Casualties of War: The Advocate Trilgy

by Bill Mesce

  “Heebie–jeebies?”

  “I got a brother, my older brother, he’s in the Air Corps in India. He got kinda banged up when his plane came in without wheels. And I got another brother, younger, he’s in the Navy, just shipped out to the Pacific. If this goes bad…” He shrugged grimly.

  “Maybe she’d be happy to have a son home safe. Even if…well…”

  “Well, she might. Mom? Yeah, she might.”

  Below, la comtesse reined her mount across the open ground, an indistinct, wraithlike figure drifting across the lightly powdered sod, then disappearing into the darkness of the forest across the way.

  “I’m gonna remember this,” he said, quietly, as if in a church. He turned his face toward the sky, blinked against the odd flake that settled on his face. “I remember a lot of pretty stuff.” He brought his face down, and I saw white flecks of snow clinging to his lashes. “I was on leave in Naples. I was just sittin’ down by the water and the sun was goin’ down. Everything was this…dark gold. The sky, the water. And the way the sun was goin’ down, the bay, that was all dark. You couldn’t see the ships or the way the krauts had tore up the waterfront. Where the engineers were workin’ there was all these acetylene torches goin’. Then the stars started comin’ out, and you couldn’t tell the difference between them and those torches. That was a time you wish you could paint or somethin’, to try and…you know.”

  “I know.”

  “You’d be surprised what you think is, you know, beautiful. After the Rapido River, I was laid up in this field hospital. Woke up, it was sometime at night. Late. I see this kid on the next cot. Really bad. One of the medics was with him, just kneelin’ with him, holdin’ his hand. There was a lamp sittin’ on a box, that was all the light. Maybe it was the morphine, maybe I was just that tired, I dunno, but that medic and that kid, it made you want to cry. I thought, that’s a picture they should put on a wall in a church right up next to where they got them takin’ Christ down off the cross.” He shook his head. “Maybe I just been over here too long.” He looked round the forest, the clearing, the chateau, as if to etch it as clearly in his mind as possible. “I guess I better turn in. The real fireworks start tomorrow, huh?”

  “In earnest, as they say.”

  I don’t know how long I remained there, alone, atop the wall, before following Sisto down the tower stairs. The lady had yet to emerge from the shadows of the forest and I had grown cold.

  JEREMIAH

  THE RAIN – AS IT ALWAYS WAS THESE DAYS – WAS A COLD, MISERABLE RAIN, backed by a damp chill that seeped into the bones even where a pancho kept out the water. Sgt. Lester Frizell ran his gloved hand over his face. It was a reflexive action, doing nothing to clear away the wet. The rain was too steady, the short brim of his helmet too ineffective at keeping it out. He kept his eyes aimed down the rutted band of mud that was more than a path, less than a road, squinted through the dreary gray latticework of the falling rain.

  His left eye began to twitch. Again, he ran his hand over his face, used the motion to conceal a momentary massage of his eye. He flicked a glance to Billy Two Trees kneeling close by, alongside the muddy trail. Billy Two Trees carried a pack radio on his broad back as easily as he carried his shirt. He was one of the Comanches the Army used as radiomen. The Comanche “code talkers” spoke to each other in their native tongue; a code the Germans could not break.

  Frizell looked to see if Billy Two Trees had noticed the twitch in his sergeant’s eye, but the Comanche’s eyes were focused down the trail, to where the band of mud dipped out of sight and the terrain slid down to the banks of the Our River.

  “See anythin’?” Frizell asked the radioman.

  Billy Two Trees grunted. Rivulets of rain coursed down his dark, lined face, round his unblinking stare, like water coursing down granite.

  “Where is this fuckin’ eight–ball?” the sergeant fretted, and raised his binoculars to his eyes. The splatter of raindrops on the lenses blurred much of the image but there was little to see anyway: that straight band of mire dropping out of sight, bordered on either side by thickets of barren shrubs, withered grass pelted flat, fir trees sagging with the weight of the rain.

  “If I find this knothead is jerkin’ off somewheres…”

  Billy Two Trees pursed his lips as if to say, “Shh,” but no sound came. He rested a settling hand on Frizell’s arm.

