"Plenty of 'em nobody'd miss," Koenig said.
"Ain't it the truth!" Pete nodded. "And you know what else? I bet there hasn't been an army since Julius Caesar's day where the noncoms didn't think it'd go better if some officers got it in the neck."
"Most of the time we'd be right, too." Like any sergeant worth his salt, Koenig was sure he knew better than the guys set over him. Since Pete McGill felt the same way, he didn't argue. Koenig waved for a fresh beer before continuing, "So if the Japs and the Reds bang heads, which way do you bet? My money's on the white men."
"Yeah, everybody said the same thing about the time you were born, too, and look how that turned out," McGill said. Anybody who came to Peking got his nose rubbed in that lesson. You couldn't come here without paying attention to what had happened in the Russo-Japanese War.
Sergeant Koenig turned red. He waited till Danny gave him his new seidel, then said, "You think the little yellow bastards can take 'em?" He paid no more attention to the barman than Pete would have.
"I dunno. They've sure got more combat experience than the Russians do. Hell, they've got more combat experience than just about anybody," McGill answered. "And it's way past the back of beyond for the Russians, and they're fighting somewhere else, and their army's fucked up. So yeah, I guess maybe I figure the Japs'll win."
"I got a sawbuck says you're full of it," Koenig declared.
As far as Pete was concerned, the problems with the Marine Corps started with sergeants, not officers. That attitude would probably change the day he got his own third stripe, but he had it now. Taking a sergeant down a peg would be a pleasure-and so would winning ten bucks. "You're on," he said.
Koenig stuck out his hand. Pete took it. The clasp turned into a trial of strength that ended up a push. They both opened and closed their hands several times after they let go.
Pete started to laugh. "What's so funny?" Sergeant Koenig asked.
"We just made a bet on who's gonna win a war that hasn't started yet," McGill answered. "How dumb will we look if it turns out the Japs're up to something else instead?"
"Dumb enough, I guess," Koenig said. "What? You never looked dumb before?"
"Not the past ten minutes, anyway," Pete said, which drew a laugh from the other noncom. He went on, "I tell you, I wish the Japs would get the hell out of Peking and stay out. Town was a lot more fun when the Chinamen were still hanging on to it."
"You got that right." Koenig nodded in what might have been approval. "See? You ain't as dumb as you look."
"Heh! I'm not as dumb as you look, either," Pete retorted. They were off duty. He could sass a sergeant if he felt like it. And he did-it wasn't a pleasure he got often enough.
"Wise guy," Koenig said, and then something in Chinese that sounded like a cat with its tail caught under a rocking chair. Behind the bar, Danny jumped a foot.
"Wow! What's that mean?" Pete asked, impressed in spite of himself.
"Can't tell you," Koenig answered. "If I said it in English, you'd have to try and murder me."
"Give it to me again," Pete urged. "Sounds like it's worth knowing."
Koenig repeated it. Pete tried to echo him. He got the tones wrong the first couple of times. He could hear that, but he had trouble fixing it. Danny held his head in his hands. Pete finally said it the right way, which made the bartender even more unhappy.
"What's it mean, Danny?" Pete called. Danny wouldn't tell him, either. That made him like his new toy even better.
When Alistair Walsh saw a road sign saying how many kilometers it was to Paris, he knew things weren't in good shape. The whole point to the war was keeping the Nazis away from Paris, the same as it had been with the Kaiser's army the last time around.
They'd done it the last time-done it twice, in fact, in 1914 and then again in 1918. He wasn't so sure they could now. The BEF stumbled back and stumbled back. People were starting to talk about the Miracle on the Marne in 1914. Well, they were getting too damn close to the Marne again, and they sure could use another miracle.
He yawned. What he could use was sleep. One of the things nobody talked about was how wearing modern war was. You were fighting or you were marching or they were shelling you or bombing you or you were trying to promote something to eat. What you weren't doing was resting.
He wasn't the only one frazzled almost to death. Even though February remained chilly, exhausted soldiers curled up like animals by the side of the road. Some slept in greatcoats, some wrapped in blankets, some as they were regardless of the cold. You had to look closely to see their chests rising and falling to make sure they weren't corpses.
Exhausted civilians also slept by the roadside, singly and in family groups. They hadn't done any shooting; other than that, they had as much right to be weary as the soldiers. One poor woman must have been a restless sleeper. She'd kicked off her blanket and thrashed around so her legs and backside were out in the biting breeze. Walsh got an eyeful as he trudged along.
One of the Tommies with him chuckled. "What we're fighting for, right?" the fellow said.
"I've seen plenty worse," Walsh allowed. "If I lay down beside her, though, I bet I'd cork off before I could try getting her knickers down."
"Blimey! Me, too." The other soldier's face split in an enormous yawn. "Don't know how I put one foot in front of the other any more."
Behind them, German artillery thundered to life. Walsh jerked a thumb over his shoulder. "That's how."
"Too right it is. Got a fag on you, Sarge?"
Walsh listened for screams in the air that would warn of incoming shells aimed their way. Hearing none, he reached into a tunic pocket and pulled out a packet of Gitanes. "Here. Got these off a dead Frenchman. Nasty things, but better than nothing."
"I'd smoke whatever you've got and thank you for it. I'm plumb out, and I'm all-" The Tommy held out his arm in front of him and made his hand tremble.
"Know what you mean. I've run dry myself a couple of times." Walsh proffered the French cigarettes. "Take two or three, then."
"I'd be much obliged, if you don't mind." The soldier stuck one in his mouth and stashed the other two in a breast pocket of his grimy battledress. He struck a match and inhaled. "Cor!" he said in tones of deep respect. "Like smoking a bleeding blowtorch, ain't it?"
Walsh had also lit a Gitane. After blowing out smoke, he coughed like a man in the last stages of consumption. "What's that you say?" he inquired.
The other soldier laughed. He took a second, more cautious, drag. "Damn froggies like 'em this way, don't they?"
"I expect so. They'd make 'em different if they didn't," Walsh said.
"Fuck." The Tommy shook his head. "We ought to be on Adolf's side."
"Bugger that, mate," Walsh said. "Germans shot me once, and it's not for lack of trying they haven't done it again. Yeah, the French are a bad lot, but those bastards in field-gray are worse."
"Take an even strain, Sergeant. I was only joking, like." But then the soldier added, "They make damn good soldiers, though."
"They make damn good dead soldiers," Walsh said. He also had a healthy regard for German military talent. He'd never met an English soldier who'd fought the squareheads who didn't. To him, that only made Germans more dangerous. It didn't mean he wanted to switch sides. He pointed to the town ahead. "Is that Senlis?" He probably butchered the pronunciation, but he didn't care.
"I think so." The soldier to whom he'd given a smoke also seemed glad to change the subject.