I stepped out from behind the hickory ties, standing tall in the center of the narrow tracks, wearing my canvas work coat, my shotgun resting across my forearm.
"Baron von Hauff," I said, my voice carrying clear and steady across the forty feet of brick.
"In December of nineteen-forty-four, your uncle, SS-Standartenführer Heinrich von Hauff, told my father the exact same thing on the road to Noville."
Von Hauff’s monocle caught the red tactical light, his posture stiffening by half an inch. "Your father was a common dispatch runner, Whitfield."
Advertisement
"My father was a master sergeant in the United States Army, Baron," I said, every syllable dropping like an anvil onto the tracks.
"And he told me... never give an aristocrat what he hasn't bled for."
I looked toward the ceiling.
"Thomas! Drop the pawl!"
Thomas yanked the overhead trip-wire with all the strength in his back.
