Dark Benediction

by Walter Michael Miller

  “But I’m not—well, thank you, Captain,” she said, and returned the salute….

  They sat spraddle-legged in the back of the truck as it bounced along the shell-pocked road. The guns had fallen silent, but the sky was full of Ami squadrons jetting toward the sunset. Pilotless planes and rocket missiles painted swift vapor trails across the heavens, and the sun colored there with blood. She breathed easier now, and she was very tired. The Ami sergeant sat across from her and kept his gun trained on her and appeared very ill-at-ease. He blushed several times for no apparent cause. She tried to shut him out of her consciousness and think of nothing. He was a doggy sort of a pup, and she disliked him. The Ami were all doggy pups. She had met them before. There was something of the spaniel in them.

  Nikolai, Nikolai, my breasts ache for you, and they burst with your milk, and I must drain them before I die of it. My baby, my bodykins, my flesh torn from my flesh, my baby, my pain, my Nikki Andreyevich, come milk me—but no, now it is death, and we can he one again. How wretched it is to ache with milk and mourn you…

  “Why are you crying?” the sergeant grunted after awhile.

  “You killed my baby.”

  “I what?”

  “Your bombers. They killed my baby. Only yesterday.”

  “Damnation! So that’s why you’re—” He looked at her blouse and reddened again.

  She glanced down at herself. She was leaking a little, and the pressure was maddening. So that’s what he was blushing about!

  There was a crushed paper cup in the back of the truck. She picked it up and unfolded it, then glanced doubtfully at the sergeant. He was looking at her in a kind of mournful anguish.

  “Do you mind if I turn my back?” she asked.

  “Hell’s bells!” he said softly, and put away his gun.

  “Give me your word you won’t jump out, and I won’t even look. This war gives me a sick knot in the gut.” He stood up and leaned over the back of the cab, watching the road a head and not looking at her, although he kept one hand on his holster and one boot heel on the hem of her skirt.

  Marya tried to dislike him a little less than before. When she was finished, she threw out the cup and buttoned her blouse again. “Thank you, sergeant, you can turn around now.”

  He sat down and began talking about his family and how much he hated the war. Marya sat with her eyes closed and her head tilted back in the wind and tried not to listen.

  “Say, how can you have a baby and be in the army?” he asked after a time.

  “Not the army. The home guard. Everybody’s in the home guard. Please, won’t you just be quiet awhile?”

  “Oh. Well. Sure, I guess.”

  Once they bailed out of the truck and lay flat in the ditch while two Russian jets screamed over at low altitude, but the jets were headed elsewhere and did not strafe the road. They climbed back in the truck and rolled on. They stopped at two road blocks for MP shakedowns before the truck pulled up at a supply dump. It was pitch dark.

  The sergeant vaulted out of the truck. “This is as far as we ride,” he told her. “We’ll have to walk the rest of the way. It’s dark as the devil, and we’re only allowed a penlight.” He flashed it in her face. “It would be a good chance for you to try to break for it. I hate to do this to you, sis, but put your hands together behind your back.”

  She submitted to having her wrists bound with telephone wire. She walked ahead of him down the ditch while he pointed the way with the feeble light and held one end of the wire.

  “I’d sure hate to shoot you, so please don’t try anything.”

  She stumbled once and felt the wire jerk taut.

  “You’ve cut off the circulation; do you want to cut off the hands?” she snapped. “How much farther do we have to go?”

  The sergeant seemed very remorseful. “Stop a minute. I want to think. It’s about four miles.” He fell silent.

  They stood in the ditch while a column of tanks thundered past toward the front. There was no traffic going the other way.

  “Well?” she asked after awhile.

  “I was just thinking about the three Russky women they captured on a night patrol awhile back. And what they did to them at interrogation.”

  “Go on.”

  “Well, it’s the Blue Shirt boys that make it ugly, not so much the army officers. It’s the political heel snappers you’ve got to watch out for. They see red and hate Russky. Listen, it would be a lot safer for you if I took you in after daylight, instead of at night. During the day there’s sometimes a Red Cross fellow hanging around, and everybody’s mostly sober. If you tell everything you know, then they won’t be so rough on you.”

