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October wasn’t listening to him. The summer had been drier than usual. Fall seemed to be making up for it all at once. “Unfair,” Morrell said. The enemy couldn’t stop him. The enemy had a devil of a time even slowing him down. Why was the weather doing the Confederacy’s dirty work for it?
Dirty work it was. Plowing through this gunk, the command barrel kicked up a bow wave like a destroyer at flank speed. But seawater was clean, not mixed with mud. Anyone this bow wave splashed would turn the color of rust-if he hadn’t already from trying to make his own way through the muck.
More lightning flashed. After a dozen or so hippos, thunder boomed. The rain came down harder than ever. Swearing under his breath, Morrell ducked down into the turret and closed the hatch behind him.
“Thank you, sir,” the new gu
“Not that wet,” Morrell said, though it didn’t miss by much. Frenchy Bergeron had shoulder straps with gold bars on them now, and a platoon somewhere around here. So did Michael Pound, if he hadn’t got hurt since Morrell saw him last. My gu
“No forty days and forty nights?” Ashton said. “Sure coming down like it. If you see a big boat with giraffes and elephants and a guy with a beard, you better watch out.”
“The Ark came down on Mount Ararat,” Morrell said. “That’s in Armenia, not Georgia. The Turks and the Russians have to worry about it. Not us, thank God.”
“Isn’t there a Georgia right next to Armenia?” Ashton asked. “Maybe we’ve floated over from this one to that one.”
“Maybe you’ve floated clean out of your skull,” Morrell said. The gu
Word coming in on the command circuits made Morrell do worse than roll his eyes. Unit after unit reported that it couldn’t go forward. Artillery was bogging down too far behind the line to give any kind of worthwhile support. Armored cars couldn’t leave the roads to scout; their tires made them more prone to getting stuck in the mud than barrels or armored perso
At last, Morrell decided struggling to go forward would cost more than it was worth. He ordered all front-line units to hold in place to give the artillery and logistics train a chance to catch up. He wanted to be ready to reopen the attack when the rains let up-if they ever did.
“You don’t think we’ll sink in the mud if we stop here, sir?” Ashton asked.
Morrell muttered under his breath. That didn’t just strike him as possible; it struck him as likely. He ordered the driver forward till they came to a paved road. That also had its drawbacks. The barrel was too exposed to make him happy. But the curtain of rain drumming down hid the machine almost as well as a smoke screen. And he didn’t want to have to summon an armored recovery vehicle to rescue him if he did bog down. His reputation would be a long time recovering from something like that.
“Here we are,” Ashton said. “The middle of nowhere. Isn’t it lovely this time of year?”
“This isn’t the middle of nowhere,” Morrell said. The gu
Clark Ashton thought for a bit, then nodded. “Somewhere we can’t get to right now,” he said.
“Well, no. Thanks for reminding me,” Morrell said. “When this barrel rolls into Atlanta, the war’s just a long spit from being over.”
Ashton listened to the rain pounding on the barrel’s metal skin. “Seems to me God’s got the long spit right now.”
Morrell grunted. “Seems that way to me, too, and I wish to hell it didn’t.” He patted the front pocket of his coveralls. “And I wish I could have a cigarette.”
“Good luck, sir,” the gu
“Won’t kill me to go without,” he said mournfully, and patted that front pocket again.
“How long do you think it’ll be before we can start advancing again?” Ashton asked.
Laughing, Morrell said, “What is it about gu
“I don’t know about anybody else, but I sure can’t,” Ashton said.
“Tell you what,” Morrell said. “Talk to God. If you can make the sun come out and dry up the mud, we’ll roll. Till somebody does…we won’t.”
“If God listened to me, sir, I wouldn’t be in a turret with you-no offense. I’d be in bed with a blonde-or a brunette, or a redhead. I’m not a fussy guy. Any kind of girl would do.”
“Blonde,” the loader said. “If you’re go
“There you go,” Ashton said. “That’d work for me.” He glanced over at Morrell. “What about you, sir?”
“One of these days, I wouldn’t mind leave to go back to Kansas,” Morrell said. “That’s where my wife and daughter are.”
“Yes, sir,” the gu
“I don’t need it that bad,” Morrell said. “Agnes isn’t fooling around on me back there, and I don’t feel right about cheating on her.”
Ashton and the loader looked at each other. He could read their minds, though they said not a word. Poor old guy, they had to be thinking. If he had more get up and go in him, he’d nail some of these Confederate bitches any which way. Maybe they were right. Morrell hoped not, but he recognized the possibility. A man in his twenties was a hard-on with legs. A man in his fifties damn well wasn’t, and never looked or acted more idiotic than when he pretended he was.
His earphones crackled with a new report: “Sir, our forward scouts say there’s a Confederate buildup centered on map square Red-14.”
“Have you called artillery in on it?” Morrell asked, maneuvering the map so he could see where the devil Red-14 was. Folding and unfolding the damn thing inside the turret reminded him of a crowded flat with laundry drying on lines strung across the front room. The square lay south and east of Resaca, not too far from where he was himself.
“Yes, sir,” said the voice on the wireless. “Doesn’t seem to be enough to break ’em up. Sure could use a spoiling attack.”
“Well, I believe you,” Morrell said. “Haven’t got a whole lot to spoil with, though. And this damn rain…”
“How much trouble can they cause if they break through there?” the voice asked.
Morrell looked at the map again. He did some more muttering. If everything went precisely wrong, the Confederates could retake Resaca. That would complicate his life. It would mean Atlanta wouldn’t fall any time soon. And it would put him in hot water with the War Department, where you were only as good as what you did yesterday.
“How big a buildup is it?” he asked. If it was brigade strength, maybe even division strength, he would put in a spoiling attack. He wouldn’t just put it in, either-he’d lead it himself. He knew he couldn’t put his hands on anywhere near a division’s worth of men and materiel, but he didn’t care. The Confederates wouldn’t be so sure of that. When barrels came at them out of a curtain of rain, wouldn’t they think twice before they tried attacking? He thought so-they couldn’t afford to get too intrepid. On the other hand, they couldn’t afford not to get too intrepid, either. How did you judge?