Late that afternoon a nurse had come to Luis’s bedside. She’d handed him orders to report to this train at the Belgorod station. Apparently Grimm got the same orders. Luis was being sent to defend another yappy fat man, Mussolini. Luis would recuperate in Rome, then take over a panzer company. He would get another Tiger in the sunny south, in a coastal town named Anzio.
‘… put you in for a medal, you know. The Iron Cross Second Class. I heard about all the Red tanks you knocked out in that damn sunflower field.
Splendid, Captain. You deserve it! And since this is the second time you’ve been wounded in battle, you’ll be getting your silver wound badge…’
Luis heard the talk of medals the way a man listens to the plops of stones landing at the darkness of a well. He dropped the medals into the darkness, plop, plop. They were not enough to give him back Barcelona, the Ramblas, his father. He was starting over. In Italy.
He watched Russia recede in his window. Adios. The moonlit flats were heaped with Grimm’s assessments of failure here, describing the expanse as impregnable, no one had ever conquered it for long. Maybe he’s right, Luis thought. Perhaps it was better to get out of here and head south. He thought about Prokhorovka. What had happened? What in hell was that old T-34 driver screaming at the end? What was he saying? What did he want?
Luis licked his dry lips. A dart of pain pricked in his stitched chin. The pain swept the Red driver out of his head, out into the bland deluge of Major Grimm’s monologue. Luis didn’t care what the crazy old Russian had been yelling. Whatever it was, Death had answered him. The Russian was not going to haunt Luis, there would be no more throbs in his hand like the partisan or the bulls, no. The darkness in Luis left no room for the weakness of curiosity, no dilution of the mind or will, no pride, and certainly no ghosts.
Stay empty, the dark told him. See how powerful you have become.
It’s simple: first the bullet outside Leningrad, then that crazy old Russian at Prokhorovka. They were sent to you, to change you and make you stronger.
You have nothing.
You are nothing, nothing but la Daga.
It will take something stronger than Russia to kill you.
* * * *
CHAPTER 33
July 16
2350 hours
fifty kilometers north of Khar’kov
Ukraine/Russian border
Colonel Plokhoi was first out of the bushes. A moment after the blast on the rail mound, before the echo was gone from the trees where they hid, he ran from cover with his submachine-gun braced at the hip, chasing his bullets over the open ground. Katya leaped out with the waves of dark partisans, following Colonel Bad, shouting and shooting their weapons into the roofs and sides of the tipping train.
The locomotive careened off the splintered rails and continued on, teetering on its betrayed wheels until it crashed over. Momentum carried it another twenty meters on its side until it plowed to a halt in the scarred earth. The locomotive lay on its side steaming and hot, a ridiculous posture for a great machine. There it lay dying in gushes. It was ignored by Plokhoi and his swarming partisans, who dashed for the five passenger cars. The locomotive had dragged each of the cars off the blown tracks, so that the entire train spilled down the rail mound into a heaped jumble. Smoke roiled from the C-3 explosion and the dirt spewed into the night air, and now the barrels of many weapons added their gunsmoke. Bullets punched holes in the cars’ thin frames, paint chipped and bare metal halos showed around every puncture. Partisans ran close and tossed grenades into the shattered windows. The blasts shook the downed cars again, fabric inside began to burn. The partisans stepped back and fired, fired, fired into the cars. Katya lowered her rifle. She hadn’t shot it more than twice, she’d seen little need to add her small bark to the furious baying of Plokhoi’s men.
Three machine-guns were hustled forward and flung down on tripods.
When they opened up the sound was like hail, ting ting ting ting, faster than a drum roll. The machine-guns shredded everything in front of them, the shooters swiveled the barrels back and forth without aim, loaders lavished them with belts of ammunition. The partisans emptied their guns into the German train. The night glimmered to the constellation of muzzle flashes, all else was black and grisly. Nothing answered from the cars themselves, not even screams. Where was the time to scream or shout to surrender?
The soldiers who’d been asleep awoke to the shock of their world tilting, they tumbled off their seats and benches, dashed against shifting walls and railings, then danced on the strings of these ten thousand bullets fired by a hundred angry fighters who had no interest in taking prisoners.
Katya ran close to Plokhoi. The partisan leader shouted with his trigger pressed, until his magazine was emptied. He dropped the spent gun on the ground and stood spent as well, out of breath and bullets at the same time, a perfection for him.
Plokhoi fired a flare pistol into the air. When the green light struck, everyone quit shooting. Katya gazed into the rent darkness of the besieged cars. Nothing came from them, no light or sound, not even a creak. They were dead, when seconds before they’d been steaming past, headed out of Russia. Now they would stay. The only noise left to the night was the locomotive sighing, sounding sad for this carnage. Katya stepped forward, past Plokhoi, to do her job. She was joined by Ivan, Josef, and Leonid.
The rest of the partisans receded into the trees without a word. This massacre required nothing more from them. The three machine-guns were lifted off their tripods and hauled back. Plokhoi held his ground, standing over the cooling weapon at his feet.
‘You’ve got five minutes.’
Josef answered, ‘Yes, sir,’ into the darkness feathering around the partisan leader.
Katya slipped her hand under Leonid’s elbow. ‘You shouldn’t be here, Leonya. It’s too soon.’
‘Shit,’ he grunted, leaning on her arm to keep up. ‘So this is what fighting on your feet is like. No wonder we became pilots.’ A rifle hung in his free hand. She’d never seen him carry a gun before.
Katya hurried Leonid as much as his healing injuries allowed over the last of the open ground. Ivan and Josef went ahead, reaching the first of the passenger cars. Josef peeked inside through the sieve that was made of the roof, then moved to the second fallen car. When Katya and Leonid caught up at the third car, Ivan had boosted Josef over the perforated roof onto the tilted side. The old man walked along the row of blasted-out windows, peering down into the shambles inside, gripping a ready pistol.
Katya gaped at the number of holes in the car, amazed that the remaining metal did not buckle under his weight.
‘Alright,’ Josef said to the three of them waiting. ‘This one will do.’
With that, he disappeared, lowering himself into the bowels of the car.
Katya would not let herself imagine what he landed on, what he walked among.
Josef’s voice strained through the perforations in the roof.
‘Someone get up on top. Let’s go!’
Ivan pulled from his ever-present backpack four muslin sacks. He tossed them to Leonid, then moved close to the car. He linked the fingers of both hands to make a step.