David Robbins - [World War II 04]

by Liberation Road (v1. 0) (epub)

  ‘No, man, not like that. That ain’t it.’

  ‘And in return, Joe Amos?’

  Joe Amos heaved a sigh. What was going on? He’d just said he was going to give the Marquis three thousand dollars! Again, confusion swirled and he could figure no other course but to press on and trust that what he would say next would be such good news that all this gloom and reluctance would disappear, and the kisses and wine would flow like he had expected.

  ‘I want to marry Geneviève.’

  No reaction came from the Marquis or the girl. Joe Amos looked to Geneviève but her eyes were fixed on her father.

  ‘I said I want to marry you.’

  ‘Joe Amos,’ the Marquis spoke. ‘Look at me.’

  He pulled his eyes from the girl. She was the reason he would do anything, be anything, a hero, a criminal.

  ‘My friend, my good boy. No.’

  The Marquis set his arm around Joe Amos’s waist to lead him away from Geneviève. Joe Amos held firm.

  ‘No?’

  The Marquis waited. Joe Amos repeated, louder, ‘No?’

  ‘It is not what you think,’ the Marquis said.

  The Marquis gave up trying to pull Joe Amos from the girl. He said to her, ‘Go in the house.’

  ‘No. She stays.’

  ‘Joe Amos, you are not the master of this home.’ To his daughter, he said again, ‘Go in the house.’

  Before walking away, the girl shook her head at Joe Amos. The gesture broke his heart. He could not tell if she was repeating her father’s refusal of his proposal, or if she was saying to him, Go now. Do not stay and ask questions. Go.

  Joe Amos watched her leave. He caught himself leaning after her, sucked in her wake, aching to dash across the lawn.

  She entered the kitchen and closed the door. Joe Amos watched the window; she did not look out.

  ‘Alright, man.’ Joe Amos yanked his arm from the Marquis’s grip. ‘What’s up? You don’t want my money anymore or you don’t want my color? Which is it?’

  Joe Amos took steps away, angered now, done with being confused. The Marquis lifted his hands into the breech between them. Joe Amos wanted the betrayal out in the open and he wanted it now.

  ‘What is it, Marquis? You fuckin’ owe me this.’

  ‘Oui. I owe you.’

  The Marquis dropped his arms.

  He said, ‘Do not think this is easy.’

  ‘Get on with it.’

  The Frenchman drew a breath.

  ‘The Nazis. I told you, they were here for four years. My wife.’

  ‘Yeah, you said before, she died of the flu.’

  ‘No. There was no flu. My wife is alive.’

  Joe Amos pulled himself erect at this, suddenly afraid of where the Marquis’s explanation might go.

  ‘If she’s not dead, where is she?’

  ‘She is there. In the house.’

  Joe Amos’s jaw dropped to speak, but his lips would not part. He leaned onto his toes, wanting to leap at the man and shake him.

  ‘My wife,’ the Marquis said, ‘Geneviève.’ It was the worst word he could have spoken.

  Humiliation reared at Joe Amos like flames, stopping him from grabbing the Marquis. He’d been made such a fool. He felt pulverized, without the bones to strike the man.

  ‘You used me.’ Joe Amos put all the venom he could muster into his voice.

  Still, he sounded to himself like a hoodwinked yokel.

  The Marquis drew himself up, proud in his posture. Joe Amos marveled, Where does he get the balls?

  ‘No worse than I have been used.’

  ‘You used? Go to hell.’

  ‘That journey has already been made. Tell me, do you think the Germans in their four years in my house asked my permission before they had their way with my young wife? Do you think I stood by and did nothing? I was dragged into this yard and beaten more times than I recall. What can a man tolerate, Joe Amos? What can he stand by and watch, what brokenhearted sob can he swallow? Hmm? Do you think you will stand this, to have been used so badly as you claim? Perhaps, perhaps not. You will learn, I suppose. As have I.’

  Joe Amos looked back to the house to see if Geneviève was watching. The windows were all empty of her. The mansion seemed small and desperate.

  ‘You son of a bitch,’ Joe Amos said.

  ‘Oui.’

  ‘Your wife’s a whore.’

  The Marquis made no move to avenge this remark.

  Instead, he raised his chin and said, unblinking, ‘I see this makes you feel better, to curse us. Go on, then, if this is what you must do. But understand. My wife that you say is a whore has more courage and honor than you and me and a thousand men. You cannot marry her because she is my wife, yes. But even if she were not, you do not deserve her. You have not suffered like her, like this house. You are just like me, Joe Amos. You are a thief.’

  ‘I’m a what?’

  The older man held his ground.

  ‘Go ahead, strike me. You think you will be the first? After four years with the Boche in my home, you think I have not had a blow? Pff, I will not even feel your hand, Joe Amos Biggs.’

  Joe Amos reined himself in. He spoke through clamped teeth.

  ‘If I’m a thief, what about her?’

  ‘What did she steal from you? Your heart? I have given it back to you. So. You are made whole. But did you think for one minute what was stolen from us? Did you really think yourself the man to give it all back? With what? Three thousand stolen dollars? An offer of marriage? That is merde for what this house has lost.’

