Shadow Soldier (The Gunsmith Book 2)

by C. K. Crigger

  “Yes, sir.” Caleb snagged his last clean shirt off a stool and put it on. “I trust there haven’t been any complaints.

  Page hesitated. “Well, no. Not about the dogs.

  Caleb’s fingers, busy buttoning the shirt, stilled. “That sounds as if there have been complaints. About what? Nothing wrong at the barns, is there? Mueller’s good with the horses. So is the new man, Blackhorse.”

  Page waved comments about the barns and the animals aside. “No, no. Nothing like that.”

  “The men⏤”

  “Men are good, too,” Page said. “They all look up to you, although they’re sick of you preaching at them about smoking. I know, I know. You’ve got a point. Walsh told me you’d barely got through warning Thomas about the light from his smoke before the sniper got him. Troops are thinking about that now, taking your words to heart.”

  Caleb had to be satisfied if he could save only one life. There remained, however, the mention of complaint hanging over his head, and he waited with all the patience he could muster for Major Page to come to the crux of the matter. If it wasn’t the dogs or the horses, or yet the men, why was he here?

  Page, his Texas drawl deepening in embarrassment, stumbled over his next words. “Your leg, soldier. How’s that coming?”

  “Very well, sir. Nearly healed,” Caleb lied. He felt the period of greatest danger of infection had passed, but horrendously painful muscle spasms and a constant drainage from the wound continued to plague him.

  “Good, good,” Page said, a false heartiness in his voice. “Glad to hear it. Keep off it, if you can. Let the others do the running. Good, good.” He paused self-consciously. “Well, I guess that means you won’t be needing the services of that nurse any more.”

  “Sir?” Caleb’s brilliant green eyes narrowed into slits like those of a suspicious cat

  “Ah, hell. You know what I’m trying to say, Smith. You’re treading in officer territory with that woman. And somebody doesn’t like you there.”

  “Who might that somebody be?” Caleb asked quietly. His anger revealed itself only by the slight flush of red across his high cheekbones.

  Major Page’s shoulders lifted and fell. “I don’t know, Smith. The message was passed from this one to that one until it got to me, and since you’re under my command, I’m passing it on to you.

  “Begging your pardon, sir, but that’s not good enough. Too vague and wishy-washy. I want to know who’s doing the complaining. I doubt it’s Nurse Prafke.” She had responded too sweetly, too ardently, to his kiss a few nights ago for him to believe she wouldn’t want to see him again.

  Caleb knew if he were wise, he’d back away from her, not get involved. A man in his position had no business—no right, really—to start a relationship he might not be able to sustain. He’d lain awake a good part of each night lately asking himself what he thought he was doing in romancing the lovely young widow. He called her a widow, for all they had no proof, although the evidence suggested Leonard Prafke was dead. He knew Irene thought so as well, denial to the contrary.

  Page had the decency to try for honesty. “One of the doctors over at the hospital, Smith. He’s the one with the gripe. Green with envy, if you ask me. He’s been after her ever since she got here, so I hear. Guess he doesn’t much appreciate an enlisted man waltzing in and making off with her with no more than a snap of the fingers. He wants you to leave her be.”

  “I haven’t ‘made off with her,’” Caleb said. “And I’m not in the habit of snapping my fingers at any woman as though she has no mind of her own. Who she wants to be with is Irene Prafke’s choice. Not yours, not the hospital’s, and not even mine, as much as I might like it to be. I think this doc—Dr. Hurry, if my guess is any good—had better ask Irene what she wants.”

  One of the dogs got up and came over to sniff at Caleb’s clenched hand. Gradually, his rigid fingers relaxed and he stroked the dog’s head, trying to let go of his anger.

  “Mrs. Prafke isn’t subject to the orders of the AEF or the federal government,” he said more calmly. “I don’t think the Red Cross even pays her. If she tells me to go, if she wants me to leave her alone, I will, but not because some bald-headed bastard old enough to be her father says so.”

  Major Page’s lips twisted with wry humor. “I could give you the order to stay away from her,” he said.

  “And is that an order, sir?”

