"Has it gotten so bad that snipers have to dig their own graves now, eh, Rohde?"
He looked up from his coffee and roll in surprise to see that it was the armorer, Hohenfeldt, who had spoken. The armorer pointed at the camp shovel propped against the bench where Rohde sat, then raised his coffee mug in salute, as if it were a beer stein. The slight sneer and tone of his voice belied the gesture. "You are up very early. It is good to see that you are so eager to get busy shooting Amis. You are getting quite the reputation."
"No thanks to you," Rohde said.
"Whatever do you mean?" Hohenfeldt asked with an air of mock innocence.
"I might not have to get up so early if you would just give me that damn Gewehr 43 you're so attached to."
Hohenfeldt snorted. "I am not the only one attached to something. I hear that you are quite attached to some French girl in the countryside nearby."
Rohde paused with a chunk of bread halfway to his mouth. "That is none of your damn business."
Where in the world had Hohenfeldt heard about Lisette? Rohde knew well that you were never really alone in the countryside. Sentries and patrols might have seen him coming and going from Lisette's place. Soldiers loved to gossip. It was not against regulations to have a French girlfriend. Visiting her when he should have been on duty was another matter, however.
"I only make the point that you have your girlfriend, and I have my rifle."
"They are hardly one and the same," Rohde said.
"Maybe, and maybe not," he said. Hohenfeldt fixed him with a knowing smile and pushed back from the table, preparing to leave. "You just let me know if you ever want to trade."
Rohde watched the armory sergeant go, without comment. Old Hohenfeldt could be trying to undermine him somehow, or he could just be busting his balls — annoying, to be sure, but ultimately harmless. The question was, which game was Hohenfeldt playing at?
Rohde had no time to think about that now. He wanted to get out in the field under cover of darkness. Hohenfeldt had been right when he'd said that Rohde wanted to get busy hunting Americans. What he did not know was that Rohde had one particular American in mind.
The hillbilly sniper.
He shouldered his rifle and trudged away from the command post in the pre-dawn light. The few sentries that he passed mumbled a greeting or simply nodded at him. Within twenty minutes he had left the more secure areas behind and was in the countryside. The Americans had not penetrated this far yet in their advance. Not yet, at any rate. In other day or two, they would be reaching this territory.
When they did, Rohde would be waiting.
He began to scrutinize his surroundings with the practiced eye of a sniper. Trees grew at intervals along the roads, and any one of them would have made a good perch. He paid special attention to the farm buildings he passed, mostly small cottages and stone barns, seeking out the advantages of each one, and just as quickly dismissing them. Instinctively, Rohde wished to avoid trees or buildings. He did not wish to become trapped, but preferred open country where he could move.
He pressed on, moving deeper into the countryside as the light grew in the east. The red rim of the sun appeared on the horizon like a bloodshot eye. The landscape was still full of shadows, and if any hostile eyes were watching, his camouflage uniform enabled him to pass through relatively unseen.
Rohde soon found what he was looking for. He found one such field, perhaps measuring 25 hectares and ringed by a scrubby hedgerow, out of which grew a few taller trees. Judging by the tall grass, this seemed to be a hay field. The war had created a shortage of farm workers, and this field had not been kept as tidy as it should. Brush and tall weeds encroached from a corner near the hedgerow, where it was difficult for the horse-drawn scythe to reach, and the field had gone untended. The farmer's loss was Rohde's gain.
The fields here near Argentan were much larger than the ones nearer to Normandy. Anyone crossing this field would be badly exposed. Praying that no enemy snipers were about, Rohde stepped into the field to get his bearings.
To catch a mouse, one needed cheese…
As a general rule, a sniper did not have the luxury of creating his hide, but had to adapt to his surroundings. He had to blend into them to be most effective.
He remembered the test they had been given during sniper training. The trainees were sent out into a no-man's land. There, they were told to set up their hides. The instructor kept watch, and anyone he saw was "out" — in combat, they would have been dead, picked off by the enemy. Rohde had dug himself a shallow hole and managed to stay hidden until the instructor had called them in. Rohde had turned out to be one of the last men who had managed to stay hidden from the instructor’s eyes. Fortunately, he had drank little and eaten sparingly that morning. The lesson had been simple, but it had stuck with Rohde. Beyond a rifle, a sniper's best friends were a shovel and patience.
Now that more of the sun was showing through the trees beyond the field, Rohde had enough light to get to work. He placed the rifle within easy reach. Stuck in his belt was the camp shovel. He took it out now and began to dig.
Though the morning was cool, his muscles soon warmed to the work. Breaking through the tangled mesh of roots in the field caused him to break out into an actual sweat. He ended up cutting out blocks of sod and setting them aside. The rich soil itself was easy to remove, and he scattered the shoveled earth across the field so that there would be no telltale piles of soil. Soon, he had shoveled out a depression just deep enough and long enough to hide him from sight.
He stretched out in the hole, then used the shovel to notch out a bit more space for his elbows. Satisfied, he climbed out, brushed off the dirt, and went to work on a narrow trench back toward where brush and shrubs marched out from the hedgerow.
The distance wasn't more than 10 meters, but it was still backbreaking work to cut through the sod with the short-handled camp shovel. Rohde wished that he had thought to bring along a mattock as well. Fortunately, the ditch did not need to be particularly deep. He just needed it to be deep enough that he could writhe his way through it on his elbows and knees. The tall grass would provide the rest of the camouflage.
He cut the ditch toward a clump of multiflora rose. The thick, thorny canes made excellent cover, and yet, through a gap in the rose bush, Rohde had a clear view of the field.
He straightened up and stretched out his back, stiff from digging, and walked toward the hedgerow. There, he spent several minutes hunting for just what he needed — a stout forked branch. He used the bayonet to chop a rough point at the long end and then used the flat of the shovel to drive the branch into the earth in front of the gap in the rose bush. He now had a sturdy rest for his rifle.
That left the final stretch between the rose bush and the hedgerow itself. Rohde took the bayonet and walked some distance away, then began hacking down branches and brush. He dragged them back and used the material to create a screen between the rose bush and the hedgerow. He should be able to move relatively unseen behind it.
Satisfied, he found a gap in the hedgerow itself. At the heart of the hedgerow was an ancient wall made of stone and earth. Trees and brush had grown up around it, anchored by the wall deep within the hedgerow's interior. Rohde burrowed inside the tangled growth until he reached the wall. There was a large, flat stone that made an excellent bench rest. He was able to position himself behind it. With the rifle laid across the stone, he had a solid platform from which to shoot. The view of the field was somewhat obscured by the overhanging branches and wooded growth, but the elevation of the wall offered its own advantages. Also, the vegetation would screen him from the enemy, in that it was easier for him to see out than to be seen within.