I could only nod. Already I was feeling the strain. The locomotive expelled billows of black smoke that thickened the air, the floorboards throbbed and swayed under my feet, and my stomach rolled. A cold sweat clung to my forehead, upper lip, chest. I’d stopped fingering the butt of my Colt. It was there and wasn’t going anywhere.
“Guess, that’s way Colonel likes it—keeps everyone on their toes.” Horton was sucking on one of his homemade toothpicks, plunging and twisting it far back inside his mouth. “Your most lazy, no-good bum can turn the most bloodthirsty, that’s what the colonel says. Or even your weak-kneed know-it-all.” He opened the chamber of his tommy gun, slapped it shut. “Kaspar? With me Cap’n?”
“Here,” I grunted, pushing wet hair from my eyes. “Just a little car sickness, I guess.”
Horton twirled the toothpick with his tongue. The tracks thumped. We’d crossed a road. He said: “Every time we been over a bridge, crossed a road, crick, anything, there’s not one US patrol. Nuthin’.”
“All quiet on the western front. Just like the colonel wanted. With the Sovs acting up in the east, what’s the point guarding the west? Guard against what?”
“The French? Owe us their shirts. Swiss? Got guns that go ‘cuckoo, cuckoo.’” Horton laughed at that, holding his gut like some jolly glutton in a silent picture.
And we chugged on, crossing the road south to Garmisch-Partenkirchen, on through junctions for the Starnberger See and Landsberg up north, the counties passing like so many fallow fields.
The rain came, driving through the loco smoke and pelting our faces at the windows. My ears popped, and my nausea seemed to pass. The train lurched over a steep hill.
“I don’t like slowing, don’t like slowing for nuthin’ and nobody.” Horton popped his head out a side window. The locomotive whistle shrieked and I stuck my head out, same side. We were passing an ancient one-room train station, where a German rail official waved us along. Up front Ushanka, the stoker, leaned out the cab window, giving a thumbs-up.
Horton slapped his knee. “Hot dang. Easy as pie.” Then, he fell silent. Staring out the window, the tommy gun between his legs. He drank from a small silver flask, which he kept close to his chest and didn’t share. I tore open a fresh pack of Lucky Strikes. We listened to the clicks of the tracks.
Horton squinted his eyes shut. He looked over to me. “I got a girl. Over near Garmisch. Her name’s Gisela, and if she knew what I was in for today, she would not like it, not one bit. Frown at me like she does. Call me a blöder Lump. But what can I do? It’s the job.” He took another drink.
“I know what you mean.”
Horton shifted his squat and faced me, the green of trees rushing by behind him. “Better than patching tire tubes. Kansas City, that was the drill. Hell. Wrastlin’ dang tire irons, smell of that glue and scraping up the rubber. Here’s what I done: when I got the call-up I gone down to the station and socked my boss Mr. Potter right across the jaw, flattened him for good measure. Told him, that’s for all the riding you give me.” He formed a fist. He punched into his open hand. Smack.
I showed Horton a grin. “You told him.”
We gained speed and the wheels shimmied and clattered—the rails were worn out here. Our cab darkened. We’d entered deeper woods. Horton, still facing me, stroked the barrel of the tommy gun between his legs as if it was hair on a doll’s head. He drew his hunting knife from its sheath. The blade was jagged and rusty. He turned it and let it catch the light as if he’d never held a knife in his hands before.
I stabbed out my Lucky on the floor and felt for the butt of my Colt.
“Hey, Kaspar. You wanna know why I look so sluggy this morning? So dang dopey? Why I feel so goddang fubar?”
“What? Hardly noticed. You tie one on, what?”
“No, not like I do. And that’s just the problem.” Horton scooted forward, leaning on his tommy. “See, I think someone mighta knocked me out. Slipped me the Mickey.”
I swallowed. Talked around the lump in my throat. “That’s nuts. When, last night?”
“Nope, night before. And I still feel sluggy, too. Something happened. Two kraut sisters ran into me at my camp-out, said they was hiking to Vienna, finally gonna do it. We had a few laughs and drank some nasty green swill. And then? All kaput, Cap’n. I tell you, musta been out ten, twelve hours. All too kaput for normal. I was one real mess when I woke and I still am.”
