And Save Them For Pallbearers

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Although in most cases we have retained the Author’s original spelling and grammar to authentically reproduce the work of the Author and the original intent of such material, some additional notes and clarifications have been added for the modern reader’s benefit.

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AND SAVE THEM FOR PALLBEARERS

By

JAMES GARRETT

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Contents

TABLE OF CONTENTS 4

DEDICATION 5

Author’s Note 6

PARTIAL DIVISION TABLE OF ORGANIZATION — (September 1944) 7

THE WARRIORS 9

1 9

2 19

3 28

THE LINE OF DEPARTURE 41

1 41

2 54

3 61

4 69

ABBY 79

1 79

2 91

3 95

4 103

5 106

6 118

7 122

8 127

9 130

10 141

11 144

12 148

AND SAVE THEM FOR PALLBEARERS 156

1 156

2 166

3 169

4 172

5 176

REQUEST FROM THE PUBLISHER 189

DEDICATION

***

For

Martha E. Garrett

and

James G. Garrett (1896-1953)

Author’s Note

And Save Them for Pallbearers is a work of fiction, as are the characters depicted in it. No resemblance to persons, living or dead, has been intended. For convenience and credibility, its fictional incidents have been gathered loosely into the historical framework that consisted of the invasion and battle of Europe—particularly the breaching of the Siegfried Line and the subsequent battle for the Rhineland—conducted by the Allied Expeditionary Force from June 1944 to March 1945. Camp Martin-Noye, Moine, Mittenfeld, the Forest of Shemai and the Blüt River have never existed, to the best of the writer’s knowledge, and were invented solely to dissuade the false association of any single American Army Infantry division with the division and its components described in the novel. Weather, battles, the movements of the central division—especially into terrain conquered by British and Canadian troops—have been manipulated whenever necessary in order to suit the progress of the fiction.

***

And there went out another horse that was red: and power was given to him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth, and that they should kill one another: and there was given unto him a great sword.

From The Revelation of St. John the Divine 6:4

PARTIAL DIVISION TABLE OF ORGANIZATION — (September 1944)

DIVISION

Maj.-Gen. Jerome Hastings Stephenson, Commanding Officer

REGIMENT

Col. William Jaffee, Commanding Officer

FIRST BATTALION

Lieut.-Col. Talmadge Mayberry, Commanding Officer

Maj. Raymond Mercedes, Executive Officer

CHARLIE COMPANY

Capt. Kenneth Eustice Flaggler, Commanding Officer

First Lieut. Wakely Piersall, Executive Officer

M/Sgt. Wendell Blakethorn, First Sergeant

THIRD PLATOON

First Lieut. Samuel Crawford, Commanding Officer

T/Sgt. Jaro Thrumm, Platoon Sergeant

S/Sgt. Tommy Derek, Platoon Guide

THIRD SQUAD

S/Sgt. Peter Donatti, Squad Leader

Pfc. Robert Joslin, Scout

Pfc. Ramón Mendez, Scout

Pfc. George Last, B.A.R. Gunner

Pvt. Harry Madigan, Assistant B.A.R. Gunner

Pvt. Paul Borg, Assistant B.A.R. Gunner

Pfc. Charles Stein, Rifleman

Pvt. Edward Davenport, Rifleman

Pfc. Ernst Dakola, Rifleman

Pvt. Michael Hogan, Rifleman

Pvt. Al Lewandowski, Antitank Grenadier

Sgt. John Curry, Assistant Squad Leader

THE WARRIORS

1

A pall of inactivity covered the land as though war had not yet visited this place; but even in the bleak German night, between the cold, slanting gusts of an early September rain, the quadrangular foxholes of Charlie Company were visible upon the forward slope of a gentle hill. It was to this hill that the Company’s attack had carried four days earlier.

The Germans—generally able and combative panzer units—had swiftly faded from the hill, abandoning their dead and wounded along the route as the American attack swept upon them. It was not until the Company had dug its foxholes that it realized why the Germans had fought so reluctantly and had retreated so eagerly. The Company—the Division, in fact—almost as one man, finally raised its head and stared over the crest of the hill into a land of endless Dragon’s Teeth, tank pits, concrete-covered tunnels and slate-colored pillboxes with 360-degree fields of fire. The Division had captured the last defensible position before the Siegfried Line.

