Casca 11: The Legionnaire (11 page)

Langer lay face down on the trail, his body crumpled and his mouth open on the damp earth. A centipede, searching for lesser organisms to eat, made a brief and unproductive journey into the open mouth. Crawling over the teeth, the yellow green arthropod sampled the bloody tongue with its antennae. It didn't like what it found there and wriggled its multitude of tiny feet back over the gums and lips to search for a more conventional meal. Two hours after the Viets had left, three villagers from a Montagnard hamlet of the Mnong tribe came upon the body. Even though the bloody tunic and trousers were great prizes, they left them alone and walked around the corpse on thick calloused soles, wrapping their thin homemade black and red striped cotton blankets a little tighter around their dark shoulders. The elder of the natives made a three fingered sign to ward off evil and whispered a prayer to the
Thanh Tien
of the mountains. Once past the body, he spat out a clot of red phlegm between black betel nut stained teeth. This was none of their business. All they needed to know or wanted lay within the confines of their small village. They didn't understand the reason why the Viets were fighting the French and they didn't care. All they knew was that no matter what happened, they would not be the ones to rule themselves.

The sky darkened. Winds began to increase in strength, shifting the branches of the trees, flapping the heavy green fronds of palms and banana trees like limp, waving arms.

Where the earth had dried, dust clouds rose to twist and dance a brief moment before the first fat drops of rain came to beat them down. Over the Red River delta, the winds rode with the moisture laden clouds. Coming in from the sea, the winds and rain swept over Nam Dinh, then turned inland up the Black River past Hoa Binh and Moc Chau to the valley where the rust colored waters of the Ma flowed south to the Gulf of Tonkin. It was near there that the skies again burst open on the mountains, the heavy rains running in brown frothing torrents, seeking the lower regions. Streams overflowed their beds and swamps became lakes for a time. On the trail where Langer lay, wind and rain whipped at his body. Red water from the clay in the soil covered the blood that his body and mouth had given up.

The rains passed, and with their passing came the dark. In the Mnong village the wisemen made magic and a precious young male water buffalo was sacrificed. They knew something was taking place in their mountains that was not good. Before, when troubles came, the high places and valleys had been their refuge. Now, the despised little men of the lowlands were there and the Mnong were no longer welcome in their own mountains. The body of the
Dum Brun
on the trail near their village was just another sign of the evil that was coming.

Large fires were built in the center of the village. The wisemen stood beside them and faced the four corners of sky and earth, tossing rice powder into the winds in the hope that the spirits of the elements would hear and honor their prayers. In two circles, the young men and women of the village danced. The men in loincloths on the outside circle moved in the opposite direction of their bare breasted women. Hands joined, they moved. With slow shuffling steps sideways, they began the ritual. One, two, stop! They raised their hands to the sky, lowered them to their sides and then repeated the action, always in the same direction, to the rhythm of brass tongs and skin covered drums. All that night they danced as signs were read and the future seen in the burned and scraped shoulder blade of the dead water buffalo. The wisemen covered their faces. There was nothing good
to be read in the future. Only death and fire were to be seen in the charred scapula, death and pain for tens of thousands and they, the children of the mountains, were also to suffer. The old women of the village began to wail and grieve when they heard the future. They cried and tore at their faces with strong black nails, ripping their own flesh open. Instinct scared off a wandering leopard who had come to steal a dog from the village. It too, in its animal heart, knew that this was not a night to kill. The keening of the Mnong women sent it back to its lair to lie and watch the night with golden eyes, but it would not hunt. There were others in the hills far more dangerous than he.

Twice, pigs came to sniff at the body on the trail, but they didn't eat it. There was something about the flesh that made them snort, stick their tails straight in the air and trot away with stiff legs. This was not for them and they knew it.

With the dawn, the villagers collapsed in exhaustion from their devotions. They had done the best they could; now it was up to the gods. The fires had burned low and tendrils of smoke rose, floating on the gentle, morning breeze as they touched, then left, the still body of Langer.

