The Lila Troy Story
by tallsunshine12
Chapter 1
Dietrich watched the singer on the stage with something akin to idol worship. His heart raced, his hands felt clammy, and, ignoring the band in the background, he had eyes only for her.
Dark-haired and dark-eyed, she had a graceful use of her hands which added an allure to her song, itself a melancholy rendering of Body and Soul, a song that had been around for over a decade. She held the mic up to lips he could barely see in the smoky dark of the bar, but he imagined they were warm to touch.
He listened raptly to the chorus of her song:
My life a wreck you're making
You know I'm yours for just the taking
I'd gladly surrender
Myself to you, body and soul
If only he could bring her to his table when she was through her set, this heavenly 'chanteuse,' and buy her a drink, or even dinner!
Afterward, they could walk in the souk together, admiring the stars above the awnings hung from side to side on the streets, which gave shade to the sellers and buyers during the day. He could hold one of her hands to his lips and tell her what his heart was saying, how it was hammering for a short ride with her in the desert.
All of this he'd love to do, but for one thing. Here in this neutral Arab city on the edge of the sea, its crystalline blue a fitting backdrop to romance, he was looking at the cousin—by some extraordinary coincidence—of Sgt. Sam Troy, his greatest foe in the war.
His spies had flushed out that fact. To say Dietrich was surprised that he could fall for Troy's cousin was an understatement. He had enough reason to hate the man 'til eternity, and no reason to think such starry-eyed thoughts of Lila Troy. No reason to hope for a deeper, more amorous relationship with her.
Indeed, he had reason to feel just the opposite. Instead of admiring the stars with her, it would be better for his side, the German side, if he kidnapped her and forced Troy out in the open to rescue her, where Dietrich could finish once and for all his and Troy's rivalry. No more convoy explosions, no more dead soldiers to bury, no more infiltrations of his headquarters by Troy's patrol if Troy himself was a prisoner of war.
But to frighten such a beauty, to see her recoil in fear of him, to feel her anger at sending Troy off to Bardia or some other camp, he didn't see how he could. How had fate carved out this dilemma!
Downing the last of his whiskey, Hauptmann Hans Dietrich, commander of the Axis supply base at al-Qarah, rose from the table and left a tip for the waiter, then made his way up to the edge of the stage. For a few moments, he stood there, watching the American beauty finish her song.
She must have had an intimation he was there, for she turned to him. Seeing his uniform, a German captain's, she looked away, just in time to see her cousin and his men entering the bar. They had agreed to take her home once their meeting was over with their Arab allies in town.
Dietrich, fearing a collision of hasty spirits, nodded at the singer and quietly and quickly left the bar by another exit, one he knew well. He intended to leave town—Biqrah—the next day and head back to his base, but something was going to prevent him.
After her 'set,' Lila Troy spoke with the bandmaster for a few moments, then rushed over to the group of men waiting at the door, collectively known as the Rat Patrol. She hugged Sam for a moment, then still holding his arms, leaned back and looked at the others in turn.
"My, none of you know how to use a razor?" she asked, having to raise her voice over the noise in the bar. Two belly dancers had now taken the stage and assorted catcalls rose and fell in volume as their hips rose and fell in tandem with the music.
Troy laughed his easygoing laugh. "We've been fighting Jerry, Li, while you've been singing to him in this bar."
"To who?"
"Jerry."
"Oh, you mean that tall, rather good-looking German who was just here, the one gawking at me when I was on stage?"
"That's him." Troy was sterner than he wanted to sound. "What's he want?"
"How should I know, Sam? My autograph, maybe?"
"Tell him you'll give it to him only if he surrenders," said one of the two younger men in the group, Tully Pettigrew, Sgt. Jack Moffitt's driver.
Hitch, Troy's driver, laughed and added, "Tell him to bring his sword."
"Yeah," said the urbane Englishman, Moffitt, "and only if he falls on it."
"I gather, from the way you guys are talking, he's not one of your favorite people?"
