Hard Target

by James Rouch

  Once they had persuaded him to confirm that he was with the 97th the rest had come almost easily, if not eagerly. The junior sergeant was not more than twenty, and it was only his second week in the Zone. This was not something he’d expected to happen to him, and it had taken little persuasion from Hyde for him to forget what seemed at that moment the lesser fear of his superiors and succumb to the aggressive bullying of the hideous Britisher.

  ‘You’ve missed your vocation, Sergeant.’ Revell checked the strips of cloth securing their prisoner’s arms behind his back. ‘You should be working as an interrogator with Field Intelligence.’

  ‘I’ve got a job, busting tanks, or I had.’ Hyde couldn’t make up his mind if there was an implied criticism in the comment. ‘If that load of nut-cases in your G2 want a monster to frighten people with, let them fry one of their own blokes.’

  Better to let it drop, thought Revell. It had been a stupid mistake he’d not make again. ‘It’s about time you and Libby set off to collect the others. Could take you a good three hours to reach the woods, and you still have to brief them and steal some transport on the way back.’

  ‘I’d be a lot quicker travelling on my own.’

  ‘We’ve gone over this already, Sergeant. Both of you go, that way if you run into trouble one of you should still make it. ‘Your aim though should be to collect them and get them back here without causing any sort of ruckus in the process. Unless the Ruskies miss the three guys cluttering the cellar, or our shit-scared comrade here, there’s a decent chance they won’t have an inkling that we’re around until we hit them with all we’ve got. Make sure you borrow that transport at the last possible moment in case you’re spotted or it’s missed, and go for the sort of thing Kurt would be tempted by, a supply wagon of some sort. That way if the alarm is raised there’s a chance it’ll be put down to the refugees, or deserters, and the alert might not spread as far as the workshops.’ ‘I still think we should use the skimmer, Major.’ ‘No.’ ft was a point which he and Hyde had argued at length, ‘You heard what our helpful Ivan said. Most of the installation is under or behind concrete. That Rarden cannon is good, but not that good. To do the job thoroughly we’ll have to work close-in anyway, so its bit of armour will be no advantage. And it could be pretty wild soon after we start. I don’t fancy our getaway vehicle getting knocked out by wild strays. If the truck gets hit then we can still hoof it clear and back to the woods. We leave the skimmer where it is.’

  Hyde had to concede that point, but there was one other he’d already raised, but not got a satisfactory answer to. ‘What about your wounded man?’

  ‘You mean Nelson?’ Revell knew damned well who he meant. ‘The state he was in when we left, I doubt he’s still alive.’ ‘But what if he is. You want me to leave someone behind to nursemaid him?’

  ‘We need every man we’ve got for the attack.’ Hell, this wasn’t the sort of thing a man should have to delegate. ‘You’ll have to rig nun so he can’t harm himself, or attract attention. There’s no alternative.’

  ‘There is one, and it’d be no harder to do than binding and gagging him while your other men are looking on. I don’t think they’re going to care for the idea very much. You know them, any suggestions how best to handle them?’

  Revell knew what Hyde’s option was. It was one that he’d been forced to resort to himself on a deep penetration mission in Yugoslavia that had been loused up, when they’d not been able to bring out two severely wounded men. It was a hard thing to have to do, kneel beside one of your own soldiers and, while his eyes stayed locked on yours, bring your pistol up and administer that single thunderously loud shot to the back of the head, holding the barrel of the automatic an inch from the scalp, just behind the ear. But there was a difference between that, a mercy killing to save a suffering man from the further torments the Russians would inflict, and killing for the sake of convenience.

  ‘Just dose him up and secure him as best you can. Dooley or the others object, tell them it’s an order from me.’

  ‘I was planning to anyway.’ Hyde pressed the point he’d made before. ‘You don’t want me to...’

  ‘No.’ Knowing what was coming Revell jumped in. ‘No, killing Russians is our job. We do that as much and as well as we can. We’re soaked in blood enough already without washing in our own.’

  ‘If that’s the way you want it, Major.’ He gathered up his few bits and pieces and made ready to leave. ‘When are you going to tell these GDR thugs what we’ve got planned ?’

