The older residents were less enthusiastic. Mutters were heard in which the name of the Devil was bandied about. But even the town's notables were ready enough to accept the explanation of the students. They had heard of Leonardo da Vinci, even if they had never seen his sketches.
The rifles, oddly enough, caused more distress. The coal-truck-turned-armored-personnel-carrier was too outlandish for the townspeople to gauge. But many of them were quite familiar with firearms, and the American-style arquebuses brought a chill to their spines. Not much to look at, true. But there was something reptilian and deadly about the serpentine slenderness of the things.
The camouflage hunting apparel also caused comment, as did the motorcycles. Couriers and scouts, apparently, although the onlookers were puzzled by the nature of the small black boxes into which the motorcyclists were seen to speak. The more perspicacious of the students spotted the similar device in the hand of the American leader riding in another vehicle. Inquiries were made, in stumbling English, to the passing American soldiers. Once it was ascertained that some of those soldiers were actually Germans themselves, additional charming acronyms were added to the students' cheers:
Four by four! Four by four!
CB! CB!
Squatting in the back of the armored pickup, Mike grinned. Frank, the operational commander of the little army, was riding up front. As soon as Frank stopped talking on the radio, Mike leaned forward and hissed at him through the small window in the back of the cab.
"See?" he demanded. "What did I tell you?"
"All right, all right," grumbled Frank. "You don't have to rub it in."
Satisfied, Mike leaned back. But his grin never faded. He transferred it to the six other occupants in the back of the truck.
" 'Familiarity breeds contempt,'" he stated. "Give something a label and it stops being mysterious and devilish. It just is, that's all. That's why I told Heinrich and his guys to spread the word, if anybody asked."
The interior of the truck bed, enclosed by welded quarter-inch steel plate, was dark and gloomy. But there was enough light coming through the firing slits to allow Mike to see the faces of his companions. They responded to his cheerful grin with their own smiles, which were nervous in every case but one.
The nerveless-say better, insouciant-smile was actually quite wicked. The eyes above it gleamed with amusement and glee.
"You hear that, Frank?" the smile's owner demanded. "'Familiarity breeds contempt!' "
Frank turned his head and glowered through the back window. At the nerveless smile, first; then, at the others.
"I still say girls have got no business here!" he snapped.
"'Girls'?" snorted Gayle Mason. "I'm thirty-two, you old geezer. I remember you saying the same thing the first day I showed up at the mine. What was that-ten years ago?"
Frank glared; Gayle glared back. Gayle was an attractive enough woman, in a stocky and muscular manner. Her face was too plain to be considered pretty, but no one had ever suggested she was ugly. Still-excepting the absence of jowls-when she glared, Gayle bore a fair resemblance to a pugnacious bulldog.
"What I say," she continued, "is that broken-down old farts have got no business on a battlefield."
"Now, Gayle," murmured Mike. "Be nice."
Frank's eyes moved away from Gayle, and focused on the other women in the truck. "Gayle's hopeless," he growled. "She's doing this just to spite me. But you other-you girls-should have more sense."
The young women in the truck abandoned their nervous smiles, in favor of stubborn jaws. Except for Gayle, they were in their late teens or early twenties. The youngest of them, Julie Sims, managed a fair imitation of Gayle's glare.
"This is a hell of a time to bring up that argument, Uncle Frank!" she snapped. "We've already been through it, and it's settled." Unkindly: "You're just pissed because I'm a better shot than you are, and you know it!"
Grumbling: "I'm tired of being a cheerleader."
"Beats being dead," came Frank's immediate reply.
"You were quick enough to put my boyfriend in the front line!"
Frank was just as stubborn as his niece. "That's different. He's a guy. And I'll tell you something else, young lady. If that stupid damned boyfriend of yours breaks ranks 'cause he's worried about you, there'll be hell to pay! That's one of the reasons I don't want-"
"Chip?" demanded Julie. "Ha! I already told him what'd happen if he did. He's hunted with me too, you know. I'll nail him before he takes a step."
Watching the interplay, Mike's grin faded. In truth, despite his genuine amusement at his older friend's knee-jerk outrage, Mike was uneasy himself with the arrangement. Mike thought he possessed little of any traditional "male chauvinism"-and what little there was had long ago been beaten out of him by his spunky sister-but he could still recognize a certain crude reality to Frank's opposition. It was a simple fact that, by and large, women were not as physically suited for infantry combat as men.
By and large…
Mike remembered a phrase from a play he had just seen two weeks ago. Shakespeare's Hamlet, staged by the high school's drama class in front of a packed audience in the school's auditorium, and then rebroadcast on TV. (They had kept the author's name. Balthazar had not objected; he had even had kind words to say about the performance, which, as was his custom, he had seen on the opening night.)
By and large…
Ay, there's the rub. What happens to the individual, when they get locked within that dangerous "by and large"? Generality is a slippery slope.
Mike studied the women in the pickup's bed, steadying himself with a hand against the truck's jolting progress down the dirt road.
Julie Sims, for all her cheerleader prettiness, had the physique of someone who was as well trained athletically as any of the boys she cheered on. Mike didn't doubt for a minute that she was in better physical shape than ninety-five percent of the men in the American/German army. Not as strong, no doubt, as many of them. But He eyed the rifle held casually in her hands. By universal acknowledgement, Julie Sims was the best rifle shot in Grantville. In all of Marion county, for that matter. Maybe even in the whole state. There had been talk of sponsoring her for the Winter Olympics biathlon. The talk had been serious enough that Julie had taken up cross-country skiing, and applied herself to it with her usual energy. Her skill on skis would be her downfall, she was convinced. Certainly not the shooting!
Mike's eyes met those of Gayle. The glance they exchanged was warm and friendly. When Gayle had started working in the mine years ago, she had encountered a certain amount of harassment from some of the male miners. Not much-and nothing in the way of physical abuse-but enough to make her defensive. "Defensive," for someone with Gayle Mason's temperament, was indistinguishable from belligerent. Then Mike had returned to West Virginia, gotten hired at his father's old job, and the harassment had ended within a week. They had wound up becoming good friends.
