"I'm going down to the radio lounge. The smart thing to do is run. It may not be the right thing to do, but it's the smart thing. The dummies can join me for a drink. We need to be back in the line at sundown. I expect the Crocodile will start firing again."
* * * *
Valentine used his knife to cut open a carton marked "snakebite serum," from the medical quarters. Mantilla had given him the case that night he'd passed most of the Quickwood on to Southern Command. He extracted a bottle of bourbon and broke the seal on the paper screwtop. He sniffed the amber contents. He flipped up two shot glasses on the bar.
"One drink for you, Colonel Travis, and one for me."
Travis didn't seem to want his, but Valentine left it there for him anyway. Ahn-Kha stood in the door.
"Good news," Ahn-Kha said. Nothing more. The Grog turned and went upstairs.
Valentine walked out the oversized doors, still on their hinges despite the shellfire. The soldiers stood in ranks, not neat, lines not dressed, and nothing but a proud expression was uniform, Post, Styachowski and Beck to the front.
"Thank you, men," he said, blinking back tears. "How many smart ones were there?"
"Nineteen," Styachowski reported. "Two were wounded. None of them women; they all wanted to stay."
Valentine saw a bright bandanna in the back.
"Couldn't get anyone to carry you out, Narcisse?"
"Didn't want to run again," she called. "Haven't had much luck with that; only have one arm left, sir."
Dr. Brough appeared with the case of bourbon. "Company commanders, to me. We've got some bottles to distribute."
"Okay, you dummies," Post said. "Back to business. Let's disperse, no point in getting killed all at once."
Valentine pulled the youngest member of his command aside as they dispersed.
"Hank, you sure you're fit to rejoin your outfit?" Valentine asked.
"Yes, sir."
Valentine disagreed. Hank looked sick.
"How's the hand?" Valentine said through gritted teeth. His nose picked up a faint, sweet smell from Hank's bandaged hand.
"Not so bad."
"Report to the doctor. If she says you're okay, you can get back to Captain Styachowski. She needs quick feet at the battery."
Hank turned away, dejected. Valentine whistled, and the boy turned.
"Hank, of all the men who stayed up here tonight, I'm proudest to have you with me."
* * * *
The Crocodile opened up on them again as soon as the sun disappeared. The Grogs upped their rate of fire to three shells an hour, every hour. Their firing was wild at night, though the air-cutting shrieks and earth-churning impacts made sleep impossible. When dawn returned they began reducing Solon's Residence to rubble.
The men began to go as mad as Max the German shepherd.
One snuck out of his dugout at dawn and was spotted by an observer standing atop a heap of rubble, arms outstretched as though welcoming a lover's embrace as the sun came up in thunder.
Later they found a boot, Post reported, his incipient beard now going gray as well.
Sergeants had to put down furious brawls over nothing. The precise timing of the shells tightened everyone's nerves into violin strings as they waited for the next howl and explosion, leaving flung dirt floating like a cloud atop Big Rock Hill.
Valentine was coming up me stairs from the generator floor, where he'd been checking fuel feeds damaged by the shelling, and passed Styachowski in the stairwell when the 15:20 struck, burying its nose in the ground deep-and near-enough to cause a collapse at the floor above. Valentine threw himself at Styachowski, pushing them both into a notch under the stairs-unnecessarily as it turned out-and the lights flickered and died just as he smelled her hair and the feminine musk coming up from her collar.