Hanging on

take one of my forms," he said, giving The Snot his credit contract.
        Slade looked at it with as much suspicion as Kelly had shown while studying the questionnaire. "What is this?"
        "A credit contract," Kelly said. Using the stature of his rank, the weight of his command, the force of his personality, and the mesmeric quality of his gaze, he tried to make Lieutenant Slade sign the paper and pass over the fifty dollars in scrip.
        "I won't sign this paper," Slade said, when Kelly was done. "And I am not going to give you or Maurice fifty dollars in scrip." He did not seem to be particularly angry. Indeed, he was grinning at the major. "This is craziness, you know. Opting for this cowardly plan in the first place-then asking your men to hock their reputations to pay for it. This is more than I ever hoped for. You have gone way too far this time."
        "Minute by minute, the eventual arrival of the Panzers becomes more of a reality, a nearer threat," Major Kelly said. He was beginning the argument which, in his own mind, was the most forceful one in favor of hocking their reputations and anything else on which Maurice wanted to take a lien. "If we tried to fight off a force as large as this Germany convoy-"
        "Are you ordering me to sign this?" Slade interrupted, rattling the credit contract in Kelly's face.
        The major considered it for a moment. He had successfully pulled that stunt with Coombs. However, though they were much alike on the surface, Coombs and Slade were utterly different underneath. What worked on one might only bring a stiffer resistance from the other. "I can't order you to do anything like that," Kelly said.
        "Damn right," Slade said. He dropped his credit contract, turned away from them, and hurried over to the men by the rec room door.
        "You're in for trouble now," Beame said.
        Kelly watched as Slade conferred with the men standing in the shadows. He was gesturing with one hand, clutching his questionnaires against his chest with the other. He kept pointing at Kelly.
        "Sowing dissension," Beame said.
        Most of the men laughed at Slade and walked away from him. But a few, a sizable minority, remained and listened. They might have thought that Slade was an ass, but they nonetheless shared his philosophy. The seed of rebellion was dormant in them, but susceptible to water and gentle cultivation.
        "He's telling them not to sign your paper," Beame said.
        "They have to sign."
        "I thought you couldn't make it an order?"
        "I can't," Kelly admitted. "But if too many of them refuse and we can't get up the money that Maurice wants, the whole deal will fall through. The people from Eisenhower won't help us. We won't be able to build the town by ourselves. We won't be able to hide from the Germans. We'll all die." . In the next hour, fifteen men refused to sign credit contracts.

----

    4
        
        In the flickering campfire light under the copse of pines by the river, Nathalie was even more beautiful than she had been the first time Beame saw her. Her black hair, like that of an Egyptian princess, blended with the night. Her face was a mixture of sensuous shadows and warm brown tones where the firelight caught it. Images of flame flashed in her eyes. She smiled enigmatically as a sphinx as they sat side-by-side on the ground and watched their dinner cook.
        She was near enough to touch, but he did not touch her. Sitting with her legs drawn up beneath her, leaning against the trunk of a pine, wearing a simple sleeveless white dress that was cinched at the waist by a red ribbon, she looked too fragile to survive the lightest embrace.
        Beame leaned forward and looked into the pan suspended above the fire. "Done," he said. "I hope it's good." He put a thick slice of dark bread in the center of each mess tin, ladled the main course over the bread. Steam rose from it.
        "What is this called?" Nathalie asked.
        He handed her a mess tin. "Shit on a shingle," he said, without thinking.
        "Pardonnez-moi?"
        "I mean… that's what it's called in the mess hall," Beame said. "Uh… out here it's creamed dried beef."
        "Ah," she said, cutting into the soggy bread with her fork. She tasted one morsel. "Mmmmm."
        "You like it?"
        "It is very good."
        He looked at his own serving, tasted it, found it was good. "That's funny. I must have