The injured man was made comfortable and the two Soviet officer prisoners set to his care.
In his mind’s eye, Lenz imagined capturing a doctor, and having a proper medic to use the supplies he was intending to liberate.
With Jensen out of the equation, Lenz now had twenty-one men with which to conduct his raid.
According to his initial view of the medical encampment, twenty-one would be sufficient for a rapid surprise attack and withdrawal.
He spent the morning formulating his plan and the afternoon instructing his troopers on how best to carry out the night assault.
His planning was interrupted by a movement of vehicles, when four heavily armed Military Police vehicles swept into the camp.
Three pairs of binoculars turned instantly, focussing on the swiftly moving vehicles.
Their presence alarmed Lenz and his senior men, Emmering and Weiss, but the group soon sped off the way they had come and the medical facility returned to normal.
Lenz finished off his briefing on a hand drawn map, occasionally pointing towards the hospital to emphasise a point, and he was satisfied that the senior men of the Kommando knew the plan inside out.
The soldiers, dismissed to catch up on sleep, lay around in the undergrowth, as relaxed as only veterans can be.
Lenz swept the battleground once more, his binoculars seeking anything that he had missed, and he was satisfied that the plan was all in order.
Throughout the day, the occasional ambulance had arrived, deposited a desperate cargo, and left, all except the last one that had driven straight into the motor pool, where it was quickly abandoned by its driver.
Lenz took the opportunity offered by the growing sunset, and made himself comfortable, dropping off to sleep in an instant, whilst others watched and waited.
In Bräunisheim itself, the venerable rifle was once more on show, as its owner was called upon to describe deeds from another conflict, a time some thirty years beforehand.
The old bar had been destroyed by a combination of blows from the three times the village had changed hands since early 1945. Its replacement had been established in an old barn, across the main road from the village, but close to the US Army facility. The villagers were nothing if not resourceful, as the excellent location attracted off-duty US personnel, both men and women, and meant that American dollars were spent on consuming large quantities of German lager, both by those who were officially stood down, and those who sneaked out of wards without permission.
Holding centre stage amidst the music and laughter was a man in Imperial German Army uniform, one clearly well cared for and that still fitted him well.
Using the Gewehr-98 he had carried throughout World War One, Heinrich Raubach demonstrated the savagery of Verdun and the bitterness of the Argonne, the Pour-le-Mérite jumping at his throat with every mock thrust.
Three other WW1 veterans joined in, occasionally using the old rifle to illustrate their own suggestions on the finer points of bayonet and butt use.
Some of the American soldiers were fascinated by the old men’s tales; others moved to enjoy peace and quiet away from such reminders of combat.
Raubach had fought with the elite Herwarth von Bittenfeld Regiment, part of the 13th Division of the Imperial German Army.
A man of great personal courage, he had been wounded on four separate occasions, and was one of only four men in 13th Division to hold the Blue Max.
On the occasion he had earned the award, Raubach had been field promoted and was an acting Leutnant, commanding the remnants of a company in the HvB Regiment.
Technically, as his substantive rank was Stabsfeldwebel and Spiess, he probably should not have received the prestigious medal, but it was 31st October 1918, and both the criteria and actualities of his award were lost in the German surrender.
The citation was made out for Offizier-Stellvertreter Raubach, and so the Pour-le-Mérite was awarded and immediately ignored by a nation cowed and quick to turn away from its military heroes.
Amongst his other qualities, Raubach was also a man with a keen eye and the ability to keep his mouth shut, and those qualities, married to his uncanny senses, had suggested that this night would be different to those that had gone before.
The things he had seen in and out of the hospital late on that summer’s evening made him return to his house and pocket four strips of ammunition.
If his senses were correct… well… he intended to be prepared.
Using infrared binoculars, Stradley surveyed the ground between the woods and the hospital site.
From within the complex, modestly illuminated, and busy with surgical shifts still working, other eyes, similarly equipped, were scanning the hills to the south, where smudges of heat had occasionally betrayed the presence of men.
Hanebury, once out of the ambulance, had made himself known to the 74th’s commanding officer.
After a short conference, Lieutenant Colonel Brinkley agreed to the MPs riding shotgun over his unit until reinforcements arrived, and assigned some of his men to create a number of rifle squads.
Brinkley was very specific with his orders, forbidding any offensive action, and requiring Hanebury to act only in defence of the facility.
The hospital head of dentistry, Major Lewis Imerman, was de facto in charge of the overall defensive force, but no one, most of all the Major himself, felt otherwise than that Lucifer held the reins.
Hanebury’s hardest job was persuading some of his new troops to go about their daily business without a care in the world.
He selected a large detail of men who knew their way around a Garand, and kept them close, sending the other ‘less reliable’ types to other parts of the perimeter.
With the dozen men that had arrived secretly in the ambulance, plus the rifle unit of belligerent medics, Hanebury had thirty men spread along the southern edge of the camp, some hidden, some revealed but seemingly inattentive to military matters.
He checked his watch as Shufeldt did the thirty-minute radio check with Pennsylvania-six-two, the faulty radio now working again.
Stradley’s force was ready and raring to go.
Hanebury had discussed the likely tactical options, and each had a single code word that, once sent, would bring the heavily armed vehicles down on whoever it was that was sat on the heights above 74th Surgical Hospital.
SS-Kommando Lenz had survived longer than any other Werewolf unit; indeed, it was the only remaining unit of its type, filled with Nazi fanatics, still intent on taking the fight to any and all enemies of the Reich.
The Kommando had lost men along the way, and gained some too, but the unit was built around the granite core of its commander and two senior NCOs.
The same three-man group surveyed the camp, relying on moonlight and its own modest illumination to check the last details.
For all his professionalism and fanaticism, Lenz was a soldier first and foremost, and knew better than to ignore his gut instinct and the advice of senior men.
“Go on, Oberscharfuhrer.”
Emmering had voiced concerns, unsupported by fact, without substance, but none the less very real.
“Can’t put my finger on it, Hauptsturmfuhrer… it looks right… simple operation… but something feels very wrong.”
Lenz concentrated harder, seeking something through his lenses to either confirm or deny the feelings of his senior NCO.
Feelings he shared.