Chapter 12 - The Road Back to Collins
Captain Warren wanted Eli nowhere near the investigation.
Eli ignored him.
So did Jack.
So did Frank and Tommy.
They had become surprisingly skilled at ignoring orders together.
Their chance came when Sergeant Hale returned from the hospital with his arm in a sling.
“You four planning something stupid?”
“No,” Frank said.
Hale stared at him.
Frank sighed.
“Yes.”
Eli showed him a hand-drawn map.
“The footprints went east.”
“MPs searched.”
“On the road.”
“And?”
“I think Burke was taken through the orchard.”
Hale looked at Eli.
“Why?”
“Because whoever took him knows patrol patterns. Roads have checkpoints.”
Jack added, “And because Carter never gets lost.”
Hale rubbed his forehead.
“I preferred when you hated each other.”
“No, you didn’t,” Tommy said.
Hale almost smiled.
Then his face became serious.
“You want Collins.”
Eli nodded.
The field where Collins died lay in the same direction.
Hale understood.
“You’re combining revenge with insubordination.”
“Recovery,” Eli corrected.
“Of a body.”
“And maybe Burke.”
Hale sighed.
“Get your gear.”
They left before dawn with authorization that was vague enough to be useful.
Officially, they were searching abandoned positions for intelligence material.
Unofficially, five men were keeping a promise.
The village where the ambush occurred had been abandoned by the Germans after American forces advanced.
The farmhouse windows were shattered.
The church tower bore the mark of Eli’s shot.
He stopped beneath it.
Jack looked up.
“You got him?”
“I don’t know.”
“Want to check?”
“No.”
They crossed the field.
Collins still lay where he had fallen.
War had moved on without him.
Eli stood several yards away.
His throat tightened.
Tommy removed his helmet.
Frank whispered, “Damn.”
Jack said nothing.
Together they wrapped Collins in a shelter half.
When Jack lifted one end, he stopped.
“What?”
Near Collins’s hand lay a crushed baseball card.
Joe DiMaggio.
Collins had shown it to them two nights before the patrol.
“My brother gave me this,” he had said. “Says it’s lucky.”
Jack picked it up.
The card was stained and bent.
He placed it inside Collins’s jacket.
“Still his,” he said.
They carried him to the road.
No speeches.
No music.
Just five tired soldiers carrying the sixth.
At the edge of the village, Eli stopped.
A boot print.
American tread.
Fresh.
Another beside it.
Bare footprint.
Burke.
They followed.
The trail entered woods behind the church and ended near a stone hunting lodge.
Hale signaled them down.
Voices inside.
One spoke English.
Major Rusk.
Eli recognized the measured, educated tone.
Another voice spoke German.
Jack’s face became murderous.
Hale put a finger to his lips.
They crawled closer.
Through a broken shutter Eli saw Burke tied to a chair.
His face was gray.
Major Victor Rusk stood beside him in an American uniform.
Across the room were two German officers and four soldiers.
Rusk said, “The Americans are advancing too quickly. I cannot keep providing routes if headquarters moves.”
One German officer answered in accented English.
“You were paid.”
“I was promised extraction.”
“You were promised consideration.”
Rusk slammed a hand on the table.
The silver eagle ring flashed.
Jack saw it.
His jaw clenched.
Burke lifted his head.
“You killed Collins.”
Rusk turned.
“You killed Collins by being careless.”
Burke spat blood at him.
Rusk struck him.
Jack started to rise.
Eli pulled him down.
“Wait.”
Inside, Rusk drew a pistol.
“I should have killed you in the shed.”
Burke laughed weakly.
“You tried.”
The German officer said something sharply.
Rusk lowered the weapon.
Eli counted.
Four enlisted Germans.
Two officers.
Rusk.
Seven armed men.
Five Americans outside, one with an injured shoulder.
Bad odds.
Then Eli noticed a fuel can beside the German truck.
He whispered to Frank.
“BAR?”
Frank nodded.
“On my shot, engine block.”
“You want the truck disabled?”
“I want them looking at the truck.”
Tommy whispered, “What’s your shot?”
Eli pointed to a lantern hanging inside the lodge.
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because if Rusk kills Burke, none of this matters.”
Eli studied the window.
Rusk stood behind Burke.
German officer near table.
Guard at door.
Eli shifted.
“Jack.”
“Yeah?”
“When Frank fires, you and Tommy take the door.”
Jack looked at him.
“You?”
“Window.”
“Of course.”
Hale whispered, “Nobody plays hero.”
All four looked at him.
Hale sighed.
“I hate you people.”
Eli settled behind the captured German rifle he had been allowed to retain temporarily as intelligence material.
The irony was not lost on him.
He aimed.
Inside, Rusk raised his pistol again.
“Last chance, Burke.”
Burke stared at him.
“Go to hell.”
Eli fired.
The pistol flew from Rusk’s hand.
Frank opened up on the truck.
The woods erupted.
Jack and Tommy charged the door.
Hale fired from cover.
Eli worked the bolt.
A German soldier moved toward Burke.
Eli shot the wall beside him, forcing him down.
Jack crashed through the doorway.
For thirty violent seconds the lodge became chaos.
Then silence.
Two Germans escaped through the rear.
Three surrendered.
One officer was wounded.
Rusk was gone.
A hidden cellar door stood open.
Jack cursed.
Eli cut Burke free.
Burke looked at him with his one good eye.
“You came back.”
Eli untied his wrists.
“For Collins.”
Burke nodded.
“Fair.”
Then he looked toward the doorway.
“And me?”
Eli paused.
“For you too.”
Outside, they placed Collins beside the American jeep they had found abandoned nearby.
Burke touched the shelter half covering him.
“I’m sorry.”
Jack stood across from him.
For several seconds the two former bullies looked at each other.
Jack finally said, “So am I.”
No one called either man forgiven.
Some debts could not be erased.
They could only be lived differently.
On the trip back, Collins lay beneath the shelter half in the rear of the jeep.
Nobody sat beside the body at first.
Then Jack climbed into the back.
He remained there for the entire journey.
At one point the jeep hit a rut and Collins’s covered arm shifted.
Jack caught it gently.
“Easy,” he whispered.
Frank heard him.
So did Eli.
Neither said anything.
When they reached American lines, Graves Registration personnel came forward.
Jack did not release the stretcher.
“Name?” one soldier asked.
“Daniel Joseph Collins,” Jack answered immediately.
“Unit?”
Jack gave it.
“Personal effects?”
“A baseball card.”
The clerk began writing.
Jack leaned closer.
“He had a son named Danny.”
The clerk paused.
“That won’t go on this form.”
“I know.”
“Then why—”
“Because somebody should hear it.”
The clerk looked at him.
Then nodded.
“Danny.”
Jack released the stretcher.
Eli watched it disappear into the tent.
War required forms.
Dates.
Serial numbers.
Cause of death.
But friendship insisted on unnecessary details.
Favorite teams.
Bad jokes.
May you like
Children’s names.
The unnecessary details were the ones that made the dead human.
