ending?

I assumed Martin entered the tiny town with a dead woman in his arms and word quickly spread - even back across the border to the Nazis.

Actually a .22 can be more deadly and from a longer range than many high powered rifles (not to be a jerk here, I know what you're saying) but, for the record, the .22 bullet has a tendency to enter the body, bounce off a bone (rib etc.,) and shatter into a multi pronged glob of lead that then continues to bounce around damaging multiple internal organs on its way to its final resting place.Doctors have a hard time saving the victim because,although the entry wound is evident,just where the bullet traveled to, and what damage it did as it spun around internally, becomes a guessing game and a race against the clock, without x-ray equiptment etc. immediately available. A .22 can be deadly from up to a mile away ! In fact, in my home town, a woman was hanging clothes in a closet when an errant slug from a hunters .22 rifle, from almost a mile away, came through the window and killed her where she stood! Absolutely true story.High powered rifles slugs at times go clean through the body - of course most of the time a vital organ is destroyed beyond help but they have been known to pass clean through missing vital organs and not killing the victim. Internal bleeding from the .22 slug is what's most troublesome as it is usually from multiple internal wounds from a single slug. If you go by the reaction of the victim in this movie I would guess a high velocity rifle like the .22 ! She was able to speak, did not appear to be in too much pain and it took awhile for her to die. This is what you would expect to happen to a victim of a .22 rifle slug if the victim was being carried some distance with no immediate medical intervention - slowly bleeding to death as the seconds ticked by. Yes, I know, this is a Hollywood ending and yes more than likely the Nazis would have been toting high powered rifles. I just wanted to clear up the ".22 small caliber so not as deadly" mis conception most people have. It can, at times, be VERY deadly and from a long ways away !

LOL !!!

I think that is the magic of the ending, you can wonder if he assumed Freya was dead, she was limp when Martin Skied off with her and the blood in the snow.

Which could leave some viewers to wonder if once they got out of range of the Mauser's he could use his veterinary knowledge to save her or check her wound.

Overall the death of our heroine in this movie helped to cement the idea that stance the brothers had taken was extremely wrong and that Stack's character had came to that realization too late.