EXCERPT “You two,” Kruger said, gesturing with the pistol, “into the outer office.”
They started to move.
“No. Wait a minute,” he said, “hold it right there. I’ve changed my mind. I
want you to hear a story, pal, in front of your old man. And you, too,
Ellen.”
Kruger said on the edge of the old metal desk. Casually, he swept all the
papers out of the way and onto the floor. “May as well make m’self comfortable,
huh? There, now. Tell me something, buddy, you know who your mama really
is?”
Jack made no response.
“Yeah, didn’t think you did. How ‘bout you, Miss Ellen, know your daddy?”
“Yes,” she said.
Kruger smiled. “Uh, huh. But I’ll bet the story they told you was a lie.”
Captain Goldman said, “Now just a minute.”
Kruger calmly raised his revolver at Jack. “Say another word, Colonel, an’
I’ll put me a bullet through your son’s chest right now, an’ we can just sit
here together an’ listen to him gurgle ‘til he dies.”
“Colonel?” Jack said.
“You bet,” Sheriff Kruger said. “Lieutenant-Colonel, to be exact. Ain’t that
right, Colonel? Bet you ain’t been called that in a whiles, huh?
Lieutenant-Colonel Hans Johann Grüber. How’s my pronunciation, Colonel, pretty
good? Somehow Daddy never taught me no German. Hell, I didn’ even know who he
really was until I read his war time diary when he died. Now, where was I? Oh,
yeah, this here old man is really Lieutenant-Colonel Hans Johann Grüber, man.
That’s who your Abraham-the-pseudo-Jew daddy really is. Not Goldman. Grüber.
A liar, a thief, a member of the regular army of Adolph Hitler’s Third Reich,
and a fucking traitor to both sides.”
Waves of nausea swept over Jack. All blood drained from his face.
The sheriff laughed at him. “Seem like near the end of World War II, your
daddy was sent here to Florida as a part of my daddy’s sabotage crew. To carry
out a mission. I ain’t sayin’ exactly from the F?hrer, ‘cause according to my
daddy’s diary, Berlin was in a damn shambles by then. But, by God, he had him
orders from higher-ups, he did. They was suppose to plant them explosives on
the beach for use by the loyal German-American Bund, of which my daddy was the
leading member. They come here in one them U-Boats that right up to th’ end of
the war was doin’ so much damage to American shipping. Bet you never read that
in your damn history books, huh? Ever once in a while, some them U-boat crews’d
come ashore an’ do what they could for the cause. Sometimes one of ‘em crew
members, like my daddy, who knew English, and had the guts to pull it off, would
go in one them mom-and-pop grocery stores and buy him fresh milk and bread for
the crew, and row back on out to the U-boat. Sometimes they would bring in
explosives and bury ‘em all up and down this coast for the Bund to use. Using
them shipments right here in Florida to sabotage whatever he could - blow up
bridges and power stations and stuff - was what my daddy did in the war.
Planning and delivering ‘em explosives like a two-bit glorified milkman is what
your daddy done during the war, at least near th’ end of it. Ain’t that right
Colonel Grüber-Goldman?”
Captain Goldman said nothing.
Kruger continued. “Yes, sir. But one them trips he got hisself cold feet, did
your daddy. Didn’t want to get caught waggin’ the wrong end of the dog when the
war in Europe come to a end. So he decided to run. He betrayed my daddy an’
all them whole crew what was workin’ with him. Almost got my daddy killed that
very night. With the help of his ex-lover, your mama, Ellen, who was once hot
as you are now, according to my daddy’s diary, that sombitch right there near
got my daddy murdered.”
Ellen stared intently at the sheriff. Jack put his arm around her.
“Now ain’t that sweet,” Kruger mocked.
“Stop it!” Captain Goldman shouted.
But the sheriff merely put his other hand on the pistol to steady it, then
turned and aimed the barrel at Jack’s throat.
Captain Goldman returned to his cot and sat down heavily.
“Thank you, Colonel Grüber. Now I’ll get on with my little tale. Your daddy
here betrayed my daddy to th’ enemy an’ my daddy was forced to live the rest his
life with forged papers. An’ I never did know near all my life who I really
was. Daddy chased that bastard right there for God knows how many years, an’
then somehow Daddy got him Jeeeeesus, I reckon ‘cause a Mama. Anyway, Daddy, he
foun’ him Jeeeeeesus, and done forgive Colonel Grüber there his trespasses. But
hell if I did, nor never will, neither. Now your mama, Ellen, helped him escape
from my daddy and his obligations to the Third Reich and all Germany, an’ th’
whole human race. Your momma hid that bastard and helped him get started on his
new life as a American, which he ain’t, by the way. Are you Colonel Grüber? No
sir. Anyway, when them two discovered my daddy had become first a deputy, then
the sheriff in these parts, they figured he was finally closing in and the
Colonel here stayed in hiding until I smoked him out all by myself. I would of
killed him, too, an’ enjoyed doin’ it, but by then I come onto this scheme to
make things pay big, an’ I mean real big. Too big to allow me th’ luxury of
torturing him then. Come here, Jack pseudo Jewboy, an’ you, too, Ellen, look at
this here coded map. Go on, look at it!”
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Children`s Fiction
Non-Adult Fiction