  “Well?

  “There’s some deserted gun emplacements just up the hill here, and an old command post. I guess I could stay awake until dawn.”

  She paused, wondered whether to trust him. No, she shouldn’t. But even so, he would be easier to handle than half a dozen drunken officers.

  “All right, Ami, but if you don’t take wires off, your medics will have to amputate my hands.”

  They climbed the hill, crawled through splintered logs and burned timbers, and found the command post underground. Half the roof was caved in, and the place smelled of death and cartridge casings, but there was a canvas cot and a gasoline lantern that still had some fuel in it. After he had freed her wrists, she sat on the cot and rubbed the numbness out of her hands while he opened a K-ration and shared it with her. He watched her rather wistfully while she ate.

  “It’s too bad you’re on the wrong side of this war,” he said. “You’re okay, as Russkies go. How come you’re fighting for the commies?”

  She paused, then reached down and picked up a handful of dirt from the floor, kneaded it, and showed it to him, while she nibbled cheese.

  “Ami, this had the blood of my ancestors in it. This ground is mine. Now it has the blood of my baby in it; don’t speak to me of sides, or leaders, or politics.” She held the soil out to him. “Here, look at it. But don’t touch. It’s mine. No, when I think about it, go ahead and touch. Feel it, smell it, taste a little of it the way a peasant would to see if it’s ripe for planting. I’ll even give you a handful of it to take home and mix with your own. It’s mine to give. It’s also mine to fight for.” She spoke calmly and watched him with deep jade eyes. She kept working the dirt in her hand and offering it to him. “Here! This is Russia. See how it crumbles? It’s what they’ll bury you in. Here, take it.” She tossed it at him. He grunted angrily and leaped to his feet to brush himself off.

  Marya went on eating cheese. “Do you want an argument, Ami?” she asked, chewing hungrily while she talked. “You will get awfully dirty, if you do. I have a simple mind. I can only keep tossing handfuls of Russia at you to answer your ponderous questions.”

  He did an unprecedented thing. He sat down on the floor and began—well, almost sobbing. His shoulders heaved convulsively for a moment. Marya stopped eating cheese and stared at him in amazement. He put his arms across his knees and rolled his forehead on them. When he looked up, his face was blank as a frightened child’s.

  “God, I want to go home!” he croaked.

  Marya put down the K-ration and went to bend over him. She pulled his head back with a handful of his hair and kissed him. Then she went to lie down on the cot and turned her face to the wall.

  “Thanks, Sergeant,” she said. “I hope they don’t bury you in it after all.”

  When she awoke, the lantern was out. She could see him bending over her, silhouetted against the stars through the torn roof. She stifled a shriek.

  “Take your hands away!”

  He took them away at once and made a choking sound. His silhouette vanished. She heard him stumbling among the broken timbers, making his way outside. She lay there thinking for awhile, thoughts without words. After a few minutes, she called out.

  “Sergeant? Sergeant!”

  There was no answer. She started up and kicked something that clattered. She
went down on her knees and felt for it in the dark. Finally she found it. It was his gun.

  “Sergeant.”

  After awhile he came stumbling back. “Yes?” he asked softly.

  “Come here.”

  His silhouette blotted the patch of stars again. She felt for his holster and shoved the gun back in it.

  “Thanks, Ami, but they would shoot you for that.”

  “I could say you grabbed it and ran.”

  “Sit down, Ami.”

  Obediently he sat.

  “Now give me your hands again,” she said, then, whispering: “No, please! Not there! Not there.”

  The last thing would be vengeance and death, but the next to the last thing was something else. And it was clearly in violation of the captain’s orders.

  It was the heating of the old man that aroused her fury. They dragged him out of the bunker being used by Major Kline for questionings, and they beat him about the head with a piece of hydraulic hose. “They” were immaculately tailored Blue Shirts of the Americanist Party, and “he” was an elderly Russian major of near retirement age. Two of them held his arms while the third kicked him to his knees and whipped him with the hose.

