The Fatal Reunion Raid

"The Fatal Reunion Raid" is the eighteenth episode of the second season of The Rat Patrol. It first aired on January 15, 1968.

Synopsis
Sergeant Moffitt and Private Hitchcock are in a North African town, waiting for Sergeant Troy, who's on his way back from a meeting. Andy (Mac McLaughlin) fills in instead. Suddenly, German planes begin bombing the town. Moffitt orders Hitchcock and Andy to take cover, but then he sees Gabrielle (Louise Sorel), a woman he met some time ago, loved and still loves. Moffitt rushes into the besieged city to look for Gabrielle, but she's already gone.

Moffitt meets back up with Hitchcock and Andy at the Café Afrique, asks about Troy, and apologizes. Soon Troy shows up. Their new assignment is to help the French underground complete the rescue of Pierre Marchand (David Bond), a French fuel scientist captured by the Germans somewhere in Algiers.

Moffitt finds Gabrielle, and they reminisce about their romance. In a flashback, we see that after Moffitt survived Dunkirk with a wounded leg, he hid from the Germans on a French farm owned by Gabrielle's father. She nursed him back to health and they fell in love.

But then Colonel Rettig (Gilbert Green) and his Gestapo thugs came looking for Moffitt, so he had to escape. Moffitt has yearned for Gabrielle all this time, but she's married now: she relates that when Rettig took over her village, life became impossible for her. She left, but Rettig kept looking for her because he wanted her too. Eventually, Gabrielle met an elderly man, Pierre Marchand, who helped her evade the Nazis. Two months later, they were married.

As Gabrielle explains this to Moffitt at night, a car shows up and drops off Marchand, who walks with a cane. He's the man they were waiting for. But it was an ambush, headed by Rettig, now a general who still lusts after Gabrielle.

Gabrielle had reluctantly made a deal with Rettig: she would surrender to him if he freed her husband. But the deal didn't include the Rat Patrol. Rettig doesn't care. Gabrielle pulls a gun on him, and then everyone who can starts shooting, even Pierre. All the Germans are killed, with Gabrielle gunning Rettig down herself.

Afterwards, Moffitt meets Gabrielle at the Café Afrique. They can't be together because Gabrielle has her husband and Moffitt has his duty, and they may never see each other again, but they'll always remember the love they shared. Gabrielle watches as Moffitt leaves with the Rat Patrol, as the yearning solo violin music is abruptly replaced by the triumphant strains of the show's theme.

Main cast

 * Christopher George as Sergeant Sam Troy
 * Gary Raymond as Sergeant Jack Moffitt
 * Hans Gudegast as Hauptmann Hans Dietrich (credit only)
 * Lawrence Casey as Private Mark T. Hitchcock

Note that Justin Tarr as Tully Pettigrew doesn't appear in this episode at all, not even in the opening credits sequence like costar Hans Gudegast, whose character isn't in this episode's story either.

Supporting cast

 * David Bond as Pierre Marchand
 * Gilbert Green as Colonel Rettig
 * Mac McLaughlin as Andy
 * Louise Sorel as Gabrielle Marchand