Part 9

"We've got them on the run!" said Vic.

Vic and Pete ate, others left the table, an officer was asleep over his food; medics sat down, complaining of lack of supplies.

Dennison and Zinc bedded down on hay and straw, a light from a Coleman somewhere in the distance, Red Cross men aiding the wounded, a GI on guard, in case of fire. Soon every sag in the hay and straw slept a man. A sergeant had his bazooka beside him. Someone, screwed up in his fatigues, curled up tight as a ball, had a puppy in his arms.

There was no such thing as a peaceful interval: men came and went throughout the night: a wounded man died: a patrol was lugged in on a stretcher: doctors whispered and hovered: toward morning there was a lull and during that lull water began to spread throughout the church. Someone thought it was the rain ... but it was not raining. The fire guard saw straw drifting on the water, then he observed a man's boot floating by: getting up he splashed about, mumbling, asking questions, mumbling:

"Lie still over there ... I'll find out what's wrong ... no, it ain't rainin' ... maybe it poured somewhere nearby ... sure a lot a water comin' in from somewhere..."

With his flash he waded outside: water had inundated the yard in front of the church and it seemed to be inches deep: as the guard stood on the lowest step a GI splashed by, with a lantern, rifle crooked in his arm.

"Heh, what's up?"

"River's flooding," the GI bellowed.

Someone with a racking cough warned the guard the Roer was rising rapidly: Nazi's are flooding us out. Inside the church the guard began waking men, asking everyone to spread the word: already the water was ankle deep. The wounded had to be shifted at once. Lights and flashlights took over. All of the pews had water around them.

The general hubbub woke Dennison.

"We're being flooded out," someone explained.

Dennison woke Zinc.

Grabbing his shoes and jacket, he scrambled higher on the pile of straw and hay; putting on his shoes he hollered at the men around him.

"Where do we go?"

"Outside."

"What for?"

"Everybody out!"

"Almost dawn."

"Yeah, gettin' light."

Dennison spotted Landel and waded across flooded straw to wake him: he woke with a groan and grabbed at his head and neck.

"We're being flooded ... it's the Nazis ... they've opened steel flood gates up the river ... the Roer's flooding ... it's on the radio," Dennison shouted.

Icy water eddied about Landel's pew where other men lay: the swift moving water carried straw, hay, a man's jacket, wood chips, towels, bandages.

"Too many flashlights!" somebody yelled.

"Douse the lights!"

"Give a guy a chance!"

"There's a hill behind the church ... everybody's going there!"

Men were evacuating GI's on stretchers.

Outside, it was cold but windless, the stars were numerous around a new moon. A jeep soused through the rising flood, its black-out lights weak. Shelling had resumed but it was in the distance. Lights flickered behind the ruined church: at the rear of the building a truck was loading wounded.

Dennison returned to the church to aid a wounded youngster who had a serious stomach laceration: he got him a new blanket, water, and found him an orderly ...

" ... got hit at a minefield ... got me bad ... Eeee ... not hard, Doc. Not so hard, like ... Eeee..."

The orderly very abrupt, very savage, told the tanker to shut up, lie down.

The fellow stared at Dennison and then at the medic: he stared beardedly at the ceiling as the doctor gave him an injection: he had the face of someone who had suffered malnutrition most of his life.

"See if you can get him into a truck or ambulance," the doctor suggested, limping off through the icy water.

Dennison secured stretcher bearers.

Landel had disappeared. Zinc was nowhere. Someone squawked a walkie-talkie and the two-way sputtering began as officers conferred by the tarpaulined altar, water already at the steps; all lights had dimmed; it was almost day.

Going outside to piss, Dennison heard a puppy whimpering; at first he could not see it, then there it was, at his feet, padding through muck. Lifting it, he recognized it as the stray the officer had been holding. The collie pup's belly and paws were cold; it cried and snuggled; Dennison popped it underneath his jacket. He was comforting it when Zinc tapped him on the arm.

" ... Radio says that sluice gates on the Roer were opened during the night ... our whole area is flooded ... hell ... You an' me an' Landel are to transport wounded guys in a Lee." Zinc was playing with the pup's ears. "Where'd you pick up this lil guy?"

"Here ... in the water."

"Whatcha gonna do with him?"

"Stash him in the church ... leave him..."

"The river's a mile or two wide in places," Zinc said.

"Do you know where the tank is--the one we're to use?"

"Sure ... I know."