  “No. I’ve passed along the warning. Your own judgment will have to take it from here. Or your own stubbornness,” Page added, not quite under his breath. His expression stated that Sergeant Ned Smith had better hope he didn’t find occasion to be a patient in Doctor Hurry’s hospital a second time.

  CALEB THOUGHT of that as well, as he walked along the rutted road toward the village and the hospital where Irene had said she’d be waiting for him. Waiting, and hoping he’d show up when he said he would. A soldier’s promise always depended on the whims of war and his commanding officer. All he could truly promise was that he’d try to make the connection, so here he was, limping through the cold rain that had begun to fall, and attempting to thumb a ride.

  It was a horse-drawn soup kitchen vehicle that stopped for him. The wagon was on the way back to headquarters after delivering hot slumgullion made up in twenty-gallon dixies to the troops along the outer perimeter. The cook and driver chomped on cold sandwiches, preferring bread and meat even in this chilly weather, to the cooked mixture of almost unidentifiable comestibles they called army food.

  Caleb took the sandwich they offered as if it were manna, though he had to sit on the tailgate of the wagon to eat. He didn’t really mind being left on his own while he thought about Major Page’s message.

  If Page could ever have conceived the idea—which, of course, he never could—of Caleb not really being of this era, or of this place, what stronger words he’d have used to describe Caleb than stubborn or injudicious. And, Caleb willingly agreed, Page would have been right.

  What made him think the chance of Irene being hurt by his attention was an acceptable risk? What if somehow he did get wafted away, back into his own reality and time? Yet another man disappeared out of Irene’s life with no trace to show where he’d gone. Hadn’t Irene suffered enough through her first marriage?

  But he’d been hurt, too. He’d been slingshotted into a time barely recognizable to him—wounded, frightened, lonely. Was it so bad of him to try for a little compassion, a little companionship to assuage his loneliness? What a pair, he and Irene. They were able to comfort each other, simple as that.

  Maybe, in time, he wouldn’t want to leave—ever.

  It took an effort for Caleb to recall his former life because he’d been so successful in forcing the memories out of his mind. Too much pain waited for him there, threatening his sanity in case the self-defense mechanism he’d put in place ever failed.

  For the first time in days, an image of Boothenay shone before him, whether he wished for it or not. The brilliance of her dark eyes, the soft fullness of her mouth, the musical lilt of her voice when she talked radiated in his inner vision. The queer chemical reaction they always had on one another exerted a pull. He twitched in sudden anger.

  With unaccustomed bitterness, he told himself to forget her. It was apparent she’d forgotten him. Written him off, discarded him like a worthless, broken part from one of her old guns. He’d been here a long time and still she hadn’t come for him.

  Caleb refused to listen to the inner lecture busy reminding him of Boothenay’s own constant self-doubts, her admitted limitations. He didn’t want to hear the story of how her own mother had once turned a tornado and of Boothenay’s fear that she was not strong enough in her power to accomplish any comparable feat.

  Better to tell himself she refused to help him, rather than to think of her despair if she couldn’t.

  So the anger helped. If he held the anger, maybe he wouldn’t have to feel the empty place in his heart.

  KEROSENE LANTERNS MADE puddles of yellow li
ght in front of the field hospital. Ambulances were drawn up outside the huge, half-sided tent where orderlies were busy trundling the less severely wounded—those whose chance of surviving the bumpy journey seemed good—to the canvas covered interiors. Doctors vied with each other in giving instructions for the evacuation; nurses hovered over favorite patients while the ambulance people did most of the work.

  Caleb’s professional standards suffered at what he was seeing. One thought managed to amuse him, and that was to wonder if Ernest Hemingway was present here tonight.

  His amusement quickly faded when he caught sight of Irene, shepherding a couple of her patients into a waiting vehicle. She was busy as a mother hen although she should have been on her dinner break. Dr. Hurry remained near, keeping a watchful eye on her.

  Watching for him, Caleb realized. Well, he knew how to find a way around that. Keeping to the wildly dancing shadows, he made his way to the rear of the truck where Irene had placed her patients and stood aside, waiting until she made them comfortable. When she prepared to jump down, he was there to catch her.