  The Marquis paused but did not look away.

  ‘What else?’ Joe Amos asked, to purge everything.

  ‘You have not heard enough?’

  ‘What else?’

  ‘Bon. We continue to survive. Geneviève, she does what she has to do even now, with the Americans in France. My young wife, she has the heart of a warrior. She knows what must be done to survive.’

  ‘What are you saying to me?’

  ‘I am saying that if you wait long enough, another truck will come up our drive and you will meet another man. And if the two of you wait, you will meet a third.’

  Joe Amos nodded, heaped with more shame than he ever thought he could bear. What can a man tolerate? This?

  The Marquis took up the bottle from the grass. He offered the wine to the glass still in Joe Amos’s hand. Joe Amos let him pour.

  ‘One more drink, my friend, then you should go. Take your gasoline, sell it, and keep the money for you and your fine McGee. The money, you deserve.’

  Joe Amos drank the wine, then let the glass drop to the lawn.

  ‘Did she care for me at all?’

  ‘Of course. You are a good boy.’

  Joe Amos walked around the long edge of the ancient house. He kept his eyes down and did not look in any windows. The sound of the Marquis’s mowing ushered him from the property. McGee and the Jimmy waited out front in the big circular drive.

  Joe Amos climbed in the cab. He cranked the motor and pulled away. Along the shady drive, he feared another Jimmy coming up the road. He would stop the driver and warn him, tell the Marquis’s whole story, the truth about that house. Had another man told him those things ten minutes ago, he would have fought. The jerricans jittered in the back.

  McGee smoked and said nothing. Joe Amos brooded over the wheel, flinging the Jimmy south to St. Lô inside a long column that had let him in. The two did not speak for hours, until the convoy had passed Vire, then Dom-front, and approached the first bivouac area at Couptrain. Joe Amos paid no attention to the time. He flew past MPs flagging the column to slow down and the large Red Bali billboards marking the one-way route. Afternoon light frayed to the east, the sun swelled orange the lower it sat on the faraway fields west. Joe Amos finally noticed the day ending, and was glad of it. He listened to the pistons and springs of the truck, the gearbox and slick rubber against the road, and thought how sick and tired this Jimmy was, how overworked. It needed to
rest, not to be sold into slavery. And the thousand gallons of gas in the back, they belonged at the front, not in Paris. I’ve been chumped, Joe Amos thought. The Marquis said he gave me back my heart. He gave it back beaten up to hell.

  Joe Amos followed the convoy into the bivouac. Dozens of Nissan huts had been erected for maintenance, sleeping areas, offices, and spare parts in the great pasture where not one blade of grass or weed was left standing. Hundreds of vehicles rolled and a thousand men walked in crisscross patterns, honking horns and yelling everywhere. The frenzied activity on the Red Ball followed them, even here where they came to a halt for a while. Joe Amos guided his Jimmy out of the column, aiming to stay just long enough for a coffee. He intended to get back on the road to catch up with Morales, Grove, Baskerville, and the rest of the boys at Chartres. He wished time was like the road, wished he could drive faster through it and leave her behind months before sunup.

  McGee jumped down to stretch. Joe Amos brought him a coffee, too.

  McGee asked, ‘You want me to take her for a while?’

  ‘Sure. Hey, McGee.’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Look, I reckon the deal’s off.’

  The boy sipped his coffee.

  ‘What you mean?’

  ‘I mean, we ain’t taking the gas to Paris. I changed my mind.’

  McGee’s gaze narrowed. ‘Somethin’ happen back there with the Marquis?’

  ‘None of your business.’

  ‘None of my business? I get in the same trouble you get in, but I only get me a thousand dollars out the deal. I didn’t say nothin’ ‘bout that. But I’m gonna say somethin’ bout this here. This is my business.’

  ‘McGee, back off.’

  ‘That girl told you she don’ want you no more. That’s what happened. Now you don’ want no money. I ain’t stupid, Sarge.’

  ‘I said back off.’

  ‘No, I think you back off. You change your mind, but what about my mind? I ain’t changed. I want this.’

  ‘And I said no. Forget it. Get in the truck. I’ll drive.’

  McGee dropped his coffee mug on the dirt.

  ‘No, Sarge. I’ll drive. And you stay here.’

  ‘McGee, think about this. It’s not a good idea.’

  The boy shook his head and all his hardness fell away.

  ‘What else I got? Really, Sarge, what else? You and I both know I got nothin’ after this war. And I ain’t got a damn thing to show now. I ain’t like you. I ain’t shot down no plane, got me some stripes. I didn’t get no girl. Come on, man, lemme have this.’

  ‘You’ll get caught.’

  ‘Maybe. Maybe not. But ‘til I do I’m gonna have me four thousand dollars in Paris, France.’

  Joe Amos looked the boy over. McGee knew the risk, and he was willing to take it. Like Joe Amos had been.

  ‘I won’t tell nobody, Sarge. I get caught, I’ll say I stole the truck out from under you. Go on inside and get another coffee. Here. Get one for me.’

