Read Online Last Orders: The War That Came Early by Harry Turtledove - Free Book Online
Authors: Harry Turtledove
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first, he couldn’t do everything with the hand that the surgeon wanted him to. Everything? He could barely do anything, and the effort left him more worn down than hauling a sack of concrete should have.
“Patience. Patience and persistence,” Alvarez told him. “You must have both.”
To Chaim, they sounded like a couple of round-heeled Puritan girls. Patience and Persistence Mather: something like that. He imagined himself in bed with both of them at once, because he had an imagination like that—especially after he’d been stuck in the hospital for so long without any friendly female company.
A few days later, as he healed more, he started being able to do things he couldn’t at first. That made him feel better. It also made him think—again—that the doctor might know what he was talking about after all. And, a couple of days after that, La Martellita paid him a rare visit.
The Little Hammer
—that was what his ex-wife’s
nom de guerre
meant. Communist activist, drop-dead gorgeous woman with a mane of blue-black hair, mother of his son … Even a glimpse of her made his dreams of wicked Puritan maids pop like pricked soap bubbles.
“I heard you might be able to take up arms again for the cause after all,” she said gravely. “That’s good news—better than I expected when they brought you here.”
“Better than I expected, too,
querida
.” Chaim’s Spanish wasn’t smooth or grammatical, but it got the job done. “Wish I could take
you
in my arms.”
“No.” Her voice went hard and flat. “It’s over. Don’t you see that?”
“I see it. Doesn’t mean I have to like it.” Chaim sighed. “How’s Carlos Federico?” He’d never expected to have a son named for Marx
and
Engels, especially not in Spanish.
“He’s well. Maybe I will bring him here again. It is good to see you are doing better, too. Now I must go.” And La Martellita did. Five chilly minutes—that was all he’d got. He could count himself lucky … or he could go back to daydreaming about Patience and Persistence.
German 105s pounded the trench line in which Staff Sergeant Alistair Walsh crouched—well, cowered, if you wanted to get right down to it. In the last war, the Germans would have—had—shot 77s at him. Those were a lot less dangerous; they didn’t fly as far, and, because theycame from flat-shooting guns rather than higher-trajectory howitzers, they had a smaller chance of coming down into the trench with you and going off.
He hadn’t thought in the last war that he’d still be soldiering in this one. But the other choice was going back into the Welsh coal mine from which the Army had plucked him. A soldier’s life, especially in peacetime, seemed better than that. So did anything else, hell very possibly included.
So he’d stayed in. He’d risen in the ranks, as far as a lad plucked from a Welsh coal mine could hope to rise. Staff sergeants saluted subalterns and first lieutenants. They called them
sir
. But, with their years of experience, they mattered more than the junior officers nominally set over them. A smart regimental colonel would sooner trust a senior sergeant than any lieutenant ever hatched, and would back him against quite a few captains, too.
All of which was fine when there were choices to be made and courses to be plotted. When Fritz was throwing hate around, all you could do was hunker down and hope it missed you. No, you could do one more thing besides. Walsh fumbled in the breast pocket of his battledress tunic, pulled out a packet of Navy Cuts, and stuck one in his mouth. The shelling hadn’t made his hands shake too much to keep him from striking a match.
He sucked in smoke. Logic said that couldn’t make anything better. Logic be damned, though. A cigarette relaxed him to some small but perceptible degree. He wasn’t the only one, either. Nobody in the front-line trenches ever quit smoking. Plenty of people who’d never had the habit before picked it up when the
“Patience. Patience and persistence,” Alvarez told him. “You must have both.”
To Chaim, they sounded like a couple of round-heeled Puritan girls. Patience and Persistence Mather: something like that. He imagined himself in bed with both of them at once, because he had an imagination like that—especially after he’d been stuck in the hospital for so long without any friendly female company.
A few days later, as he healed more, he started being able to do things he couldn’t at first. That made him feel better. It also made him think—again—that the doctor might know what he was talking about after all. And, a couple of days after that, La Martellita paid him a rare visit.
The Little Hammer
—that was what his ex-wife’s
nom de guerre
meant. Communist activist, drop-dead gorgeous woman with a mane of blue-black hair, mother of his son … Even a glimpse of her made his dreams of wicked Puritan maids pop like pricked soap bubbles.
“I heard you might be able to take up arms again for the cause after all,” she said gravely. “That’s good news—better than I expected when they brought you here.”
“Better than I expected, too,
querida
.” Chaim’s Spanish wasn’t smooth or grammatical, but it got the job done. “Wish I could take
you
in my arms.”
“No.” Her voice went hard and flat. “It’s over. Don’t you see that?”
“I see it. Doesn’t mean I have to like it.” Chaim sighed. “How’s Carlos Federico?” He’d never expected to have a son named for Marx
and
Engels, especially not in Spanish.
“He’s well. Maybe I will bring him here again. It is good to see you are doing better, too. Now I must go.” And La Martellita did. Five chilly minutes—that was all he’d got. He could count himself lucky … or he could go back to daydreaming about Patience and Persistence.
German 105s pounded the trench line in which Staff Sergeant Alistair Walsh crouched—well, cowered, if you wanted to get right down to it. In the last war, the Germans would have—had—shot 77s at him. Those were a lot less dangerous; they didn’t fly as far, and, because theycame from flat-shooting guns rather than higher-trajectory howitzers, they had a smaller chance of coming down into the trench with you and going off.
He hadn’t thought in the last war that he’d still be soldiering in this one. But the other choice was going back into the Welsh coal mine from which the Army had plucked him. A soldier’s life, especially in peacetime, seemed better than that. So did anything else, hell very possibly included.
So he’d stayed in. He’d risen in the ranks, as far as a lad plucked from a Welsh coal mine could hope to rise. Staff sergeants saluted subalterns and first lieutenants. They called them
sir
. But, with their years of experience, they mattered more than the junior officers nominally set over them. A smart regimental colonel would sooner trust a senior sergeant than any lieutenant ever hatched, and would back him against quite a few captains, too.
All of which was fine when there were choices to be made and courses to be plotted. When Fritz was throwing hate around, all you could do was hunker down and hope it missed you. No, you could do one more thing besides. Walsh fumbled in the breast pocket of his battledress tunic, pulled out a packet of Navy Cuts, and stuck one in his mouth. The shelling hadn’t made his hands shake too much to keep him from striking a match.
He sucked in smoke. Logic said that couldn’t make anything better. Logic be damned, though. A cigarette relaxed him to some small but perceptible degree. He wasn’t the only one, either. Nobody in the front-line trenches ever quit smoking. Plenty of people who’d never had the habit before picked it up when the
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