"Let's go," Dennison said. Reentering the church, he placed the pup on a pew. "Gotta go, old boy ... gotta go ... just stay there and yelp."

A lingering glance at the antique windows, then he followed Zinc toward the hill behind the church: a ditch drenched them to the knees: swearing, they floundered ahead, past a group of tanks, to the Lee, higher on the slope, out of the menacing flood water.

"That's her!" Zinc yelled.

"Okay."

Fred Landel was inside, in the driver's seat, warming the motor: the cab was jammed with wounded, some standing, leaning against walls, some on the floor, huddled against each other.

"Where do we go?" Dennison asked Landel, mouth to his ear.

"You drive!" said Landel. "We go to Gex ... I have the map ... I know the route ... take a long look at those red lines; let's pull out of this goddamn place ... lights out ... we leave the wounded at a Red Cross station ... (he jabbed the map with his forefinger) ... I'll let you know ... sit down ... check the dials ... lights out ... this bus has had it rough..."

As they got rolling, the sunlight was filtering, but the clouds were thick and seemed on the verge of blanketing the sun. Dennison drove carefully, trying to familiarize himself with the Lee: he had piloted others but this one was different and he wanted to work out any differences; the engine power, the tread maneuverability, gear shift, traction, carburetion? He had tried to memorize the route and compelled his mind to re-establish landmarks.

God, it was raining!

Rain and more mud, lousy traction, anything to foul us up! The Lee was climbing a slope, doing well: no flooding here. Beyond this slope there was supposed to be a road; he was to follow that paved road, toward Gex. Yeah, there it was ... a road, trees, fences, farms in the distance.

"You'll have to help me," a fellow screamed, grabbing at Dennison's leg. "It's my knee ... shrapnel ... Aaah-hhh!" Pain-sobs gushed out of him as he pawed at Dennison. Dennison slowed and stopped the tank.

"Let me see your knee," he yelled.

His kneecap was dangling, bleeding: Dennison and Landel could do no more than press it into position, re-bandage. Dennison crouched beside him, using his flashlight: again and again he was aware of leaves, leaves and sunlight: he was not sure where. The GI was sobbing.

A Red Cross official beat on the forward door; Landel admitted him; somehow he managed to find room, his face rain streaked, satchel in his arms, a bayou figure: the gaze fixed on some everglade of the mind.

_Okay_, Landel signalled.

_Okay_.

Landel felt the jolting of the bus: pain, from his neck wound, was beating through him.

"Where?" the Red Cross man asked.

"Gex."

The Lee crawled by a winery, a bombed complex, dinosaur ribs of buildings, passed rows of barrels, tall grass waving in the rain: some of the barrels were moulded: the road curved in a long curve; there, at the apex of the curve, was the Red Cross station, aerial designation and the familiar flag. No one appeared.

An ambulance had a jack under its differential.

Landel, Zinc and Dennison assisted the wounded; they climbed out; Landel climbed back into heat, began checking their armament, began arming his gun.

Dennison glared numbly at a strip of black sky as he drove away. Zinc fussed about with his gun, pleased that he had space to move around. Landel, making every effort to shake his pain, hanging to the sides of his seat, was remembering Panama, nights of pleasantry, dancing, _Cuba Libres_, marimbas, time, that was the time, time for a cigarette, time for a drink.

A shell boomed in front.

Widening his ports, Dennison observed a Sherman ejecting shoelaces of black smoke; as he drew nearer flames spouted and enveloped the tank completely.

_Go on_, came the signal.

Dennison leaned back in his seat and wet his lips with his tongue ... destroy ... shall we destroy?

I suppose there's a lot of tall grass in Wisconsin.

She wants ...

The terrain is solid ... no road ... fields ... Gex is a mile or so in front ... the radio was crackling ... Landel at the dials ... the Lee rolled and rolled again ... they passed under trees ... they passed a giant barn with two cows visible in a stall ... there were no hedgerows ... they passed a country school ... they passed a row of burning homes and rolled into Gex ...

Gex ... Gex ... what about the guys who had burned to death in that Sherman?

Gex ...

God, it was raining hard.

An awkward four-legged windmill was batting at the rain.

"Gex, Gex!" exclaimed Landel, and closed his eyes and hung on, worried that the gas indicator was so low.

Gex was smoke and paved streets and ravaged buildings, a man fleeing, a gunnysack over his shoulder. Girders jabbed out of ripped apartments. Burning beams smoked in cottages. In a hotel fire escapes were twisted. Again more smoke ...