  The sergeant winced at the sound of heavy, clumsy footfalls behind him, someone heedlessly splashing through the mud of the trail, then kneeling behind the sergeant, setting an unwelcome hand on his soldier. “Hey, Sarge – ”

  “You got feet like a fuckin’ elephant!” Frizzell hissed in a hoarse whisper. It was his corporal – what the hell was his name? The corporal’s jaws were going like a punch press, hammering a wad of chewing gum. Frizzell could never remember seeing the corporal without his jaws pounding away, issuing – in Frizzell’s ears – a cacophony of smacks and pops sure to draw the attention of every German sniper along the Seigfreid Line.

  “I just wanted to see what was goin’ on,” the corporal said blithely, evidently immune to the damning stare of his sergeant.

  Frizzell stabbed a finger into the corporal’s mouth, gouged out the portion of gum and flicked it off into the bordering thickets. “Didn’t I tell you to watch the back door? Get the fuck back where you belong! You move without me tellin’ you agin ‘n’ I swear to Christ I’ll send you cryin’ home to mama!”

  The corporal blinked, still oblivious to his offense, and with a shrug went clomping back to his post at the rear of the file.

  Frizzell nodded his head. “Leadership qualities.” That’s what the lieutenant had told him in explaining why Frizzell’s new corporal was a corporal. “File says so,” the lieutenant had said, though he didn’t seem any more persuaded by the file than the doubtful Frizzell.

  “Leadership qualities my ass.”

  “Hush up,” Billy Two Trees whispered and that was when Frizzell realized he’d spoken aloud.

  You’re losin’ it, Lester, he cautioned himself. Ya got this fuckin’ twitch, talkin’ to yourself, you’re gonna wind up goin’ home on a psycho. “At least you’ll be goin’ home,” he responded to himself only to be hushed by Billy Two Trees once again.

  He checked his watch. “I’m gonna give this guy a couple more minutes then I’m goin’ up there,” he said to Billy Two Trees.

  “Wait,” Billy Two Trees said. The Comanche’s voice, quiet, had the deep sound of slabs of slate moving over each other.

  Frizzell looked down the trail behind him to make sure the corporal had returned to his position. What the fuck was the corp’s name? What the fuck were any of their names? He looked at his squad, strung out along each side of the trail. Kids. All kids.

  Two of them were kneeling side by side, whispering back and forth, like children in a classroom behind the teacher’s back. Frizzell picked up a stone, hurled it, pleased with the accuracy as it struck one of the soldiers square in the knee.

  “Ouch!”

  “What’d I tell you shit–for–brains ‘bout bunchin’ up?” the sergeant whispered as loudly as he dared. “Spread out ‘n’ keep your fuckin’ yaps shut!” He turned to look back up the trail, shaking his head. “Fuckin’ kids!” he muttered. “Where do they get these fuckin’ kids?”

  He looked to Billy Two Trees. The Comanche grunted and shrugged.

  The “kids” referred to Lester Frizzell and Billy Two Trees as the “Lester and Billy Wild West Show” since Billy Two Trees was an Indian and Frizzell was from Arizona. The kids thought this was hysterical and often laughed over it. Frizzell didn’t think it was particularly witty or clever. He’d never worked a ranch or, for that matter, rode a horse, working, instead, in his father’s dry goods store in a place called Winkleman on the Gila River.

  Their squad was part of an I & R Platoon in the 28th Infantry Division. During their time serving in the squad together, up until a few weeks ago Frizzell and Billy Two Trees had hardly
spoken. As a white Arizonian and Comanche, though they had had no overt animosity to each other, they had found themselves almost instinctively keeping a distance.

  Then the 28th had been sent into the Huertgen. Within two weeks, Frizzell and Billy Two Trees had been the only men in the twelve–man squad who had not been killed or wounded or “out on a psycho,” and Frizzell didn’t think he had a closer friend in the world than the Comanche RTO. Deployed in the Ardennes for a rest and re–fit, Frizzell – as senior – had found himself with the unwanted honor of sergeant’s stripes and equally undesired responsibility for the well–being of a squad of replacements so green – as he explained to the stoic Billy Two Trees – “They’s practically fresh off their mama’s tit.”

  Lester Frizzell himself was just twenty years of age.