His eyes moved to the woman sitting next to Gayle, and the concern in them deepened.
"Relax, brother of mine," said Rita. "We'll stay out of trouble. I promise."
Mike smiled ruefully. Promises be damned! He knew his sister too well.
In the front, Frank was still muttering. "Damn Melissa Mailey, anyway," he was heard to grumble. "Stupid pinheaded liberal feminist peabrained-" On and on.
Bouncing around in the semidarkness of the truck bed, Mike and his sister exchanged grins. Melissa, of course, was taking the public blame for this latest outrage. Simpson, especially, seemed to spend half his time cursing her name from the rooftops. He had long since, in his relentless political campaign, elevated Melissa Mailey to the status of Ba'alzebub to Mike's Satan.
But Melissa was quite innocent, in truth. The middle-aged schoolteacher had been as surprised as anyone, when Rita and Gayle and Julie Sims advanced their demand to be incorporated into Grantville's armed forces. In the raucous debate which erupted in the emergency committee, Melissa had waffled and wavered-quite unlike her usual self. On the one hand, her feminism inclined her to support the proposal. On the other…
At bottom, Melissa Mailey had the soul of a pacifist. A semipacifist, at least. A Boston Brahmin, born and bred in a certain other-worldly atmosphere. The thought of carrying a gun herself had never seriously crossed her mind. Not even in her days as a radical college student, when she had been much more attracted by the tactics of civil disobedience.
No, Simpson could denounce Melissa all he wanted. Here, as in so many things, the rich man from the big city simply failed to understand the mentality of the "poor white trash" he had found himself placed amidst. Unsophisticated they might be, in some respects. But generations of poverty and hard times had also bred a certain hard-headed practicality, and a willingness to accept reality for what it was. Nor did the proposal seem all that strange, come down to it. Many of Grantville's women had already served in the U.S. military, after all, drawn by the same blue-collar motives which impelled their brothers and cousins to volunteer.
Our army's too small? Well, then-enlist women.
Squawk, squawk, squawk. By and large…
Fine. They've got to pass the same physical tests.
By and large, the women who volunteered failed to pass Frank's rigorous regimen. And Mike refused all pleas to ease the training. That far, he was not prepared to go.
By and large…
Ay, there's the rub. Because a fair number of women did pass even Frank's disgruntled scrutiny-and some of them with flying colors. Six of them, to be precise. All six were now riding in the pickup with the army's official commander. Mike had decided he should accompany them, in their first test in actual battle.
"Just stay out of trouble," Mike said, loud enough to be heard by all the occupants in the back of the truck. "Do us all a favor, will you? Stay out of trouble."
Gayle and Julie grinned. The other three girls smiled. Rita seemed to ignore the remark completely. She was peering through one of the firing slits.
" 'Stay out of trouble,' " she mimicked sarcastically. "Jeff's just dropping Gretchen off. Now there's the woman you oughta be worrying about."
She turned away, bestowing her brother with a glare. "Why is it," she demanded, "that men shit their pants at the idea of a woman in a battle-but have no trouble at all sending Mata Hari into the lion's den?"
Mike laughed. "Mata Hari? Get real! Gretchen's not going to be batting her eyes at any diplomats and generals."
His sister's gaze was unwinking. "No. That'd be safe, compared to what you want her to do."
Mike looked away. To his relief, Gayle came to his rescue. "Give your poor brother a break, Rita," she said, chuckling. "He backed us up, didn't he, push come to shove?"
His sister's reply was inaudible. But Mike wouldn't have heard it, anyway. He had caught sight of Gretchen, still kissing her new husband as she stood alongside Jeff's motorcycle. He almost laughed again, seeing the shocked expressions on the faces of the German burghers and their women alongside the road. In public! Outrageous!
"You ain't seen nothing yet," he whispered. "Notable men and women of Germany-heeere's Gretchen!"
Chapter 38
Reluctantly, Jeff let her go. "Be careful," he whispered, giving Gretchen's waist another quick hug.
"Me?" she demanded, frowning half-jocularly. "You are ze one goink in battle. Not me!"
Jeff was not mollified. "Still-"
Gretchen grabbed the back of his head and drew his face to hers. A quick, firm kiss followed. Then she stepped back, patting him on a plump cheek. "Go, husband. Come back to me. Safe."
Jeff sighed. When she wanted, his wife had a will of iron. He knew full well that this was one of those times. He still didn't understand why Gretchen had been so quick-so eager-to accept Mike and Melissa's proposal. But he hadn't questioned her at the time, and he wasn't about to do it now.
So he satisfied himself with a quick glance at her bodice and vest. The garments had been designed slightly oversize. Between that, and Gretchen's impressive bust, the 9mm automatic resting in the shoulder holster was quite unnoticeable.
His wife laughed. "Not to stare at mein tits!" she exclaimed, shaking her head and wagging a finger. "Vat skandal!" Then, very softly: "Do not vorry, husband. Go."
A moment later, Jeff was roaring off. He made it a point to do a wheelie as he passed a small group of young men standing by the road. The local toughs, by their look.
They were suitably impressed-not so much by the acrobatics of the machine as the ferocious scowl on the face of the very large man who rode it. That, and the odd but deadly looking weapon slung over his shoulder. Jeff would have been quite shocked-and utterly pleased-had he known the impression he made on those bravos. They saw nothing of a shy young man in his leather-jacketed form. Just a killer. The fact that he wore spectacles made him seem all the more dangerous. The better to see his victims, no doubt.
One of the young toughs was not as intimidated as the others. After the motorcycle's roar faded, he cast an eye on the woman standing by the road staring after it.
"Good-looking," he mused. "Very."
"Forget it, Max," hissed one of his friends.
Max leered. "Why, Josef? Who knows? Her man might be dead before the day is over."
Max's friends gathered around, crowding him close. "I said forget it," repeated Josef, punching Max in the shoulder. The gesture was not playful in the least. "He might not, either. And even if he is, what of the others?"
