The Saga of the Lion and the Lamb

By JZ Z Greiner

Erik-Christian Denman was a youthful genius-general in the Royal Danish Army who went rogue after the Danish occupation by Nazis in WWII. Leading a group of elite, saboteurs, and assassins to uncountable and legendary victories, in the final months of 1944, he made a series of strange decisions that seemingly put him and his men in mortal danger. With him as a brilliant militarist and fearsome combatant coveted by nation-states across Europe, his men wondered if Danish General Denman was a gifted warrior who would lead them to continued victories or a genius madman who would get them killed. With questions haunting him about life that man had yet to answer and might never answer, General Denman was not certain he was the godsend saint people believed him to be or the spawn of Satan he feared he might be. In December of 1944, in the midst of battle, his men realized that they had a very, very dangerous man on their hands. Deliberately idealized and idyllic to depict his diametrically opposed selves graphically, General Denman's cast of characters are likeable men and women to be enjoyed and admired as they live through his saga with him, often pulling him in opposing directions or supporting him lovingly. Plagued by remorseful doubt and whipped to the core, body and soul, General Denman struggled to continue to do his dirty job. While he performed superbly, like us, he was unaware of how he had impacted their lives. General Erik-Christian Denman made his way among people who did not understand him, with his God, Who did not understand him, in a world that did not understand him, like the rest of us. Eventually, the disconnected pieces of the puzzle of his life formed a complete picture. Though he was once tormented by the unwelcome assaults of despair and resignation, his end of days was an affirmation of hope and a celebration of his virtue.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: May 17, 2018
• ISBN: 9781641389266

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The Saga of the Lion and the Lamb

JZ Greiner

Copyright © 2018 JZ Greiner

All rights reserved

First Edition

Page Publishing, Inc

New York, NY

First originally published by Page Publishing, Inc 2018

ISBN 978-1-64138-925-9 (Paperback)

ISBN 978-1-64138-927-3 (Hardcover)

ISBN 978-1-64138-926-6 (Digital)

Printed in the United States of America

For the Divinities with my gratitude for their sustaining guidance and to their mighty Michael, our protector.

The Tyger

By William Blake

Tyger Tyger, burning bright,

In the forests of the night;

What immortal hand or eye,

Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies.

Burnt the fire of thine eyes?

On what wings dare he aspire?

What the hand, dare seize the fire?

And what shoulder, & what art,

Could twist the sinews of thy heart?

And when thy heart began to beat,

What dread hand? & what dread feet?

What the hammer? what the chain,

In what furnace was thy brain?

What the anvil? what dread grasp,

Dare its deadly terrors clasp!

When the stars threw down their spears

And water’d heaven with their tears:

Did he smile his work to see?

Did he who made the Lamb make thee?

Tyger Tyger burning bright,

In the forests of the night:

What immortal hand or eye,

Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

Part I

A General’s Battlefields

Chapter 1

The Blond Lion

His throat turned dry. His heart was racing. The doctor had observed that the Nazi general’s gray uniform jacket was splotched with dried blood that evidently was not the Nazi’s blood.

The doctor was a US Army captain. The doctor was the Nazi general’s prisoner of war. The doctor would not help this Nazi’s wounded. This vow Dr. Michael St. John repeated in his head like a mantra as he walked behind General Maximillian Weiller over frozen dirt from the barracks housing the prisoners of war across the small courtyard to the general’s headquarters. Exactly how the doctor would refuse, he did not know. Exactly how he would accept the consequences General Weiller would dole out for that refusal, he did not know.

Perhaps his stand was a relatively small act of courage, St. John mused. Somehow, in his nearly year-long confinement, St. John had observed that this General Weiller did not view war as some excuse to engage in temperamental brutality against the POWs. Weiller had been more of the efficient overseer than a conquering warlord. The doctor had never been abused, nor had he witnessed abuse in Weiller’s camp. This esteemed Nazi general was preoccupied with serious war business, treating the camp as a sideline. The POWs received fairly humane custodial care, given the amount of food and supplies that was available to them. With strict oversight, Weiller restrained the prison guards.

Located on the fringes of the southern edges of Denmark, the camp was small, housing only fifty or so prisoners, who were mostly Danes, a French senior officer, and one Pole. They were held there rather comfortably by war’s standards.

The December air was frigid. The sky was overcast. As the doctor hurried past empty barracks toward Weiller’s office, once again, as he had for the last year, Captain Michael St. John speculated about what purpose this camp really served. Shit! It was maddening to be in a place and not know what the hell was going on in the building two hundred yards away.

Earlier that morning, during the routine walking exercise, the doctor had been pulled from the ranks and returned to the camp, after which he was told to wait in his barracks. St. John was there only a few minutes, unguarded, before General Weiller made his grand entrance. The camp was deserted still.

The midmorning sky fielded snow clouds. Already it was December 19, 1944, and there had been no major snowfall. The chilly wind brushed through the doctor, forcing him to pull the collar of his green army jacket up around his neck as he followed Weiller up the few wooden steps to the entrance of Weiller’s headquarters. Strangely, Weiller murmured, It feels like snow, as if snow were welcome. As a native Texan overseas only a few months, St. John had no clue what feeling like snow meant.

Little did the American doctor know how dramatically the local weather and the climate of war were also about to change for him. There was the war with its seemingly gentlemanly rules of engagement, and there was the war high-powered grand masters fought with their own brutal rules. That was the war he was about to enter unwittingly.

St. John had seen Weiller’s office only once when he arrived and was interrogated, if one could call Weiller’s scant and indifferent interview an interrogation. Like then, the army captain was struck by the room’s austerity. The windowless small office seemed almost unoccupied by an active general of this glorious Reich. No paperwork was available to the scanning eye. The high-back black leather chair was slid into a mahogany desk just so. Not so much as a pen present.

For months St. John had seen Nazi brass roll in and out of that office. Radio communications equipment, extensive and expensive, lined the left wall. Contrary to appearances, this office was occupied and thriving.

Through Weiller’s office St. John followed him, past the communications nest and down an unlit corridor a few feet or so to the general’s private quarters. He continued to follow the general through a small carpeted parlor into his bedroom with only one small window raised high for security reasons. Instinctively, the doctor’s eyes rummaged the dark room for the presence he felt so keenly.