  “Ned,” she cried, her eyes lighting warmly. “I thought I’d miss you. I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to tell you goodbye.”

  Without protest, she let him lead her into the darkness beyond the lantern light and away from the bustle of the patient transfer. Her lips met his in an eager kiss

  “You’re leaving?” he asked, allowing his breath to return to normal. “For good?” How had Dr. Hurry pulled this off? he wondered. The evacuation seemed too pat coming, as it did, on the heels of Major Page’s warning.

  “Not for good,” she said, sounding almost regretful. “The hospital director is rotating those of us who have been here longest back to Neuilly-sur-Seine for a leave. We’ll still be on duty, but Ned, the men there will have a real chance of survival! We nurses won’t have to come on shift and find half our patients have died while we’ve been away. We won’t have to work twelve to sixteen hours a day. Oh, Ned, be happy for me, just for a little while. I’ll be back, I swear to you.”

  The hospital director was Doctor Benjamin Hurry.

  “I am happy for you, Irene. You deserve a leave. A real leave with no patients would be better yet.” He made the words enthusiastic, made his lips smile. “I’ll miss you.”

  She grasped his hands and looked deeply into his eyes. “I heard your battalion is moving up, Ned. I don’t think I could bear being here, knowing at any moment the next wounded man brought in might be you.”

  “There’s no one I’d rather see,” he said. “My own personal angel.”

  Irene shook her head hard enough a lock of her pale hair escaped from under her nurse’s cap. “Oh, Ned, I’d simply die. You don’t know what it’s like—the stench, the maggots, the blood.”

  How could she think he didn’t know, when he’d seen the same sights she had, many times over? And worse, much worse. They never bothered with bringing the most hopeless, most horrifying cases back to the field hospital. They simply tipped the dead into a trench and shoveled a little dirt over them if they had time. Helped kill the stink if nothing else.

  But he didn’t tell her about that. Instead, he took her in his arms and held her until the trembling that wracked her body stilled. It was easy to see she was suffering from her own version of shell shock

  “I’ll be fine,” he told her, smiling as if he meant it. “I’ve had my wound and survived. Lightning never strikes in the same place twice, you know.” Inwardly, he cringed as he repeated a cliché that, from his own experience, he knew to be false. He’d read about lightning strike probabilities, and how certain areas were always more prone to the phenomenon. Since he’d taken a wound in the same leg three times, in three different lives, he thought himself an expert on such probabilities.

  “Yes, that’s true.” Irene grasped at his reassurance as though he’d thrown her a lifeline. “Of course you’ll be fine. I know you will, Ned. You’re so strong and sure.”

  In Caleb’s humble opinion, a little more concern might have been in order. He didn’t think he felt all that strong and sure about anything right now.

  “Is the doc taking a break as well?” he asked, aware of sounding like he’d tasted sour apples.

  “Why, yes, he is. Dr. Hurry has been working very hard, too, for weeks now, night and day. He’s saved so many men, Ned. Almost brought them back from the dead by transfusing them with blood from donors. Have you ever heard of doing that under these conditions? Dr. Hurry is absolutely brilliant.”

  “Quite the hero,” Caleb said, striving to keep the snarl at bay. In this he must have been only partially successful for Irene gazed searchingly at him.

  “Well, yes,” she said gently. “Not a man of action like you, Ned, winning a medal, but he does what he can in his own way.”

  Feeling a fool, Caleb felt bound to agree, and when they heard Dr. Hurry calling Irene’s name, asking if her patients were settled in the ambulance as yet, he kissed her quickly and let her go. They peeked around the side of the canvas-topped truck—the canvas painted with a big red cross—until they saw the doctor’s back was turned, and Irene could slip around the corner into the light.

  Like recalcitrant youngsters, Caleb thought, hiding from authorities.

  “All ready, doctor,” she said loudly, for Ned’s benefit. “Base Hospital number one, here we come.”

  It was an invitation for him to find her, Caleb realized, should he ever get to Neuilly-sur-Seine.