In the dark that was his mind and soul, a pinpoint of light flickered once, then again. A delicate tremor ran along the mesentery of his abdominal cavity. The bleeding inside had stopped long before and, while in his death sleep, the cursed body was taking steps to heal itself. Blood filled lungs moved of their own volition. The tiny, hairlike cilia worked in waves, removing the blood drop by drop, shoving it up to the throat where the larynx spasmed, forcing the mouth open to throw out the black clots. The spark in his mind grew larger, thoughts beginning to flow together in a stream. Thousands of faces merged, swam, and dissolved. The curse that had been with him had not gone away. But it had been so long since he had felt its pull that he had nearly begun to doubt his own reality. The curse put on him had been given to him those long centuries ago at the mount of Golgotha, where the sad face of Jesus had looked down at him from the cross, then turned angry as the bloody spear in the hand of the Roman Legionnaire was pulled from his body. Jesus had looked down on the frightened face of the Roman soldier and told him in words that rivaled the storm and winds of that day:

"Soldier, you are content with what you are. Then that you shall remain, until we meet again!"

He, Casca Rufio Longinus, was condemned to live, to walk the earth until the second coming. Time and again over the centuries he had tried to die, and should have, but each time it had been denied him, as it was being denied him now. He was not an unusual man. He felt and loved and hurt as did everyone else. He knew cold and hunger, all the things that mortal men knew except for death. He was condemned to be no more than what he had been at that moment in Judea
, a soldier. His destiny, to fight endless battles until the second coming of Jesus when he would at last be granted peace. The sweet peace of sleep from which he would never again have to wake.

His heart pounded once, twice, three times, then picked up its beat. Blood began to move through stiff veins and arteries. The lungs spasmed once more, sucking in air to feed the flood. The soldier of time blinked. Tears moistened his eyes and he saw light and cried for his lost death.

There was still pain from his wounds and if he had not been hit by the fast copper jacketed bullets from an M-1 carbine, there would have probably been a great deal more damage done to him. He had no choice but to go on. He was what he was, no more. Stiff and sore, he rose from the trail, checked the set of the morning sun and moved off on stiff awkward legs. It took several hours before all of his parts were functioning properly again, and he was hungry. Near a stream he found another trail and took it, keeping to a well-used track. He was pleased that it had begun to turn to the southwest, a direction that was sure to take him to regions controlled by the French, if he didn't stumble into a Viet ambush or patrol. Twice that day he saw Gruman f8f-1B fighter bombers go overhead, flying in the direction of Laos. Stopping only when the rains came in the afternoon, he found a poor semblance of a shelter between the roots of a tree and used a palm frond for an umbrella to keep the worst of the storm's pounding off his head and face. A four foot grass snake, washed out of its hole by the rains, slithered wetly by his foot and was kind enough to provide him with his supper. The flesh was tough and bland tasting, something like raw fish, but it did fill up the vacuum that had been gnawing at him all day.

For the next four days he played a game of hide and go seek with wandering patrols of Viet Minh. The villages he'd passed on the first two days were all Montagnard. On the third day he began to come across some that were inhabited by Vietnamese, a sure sign that he was getting close to civilization. The temptation to go into some of the villages he passed was not too difficult to avoid. He knew that if the village itself was not an active supporter of the Viet Minh, there would certainly be at least a few part time guerrillas living there. He did manage to steal a couple of chickens from one of them. These combined with what he was able to hunt on the trail lizards, bird's eggs, and even ants took up the worst of the slack in his food needs. Just after dawn on the fifth day since his ambush of the Viet Minh patrol, he broke out of the true brush onto a plain, dotted with patches of trees and crisscrossed with fields. Across them lay a good sized city, not one of the tiny hamlets of the highlands. He didn't know what the name of the town was, but anything this size would have to have a government garrison. Still, just to make sure, he moved to about three kilometers from the first of the buildings to where he could keep an eye on what traffic was moving in or out of the city. Not long after that he saw three armored cars move out on the road and head away from him to the southwest. On their sides was the insignia of the 1st REC. He was back on safe ground.

Suddenly the front of the lead car exploded, bursting one of the solid rubber tires and blowing the other completely off the rim. The engine on fire, it swerved off the road to careen into an irrigation ditch that fed the rice paddies. Langer dropped back down lower on his side of the road. As the crew of the car tried to escape their burning vehicle they were cut down by a burst of fire from a DPM light machine gun hidden in a grove of trees. The gunner operating the Degtyarev knew his business. Firing short, controlled bursts, he picked off the five men from the car with ease.