There he lay in bed, in General Weiller’s bed, against the far wall opposite the door. Bloody. Unconscious. With only dim light shining through the one high window, the doctor saw a man whose hair was very blond. Resting over a bloodstained leather overcoat. St. John recognized the outline of his long body. He was a good six feet and a few inches, if he had any height at all, with a chest as broad as the plains in the Texas panhandle. His was the physique of a warrior, not just any warrior, but a warrior designed by a grand master. Across the room the doctor could see that this man, with the muscular perfection of Michelangelo’s David, was more likely a ferocious Achilles who had recently been felled in battle than a draftee.

After Weiller crossed the room to the bed, he flipped on a lamp on the nightstand. The low lamplight radiated over what was St. John’s black medical bag positioned on the nightstand. The traditional black satchel had been a gift from his parents when he graduated medical school. It had been confiscated when he was captured. Thinking it gone forever, Dr. St. John had bid it farewell months ago.

The doctor stepped closer to the bed. By reflex, the doctor grew alert. The man’s face was rife with fresh bruises and contusions. There was too much blood seeping from the man’s left shoulder and right leg. Someone had beaten him good, shot him, stabbed him, or both. Pensively, Weiller took off his hat and placed it methodically on the front left corner of the mahogany nightstand behind the valued bag. Abruptly he removed his hat, as if he had committed a faux pas by sitting part of his Nazi uniform adjacent to the sacred medic’s bag. Weiller tossed the hat onto a small table in the middle of his bedroom. He missed, and it fell to the floor and was not retrieved. Instead, General Weiller turned to his prisoner, the doctor.

In the strange starkness of that deadened silence, the two enemies stood close enough for St. John to see Weiller’s unbridled sorrow. St. John squirmed. Adversaries are not tender.

Bitte, Weiller said, clearing his throat, hardly audible, bitte, Herr Doktor, Helfen Sie mir. Weiller broke into English again. Doctor, please help me. Weiller’s eyes betrayed his concern and sadness.

Forget it.

St. John was pleased by the unexpectedly firm conviction in his voice. Would he be beaten? He surveyed this brutalized victim. Would he be able to live through this kind of punishment without breaking?

Humbled by circumstance but determined in his own resolve, Weiller lobbied without hesitation. Weiller lobbied without pride.

It is not right he bleed to death, die of infections from bullets he does not deserve . . . to die this way . . . he does not deserve to die this way. He is not German. He is not one of us . . . he could never be.

Weiller’s smoky gray eyes bore the fatigue of years of unquenched thirst for relief, of too much experience with evil, unveiled, seen from face to face and from eye to eye.

Since he was captured, daily St. John had rehearsed his assured refusals. He had expected to be ordered sometime during his captivity to perform as a physician. He would help one of his own, but he would not help those who had imprisoned him. Not those who agitated war and brought this whole fucked-up mess to his world, to his own happy-go-lucky life as the playboy son of a wealthy rancher from the great state of Texas who had been forced from his life of ease to the bloody womb of Europe’s self-inflicted, brutal folly. Not those men. Fuck the Hippocratic Oath; as far as the American doctor was concerned, these Nazis could be damned, every last one of them. He hated them.

This was not the scenario that commanded his imagination. In exchange for St. John’s medical expertise, Weiller offered his vulnerability and personal humiliation. Instead of arrogance or brutal threats, the Nazi offered his frailty. US Army Captain Michael St. John was not prepared for love, but that was unmistakably the feel of the moment. Weiller emanated love. Weiller loved this injured blond Achilles.

Despite the concerted detachment from pain St. John had cultivated to survive his fate as a soldier and POW, he still had not yet learned how to refuse the heartfelt. He anticipated hysterical demands and threats of torture, but for this appeal, his imagination had failed him. Nothing, no one had prepared him for the humility, the humaneness, and the helplessness of his enemy, this Nazi general.

Weiller gazed at the injured man as he unbuttoned his tunic and removed a fresh white handkerchief from his shirt pocket. He placed it over the man’s bloody shoulder wound.

I fear he will bleed to death or die of infection if not attended properly. I do not know how to help him. I cannot give him up to Nazis. He will be identified . . . please help him, not me, help him. Weiller continued to press his handkerchief over the gunshot wound. "He cannot die."

Weiller was compelling, as if some unseen power exerted its force. Before tumbling deeper into his desperation, he spoke for himself. He should not die. I will do whatever you say, assist your need here, give you your freedom when it is over.

Weiller won without another word. But it was not the Nazi who won or the offer of freedom that changed the doctor’s mind; it was a lonely, humbled man. Somehow, despite the uniform, Weiller was no longer an enemy general. He was simply a man who did not want someone he loved so much to die. This once-gloried Nazi general groveled before his enemy to save this man’s life.

He is not a Nazi? St. John quizzed him.

Weiller shook his head.

God help me, St. John uttered haplessly, hoping he was not healing a strategically placed Nazi and that Weiller was nothing more than a superb actor.

Weiller observed the doctor’s cursory evaluation of the man’s condition. Leaning over the victim, gingerly St. John spread wide the man’s black leather jacket. His blood oozed from a bullet wound in his left shoulder and spurted from a gash several inches long on his right thigh. When St. John pulled open tears in the sweater, he saw six superficial slashes across his ribcage. He checked the pulse in the man’s neck: steady. This man was tough, an athlete, in his midforties, guessed St. John. Healthy, but very old for a combatant.

Bring me whatever medical supplies you have . . . bandages, alcohol, antiseptics, and some sheets, towels, a washbasin . . . St. John went on, assuming command. Weiller obeyed.

St. John gazed at the bag. A chill ran down his back, and a thrill ignited him. He was a doctor again.

While Weiller gathered some requested supplies, St. John touched his patient. A haunting presence emanated from this beaten man stretched before him. Contrasting with the muscular frame of an exquisite warrior was an inexplicably pleasant, peaceful aura pulsating from him, somehow encasing him. Wherever he was at that moment, despite such agonizing injuries, the battered blond Achilles was tranquil.

Next thing St. John knew, he felt those serene strains invade him and impress on him that it was somehow vital that this man, whoever he was, be resurrected. He, the doctor, was capable of performing that very task.

A very special urgency to heal and a very special clarity with respect as to how to go about addressing typical wartime injuries pleasurably took over. From whence did that urgency and sense of competency ignite, and why did it ignite Dr. Michael St. John’s soul now?