Max let it go. The woman had disappeared into the crowd, by now. And he didn't like the way in which Josef was gripping his dirk. "Just joking," he mumbled. But he made himself a silent promise to pursue the matter. Alone.
An hour later, their bikes perched atop a small ridge, Jeff and Larry Wild spotted the oncoming mercenaries through their binoculars.
Well-Jeff did. Larry was too busy admiring the scenery. "God, this is a pretty place," he murmured admiringly. He pulled the binoculars away from his eyes for a moment, to get a panoramic view of the Saale valley. The Saale was a small river, originating in the hills of the Thuringen Forest. In its northward course, flowing down the valley to which it had given its name, the river passed through Jena on its way. The valley was flanked by red sandstone and chalk hills, half-covered with grapevines. This was wine country, and it was as pretty as such areas usually are.
"Forget the vino," muttered Jeff. "Trouble's coming."
Startled, Larry's eyes followed the direction of his friend's binoculars. Even without the aid of his own, Larry could now see the cloud of dust.
"How many?" he asked.
Still holding the binoculars pressed to his eyes, Jeff shrugged. "Hard to say. That's not an army, so much as it is a mob. If there's any marching order at all, I can't tell what it is."
By now, Larry had his own binoculars back in place. "Not too many cavalry," he commented. "Mike'll glad to hear that."
"I don't think there's any cavalry at all," snorted Jeff. "Just maybe two dozen guys who managed to steal horses and ain't real good at riding them yet. Call themselves 'officers,' I bet. The Scots'll go through 'em like a chainsaw."
After a few more seconds of observation, Larry chuckled. "I do believe you're right, buddy of mine. I do believe you're right."
Jeff lowered the glasses and reached for his radio. A moment later he was giving Frank Jackson directions to the ridge. He and Larry had already determined that it was the best position from which to command this portion of the valley. It was the only high ground in the area and, what was even better, the road into Jena passed by at the foot of the ridge. They were hoping that the veteran Frank would agree with them, with all the tender pride of youthful war-gamers putting abstract skills to concrete practice.
Frank did. Heaped them with praise, in fact, insofar as Frank's terse remarks could be called "heaping." But Frank Jackson was one of those people who ladled with a teaspoon, and Jeff and Larry were more than satisfied.
The next few minutes were taken up with preparing the American positions. Mike kept the APC and Mackay's cavalry out of sight, hidden beyond a curve in the road. They would be used to pursue and capture the defeated enemy. He stationed Heinrich and the German contingents across the road itself. They would form the barrier to the oncoming mercenaries.
The new German recruits constituted about half of Mike's infantry force. They were still organized into their own units, under newly elected officers. Heinrich was in overall command.
Mike had intended to integrate the army immediately, rather than keeping the Germans in separate contingents. But experience had taught him that the process was going to be protracted. The problem was not "social," and involved no prejudice. The American and German soldiers were getting along quite nicely, as it happened-especially after a notable barroom brawl in which several American and German soldiers marched into the Club 250 and taught the resident rednecks who was who and what was what. Dan Frost and his deputies had tossed the lot of them into the town's jury-rigged jail thereafter, but the event had crystallized the army's growing sentiment of comradeship.
No, the problem was purely military, and purely simple.
Germans couldn't shoot.
Blast away, yes. Stand their ground like lions, yes.
Aim? Hit a target? Not a chance.
Squeeze the trigger? You must be joking! An arquebus has no "trigger." Just a heavy hand-lever closed with a jerk-after shutting your eyes to protect them from powder burns.
Heinrich and his men were veterans, and their habits were deeply ingrained. With the exception of a handful of the youngsters, none of the Germans had been able to adjust to modern rifles. The attempt to train them had simply produced frustration on all sides.
In the end, Mike had taken the practical course. "Screw it," he told Frank. "Just arm them with shotguns loaded with lead slugs. We'll use them for close action."
The Germans had been ecstatic. They took to shotguns like bears to honey. The shotguns were more accurate than arquebuses, even after the chokes were sawn off to produce cylinder bores which would handle solid slugs. But the Germans didn't give a damn about accuracy, anyway. They had survived as long as they had because each and every one of them was a devotee of the First Principle of Smoothbore Battle:
Rate of fire. That was Moses and the prophets, as far as the German soldiers were concerned. Rate of fire. Victory in battle went to the men who stood their ground and blasted away the most. Simple as that.
The American invention of bayonets was icing on the cake. None of them, any longer-arquebusier or pikeman-had to worry about the reliability of the other. All were now both in one.
Pump-action shotguns, fitted with bayonets-those, if nothing else, sealed the allegiance of Heinrich and his men to the new order. Their love for the marvelous devices was so great that it even reconciled them to the grotesque eccentricities of the Americans. Such as***
The German soldiers were careful not to ogle Gayle as she and two of the other women passed down the lines handing out extra ammunition pouches. Nor did they seem to pay any attention to Rita-unseemly attention, at any rate-when she took up her position as the unit's radio operator. Heinrich and his men, for all their crudities, had long ago learned the First Principle of Mercenary Armies: Don't piss off the toughest guys around. Which exalted status the Americans still had, in general-and one American in particular.
Rita's brother, of course, was their commander. But what was more important-much more-was that her husband stood in their own ranks. In the center, in the front line-as befitted a man who had gained the absolute confidence of his new comrades. And a man whom none of them-not the biggest and toughest veteran-would even think of challenging. Easy-going, he was-true, true. Not a friendlier man in the company!
Good thing, too. Seeing as how he was as big as a walrus and could bench-press a horse. So, at least, thought the man's German comrades. When the man himself had explained to them that he wasn't quite up to the standards of "professional football," he single-handedly killed-quite inadvertently-any chance that football would become a popular sport in the new society. In this new universe, it would be Tom Simpson, not Abner Doubleday, who caused the astounding popularity of baseball. A reasonable sport, baseball, playable by reasonable-sized men.