The other two cars screeched to a halt, the gunners on each sprayed the rice paddies to either side, searching for the hidden gunner who was now getting some support from a 60mm mortar. The drivers of the cars were wise enough not to pursue the situation any further. They were sitting ducks and, not knowing what they were up against, the best course would be to let wisdom rule over valor and get the hell back to town. Gears crashing, the drivers backed up. The light machine guns over the cabs were doing their best to burn their barrels up. Langer figured that he might as well get a ride into town as long as they were going that way. Rising from his side of the paddies, he ran for the armored cars. A burst from a .30 caliber weapon nearly took a leg off as he yelled at them, waving his arms above his head.

"
Je suis un Legionnaire. Cessez de tirer
." The cry of, "I am a Legionnaire. Stop firing!" was obeyed. They slowed down a bit as he ran toward them. Surprised faces reached out hands and hung on to him as the car ground up to peak speed, still traveling backward. For a moment, afraid his dangling legs were going to get caught in the half-track's treads, he wished he had stayed on the ground and taken his chances with the Viets. The drivers of the two cars drove in reverse as fire from the DPM light machine gun peppered the steel sides and front. On all sides, mortar shells bracketed them until they were out of range. Then, and only then did they turn cars around for the rest of the short return trip. When they slowed up, Langer was hauled over the side into the rear of the car, scraping his nose on the steel floor and nearly losing an eye on the corner of a box of machine gun ammunition Turning over on his back he looked up at the lean faces of the Legionnaires manning the machine gun: "
Je suis heureux de vous voir
."

A gruff voice responded with a German accent, "It's nice that you are glad to see us kamarade. But what the
scheiss were you doing out there, and who do you belong to?"

Holding on to the ammo case as the heavy car made a sharp turn, he called out over the roar of the motor, "The 2nd BEP. Just escaped."

Langer put off the rest of the questions until he caught his breath. The two armored cars rumbled back into town, passing a pair of sandbagged bunkers on either side of the road. He hadn't been able to see them because of a rise in front of the town. If he had, he would have just gone straight on in, saving himself this last bit of aggravation. Sometimes he wondered if he was really cut out for this kind of work.

Gus waddled through the myriad of tin roofed houses and shacks, down streets, into alleyways, ignoring the smell of fish and charcoal cooking fires that blended with the odors of excrement rising from the drainage ditches along the streets and oozing from the alleys where the less fortunate lived. All in all, it had not been a bad day. His pockets were full of good francs and his mouth was ready for a thick
chateaubriand
, even if it was cut from the hide of a water buffalo. Best of all, his plan to drive Hermann mad was progressing nicely. Now that he had an ally in his plottings, it was much easier to make himself scarce when the actual events took place, removing him from any blame for the former Sergent chef's increasingly nervous condition. Ciardello had a mind as devious as his face was pretty. Between the two of them they had Hermann at their mercy, especially since Dominic had made a point of bad mouthing Gus. He even picked a fight with the human ape just to convince Hermann that he was to be trusted. Of course, Gus didn't really hurt him. Having once lived with a professional lady wrestler in Dresden, he had learned many of her tricks, it looked good, but there was actually no more harm done than a bloody nose on each and a lot of grunts.

They were always at least one step ahead of Hermann. Every move that Hermann made for revenge was quickly countered, and as with all acts of terrorism, ruthlessly retaliated against. Gus stalked his every movement with the determination of a religious fanatic trying to bring a stray soul back into the fold. Through the good efforts of his handsome Italian compatriot, he had just collected his rewards on another coup. Gus had wangled an invitation to sit in on a card game where Hermann would be present. Hermann liked to gamble and was an inveterate cheat. He simply could not refuse the temptation to mark cards or slip in a set of loaded dice, even when playing with his own comrades. But he wasn't a good enough mechanic to deal seconds or even bottoms. The best he could do was use trick cards and dice, which he ordered from an American novelty supply house in Kansas City, Missouri. To this effect, there had been a big game taking place at a Chinese sing song house, known as the Café of the Summer Moon, where members of the French forces went to relax in relative security. The owners paid protection money to the Viet Minh, guaranteeing that their customers, though they were the enemy, would not be bothered coming or going from the house. This worked to everyone's advantage and Gus thought the arrangement admirable and quite logical. The Viet Minh needed money, the Chinese needed customers and the French needed somewhere to go where they wouldn't be caught while they had a hard on.

