"This is their rear guard," Onie said. "This vehicle."
"Go ahead and shoot it," I said to Claude. He shot it and there was no front compartment and then they went in after what would be left of the money and the paybooks. I had a drink and waved to the vehicles. The men on the fifties were shaking their hands over their heads like fighters. Then I sat with my back against the tree to think and to look down the road.
They brought what paybooks there were and I put them in a canvas bag with the others. Not one of them was dry. There was a great deal of money, also wet, and Onie and Claude and the other outfit cut off a lot of S.S. patches and they had what pistols were serviceable and some that weren't and put it all in the canvas sack with the red stripes around it.
I never touched the money. That was their business and I thought it was bad luck to touch it anyway. But there was plenty of prize money. Bertrand gave me an Iron Cross, first class, and I put it in the pocket of my shirt. We kept some for a while and then we gave them all away. I never liked to keep anything. It's bad luck in the end. I had stuff for a while that I wished I could have sent back afterwards or to their families.
The outfit looked as though they had been showered by chunks and particles from an explosion in an abattoir and the other people did not look too clean when they came out from the body of the half-track. I did not know how badly I must have looked myself until I noticed how many flies there were around my back and neck and shoulders.
The half-track lay across the road and any vehicle passing would have to slow down. Everyone was rich now and we had lost no one and the place was ruined. We would have to fight on another day and I was sure this was the rear guard and all we would get now would be strays and unfortunates.
"Disarm the mines and pick up everything and we will go back to the farmhouse and clean up. We can interdict the road from there like in the book."
They came in heavily loaded and everyone was very cheerful. We left the vehicles where they were and washed up at the pump in the farmyard and Red put iodine on the metal cuts and scratches and sifted Sulfa on Onie and Claude and me and then Claude took care of Red.
"Haven't they got anything to drink in that farmhouse?" I asked Rene.
"I don't know. We've been too busy."
"Get in and see."
He found some bottles of red wine that was drinkable and I sat around and checked the weapons and made jokes. We had very severe discipline but no formality except when we were back at Division or when we wanted to show off.
"Encore un coup manque," I said. That was a very old joke and it was a phrase that a crook we had with us for a while always uttered when I would let something worthless go by to wait for something good.
"It's terrible," said Claude.
"It's intolerable," said Michel.
"Me, I can go no further," Onesime said.
"Moi, je suis la France," Red said.
"You fight?" Claude asked him.
"Pas moi." Red answered. "I command."
"You fight?" Claude asked me.
"Jamais."
"Why is your shirt covered with blood?"
"I was attending the birth of a calf."
"Are you a midwife or a veterinary?"
'I give only the name, rank and serial number."
We drank some more wine and watched the road and waited for the point to come up.
"Ou est la fucking point?" Red asked.
"I am not in their confidence."
"I'm glad it didn't come up while we had the little accrochage," Onie said. "Tell me, mon Capitaine, how did you feel when you let the thing go?"
"Very hollow."
"What did you think about?"
"I hoped to Christ it would not trickle out."
"We were certainly lucky they were loaded with stuff."
"Or that they didn't back up and deploy."
"Don't ruin my afternoon," Marcel said.
"Two Krauts on bicycles," Red said. "Approaching from the west."
"Plucky chaps," I said.
"Encore un coup manque," said Onie.
"Anybody want them?"
Nobody wanted them. They were pedaling steadily, slumped forward and their boots were too big for the pedals.
"I'll try one with the M-1," I said. Auguste handed it to me and I waited until the first German on the bicycle was past the half-track and clear of the trees and then had the sight on him, swung with him and missed.
"Pas bon," said Red and I tried it again swinging further ahead. The German fell in the same disconcerting heartbreaking way and lay in the road with the velo upside down and a wheel still spinning. The other cyclist sprinted on and soon the copains were firing. We heard the hard ta-bung of their shots which had no effect on the cyclist who kept on pedaling until he was out of sight.
"Copains no bloody bon," Red said.