But Tom Simpson now had other accomplishments to his credit. One, in particular: it had been he, in truth-far more than the shotguns-who truly welded the German soldiers into the American army.
Tom Simpson, in the first months after the Ring of Fire, had been something of a lost sheep. His allegiance to Mike's course of action had completed his estrangement from his own parents. Yet, there had seemed no real place for him among Mike's crowd.
Not that Mike didn't make many offers. But Tom, stubbornly, turned them down. He had had enough nepotism and favoritism to last a lifetime. For a while, Tom thought of dabbling in business. But, in truth, he knew he had none of his father's executive skills. Nor, perhaps because of his rich birth, did he have the hardscrabble instincts of a true entrepreneur-which were an absolute necessity in the raw and booming commercial world springing up in southern Thuringia.
He had volunteered for the army, of course, as soon as Mike put out the call. But, there too, he had found no ready place. For all his size and incredible muscle, Tom was a rich kid from the city. Among his country-boy fellow soldiers, he quickly become famous as the worst marksman anyone had ever seen. The jests were never made in a nasty spirit-Tom was a popular figure-but they stung nonetheless.
Finally, more out of desperation than anything else, he volunteered to join the new contingents of German troops being formed. And there, as much to his surprise as anyone's, he found the home he was looking for.
Tom, it developed, had a knack for learning foreign languages; in the field, at least, if not in a classroom. What was more important-much more-was that he discovered he had the right temperament for the work. He liked the German soldiers, and they liked him. He was easy-going, unflappable, friendly-and fearless.
True, that fearlessness had yet to be tested in a gun battle. But there was not a man in Heinrich's contingent who doubted the outcome. Fear, they knew, came from the mind, not the bullet or the pike. In the way such men have, many had tried to intimidate Tom in the first weeks.
Size be damned! Size isn't everything. Toughness is a thing of the mind. So, in the first few weeks after Tom joined their ranks, Heinrich's toughest veterans tested his alpha-male mettle.
Heh.
Tom never had to raise a hand. He was accustomed to the ferocious intimidation on the football fields of the nation's top universities. In the line. And he had been very good at it. His body wasn't quite up to the standards of professional football, but his mind certainly would have been.
By the time the battle of Jena began, the thing was settled. Tough Tom-gut Thomas!-stood in the front line, in the center, where he belonged. His comrades took strength and courage, seeing his huge form standing there.
Because that was what won battles, in the end. Not firepower and fancy marksmanship. Strength and courage.
So, needless to say, no one ogled his wife. But once the other women were gone, scampering up the ridge, some gave vent to their true sentiments.
"The Americans are crazy," grumbled Ferdinand, one of Heinrich's lieutenants. "You watch-those silly bitches'll start screaming as soon as the first gun goes off."
Glumly, Ferdinand stared up the slope. The bulk of the American soldiers, he knew, were positioned just over the crest of the ridge. "Then those soft-headed American men will drop their own guns and spend all their time trying to calm the women down."
He shifted his gaze, now staring up the road. Perhaps half a mile away, Ferdinand could spot the first enemy horsemen coming into sight. "You watch," he concluded sourly, "we'll wind up doing all the fighting." He stroked the sleek shotgun in his hands, finding solace in that wondrous rate of fire.
Heinrich, examining the same horsemen, sucked his teeth. "Maybe," he grunted. He lowered the binoculars and looked up the ridge. He spotted Frank almost at once. Two women-girls, in truth-were standing next to him. One of those girls, Heinrich knew, was Frank's own niece. He and Frank had become very friendly, over the past few months, and Heinrich knew full well that Frank shared his own reservations. On the other hand…
"I admit the damn girl can shoot," Frank had told him once. Grudgingly, true. But given Frank's definition of "shooting," Heinrich understood just how much praise was contained in that sullen admission.
He looked away. "Maybe," he repeated. A slight smile came to his face. "Then again-maybe not."
At that very moment, as it happens, Jeff and Larry were heaping their own praise onto Mike and Frank. And there was nothing grudging or sullen about it. The two young men had just realized what Mike intended, by positioning most of his American troops on the reverse slope of the ridge, just below the crest. They would be invisible to the enemy there, until he summoned them forth.
"Man, that's slick, Mike!" exclaimed Larry.
Mike jerked a thumb at Frank. "Tell him, not me. He's the pro-I'm just following his advice."
The adulation was transferred to Jackson. "Just like Wellington at Salamanca," intoned Jeff.
"And Le Haye Sainte," agreed Larry sagely.
Frank scowled. "Common fucking sense, is what it is. I learned this trick from a sergeant in Nam. I think he learned it from the NVA. So who the hell is Wellington?"
Jeff and Larry goggled at him for a moment. Then, in a small voice, Jeff said: "He's the guy they named your favorite boots after."
Now, Frank was impressed. "Oh," he said. "Him. Good man! Whoever he was."
And, at that very moment, Gretchen struck the first blow against a different enemy. A much less concrete foe, in her case-and a much harder one to vanquish.
"All right," said Mathilde, one of the women in the shack. Her voice was hesitant, uncertain. She glanced quickly at the four other women huddled on pallets against the walls. Two of them were Mathilde's sisters; the other two, cousins. Both her cousins and one of her sisters were nursing babies.
Mathilde's own fears and doubts were mirrored in their faces.
"I do not ask you to take great risks," Gretchen said immediately. "Nothing you are too scared to do. But I think you will find everything much easier by tomorrow. After the battle is won, Jena's high and mighty notables will not be so quick to accuse anyone of witchcraft."
The women in the shack stared at her. They were still frightened, Gretchen saw. They had been frightened and nervous since the moment Gretchen approach Mathilde and one of her cousins. The two young women had been part of the crowd watching the American army march past. Gretchen had singled them out within a minute of Jeff's flamboyant departure. She had been guided less by instinct than by her own hard experience. She knew how to recognize desperate women-and, what was more important, women who still retained their backbones.