  ‘Not till the last possible moment. That way if one of them has ideas about running to the Reds and doing a deal it’ll be too late to matter.’ ‘Perhaps they won’t be keen on carrying out the part you want them to play.’ The doubts he’d had from the first about the involvement of the ex-border guards had not deserted Hyde, in fact the very opposite. The whole bunch were traitors several times over. They’d betrayed their country, their people and even their Russian paymasters; and it was a certainty they’d survived in the camp by preying on the weak.

  ‘Don’t worry about it, Sergeant. One thing ties them to us, they want out and we can take them. For that reason and no other they’ll go along with us in the attack.’

  ‘Are we going to take them?’ So far Hyde had not been successful in anticipating the officer’s answer to any question, or reaction to any situation. More than at any other time he didn’t know what to expect now.

  ‘We’ll wait.’ Revell had already given the matter some thought, and the lift capacity of the Iron Cow had not been an important factor. The girl would be going with them, he knew that, had known it from the first moment he saw her. Jesus Christ, why did he have to fall in love with, or want, every woman he met? But Kurt, and the others...

  ‘We’ll wait and see what the casualty list is like.’

  It was no answer at all, Hyde was fully aware of that. The sequence of action for the assault on the workshop flickered through his mind. Casualties... shit, that didn’t take much working out. They’d be heavy. Without further comment he left the room and went back down, two stairs at a time, to collect Libby. Now why in hell’s name was he hurrying? Casualties... yes they’d be high, already were with three-quarters of the platoon destroyed on the way there. That was seventy-five per cent. Everything was bloody decimals or averages or percentages now, and he knew them all: the odds against getting a wound and the percentage that did, point- what of a ton of high-explosive had to be dropped to wipe out a platoon. This was a rotten mission, but it would be his last if the percentage figure reached a hundred.

  There was complete silence in the skimmer when Hyde finished the briefing. A long loud fart from Burke was the first thing to break the silence.

  ‘Yeah,’ Dooley spoke, ‘that’s about the effect it had on me.’ ‘Do any of you have any questions?’

  ‘I have.’ It was Cohen. ‘Tell me where the major is holed up at the moment, and what he’s doing.’ He turned an oily self-satisfied smile towards Dooley, and patted his money pocket confidently.

  ‘I’ve no idea what he’s doing, but he’s in a place Dooley might like...?’ Cohen’s smile began to fade.

  ‘...It’s called The Farm.’

  With an effort Dooley pulled out the tight waistband of his pants and shouted down into them. ‘You hear that, you hear where we’re going? Great balls of steaming crap, now why can’t every fight be like this?’ He broke off from addressing his genitals to push away a crumpled scrap of paper Cohen was offering him. ‘What the hell’s that, I want cash, real money.’

  ‘It’s one of your markers, for fifty bucks; leaves you owing me four hundred.’ Dooley looked down into his underwear again. ‘You just keep on growing, fella, I’ll get back to you later.’ The taut waistband snapped back. ‘Not so fast, just because you take markers doesn’t mean I believe in them. No, I want real money.’

  A look of mute appeal at the great unreasonableness of the big man’s pronouncement met with no sympathy and Cohen put the paper away
again. ‘I don’t carry that much.’

  ‘You lying crud.’ Jango joined in, enjoying Cohen’s annoyance. ‘In that top left pocket of yours you’ve got a roll that thick.’ He waved his bony fist. ‘Half of it’s in twenties, come on, pay the man.’

  ‘Shut up, you lot. Sort your debts out after we get back.’ Hyde grew impatient at the flippancy.

  ‘When you say everyone is going, Sarge,’ while the bickering had been going on, Burke had given that a lot of consideration, ‘do you mean every one. You know, all of us?’

  ‘All of us.’ Hyde laid great stress on the ‘us’. ‘I’m a driver, not a bloody rifle-man.’ ‘Actually you’re a combat driver, so just for once we’re going to use the other half of your supposed abilities. You wouldn’t have an objection, would you?’ Hyde paused only a minute, then injected an aggressive edge into his voice. ‘Good, you haven’t. Right there’s work to do,’ he became brisk. ‘Libby, take Collins and a roll of tape and mark the safe path to the perimeter of the woods. When we come racing back tonight there isn’t going to be time for fancy pussyfooting in the dark.’

