James Rouch - Civilian Slaughter

It was Dooley, Revell noticed, who sheepishly made an answering gesture. He stopped abruptly when he saw he was drawing attention to himself.

“I hope those Russians are a docile bunch.” Hyde had been scrutinizing the company. “The state they’re in, they’d have problems controlling a church choir.”

“They should be, if they’re allowing them out of the cages.” Try as he might though, Revell couldn’t entirely convince himself of that. He kept recalling the colonel’s description of the improvised construction battalion.

Garrett leaned out from the rear radio compartment of the Hummer, nearly strangling himself on the headset cord. “They’re almost here, Major.”

“They’d have been here by now,” Hyde glowered at the PFC. “That’s if you’d read the bloody map correctly and passed on the right grid reference when they got lost.”

“I wonder what sort of escort they have.” Having finally persuaded his Dutch pioneer platoon to form ranks, Vokes had deserted them so as not to be upset by their constantly changing places to discuss with friends; the events of the night.

“We’ll know in a few minutes. Probably got some staff officer from Division tagging along, to make sure we don’t goof off. That’s why I’ve had the men turn out, for the sake of appearances.” Revell cast a pained look over his command. “Not so sure it’s a good idea any more though. Sergeant Hyde!”

“Sir.”

“Do something with them, will you. I know they feel awful, but there’s no need for them to look it as well, I and Lieutenant Volkes…”

In anticipation of what was coming, Vokes gave a resigned shrug.

“…From here it looks as if your men are involved in some bizarre slow motion dance. If you can’t get them to stand up straight, at least see if you can get them to stand still.”

“They’re real close now, Major.” Garrett was more careful this time, and only managed to unplug himself from the set. “Reception is brilliant.”

“Really? Well I must say I’m hardly surprised, seeing as they’re driving in through the gate at this moment.”

“No wonder they’re three hours late. Looks like they had a bit of an adventure on the way.” Hyde watched a very battered Unimog light truck grind its way toward them, its stately ten-mile-an-hour rate of progress being dictated by severely buckled front wheels.

The panel work of the cab showed further evidence of a hard collision, as did the starred windshield and ripped fabric roof. As it crabbed an erratic course along the drive the Unimog scuffed strange patterns on the gravel. Into view behind it came a procession of equally decrepit ex-civilian single deck buses.

The truck came to a halt beside the Hummer with a screech of brakes more in keeping with an emergency stop from ninety. After what sounded like several hard kicks the driver’s door creaked open and an elderly and overweight master sergeant alighted, easing his bulk with care over the jagged remains of the fender. He beat dust from his blood speckled camouflage jacket before looking about him.

“Is there a medic hereabouts?”

The sergeant dabbed at his swollen nose with a red-stained handkerchief.

“You run into trouble?” Revell scanned the now halted column. Faces filled every window of the convoy. Apart from the truck there were only the buses. “And where the hell are the escort?”

“Shit, I’ll say I ran into trouble. Some damned crappy refugees, they were all over the road. Wish I’d creamed a few of them, instead of taking to the hill and whacking into the side of a fucking church. Ain’t there a medic here? This keeps up, I’m going to bleed to death.”

“I asked where the escort had got to.” Revell knew that his tone clearly conveyed his growing anger, but the master sergeant appeared not to notice.

“Oh heck Major, there’s no escort, excepting for me and my drivers.” He waved vaguely in the direction of the buses. “We had a handful or so with us for a while but they must have missed a turn, or stopped for a leak maybe… anyway, haven’t seen them for a couple of hours or more. Maybe five, I guess. Don’t matter though. These here Ruskies are like pussycats. If you’ll just sign, I’ll find your medic then I’ll be getting back. I got a date for tonight.”

Not accepting the clipboard and greasy pen held out toward him, Revell started toward the new arrivals. “I like to see what I’m signing for, I want a roll call.”

“Hell, you don’t want to bother with all that fuss, Major. It’s real straightforward. I deliver three hundred and fifty-seven Reds. Or maybe they ought to be called pinks now, heh?” Seeing his little joke wasn’t well-received, the sergeant went on. “I deliver, you sign. See, everybody is happy and I make my date on time. If we start messing about with roll calls and the like we could be here all day.”

“A roll call, now.”

“Now Major, I hope you won’t mind me saying this…”

“I probably will, so you’d better not.”

For the first time, the sergeant appeared to be getting a glimmering of an understanding that the officer was less than happy with something.

“OK Major, OK, we do it by the book. But maybe it wouldn’t hurt if we take a sort of shortcut, just to speed things up a little. See, there’s seven buses, fifty Reds on each one, excepting the last. That’s got fifty-seven. So we do a swift head count on the tail-end Charlie and that’s…”

“I see only six.”

“Hate to say it, but you’re wrong Major, it’s seven…”

The sergeant did a double take and a sickly grin spread across his fleshy face. “Aw crap. Fucking crap. Well, I expect it’ll be along in a while. Look Major, can I have a word?”

When Revell wouldn’t be drawn aside, the sergeant leaned close to him and lowered his voice to a confidential whisper.

“I’m just sort of doing a favour for my captain; you know how it is, sure you do. He was on to this sure thing, a real hot date, and I figured if I did this favour for him then I’d be OK for a few in return. Happens all the time.” He looked keenly into the officer’s face, trying to read his mood, and didn’t like what he saw.

“Right, Major, you think I’ve goofed up. So maybe everything ain’t quite kosher, but in the Zone who cares what happens to fifty…”

“Fifty-seven.”

“…Sure, fifty-seven Reds. Shit, we’ve got a half million behind wire and there’s loads more who’ve deserted and are just wandering about. Can’t we sort of overlook the discrepancy this time? You know I should have been retired years ago. It’s not my fault I’m still in this stinking war, I…”

“It sounds like you and your captain are a good pair.” Revell beckoned Sergeant Hyde. “I want them out of the transport and lined up in fives. Keep a good guard on them.”

“We could use the tennis courts. The wire’s still standing around them.”

“Good idea. And we’ll have that lot down for checking as well.” Revell pointed to the mountain of cases and bags loosely secured and partially sheeted on the roof of each bus.

“Is there anything I can do, Major?” The convoy commander ran his finger around the inside of his collar to loosen it. Blood was again dripping from his burst nose but he ignored it and instead wiped away with the back of his hand the perspiration that was running down the side of his face.

“You’re already doing it. And you’ll be sweating a lot more blood by the time I’m finished.”

“The fifty-seven in the missing bus you know about.” Hyde consulted his lists. “There are another thirty unaccounted for from those who did arrive. That gives us two hundred and sixty-eight milling about on the hard court.”