“But . . .” Jenou looks pleadingly at Rainy. “It doesn’t even make sense. It’s insane. It’s madness!”
“No,” Rainy says quietly. “It’s evil.”
32
FRANGIE MARR—DACHAU CONCENTRATION CAMP, NEAR MUNICH, GERMANY
“Walter! I mean, Sergeant Green!”
“Miss Frangie?” Walter Green grins hugely. It almost seems for a moment that he will run to her and give her a hug. Almost. They are both part of a column moving through southern Germany, but because it’s a column of more than one unit and quite long, neither knew the other was in it.
The column is stalled—as it often is—by things sinister like mines or snipers, or by more mundane obstacles, often cattle or sheep, or mechanical breakdown. And often for refugees, whose children beg food and cigarettes from the GIs, who with few exceptions give all they have.
When the column stops soldiers pile off their trucks and tanks and pee in the woods or ditches, hurriedly brew up coffee, or try to write letters. You can write a letter while perched on the back of a Sherman, but, as Frangie has learned, the results will not be legible. Exhibit A: the ripped, pierced, scribbled-upon piece of paper in her hand.
She shoves the mangled letter into her pocket and straightens her uniform. She resists the mad urge to smell her armpits to see whether she is merely offensive or extremely offensive, then reminds herself that she had a shower just three days ago, and she has a moderately fresh uniform without major parasitic infestation, so . . . So she probably looks about as good as a tiny black woman wearing a green uniform and a helmet is capable of looking.
Walter for his part looks quite . . . and Frangie stops herself right there, because it is in no way proper for a good Christian woman to be thinking the thought that slips into her head upon seeing him. Especially since her reaction had been rather less thought and rather more physical. In fact, her specific first thought was that she’d like to kiss him, to kiss him from the sheer joy of seeing him alive and well.
And also, would he take his glasses off if he kissed her?
What if she took them off for him?
Well, that would be wrong. That would be forward to the point of . . . of . . . well, not being the sort of thing a decent woman would do.
He stands before her, grinning, and she grins back. They each perform a surreptitious glance around to see who is watching—no one—before he takes her hand and squeezes it.
And she squeezes back.
And then they each let go, but very slowly, with fingertips trailing fingertips.
“I didn’t know you were in this column,” Frangie says.
“No. Me neither. About you, I mean. Do you even have a unit, or do you just sort of wander around Germany healing the sick?”
She laughs. “I have a unit and a captain and everything. Now, if you were to ask me what we are doing here, that I couldn’t say.”
They hear the sounds of engines firing up again. The column will be moving shortly.
“You have a jeep?” Walter asks.
“Nope, I am hitching a ride with Sergeant Moore.” She cranks a thumb toward the nearest Sherman, and Moore, who sits astride his big cannon smoking.
“I have a jeep,” Walter says. “And we’re going the same direction . . .”
“Is this a date?” Frangie asks, then gasps in horror at her own forwardness.
Walter, however, seems charmed. “Miss Frangie Marr, would you do me the honor of accompanying me on a ride in the German countryside? We can make a picnic.”
“C rations
and canteen water?”
“Nothing but the best for you,” Walter says.
They walk forward up the line of vehicles and find the jeep. Walter yells for his corporal, who comes running from the woods, pulling his trousers up as he runs.
“I’m afraid Corporal Penn has the trots,” Walter says. “We may have to make frequent stops.”