***

A rifle shot, ricocheting into the distant brush, brought Staff Sergeant Peter Donatti’s head erect. His brown eyes were bracketed in shadow. His head, with the grotesque steel helmet slapped upon it, resembled a turtle’s. A stiff aquiline nose jutted from a cadaverous cheekline.

When the bullet sprang from the darkness to thud aimlessly into the brush, he had been thinking of the rain: the cold, wet, continuous deluge that poured upon him and his open foxhole. He brushed irritably at the back of his neck where the rain ran off his helmet and dropped down his collar. He watched idly as a rivulet formed on the lip of the foxhole and dripped onto the helmet of Sergeant John Curry, asleep at the bottom of the hole. Donatti pushed the earth up with his thumb to dam the flow of water.

He listened to the sound the rain made as it dripped from a grove of nearby trees, from the bent dead bushes directly before his foxhole, from the dried grasses that were matted into thick carpets. He listened to the rain form pools in shellholes, vehicle tracks and the places where men had walked. He listened to the sound of rain upon his helmet, upon his field jacket as it soaked through to his olive-drab shirt. He listened to the rain as he had listened to it yesterday and the day before yesterday.

Sergeant John Curry awoke, yawned loudly, rose and stretched, pushing his rifle over the muddy parapet before the hole. Why don’t they relieve us? he asked, expecting no answer.

I don’t know, Johnny, Donatti said. It was a question he did not dare ask himself, but every hour or so Curry stretched, stared angrily at the sky and asked, Why don’t they relieve us? Why hadn’t they relieved them after three days!

You can bet it’s warm in the CP, Curry said.

A grenade exploded nearby and both men snapped to alertness. Curry probed the wet darkness with wary eyes.

We wouldn’t hear or see the Krauts in this mess, anyway, Pete, he complained. Running a hand over his face, he felt the bristles of his three-day-old beard. He vehemently disliked the listening post.

As long as you’re so full of conversation, said Donatti, why don’t you call the CP and wake the bastards up? He pointed to the field telephone which lay in the mud at the bottom of the hole.

Aw, let them sleep, Curry said sheepishly. If it’d only stop raining...

...Lissen! Donatti hissed. He had detected an alien sound in the night, and now he waited for the faceless enemy to come from the rain and assume a personality. His body stiffened and he huddled over the parapet to thrust his rifle at the forest shadows. A flare caught fire in the sky and burned brightly with sudden and startling combustion.

Don’t worry about it. But Curry was nervous and uncertain. You probably didn’t hear anything but the rain.

Something out there, Donatti insisted.

Krauts. To hell with them.

Donatti finally relaxed and smiled in the darkness. I was thinking of Alençon, Johnny. You remember Alençon?

Curry shrugged. Must have been after Bayeux.

Bayeux was D-Day. This was after that. Alençon’s a little town we took in the afternoon and dug in just beyond that night.

Alençon, Paris, Metz...they’re all the same to me. Bayeux’s the only thing I remember. Nothing different ever happened after Bayeux, Curry said bitterly, except that more men died.

We lost Jake and Crowley at Alençon, Donatti said. He placed his back against the wall of the foxhole, thinking of D-Day and how many had died before they got into Bayeux, and that what Curry said was true—nothing different ever happened. But that had been in Normandy, and, as far as Donatti was concerned, Normandy had died centuries before. He had not liked Normandy, with its apple orchards and hidden Calvados stills and the eternal rain rolling down from black, boiling skies, and the Tiger tanks that rumbled behind the hedgerows.

Jake and Crowley were good men, Curry said.

The best.

Crowley’s wife looked a little like Gloria De Haven. Curry gazed suspiciously at Donatti. Why Alençon? Why Jake and Crowley?

You remember, Johnny...Jake and Crowley were killed on listening post.

A wall of fear reared out of the night to confront Curry and flow over him and leave raw welts of terror upon him.

Hunker down and get some sleep, Johnny. I’ll watch, Donatti said.