The doctor had never felt these compelling and curious sensations. Not ever. It seemed beyond the natural, the normal drive to preserve or restore life. This was the first of those many sensations he would have as he labored to heal this man over the oncoming months. The compulsion to serve this man, in fact, did not end until years after this war did end. From this moment forward, the doctor’s life was unalterably changed.

St. John headed to the adjoining bathroom, washed his hands in alcohol, and scrubbed them down with Betadine while Weiller still assembled the requested supplies. When St. John returned, he more thoroughly evaluated his unconscious patient’s injuries.

Best wash up, St. John advised Weiller and headed back to his patient, while Weiller went to the bathroom to scrub up after the doctor gave him detailed instructions on how to do so.

As the doctor was with his patient at last, his eyes immediately caught sight of a slight protrusion at the man’s left wrist, a fractured bone that had not yet pierced his patient’s skin. In addition to the obvious bruises over most of his exposed body, his mystery patient had a bullet wound in the left shoulder and right side between his ribs, superficial lacerations across his chest and one over his abdomen, and another over his forehead, above his left eye. There was a superficial laceration, about six inches, in the right thigh, and possibly fractured ribs on the right side. St. John speculated on the injury in view of the wide bruises emerging around the ribs. Obviously, he had been beaten with an object to flush out the emerging, broad-based red-and-blue splotches spreading over his ribcage.

As if reading his mind, Weiller returned and informed. There were six men. They beat him with their rifle butts. Five are dead now. One is missing.

St. John picked up the strained note in Weiller’s voice about the one who had escaped.

There was much to do: reduce and immobilize the fractured left wrist, remove two bullets, repair the lacerated leg, and tape some possibly fractured ribs, in addition to addressing those numerous minor lacerations and abrasions to be cleansed.

While removing wet compresses that he had placed on the man’s face in the course of his examination, St. John noticed the rhythm of his patient’s respiration. His breathing was controlled and perfectly even. He saw the man tighten his eyelids ever so deliberately, ever so slightly. The breathing pattern was focused. Then he got it. The man used this breathing technique to manage his own pain. Who was this crumbled mass of human who controlled his own pain with rhythmic breathing and self-discipline?

Handing Weiller a fresh, wet washcloth, the doctor instructed the general to press it lightly on the leg wound.

The man’s eyes opened. Those sapphire-blue darts flashed his way. St. John was the object of his gaze. This man’s restrained power pulsed beneath his touch. The power surged, as if the man sent out waves of his power not only through himself but also to St. John and Weiller. St. John turned to Weiller for a split second. Weiller nodded that he felt this odd sensation too.

The doctor observed these two cohorts when Weiller’s stare phased into the bloodied man’s eyes. In the midst of the pain, deliberatively, this battered soldier whispered to Weiller.

Max, Nein . . . ich sage . . . nein. Ablasse. Es ist genug. The voice, similarly soft like Weiller’s in sentiment, was a tired whisper that aired that sense of fatigue of one exhausted far beyond the day’s events. To the American’s relief, when the blond spoke, he sounded like his fellow prisoners of war, like a Dane, not a German.

Weiller did not acknowledge his plea; he continued applying pressure to the man’s bleeding thigh as diligently as St. John had hoped. St. John continued his work on the simple injuries to allay this threatening strength that pulsed beneath his hands.

When St. John cleansed his patient’s face and blotted his patient’s chest of blood from the slash marks, the man twisted toward him sideways through what St. John knew was burning pain of bullet wounds radiating through his left shoulder and right side. St. John turned to those focused eyes he was slightly fearful of encountering. He offered his hand in full view of his patient, hoping to communicate that he could grasp his hand to deal with any momentary surge of pain.

He speaks English, Weiller offered, not looking up from his work cleansing the man’s thigh wound. As St. John observed the Nazi, it was obvious Weiller had some basic training as a medic.

Squeeze my hand for the pain, the doctor said.

Instead of accepting St. John’s offer of support, the injured man yanked his leg free of Weiller. Nein . . . no. The man emphatically rejected the offer. With a smooth motion, the injured man retracted his leg and planted his foot in Weiller’s chest. Swiftly he thrust the Nazi backward a step or two with only force sufficient to push the general out of his way with the ease of simply kicking aside something in his path. Now, General Max Weiller was a man of hefty build, at least six feet and then some; broad chested he was, and sturdy for his sixty-some years. From what reserve of strength did this injured soul draw his strength?

Uncoiling his right arm, the man shoved St. John aside. The blood from the blond’s leg and shoulder and his right side erupted in warm red spurts, splattering onto his black sweater. The blood meandered gingerly downward onto the Nazi’s leather overcoat still beneath him.

With his right hand dug into the bed, the man miraculously leaned to the right and propped himself up to a sitting position. Then he touched his limp left wrist to assess the damage. Momentarily he sat there without support. With his right hand, he reached behind his waist. In one sweep, he yanked a knife from his waist, raised his hand to his head, and with a flick of his wrist, flung it.

Like a flash of lightning, before St. John could understand, a knife rotated by within inches of his head and stabbed, dead center, the swastika in the Nazi flag hanging over Weiller’s desk directly across from the bed. It happened in seconds.

Jesus! St. John exhaled.

Blood trickled from the left brow over the stoic’s cheek. His eyes squared off with Weiller’s.

Nein. Verstehen Sie das, General? The man asserted his disapproval sternly to Weiller.

This feisty one will make it just fine, concluded his doctor. Six men. The words haunted St. John. Six men, and this stalwart middle-aged blond, controlling his pain with concentration and breathing rhythms, losing blood, still had this much fight in him, mused St. John.

This warrior, who foisted on this American medic experiences with the wounded in war that St. John had never encountered, was all the more impressive as he sat within his own wounds and blood. Some sort of life’s energy or spirit shone through him like a beacon. His soul lived in a realm beyond that of his battered body. He was fearless. This inexplicable composure and control over pain his posture affirmed disoriented the doctor, who was accustomed to ministering to those weakened from fear and pain that accompanied such physical punishment. Nothing since Weiller brought him to his headquarters had been normal.