Frightened, yes; nervous, yes. But Gretchen knew her choice had been well-aimed. The women had still listened, as she spoke, with neither protest nor any attempt to drive her out of their miserable dwelling in Jena's worst slum.
Mathilde and her extended family were part of the great mass of poor women whom the war had driven into dire straits. All of them were refugees from the Palatinate, who had found a sanctuary in Jena. The adult men in the family were all dead or gone, except for Mathilde's crippled uncle. He was sleeping quietly in the next-door shack.
Mathilde and the prettiest of her cousins supported the family by prostitution. Jena was a good town for the trade, what with its large population of young male students, most of whom were from Germany's nobility and prosperous burgher class. But if Jena was a sanctuary, it was a precarious one. Women of their kind were only tolerated so long as they kept their place. For almost a century, since the witch-hunting craze began, it was wretched creatures such as they who were the first to be accused of witchcraft. The accusation was almost impossible to disprove, even if the area's notables were willing to listen to protestations of innocence-which, more often than not, they weren't in the least.
"Trust me," Gretchen stated. "After today, the notables will be much less full of themselves."
"You are so sure?" asked one of the cousins. Her voice, for all the meekness of its tone, held a trace of hope.
Gretchen gave no answer beyond a level gaze. But that was enough. For all their fears, the women in the shack were quite dazzled by her. They could tell she was one of their own kind. Yet the woman seemed so-so Sure. Confident. Poised.
Powerful. They had never seen a woman like that. Not once. Not from their own class…
"All right," said Mathilde again. This time, the words were spoken firmly. "We will do as you say, Gretchen. We will start here, with us. There are some others we can talk to, also." Mathilde glanced at her sisters and cousins. "Hannelore, I think. And Maria."
One of her sisters nodded. Mathilde's cousin Inga, the other prostitute, smiled. As if a dam had burst, she began to speak quickly and eagerly:
"And the students will be easy. There are at least three I can think of at once! Joachim, Fritz and Kurt-especially Joachim. He's very nice, and always wants to talk to me afterward. He thinks a lot about politics, I know that, even if I can't follow half of what he says. I wish he wasn't so short of money all the time so he could come more often."
Mathilde laughed, a bit coarsely. "He comes often enough, girl! What kind of idiot whore lets her customer owe her money?"
Inga flushed. "I like him," she replied stubbornly. "So what if he can't always pay at the time? He never cheats me. He always gives me what he owes whenever his parents send him money."
Mathilde didn't press it. She rather liked Joachim herself, actually. But mention of his name brought up another concern.
"For the students it will be easy, this-what did you call it?"
"Committees of Correspondence," said Gretchen.
"Yes. For them, easy. But for us? Inga is the only one who can even sign her name."
Gretchen scanned the women in the room. "You are all illiterate?" Five nods came in reply.
Gretchen sat up straight. Since she had the only chair in the shack, she practically towered over the others. The height, and her own size and posture, made her seem like a hearth goddess.
"Then that is the first thing we will change." Her eyes fell on the youngest woman in the shack. A girl, really. Her name was Gertrude, and she was Mathilde's youngest sister. She had just turned fifteen, and already showed signs of becoming as attractive as Mathilde. Under normal circumstances, she would become a prostitute before she saw another birthday.
But circumstances had changed. The family had been adopted by a hearth goddess, and she made her first decree.
"Gertrude will accompany me back to Grantville. We will put her to school."
There was no protest. The first Committee of Correspondence was still fearful, still uncertain, still groping for clarity and understanding. But their timid fingertips could feel the first touch of hope. And, besides, women of their class did not argue with a goddess. Not even a goddess who spoke in their own tongue. Especially not such a goddess.
Mathilde cleared her throat.
"You will speak to the students, then, after we-" She fumbled at the unfamiliar terms: "organize a meeting?"
Gretchen smiled. "Me? Nonsense! Well, not alone, at least." She snorted. "Stupid boys. They'll think of nothing but what I look like naked."
Soft laughter filled the shack. Gretchen's smile returned, wider than ever-and more than a little wintry. "No, no. I will come. But I will bring my husband with me. Better that way. He's an intellectual himself, which I most certainly am not. The students will understand him better."
Inga's eyes were very wide. "I saw him, when you came into town. Oh!" She snickered. "They'll be so scared of him, too."
Gretchen's heart warmed, for a moment. She would be sure to mention that comment to Jeff. He would be pleased, very. She liked pleasing her husband, even if the whole matter was male foolishness.
But she let none of that show. Her eyes were cold and grim.
"Yes, they will. Sehr gut!"
Chapter 39
Mike knelt down next to Julie Sims. Frank's niece was sitting cross-legged next to a small tree at the crest of the ridge, just a few yards from its highest point. Mike didn't recognize the tree. Some kind of elm, he thought. The leaves had not yet been touched by autumn color.
Julie's rifle was propped against her shoulder, the butt nestled against her inner calf. The rifle was a Remington Model 700, firing.308 rounds, with an ART-2 scope. The gun was a larger caliber than was used in biathlon competition in the modern era, but it was the rifle Julie preferred for hunting. Her father had bought it for her three years earlier.
Next to her was Karen Tyler, the girl who would serve as her observer. Karen was raised up on her knees. A pair of binoculars were slung around her neck, but at the moment she was studying the oncoming mercenaries through an M49 spotting scope. The expensive optical piece had been Frank Jackson's contribution to Julie's fledgling biathlon ambitions, along with her skis. For all Frank's crabbing, Mike knew, he adored his niece as much as any of his own sons.
"You're sure about this?" asked Mike. He spoke very softly, so only Julie could hear.
Julie's lips twitched, but her eyes never left the landscape below the ridge. "What? Are you going to lecture me too?"
Solemnly, Mike shook his head. "Look at me, Julie." For all the softness of his tone, the words were full of command. Julie turned to face him. As always, Mike was struck by her classically "all-American country girl" features. Peaches-and-cream complexion, light brown hair, blue eyes, open face, snub nose. No one except a man in love with her would ever call Julie Sims "beautiful." Just-good-looking.