Curry stared into the darkness. He did not want to admit that he was too frightened to sleep.

***

Technical Sergeant Jaro Thrumm was the only non-commissioned officer in the Company to wear his stripes. At one time, when they had first entered combat, there had been a standing order from Division Headquarters that all enlisted men above the rank of private were to display their chevrons, but when the Division was thoroughly seasoned in combat the order was rescinded. That had not really been necessary, since it had been ignored.

Jaro Thrumm was of the Old Army, the remarkable group of Regulars who became the cadre of the Army after Pearl Harbor, and this month—September 1944—marked his sixteenth year of service. His career had been a checkerboard of southern camp associations: Bliss, Sam Houston, McClellan, Benning and, finally, Martin-Noye, Texas, where he had helped to reactivate the Division.

Thrumm paused at the entrance to the castle that had been transformed into the Third Platoon Command Post, spat a brown stream of chewing tobacco into the drumming rain and stared up at one of the turrets atop the structure. He was unable, because of the rain, to see the windows in the turret through which he had peered endlessly the past four days at the hostile German terrain a hundred yards beyond the Platoon front. From the turret no-man’s-land, wreathed in shimmering mist and patches of fog, had appeared strange, silent—almost indifferent; the war had seemed very far away. Jaro Thrumm sighed. That was where he wanted it—far away.

Platoon Headquarters was in the cellar of the castle. A narrow flight of stairs led to the cellar and an olive-drab blanket hung across the opening at the bottom of the steps. Thrumm pushed the blanket to one side and stepped into a large, dimly lighted area. As he did, his helmet struck the ceiling at the opening and loosened a thin trickle of cement that dropped into his collar and slid down his back.

Musta built this thing fo’ midgets, Thrumm said to the three men slouched against the far wall of the cellar.

First Lieutenant Samuel Crawford, the platoon leader, said, Calm down, Jaro. You talk like you’ve got a mouthful of Wheat-ena.

You oughta have a guard upstairs. Thrumm glared at Staff Sergeant Tommy Derek, the platoon guide, and Private first class Charles Stein. One o’ you birds!

Derek, who had joined the Platoon only the week before and felt ill at ease because he had not earned his stripes with it, stood up and said, I’ll see to it, Sergeant.

Forget it, Stein said. Jaro’s just got a wild hair up his ass because he’s wet.

Some Kraut rolls a grenade in here, you won’ think so.

Sure, Stein agreed lazily.

Shit! Jaro Thrumm acknowledged defeat and walked across the room to stand near Crawford. What about Donatti an’ Curry, Sam?

We’ll be relieved tonight.

You said that last night, Sam, Stein said.

Thrumm said, They been out there three days...

...and nights. Stein finished the sentence for him.

It rained all that time, too, said Crawford. ‘The Company was to have been relieved the night before last. Then, it was last night. I know they’ve been there two days too long. Tonight, we pull out for certain. If not, we’ll get someone to replace them before morning. The field telephone caught his eye. Ring them up, Tommy, and see if they’re awake."

Derek obediently picked up the phone and cranked the handle. Stein watched him for a moment, then sighed and rolled onto his side.

Tommy Derek said, They don’t answer.

Try again, Crawford said, leaning nearer the telephone.

Stein rose awkwardly and strapped an extra bandoleer of ammunition around his chest and stuck several hand grenades in the pockets of his field jacket.

Finally, Crawford said, Your phone’s dead, Sergeant.

I don’t even get a buzz, Derek agreed.

Rain might’ve shorted it out, Jaro Thrumm said. Ain’t likely, though.

We’ll get a patrol up, Crawford said, and looked at Stein, who nodded and left the cellar. You stay here, Tommy, and keep on the phone.

I’d like to go, Lieutenant. Derek volunteered for every dirty job no one else would take in the hope the Platoon would accept him as one of its own.

Crawford turned and smiled, Next time, Tommy.

Derek sat beside the phone and tried again to raise the listening post. Suddenly, he threw his steel helmet across the cellar in disgust.