A squad of riflemen sniped from a smashed grocery.

"Get them," Landel ordered.

Their guns began to pound and Dennison wormed his bus closer and closer to the grocery: the bow crushed its windows and wall: the bow seemed to be raiding for meat and potatoes. Gunfire shredded the glass counters. Machinegun bullets cut down the store's sign: it fell. Bullets tore into a refrigerator.

No riflemen escaped.

A narrow street, trees along one side ...

Dennison read _bakery_ and _meat market_ and wondered when he would sidle up to a counter and order a loaf of whole wheat..."four center-cut pork chops." And in the coffee shop, how about liverwurst and beer?

What a way to enter a town! Gex: who wanted Gex? What would the USA do with Gex? Right now, a beefsteak was worth more!

"Who's that guy?" he yelled on the intercom.

A helmeted GI blocked a doorway in a ruined building and flagged the tank; other GI's spewed from an aperture left by a shell; Dennison hesitated to stop the Lee under the riddled wall, yet he obeyed.

Inside de-ribbed apartments he saw a fireplace, book shelves, shoes on a carpeted floor, clothes on wardrobe hangers, a toilet ... on a brass plate: Dr. Horace Kreutger, _Child Specialist_. A church dome glistened in a sewage of light.

The helmeted GI in the doorway was signalling ...

_Starboard ... sharpshooters ... balcony ... port_.

Dennison sent the bus to the port, crawled over garbage in an alley, saw a piece of sky, and then the sharpshooters on a grilled balcony.

Zinc fired and a fellow sagged to his knee, another dropped his rifle on the balcony floor, another began dragging a wounded comrade, both crawling on hands and knees: the wounded man seemed to be shouting: his dentures popped from his mouth, bounced and smashed in the street. Landel killed the remaining pair.

A GI appeared, wig-wagging, a walkie-talkie in his big, hairy arms, his helmet cockeyed. Reporting into his w-t he paced the Lee; as it swung onto a main street, the motor responded sluggishly, as if running out of gas, and Dennison worked the choke. As he glanced through the periscope he noticed the GI walking on the sidewalk, swinging one arm, talking as he walked. A shell exploded: the GI, his w-t, bones and flesh splattered across the walk. Another 77 blew up the paving in front of the Lee: a roof collapsed, mixing steel and concrete.

Dennison reversed.

Following the main street, deserted shops and stores on both sides, he saw something drop from a second floor--a mattress. It fell across the tank's prow, swayed, fell again.

Dennison rammed an empty swastika jeep. From second floors machine guns raked a GI patrol, wiping it out, the men dying in the gutters.

Telephone wires whipped around a lamppost.

It was no longer raining.

Landel began directing Zinc: their guns accounted for several SS outside a drugstore. Waiting for smoke to clear, Dennison moved along the street where machine gunners were mounting their gun in a building named Zorn: ZORN was carved on the facade in tall letters: under shellfire, Zorn crumbled as they passed.

For Dennison, the grief of other attacks was returning, muddled, violent, hobnailing his brain.

This is our last attack, he told himself: gasoline low: stop: not any more: not any more: Gex is a ruin: we'll be able to rest ... rest ... a little rest ...

Mouth open, he longed for a cool drink, remembering the apple cores floating on the floor of 9.

Who was that walking along the street?

Jeannette, get off the street!

Jean ... what are you doing here?

Can't you hear me?

Oh, Christ, my head!

He bent forward and wet his lips with his tongue.

Before he could stop the tank it plowed into a wall and stopped with a great shock. Landel screamed. Zinc fell. Landel grabbed hold of Dennison and beat him with his fists, the pain in his wound galloping through his body. He sobbed and babbled; Zinc had to yank him off, and restrain him.

"What's wrong with you? What's wrong with you?" Landel shouted.

Dennison could not figure out what had happened: he could not understand why the Lee was out of action: he asked Zinc if they had been hit.

In spite of his deafness, he heard Landel ask:

"Why did you ram the wall?"

"Do what?"

"Why did you hit the wall?"

Dennison waited for several seconds.

"I don't know what happened."

"You rammed into this wall--you fool!"

"I went blank."

"Let 'im alone!" Zinc shouted.

"Shut up!" Landel yelled.

"I went blank .... that's all," Dennison repeated.

