bones shattered by the huge blow. Both died within seconds.

In the turret, the loader was blown against the turret wall, fracturing his skull and smashing his right shoulder.

Godfrey was
temporarily blinded as his sights shattered, the shock wave also dashing his head on unyielding metal, which nearly knocked him out.

Johnson broke his left wrist
, and nearly trepanned himself on the inside of the cupola, peeling part of his forehead back as the metal edge did its work.

Braun slammed his fist against the wall of the Panther
’s turret.

The Churchill had to move or the bridge was useless to them.

Another shell struck the wounded beast, but it was of a smaller calibre, and did not damage the tank.

The two AVRE
’s pushed in on the right of the bridge and, one after the other, efficiently put their fascines into the water.

“
Dora Zero One to Dora. Use the bundles to the right of the bridge. Move up now and straight over... fan out once across. One-five, watch to the north-east. Over.”

One
-five, Stepanski’s tank, let two others roll over the fascines before he decided to cross.

Inside the
bridge layer, Johnson struggled to decipher the messages from his brain.

He could smell explosives, fire, blood, faeces, urine, vomit and
fuel, all of which told him that he needed to be elsewhere immediately.

He squealed as
his broken wrist announced itself, denying him the leverage to push up through the hatch at the first attempt.

Again
he tried, this time successfully, and he welcomed the fresh cold air that greeted him.

Braun spotted the movement and tried to contact the British tank
, but the radio had lost the uneven struggle against the large calibre HE round, something he had suspected the moment the shell hit the Churchill.

He willed the young officer to do something.

‘Move the tank, Englander... move the fucking tank!’

There was no point in shouting, it was too
far, and the noise of battle was growing as the Panthers on the other side of the bridge started to work the battlefield.

On the Churchill
’s roof, Johnson cleared his head and peered back inside at is crew.

Godfrey was coming round
, and the loader was also showing signs of life.

“
Corporal Godfrey! Godfrey! Shape up, man! Get yourself sorted. Get ready to evacuate on my order.”

Not waiting for a reply, Johnson rolled off the turret, unaware of the
unwanted attention he was now getting. The twang of bullets striking the tank’s armoured plates did not penetrate into his consciousness, so focussed was he on the task he had set himself.

Through the open
hatch, he could see that his driver was beyond help. He grabbed at the corpse with his one good arm and, thankful that the man had been nigh on a starved dwarf, Johnson exerted his strength and managed to get the body partially out of the seat, and slid the body in the general direction of the hull gunner.

A bullet nicked his calf, the sting making him
work harder.

Sliding
down through the narrow opening, Johnson worked to push the driver out of the way.

Another huge shell landed near to the tank
, rocking the Churchill, causing Johnson to bang his head. A steady stream of blood emerged from the small but deep wound caused by the prominent corner of an electrical junction box above the driver’s position.

Having made
enough room for himself, he restarted the tank, praying that the engine would catch.

It did, but the plume of black smoke informed the defenders that the Churchill was
once again a target.

Dropping the tank into reverse gear, Johnson grabbed the tiller bar with his good arm and started to move
the vehicle away from the bridge.

‘
Well done, Englander!’

“
Dora Zero One to Dora. Bridge is clear, I say again, bridge is clear.”

Speaking o
n the intercom, he gave the order to push forward, all the time watching the Churchill.

To its right, a Panther followed closely on the heels of one of the AVRE
’s, both British tanks now across the water.

Braun smiled
, but his eyes took in something on the periphery.

He snatch
ed up the radio and tried to get through, even though he knew it was useless.

“
Nein, nein, get out, Johnson, the bank’s giving way, get out now!”

The last heavy shell had affected the integrity of the
river bank, and it seemed that only Braun could see it as plain as day.

No one
would ever know if Johnson had felt it start to go, or even if he heard Braun’s cry over the radio.

The bank
slowly gave way and forty plus tons of Churchill slithered, left side first, into the water.

A man started to emerge from the turret hatch.

Something acted as a stop; possibly a submerged rock. Momentum and gravity took over and the heavy tank rolled over, coming to rest upside down in the freezing River Zorn.

The water flooded into the tank.

Godfrey, half in, half out of the turret, was mashed and virtually cut in half as the vehicle rolled into the water. He was dead before he had a chance to drown.

The loader died without regaining consciousness.

The interior light by the driver’s position stayed illuminated, even when both it and Johnson were immersed by the inrushing waters.

Abject terror seized the young tank officer, but his screams were silenced by the water that flooded into his mouth.

As the water closed over him, the light stayed bright in the icy waters, illuminating his desperate efforts to hold his breath, and then to drink the river dry.