Mike nodded at Karen, now exchanging the scope for the binoculars-just as James Nichols had trained her. Use the binoculars for scanning the area, the scope for pinpointing target locations. He could see the little notebook by her knee in which Karen had scrawled key target areas and wind direction. The target area page was full. There were only two words on the opposite page: no wind.
"This isn't target shooting, Julie. Or deer hunting. This is sniper work. In the past few weeks, James trained you the way he was trained when he was in the Marines, after he volunteered for sniper school."
Julie said nothing. Her face was expressionless. "Did you ever wonder why he never finished the training?" he asked gently.
Nothing. Mike sighed. "He told me-and I'm willing to bet he told you, too. He thought being a tough guy and a good shot would be enough. It isn't. They make sure you understand that. And you can drop out any time you want, without prejudice."
Nothing.
"When he did finally understand it, he dropped out. He just didn't have the temperament. And I know I wouldn't, either. One shot, one kill-and you're killing men, not animals. Men with faces you can see."
Finally, an expression came to her young, almost angelic face. But Mike couldn't quite interpret it. Sarcasm? No, it was more like whimsy; or maybe, wry amusement.
"Did Uncle Frank ever tell you the story," she asked, "about the first time I went deer hunting? How I cried like a baby after I shot my first buck?"
Mike nodded. Julie's expression grew very wry.
"You know why? The deer was so pretty. And it had never done me any harm." Julie cocked her head toward her observer, a girl no older than she. Another recent high-school graduate. Slender, where Julie was not, but otherwise-peas from a pod.
"Hey, Karen! Those guys look pretty to you?"
Karen shifted her gum into a corner of her mouth. "Nope. Ugly bastards. Mean looking, too. Look more like wild dogs than cute little deer."
Julie bared her teeth. The smile was far more savage than anything belonging on the face of an eighteen-year-old, male or female. "That's what I thought. Hey, Karen! Watcha think they'll do-to you and me, I mean-if they get their hands on us?"
Karen was back to chewing her gum. Her words came out in a semimumble. "Don't want to think about it, girl. But I'll tell you one thing. Won't be trying to sweet-talk us into the backseat of a car. Not likely."
The smile left Julie's face; but, if anything, the sense of whimsy was even stronger in her eyes. She gave Mike a level gaze.
"That's the whole problem with allowing men into combat," she said solemnly. "You guys are just too emotional about the whole thing."
Mike chuckled. "All right, Julie-enough! Just checking."
"S'okay, Mike. I like you, too. But I'll be fine. Just give me the word, and I'll start dropping the bastards."
Mike shook his head slightly. The gesture was more rueful than anything else. He rose to his feet. "How far are they now, Karen? I make it six hundred yards."
" 'Bout right," came the reply. "A little less, those first horsemen. The crossroad is right around five hundred fifty yards, and they're almost there."
"You two got your locations fixed?" Both girls nodded. "Okay, then. I want to wait a bit. Don't want to scare them off before the Scots can circle. I want that army captured, not running off to attack some other town."
Mike turned his head, looking for Mackay. Mackay was standing next to Frank Jackson some fifteen yards off. Mike had asked the Scottish commander to stay with him as an adviser. Mackay had agreed readily enough. Much more readily than Mike had expected, in fact. At the time, Mike had ascribed that willingness to nothing more than Mackay's confidence in Lennox. But now, seeing the Scotsman staring at Julie, he realized that Mackay had an interest of his own.
Mike managed not to smile. He had noticed the way in which Mackay, in times past, had tried not to ogle Julie in her cheerleader costume. The Scotsman had been quite discreet about it, in fact, despite the bare legs and Julie's exuberant athleticism. Mike found it amusing that Mackay was doing a much poorer job of maintaining his gentlemanly couth, seeing Julie now in her baggy hunting outfit. The Scotsman seemed utterly fascinated by the girl.
Mike cleared his throat. "Uh, Alex?"
Startled, Mackay jerked his gaze away from Julie. "Aye?"
Mike pointed toward the still-distant mob of mercenaries. "How close do they need to be? For Lennox to be able to surround them before they can make their escape?"
Mackay, for all his own youth, was a seasoned cavalry officer. He took no more than a few seconds to gauge the problem. "Four hundred yards," came the confident answer. "Once all of them have passed the crossroad. That'll do nicely."
Mike turned back to Karen and Julie. Karen nodded. Julie ignored him. She was giving Mackay an odd look. Then, quickly, looked away and hefted her rifle. There might have been a slight flush on her cheeks. Maybe.
Mike strolled back to the top of the ridge, where Frank and Mackay were standing. Frank was studying the mercenaries on the level ground below through his own set of binoculars. When Mike came up alongside the Scotsman, he said casually, as if commenting on the weather: "She's got a boyfriend, you know."
Mackay's flush was not slight in the least.
Mike did smile, now. "Frank doesn't think much of him, though."
Jackson never took the binoculars away from his eyes. "Worthless snot, you ask me. Thinks 'cause he was the captain of a high-school football team that he's some kind of bigshot for life. Probably wind up flipping hamburgers for the next thirty years."
He lowered the eyepieces. His face was quite expressionless. "Rather see her get hooked up with a more substantial sort of man, myself. Even if he ain't as pretty as a homecoming king."
Silence. Mackay's eyes were riveted on the mercenaries, as if he had never seen enemy soldiers before. His lips were pressed tightly shut.
Frank glanced at him. "Your teeth bothering you? Why don't you pay a visit to the town's dentist? It'll hurt, mind you-he's pretty well out of anesthetic. But I'm sure he could fix them up."
Mackay's flush deepened. Mike knew that the Scotsman's teeth made him nervous in the presence of American women. For this day and age, Alex's teeth weren't in bad shape. But by American standards, they were something of an eyesore.
Mackay's preoccupation caused him to lapse into the dialect of his youth. " 've thought on it," he muttered. "I'll no mind t'pain."