  McGee bent for the dropped cup. He walked close and handed the mug over. Joe Amos took it. The two shook hands.

  ‘You know the address in Montparnasse?’ he asked.

  ‘Yeah. I got it. Rue Stanislas. I got the map in the glove box.’

  ‘You know the man’s name?’

  ‘White Dog.’

  ‘Alright. Good luck.’

  ‘I get away with it, I’m gonna bring you a thousand dollars.’

  ‘Don’t, McGee. Keep it all.’

  Joe Amos let the boy’s hand loose. He took the empty coffee cups inside the tent. He kept his back turned until he heard the rush of the motor and the lunge of gears. He walked outside with the two mugs steaming, to watch McGee pull away. Joe Amos’s M-1 lay on the ground. He dumped out McGee’s cup.

  Another colored driver came beside him, sipping coffee.

  ‘That your rifle?’

  ‘Yep.’

  ‘That your rig?’

  ‘It was.’

  ‘What’s up?’

  ‘Me and my assistant had a little argument. He drove off without me.’

  ‘Asshole.’

  ‘Not really. I need a ride to Chartres.’

  ‘Sorry. We ain’t stopping there.’

  ‘Where you goin’?’

  ‘Long fucking way, out toward Metz. Right up to the front.’

  ‘Who’s in Metz? Patton?’

  ‘Patton. We’re takin’ ammo to the 90th, outside some town called Thionville, on the Moselle.’

  The Tough Ombres were at the Moselle? Damn. The last time Joe Amos looked, the 90th was just east of Paris. Now they’re knocking on the German border.

  The driver shrugged. ‘Like I said, it’s a long drive.’

  Joe Amos laughed into his coffee cup.

  ‘Man, you don’t know. I’d walk it.’

  ~ * ~

  D+93

  September 7

  Ben took his second bullet of the war. This round nipped his web belt at the waist, spinning him around full circle before he went down. His left hip stung like he’d been cut with a scythe. On the ground he burrowed hard, scared and mad. The gunner knew he was down and plowed the soil left and right but missed Ben, flat in the high grass. Once the zings of bullets swept away elsewhere, Ben rolled over gingerly to pick at his belt buckle, to get it off and take a look at where he’d been hit. I Company had walked right into the Kraut MG’s sights, which blasted from a stand of trees a hundred yards ahead outside the village of Mont. The target for the day’s march was the town of Fontoy, and this sudden resistance along the way was unexpected; the Kraut MG was the first combat for the whole division in over two weeks, spent resting without an enemy to pursue or gasoline to chase them with. This wasn’t much in the way of a fight: some unlucky Kraut unit got left behind to slow the Americans down while the rest of their bunch hotfooted it farther east. Even so, two hundred shocked doughs of I Company went to ground fast. Shouts went up from a handful of wounded. An officer scrambled for the radio, calling for an A/T gun to move up. Sergeants yelled at their squads to get on their feet and circle the trees.

  A medic skidded beside Ben and helped him ease off the belt. The lattice was sliced where the bullet struck. The weeds gave some cover for Ben and the medic as the Jerry machine gun busied itself, hacking away at the company spreading out.

  The medic muttered, ‘What kind of sumbitch shoots a chaplain. I mean, that ain’t right. He can see plain as day you got a red cross on your dang helmet. I swear.’

  Ben sucked through his teeth. The medic’s annoyance at a chaplain’s being shot made his hands brusque exposing the wound.

  ‘It’s alright,’ Ben said to get the boy to ease up tugging at his shirt and pants. ‘It’s... ow! It’s fine, I been shot before. Just...!’

  Phineas’s pistol tumbled out when the belt went slack. The medic raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Looky here. Maybe that Kraut saw you comin’, Padre, and just shot you first.’

  ‘Could be. How’s it look?’

  In answer, the medic stuck a thumb and forefinger into the cardinal depths of the gash, checking for fragments. Ben felt speared. His mouth gaped and his eyes crossed. He blinked into an encroaching blackness, ready to faint.

  ‘Looks clean,’ the medic said. ‘Come on, Padre, hang with me now. Attaboy.’ Ben sensed a hand on his back and a canteen at his mouth. Water ran over his chin before he could remember to part his lips to drink.

  ‘There you go.’

  With the medic’s mitts finally away from the wound, Ben’s vision unclouded. He noticed the size of the boy, big as a bull.

  ‘Were you... uh...,’ Ben asked, ‘were you a boxer or something?’

  ‘No, why you ask?’ the medic sprinkled sulfa powder over the channel punched through the fleshy part of his waist. Ben sucked air at the new, smaller stabs of pain. The medic dug into his pack for a gauze wrap and a bandage. The gash bled into Ben’s OD underpants.

  ‘Nothing,’ Ben groaned. ‘Forget it.’ />
  ‘My dad runs a meat-packing plant in Wyoming. That what you mean?’

  ‘Yeah. Must be.’

  ‘You got lucky here, Padre. There ain’t much of you where a bullet could miss an organ. But this one did.’