“It’s low, buddy, I’ll sure go along with that. Well, it’s done, and nothing we can do about it. Let’s get down to hard facts, buddy: How many people did you lose?”
“Too goddamn many. I lost just about twenty-five percent. Another ten percent wounded so badly they’re out of action for weeks-maybe months.
Equipment fared a lot better. We got ninety-five percent of our howitzers and armor out.”
“Thirty-five percent of your command, then?” Ben questioned, a deep and very personal sense of loss touching him. He knew every man and woman in every unit.
“At least.”
“Don’t feel too badly, Ike. My figures are just about the same as yours. Cecil’s bunch took one hell of a pounding, too. He lost almost forty percent. And I hate to see Hector’s losses when he comes in.”
“I know he took a beating. When Hec’s left flank caved in-wrong choice of words-was overrun-he lost an entire company right there. Last radio contact I had with him, he told me he took some heavy losses. Striganov really threw some people at him. Hec told me he was outnumbered four, five to one.”
“I’ve sent out scrambled messages for any survivor to the east to come across at Cairo. That’s why I asked you to leave people there. I got a hunch they’ll be in pretty bad shape. Chase is sending medical teams over there to assist.”
“You heard Maiden’s dead?”
“No. I hate that. We were beginning to be friends. Mark Terry?”
“I just heard he was wounded, but managed to get out. He rescued one young woman from the front of an APC.”
“They’ll be drifting in pretty soon, I imagine. I hope so. We’re going to need all the warm, breathing bodies we can muster.”
“Plans?”
Ben shook his head. “I don’t know what we’re going
to do, Ike. I want a fully attended meeting of the minds as soon as everybody gets in.”
“I wonder if the Russian knows how really weak we are?”
“I doubt it. And he must not find out. If he threw everything he had at us right now, he’d hammer us into the ground.”
It was a downhearted and beaten group of men and women that straggled southward toward Cairo, Illinois. Although they did not speak of the horror, the picture of the naked women lashed to the front of the APC’S and the old people stumbling along, frightened and humiliated, was a mental scene none could erase from their minds.
And for many, the thought nagged at them: Was I acting cowardly by refusing to shoot?
It was a question that many would never resolve to any degree of satisfaction.
Mark and Peggy encountered the first group of troops from New Africa at Du Quion, Illinois. Mark, his resentment toward them still a hot fire within him, at first would not acknowledge their presence. He drove past them without speaking, waving or even looking directly at them. Outside of the deserted town, he pulled over, conscious of Peggy’s unwavering stare on his face.
He parked on the shoulder, sighed and then cut off the engine. He turned to face her. “What is it you want me to do, Peggy?”
“I want you to go back and rally your people. The fight isn’t over, Mark. The fight can’t ever be over until
the Russian and Hartline are both dead and the dream of… of the master race is dead with them.”
“Those people back there are cowards,” Mark said, jerking his thumb in the direction from which they had just come.
“Oh, Mark, they aren’t any more a coward than you are. And in your heart you know that’s true. They’re confused and troubled and I’m sure they feel they let you down.”
“Let me down? Hell, they did let me down! And not just me. They let Ben Raines down. And there is something else, Peggy. I keep replaying that awful scene in my mind, over and over. And I keep asking myself this: If those people lashed to the front of those APC’S, those people being herded in front of the troops, if those people had been white instead of black, would my troops have stood their ground and fired?”
“Oh, Mark! How could you even think such a thing? That’s-was
“No, Peggy, let me finish. This is something-what I’m about to say-I argued and debated with Al many times. And I think, I believe, the events of the day before yesterday prove me right. There is still a lot of hate among the races in this country; and it is not one-sided as Al used to preach. I’m sorry he was killed; he was coming around, getting his head on straight. The nation, if there is to be a nation, cannot exist the way we were going. I mean, Hispanics in one part of the country, blacks in another, whites in yet another. Damn it, Peggy, that isn’t democracy. Our young people aren’t-weren’t-getting an accurate picture of life. I’m not African-I’m an American. I don’t speak Swahili-I speak English. Al could never understand,
I could never make him see, that I didn’t give two hoots in hell about the internal politics of Uganda. I was too concerned about what was happening in this nation. I don’t want to wear tribal robes and stick a bone in my nose. Jesus Christ. That was part of the problem with many whites refusing to accept blacks.
“Look at Cecil Jefferys; he’s never had any problem in his entire life being accepted-anywhere. And do you know why? I’ll tell you why: He dressed well; he spoke proper English and insisted his kids do the same. He didn’t try to excuse bad grammar by saying it was part of the black culture. He knew, just as I know, that is pure bullshit. Bad grammar is bad grammar. Period. I cannot for the life of me conjure up any image of Vice President Jefferys doing any shuckin” and jivin’.”
Peggy laughed aloud at the expression on Mark’s face.
“You mean Mr. Jefferys calls a spade a spade?” she said with a grin.
“I’ll have to remember that one,” Mark said, returning her smile. “Cecil will get a kick out of that. Yes, that’s true, Peggy. He calls a spade a spade. Cecil, as does Ben Raines, knows there are classes of people: just as there are bigoted, ignorant rednecks in the white race, there are ignorant, bigoted niggers in the black race.” He smiled at her. “Sorry, Peggy-I didn’t mean to preach at you.”
“No, it’s all right. I like what you’ve said. Go on.”
“All right, I’ll lay it all out for you. I’m linking up with Ben Raines. I think that’s what we have to do if any of us are going to make out of this situation. Those people back there-was he jerked his thumb-“if
they want to live under those rules, those conditions, those ideas that Ben and Ike and Cecil put forward-then fine, that’s what we’ll do. I’ll put what happened on the ridges out of my mind, forgive, if not forget, and we’ll join Ben Raines and try to beat this IPF thing. Those that want to go on back to New Africa and stick a goddamn bone in their noses … well, to hell with them.”
Her dark, serious eyes never left his face. “You must think Ben Raines hung the moon and the stars in the heavens, Mark.”
He shook his head. “No, I don’t think that at all, Peggy. Ben Raines is just a man, with faults like all the rest of us. And I don’t agree with all he says. As a matter of fact, I hated him at first. Until I began to wise up to what he was saying: no free rides. And then he began to make sense to me. His Tri-States worked, Peggy. It really worked. All races lived there, honey. All races. And Ben Raines did it. He made it work.”
“I’ve never met the man. But I have seen his picture.”
“He’s …” Mark paused, searching for the correct words. “Ben Raines is impressive. He … exudes power and confidence. And something else, you may as well hear it from me: A lot of people believe Ben Raines sits awfully close to a higher power.”
Disbelief sprang into her eyes. “And what do you believe, Mark?”
Mark sighed, many different emotions surging through his mind. “I… don’t know. I don’t want to believe that. But I’ve heard so many stories about him. And I know that many of them are fact. Peggy, the man’s been shot two dozen times; he’s been stabbed,