I made my eyes big. “Now wait a sec. You think somebody had a crack at it? At our boxcars?”
Horton grasped both hands around the tommy barrel, twisting. He smiled. “That’s just the thing. Boxcars look the same, far as I can tell. Padlocks are locked. Far as I can tell. Colonel never left me a key so I couldn’t a checked inside.”
“You did check around though? This could be serious, Sergeant. Real serious. Maybe somebody tried. Jesus. Maybe somebody’s going to try again?”
“There was trucks up there. More than just a one. Out of the warehouses, at least. Had to be. And the rest of it? All a little too clean—spanking new, in fact, if you know what I mean. No trace of a thing. No leaves, branches, ruts, weasel holes, nothing, like a garage floor been swept.” Horton’s eyes seemed to pull closer together. “Now. How do you explain all that?”
“Explain it? Me?”
Horton scooted forward. The tommy gun rested level on his thigh now, the barrel pointing between my legs. “You. On account of you’re the only one who would have tried, on account a you’re the only one who knew about that salt mine. You and maybe that baron. But he’s not that greedy, is he? Or dumb. Or trusted. Nope.”
My back had pressed to the window, the draft gushing down my shirt. “Well, I can’t explain it. Mean, how could I?” I laughed. Grinned. Horton grinned too and aimed the tommy higher. I waved hands. “Whoa there, wait, wait—you think I did it? Come on, why would I be so stupid as to try anything?”
“Maybe you went and thought, why not? Sure. Because the colonel going to go and rub me out anyways? Me, meaning you.” Horton lowered his eyes to the floor and his tommy with them. “But the colonel finds anything rotten? I’m a dead man too.”
Of course, I was a dead man. Who was I kidding? I said nothing. I let his words settle in, under the weight of my thoughts, but the words didn’t lose their barb. I didn’t know what was worse—the crush or the cut of it. I was falling, plummeting down a giant iron funnel, the walls narrowing. Yet I still had to try. I still had to fight it.
The brakes had grabbed. We tottered and held on. We were slowing again and fast. Horton rushed to the window.
I shouted to him. “If it’s another checkpoint? You need me. And I need you.”
Horton glared back. “First, gimme your rod. And do it nice-like.”
I handed over my Colt, butt first. What else could I do? Trust seemed the only weapon I had at the moment. We poked our heads out. Up ahead was a crossing and a white building that was square and stout, like a bunker or a jail. Everything was painted a fresh white. Road markers and fences, the two thick metal barricade bars blocking the tracks. A broad sign read:
ALL VEHICLES HALT
TRANSPORT CHECKPOINT
We pulled back in, facing each other. “This is the real deal now,” I said. “We get through this one, we’re home free.”
“Yeah? Don’t be so sure.”
Brakes screeched. Full stop. We looked out. Three armored cars had pulled up. A line of soldiers stood ready wearing starched new tunics, bright yellow scarves, and silver helmets.
“Silver helmets?” Horton said. “Look like a goddang football team.”
“Worse. They’re Constabulary Corps—MG’s new occupation police. Real elite troop if you like that kind of show.”
“I heard about them. A show’s one thing. They got teeth?”
I nodded. “Can’t wait to bite, too. Worse than rear-line MPs. Never got to mix it up with krauts or combat GIs so they’re aiming for the next best fight—AWOLs up to dirty tricks, deserters running rackets
, thieves, and murderers on the run.”
Whistles sounded. The constabulary troop advanced in step aiming glossy black M-3 submachine guns. Horton’s face had scrunched up. “Hate those little grease guns. Only thing worse than a copper? Copper for hire.”
“The company cop, that’s right. MG goons were exactly the kind of snag the colonel was worried about. They’re not on any take, and they play it by the book too. That’s why I’m here. So. You going to let me earn my keep, or maybe you’d like a try?”
Horton unhooked the hunting knife and German holster from his belt. He set them down. He handed back my Colt. “I’ll be right behind you.”