  As the pair departed the sergeant looked around for other work to hand out. Burke and Dooley became instantly engrossed in a minute examination of the nearest objects. In the driver’s case it was the fuel gauges. The big man’s sudden intense interest in the back of the hand with which he’d been in the act of smothering a yawn was less effective as a task-avoiding ploy.

  ‘You can get working on this lot.’

  Dooley just caught the satchel of blast grenades. ‘What do I do with these?’ ‘I’m sorely tempted to tell you, but what I really want is to have them made up into nice tidy bundles of four or five each. When you’ve done that, you can do the same with these incendiary grenades.’

  Comprehension dawned on Dooley, as he accepted a more carefully passed bag of thermite bombs. ‘Now you’re talking business.’

  Clarence sat at the back of the compartment. Since Hyde and Libby had returned and he’d been summoned down from his position in the turret he’d not said a word; now he looked at Hyde and spoke quietly. ‘You haven’t said precisely what I am doing in all this. Where do I come in?’

  Hyde squeezed on to the bench beside the sniper and took out the map. ‘We’ll be taking on the workshops from the direction of the farm, from here, see.’ He turned the map for Clarence. ‘Now the Ruskie we collared says there’s a pair of camouflaged light anti-aircraft guns on the hill opposite. If they spot us and can get into action, at that range, about a thousand yards, we’ll be cut to bits. You’ll take up a position on the flank and snipe the crews to pin them down. We’ll pick you up on the way out.’

  There was no concern or emotion in Clarence’s voice. ‘What are they? If they’re above machine gun calibre there will be shields for the gun-layers. At that range I’ll not be able to get through them, I’ll have to content myself with picking off the loaders, and slow their rate of fire.’

  ‘All the Ruskie knew was that they were light, only four or five crewmen to each.’

  ‘Then it’ll most likely be twin 23mm or single 57mm mounts. Well, I’ll do what I can.’

  ‘Good, thanks.’ Now why the hell had he thanked him. It mildly annoyed Hyde that Clarence always exuded an air of superiority, though there was nothing in his manner, apart from that impeccable accent, that could account for the impression he gave.

  Now there was only the wounded man to see to, Hyde had been putting that off. Nelson was still clinging to the last shreds of life. His breathing was starting to become noisy, and every laboured intake seemed like it might be his last, but still the next one came, and the next, and the next.

  Rinehart moved over so the sergeant could get a closer look at him. ‘He’s a tough kid.’ Hyde almost added ‘more’s the pity’, but checked himself. ‘Do you think he’ll last until we get him back?’ ‘Hey, Sarge, you don’t have to have an expression on your face for me to know you ain’t really interested. What you want to know is how long is he going to hang on.’

  ‘That’s what I’m thinking, is it?’

  ‘Sure it is. This ain’t the first time I’ve been in action with the major. He reckons we should pull out all the stops, hit the Commies with all we’ve got and finish them once and for all. And since he can’t get the General Staff to go along with that, he kinda practises it himself. Total War is the term he uses. It sorta fits the way we’ve always gone about things. Firepower is his. God and the Zone is his temple. He wants me up front zapping Reds, not pissing about back here playing nurse. So am I right or am I right?’

  ‘How do you feel about it?’ Hyde was conscious that the others were listening. ‘What about, killing Reds or leaving Nelson?’ Hyde nodded at the wounded soldier.

  There was the briefest hesitation, and the answer was not as slick this time. ‘We all got to go eventually. Guess he’s as comfortable and going as easy as a lot I’ve seen. Better he kicks the bucket now than lives on with only half a head and no brain. Bed sores, baby food and contempt is all he s got to go back to.’

  ‘You ain’t thinking of helping the kid along are you?’ Dooley paused in his work. ‘They can fix up most anything now. A guy in ‘C’ company got scalped by a bomb splinter, took the top off his skull like the lid off a coffee pot. They fitted a plate over the hole and now he’s even got hair growing back.’