  “Just a little spanking, commie, to learn you how to recite for teacher, see?”

  “Whip the bejeezis out of him.”

  “Fill him with gasoline and stick a wick in his mouth.”

  “Give it to him!”

  They were very methodical about it, like men handling an unruly circus animal. Marya stood in line with a dozen other prisoners, waiting her turn to be interrogated. It was nine in the morning, and the sun was evaporating the last of the dew on the tents in the camp. The sergeant had gone into the bunker to report to Major Kline and present the articles her captors had taken from her person. He had been gone ten minutes. When he came out, the Blue Shirts were still, whipping the prisoner. The old man had fainted.

  “He’s faking.”

  “Wake him up with it, Mac. Teach him.”

  The sergeant walked straight toward her but gave no sign of recognition. He did not look toward the whistle and slap of the hose, although his face seemed slightly pale. He drew his gun in approaching the prisoners and a guard stepped into his path.

  “Halt! You can’t…”

  “Major Kline’s orders, Corporal. He’ll see Marya Dmitriyevna Lisitsa next. Right now. I’m to show her in.” The guard turned blankly to look at the prisoners. “That one,” said the sergeant.

  “The girl? Okay, you! Shagom marsh!”

  She stepped out of line and went with the sergeant, who took her arm and hissed, “Make it easy on yourself,” out of the corner of his mouth. Neither looked at the other.

  It was dark in the bunker, but she could make out a fat little major behind the desk. He had a poker expression and a small moustache. He kept drumming his fingers on the desk and spoke in comic grunts.

  “So this is the wench,” he muttered at the sergeant. He stared at Marya for a moment, then thundered: “Attention! Hit a brace! Has nobody taught you how to salute?”

  Her fury congealed into a cold knot. She ignored the command and refused to answer in his own language. “Ya nye govoryu po Angliiskil” she snapped.

  “I thought you said she spoke English,” he grunted at the sergeant. “I thought you said you’d talked to her.”

  She felt the sergeant’s fingers tighten on her arm. He hesitated. She heard him swallow. Then he said, “Yes sir, I did. Through an interpreter.”

  Bless you, little sergeant! she thought, not daring to look her thanks at him.

  “Hoy, McCoy!” the major bellowed toward the door.

  The man who came in was not McCoy, but one of the Americanist Blue Shirts. He gave the major a cross-breasted Americanist salute and barked the slogan: “Ameh’ca F’ust!”

  “America First,” echoed the major without vigor and without returning the political salute. “What is it now?”

  “I regrets to repoaht, suh, that the cuhnel is dead of a heaht condition, and can’t answeh moa questions.”

  “I told you to loosen him up, not kill him. Damn! Well, no help for it. Get him out. That’s all, Purvis, that’s all.”

  “Ameh’ca Fust!”

  “Yeah.”

  The Blue Shirt smacked his heels, whirled, and hiked out. The interpreter came in.

  “McCoy, I hate this job. Well, there she is. Take a gander. She’s the one with the bacteriological memo and the snap of MacAmsward. I’m scared to touch it. They’ll want this one higher up. Look at her. A fine piece, eh?”

  “Distinctly, sir,” said McCoy, who looked legal and regal and private-school-polished.

  “Yes, well, let’s begin. Sergeant, wait outside till we’re through.”

  She was suddenly standing alone with them, eyes bright with fury.

  “Why did you begin using bacteriological weapons?” Kline barked.

  The interpreter repeated the question in Russian. The question was a silly beginning. No one had yet made official accusations of germ warfare. She answered with a crisp sentence, causing the interpreter to make a long face.

  “She says they are using such weapons because they dislike us, sir.”

  The major coughed behind his hand. “Tell her what will happen to her if she does that again. Let’s start over.” He squinted at her. “Name?”

  “Imya?” echoed McCoy.

  “Marya Dmitriyevna.”