I tugged my Ike jacket down straight and pulled my side cap tight. Strode down the stairs. The silver helmets stood at attention all down the line—milk-faced teens, most of them. I snapped a salute. A lieutenant was marching over to me, all riding pants and thin mustache. He stomped his shiny brown boots together, saluted. I said: “At ease. Real spit and polish, Lieutenant. I can’t tell if you boys are cops or cavalry.”
“Thank you, sir.” The lieutenant glanced down at my paratrooper boots.
“I’m Public Safety myself, County Heimgau, and Acting CO now.” I wagged a thumb at the freight cars. “We have here a confidential shipment—”
“We’ll get to that. Sir, your men up front—the driver and coal man, they don’t speak English. They’re Russians, it seems.”
Horton had followed me. He’d pushed his shaggy hair back and pulled on a side cap, let his face go slack. The change amazed me. He looked like the cheery slothful clerk he might have well become had he not inherited a fierce temper, habitual bloodlust, and deep hatred for authority. He even saluted.
“Worse yet, they don’t have authorization,” added the lieutenant, glancing at Horton now.
“I got that, got it right here.” I reached into my front pocket, unfolded papers.
The lieutenant held my papers out in front of him like a scroll he was about to read aloud. He checked the carbons underneath. Meanwhile, two of the armored cars directed their cannons at the train.
The lieutenant looked up. “Heimgau? That where that major was killed?”
I nodded. “I served under the man.” I raised my chin, in mock respect.
“That’s rough, sir. The fight’s never over here.”
“No. Not ever.”
The lieutenant read on and handed back my papers. “This is transport authorization, but these are CIC orders, sir, supplementary trip permits for the zone frontier. That means beyond the border only.” He stole another glance at Horton. “This is an internal checkpoint, you understand.”
“I know that. But you asked for them, didn’t you? So why the runaround?” I took a step forward.
The lieutenant glanced at his watch, for no reason but nerves. “Sir? I don’t follow you.”
“Huh?” I barked at him: “You don’t follow? What’s the big idea?” Another step forward.
The lieutenant stepped back, feeling for his mustache, glancing at his men and armored cars.
Glaring, I patted my other pocket and pulled more papers. “Of course I got my MG paperwork … trip ticket, permit, cargo clearance et cetera, drafted and signed by yours truly if you’ll notice.”
The lieutenant read. He stabbed at a page. “Ah. There now. These are fine, fine. See, MG orders take precedence.” He handed back the papers, beaming. “Why didn’t you say so, sir? All you had to do was say it—”
“Because you did not ask. You were imprecise. Get me? You did not do your job, and you’re lucky I don’t take your name. Just watch out from now on, hear? People die for less. For Christ’s sake.” I placed a Lucky in my mouth and talked around it. “It’s all right. You’re a young kid. Kid, I’m detachment CO, did I say that? Got the paper for that too, up in the train if you need it.”
“No, no. That’s fine, sir. Everything’s fine. Confidential is confidential. Please, carry on.” The lieutenant saluted. He waved toward the white bunker, whistles sounded, and the silver helmets pivoted and headed off single file. “Enjoy the rest of your trip, sir.”
The train charged on, full speed. Horton watched me from back at his corner window. After the checkpoint, he had told me I did a nice put-on. I had thanked him. He didn’t take my Colt back. Now he stared at me with a hangdog look. His thick brow had twice the weight. He scooted over my way.
“How long have you been a deserter?” I said. “A year or more?”
Horton nodded.
“Colonel Spanner kept you going.”
Horton’s eyes glazed over. “He’s no fucking colonel.” He scooted closer, his big hands loose in his lap. I said: “You killed Major Membre, didn’t you? That’s why I saw you that day out on the square.”
“Spanner did the deed this time,” Horton said. “I was the muscle and the lookout. He was still up there in that suite when you waltzed in there. Holed up. Said he had good cover behind a hutch.”
A shiver hit me. Spanner had to have been seconds from lowering the hatchet on me too. “Guess I should be glad there was no friendly fire.”
“You should be. The colonel did quite the job on that major, considering his gimpy hand.”
“That the usual way?”
“It’s our way. I helped the colonel torture those three you found, and kill them too.”
“I know.”