The man was posed like a portrait, his hair silky fine and golden blond under the lamplight. With a sweep of waves falling from a widow’s peak, regally draping his carved cheekbones, they sat astride a squared-off jawline and brushed the back of the turtleneck collar of his black sweater, rich of either soft lamb’s wool or cashmere. Upscale attire for what must be some sort of soldier. His eyebrows were arched, solid, and darker than his fine hair. From the corner of his left brow, blood continued to trickle to his classic, sculpted cheekbones, winding its way to the corner of his parched, pale lips and his jawline, underscored by a light-brown five o’clock shadow.

Enchanting like a magician’s crystals, those penetrating eyes revealed more to this man than St. John knew he might ever comprehend. St. John had never experienced the kind of depth that was the essence of these dark-blue gemstones. Their awareness wielded intensity and ruggedness but was not exclusive of charm or tenderness. They were companion to dignity and discipline, a good combination for the recovery that was ahead of him. Those eyes were made to endure far more than this physical recovery required. They bespoke of a life in another time and place that St. John and others would never visit but would only know through those few who told of it in stories. Those eyes lived in some parallel realm of transcendence. St. John found it hard to stare into those eyes and hard not to. Those eyes were like magnets, forcing the doctor’s attention on their master. Used as weapons, those eyes might deign to extract well-guarded secrets and, once extracted, dissolve a man’s soul.

In contrast, there was delicacy on his ravaged countenance that betrayed a sensitivity anathema to the warrior or mercenary that undoubtedly he was. He was rugged. Handsome. Oddly, he was beauty. His neck was athletic, sweeping down into shoulders broader and more solid than Weiller’s bulk, which St. John had studied over the months during some facsimile of roll call.

He was dressed in leather, as though he rode a motorcycle on such bitter December days. It was soft leather, like kidskin, except for the boots. Underneath the black leather jacket was a tight waist. His thighs, minimally, were enough to bring a man of oversized stature to submission were he kicked or squeezed between them.

This man was a combatant, not a conference-table, coffee-guzzling, chain-smoking commander barking orders to those who were then commanded to crawl in the dirt while covered with blood. His hands were sturdy and rough. This man crawled in dirt and mud.

Yet his eyes betrayed him as so much more. Those eyes seemed to defy definition. As soon as they reflected one quality, the image blended into another, processing and processing so much of life simultaneously. He was an artist, but not really an artist. He was a holy man, but not really. He was not really a soldier. He was something much more. But what?

Voluntarily the warrior lay back slowly on the bed. Surprisingly, this time he did not resist St. John’s attempts to ease him into a comfortable position. The man was still heavy even though he supported his own weight as he let the doctor manage him. Submissively he lay as the doctor and Weiller removed his jacket. St. John could tell by his acquiescent movements that this man was accustomed to being attended to, as though he were royalty, or more sadly, he was too familiar with the role of a seriously injured patient.

St. John cut the left sleeve of his patient’s sweater and examined his left arm and broken wrist. Weiller reestablished himself at his station and pressed a clean, damp compress on the slash wound on the thigh. St. John reexamined the ribs as his patient focused on the ceiling. The patient said not a word during the exam, but St. John knew already from the reaction in his patient’s eyes that some ribs were quite painful to the touch, undoubtedly broken. St. John could feel telltale scars toward the back of his patient’s ribs, inching to his mid and lower back. Perhaps some of these ribs had been broken before. St. John suspected by the end of his examination that several of his patient’s vertebrae might have been fractured; minimally, his back had been somehow severely injured previously. The injured man declined to answer any questions about his medical history, but Weiller nodded affirmatively when St. John probed about his patient’s spine.

Severe trauma . . . took months to recover from blows by falling beams and debris. During an attempt on his life, he shielded his father, hoping to save his father’s life, offered up the Nazi.

St. John kept his admiration of this blond man’s heroism to himself under these tense circumstances.

Startling the doctor and general, however, the man spoke again.

Max, nein. Quietly the man nodded. He wanted the Nazi to stop his work and to discontinue divulging any more information. The Nazi ignored the previous show of force and the entreaty. Nein, Max, no more . . . it is enough . . . genug, the man continued.

Now staring at the ceiling directly over him, the man whispered to St. John as he worked, Nein, like a sluggish, broken record. St. John placed a clean white hand towel on the superficial marks slashed across his chest. With another wet washcloth, St. John wiped the man’s face, dabbing gently over the bleeding eyebrow. St. John brushed his patient’s hair back with the cloth. He took a gauze bandage and placed it on the gash over his patient’s left eyebrow to absorb drops of blood as they oozed. While Weiller lightly pressed a compress over the lacerated thigh, waiting for the doctor to suture it, the Nazi acknowledged neither the outburst nor the subsequent entreaties of his patient to stop the healing labors.

St. John approached Weiller. You have no way to sedate him?

Weiller confirmed with a nod. Just liquor.

I can’t suture his leg or the gash over his eye or remove these bullets without his cooperation. I’ll wind up stabbing him, or worse . . . talk to him, St. John ordered and turned from Weiller.

To give them privacy, St. John walked over to the table with medical supplies, ostensibly surveying them.

Except for morphine or strong analgesics, Weiller was well stocked. He even had some antibiotics on hand. Both knew that the simple aspirin would do little to alleviate surgical and postsurgical pain.

Weiller came to the bedside and knelt. He knelt! It was all too bizarre. For the first time in his life, the American heard German spoken as a gentle, soothing language instead of a series of agitated barks. The language always struck the American as the quintessential language rich with the tones of war and aggression, invented primarily to intimidate its victims. With Weiller, it was sounding like sweet lullaby.

Bitte, General, he started. Erik, du bist mein Freund, mein gutest Freund. He spoke so tenderly. Ich konne nicht . . . dich toten. Frage diese nicht. Ich konne nicht . . . Ich konne nicht . . . du bist . . . ich liebe dich, Erik . . . Hapless, Weiller lowered his head in distress.

Toten Sie mir, General Weiller, the man responded icily to Weiller’s warmth. But the ice melted instantly. Bitte. Ich wolle toten . . . es ist genug . . . es ist genug.

Misha, it is too late . . . you cannot protect this doctor . . . speak freely and let him understand.

Finally, the man spoke in English. Let me go, Max. I am too dangerous to you . . . leave me outside of your camp . . . protect yourself . . . it is enough. I am finished here. I am finished with war, he said with unarguable finality and baffling contentment.