  Frizzell looked across the path to “the tourist.” That was his appellation for the young Intelligence colonel (what the fuck was his name?). The G–2 man was an undernourished lad who seemed much too young to be carrying a colonel’s eagle on his collar. Pasty–faced. From all that time sittin’ on his ass in a nice, dry, warm, office, Frizzell had adjudged when the lieutenant had first introduced him to the colonel, telling him the G–2 man needed a squad to take him on a reconnaissance up to the Our River.

  But he had to give the youthful colonel credit. He’d kept his pace with the squad, certainly moved with a quieter tread than the inexpert riflemen, had craftily muddied up the colonel’s insignia and officer’s bar on his helmet. And Frizzell also appreciated that if the colonel had any critical remarks regarding the amateurish conduct of the squad members or the somewhat twitchy, over–cautious, headed–for–a–Section–8 conduct of its leader, he’d kept them to himself.

  Frizzell glanced at his watch again. He couldn’t remember how much time had passed since he’d last marked the time. “I’m gonna give this guy just one more minute ‘n’ if I find him screwin’ around out there, he’ll wish the krauts found ‘im first!” Frizzell turned to Billy Two Trees, indicating the scout who had disappeared up over the rise. “What’s this kid’s name anyways?”

  “Jewish kid.”

  Frizzell remembered; he wasn’t really Jewish. The sergeant was always calling him, “Goldstein,” or “Goldman” or something, and the kid was always correcting him: “Goldstone. I’m not Jewish!” Kid was actually from Georgia or something.

  “That’s it,” Frizzell said with finality, taking up his rifle and starting to stand. “I’m–”. Billy Two Trees held up a finger, gave a quiet, barely heard “hiss” and the sergeant dropped back to his knee, M–1 at the ready, as the Comanche’s upraised finger pointed up the trail.

  Through the rain, an indistinct figure, a helmet, black pancho gleaming with rain. Frizzell brought his M–1 up, lowered his eye to the rear sight.

  Billy Two Trees set his hand gently on the rifle, pushing it down.

  I wasn’t going to fire, Lester Frizzell told himself. Just being ready. You always gotta be ready. But he didn’t quite believe it himself.

  It was Goldstone. Walking along like he was on a stroll in the park, his rifle slung. And he had his arm around a woman, protectively, as if showing her the way. Her clothes were drenched, her legs, bare below the hem of her skirt, caked with mud.

  “This kid found hisself a fuckin’ date?” Frizzell seethed.

  Goldstone looked up from the woman, saw the squad up ahead, smiled and waved a hullo.

  “I shoulda fuckin’ pipped ‘im!” Frizzell sighed.

  As soon as Goldstone was close, the sergeant grabbed him by his pancho and pulled him down to his knees. “Hey, Sarge!”

  “If you got no smarter brothers, the family name’s gonna end with you,” Frizzell said. “What the hell’s a matter with you?”

  “There’s nobody over there, Sarge,” Goldstone chirped through his insouciant smile.

  “Says who? Her?”

  The tourist – the G–2 colonel – had taken the women to the other side of the trail, eased her down on to the grass, then stripped off his pancho and helped her wriggle into it.

  “Nah,” Goldstone said. “I seen it!”

  Frizzell crept across the trail and squatted by the G–2 colonel and the woman. The sergeant thought she looked old enough to be his mother, early forties or so. She might’ve been younger but she looked like she’d been on her feet a long time, almost numb with fatigue, the cold, the wet. Her face was ashen, deep shadows under her eyes, and she shivered uncontrollably.

  The Intelligence officer was thumbing his way through a small German phrase book.

  “She a kraut?” Frizzell asked.

  The G–2 man asked her something in German.

  She responded in a small, tired voice that quaked with the cold.

  “Her name’s Elise Delé,” the G–2 man said. “She’s a Luxembourger.”

  “Hey, can I get my Luxembourger with cheese?” quipped one of the riflemen.

  Frizzell didn’t see which one but he sent a glare down the file that erased all grins and stifled all titters.

  The G–2 man and the woman went back and forth, he hunting through his phrase book, she patiently waiting for him to decipher the answers she gave slowly, and for him to piece together his next question.

  “What’s the skinny, Colonel?” Frizzell asked.