“You did something to this train, didn’t you, Cap?”
“No.”
Horton wiped at the glaze in his eyes. He stared at the floorboards a while. He looked up. “Whenever I do a job like that, I don’t feel a thing. Only that same empty feeling I always got in the morning on the way to work. Same with those three corpses you found.”
“You dumped them out along the Heimgauer Strasse.”
“Yup.”
“Why not in the woods? It was so someone could find them easily, pick them up. Wasn’t it? You got a small fee for that, I’m guessing. Little dump job on the side you had going.”
“Yup, sure.”
“A local hire you?” I said.
“That’s it.”
“Who?”
Horton said nothing. He couldn’t answer. His chest was heaving, and tears welled in his eyes. His tommy gun lay at his feet. He let it stay there.
He let me be. He left me with my Colt, my racing thoughts, everything. I sat under my corner window, weighing just how to take out the sergeant before it was too late.
He made his way back to his window. I stayed in my corner, eyeballing him. He sat with his shoulders towards me, his forearms resting on the sill, his chin on his arms. Hard to tell if the big man was sleeping or looking out. His tommy gun lay five feet from him.
What if I just kicked him off? Aim my Colt, get his hands up. Walk him to the door …
I drew the Colt. I aimed at the center of his back and took a step forward. And another.
Horton swung around, lunged, and grasped at my wrist, directing the Colt away. He pressed his hunting knife to my throat.
“Whoa, wait, hold on.” I backed a step and the knife moved with me, into my flesh, a cold sting. His putrid parched breath hit me.
Then he eased off my wrist and to my amazement, I was able to bring the Colt back around, pointing it at his chest. His knife was still at my throat.
He snickered. “Shoot,” he hissed, “shoot.”
I’m dead anyway, I thought. I squeezed the trigger.
Nothing. I squeezed again. Still nothing.
Horton laughed. He drew the knife back and stroked the air sideways with it. “You dang idiot.”
I stared at my Colt, searching for some logical reason why I had the grip safety on.
Horton karate-chopped my wrist. The gun flew away and spun across the floor.
I sputtered: “You were scaring me, see, with all your crazy talk and I thought you were going to take me out. But I had the safety on, didn’t I? Didn’t I?”
Horton lowered his knife. “Dang idiot, you probably had it on s
ince you got here.”
“I …”
We both paused. We had both heard it. The clicking of the rails was sounding farther apart. The train was losing speed again.
“You can’t kill me,” I said. “Not yet.”
The brakes squealed. The train lurched and slowed.
Twenty-Seven
HORTON STUFFED MY COLT into his belt. “Why’re we stopping? Too early for another checkpoint,” he said, the veins in his thick neck bulging like waking snakes.
“I don’t know,” I muttered. I was still shocked that I had let him snatch my Colt back. “I need my gun.”
“No! You made me mad,” he said, a whine creeping into his voice, and for a moment I knew what it was like to be his girl Gisela. He snatched up his tommy too.
We peered out windows, front and back. We had reached a higher, denser stretch of wood. Thick tree trunks lined the rail bank. The locomotive’s smoke and steam had settled around us and locked us in, a gray, humid fog that crept into our cabin.
I felt for the fighting knife under my trouser leg, and eased out the grip a little.
“Nothing around here, far’s I can tell,” Horton said, “no crossings, switches, nuthin’.”
He came at me. He grabbed me by the throat. “You know about this? Do you? Do, tell me now.”
“I swear to you. I wish to God that I did.”
The train jerked to a full halt, more steam spurted out. Horton cocked the tommy gun. “Stay here,” he barked and bounded down the steps.
I squinted out the window, but he was already lost in the swirling steam fog. The locomotive hissing and clanging. I thought I heard boots crunching out on the gravel.
I pulled the fighting knife from its sheath, which popped out and hit the floor with a slap. I crouched, holding the knife grip with both hands, the blade out in front of me. I crept toward the steps.
I heard boots clanging, on the rail car steps.
Horton plodded back up into the car. His face looked heftier, paler, a doughier version of itself like a papier mâché. His hands hung at his sides. He didn’t have his tommy gun. He didn’t look at me, didn’t see me.
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