Turning from Weiller in exhaustion, the injured man closed his eyes. He resumed his rhythmic breathing. Then the insight grabbed St. John, and he could not shake it. This man had been subjected to pain, so much so that he had almost become its master, no doubt when he had to endure a recovery from injuries as arduous as the ones he endured when beams fell across his back. His patient had developed immunity, an ability to look pain in the eye and not be intimidated. That ability struck horror in St. John. It was good and safe to be afraid of pain. Fear of pain protects. This man, accustomed to pain, managed it and did not fear it. He became immune to its protective function. He was the perfect warrior, as long as he survived. He was a very dangerous soldier, especially to himself.

Brutally injured, all this man wanted was to be left alone, quite possibly to die from exposure and injuries, if left in the frigid December temperatures unattended. Weiller’s efforts to save him, ignobly betraying his Nazi cause, did not impress the blond enigma enough to give life another chance.

Weiller persisted. The man exhaled deliberatively. Focused, the man listened to Weiller’s pleas. From time to time, he breathed heavily and irregularly into his pain, as if yielding to his pain to rest himself. His eyes were still closed. Weiller’s convincing tones persisted. As if Weiller had cast a spell over this injured man, the man lost consciousness. What a stroke of luck! St. John felt cleared for work. He picked up scissors and proceeded to the bed.

Then he felt that sense of presence. Those eyes were thickly focused on him. They were not friendly. Weiller stepped forward. Dr. St. John deferred to Weiller. Weiller took the doctor’s pair of scissors and continued to cut the sweater from the open chest to the neck. He moved very slowly so as not to incite a wounded beast. The man finally forced eye contact.

With an impatient finality, Weiller asserted, Ja, Misha. Es ist genug . . . it is enough. I understand. At last, Weiller was dejected.

The man broke contact. Apparent by his breathing, pain rippled through him. The blue eyes, like beams piercing that dark room, stared into Weiller’s for a few seconds, as if assessing something. Finally, they softened and closed in resignation.

Ja, Max. Ja . . . Du bist mein gutest Freund. Wearily, the uncooperative blond at last yielded to the truth of their lifelong friendship in this bizarre war, a truth he had hoped to deny to save the Nazi general from his own demise, as the blond had sacrificed himself in the hope of saving his own father. Thus, St. John would eventually come to understand this honorable blond warrior.

The bleeding blond capitulated. You are my dearest friend. He smiled as he raised his right hand, now splotched with the blood seeping from those lame knife wounds on his chest, as if to gesture that he would lay down his weapons and end his resistance.

He was theirs to do with as they saw fit. Into your hands I commend myself, the man murmured. There was a peaceful acquiescence that saturated the room.

He is yours, Weiller told the doctor.

You’re sure? St. John wanted unquestioned confirmation.

Herr Doktor, you will find another knife in his right boot and one in the right side of his belt, perhaps others. If he still wanted to stop us, we would be dead now… This man is lethal. He has surrendered. So as you find the knives, place them in your medical bag for safekeeping. He will want them returned.

Ja? Weiller verified with his unruly patient.

Ja, the man confirmed, eyes closed.

St. John reconsidered his patient’s decision to cooperate for a second or two. But he gave in.

All right . . . all right. I am obliged to tell you that he would have better chances of recovery in a hospital. These conditions aren’t sterile. I’m worried about infections. That bullet in his shoulder is clean, but deep. The one in his side was through and through, but the soft tissue needs some repair, stitching. I could probably slow the bleeding enough to make it safe for him to travel to Gråsten. If there is a hospital there, he’d survive the trip. He’s plenty strong. These injuries are not life-threatening at the moment.

Weiller’s tenor was definite and steady. In any hospital, his identity will be discovered and reported to the Gestapo . They will kill him. It will be an unkind death. What he endures here is more merciful. If he is to die from infections or complications, it is right that he die in caring hands.

St. John began to notice the poetry in Weiller’s language that would always surface when Weiller spoke of this man, when indeed the others surrounding this man spoke of him.

I will find more penicillin and morphine when you no longer need me here to assist. You have his submission. He will resist you no longer. There is nothing more unquestioned than this man’s word. You will come to know this, Herr Doktor.

That was that, concluded St. John.

St. John was very present to the fact that his patient was unprotected from the pain from each incision, from each stitch he made. They had started in midmorning and worked continuously until about two o’clock. Whether this mysterious man was conscious or in pain, there was no more resistance. His patient exhibited peaceful passivity and extraordinary self-discipline while the doctor performed his painful healing. Cleansing, cutting, and stitching, he proceeded while his patient, fully awake, endured the procedures in unflinching silence over a period of a few hours. A battlefield doctor, St. John had never seen anything like this in a patient, not even close.

For lunch, Max put out coarse brown bread and cheese, sausage, some hard-boiled eggs, dill pickles, and pickled beets for them to eat along with some beer. But their patient could not be coaxed to partake. St. John and the general ate in silence. After clearing away the food, the Nazi general went to his outer office and, for the next hour, worked feverishly, using his communications equipment and ordering his staff about. The doctor took the time to rest on the sofa in the general’s quarters. Around half past four, General Weiller returned to find the doctor checking his patient’s pulse.

I must tend to something now that it is becoming dark. Please take any food you find here. I will bring more from the mess when I return. Do not open this door. My soldiers know that I am gone. They believe you were taken from the camp this morning, transferred out of here. In my absence they are forbidden to enter my office, which I will lock. I have told them I am searching for the soldiers who have not returned from morning patrol. Keep this one light on and one in the bathroom for your convenience. I have placed some clean clothes and towels in the bathroom for you to shower. You will feel better not having blood on yourself and uniform. But do not turn on more lamps. It will alert my soldiers. I have left a few books for you to entertain yourself with as he sleeps.

General Weiller spoke while he went around the room, gathering his hat and an old uniform jacket and gloves; his warm, rich leather trench coat was still beneath the injured warrior. Then the Nazi general stopped by the bed.

Can you forgive me my insistence, Misha? The Nazi entreated this man, whom he now revealed as his friend.

Weakly came the understanding, with reserve and dignity.

Ja.

St. John soon learned that the mystery blond exuded conviction and authority with that single word, ja that acknowledged a wealth of comprehension. Uttered by the blond, it was one powerful word.

Weiller waved the American over to the bed.

Misha, I believe I should introduce you to the man who is caring for you and that I should introduce this doctor to the man whose life he has saved.