They rested a few minutes and then began creeping along, patrolling the main street, under radio orders, their guns silent, the enemy nowhere. Stopping at a barricaded intersection, where trees had fallen under bombing, where heaps of rubble smoked, the radio announced the official take-over of Gex.

They were radio-ordered to park with other machines under trees fringing a town garden: roses and shell holes, benches and crushed benches, paths that stopped suddenly: a small bronze figure was still upright under branches: the three men crawled from their cab and sat on a low stone wall, faces black, clothes grease-caked, bloody.

Zinc showed Dennison a gashed hand.

"How did you get hit?"

"Oh ... I dunno."

"Need some iodine?"

"Umm."

"Open your hand."

"Can't."

"Open it, Isaac."

Zinc grinned boyishly.

Tenderly, Dennison opened Zinc's hand; he found an emergency kit in the Lee and cleaned the wound: all of the time he felt the fresh air on his face and realized he was breathing something worth breathing. He promised himself he would soon have something to eat.

"Shall I bandage it tighter?"

"No ... like it is."

"Okay now?"

"Yeah ... but awful tired."

"Me too."

"Where's Landel?"

"Gone for water."

"Ah."

A little later, Zinc said:

"I'm gonna marry Millie when I get back."

"What?" Dennison cried.

"Nuthin'."

Landel offered them water from a thermos.

"I've had some ... it's okay."

Zinc drank, Dennison drank, then it went the rounds once more.

"I'm beat," Landel said.

They nodded.

That night, after grub, they slept in a handsome 17th century residence near the park, in a bedroom on the second floor, under elegant drapes, elegant table cloths, in mahogany beds: a silent place, gilded wallpaper, ormolu furniture, golden carpet. Before falling asleep, Zinc washed and scrubbed with perfumed soap in a basin painted with forget-me-nots. In his sleep he thought of his boat, an ephemeral boat, but it was his boat ... he dreamed of a wedding ceremony, people tossing rice ... his injured hand relaxed ... but his face burned and his head throbbed violently from time to time.

Landel slept uneasily in his bed, a feverish night: he had gulped down aspirin from the emergency kit, then he added codeine, a double dose in the night: tomorrow, he asked himself, tomorrow? He was unsure. How could he continue?

For Dennison it was a problem to relax: he floated on his mattress, under the layers of drapery: his subconscious was uncomfortable: he heard his mother say:

"I think we've had more snow this year than we've had for years."

Of course this was played back a number of times.

In another dream a man whispered:

"Jeannette ... Jean..."

She was sitting on the grass by a lake, a picnic basket beside her, a blue scarf around her head: her eyes were marvelously blue: she was smiling: she was saying with her smile: come on, lunch is ready, let's eat.

"Darling," he said, aloud.

He awoke, shivering, angry with himself for having slept without his jacket. Putting it on, he climbed back into bed, and pulled the draperies closer, a rumble of low-flying bombers shaking the room.

... They continued to fight in Germany.

... Christmas was dead and gone.

... Time?

Eight Shermans boiled along an _autobahn_, the paving was excellent, one gradual curve sliding into another. Telephone lines, on stubby poles, wandered across fields into a weak sun. Villages lay upside down in a river.

As he drove, Dennison thought of shaving, recalled the whiff of Yardley soap, the rasp of his razor. Maybe, someday, somewhere, an electric shaver ... maybe after shave lotion ... maybe ...

He was doing thirty-five, thirty-seven, third in line, in the left lane. Heat boiled on its endless tread; noise rushed under the floor, rushed overhead, rushed along the walls.

They had a new crewman, a fellow from Chicago, a swarthy, husky outfielder, smart, good-natured, with a shock of black hair and black eyes: Paul Murphy; PM, the guys called him.

PM was hanging onto Dennison's driving seat as the freeway peeled by: he was reading the speedometer, tickled by Dennison's skill and recklessness. His eyes glistened; there was a silly grin on his face; he wanted to be able to drive a tank like this. As the bus rocked along smoothly, approaching fifty, he waved his arm at Zinc.

But Landel was squirming, resentful of such speed: he could think of a dozen reasons for disaster: his neck ached and he did not look forward to a ghastly jolt. For several weeks he had been sneaking off, drinking heavily, talking little: he was involved in the art of deception--the alcoholic's art. He bellowed through the phone, "cut your speed," then slumped against the armor plate, mouthing a small flask.

He bellowed again, this time at PM, signalling him to his machine gun.

God, Dennison thought, he doesn't leave anybody alone.

