Such a vast expenditure of effort, for what? An extravagant, almost profligate expenditure of man and machine hours to defend an insignificant unit in a quiet sector. Perhaps the answer would become clear in the morning. Time enough to puzzle over it then. At least he wouldn’t be waking up with a hangover again, and the nagging worry as to what he might have caught this time.
“Dooley wants a word with you, Major.”
“Can’t it wait until the morning, Sergeant Hyde. And what’s come over him that suddenly he should decide to do things the correct way. Usually he simply saunters over and starts a conversation.”
“I’ve no idea. He’s been acting funny all evening.”
“In what way?”
“He’s gone quiet.”
“I see what you mean. Well, send him over. Let’s see what it’s all about.” So what would it be this time? Since he’d first had him under his command, Revell had seen their antitank expert materialize a hundred or more ailments or excuses. All were imagined and all were intended to get him off some detail he didn’t fancy. He should have asked his sergeant what guard duty Dooley had drawn. That might have offered an explanation. But Dooley going quiet… that was a new one.
“Permission to speak, sir.”
The “sir,” and the salute which accompanied it were definitely unique phenomena. It put Revell on his guard immediately. With the exception of Old William, who never offered more than a nod of recognition to officers, Dooley was probably the least military of any of his men.
“I’m listening.”
“It’s a rather personal matter, sir.”
Revell looked about. They were fifty meters from the closest vehicle, as much again from the nearest sentry. “We’re as alone as we’ll ever be.”
Despite that reassurance Dooley still made his own check of the surrounding gloom. “I’d like to apply for leave, sir. On compassionate grounds.”
That was more like it. They were now on familiar territory. It was a ploy he recognized, and prepared to meet it. In the last twelve months Dooley had alleged the death of all his relatives down to second cousins, in similar attempts. Whatever his reason, it wouldn’t take a moment to knock down. They’d had no mail for a month so he wouldn’t be easily able to pluck any long lost uncle who languished on the threshold of death.
“Go on.”
“I want to get married.”
All of Revell’s stock replies went out the window.
“Why?” Even as he said it he realized it was a stupid damned thing to ask, but in the shock of the moment it was all he could come up with.
“I’m in love, sir.”
“Known the young lady long?” Suspicion lurked in Revell’s mind. “It is a young lady, is it? Not one of the, shall we say, more mature females I’ve seen you with.”
“She’s about twenty… twenty-five… well, about that, sir.” Understanding began to dawn on the major. “So how long have you known this young lady of twenty or possibly twenty-five, with whom you are so in love.”
“Since about this time yesterday, Major.”
“And her name?”
This time Dooley didn’t blurt out his response. He shifted from one foot to the other, looking at the ground.
“Actually… well we didn’t… that is, we didn’t get down to exchanging names.”
“A case of actions speaking louder than words, I take it. You’re not thinking of chasing off after her, are you?”
“You know me better than that, Major. Request denied then, is it, sir?” It would have been easy for Revell to dismiss the matter as a joke, but for all he knew Dooley could be quite serious, if not very practical. Certainly stranger things had happened to others in the combat company. Burke’s transformation, for instance.
The eldest, until Vokes’s pioneers had joined them and brought Old William along, a real old soldier and barrack room lawyer, he had changed overnight when Karen Hirsh had come on the scene. The chubby little nurse, barely out of her teens, had really got to him.
And there was Libby, one of their most reliable men. He’d deserted, gone back into the Zone to look for his Helga.
“I think you’ve got to get things on a more realistic footing first, don’t you? We’ll be through here in a couple of weeks. Look her up then. At least that’ll give you a chance to get better acquainted, maybe find out her name.”
Dooley grinned, and all thought of saluting forgotten, wandered off wearing a thoughtful but satisfied expression.
Maybe, Revell thought, he should have squashed the idea flat, but what the hell. For all his faults, Dooley was a good infantryman. If he needed a dream to keep him going, and it was more realistic than his vague plans to become a roving toy-boy in Miami, who was he to shatter it.
In a way he could even envy him. All Revell had got out of the previous night was the fulfilment of a physical needs. His girl had been good in bed, too good perhaps, if the ache in his back and the soreness of his penis was anything to go by. Yes, let Dooley keep his dream. Most likely it would only last until the next hooker came along, or until his forever scheming brain was again immersed in plans of servicing every rich widow and generous divorcee in Florida.
Still, he’d rather his men brooded over matters of that sort than dwell too much on their chances of coming through the war alive, and in one piece. Not that in all truth there was the slightest possibility of any of them managing that miracle.
As he made his way to his Hummer, and an uncomfortable night on the ground beside it, he thought of Thome. His future was a standard issue coffin in a military cemetery that stretched as far as the horizon. It was not enough that his remains were slashed and mutilated beyond recognition. A final indignity would be his interment in a plot especially reserved for contaminated corpses.
Strange to worry about spreading poison to a plot only six by six by two, when millions of acres of Europe were already contaminated by chemicals and bacteria and massive doses of radiation.
Even when you were dead the Zone still clung to you, keeping you an outcast, forcing you to remain a part of it.
Revell gave himself a mental shake. He was thinking too much, and about the wrong things. Shouting aboard one of the buses drew his mind away, and for once he welcomed the diversion.
TWELVE
“At this rate we’ll be able to take back those that are left alive in just the one bus.” Revell scowled at the three bodies the dawn roll-call had produced. “Will somebody close their eyes.”
Sampson bent down to do it.
“And while you’re at it, check those wounds. What caused them, and how long ago?” Pacing up and down in front of the shuffling Russians, Revell noticed that all avoided catching his eye. They were an ugly and disreputable looking crowd to begin with. The furtive behaviour did nothing to improve his opinion of them. It was obviously assumed, as on turning around, he would sometimes catch one slyly grinning at the corpses, or nudging his companion in the ranks and offering a whispered comment. The instant they realized they were observed down would come the attitude of shifty subservience, like a veil across their face.
While Sampson made a quick inspection of the bodies, Scully went through their pockets. Most were already pulled inside out and he found only a single rifle round that had slipped through a hole in a coat lining.
“Two of them got it real quick, Major.” Sampson looked up at the officer as he wriggled fingers through a small tear in the chest panel of a shirt.” The one on the end, with the red beard, I reckon he bled to death. Must have taken a couple of hours. He’s still warm, so if it all happened about the same time then, maybe around 3 AM would be a pretty accurate guess.”