Hanging on

presence.
        The soldier in the sidecar pulled a map from between his legs, unfolded it in the light of a hand torch which the driver held for him. A few lanterns burned by the church and rectory, but not enough to help the two Germans. The soldier traced their route with one thick finger on the map, talking to the cyclist as he did so. The driver nodded impatiently and pointed to the crowd in front of them as if to say that the senses could not be denied and the map, therefore, must be all wrong. There was a town by the river, despite what the cartographers had drawn.
        We're dead, Kelly thought. One of them will be unable to believe the map makers were wrong. That's the German way. Believe the printed word before you believe what the eye shows…
        Suddenly, behind the motorcycle, dwarfing it and the houses on the north side of the bridge road, a Panzer jerked forward from the deep forest shadows like a prehistoric sawtoothed reptile smashing its way out of an egg. The wicked black muzzle hole came first, a round mouth in the vaguely illuminated neck of the barrel, a death-spitting orifice that riveted every man's eye. Then came the churning treads, great clattering, banging bands of pitted, bluntly bladed steel that ripped up the broken macadam roadbed and tossed it out behind in fist-sized chunks. Heavy, downsloped tread fenders, thickly coated with mud, shielded most of the tracks from sight but did nothing to soften the terrifying sound of them. The brutally insistent parallel treads snapped and crunched the ground beneath them as a beast might grind up a man's fragile bones in its teeth. Abruptly, the entire tank hove into view: an armadillolike bow with a dragon's middle and stern, scaly and muddy, covered with curious protuberances, green-gray, scarred. The side-hung head lamps had been fitted with blackout caps, permitting only a thin slot of light to lance out from the bottom half of the lenses; the effect was that of a dragon with its eyes slitted while cautiously stalking prey.
        Behind the first behemoth came a second. It broke through the trees, growling close at the tail of the leader, eyes slitted too, adding to the cacophony of tread and engines.
        As Kelly's eyes adjusted to the scene, he could make out a long line of narrow, blackout headlights stretching to the top of the eastward rise and out of sight. We're all dead, Kelly thought. Mashed. Crushed. All destroyed.
        The first Panzer slowed down. Its whirling tracks stuttered noisily. The heavy-duty engines screamed down the musical scale and settled into a deep-throated, unmusical rumble as the tank halted with much shuddering and rattling behind the two soldiers on the motorcycle. Thin white smoke rose lazily from the well-meshed gears inside the tread band, drifted eastward.
        Behind the first tank, the second tank stopped as well, rocking back and forth for a few seconds as its frame worked against its tracks. Along the sloping highway, out to the undefined crest of the dark hillside, the rest of the convoy came to a standstill.
        Major Kelly, or Father Picard as he must now be, was out in front of the other villagers by a full yard. He looked up at the shelved front of the Panzer and wondered what in hell he was doing here. They were all dead. Crushed. Mashed. And worse. Why in the name of the God he didn't believe in-why had they not run away?
        And then he remembered why. They were behind German lines. There was nowhere for them to run.
        On the rectory steps, Lieutenant Beame looked from the tanks to the convent where Nathalie was standing in a nun's habit. He was suddenly, incredibly terrified of losing her. Why had he let Maurice put him off? Why hadn't he knocked that fat old frog on his ass and taken Nathalie? Why hadn't he reacted to Maurice like a man? This was the perfect woman. Nathalie was what he had always dreamed about-and more. They were perfect for each other both spiritually and, he was somehow certain, sexually. He wanted her more than he had ever wanted the other women of his dreams-Betty Grable, Veronica Lake, Lana Turner, Marlene Dietrich, Dorothy Lamour, Ann Sheridan, Rita Hayworth, Hedy Lamarr, Jane Russell, Esther Williams, Greta Garbo, Katharine Hepburn, Ginger Rogers, Mae West, Barbara Stanwyck, cute little Mary Astor, the Andrews Sisters whom he had wanted to assault all at the same time, Bonita Granville, Gene Tierney… Nathalie was more