Barry Sadler: Desert mercenary

Gods! It had been a long time since he and Gus had frozen on the steppes of Russia. There had been the ice and the snow winds that peeled frostbitten skin from the face and froze the delicate tissue in the lungs. He almost wished they were back. No! That was a lie. There was no way he could ever wish for that time to return. The Twenty-sixth Panzer Regiment. He and Gustaf Beidemann were the last survivors of their tank crew. All the others were long dead, left on the frozen fields of Mother Russia along with hundreds of thousands of others who had fought and died — for what? An ideology of some sort.

Memories overcame the present. Once more Langers smelled diesel fumes and cordite, heard the rasping rumble of tank treads as they crashed into each other during the Battle of Kursk. There the smoke of battle was so thick, tanks couldn't see each other at a distance of thirty meters and a hundred thousand men a day were killed or wounded. Kursk! The Dnieper River Line! Red Guards, SS, Kalmuks, and partisans. Trains filled with munitions and living cargo that was to be taken to extermination centers. German soldiers with shell casings hammered into the backs of their necks or left crucified on battlefields. On both sides such an incredible madness.

Mind half-awake, half-numb he dreamed. Faces passed before and around him, hundreds of dead men. Storms of lightning, caused by thousands of heavy guns, crashed, ripping open the earth to receive the dead. Faces, faces…

His eyes jerked open. He couldn't take anymore. Through his nightmare Gus had slept the sleep of a child. He was the only true innocent Carl had ever known. Nothing bothered him. His memories of pain were short, therefore he could sleep when others cried out in the night.

Carl slept no more, afraid of what might come. It was easier to just put his mind at a distance and wait for the sun to begin its decline. When the shadows at last grew longer, he rose and showered again, changed into his cleanest dirty shirt, and shook Gus back into the real world.

"C'mon, let's go out for a while, maybe get something to drink or eat."

"Eat! Drink! Be right with you, comrade."

By the time they hit the streets the temperature had dropped into the nineties, almost comfortable. There were people everywhere: Arabs, vendors, women with the veil and without, children running in packs among stalls, wilted Europeans with red, sweaty eyes. One and all seemed to be on the streets now that the worst heat of the day had passed. Near the bazaar they stopped for Gus to refuel. Spiced meats and wine once more disappeared down his maw.

"Let's go over to the Club Chat Rose. I want to see if there's anyone around we might be able to use," Carl said.

Gus took the lead, cutting through the throngs; he was a human battering ram that ignored all in its path. Dirty looks and curses describing his parentage for ten generations slipped off of him. But no one stood in his path. Leaving a wake behind him of frustrated, angry people, they passed the street of coppersmiths, cut over near the old mosque where muezzins still called the faithful to prayer, made a sharp left by the dyers' streets, walked three more blocks, and they were there.

It was the good time, too. The sun was near setting and the streets were growing darker with the creeping shadows, which at dusk took over the city. Vendors were taking down their stalls, closing till the rise of the new sun, but other shops were just preparing to open. It was shift change in Tunis.

The Chat Rose, or Pink Pussy, as Gus liked to call it, was one of the watering holes for the leftovers of a dozen nations. The smell of alcohol drove Gus through the door first. Carl let him go. It was never wise to get in front of Gus when he was after food, booze, or pussy. One might get trampled, unintentionally of course, but the painful end result would be the same.

Gus cast his eyes over the motley crew which the Chat Rose catered to. A few limeys, several Germans, a couple of Polish sailors without good sense to stay closer to the harbor. And in the corner sipping Pernod quietly, his hands holding the small glass between them, was the one they sought.

" Dominic! "

At Gus's greeting several of the customers started to dive under their tables looking for cover, mistaking the explosion of sorts for a mortar attack.

Dominic showed no response; it was a salutation he was long used to.

Slowly raising his eyes from the table he looked up to see the dark hulk of Gus coming toward him, followed by a shorter but not much less squarer form.

" Ciao, Gus, Carl. What brings you to the asshole of the world?''

Gus took Dominic Ciardello's glass from him, tossed the remains down neatly, made a face, and ordered a bottle of scotch to be brought to the table. Carl sat on his left, Gus on his right, letting their chairs face the door and inner room.

Carl worried about Dominic. His face, though still handsome, was drawn. Thick black, curly hair cut short framed his old-young face. His body was slight, almost boyish, but very strong and quick. Carl knew his ailment. He had fallen victim to the sickness called killing. Since Dien Bien Phu and then Algeria he had seen the sickness eat up the Italian. Dominic knew it, too. He was not stupid and the need to kill made him sick of himself. He knew what his problem was but had no way to resist it.

The bottle was brought by a tavern wench of mixed ancestry. For centuries Tunis had been a stopping place for every ship that plied the Mediterranean. The girl was only the long-term genetic result of such visits. Deftly she avoided Gus's paws as she placed the bottle on the table with three semi-clean tumblers and a pitcher of water. She stood back out of range till Carl paid her and then quickly put distance between her and the beast-man.

Carl did the honors, pouring drinks all around, leaving the others to add water if they pleased.

"How is it for you, Dominic?"

The Italian sipped his whiskey slowly between fingers which held only a trace of tremble to them.

"It goes the same, my friends, but it doesn't matter. Like you two, I wait."

Carl nodded in understanding. "Well, perhaps the waiting is about over. You remember Sergent Chef Monpelier?"

Not waiting for Dominic to answer — he already knew they had met — he continued, "He says he has work for us. Do you wish to hear what the job is?"

Dominic shook his head. "It makes no difference. If you have accepted then I do too." The response was not unusual. They had fought many times side by side.

His eyes showed their first spark of life. He needed to get back into the field again. He could have taken many jobs as an assassin. There was much work of that kind to be had, but he hadn't taken any of it. He still had some of his pride left. He was not a murderer, only one who enjoyed the kill, if a bit excessively.

For a few minutes they sat quietly. Even Gus seemed to slow down a bit as they worked their way through the bottle of whiskey. With the true dark of night on the streets, the Chat Rose began to slowly fill with ex-soldiers, mercenaries, dealers in opium, heroin, and slaves, and with smugglers and thieves.

The lights were turned on to provide what feeble illumination forty-watt bulbs could give. From a phonograph behind the bar the girls played records that somehow all sounded the same whether French, Italian, or American. Among the clientele were a few Arabs with their robes covering expensive suits made in Paris or Rome. Being good Moslems they did not drink the whiskey or wine, leaving that to the men they bargained with, men with hot, hungry looks in their eyes.

Carl knew some of them and knew what they did. Sitting with a man wearing the striped robes of a Berber, though the mixed blood in his face showed he was not, was Alexis Sulman, a specialist in the selling of flesh, usually that of young girls, none older than fourteen, for the brothels in Marseille or Hamburg. He had once approached Carl about working for him. Now when he saw the scar-faced man's eyes on him he felt his stomach nearly turn over. The ex-legionnaire's response to his proposition had been somewhat less than friendly; Sulman had not been able to enjoy sampling any of his stock for several weeks.