Then we saw the copains falling back to retire onto the main body. The French of the outfit were ashamed and sore.
"On peut les fusiller?" Claude asked.
"No. We don't shoot rummies."
"Encore un coup manque," said Onie and everybody felt better but not too good.
The first copain who had a bottle in his shirt which showed when he stopped and presented arms said, "Mon Capitaine, on a fait un veritable massacre."
"Shut up," said Onie. "And hand me your pieces."
"But we were the right flank," the copain said in his rich voice.
"You're shit," Claude said. "You venerable alcoholic. Shut up and fuck off."
"Mais on a battu."
"Fought, shit," Marcel said. "Foute moi le camp."
"On peut fusiller les copains?" Red asked. He had remembered it like a parrot.
"You shut up too," I said. "Claude, I promised them two velos."
"It's true," Claude said.
"You and I will go down and give them the worst two and remove the Kraut and the velo. You others keep the road cut."
"It was not like this in the old days," one of the copains said.
"Nothing's ever going to be like it was in the old days. You were probably drunk in the old days anyway."
We went first to the German in the road. He was not dead but was shot through both lungs. We took him as gently as we could and laid him down as comfortable as we could and I took off his tunic and shirt and we sifted the wounds with Sulfa and Claude put a field dressing on him. He had a nice face and he did not look more than seventeen. He tried to talk but he couldn't. He was trying to take it the way he'd always heard you should.
Claude got a couple of tunics from the dead and made a pillow for him. Then he stroked his head and held his hand and felt his pulse. The boy was watching him all the time but he could not talk. The boy never looked away from him and Claude bent over and kissed him on the forehead.
"Carry that bicycle off the road," I said to the copains.
"Cette putain guerre," Claude said. "This dirty whore of a war."
The boy did not know that it was me who had done it to him and so he had no special fear of me and I felt his pulse too and I knew why Claude had done what he had done. I should have kissed him myself if I was any good. It was just one of those things that you omit to do and that stay with you.
"I'd like to stay with him for a little while," Claude said.
"Thank you very much," I said. I went over to where we had the four bicycles behind the trees and the copains were standing there like crows.
"Take this one and that one and foute moi le camp." I took off their brassards and put them in my pocket.
"But we fought. That's worth two."
"Fuck off," I said. "Did you hear me? Fuck off."
They went away disappointed.
A boy about fourteen came out from the estaminet and asked for the new bicycle.
"They took mine early this morning."
"All right. Take it."
"What about the other two?"
"Run along and keep off the road until the column gets up here."
"But you are the column."
"No," I said. "Unfortunately we are not the column."
The boy mounted the bicycle which was undamaged and rode down to the estaminet. I walked back under the hot summer sky to the farmyard to wait for the point. I didn't know how I could feel any worse. But you can all right. I can promise you that.
"Will we go into the big town tonight?" Red asked me.
"Sure. They're taking it now, coming in from the west. Can't you hear it?"
"Sure. You could hear it since noon. Is it a good town?"
"You'll see it as soon as the column gets up and we fit in and go down that road past the estaminet." I showed him on the map. "You can see it in about a mile. See the curve before you drop down?"
"Are we going to fight any more?"
"Not today."
"You got another shirt?"
"It's worse than this."
"It can't be worse than this one. I'll wash this one out. If you have to put it on wet it won't hurt on a hot day like this. You feeling bad?"
"Yeah. Very."
"What's holding Claude up?"
"He's staying with the kid I shot until he dies."
"Was it a kid?"
"Yeah."
"Oh shit," Red said.
After a while Claude came back wheeling the two velos. He handed me the boy's Feldbuch.
"Let me wash your shirt good too, Claude. I got Onie's and mine washed and they're nearly dry."
"Thanks very much. Red," Claude said. "Is there any of the wine left?"
"We found some more and some sausage."
"Good," Claude said. He had the black ass bad too.
"We're going in the big town after the column overruns us. You can see it only a little more than a mile from here," Red told him.
"I've seen it before," Claude said. "It's a good town."