James Benn - A Mortal Terror

Machine-gun fire ripped through the air, probing the ditch we’d just left. I felt the air vibrate above me as the rounds searched farther afield, stitching the earth, hoping for flesh.

The line halted. Father Dare, at the front of the litter, nearly collided with the medic. An awful groaning sound rose up ahead of us, and I knew someone had been hit. A stray bullet, I hoped for the rest of us. For the man hit, it made no difference. We laid down the litters and Father Dare gave the other wounded men water. We waited while impatient murmurs ran up and down the line. I was the last man, and felt nothing but the white emptiness of death behind me. I fought the urge to leap out of the streambed and run for it, taking my chances with speed and leaving this ghostly, slow retreat behind.

Minutes passed, and we began shuffling along again. I lost track of time, hunched over, carrying the burden of a badly wounded man, able to see nothing beyond a yard away. The machine-gun fire rose in intensity, and this time it was aimed at us. The Krauts had figured it out, and were spraying the general vicinity with all they had. Clods of dirt kicked up along the bank as we bent further down, our arms heavy with the weight we carried. I had to tilt my head back to see anything, and I could barely make out Father Dare.

The air thrummed with bullets, hundreds of rounds slicing above us, looking for the right angle, the perfect trajectory of bullet and bone.

They found it. Screams tore loose from throats ahead of us, the sounds of men dying. It was like a dam breaking-no more low and quiet, but a footrace as the column sprinted, trying to outrun the Bonesaw, fear taking over where caution had been in control. The bursts kept coming, and I heard Stump coming down the line, telling us to hustle, we were almost there. He stayed with us as we passed bodies being carried out, including Flint with Louie draped over his shoulders, fireman style. Other GIs were carrying wounded between them, and I was too exhausted to even look for Danny. We ran until the streambed curved and brought us out into a field, behind a stone farmhouse. Medics were waiting, and in the swirl of smoke I saw Harding, standing next to a couple of Carabinieri. What were they doing here? We set down the litter, and I collapsed against the wall, my chest heaving, my lungs choking on the smoke, my mind as clouded as the air.

Somebody gave me a canteen and I drank half of its contents down and poured the rest over my head. The damned gray haze was everywhere, and now smoke grenades were tossed out to cover the jeeps coming up for the wounded. I managed to stand, and Harding materialized out of the swirling clouds.

“You okay, Boyle?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. Thanks for getting us out, Colonel.”

“I wasn’t entirely sure that runner would make it.”

“I told him you’d make him a corporal once we got back.”

“I’ll see to it. Your kid brother okay?”

“I’m pretty sure, but I need to find him.”

“Get a move on then. We have a report of Kraut tanks on the other side of that hill. If they decide to hit us now, things could get worse real fast.”

Clutching a pair of binoculars, Harding was off to observe the German lines while I went in search of Danny. It was a mass of confusion, the badly wounded waiting for evacuation, the lightly wounded being treated behind the stone farmhouse, as smoke eddied and curled around the building and along the ground. I found Evans trying to sort out his squads from the crowd. He hadn’t seen Danny. Dead bodies were laid out, about half a dozen, but I didn’t want to look there yet. Flint walked by me, glassy-eyed, working the thousand-yard stare, so I didn’t ask him how Louie was doing.

Father Dare was with the medics, looking about ready to pass out himself. He’d seen Stump and his squad, and thought he’d seen Danny and Charlie head down the road to Le Ferriere. I went in that direction as the Krauts lobbed a few mortar shells at us. It was halfhearted, as if they knew we’d pulled a fast one and were only going through the motions, but I jumped into a shell hole until it was over anyway.

When the shelling stopped, I looked up to see I was sharing the hole with Phil Einsmann.

“Hey Billy, helluva mess, isn’t it?”

“What are you doing up here, Phil?”

“I was with a party of brass who came up to observe the advance. I snuck away for a closer look and nearly got my head blown off. Were you out there?”

“Yeah. Most of us made it back. Watch out for yourself, Phil. The Krauts aren’t going to be looking for that war correspondent’s patch on your shoulder.”

“I hope I don’t get that close. But if I do, look what I won in a poker game last night.” He opened his jacket to show me his. 45 automatic in a shoulder holster.

“Nice,” I said. “For a noncombatant. Ditch that if you’re captured.”

“Not planning on that either. You going back to the village?”

“After I find my kid brother. Good luck,” I said, climbing out the shell hole. I wandered down the road, looking at small clusters of GIs sharing canteens or a smoke, laughing as if they hadn’t nearly been killed. Or because.

“Billy!” It was Danny and his pal, leaning against a tree by the side of the road, eating K rations. Canned cheese and biscuits. It actually looked good. I sat down next to him and we just grinned at each other. He gave me a biscuit with cheese and for some reason it seemed like the funniest thing in the world. We both started laughing, and Charlie even joined in, understanding how good it felt to be alive and in the company of someone you cared about.

“I saw Flint carrying Louie out,” I said. “Is it bad?”

“Louie is dead,” Charlie said.

“I know, but how is he?”

“Billy, Louie is really dead. Sticks too. They both got it in the head,” Danny said.

“Jesus,” I said. “What a waste.” Another round of mortar fire came in, closer this time, leaving no time for mourning. Jeeps with wounded laid out on litters zipped down the road, making for the safety of Le Ferriere. “They’re getting closer.”

“We had to get out of the smoke,” Danny said. “Charlie doesn’t like it. He got lost for a while, but I found him.”

“It is not a good place to die,” Charlie said. “A man’s soul would be lost as sure as I was. Louie should have waited for a better place.”

Danny raised an eyebrow, not in a mocking way, but in sympathy. It sort of made sense, considering the riverbed was underground and smoke still drifted out of it. It was hard enough for the living to get out, never mind the recently departed.

“The smoke did save our lives,” I offered.

“True. But it did not save Louie.”

“Hard to argue-” A sharp crack cut me off, followed a second later by a massive explosion that engulfed the farmhouse and blew out the back wall where the wounded had been moments ago. Another retort echoed and the roof blew up, sending debris sky high. The force of the blasts was so great that the concussion instantly evaporated the smoke. This wasn’t mortar fire, it was high-velocity cannon fire.

“Get back to Le Ferriere,” I said to Danny as I ran to the farmhouse. As usual, he didn’t listen to me, lieutenant or not. I closed in on the scene with him and Charlie on my heels. A section of roof collapsed, and granite stones fell from the weakened rear wall like tears.

“Tigers!” someone yelled, and others took up the call. Every GI thought every German tank was a Tiger tank, but today they had it nailed. Four Tigers, their 88-mm guns pointed straight at us, were trundling across the fields, infantry spread out behind them. Harding had been right: we were sitting ducks, a mass of disorganized men with practically no cover. We had to get back to the village.