***

The German patrol discovered the telephone wire leading to the listening post quite by accident. Tank movements had been heard behind the American lines and the Germans had sent out a reconnaissance patrol to discover if an attack was imminent. The patrol discovered nothing behind the American lines and was returning when the officer in charge tripped on the telephone wire. He immediately cut the wire and the patrol made its way patiently through the rain and mud to a position some ten yards behind the listening post. The best shot in the patrol—a beardless youth who liked American chewing gum—drew a bead on the two dim figures in the foxhole before him. At least he thought there were two but could not be sure because of the rain and darkness. Twice he got the rifle to his shoulder and put it down when he failed to see anything through the sights.

The officer struck him angrily on the arm. Fire, you idiot!

The rain spoils my aim.

Fire anyway! So the others will fire! The officer could not move around to tell the others without taking the chance of warning the Americans.

The youth raised his rifle quickly and emptied it in the direction of the listening post.

One of his bullets discovered Sergeant John Curry’s back. Somehow Curry managed to hold his scream to a brief and bitter execration as he rolled to the bottom of the foxhole. He struggled to his knees and vomited as he fumbled at his first-aid packet with trembling fingers. But it was useless. He could do nothing more than kneel there with the rain running down his face and sob out his helplessness.

Donatti’s fingers became sticky when he touched Curry’s back to explore the wound. Curry chose that moment to vomit again, upon Donatti’s arm.

Goddam you...! Donatti hesitated. Goddam you, Johnny-boy, goddam. He wiped his arm on the edge of the foxhole and prayed that John Curry had not understood him.

The cold night air breached Donatti’s jacket and chilled his sweating body. He shivered and pulled a grenade from his pocket. At that moment Curry fell forward in the foxhole to lie full-length in his own sickness.

Donatti crawled over the parapet and slithered away from the hole on his stomach. The earth was slick; he felt its gumminess wrench at his uniform. The suction caused his progress to be agonizingly slow, but he finally reached a clump of bushes and rolled behind them.

A Schmeisser pistol kicked mud in his face as its bullets ripped the edge of the foxhole to shreds. He had been there only a moment before! At least the bastards taught me to creep and crawl and eat muck, he thought grimly. If I get out of this, I’ll erect a monument to the cadre of Camp Martin-Noye.

Judging the place from which the gunshots had come, he raised himself quickly on one arm and hurled a grenade through the air, heard the handle break off. Exhausted by this sudden effort, he waited patiently, confidently.

The young German was the first to advance. He understood nothing of American grenades and ignored the sound the handle made as it left the missile while his companions flung themselves frantically onto the ground. The grenade, still in the air, exploded directly behind him and blew his head from his shoulders, and the amputated stump that had been a man ran two yards and pitched into the foxhole with John Curry. One of the other Germans bled to death with his face pushed against the earth. He made no noise, although he was conscious during the entire process, and it was finished very quickly. The four who remained squirmed away from one another as quietly as possible and spread themselves into a wide fan behind the foxhole. There they waited for Donatti to betray himself.

The Germans were pretty good, Donatti was forced to admit. He had heard their movements as they arranged the pattern behind the foxhole, but he could not see them and did not fire aimlessly and reveal his own position. He, too, waited.

One German, more impatient than the others, rose silently and glided forward, rifle and bayonet extended before him. Donatti heard the swish of early winter’s grasses, got to his elbows and knees and crouched in the darkness as his enemy slid to a stop in the mud behind the foxhole.

Donatti lunged at him then, and the point of his bayonet sliced into the man’s throat before he was able to scream a warning to his comrades. For a moment Donatti’s bayonet stuck in the German’s neck and he could not get it free. When the man fell, he jerked it loose and threw himself into the brush again. This maneuver, however, did not escape notice. The grass rustled in front of him. The Germans were creeping upon his position! He lay still, trembling, a hunted man. His only hope was that someone in the Platoon had heard the firing and would send out a patrol. It was a slender chance. Weak now with the full force of fear and premonition of his own death, he waited. The nakedness of his body struck terror into his mind; he writhed on the earth, forced his genitals against its dampness, and with a last desperate effort focused his mind on the enemy.

The Germans had risen to their feet to move in upon him, and with terror-filled eyes he saw moonlight flashing off the edges of their bayonets.