  ‘That was different. Nelson here has lost a chunk of his brain.’ Peeling back the edge of yet another blood-soaked bandage, Rinehart exposed the scooped-out hollow surrounded by jagged bone and untidy flaps of hair-tufted skin.

  The display did nothing to weaken Dooley’s stubborn stance. ‘I’m just telling you, there ain’t no one going to give the kid the cut-the-grass. Not while he’s in with a chance.’

  ‘Who said anything about finishing him? The major just wants us to dose him up and make sure he can’t come to any harm while we go off and do the job.’

  Dooley shifted uneasily. Some of the ground had been knocked from under him, but he wasn’t prepared to let it go that easily. ‘OK, just so long as that’s understood. And no trying anything funny like slipping him a couple of extra shots so he OD’s.’

  When the big man had flown off the handle Hyde’s immediate reaction had been to regret raising the subject a full hour before they’d have to leave, but now he saw it had worked to his advantage. Dooley would have made the same fuss later on about tying Nelson. By accepting it as a lesser evil, he would presumably raise no further objection when the time came. Now with that out of the way, Hyde began to check off the long list of ordnance they’d be taking with them.

  It was impressive, it needed to be, they were going after a very hard target. ‘Those friends of yours behaving themselves with the girls?’ Andrea didn’t answer the real question Revell had concealed in the sentence. ‘I do not know, or care. Some of them are keeping a watch that is all that matters. The whores are used to being abused. It will keep them in practice.’

  Their Russian captive looked on uncomprehendingly, but constantly glanced from the girl to the officer as they spoke, as though in so doing he might deduce what they were discussing, and whether it concerned him. ‘Have you been with Kurt and the others very long?’ He tried burying the question another way, determined to find out her relationship with the motley crew of renegades and traitors.

  ‘Why do you not simply ask me if I sleep with them? Are you afraid you will not like my answer?’

  ‘Well, do you?’ Her bluntness had surprised him. He tried belatedly to match it.

  ‘No.’ She added nothing to the bald statement. Revell probed now that he had at last got her to talk. ‘What’s your secret? One of them must have tried something.’

  ‘Yes, one of them did try to have me, when I was first with them. I killed him, before he could. It will save us both time if I tell you I do not like men, so you see there is no use in your pursuing me.’

  Was he that damned obvious? At one time he’d prided himself on his technique, an
d he knew it still worked, but not on this one. Apart from a rather mannish middle-aged teacher at high-school, who’d been the cause of much speculation and a host of wild and often absurd or obscene rumours, he’d never knowingly had any contact with lesbians. Was she one? Somehow he couldn’t picture her in another woman’s arms, but he couldn’t picture her in a man’s either. She was hard, but she still moved like a woman and could hardly be judged by her appearance. If every girl back in the States who’d ever worn jeans and jacket were a lesbian, then who the hell was it keeping the birth rate up?

  ‘Do you drink?’ Revell offered her the opened bottle of vodka, from which both he and Hyde had only taken a sip. It tasted like aviation spirit, and must have been over a hundred proof.

  She declined the bottle, but helped herself to the bread, tearing off a piece and dunking it in the jam.

  The major considered taking another swig, but decided against it. He didn’t enjoy it that much and to do so might have seemed, would have been, showing off. Christ, he’d thought himself past that stage. It was just that he couldn’t find a way through to her. Well, regressing wasn’t going to do it. How old was she ? Twenty- something or nearer his own age, thirty. There was a frightening maturity about her that many of the most sophisticated women would have striven for years to perfect - and failed. But then the camps were a forcing ground, thrusting people through the spectrum of their adult lives in months rather than years.

  ‘I want you to stay back when we go into action. Kurt and the others will be enough. We can pick you up after.’

  She went on eating.

  ‘You understand?’

  ‘Yes, I understand.’ Andrea finished a last mouthful and wiped a sticky orange- coloured blob from the side of her mouth. ‘It is you who does not understand. You will have much to explain to Kurt about what you want done. If I am not to come, then I shall not translate. I do not think your German is good enough for it, not for all that must be arranged just so.’