Hanging on

stop."
        "Untrue! I've cut back. I've only had one bottle so far today."
        "Jesus, Emil, it's only an hour since dawn. You call that 'cutting back,' do you?"
        "You're going to destroy me," Hagendorf said. His round shoulders slumped more than usual, and he appeared to age before Kelly's eyes.
        "Nonsense," Kelly said. "Now, move! Let's get down to the machinery shed. Your men are waiting. We've dusted off your theodolite and other tools. Hurry, Hagendorf! Six days will be gone before you know it."
        "My theodolite," Hagendorf said, dreamily. His mind spiraled back to more pleasant times when the world could be measured and known. Abruptly, he dropped his wine bottle and started to cry. "You really are destroying me, sir. I warn you! I warn you!"
        Fifteen minutes later, as Kelly stood by the shed watching Hagendorf stagger away with his assistants, Private Vito Angelli-the Angel from Los Angeles as Pullit had begun to call him-came along with his French work crew. They all jabbered at once, laughed, and gesticulated furiously, as if they were on stage and required to exaggerate each gesture to communicate with the people in the back rows. Angelli stopped them at an enormous bomb crater north of the machinery shed.
        Kelly hurried over and clapped Angelli on the shoulder. "Going okay?"
        Angelli was thin, dark, all stringy muscles, intense eyes, and white teeth. "We've filled in all the other craters below the bridge road."
        Angelli could not speak French, and none of the workers could speak Italian or English. Therefore, Angelli used a lot of gestures and smiled a great deal, and said, "Eh? Eh?" When dealing with his relatives who had come to the States from the old country and who often spoke a different dialect of Italian than he did, he had learned the best way to be understood was to punctuate everything with numerous ehs. It never failed. No matter what you said, if you framed it with a couple of ehs you could topple any language barrier.
        Angelli turned to the workers, clapped his hands. "One more hole to fill, eh? Eh? Quick job, eh? But big job gets done pňco a pňco, eh?"
        The Frenchmen laughed and went to work. They all had shovels, and they energetically attacked the ring of blast-thrown soil, scooping it back into the crater from which it had come.
        "Faster!" Kelly said. They seemed to be working in slow motion. "Angelli, tell them to shovel faster. We've got only six days!"
        "But they are shoveling fast," Angelli said.
        "Faster, faster, faster!" Kelly demanded. When Angelli gave the order and the Frenchmen complied, the major said, "You've got excellent rapport here. If all the men could work with the French as well as you do, we might come close to building the town before the Germans get here."
        Angelli grinned. "Then you think we'll do it, sir?"
        "Never," Kelly said. "I said we'd come closer to doing it if we had your rapport with these people."
        "Do not be so negative, bon ami." Maurice appeared out of nowhere at Kelly's elbow. "The work goes well. You will have a new bridge tonight, with my people helping. Your chief surveyor has begun to mark off the streets and lots. My wonderful people have cleared away random brush and have filled in the bomb craters. We've come so far in so few hours!"
        Kelly looked at the bundle of papers Maurice was carrying. Ignoring The Frog's optimism, he said, "Those the forms?"
        "Ready for signatures," Maurice said, handing them over.
        Reluctantly, Kelly took them. "The men won't like this."
        "Oh, but they will!" Maurice said. "They are sure to see what a real bargain I am giving them. Americans love bargains."
        Private Angelli looked warily at the forms. "Why won't we like those? What are they?"
        "Credit contracts," Maurice said. "Nothing sinister."
        Angelli was perplexed. "Credit contracts?" he asked, squinting at the bundle.
        "One for each man in the unit," Maurice said. He thumped the middle of his checkered shirt. "Made out by hand, written by me or members of my immediate family, very official."
        "Credit contracts?" Angelli repeated.
        "Let me explain," Kelly said, wearily.

----

    3
        
        Sergeant Coombs was operating the small cargo shuttler when Major Kelly found him. He had been trundling the more compact construction materials from the storage