  “Familiya?”

  “Lisitsa.”

  “It means ‘fox’, sir. Possibly a lie.”

  “Well, Marya Dmitriyevna Fox, what’s your rank?”

  “V kakoin vy chinye?” snapped McCoy.

  “Starshii Lyeityenant,” said the girl.

  “Senior lieutenant, sir.”

  “You see, girl? It’s all straight from Geneva. Name, rank, serial number, that’s all. You can trust us…. Ask her if she’s with Intelligence.”

  “Razvye’dyvatyelnaya sluzhba?”

  “Nyet!”

  “Nyet, eh? How many divisions are ready at the front?”

  “Skol’ko na frontye divizii?”

  “Ya nye pomnyu!”

  “She says she doesn’t remember.”

  “Who is your battalion commander, Lisitsa?”

  “Kto komandir va’shyevo baralyona?”

  “Ya nye pomnyu!”

  “She says she doesn’t remember.”

  “Doesn’t, eh? Tell her I know she’s a spy, and we’ll shoot her at once.”

  The interpreter repeated the threat in Russian. The girl folded her arms and stared contempt at the major. “You’re to stand at attention!”

  “Smirno!”

  She kept her arms folded and stood as she had been standing. The major drew his forty-five and worked the slide.

  “Tell her that I am the sixteenth bastard grandson of Mickey Spillane and blowing holes in ladies’ bellies is my heritage and my hobby.”

  The interpreter repeated it. Marya snorted three words she had learned from a fisherman.

  “I think she called you a castrate, sir.”

  The major lifted the automatic and took casual aim. Something in his manner caused the girl to go white. She closed her eyes and murmured something reverent in favor of the Fatherland.

  The gun jumped in Kline’s hand. The crash brought a yell from the sergeant outside the bunker. The bullet hit concrete out the doorway and screamed off on a skyward ricochet. The girl bent over and grabbed at the front of her skirt. There was a bullet hole in front and in back where the slug had passed between her thighs. She cursed softly and fanned the skirt.

  “Tell her I am a terrible marksman, but will do better next time,” chuckled Kline. “Good thing the light shows through that skirt, eh, McCoy—or I might have burned the ‘tender demesnes.’ There! Is she still cursing me?”

  “Fluently, sir.”

  “I must have burned her little white hide. Give her a second to cool off, then ask what division she’s from.”
>
  “Kakovo vy polka?”

  “Ya nye pomnyu!”

  “She has a very poor memory, sir.”

  The major sighed and inspected his nails. They were grubby. “Tell her,” he muttered, “that I think I’ll have her assigned to C company as its official prostitute after our psychosurgeons make her a nymphomaniac.”

  McCoy translated. Marya spat. The major wrote.

  “Have you been in any battles, woman?” he grunted. “V kakikh srazhyeniyakh vy oochast’vovali?”

  “Ya nye pomnyu!”

  “She says—”

  “Yeah, I know. It was a silly question.” He handed the interpreter her file. “Give these to the sergeant and have him take her up to Purvis. I haven’t the heart to whip information out of a woman. Slim’s queer; he loves it.” He paused, looking her over. “I don’t know whether to feel sorry for her, or for Purvis. That’s all, McCoy.”

  The sergeant led her to the Blue Shirts’ tent. “Listen,” he whispered. “I’ll sneak a call to the Red Cross.” He appeared very worried in her behalf.

  The pain lasted for several hours. She lay on a cot somewhere while a nurse and a Red Cross girl took blood samples and smears. They kept giving each other grim little glances across the cot while they ministered to her.

  “We’ll see that the ones who did it to you are tried,” the Red Cross worker told her in bad Russian.

  “I speak English,” Marya muttered, although she had never admitted it to her interrogators, not even to Purvis.

  “You’ll be all right. But why don’t you cry?”

  But she could only cry for Nikolai now, and even that would be over soon. She lay there for two days and waited.

  After that, there was General MacAmsward, and a politer form of questioning. The answers, though, were still the same.