Troy chuckled. "That'd be putting it mildly. You're finished? Can we go now?"
The four men escorted Lila back to her shared apartment, her roommate like Lila a singer who had followed the Americans when they landed in North Africa back in late 1942. It was in a slightly seedy area on the outskirts of town. Troy didn't like the look of the place. There was an aura about the area that didn't set well with his brotherly feelings towards Lila.
"Claire, I suspect, is out," she said, looking up at the dark apartment window. "She sings in a different cantina than I do."
Claire's father had some pull with the State Department, so the girls had been able to receive permission to enter a war zone, in exchange singing their hearts out for lonely soldiers. Biqrah was a town which had not declared itself for one side or another. Still, there was danger in just being in a time of turmoil in the country.
Troy had not been happy first to receive a telegram telling of their arrival and then the girls themselves on this side of the Atlantic. But he had never been able to tell his cousin, his Uncle Nick's daughter, how to behave.
Lila had always been headstrong. She loved adventure. When only the stars provided light, she liked to ride out—alone—on the meadows on Nick's Colorado ranch, about a stone's throw from where Troy and his folks lived. Sometimes, if he was visiting, he joined her. If he didn't break a leg, he was afraid his horse would.
Now, almost thirty and still unhitched, she had a charming voice, but over the years she had 'charmed' way too many men with it, and Troy feared that one of them—Dietrich—might use her to try to get at Troy himself.
He'd seen Dietrich's interest in her that night, and he feared it was not all on the up-and-up. What better way to capture the leader of the Rat Patrol than to lure his cousin into his Kubelwagen for a night ride on the desert?
Troy had made a pledge to himself there and then. If he hurt her, even if it was to bring a tear to her eye, there wasn't a cave he could hide in or a rock he could crawl under. Troy would find him and 'deal' with him as he saw fit.
On the walk home from the bar, Troy filled Lila in on her mysterious admirer, Hauptmann Hans Dietrich of the Afrika Korps. Even if, as honorable men, they shared a grudging admiration for one another, he and Troy had no love for one another. They were rivals, desert rivals, poised like archers to see who could shoot the farthest.
At her door, Lila bid the men of the Rat Patrol good night, with another hug for Sam. She lightly kissed him on the cheek. He wanted to come up, to see for himself that no one had broken into her apartment, but she insisted he go and get some rest for the night. He was done in, as he and his fellow Rats had driven over sixty desert miles that day to arrive at Biqrah for the meeting.
"We'll wait here until you're up safely," he said, glancing up at the window. He'd been in her apartment once already, when he first arrived, but now it had a sinister feel to it.
"Oh, Sam, you're treating me like a ten-year-old."
Sam Troy laughed, saying, "Remember what you did when you were ten-years-old? That horse you tried to break?"
Lila rubbed her hip at the sudden recollection of the fall off Blazer's back and nodded. "Alright, wait here then. I'll turn the lights on and if they go off suddenly, you'll know someone's got me."
"Lila," Troy tried to sound stern, even though he knew she was teasing, "be careful."
"You, too, Sam. Night, guys!" She waved at the other three and then climbed the outside steps to her second floor apartment, opening the door with a key. Before entering, she waved again. "Thanks!" she yelled down and then slipped inside.
The lights came on and they didn't go off 'suddenly,' so no one had gotten her.
"Come on, we've got to get some shut-eye," Troy said, gathering up his men—his flock—and turning back towards the main section of town where their own digs were.
"Admirable girl," observed Moffitt, smiling up at the window. "I wouldn't mind dating her myself."
"You'll have to fight Dietrich for her," said Tully, ominously. Troy looked at him. Maybe he was right.
The next day, Lila donned a head scarf—for respect's sake—and journeyed down to the souk. The sea breeze mingled with the odors of spices, and the noise of the hawkers was at odds with the snorting of lonely goats.
She had a grim feeling of being watched as she moved through the booths, soaking up the atmosphere and buying tiny trinkets here and there for friends back home. Figuring it was Sam, or one of his men, she stopped to wait for the 'lurker' to come out of hiding.
