Lehto gave a strange, deep laugh. He was so pleased that he nearly softened, for a moment. He knew he’d had his revenge. No, there was nothing they could do to him. They couldn’t concoct anything worse than death, and death he could cope with well enough.
Rahikainen acted as if the attack hadn’t frightened him in the least. He was already back to cracking jokes with his customary panache. ‘Let’s see what grade Liberty Cross we get when the peacock hears what heroes we are! And Hietanen oughtta get one of the oak-leaf pins for sticking around so long, even though he wasn’t one of the crooks like the rest of us.’
When the guys in the camp had recognized the planes as Russian, they had abandoned their card games and laundry. Koskela ordered everyone to take cover in the forest, and a few of them ran like mad as far as they could, but some stayed by the tents because somebody shouted, ‘They never hit the tents since that’s where they’re aiming!’
After distributing the men’s pay, Master Sergeant Korsumäki had stuck around to chat with Koskela, so he was still in the camp when the planes flew over. Koskela ordered him to take cover in the forest with himself and the others, but Korsumäki had stayed by the tents. He lay in a ditch beside a mound of grass, holding his hands over his ears. He’d stuck the empty cigarette-holder in his mouth so it would stay open and protect his eardrums.
The earth heaved beneath him and when the explosions grew near, he felt something fall and strike his shoulders, knocking him unconscious. As he came to, he realized he was on his knees. Everything felt incomprehensible. Only when he heard groaning and saw a man lying on the ground did he realize what had happened, and that he himself had been injured too. A heavy drowsiness swept over his body, but he didn’t feel any pain. He rose to his feet and took a few halting steps forward. His entire being flooded with agony. ‘I can’t… I can’t… I got it bad.’
In a confused blur, he remembered fearing death the entire time he had been at war, waiting for it… So this was how it happened. ‘It’s over… I can’t go on.’
The ground swayed and his eyes dimmed, and consciousness had left him by the time the fighter planes raked his body with machine-gun fire. The last sounds to escape his mouth were a sob and a helpless whimper. ‘Stop… stop… let me live.’
Koskela and Hietanen arrived on the scene simultaneously, just as the medics were arriving from the road. There was nothing to be done. Korsumäki was already dead, and the other guy who had been injured had lost consciousness. It was in fact Salonen, just as Rahikainen had guessed – the same Salonen for whom Hietanen had convinced Mäkilä to hand over new boots before their departure. One of his hands was torn off entirely, and his heartbeat was scarcely perceptible by the time the medic took his pulse.
The men began to gather round. Even the company secretary came rushing over, repeating over and over like a madman, ‘I was right there! If I had stayed with the Master Sergeant… it’s just like being on the front lines, even if I am staff!’
He was so worked up that even he himself didn’t understand the stream of speech pouring out of his mouth, in which the words ‘right there’ and ‘front lines’ shot out over and over in quick succession.
Hietanen was feeling rattled and jittery from all that had happened, and finally he exploded angrily, ‘To hell with your goddamn chatter!’
The secretary straightened his shirt, smoothed his hair, set his cap on his head, and kept overflowing with verbiage. Hietanen checked Salonen’s pulse, then picked up his cap from where it had fallen, used it to flick away some debris and said, ‘You can stop bandaging. It’s over.’
They lifted the body onto a stretcher, and the men’s shock manifested itself in an eagerness to help take care of everything. Somebody carefully picked up the severed hand and placed it beside the body.
‘Set him in good…’
‘His leg’s kind of…’
‘Somebody press his eyelids down a little…’
Their careful attentions revealed the awe in which they held death, and for no apparent reason even their voices dropped almost to whispers. The medics carried Salonen away and Korsumäki lay awaiting his turn. They set the Master Sergeant’s fallen cap back on his head, though not too firmly, nor quite as straight as it had always been before. They noticed a tear in the corner of the Master Sergeant’s eye. Perhaps it had welled up there in the final seconds, as he realized that he was dying. The old man’s limp body had melted into a helpless sob as he understood that the end had come. There was something touchingly elderly about his corpse, which the men perceived as well. It was probably just his thick, patterned wool socks, whose homey quality brought to mind the old people who generally wore them.
There was a third body lying on the ground beneath the collapsed tent. It was Private Kaivonen from the fourth squad. He still had three crumpled 100-mark notes and five playing cards clenched in his fist.
‘What are they?’
‘Four aces and a lady.’
‘Good Lord.’
‘Rough game. I’d have bet my spot in heaven on that hand.’
‘Guess those devils must have had a joker.’
They were perfectly serious. No one smiled; they expressed their astonishment with perfect gravity, as if they were reading the Lord’s Prayer. But as soon as the bodies were carried away, the heavy atmosphere began to lift. They tried to be even more chipper than usual, making careless declarations like, ‘Boys’ve gone and left us for the cemetery sector!’ ‘Only hurts once…’ ‘Can’t lose any more than the life ya got.’
They lamented the Master Sergeant’s fate a while longer. Now nobody had the smallest grievance with him and he had even become quite popular since the fighting had begun, particularly after the men observed his cold conduct toward Lammio, everyone’s enemy. They knew that the Master Sergeant could have obtained a transfer away from the front as soon as mobilization came, but that he had refused to do so. ‘Death had to come all the way out here looking for the old man.’
The three bandits were still standing at attention at the edge of the forest. Only once the dead had been carried away did it occur to Koskela to turn his attention to them and ask Hietanen, ‘Those three still standing over there?’
‘They stood over there through the whole bombing. Wouldn’t leave, even though I ordered ’em to.’
Koskela laughed and ordered the culprits to come away, but they asked to stay and carry out their punishment to its completion.
‘Well, whatever suits you,’ Koskela chuckled, amused. He was quick to see the comedy in the whole ordeal, with all its nuances, and it tickled him. Lammio needed a lesson, and Koskela was more than happy to hand him one. Although Lammio put precious little store by other people, even he was careful never to attack Koskela directly. Koskela still felt a certain aversion toward him, though, and he was also sensible enough to see that Lammio’s every move poisoned the men’s spirits.
When the two hours were up, the trio returned to their tent. Lehto was silent, but his cruel smile kept flickering across his face. ‘“You’d better be prepared to see it to the end.” That’s what Kaarna told me once. That old man knew what he was talking about and he lived up to his word. But that snotty little jackass just needs a good fist in the face. And I might just keep it there till Christmas. With one good, extra twist on Christmas Eve.’
Rahikainen was bragging about his heroic feats, never mind about the squatting in the middle. ‘No use kowtowin’ before death. A fellow’d get his neck all whacked out of shape if he kept noddin’ every time things started heating up! Well, anyway, now that the old accounts are settled, we can start in on some new ones tomorrow. If we’re gonna get on here, we’re gonna hafta go about making some acquisitions. Koskela, you’re gonna hafta cover up our operations, cause we’re not about to start goin’ hungry round here.’