The last statement was flat, firm. Mike didn't doubt him for an instant. Men of Mackay's time had standards of pain acceptance that veered just as widely from those of Americans as their dental condition. "Anesthetic," to a man like Mackay, meant half a bottle of wine-and glad to get it.
Behind his lips, Mike could see Mackay's tongue running over his teeth. " 'Tis no the pain. S'the expense. I dinna ken if I can afford it."
Frank made a faint snorting sound. More of a sniff, perhaps. "Hell, don't worry about that, Alex. Your credit'll be good with him."
"Credit?" Mackay's eyes widened. "Credit? I don't even know t'man!"
"I do," stated Frank. "He's my brother-in-law. Henry G. Sims, DDS." Jackson nodded toward the sniper. "Julie's father, as it happens. And he don't think any better of little old Chip-shit than I do. As it happens."
The binoculars went back up to his eyes. "So go see him, why don't you?"
"Good idea," concurred Mike. He gave Mackay a friendly slap on the shoulder. "Good idea."
As Gretchen was about to leave the shack, a young boy came rushing in. She recognized him-one of Mathilde's two younger brothers.
"Max Jungers is outside!" hissed the boy. He leaned over, his face anxious and intense. Gretchen saw the difficulty with which he was controlling his impulse to point.
Her eyes flitted to Mathilde. Mathilde's own face was tight with apprehension.
"Shit! I thought he'd decided to leave us alone."
"Who is Max Jungers?" asked Gretchen.
The words came out in a quiet, tumbling rush, from all of the women at once. When they were done, Gretchen nodded. Local tough. Hooligan. Thief. Cutpurse. Would-be pimp.
"The usual," she muttered. "He has bothered you?"
The women nodded. Mathilde's little brother was staring at her with open eyes. "I think-" he squeaked. Then, clearing his throat: "I think he's not here for that." The boy hesitated, as if abashed. "I think-"
Gretchen chuckled. The sound was as humorless as a razor blade. "Me?"
The boy nodded. The gesture was quick, frightened.
Gretchen rose from her chair. "Well, then. I should go speak to him. Since he came all this way to see me."
Three seconds later, she was striding out of the shack. The women watched her go, gaping. There they squatted, for a moment, before the reality registered. Like a little mob, they rushed to the door and stared out.
Max Jungers, sure enough. He had apparently been lurking at the corner. Now, seeing Gretchen coming down the narrow street, he smiled and ambled toward her across the cobblestones. His hand was resting loosely on the hilt of a dirk scabbarded to his waist.
"Shit!" exclaimed Mathilde again. "There's going to be trouble!"
Her cousin Inga nodded sadly. "It's too bad. I liked Gretchen."
Mathilde stared at her. "Are you mad? Don't you understand yet?"
"Four hundred yards!" snapped Karen. Before the last word was spoken, Julie's Remington erupted. Less than a second later, the most flamboyantly caparisoned mercenary "leader" was hammered out of his saddle. Julie was using her match ammunition. The 173-grain boat-tail round punched right through the front of his cuirass and took a goodly piece of his heart with it through the backplate.
Julie was not particularly tall for an American girl-five and a half feet-but she weighed a hundred and forty pounds. The shapeliness of her somewhat stocky figure was due entirely to muscle. She absorbed the recoil with no difficulty at all. A quick, practiced, easy motion jacked another round into the chamber.
"Target area six!" snapped Karen. "Three hundred fifty yards! Hat-green feather!"
Julie was standing, to give herself maximum ease of movement. At that range, she was not worried about accuracy. It took her not more than three seconds to bring the next target into her scope.
Crack! The head beneath a green-feathered hat spilled blood and brains. The horseman slumped sidewise out of the saddle.
"Fuck," grunted Julie. "Missed!"
Mackay's eyes were like saucers. Mike was amused-and half-appalled. "She was aiming for what James calls the 'sniper's triangle'-both eyes down to the breastbone," he explained. "That shot was a little high."
Karen: "Area three! Three hundred fifty again! Big old floppy hat!"
Crack! A cavalryman was driven out of his saddle onto the rump of his horse. A red stain appeared on his cloth coat, just above the belt buckle. Behind him, a much larger pool of blood spilled down his mount's tail.
"Shit!" screeched Julie. She jacked another round into the chamber. The gesture was angry, frustrated. Her uncle hurried toward her. In the distance, Mike could see the cavalryman clutching his stomach. His legs flopped uselessly, trying to hold him onto the horse. Mike realized his spine was severed. A second later, he was toppling off the horse. He hit the ground like a sack.
"Five ring at six o'clock," said Mike softly. "She's off a little." He glanced at Mackay. The Scotsman had transferred the wide-eyed stare to Julie.
Frank was at her side now. Karen started to call out another target, but Frank waved her down. With one hand on Julie's shoulder, Frank was speaking urgently into his niece's ear.
Mike could just hear the words. "Take it easy, baby. Just buck fever, that's all it is. The bastards are going down. You aren't wide, just off your elevation. Easy to fix. Just take a breath-relax-that's it."
Julie took a deep breath and began easing it out. Another. She flashed her uncle a quick, thankful smile. Frank smiled back for an instant, before frowning ferociously.
"And don't let me hear you using that kind of language again, young lady!" He started wagging his finger.
"You?" demanded Julie. "Foul-mouth Frank himself? Ha!"
Cheerily, now-smiling-Julie looked to Karen.
"Call 'em out!"
Karen was right on the job. "Area one! Four hundred yards! The fatso!"
Crack! A heavyset officer lost the proverbial pound of flesh-right from the heart itself. The shot was perfect.
And so were the rest. Crack! Crack! Down, down.
Frank reloaded for her while Julie rested her shoulder. She was back to work in seconds.
Crack! Crack! Crack! Crack!
"Aye, an' she's t'true Queen o' Hearts," whispered Mackay.
When Gretchen was fifteen feet away from Jungers, she stopped. So did he, leering cheerfully. He took his hand from the dirk and planted his arms akimbo.
