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Mallory rose groggily to his feet, picked up his gun. «How is he really, Dusty?»
«He's dead, but he just won't die. He'll be gone by sundown. Gawd only knows what's kept him goin' so far.»
«It may sound presumptuous,» Mallory murmured; «but I think I know too.»
«The first-class medical attention?» Miller said hopefully.
«Looks that way, doesn't it?» Mallory smiled down at the still kneeling Miller. «But that wasn't what I meant at all. Come, gentlemen, we have some business to attend to.»
«Me, all I'm good for is blowin' up bridges and droppin' a handful of sand in engine bearin's,» Miller a
«I'm inclined to agree with you.» Mallory settled himself more firmly behind the jumbled rocks in the mouth of the ravine that opened on the charred and smoking remains of the carob grove directly below and took another look at the Alpenkorps troops advancing in extended order up the steep, shelterless slope. «They're no children at this game. I bet they don't like it one little bit, either.»
«Then why the hell are they doin' it, boss?»
«No option, probably. First off, this place can only be attacked frontally.» Mallory smiled down at the little Greek lying between himself and Andrea. «Louki here chose the place well. It would require a long detour to attack from the rear — and it would take them a week to advance through that devil's scrap-heap behind us. Secondly, it'll be sunset in a couple of hours, and they know they haven't a hope of getting us after it's dark. And finally — and I think this is more important than the other two reasons put together — it's a hundred to one that the commandant in the town is being pretty severely prodded by his High Command. There's too much at stake, even in the one in a thousand chance of us getting at the guns. They can't afford to have Kheros evacuated under their noses, to lose—»
«Why not?» Miller interrupted. He gestured largely with his hands. «Just a lot of useless rocks»
«They can't afford to lose face with the Turks,» Mallory went on patiently. «The strategic importance of these islands in the Sporades is negligible, but their political importance is tremendous. Adolf badly needs another ally in these parts. So be flies in Alpenkorps troops by the thousand and Stukas by the hundred, the best he has — and he needs them desperately on the Italian front. But you've got to convince your potential ally that you're a pretty safe bet before you can persuade him to give up his nice, safe seat on the fence and jump down on your side.»
«Very interestin',» Miller observed. «So?»
«So the Germans are going to have no compunction about thirty or forty of their best troops being cut into little pieces. It's no trouble at all when you're sitting behind a desk a thousand miles away… . Let 'em come another hundred yards or so closer. Louki and I will start from the middle and work out: you and Andrea start from the outside.»
«I don't like it, boss,» Miller complained.
«Don't think that I do either,» Mallory said quietly. «Slaughtering men forced to do a suicidal job like this is not my idea of fun — or even of war. But if we don't get them, they get us.» He broke off and pointed across the burnished sea to where Kheros lay peacefully on the hazed horizon, striking golden glints off the westering sun. «What do you think they would have us do, Dusty?»
«I know, I know, boss.» Miller stirred uncomfortably. «Don't rub it in.» He pulled his woollen cap low over his forehead and stared bleakly down the slope. «How soon do the mass executions begin?»
«Another hundred yards, I said.» Mallory looked down the slope again towards the coast road and gri
Miller studied the guns drawn up on the road behind the two trucks and cleared his throat.
«I was only sayin' what Louki told me,» he said defensively.
«What Loiiki told you!» The little Greek was indignant. «Before God, Major, the Americano is full of lies!»
«Ah, well, mebbe I was mistaken,» Miller said magnanimously. He squinted again at the guns, forehead lined in puzzlement. «That first one's a mortar, I reckon. But what in the universe that other weird looking contraption can be—»
«Also a mortar,» Mallory explained. «A five-barrelled job, and very nasty. The Nebelwerfer or Moanin' Mi
«That's right,» Miller gowled. «Cheer us all up.» But he was grateful to the New Zealander for trying to take their minds off what they had to do. «Why don't they use them?»
«They will,» Mallory assured him. «Just as soon as we fire and they find out where we are.»
«Gawd help us,» Miller muttered. «Fragmentation bombs, you said!» He lapsed into gloomy silence.
«Any second now,» Mallory said softly. «I only hope that our friend Turzig isn't among this lot.» He reached out for his field-glasses but stopped in surprise as Andrea leaned across Louki and caught him by the wrist before he could lift the binoculars. «What!s the matter, Andrea?»
«I would not be using these, my Captain. They have betrayed us once already. I have been thinking, and it can be nothing else. The sunlight reflecting from the lenses …»
Mallory stared at him, slowly released his grip on the glasses, nodded several times in succession.
«Of course, of course! I had been wondering… Someone has been careless. There was no other way, there could have been no other way. It would only require a single flash to tip them off.» He paused, remembering, then gri
«I do not believe it,» Andrea said flatly. «You couldn't make a mistake like that, my Captain.»
«Not only could, but did, I'm afraid. But we'll worry about that afterwards.» The middle of the ragged line of advancing soldiers, slipping and stumbling on the treacherous scree, had almost reached the lower limits of the blackened, stunted remains of the copse. «They've come far enough. I'll take the white helmet in the middle, Louki.» Even as he spoke he could hear the soft scrape as the three others slid their automatic barrels across and between the protective rocks in front of them, could feel the wave of revulsion that washed through his mind. But his voice was steady enough as he spoke, relaxed and almost casual. «Right. Let them have it now!»
His last words were caught up and drowned in the tearing, rapid-fire crash of the automatic carbines. With four machine-guns in their hands — two Brens and two 9 mm. Schmeissers — it was no war, as he had said, but sheer, pitiful massacre, with the defenceless figures on the slope below, figures still stu