‘Goddamn it! What did the lil’ monkey do that for? And after I just spent four hours tellin’ him about that exact thing! If he’d a lived, I’d be givin’ that boy a swift kick in’na rear.’
‘Shouldn’t have been out here alone yet.’
‘Yeah, though nobody can say that he didn’t know,’ Koskela said.
‘None of us got half as much advice as he did.’
‘No, we didn’t.’
And so they ceded responsibility to fate.
Hauhia lay crumpled on the trench floor. In the middle of his brow, perfectly centered between his eyes, there was a small, blue hole. The point of entry had not a single drop of blood along its edges, but the back of the boy’s head had been partially blown off. It wasn’t an unfamiliar sight in itself, but even so, somehow or other the boy’s accidental death felt more horrible than the others that had occurred amongst them. Most of the men were only a couple of years older than Hauhia, but even so, he somehow seemed like a child to them, and that made his fate even more upsetting.
Rahikainen took over for the rest of the guard shift and the others carried the body to the bunker. They set it in the front entryway and wrapped it in tent tarps. Koskela notified Lammio and Kariluoto of the incident and requested a heavy barrage on the Devil’s Mound. Artillery fire had not previously been allowed without permission from the Commander, save to counter an enemy attack, and in order to obtain permission Koskela told Sarastie that he had seen a lot of movement up on the hill. Sarastie wondered why the Artillery Commander hadn’t notified him of the commotion, but he trusted Koskela so unconditionally that he granted permission. The men, too, were amazed at how naturally lying came to Koskela.
‘Let the damned pigs squeal a little while,’ Koskela said as he lay down on his bunk. ‘The kitchen cart can take the boy back.’
They waited awhile, and soon the bunker windows began to rattle with the pressure of the first blasts a couple of miles off.
‘It’s the big gun over in Itävaara.’
‘Could be Korvenkylä.’
‘Nope. When’na fellas fire from Korvenkylä they hit to the right a that pine there. Lissen’na the rumble.’
Even quiet Susling said bitterly, ‘Just git ’em good this time.’
For once they really did hate the enemy. Practically a crime, beating that kid to the punch. In any case, whatever the reason, Hauhia’s death was a much more powerful agent in stirring their fighting spirit than the Military Police’s execution of those two men by the sauna wall.
The barrage was still underway when Hauhia’s friends arrived at the bunker. They had seen the body wrapped in tent tarps in the entryway, but in their state of anxiety at the explosions, they hadn’t looked at it very closely. There were four of them, two infantry guys and the two replacements. Frightened, they scuttled quickly into the bunker, sugar cubes and rye crispbreads in their pockets. The first fellow stood at attention and said, ‘Lieutenant, sir! We’re here to see Private Hauhia. We were all in the same group.’
Rokka polished a ring. The others lay silent. Nobody wanted to be the one to tell the boys what had happened, so the task fell to Koskela.
‘The unfortunate fact of the matter is that we’ve lost Hauhia. Sniper got him. Body’s back there in the entryway.’
The boys tried to retreat behind one another’s backs, embarrassed to be seen by this officer. The ones furthest back hesitatingly made movements to leave. Then Koskela added, ‘Look, we have to take lessons from one another. Your own experience sometimes comes too late. Now, believe me when I tell you guys that games and reality are never far apart out here. They’re all mixed up together.’
‘Yes sir, Lieutenant.’
‘Can we see him?’
‘If you want. But make sure you wrap him back up properly.’
The boys didn’t linger in the entryway long. They felt the same way the others had felt looking at Vuorela one year before. Glassy eyes, twisted gums, contorted, yellowed skin.
That evening Vanhala thought he’d put on the gramophone, but Koskela said, clearing his throat, ‘Maybe not today, OK? We’ll put it on again tomorrow.’
He had taken Hauhia’s half-written letter, thinking it might be better that it not end up in the hands of his family.
Out here, somewhere 10/8/’42
Dear Family,
I am now on the front line. There’s a lot of explosions out here. I arrived with some friends last night and now I’m standing guard. I forgot to ask the Lieut’ for the postal code for this sector, but I’ll fill it in at the end. There are bodies lying all over the place. They weren’t shot down that long ago, but they are already full of worms. Put lots of salt in the meat when you send it. Packages take a long time to get here. A barrage just started over at the neighboring position. We’re supposed to go up there soon, but don’t you worry, I’ll be fine…
Chapter Twelve
‘Blood-thirsty souls slurping gore! Heehee…’ Vanhala was chanting his satirical verses again, though his own blood had been running rather thin for a while there. He had volunteered to go out on a patrol, or rather he had traded one of the infantry guys four shifts of guard duty in exchange for a patrol. He had returned pale-faced with a bullet in his side. Now he was back from the military hospital, but in his extended absence the others had come to realize just how important the little giggler was to them. When someone gazing out of the bunker window spotted Vanhala returning from sick leave, they all rushed out to meet him, shouting raucous welcome greetings, and Sankia Priha’s face, grown rounder with his leave, stretched wide into a hearty grin.
Honkajoki was hard at work on his perpetual-motion machine, which was always just on the point of reaching completion. Rokka had given up his ring scheme in favor of a lamp-stand manufacturing operation, and Rahikainen had stayed on as sales manager. Rokka wasn’t a shabby salesman himself, but this arrangement allowed him more time to work. Määttä was awarded another stripe, but other than that, the life of the platoon continued on uneventfully. Even their autumn ‘turn on the Millions’ came and went without any casualties.
With the start of a new year, they began to receive impassioned bits of news, courtesy of the Devil’s Mound. The fighting at Stalingrad was nearing its end, and things were not looking good – and the urging and entreaties of previous propaganda broadcasts had been replaced by a threatening, frightening confidence in certain victory. It was during this time that Honkajoki’s bow became legendary. It was their new secret weapon, in which all hopes were invested, and Honkajoki paraded from bunker to bunker lecturing about it.
‘Bottle up one of “Onega’s Waves” now so you’ll have something to remember her by when you retreat!’ the loudspeaker would declare, to Vanhala’s untold amusement. Once he’d been listening to the radio at the neighboring position when, right in the middle of the soldiers’ evening prayer service, interference crackled into the background, shrieking, ‘Blast those bridges, boys!’
The startling contrast had set Vanhala giggling for weeks.
Little by little the idea of defeat settled in. The army made no effort to fend it off, save a few senseless, small-scale charades. A few lively diversions and wood-chopping tasks were devised to keep their spirits up. The men in the trenches knew perfectly well what was coming, but they soldiered on with determined nonchalance.