  CHAPTER 19

  For the second time today, I found myself running as though the king of monsters was after me. Only this time I was running away. By rights I should have been heading toward the source of all the noise and mayhem—or so my better self told me. My guts said something else. Over the fear churning inside my belly, I listened to the guts. They kept saying to get the hell out of here, while I still had legs to run. It wasn’t anything new, after all, to be killed by “friendly fire.”

  On second thought, is there such a thing as friendly fire? Dead is dead, after all.

  Whatever happened to the good old days when I dreamed myself to such adventurous places as this, meanwhile retaining an ability to stay outside, a mere observer? I looked with nostalgia at the trips August’s photographs had led me on, so easy and peaceful—not to mention deceptive.

  This time was for real. This time, now or never, I had to get to Caleb. Last chance!

  Upon this rallying thought, and taking every bit of courage I possessed in hand, I turned around and faced the way I’d come. I gasped in involuntary revulsion at the carnage that met my eyes.The locomotive lay on its side making a horrible hissing sound as though the boilers were about to explode. Wonderful. I could see myself already, trying to duck all those pieces of flying steel, just as if the high-powered cannon shells still pounding the area weren’t spreading enough shrapnel of their own.

  If I’d had a shovel, I’d have been digging the deepest foxhole of all time. Unless, of course, it turned out to be my own grave.

  Fires bloomed everywhere they found fuel: semi-dried crops in the fields, a few trees left standing, spilled oil. A great deal of light came from these fires, not the most soothing circumstance for my peace of mind. It illuminated all too well the maimed, the dead, and the few living souls able to crawl away from this scene of destruction. One of the coal-stokers was turned into a living torch as I watched, his dust- powdered clothing catching fire as though drenched in incendiary fuel. Maybe they’d never heard of drop and roll in this day, for he continued to run, shrieking, until he collapsed.

  I collapsed, too, the horror of the scene taking me to my knees. I just covered my head with my arms and tried not to watch. Dear Lord, how was I to go through with this?

  Yet nothing lasts forever, and after a while, the cannonade shifted to a different vector, the fires died to embers as the steady drizzle doused them, and the horses finally stopped screaming. A blessed, comparative quiet ruled.

  I started walking, going back past the
remnants of the train, the smell of roast horse strong in my nostrils. Trying to ignore my rebelling olfactory glands in hopes of suppressing the old gag reflex, I noticed the carriage I’d vacated such a short time before was now smashed to no more than splinters and steel shards.

  I refused to look at the stoker’s formless, black heap. It wasn’t until I left him behind that I realized I was running, my breath coming in gasps and a stitch to beat all stitches in my side, a result of ragged aerobic control.

  Where was I going?

  Away. That was all I cared about. My idea was to follow the tracks because they must lead somewhere. At least they would put distance between me and the bombed-out train, I rationalized, as though a bogie man might get me if I stayed. And then my brain finally started working again—more or less.

  Time was a factor I had to consider. In my note to Dad, I had asked him to begin trying to call me home after forty-eight hours. Forty-eight of his hours. I really didn’t know how long that would give me here, but I didn’t figure I had a minute to waste. Especially since I still had no idea how, or where, I’d find Caleb.

  “Damn you, August von Fassnacht.” Only after I heard the words did I perceive I had actually spoken out loud in English, a rather dangerous language to use since I was walking around in the middle of the German Army. The soldiers who’d abandoned the train before the shells started falling could be anywhere. Including hiding in the ditch alongside the tracks where they could hear every word I said. So I clamped my mouth shut and trudged on. And on and on, through the rain, the thunder of guns, and the total, flat-out terror.

  After maybe an hour or so, I came to the conclusion I was being stupid—more stupid than usual, that is—and when I found what looked like a little country road heading in the general direction of where August had said I’d find the Allied lines, I climbed over the railway embankment and followed it.

  I had no idea how far I’d walked; I had no idea how much further I had to go. My only thought was to get beyond the German army, find the American Expeditionary Forces and, ultimately, Caleb. How hard could it be, anyway, with the good guys doing their best to help, the bursting of their shells like flares to point the way?