  “What I can pick out is her and her son were in Vianden.”

  “Our Vianden?” The I & R Platoon was billeted in Vianden.

  “They were out trying to scrounge up some warm clothes a couple of days ago. They bumped into some krauts, her kid took off but the krauts took her back to their side of the river. They questioned her, let her go, and she’s been trying to get back ever since. If I got it right what she’s saying, she says there’s no krauts over there.”

  “See?” Goldstone piped, vindicated.

  Frizzell rubbed his hand across his face. “Whaddaya think, Colonel?”

  “I think we need to go see for ourselves,” the G–2 man said.

  Frizzell nodded glumly. He called over Billy Two Trees, made radio contact with platoon headquarters in Vianden and reported in. Then he called up his corporal. “You take one section, get this lady back to Vianden. They know you’re comin’ in with her. Try not to embarrass me by gettin’ lost on the way.”

  The woman noted the gathering of her escort with concern. She said something else to the G–2 colonel. He flipped through his phrase book, sighed sadly. He gestured for her to follow the corporal and his men: “Bitte.”

  With a resigned look, she took the corporal’s outstretched hand as he helped her to her feet, and down the trail they went.

  “What was that last bit?” Frizzell asked.

  The G–2 colonel squinted against the rain in the direction of the Our River. “She wanted us to let her go look for her son.”

  *

  Goldstone was returned to the point and led them up the trail, then down the steep, rugged side of the valley of the Our River. Despite the cover of rain and the gray half–light filtering through it, Frizzell could not help but feel exposed as the squad moved down the slope, the trail completely open to positions sighting on them from the high ground on the other side of the river. His left eye twitched madly.

  Normally, “river” was something of a grandiose description for the Our. “Most of them Ardennes rivers wan’t no more bigger ‘n’ a urinal,” one Keystone division veteran would remember. But the winter rains and snows had bolstered the stream into a broad if sluggish moat. Luckily, a narrow footbridge across the river spanned even this swollen breadth. Frizzell sent his men over one at a time, and with each passage he expected the rim of the heights above the eastern bank to light up with rifle and machine gun fire.

  But there was only the hiss and splash of the rain, the gurgle of the river.

  Across the river, the seven men trudged their way up the steep valley slope, threaded their way through barriers of concertina wire with Frizzell constantly hounding them about the dangers of mines and
trip-wires. For all the sergeant’s concerns, they made it through the defensive barriers without incident until they could see a row of concrete pillboxes scattered along the rim of the valley, squatting low in the ground, barely visible in their cloak of camouflage–patterned paint.

  Frizzell had the squad ready themselves to provide cover fire while he sent Goldstone ahead to reconnoiter the nearest pillbox. The GIs waited tensely while their point man scurried up to the stout walls, then disappeared round the rear of the pillbox. In a minute he was in sight again, waving them on.

  Soon, they were gratefully out of the rain inside the dank-smelling shelter. They made no move into the dark space, but stood about the oblong of gray light entering the open door. Frizzell crossed to the gunports and, with his binoculars, studied the emplacements on either side of their pillbox but saw no signs of occupancy. He scanned the muddy field behind them, then the thick–set forest beyond that, but, again, saw no movement, no sign. He sent Goldstone and one rifleman to the pillbox on their left to reconnoiter, two others to the one on their right.

  “I’m gonna go have a look down there,” the G–2 colonel said, nodding at the open ground behind the high point where the pillbox sat. Frizzell made as if to follow him but the colonel waved at him to remain behind. “Stay out of the rain,” he said and warily walked down into the meadow.

  Frizzell took off his helmet and massaged his scalp. The cold December air felt – at least for the moment – refreshing through his hair. When he brought his hand away from his head, he shook his head mournfully over the hair caught in the weave of his woolen gloves. Jesus! I’ll be bald by Christmas!

  He heard something scuffle about in the darkness along the walls below the gunports. His rifle came up but Billy Two Trees waved at him to stand easy, then crossed the gloom on silent feet. The Comanche halted by the far wall, then his body spasmed as he kicked at something in the darkness below him. There was a soft thud, something like a baby’s cry cut short, and the sound of a small satchel sliding across the concrete floor until it butted against a wall.