It was just before Hermann left the barracks to make his regular Saturday stop for a blackjack game at the sing song house that the marked cards, which he kept in his locker, were switched by Dominic Ciardello. They were replaced with ones belonging to Gus. This time, when Hermann cold decked the game, he would be in for quite a surprise; and there would be nothing he could do about it. Gus would be the only one who could read the "paper" Hermann brought in with him. And Gus knew that darling Hermann would wait until the pot was right and he was holding a good hand. Then he would switch decks for the draw, knowing he would be able to read what everyone else had. At least he thought he would be able to.

Gus stepped over the carcass of a dead cat, chuckling with fiendish pleasure, recalling the events of the last few minutes. He'd experienced boyish delight when Hermann at last switched decks for the big pot. The betting had been heavy. Participating in the game were two hardened sergents from the 2nd BEP, one from the 13th DBE, and a caporal from one of the Moroccan companies. The
expression on Hermann's face had been beautiful to behold. As he reached out to rake in the pot, it changed from smug to confused when Gus had stopped him by laying his own cards down, beating Hermann's hand. In shock, Hermann had blurted out: "You son of a bitch, those aren't the cards I dealt you!" Thus letting everyone at the table know he was a cheat. While the others were venting their righteous rage on Hermann, Gus, as was his norm, took the better course to valor and left before they figured out that he too would have had to have been cheating. In order not to have the others gunning for him, he'd tossed a goodly sum of francs on the floor for them to divide among themselves. It was not as much as they had lost, but he could always claim ignorance. That had never been very hard for him to do. He estimated, knowing the temperament of those he had left behind, that Hermann would not be in the hospital any more than five or six weeks. When last seen, he was giving a good account of himself. His back against the wall, fighting off his attackers with the leg of a teak table, Hermann cried out for Gus's help. Gus refused his invitation. He had more pressing matters to attend to, such as dividing up the money with Dominic, then figuring out how to get the Italian to spend his half on the forthcoming party he had in mind.

Hermann's bulldog face was red with sweat, blood, and hate as he took the table leg and pounded on the
thick skull of a Polish parachutist from the 1st BEP. At the same time the Moroccan attempted to disembowel him with a bayonet. Kicking the Arab between the legs with one booted foot, he used the body of the Pole as a shield to break through the angry faces around him. A broken bottle took off the lower lobe of his right ear. Blood ran down the side of his face. Blocking the heavy fist of a sargent from the 13th, he threw the Pole's unconscious body at them and broke loose, scrambling over tables and chairs in his haste to make an exit. Stumbling out the front door, a bottle of vodka followed his progress, bouncing with an audible thonk off the thick bone of his skull. The others in the game were now fighting among themselves for the money Gus had thrown on the floor. They could always get the conniving Hermann later but none of them wanted to leave the money behind, knowing it would be gone when they returned.

Hermann swore vengeance as he took to the alleys. Ignoring the startled looks of peasants and workers, he plowed through them like the ramming prow of a Roman galley, his uniform torn and bloody, his ear ripped half off and a definite swelling growing on the back of his head.

Hermann was in a royal piss. He didn't know how this had happened, but he knew who had made it happen, and was determined to have his pound of flesh. No! Considering the size of Gustaf, he'd have his ton of flesh one way or the other.

Straightening out his uniform and adjusting the tilt of his kepi so it was at the proper rakish angle to fit his mood, Gus made for the entrance to the Chat Blanc Bistro, where he was to rendezvous with Dominic. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the dim light of the bistro's interior. He was greeted with some trepidation by a petite Vietnamese hostess doing her best to look like a girl from the streets of Paris. She would have done much better had she stayed with the softer, flowing silk and cotton
ao dai
of her native land. Gus handed her his kepi, fighting off the temptation to pat the firm, tight buttocks of the tiny girl. He was in a hurry to let Dominic know the results of their latest ploy. The other clients kept a watchful eye on the big German as he went by, several of them cringing at the remembrance of past encounters. Two left the bar altogether. Dominic saw Gus coming toward him, passing the bar and ignoring the invitations of the day shift bar girls sitting on a row of stools. With some reluctance, Dominic shooed off the three girls sitting with him and on him. He was one of the very few men Gus knew who had the working girls buying drinks for him. If Dominic had been a whore, in six months he could have retired for life, living in total luxury in Cannes.