Ja, Max, this will be my pleasure. The brutish blond was surprisingly charming.

Sehr gut! We begin with rank. Step closer please, Doctor.

St. John stepped within the man’s eyeshot.

General Denman, may I present to you Dr. Michael St. John, captain in the United States Army. Dr. St. John, it is indeed my privilege to present to you, as it should be your privilege to meet, General Erik-Christian Denman of the Royal Danish Army.

Please know it is my honor and pleasure to meet you, Dr. St. John.

The Dane’s poised formality did not overshadow his natural warmth. He was instantly likeable and was the essence of calm, while within St. John a storm of excitement churned. Erik-Christian Denman! Holy Christ! General Erik-Christian Denman. The name raged in the American’s head. It would have been more believable if Weiller had introduced him to Adolf Hitler.

The Danish general extended his right hand outward. St. John had the wherewithal to shake the Dane’s hand but was so caught off guard by the news it was as though he were watching the entire scene as an observer. As expected, the Danish general’s grip was not only confident but also still strong after his recent ordeals. St. John barely heard the Danish general’s accompanying expressions of gratitude for his diligent and patient efforts to restore his body.

The next thing St. John knew, the Dane and the German exchanged a few words. General Weiller found the knife hidden within the Danish general’s highly buffed black leather boot, removing from its inner lining a pearl-handled knife identical to the one that had whizzed past St. John and, with Denman’s deft accuracy, and confidently, plunged into the heart of the Nazi flag a few hours earlier. Analogous to the way the Danish general’s daring acts of sabotage confidently stabbed the heart of the Third Reich.

Weiller slipped the war prize into the Danish general’s hand and he, in turn, placed it in the doctor’s hand. General Denman asked that the doctor accept it not as payment but as a gesture of gratitude. The distracted American somehow heard Weiller tell him to keep it because the handsome weapon would one day be an invaluable war treasure. The doctor remembered seeing the Dane dismiss Weiller’s advice to St. John with mild laughter.

Throughout the surreal revelations, St. John only heard Weiller’s words. It is indeed my privilege to present to you, as it should be your privilege to meet, General Erik-Christian Denman of the Royal Danish Army.

Erik-Christian Denman. Every prisoner of war—maybe every soldier in Europe—knew that name. Erik-Christian Denman. This man was Erik-Christian Denman!

This was General Denman: his men lethal, and his operations brutal and risky. And such a priceless weapon was Denman in the realm of saboteurs that it was said those outside his inner circle never lived long enough to identify the Blond Lion’s face.

Was the esteemed Nazi General Maximillian Weiller using his expensive communications equipment and his resources to defeat the Third Reich by working with the prince of underground resistance, Danish General Erik-Christian Denman?

How much danger was he in? wondered the American doctor.

Chapter 2

Reiner

If Reiner was anything, he was one terrified Nazi soldier. He rambled through the woods as darkness fell. The damp, dark winds were indifferent to his discomfort. The colorless sky was depressing, the trees barren of life. All around was emptiness. Death was in his thoughts. Death was reflected by the dead gray winter around him.

Against his will, while at the same time intriguing him, the scene that morning performed repeatedly before the eyes of his memory. Weiller shot them. He shot his own. The bodies of his fellow soldiers, his friends, were twisted awkwardly from stabbing bullets. There in uniforms now decorated by their blood instead of medals of valor, his comrades had fallen to the ground.

Reiner’s will failed to block their mutilation. He saw again several hundred rounds blown into five soldiers in less than a minute’s time. Their eyes, the eyes of his fallen comrades, appeared as apparitions floating in the chilly winds. Reiner, he could not rid himself of the shock alive in those dying eyes. General Max Weiller stood when they fell. If one moved, Weiller fired again.

Weiller killed his own soldiers.

Then utter silence except for the man’s lament, the blond man in black leather on his knees, with his hands fisted in frustration and his eyes tightly closed by anger.

What had they become to bloody this man as though it were a sport? Soldiers. They had become soldiers, housed in the mind-set of destruction. Yet this man, their victim, also, too, a soldier, this man mourned the deaths of his assailants. Strange man.

Reiner recalled the vision of the blond man in black before him. Fascinating. Before his general the mysterious man knelt. His blood trickled from his left brow into longish blond hair in his face. More blood streamed from his left shoulder where Huber had shot him, from the muscular thigh where they knifed him. Somehow the man did not feel the pain from his injuries; he only seemed injured by the deaths. I am unworthy of this slaughter, General. The tone was that of a defeated man. How strange. Kneeling before his enemy, the man utters this lament in anguish that is not over his own wounds but at the deaths of those who had beaten, shot, and slashed him.

Better for him would Weiller have shot the blond, as he requested, than reduce this magnificent, stoic warrior to this humiliation. Kneeling in the dirt, leaning into the heels of his rather-fine black leather boots, the blond warrior lowered his head toward the frozen dirt. The boots were so clean. Who in war had such clean boots? His fine blond hair fell over his face as it absorbed his blood. In a dignified lament, he whispers, I am unworthy of this slaughter, Max. Then Weiller turns from the bodies and looks at him. He calls him Max; the blond calls the esteemed German General Maximillian Frederick Weiller, Max.

The man kneeling, quickly pulls the knife from the sheath behind his left shoulder and raises it. Despite this animated puzzle, Reiner raises his rifle to protect his general. The fallen man surprises Reiner; he aims not for the general but at his own chest. Standing behind the injured blond, Weiller grabs his wrist outward and squeezes it. Now, finally, the blond man in black resists and wrestles for the knife. He is much too battered from the beating to hold his own. Weiller holds the man’s wrist and pounds the man’s right arm into his knee. The knife falls from the blond man’s grip. Then Weiller holds the man’s wrist and squats to the ground, facing this strong, fierce blond man all in black leather. Weiller whispers Misha, Misha, as if to comfort him.

Es ist genug . . . genug. It is enough, the man whispers to Weiller in German.

Genug . . . genug, in defeat, the blond repeats himself while the blood on his face streams down his cheek and neck—so bright red in that silky blond hair. His eyes, blue as the ocean, are assaulted by grief.

Reiner cannot stand to look into them. He cannot stand to see the grief those eyes bear. Reiner has never seen such compelling eyes; like spears stabbing into one’s soul were those blue, blue eyes, stabbing and opening a soul to its secrets for the man to learn. What kind of man had eyes such as these?

