“Can I look?” Kelly asked.
Danielson shuddered and managed to speak. “Nothing to see. Okay.” His teeth and tongue were bright with blood.
“If I could look, maybe I could keep it from hurting,” Kelly said.
Danielson started to scream again, that same monotonous ululation. His mouth was wide open, all red inside, and bloody foam bubbled at both nostrils.
Slade had come up beside Kelly while the major was talking to Petey Danielson. “What's wrong with him?”
Kelly didn't answer him. He took hold of the screaming man's hands, which were cold. He was prepared to pry Danielson's hands away from his stomach, but the wounded man surrendered with surprising weakness. Then, with nothing to hold in its place, his stomach fell away from him. It just bulged out through his shredded shirt in a shapeless, awful mass. Undigested food, blood, intestines, feces, and the walls of his stomach flopped onto the ground in a slithering, glistening mass.
Danielson screamed and screamed.
“Christ,” Slade said.
Major Kelly looked at Danielson's insides, trying to pretend them out of the way, trying to pretend Danielson back to health. He couldn't do it. He stood up, trying not to be sick. He turned to Slade in the jerky way of an automaton in a big department-store Christmas display, and he took the loaded revolver out of Slade's hand.
Danielson was curled up on himself now, trying to stuff his ruined intestines back through the neat slit the shrapnel had made in him. He was screaming and crying and apologizing to someone.
Major Kelly aimed the revolver at Danielson's chest but found that he was shaking too badly to make a good shot. He planted his feet farther apart and gripped the gun with both hands as he had seen Slade doing when the B-17 was over them. He shot Danielson four times in the chest, until the man was dead.
He gave the gun back to Slade.
He walked away, holding his hands over his ears, trying to block, out Petey Danielson's scream which he imagined he could still hear like a siren cutting across the smoking campsite.
In his quarters, Kelly put on new shorts and a dirty pair of khaki slacks. He took his bottle of Jack Daniels out of the pasteboard trunk and took several long pulls straight from the neck. Although he wouldn't have believed he could be functional so soon, though he wouldn't have thought he could push Danielson out of his mind so quickly, Kelly was ready to listen to Lieutenant Beame half an hour later when Beame came in to report on the condition of the bridge.
“Both piers are undamaged,” Beame said. “But we'll have to repair the entire floor and superstructure. All in all, not so bad.”
“We'll have to get on it right away,” Kelly said. “The Panzers must be on the way.”
Beame didn't understand.
Kelly said, “We were hit by one of our own bombers. That means the Panzer division is on its way west and the brass wants to deny it the use of this bridge.”
Beame didn't like that. “No. It can't be.”
“There's no other reason for them to risk a B-17 and its escort on such a limited target. We're all doomed.”
7
The HQ building had not been damaged, except for the fallen wall. In a few hours, even that was in place and all was as it had been in that corner of the camp. The radio room was undisturbed, and the wireless hummed menacingly.
Major Kelly wanted to call the general to order supplies and ask about the big Panzer division, but he could not do that. The wireless communications link between the camp and Blade was decidedly one-way; only the general could initiate a conversation. So far, this had been fine with Kelly. Now, however, once the men had been set to cleaning up the debris and there was nothing to do, the major's mind dwelt on too many unpleasant possibilities which a single call to the general could have confirmed or negated. Probably confirmed. The worst would happen. The B-17 had bombed the bridge because the Panzers were on their way. Still, until he got word for sure on tonight's Blade and Slade Show, Kelly would have to occupy his time in some manner that would take his mind off these other things. He decided he might as well return to the problem of the camp informer. Operation Traitor Hunt would keep him busy and, perhaps, gain him some respect from Slade and Coombs.
He sat behind a plank table-desk just inside the door of the mess hall, toying with a dagger. For the first time since they'd been dropped behind enemy lines, he was wearing his uniform. He felt it was only proper, while carrying on an interrogation, to wear his uniform and to toy with the dagger, thereby instilling a combination of respect and fear in the men he questioned, insuring their cooperation. Also, he wore his uniform because it gave him an excuse to wear a hat which covered the worst of his widening bald spots and prevented the interrogation subjects from laughing at him and making cruel jokes. The only trouble was that he perspired heavily, leaving the uniform wrinkled and streaked with sweat. And he had twice cut himself while toying with the dagger.
“Next!” Kelly called.
Lieutenant Slade opened the door and escorted the next man inside: Danny Dew, who had just taken a break from his D-7 work in the gorge. Danny sat on the hot seat, leaned back, clasped his hands behind his head and smiled. “What's the hubbub?” he asked, flashing white-white teeth.
“Wipe that smile off your face, soldier,” Major Kelly said.
But he was no good at discipline, and he knew Danny Dew too well to throw the least bit of fear into him. Danny Dew looked sideways at Slade and grinned, as if they all shared some private joke.
“That's better,” Major Kelly said, refusing to acknowledge that the smile was still there. He leaned forward on the table, pointing the dagger at Danny Dew. “Corporal Dew, have you any idea why we're questioning every man in this unit?”
Danny grinned at him. “No, Massah Kelly.”
“Because,” Major Kelly said, “there is a traitor among us, and we are going to find out who he is before he has another opportunity to report us to the German Air Force or to — any other German force.”
“Wonderful, wonderful!” Danny Dew said.
Kelly nodded. “I will tell you what I've told every man so far, Dew: I want to trust you, but I can't. For all our sakes, I've got to assume that you could be the kraut agent. There's no way I can actually find out for sure, short of torturing you, and that is impractical. Therefore, I want to say this, Dew: if you are a kraut agent, and if you don't tell me now and let me find out on my own, later, I will have you executed without trial.”
Dew smiled. “Ain't nothin' in my ole head, Massah Kelly.”
“Christ,” Kelly said. “If you insist on doing that bit, can't you at least get it right? Not 'head'—'haid'!”
“Ain't nothin' in my ole haid, Massah Kelly!”
Kelly toyed with his dagger awhile. “Execution without trial,” he said again. “But that isn't all, Dew. Before I have you killed, I'll assign you to the radio room where you will be tied to a chair and forced to listen to every one of General Blade's calls.”
Danny Dew stopped smiling.
“Furthermore,” Major Kelly said, warming to the routine again, “I will order the shortwave channels kept open at periodic intervals so that you will have to listen to other transmissions of other officers like General Blade, wherever and whenever we can locate them.”
Danny Dew looked distinctly ill. He had taken his hands from behind his head and clasped them between his knees. He was hunched forward as if he were going to be sick on the floor.
“And when you're screamingly insane, then we'll kill you.” Kelly waved the dagger to emphasize the point. “Now, are you the damned traitor, the kraut informer?”
“No, sir!” Dew said.
Kelly smiled. He softened his tone of voice and tried to look sincere. “Actually, I wouldn't turn you in, even if I learned you were a traitor. You understand that? I wouldn't interfere with your work. It's just that I want to know, you see. I'd promise not to get in the way of your traitoring, so long as you stopped trying to fool me. Do you get my meaning?”