Purple Hearts (Front Lines 3)

Rio assigns Pang to be next, and he does the job, stopping the instant the second hand on his watch shows ten minutes. One of Cat’s veterans is next. But from here on it will be up to the greenhorns—they’ve risked enough useful soldiers.

But one of Mercer’s privates refuses and won’t budge. Then one of Cat’s.

“You want us to shoot ’em?” Cat asks Stick sarcastically.

Rio says, “Listen, if we cut straight east here we’re in Kraut territory, right? Any place they are, there will be fewer mines, right?”

“Yeah, and a lot more bullets,” Mercer says, speaking up for the first time in this group.

“Not if they don’t hear us,” Rio says. “They sure as hell won’t see us. If they’re spread as thin as we are we can maybe just sneak past, and we cut a couple miles off the march.”

Rio has learned a phrase from one of the war movies shown by the USO. A submarine movie had used the term rig for silent running. Now she is inspecting her people as they rig for silent running, making double sure that clips do not rattle in ammo pouches, that canteens do not bounce, that anyone who stumbles does it without the obligatory curse.

“Not a word,” she says. “And I will personally shoot anyone stupid enough to light a cigarette.”

They pivot east and walk in a long single file toward the German positions. Twenty-nine pairs of boots crunch on wet pine needles. Twenty-nine pairs of eyes are trained on the ground, which is as invisible as the dark side of the moon.

The sergeants know that Rio has exaggerated just a bit: there is still the possibility of mines and booby traps, even close to German lines. Only when they are through the German front line can they relax at all, and even then there may well be minefields, though they’d most likely be antitank mines, which are not set off by even a very large soldier.

But Rio cannot betray her uncertainty, so she walks point again, violating the rules and the logic that says she is more valuable than one of her privates. All well and good, but which of her greenhorns is going to keep up the necessary pace? And who but an experienced veteran will even spare a thought for non-

mine threats?

She makes a fist, but the dark is so total that Jack plows into her.

“Krauts,” Rio says in a voiceless whisper. She licks a finger and holds it up to judge the breeze. She has neither seen nor heard Germans, but the smell of bitter tobacco and pickled cabbage is on the slight breeze. She makes sure Jack is looking at her and makes a you-and-me gesture. Geer is with them now, and she says, “Keep moving. Send word back to Cat and Mercer.”

She and Jack crouch low and creep away into the forest. She’d rather have not brought Jack on this recon, she’d rather have a second Thompson rather than his rifle, but he was next up and she is loath to ever be accused of protecting either him or Jenou. Favoritism has no place here.

Rio places each step carefully, feeling for wires or sudden depressions or twigs that might snap loudly. Careful but not slow. Cautious but not paralyzed with fear. She motions for Jack to stay in her footprints.

Her finger is on the Thompson’s trigger, safety off. She reminds herself of the location of her grenades and wishes she’d thought to swap the smoke grenades for the high-explosive grenades, which are more useful at night, but too late now.

I still make mistakes. How am I supposed to tell my people what to do?

She sniffs the breeze, nods, and motions for even slower, even more silent movements. Then . . . low voices. Low voices speaking German.

Rio lies flat on the ground, and Jack joins her. Faces so close they’re breathing each other’s exhalations, Rio says in a voice inaudible at a distance of more than half a foot, “I’m going closer.”

“I’m going with you.”

“Stay here. I want to see if it’s an MG or just riflemen.”

Jack’s face is barely visible, even inches from her own. But she can guess at the stubborn expression. She crawls on hands and knees, the Thompson resting across her back. Each movement must be carefully managed so as not to snag on a branch or a root.

Closer. Closer. Two voices. An older man and a younger. Both smoking the putrid weeds that pass for tobacco in war-strained Germany.

Closer. Now she can hear them breathing. There cannot be more than ten feet separating Rio from the Germans, but she sees nothing. Not even shadows.

“Ich muss scheissen,” the older voice says.

Jack’s hand grabs Rio’s boot. She is irritated but not surprised to find that he has disobeyed and followed her. He crawls up beside her and says, “Latrine run.”

Rio hears the German climbing heavily up out of his fighting hole. Footsteps on leaves, fading. A sound of a belt being unhitched. Trousers dropping. A sigh.

Jack jerks his head to indicate that they should crawl back now. Rio considers crawling farther and perhaps cutting the younger German’s throat, but that would raise alarm. She follows Jack back to relative safety, then hurries to catch up with the platoon. She finds Stick.

“We’re through their front line,” she says.