***

The Squad was assembled outside the Third Platoon Command Post when the first faint shots from the listening post were heard through the pounding rain. The men scuffed about nervously in the mud until Lieutenant Crawford shouted, Move out! His sense of urgency passed through them like an electric current. In squad file, one behind the other, they sloshed through the mud that congealed on their boots and slopped up on their legs like slimy leeches.

Private first class Robert Joslin forged ahead of the Squad. The rain spotted his glasses so that objects looming through the darkness were indistinct. He walked quickly, his long legs eating up the ground, knowing that the Squad was the only means by which Donatti and Curry could be saved, if they were not already dead or captured. But even as he pushed himself on, the image of Betty Ciresi—small, dark and pretty—got in the way of his mission. She wore the blue angora sweater that matched her eyes and was his favorite. She had worn it the night she convinced him that he should enlist like the rest of his friends. He had wanted to wait until he was drafted, but she had opened the door and posed with her back to it and refused to let him put his hands upon her. Angry at his own weakness, he had relented and said that he would go down and enlist in the Army the next day. Then, she had given him her sweaty kisses and moaned as she pulled him onto the davenport, whispering that she was proud of him, that she would not have to make excuses for him to her girl friends. He stumbled in the dark and cursed soundlessly....Damn her! Damn her!

The line seemed to buckle momentarily, then slid muddily to a halt as Private first class Ramón Mendez fell over a tree branch.

Shoulda warned me, he mumbled petulantly at Joslin’s retreating back, and then had to scramble to catch up. Behind him he left confusion as Private Harry Madigan, an assistant Browning Automatic Rifleman, troubled by the weight of his B.A.R. bandoleers, collided with Charles Stein, but Private first class Ernst Dakota straightened them out and pushed them ahead before he, in turn, was bumped by Private Al Lewandowski, the antitank grenadier.

How’d you get up here? Dakola snarled. You oughta be at the rear end!

Aw, this whole goddam file’s snafued, Lewandowski said. No one’s in the right place.

Hey, knock it off, Private first class George Last, the Browning Automatic Rifleman, said. You want the goddam Germans to know we’re comin?

Silence fell upon the Squad.

The Browning Automatic Rifle was cold and damp in George Last’s fingers. He fondled it gratefully, pressed his fingers against the metal and felt his pulse throb. Last loved the B.A.R. In a life devoid of niceties, hinged upon the ancient premise of kill or be killed, it was everything—comfort, friendship, even love—that meant survival. Last was intolerant of those who did not properly care for their weapons. For Last, cleaning the Browning was a ritual. George Last had plans for the future—he would live.

Last was a big man without any of the big man’s suet. His face was gnarled and hard; it was a face that spoke of bellicosity and brutality and might have graced a prize fighter, a wrestler or a football player. George Last in civilian life, however, had been a floorwalker at the J. L. Hudson department store in Detroit.

The young, fresh-faced officer at the Induction Center on East Jefferson Avenue in Detroit had laughed when he learned that Last had been a floorwalker. When Last told him that he had been attending night school, studying business administration, the officer replied, We’ll make good use of that, all right, and assigned George Last to the Infantry.

A root caught Last’s foot and sent him tumbling to the ground. He scrabbled in the mud until he recovered the B.A.R. and got up shaking. He brushed awkwardly at the weapon.

Close behind him, Lieutenant Samuel Crawford waited for Last to move forward. A flare exploded overhead and the harsh, grinding light showered down while Crawford stood rooted, not daring to lift his eyes from the ground and waited for the flare to extinguish itself. It seemed that it would never burn out; it hung motionless in the sky, wafted back and forth by the wild rain winds. Finally, it sputtered and the night grew back into shape. Crawford kept his eyes fastened on the back of the big man ahead of him and fixed his mind on Ruth, his wife.

Crawford, in civilian life, had been an English professor at Western Reserve University, and his only interest in cocktail parties was the allegiance he felt he owed the faculty members who gave them. He usually slipped away after his second martini. But at one, after he had drunk his second martini, he went upstairs to retrieve his coat from a bedroom