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"Don't talk nonsense. You seem to forget there's several feet of snow in the woods. Under the circumstances, they wouldn't take a long walk."
    "If they had skis perhaps."
    "Skis!" Giesinger turned quickly to Meisel: "Did you see any skis?"
    The captain shook his head. "I don't think they did have skis. Unless they laid them by somewhere."
    "Hardly likely." Giesinger looked at Schmitt. "You over-rate these scum. It's all right for a dozen of them to attack defenseless people, they can think that one up—but their imagination won't stretch any further. We'll give them a lesson they won't forget in a hurry."
    "I wouldn't do anything drastic without getting Corps' consent," said Major Fuchs, commander of the reconnaissance unit. Giesinger waved this aside. "If we can inform Corps that we've freed the general, everything will be quite all right, my dear Fuchs. We haven't got time to wait for any bureaucratic decisions. Colonel Kolmel said nothing about our not taking any action."
    "Nor about our taking any," commented Fuchs, and several of the other officers nodded approvingly.
    Giesinger sprang to his feet. "I wonder what the general would make of your attitude," he snapped.
    Fuchs looked lazily up at him: "What's the matter with you? You don't imagine this thing leaves me cold, do you? It's just that on principle I'm against ill-considered actions. Besides, as you very well know, it's only an hour since my men got back, frozen and exhausted. I wouldn't dream of sending them out in the cold again now."
    Giesinger decided it would be wiser to give way for the moment. "Nobody said anything about that," he answered, "I was thinking of Herr Schmitt. The reconnaissance unit were the rearguard," he explained to Schmitt, "and they only returned an hour ago. But your men have been rested, have they not?"
    Schmitt had seen it coming. He sat up straight, and said coldly: "Would you like to hear my opinion?"
    "Yes?"
    "Then I must express strong disagreement. My men are also dead tired, and I protest against their being sent into action so soon again."
    "They'd still have been in action now if I hadn't brought them to Kosice."
    "I know. But then they wouldn't have been on the road all night."
    "They'd have been working the whole night in their trenches."
    "Not as bad as twenty-five miles' march in snow. You seem to forget. . ."
    "And you seem to forget," said Giesinger loudly, "that I didn't call you here for a debate."
    "Please, gentlemen," put in Fuchs; but Giesinger would not be deflected. "So you don't want to?" he said, looking down at Schmitt.
    "No."
    "Interesting. Captain Schmitt doesn't want to. Captain Schmitt is asked to rescue his general from the partisans, and he doesn't want to. I must say you've established your independence pretty quickly. But we can perhaps make it simpler: I now give you an official order to leave with your battalion immediately and make all possible efforts to recover the general. Has anyone here any objections?" His cold eyes ranged over the officers' faces. They were silent. Sensing their irresoluteness, Giesinger threw caution to the winds: "I’ll take responsibility."
    "If it goes wrong," said Fuchs, "well, you know what can happen to you."
    Giesinger bit his lip. For a moment he felt uncertain, and his heart began thumping. But this was the chance of his life: suppose he succeeded in freeing the general! The idea intoxicated him. "That's my worry," he said, "Has anyone else any objections?"
    "We're talking too much," declared Meisel, laying his injured arm on the table. "If I were able to, I'd get going at once. Giesinger's right, we must teach the rabble a lesson. If you'd seen how ..." He stopped for a moment and stared in front of him, then raised his head. "They can't have got far yet, we mustn't lose any time."
    "Indeed we mustn't." Giesinger sat down again, and said to Fuchs: "You'll admit yourself that it would be futile to ask Corps first. We'd have lost hours before the gentlemen made up