I cannot . . . I cannot bring you to your sanctuary . . . you bleed too much for that trip, Misha, Weiller responds too, in German. Weiller then takes off his own leather coat, such a fine leather overcoat. The Nazi general places it over the blond man’s shoulders for warmth.

Weiller picks up the man’s discarded knife, a handsome knife with a straight thin silvery guard and pearl handle. With it Weiller stabs one of his dead soldiers in the chest, to be seen by all. The sun is gone now, but with regal prominence, the pearl handle glistened in the early-morning sun just hours ago. Next, leaning toward the blond man, who is still kneeling in the warm coat of the Nazi general, General Weiller grips the man’s shoulders. With care, he helps the beaten blond man to his feet. The man can hardly stand now that the soldiers had ravaged him so. Weiller picks up his rifle and slings it over his shoulder, careful still to hold the man steady. Then, grasping this mysterious blond warrior with polished leather boots and blue, blue eyes tightly around his shoulders, Weiller led him to the dirt-brown jeep, also with care that this strange man would not fall. Weiller is a strapping German, but the blond is younger, taller, more broad shouldered. He looks like a Dane. In December, the general removes his overcoat and gives it to this Dane. The general drives to camp several miles in only his uniform tunic.

So Reiner observed this strange behavior.

Reiner has walked and walked for hours already. Why? Who is this blond Misha? Misha, a Russian nickname for a Dane. Russians and Danes are the enemy. Reiner questions everything over and over as he walks, as the late-afternoon darkness set in, looking for the German-Danish border. Where else can he go? Weiller will search for the soldier unaccounted for, Reiner, the one who saw Weiller kill his own soldiers. Weiller, his general, has become his predator.

Reiner walked a while longer. The memories of the sunlight of that morning awakened his recollection of the episode yet again.

They had been on routine morning patrol, three in one jeep, three in another. Weiller trailed them, as if to catch up to them with an urgent message. Ignoring their general, the soldiers, his good friends, drove on. A grave mistake.

As they patrolled, out of nowhere, a motorcycle swerves abruptly in front of the jeep Reiner drives. The blond man in black accelerates that BMW —such a fine machine—but a soldier shot his tire. The tire blows. The motorcycle swerves to the left, and the driver is thrown a few feet off to the side, landing twenty feet before Reiner’s jeep. They stop and soldiers head toward him on foot.

The blond, dressed all in black leather, jacket to boots, was so still. He is dead. Surely, the big, brawny blond is dead. The Nazis approach him. While they are some five feet away, the man, spry like a cat, rolls over and springs onto his feet. With penetrating blue eyes, he is now holding a firearm and calmly poised to kill. Steadily he fires. He strikes the hand of one Nazi soldier holding out his sidearm. The blond is so accurate, so precise that Reiner is shocked by his skill. The blond hit his target and shot the weapon out of Schrader’s hand. The blond did not kill. He does not kill. He swerves around to those soldiers behind him, knowing exactly where each one stood. He fires again at another, hitting him in the thigh. He is power. He alone could take these five. Like deer in the headlights, these Nazis are paralyzed by fear now.

Then, the powerful man in black, with the wide waves in his longish blond hair, stops. He is crazy. The man just stops and studies them. Reiner is fascinated now as he was that same moment hours ago. Those blue eyes scan them. Suddenly, those commanding eyes soften and no longer terrorize them with the intensity of battle but emit the serenity of resolution. The man tosses away his sidearm, far out of his reach, into the brush. He tosses away the knife in his belt at his hip. He spreads his arms to his side. The soldiers, with pistols and poised to shoot, stare a moment.

As he stands, one shoots the blond in the left shoulder. The blond is knocked backwards. They watch. The man stands and spreads his hands to his side. He was surrendering. Even Reiner knew that the man was surrendering. He stands with his arms outstretched to his side in surrender. He does not move. Huber grins and eyes Von Graf. The others watch. Huber shoots him, grazing his right side. Then the soldiers rush him. The five Nazis beat him. His black leather jacket is open, as if this blond were too warm in the December winds. How can he be so warm? With their knives they slash him across his chest, shredding his fine black turtleneck sweater. Blood seeps through. The man does not care that he is slashed.

Reiner watches this man, who stands there. He does not defend with his leg to kick outward as a Nazi picks up the discarded knife and tears his right thigh open with his very own weapon while Huber and Schuller hold him. With the butts of their Gewehrs they bash his ribs to the right, and Heinrich, Reiner’s good friend, smashes his rifle butt into this man’s left wrist pinned behind him.

The man just stands there. He just stands there in utter silence.

Weiller stops his jeep and bolts out of it. Halten, halten! he shouts at them.

Weiller is angry. General Max Weiller is furious. What they had done to this man in just seconds! The soldiers stop and release the blond. He still stands, with blood all over him, a knife in his thigh. Abruptly shoving aside one of his troops, Weiller steps toward this captive. The man stares past Weiller, who puts his hand on the blond man’s wounded shoulder. Then Weiller gently pulls the knife from the man’s thigh. The man sways finally with the pain. But with those frightening blue eyes, he looks cold past Weiller. Weiller brushes the man’s hair aside to see the gash on his brow. The man stands erect. A prisoner scrutinized by his conqueror should show respect to the superior.

This captive had dignity. Then the man watches Weiller take his weapon, his MP 40, from his shoulder. Reiner thinks; We have captured a prize here. Weiller will take credit for the kill. It is only right. He is the general. The man utters finally a word before his anticipated death. Facing the general, he says, Your win is fair, General. I concede to you the victory. The man then stands in silence.

Reiner thinks how is it this blond Dane, a resistance, stands so calmly, not asking for any mercy, as blood trickles from his body to the ground. He stands there, not human.

Weiller says, To shoot you is my defeat, Herr General.

So thinks Reiner, What does this mean? Weiller addresses this prisoner as Herr General. They ravage a general. He has no uniform. He looks more like a criminal, in black, a saboteur.

Then it happens. Weiller turns from the blond in black, the injured bulwark who is beaten but undefeated. The blond man in those exquisite black boots sees the future and blasts out a command that roars like thunder. No . . . no!

The blond lunges forward to block Weiller from his soldiers. But the captive, he is too injured, and Weiller is too quick. After aiming his weapon past the blond, Weiller fires deafening rounds of ammunition into his own men, his own Nazi soldiers.