"Well now, girl-it seems to me-"
"Did you see my husband?" interrupted Gretchen.
Jungers broke off. For an instant, his face was still. Then, just as quickly, the leer was back. More of a sneer, really.
"The big fat one? Not worried about him."
"No reason to be," agreed Gretchen. She nodded, then smiled. The smile was very thin. Like a razor.
"He would have tried to reason with you. That's why I love him so." Gretchen reached into her bodice and removed the 9mm. The motion was easy and relaxed. So was the way she levered the slide. So was the way she slipped into a firing crouch, and brought the pistol up in a two-handed grip. She had spent hours and hours on the firing range, over the past few weeks, being trained by Dan Frost.
Jungers' eyes widened. But he never thought to reach for his dirk. He didn't recognize the pistol for what it was, until the first shot was fired. But that shot blew out his cerebellum along with his teeth, so the thought was fleeting.
Gretchen stepped up four paces, aimed at the body lying on the street, and fired again. That round went into the heart. There was no need for it, but Dan had trained her to go for the body mass shot. "No headshots unless they're wearing armor," he had insisted, over and again. Gretchen was feeling a little guilty. She just hadn't been able to resist wiping that leer away.
The mercenaries were truly a mob by now, milling aimlessly. Their pikes bristled in all directions, like a porcupine. Dozens of arquebuses were fired at random, blasting at nearby shrubbery.
"I'll be damned," hissed Mike. "They don't even realize what's killing them."
"At this range?" choked Mackay. "They've not a thought in the world!" The young commander gave his head a sharp shake. He was finally able to tear his eyes away from Julie and look down the slope behind him. Far below, Lennox's upturned face was staring back, waiting for the command.
Alex whipped off his hat and waved it. Lennox spurred his horse into motion, bellowing his own commands. Within thirty seconds, the Scots cavalry was pounding around the eastern end of the little ridge, aiming to encircle the left flank of the mercenaries by using the crossroad.
In those thirty seconds, Julie extracted three additional hearts. Then there was a pause. The mercenaries had finally realized that only cavalrymen-officers-were being targeted. Every man on a horse who was still alive had clambered off. Most of the men wearing fancy headgear had removed it like so many snakes.
Mike heard Karen muttering. "Have to just pick 'em at random now. Okay. Area three! Any-"
"Hold up!" shouted Mike. "Hold up, Julie! That's enough!"
He raised his binoculars. The mercenaries and their camp followers were crowded into a rough, packed circle. Julie's long-range massacre had confused them utterly. They had assumed themselves to be under attack from nearby skirmishers, and had taken position to charge in any direction once the enemy was spotted. By the time they saw the Scots cavalry pouring out from behind the ridge, it was too late to even think of fleeing. Most of them were on foot, and the cavalrymen didn't dare get back on their horses.
Mike turned. Gayle was right there, handing him the CB. "Okay," he ordered into the radio. "APC move up. Remember, guys-I want a surrender, not a slaughter. So start with the loudspeakers."
Below, the APC's engine roared into life. Hearing the sound behind them, Heinrich and his men immediately cleared a path down the middle of the road. Seconds later, the APC went charging through the gap. The German at the loudspeaker microphone was already bellowing out the terms of surrender.
"You are surrounded. Lay down your weapons. Quarter will be given to all unarmed men. Your women and your possessions will not be touched. Lay down your weapons. New terms of enlistment will be offered. Pay-good pay-food and shelter. Only to unarmed men. Lay down your weapons. Quarter will be given-"
On and on, over and over. By the time the APC reached the mercenaries-still hundreds of yards from the ridge-many of them were beginning to lay down their pikes and firearms. To the north, the Scots had finished the encirclement and were beginning to trot forward. Hurriedly, all the mercenaries began to disarm.
"A combination of the old and the new," mused Mike. Changing sides was common practice in this day and age, for surrendered soldiers. Even if APCs and rifles which could slay unerringly across a fourth of a mile were almost like magic. "Old and the new."
He turned to Mackay, but saw that the Scotsman's mind was elsewhere.
"God in His Heaven," whispered Alex. "I've been in-what?-call it six battles. Never killed that many men. Not in all my days put together."
Mike followed his eyes. Julie was leaning against the tree. So was her rifle. She was staring at the enemy, her arms crossed over her chest. Her face was blank as a sheet. Frank put his hand on her shoulder and gave it a little squeeze. That gesture brought Julie's own hand up, covering her uncle's. Other than that Nothing.
"Can you handle this, young man?" asked Mike softly.
Mackay never looked away. His tongue, again, swept teeth under tight lips. "Where does this dentist do his work?" he asked.
"I'll take you there myself." Mike smiled. "As it happens, I don't think any better of her boyfriend than Frank or Henry."
"There will be trouble," muttered Mathilde. She was now standing alongside Gretchen, not ten feet from Jungers' body. Mathilde plucked at Gretchen's sleeve. "Come. He was nothing but garbage. If we are not here when the Watch arrives, they will not question anything. Just another street killing."
Gretchen swiveled her head. Her eyes widened slightly. "Oh, but I want them to," was her reply. And she refused to budge thereafter, for all of Mathilde's pleas.
"And maybe not," concluded Heinrich. He grinned at Ferdinand. "So what do you say now, wise man? Ever been in such an easy fight in your life?"
Heinrich spread his arms and looked down, inspecting his body. "Look! Not even a speck of dust. Much less blood and guts."
Ferdinand glared at him. But not for more than a moment or two. Then he raised his head and gazed at the girl standing by the small tree atop the ridge. He heaved a deep sigh.
"Ah…! I still say-ah!"
He rubbed his side. Even beneath the heavy cloth, Ferdinand could feel the ridged scar tissue. A pike had done for that, years ago, somewhere in Bohemia.
Suddenly, he snatched the helmet off his head and raised it high.
"Joo-li!" he cried. "Let's hear it for Joo-li!"
The cheer was echoed instantly by all the men in the German contingent. Almost two hundred helmets were raised high-a good number of them atop bayonets.