He could have elaborated on the many failings of the U.S. War Department, but Bergman hissed at him and jerked a thumb off to the left. “Here comes the lieutenant,” he warned.
Second Lieutenant Don Griffiths was typical of the breed. He was young, he didn’t know much, and one of the things he didn’t know was how much he didn’t know. He had blond hair and freckles and couldn’t possibly have bought a drink without proving to the bartender that he was over twenty-one.
Sergeant Pound and PFC Bergman saluted him. He returned the gesture. “Men, we have our orders,” he said.
He sounded full of enthusiasm. It was too early in the morning for Pound to feel enthusiasm or much of anything else except a deep longing for another cup of coffee. But Griffiths stood there waiting expectantly, so Pound did what he was supposed to do: he asked, “What are they, sir?”
“We are going to drive the enemy out of Pennsylvania,” the lieutenant said grandly.
“What? All by ourselves?” Pound said.
Don Griffiths wagged a finger in his face. “I’ve heard about you, Sergeant-don’t think I haven’t,” he said. “You haven’t got the right attitude.”
“Probably not, sir,” Pound agreed politely. “I do object to being killed for no good reason.”
“Don’t get smart with me, either.” Griffiths’ voice didn’t break the way the late Lieutenant Poffenberger’s had, but he still sounded like a kid. “I’ll bust you down to private faster than you can say Jack Robinson.”
“Go ahead, sir,” Pound answered, politely still. “I’ll never get rich on Army pay no matter what my rank is, and if I’m a private again I’ll get out from under you. Besides, how likely is either one of us to live through the war? Why should I get excited about whether my sleeve has stripes on it?”
Lieutenant Griffiths gaped at him. The gold bar Griffiths wore on each shoulder strap was the only thing he had going for him. He couldn’t imagine anybody who didn’t care about rank. In fact, Pound did, very much, but the best way to hang on to what he had and be able to mouth off the way he wanted to was to pretend indifference. “You are insubordinate,” Griffiths spluttered.
“Not me, sir. Bergman is my witness,” Pound said. “Have I been disrespectful? Have I been discourteous? Have I been disobedient?” He knew he hadn’t. He could be much more annoying when he stayed within the rules.
Griffiths proved it by spinning on his heel and storming away. PFC Bergman chuckled nervously. “He’s gonna get you in Dutch, Sarge,” Bergman predicted.
“What can he do to me? Throw me in the stockade?” Pound laughed at the idea. “I hope he does. I’ll be warm and safe in a nice cell back of the line, three square meals a day, while he’s stuck up here with unfriendly strangers trying to shoot his ass off. The worst thing he could do to me is leave me right where I am.”
Bergman shook his head. “Worst he could do is bust you and leave you where you’re at.”
Pound grunted. That, unfortunately, was true. He didn’t think Lieutenant Griffiths had the imagination to see it; if he’d had that kind of imagination, he would have been a real officer, not a lowly shavetail. Pound proved right. The next time Griffiths had anything to do with him, the barrel commander pretended their last exchange hadn’t happened. Pound played along. He watched the way Griffiths eyed him: like a man watching a bear that might or might not be ready to charge.
Their barrel moved out the next morning. Several platoons of the new machines rumbled north and west from the classically named town of Tarentum. Tarentum lay northeast of Pittsburgh; the barrels wanted to knock in the head of the Confederate column sweeping past the industrial center. Another enemy column was pushing up from the southwest. If they met, they would put Pittsburgh in a pocket. That had happened to Columbus the summer before. If the Confederates brought it off here, they could smash up the U.S. defenders in the pocket at their leisure.
Pittsburgh was the most important iron and steel town in the United States. If it fell, how could the country go on with the war? If it fell, would the country have the heart to go on with the war? Those were interesting questions. Michael Pound hoped he-and the USA-didn’t find out the answers to them.
“This is pretty good barrel country, sir,” he remarked to Lieutenant Griffiths after they’d been rolling along for a while.
“It is?” Griffiths sounded suspicious, as if he feared Pound was pulling his leg. “I thought you wanted wide-open spaces for barrels, not all these trees and houses and other obstructions.”
Anyone who used a word like obstructions in a sentence was bound to have other things wrong with him, too. “You do, sir, if you’re on the attack,” Pound said patiently. “But if you want to defend, if the enemy’s coming at you, having enough cover to shoot from ambush is nice.”
“Oh.” The lieutenant weighed that. “Yes, I see what you mean.”
“I’m glad, sir.” Now Pound sounded-and was-dead serious. “Because the point of the whole business is to kill the other guys and not get killed ourselves. That’s the long and short of it.”
Griffiths didn’t disagree with him. The young officer opened the cupola and stood up in the turret to see what he could see. Pound just got glimpses through the gunsight-which was also improved from the one in the earlier turret. The Confederates hadn’t got here yet, so the landscape wasn’t too badly battered. That didn’t mean he would have wanted to live here even if no one had ever heard of war. Coal mines, tailings from coal mines-he’d heard the locals call the stuff red dog-and factories dealing with coal and steel and aluminum dotted the landscape. Some of the factories belched white or gray or black or yellowish smoke into the sky even though the enemy was only a few miles away. They were going to keep operating till the Confederates overran them.
Michael Pound scowled. When they shut down, all the workers would try to get away at once. He’d seen that before. They’d clog the roads, U.S. troops would have trouble going around them or through them, and the Confederates would have a high old time bombing them and shooting them from the air.
Not five minutes after that thought crossed his mind, the barrel slowed and then stopped. Lieutenant Griffiths shouted from the cupola: “You people! Clear the road at once! At once, I tell you! You’re impeding the war effort!” Pound wouldn’t have moved for anybody who told him he was impeding anything. This crowd didn’t, either.
And they paid for not moving. No Asskickers screamed down out of the sky to pummel them, but they were in range of Confederate artillery. So were the advancing U.S. barrels. That didn’t worry Pound very much-except for the rare unlucky direct hit, long-range bombardment wouldn’t hurt them. He did tug on Griffiths’ trouser leg and call, “Better get down, sir. Fragments aren’t healthy.”
“Oh. Right.” The lieutenant even remembered to close the cupola hatch after himself. He was faintly green, or more than faintly. “My God!” He gulped. “What shellfire does to civilians out in the open… It’s a slaughterhouse out there.”
“Yes, sir,” Pound said, as gently as he could. “I’ve seen it before.” He’d got glimpses through the gunsight here, too, and was glad he’d had no more than glimpses. Shrapnel clattered off the sides and front of the barrel. There were times when sitting in a thick armored box wasn’t so bad, even if it was too damn hot and nobody in there with you had bathed anytime lately.
Griffiths spoke to the driver over the intercom: “If you can go forward without smashing people, do it.” The barrel moved ahead in low gear. Pound didn’t like to think about what it was running over, so he resolutely didn’t. The lieutenant peered through the periscope: a far cry from sticking your head out and looking around, but nobody would have done that under this kind of shellfire. Well, maybe Irving Morrell would have, but officers like him didn’t come along every day.