On the periphery, Reiner escapes. First, he hides behind his jeep. Then he rolls to the safety of the woods only a few feet away. Watching, he breathes heavily.

As Weiller fires, the bleeding blond raises his right hand to push the weapon away, but instead, he staggers barely able to keep his balance. So weak from the beating and bullet wounds. Weiller is too quick. He steps out of reach, firing and firing. His soldiers are falling. Round after round, Weiller fires into his soldiers as they squirm in the dirt, stunned and crying for mercy.

In naked agony, this strange warrior pleads for the lives of soldiers who have just tortured him for pleasure. Their lives were more to this blond stranger than they were to their superior officer. The blond commands Weiller, Nein . . . General . . . General, General, nein, nein, nein . . . bitte, Max . . . bitte!

There is anguish in this man’s voice. The blond man falls to his knees. I am unworthy of this slaughter. Max, once again, he who looks upon me pays for that transgression with his life. Es ist genug . . . it is enough.

For Reiner, nothing makes sense. This strange blond is frustrated by his incompetence to stop the slaughter.

At last, Weiller brought him to his knees. There the defeated blue eyes of this man mesmerized Reiner and shred his soul with his unspeakable anguish over the deaths of more soldiers, the deaths of his enemies. Those beautiful blue eyes told the story of the man’s soul. They were steady like unbending beams of light as he was beaten, lifeless at once, paradoxically full of intensity and control. Now those eyes flashed with horror over these deaths. Again, head bowed to the ground, the blond dressed in black laments. I am unworthy of this slaughter, Max. Whoever looks upon me with contempt pays for it with his life. He had been shamed by Weiller’s actions that saved his life.

Reiner turned away. He could no longer look into those powerful eyes and the bloody carnage. As a soldier, Reiner had been protected. He had been spared the nightmare of war until today. Fifteen minutes earlier, his young comrades were filled with life, anticipating a bit of Christmas. His heart had begun to pound when reality caught up with him. His general was a madman. Weiller was a madman. Nazis would not provide safe haven. It was freezing, and Reiner had no food or money. He was in danger now. He had nowhere to go. He broke out into a nervous sweat.

While Reiner had walked through the woods later that morning, the sun gave way to gray snow clouds. In early afternoon, snow flurries fluttered in the chilly winds. Reiner walked and walked. What to do? Where to go? The soldiers had done what Weiller had forbidden, beaten someone, a stranger who had raised his hands in surrender, a general, no less. They had beaten this skilled and powerful blond Misha with the handsome knives, whom Weiller had addressed as Herr General. Herr General. Herr General? An enemy? A comrade? Not a comrade. The man will not surrender were he a comrade. An enemy? Yes, of course, an enemy. But the overcoat, Weiller gave this man his fine leather overcoat and shot his own to defend this prisoner. An enemy? A friend? Yes, a friend of Weiller’s, clearly so. In black, the color of the night, the color of saboteurs who explode their bridges, burn their offices, and hurl grenades on their convoys. A saboteur, too blond—not German. This saboteur is from Denmark. The man is a Dane, with handsome knives with initials etched in the handles. Misha, in black with knives and initials. Danish. Danish saboteur.

Erik-Christian Denman is blond, and he is a saboteur, and he is a general. And he is a Dane. How could Reiner have been so stupid? he wondered. The stalwart blond Dane is Erik-Christian Denman, the prince of the resistance. These boy Nazis had captured the most notorious saboteur on the continent, Danish General Erik-Christian Denman.

In the chill of that unwelcome cold, Reiner was sweating. Erik-Christian Denman. Erik-Christian Denman. Reiner realized they had captured Erik-Christian Denman. But the man had been out alone, unguarded. How could that be? Denman only traveled through a maze of assorted mercenaries, bodyguards, and decoys. They had had Denman. God Almighty, they had captured Denman! But Erik-Christian Denman on his knees, mourning Nazi deaths. Denman aided by General Weiller. Weiller, a traitor? Weiller protecting Denman? Weiller killing his own to protect this Denman, the enemy? No, not Weiller. Weiller is German. He was bringing in Erik-Christian Denman himself to take the credit. So Weiller punishes his soldiers for injuring this war prize. That must be it.

But Weiller comforts this saboteur, Denman. Misha, Misha, Weiller says. Weiller is Denman’s friend. There is no other logic here. They were beating Weiller’s friend, Erik Denman. Damn it. Weiller has known Denman through the war. Weiller killed his soldiers to protect Denman. They must not know the blond in black leather with the special knives is Denman. Weiller will not let Denman be surrendered to the SS, or Gestapo, to Altvater, who stalks him. Weiller kills his men to help Denman escape, to protect him. This feels right. This is it. So General Maximillian Frederick Weiller is a traitor.

Or was this noble Denman in fact the traitor? But Germans were dead at Weiller’s hand. No. The traitor is Weiller. It is Weiller. But Denman calls him Max. Denman was alone, feeling safe. Maybe meeting Germans. A traitor? But it was Weiller who shot the soldiers as the Dane pleaded that the soldiers be spared. Clearly, at least Weiller was the traitor. Maybe this Denman is just mad, out of his mind, like Weiller.

Back and forth go his confused thoughts.

The hate that blossoms in Reiner at the general he once would protect keeps Reiner warm when the temperatures back down as evening slips into night. The commander turns against his men to save this Misha who destroys German boys, fathers, sons. Yet this Misha, what is wrong with him? He mourns the slaughter. He raises his knife to plunge it through his own chest.

Would Denman have claimed the victory were he in Weiller’s place? wondered Reiner. Denman dead beneath his own knife—how perfect a demise!

What to do? What to do? Go to the Gestapo, SS. But how could he trust them? They are Weiller’s friends. They dine together and vacation with one another. They will not believe Reiner, a nothing when matched against the noble, dignified Weiller, longtime and valued servant of the Reich.

Denman leads Erreger, Danish resistance. Reiner makes a plan. Let Erreger repay Weiller for taking Denman. Let Erreger repay Erik-Christian Denman if he is a traitor. The Cossack, that crazy Russian, the Dane’s first lieutenant, he will, like a savage, tear apart Weiller or Denman, whoever is guilty. The Russian, he will tear the guilty ones apart