Dennison had requested a transfer--any unit: after his injury at the Roer River, Landel was often violent, word and action. He often fell asleep on duty. During some of his binges he went homo.

"Maybe he figured I was someone else," Dennison told Zinc. "Did he come at you?"

"Sure ... sure! But, lord, I haven't cracked up yet! We'll wrangle transfers, you and I. Have to..."

The driver in front of Dennison was losing speed: he was far to the right, too close to the shoulder.

"Steady, steady," Dennison mumbled to himself. "If you go slower, make it steady ... watch yourself."

What's the number on his turret: 6 ... 7 ... 67? Is that right? The 67 was nearly obliterated. The tank's armor was rust colored, mud and grease smeared, but somebody, at a depot or relay point, had slapped on yellow paint across one side and it was as though the machine sported a yellow crab, its pincers toward the prow.

So Chuck Hitchcock killed himself in a Brooklyn hospital! ... poor guy! Made it to the fire escape, blind as he was! Ten floors. God, to drop ten floors. Three seconds. Right on a paved driveway. He was out of his mind. Perhaps not. Dennison had Jeannette's note--dirty and crumpled--in his billfold. Had it for days, unable to reply. Where was he to get it mailed? In Berlin? What was there to say? What did she expect? Dear Jean: so sorry your brother bumped himself off! With those sightless eyes of his, what could he do? Not even Cyclops!

Better off.

With a jerk, 67 swung violently to starboard: its starboard tread left the highway, and the machine seemed to balance on one tread, race on one; then the highway shoulder crumbled and the bus spun over and over into a gravelled ditch, to stop bottom-up: the whole thing registering on Dennison, sucked inside his brain through his driving viewer.

"Tank over!" he bellowed, braking his machine gradually. He yanked Landel's arm, and shook it. "She'll catch fire," he bellowed. "Landel ... 67's in the ditch! Rolled over fast! Can we open her hatches?"

He was yelling at himself.

Landel was alert.

A tread of their tank sank and Dennison yanked her straight, centered her on the road, slowed, and brought her to a halt behind 67, smoke belching from the upended machine.

Sweat was running down his face and he wiped it off as he unstrapped his seatbelt.

The blow must have stunned 67's crew: Ben was there: his shoulder injury would cripple him: Carson was there ...

The men were dumped together between machine guns, cannon, ammunition, thermos, gasoline, wrenches, oil, heat.

Dennison was alongside the Lee.

From their firebox at the rear, he grabbed two Pyrenes: he handed one to Zinc and raced for 67, slipping on mud: he dropped the extinguisher but snatched it and squirted chemicals on the yellow paint smear, on the turret.

"Somebody get a shovel ... hunt for a crowbar ... tear open ... let them out! Smoke's choking them ... they can't see a thing!

"Here, PM, squirt this on the motor area," he shouted: he realized that PM could not hear and he shoved the extinguisher into his hands.

He began to unwire a crowbar from his own machine, his fingers awkward; he tried to steady himself; smoke was ballooning; the Pyrenes were whitening the smoke. Using all his strength he wrenched off the bar and rushed back to 67. Machinegun bullets were bursting inside. Now Landel was discharging an extinguisher.

PM had run back to his bus. Now he nosed 67 over: with a huge thud, and a great cloud of white smoke, she flopped onto her side. Another tankman attempted to beat open a driving slot, to admit air.

Handkerchief over his face, Dennison climbed onto 67, to force a hatch. Somebody might be there, ready to be dragged out. Hell, the guys couldn't see!

Raising his bar he rammed it: smoke blinded him but he struck again: the steel rebounded: there was less smoke: he struggled to breathe: probably they were dead: Carson, Ben, Townsend, Lee, Arthur. Yet there might be a chance ... must be a chance ... must be ...

Slipping, he fell off the tank and somebody helped him up, and he whirled for one of the forward ports. Sweat drenched his hands and face. He gripped the bar tighter and drove at the little door and it seemed to give and he hammered at it again, coughing.

I've got a crack ... lean forward ... hit closer to the rim ... can't see ...

His handkerchief dropped. He couldn't stop coughing. When smoke blew away he looked about and saw that nobody was using the extinguishers: were they empty? Everyone had backed away.

Goddammit ... I'll open that starboard door ... I'll hack it open with my bare hands!

He rammed and the door yielded. He slammed at it again and it gave a hair. He hit it again with every ounce of muscle. His hands slipped and he almost toppled.