The girls were upset, wondering what the semi human looking beast could be telling Dominic that was more interesting than them. From the farthest end of the bar, ears perked up. The girls had developed the ability to hear the crinkling of money at an incredible distance. In a flash, several of them changed their minds about Gus. The money he was laying out in piles on the table could have made a Malayan saltwater crocodile appealing. Wine and cognac of good vintage was ordered for all. One thing they knew from experience about Gus, when he had money he spent it. Dominic was laughing so hard he didn't notice Gus paid for the wine from his pile.

Hermann knew he couldn't report back to camp in his present condition. He took the time to stop and have a Vietnamese doctor treat the worst of his injuries. While his cuts and bruises were being tended to, he had the doctor's nurse take his uniform out for a quick laundering to get the blood out of it. As he waited, he fairly seethed with hatred for the subhuman who had caused him so much grief. The only pleasure he'd had in months was when the monster's friend, that other troublemaker Langer, had been captured. He hoped Langer's death had not been too quick. Swine like him should suffer as long as possible.

Gus was in rare form, swilling wine and roaring out ballads from the eastern front. Dominic had passed out and two bar girls were attempting to drag him off, each with a booted foot in their hands, arguing over who was to have him. As Gus broke into the lyrics of one of the old songs, “lch hat ta einen kameraden," a plaintive ballad about a dead friend, he suddenly broke into tears. His mood changed from elation to sorrow in one heartbeat. He thought of Carl
, sweet, understanding Carl Langer, and he blamed himself for his friend's capture. Groans of grief burst from his hairy barrel chest, startling the girls into dropping Ciardello's feet. Filled with remorse, Gus opened his throat and drained a full liter of Pinot Noir. The sight of the beat up, hulking Legionnaire in such a state touched the hearts of the girls so greatly that when he at last passed out they let him keep half his money.

When he woke up the next morning, there were three others in bed with him; Dominic and two of the bar girls. It took some time for him to determine which were his own legs, since he had no feeling in his lower limbs. Groaning, he knew that the years were catching up to him. In the past, a small party like the previous night would have left him with no more than a minor thirst. Rolling out of the bed, he knocked one of the girls on the floor. Gently, he picked up the small, delicate body and laid it on Dominic's chest then stumbled down the hall to the bathroom. It was time to head back. There was a war waiting and life had to go on.

His morning ablutions were interrupted by Dominic's pounding on the bathroom door. “Can't you wait till a man empties his bladder, you lousy wop?" Dominic was used to Gus's bad temper in the morning. Besides he was too sick to take issue with him.

"Langer is on his way back. He's free!" Dominic blurted.

Gus burst out of the bathroom, trousers half on. He pointed a hairy finger at Dominic's wine ravaged face. "Don't shit me. I'm in no mood for it! "

Dominic held his head between his fingers trying to block out the worst of the bellowing.

"It's the truth. Stefan, from the Headquarters communications center just woke me up. Langer escaped and made it to Na Sam where he was picked up yesterday. He'll be coming in with a convoy in a couple of hours. "

Gus broke down and cried like a baby, tears welling up around his beady eyes and running down his stubble
-covered face. It took Dominic and the two girls to get him cleaned up and dressed. Being Italian, Dominic understood the feelings Gus had for Langer. They were like family, and no one could sever that bond. Once they had Gus outside, he waved down a cyclo cab for the ride back to camp. Gus gained control over his emotions before they got off the three wheeled bicycle taxi and passed the main gate under the distrustful and suspicious eyes of two military gendarmes, who'd been given plenty of reasons for not being very fond of the Legion parachutists.

Hermann blasphemed every god of every land for this unreasonable curse which had been laid upon his shoulders. Now that Langer was coming back he knew he'd never have any peace. Gus was bad enough, but Langer was smart and much tougher to deal with. He had planned on killing Gus the next time they went on patrol, but now if he did he knew that Langer would get him. There was no justice in the world. He took out some of his rage by literally kicking out of his quarters the ten year old Tonkinese houseboy who served him. The child said nothing, nor did he cry. He had seen too much in his years to let a mere kick bother him. To get even, he made it a point to pour sugar into the gas tanks of at least three trucks that day.