When he did, who should she see but the tall drink of water that was the German who had stood at the stage last night, unabashedly admiring her? He stood in a sunny corner, and was by no means hard to spot.
It was time to move on, for she could see the Arab barker she had been told to meet. He was wearing a striped red turban and had a dark beard with streaks of gray in it. Lila stopped at his booth, then turned around to see if the German captain was still there. He didn't appear to be.
"Thank you, Nazir," she said, reaching out her beringed hand and taking the small envelope he had pulled out of his sash. "I will give this to Laurent."
"Ma'a salama," said the older man, who wished he had a daughter of such beauty as the girl before him. Lila knew enough Arabic to smile and repeat the phrase, meaning "Go in peace," essentially goodbye.
Dietrich watched her as she briskly walked, without turning back, to the gates of the souk. She had what she came for, besides the gewgaws he had seen her buy, and now she was off to give the packet to … to who? Troy?
Was she working a side hustle helping the Rat Patrol? How unlike Troy though to use his cousin in that way. Whatever she was doing, or whoever she was working for, she was playing a dangerous game. These Arabs were men of the desert first, and of civilization second. In seconds, they could be quick, brutal, and decisive, after seeming to be a friend the moment before.
Dietrich knew them. What he didn't know was what was in the envelope. It was flat, like a sheath of papers. A trinket it was not.
Maybe he was making too much of this. Perhaps the envelope had only contained directions to the house of a beautician or dressmaker. He decided to follow her to see if Lila would reveal how important the packet was. He leaned up from the warm, sunny wall and turned his long legs in her direction, the direction of the gate.
This time, however, he behaved a bit more surreptitiously, not wanting her to realize his presence. What she did next didn't surprise him. She first of all went to her apartment, probably to unload her sundry purchases and to rest for a while in the heat of the day. He knew he had to wait for her to reappear again, if she did.
In two hours, well before the time she would have gone to the bar, she came out of the three-story rooming house and strode up the street. She had changed her dress to a pair of loose-legged pants and flowing top. The scarf was gone. She wasn't heading to any place where Arabs would likely see her.
Staying as far back as he dared, he walked up the same streets, down the same alleyway, and to the sea where she entered a low dwelling close to the beach. He found a convenient set of crates to hide behind and leaned out to watch.
After about thirty minutes, Lila and a man who Dietrich didn't recognize, a Frenchman by his dark Gallic looks, stepped out and embraced. It was not a casual embrace, or a brotherly one such as Troy had given her the night before. This embrace was all-business, and not of the money-changing kind, either.
"Who is he?" Dietrich thought to himself. "What does Sgt. Troy know about this? Dare I ask him?' He was amused by the thought of going up to his enemy and saying something like, "Do you know the man your cousin is seeing, Troy?"
Just for sticking his nose in where it didn't belong, he might get it shot off with Troy's Colt .45. In any case, he didn't think Troy would be best pleased to know that Hauptmann Dietrich was 'tailing' his cousin around Biqrah.
After disengaging from the man, who didn't seem to want to let her go, but who looked longingly after her, Lila rushed back to the apartment and there Dietrich stopped following her. He had some research to do. From his own contacts he discovered that the dwelling she had entered on the beach was a hotbed of partisan activity.
The man she had met—and made love to—was a well-known ringleader of the partisans, currently hiding out here in neutral Biqrah until the 'heat' died down in German-held Benghazi. So she was passing intel to a Resistance leader? Would Troy condone that, even if it was done on the side of the Allies? Dietrich didn't think so.
Would he like her deliberately exposing herself to the same fate as members of the Resistance themselves would meet if they were caught? Dietrich considered. Perhaps it was time to have a talk with the sergeant, if he could safely enter Troy's orbit without getting his German head blown off.
He decided to stay in town one or two days longer, rather than go back to al-Qarah. al-Qarah was the oasis town where he trucked supplies in from the ships on the coast, and then sent them out again to the German fighting forces on the front lines.