Hanging on

townspeople were farmers and laborers; Maurice owned the only grocery and the hardware store, a third of the town's businesses which lined the single main street. Maurice was perhaps sixty years old, drank too much, bathed too little, and bragged that his eldest son was in Brittany working in the FFI-Forces Françaises de l'Intérieur-and had renamed his town Eisenhower once the Normandy invasion had acquainted him with that word.
        Slade, seeing the disbelief in their faces, said, "I know that's an unpopular notion. I know how much everyone here likes Maurice and how much everyone thinks Maurice has done for us. But you'll remember that I have never fully trusted him, and you'll admit that he has the best opportunity to report to the Germans."
        "Surely there isn't a radio in Eisenhower," Kelly said. "And he would need one to make reports…"
        "Perhaps it was dropped to them by a German night plane," Slade said. He always had an answer, which was another reason why everyone hated him.
        Kelly wiped the soot off his face, looked at the blackened palm of his hand, wiped his hand on the seat of his pants, and jumped when his fingers slid over his own bare ass. Embarrassed, he said, "I can't picture that." He wondered if there were long black finger marks on his behind.
        Slade wasn't done. "Why is it that the Stukas have never given our position to any element of the German army? Why haven't they sent ground troops after us, to wipe us out? Why is it that the Stukas bomb the bridge but not our positions? The machines, all our supplies, stand unharmed so we can rebuild the bridge again. Could it be the Krauts are playing some sort of game with us?"
        "What would their purpose be?" Kelly asked.
        Slade frowned. "I haven't worked that out yet, but I will." He looked at his watch, snapped his head up so suddenly he'd have lost his toupee, if he were wearing one, and turned back toward HQ. "General Blade will be coming through in less than four minutes." He trotted away.
        Beame, who wasn't given to swearing that much, said, "That fucking little creep gives me the fucking horrors."
        "Let's go talk to the general," Major Kelly said.

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    4
        
        The big wireless transmitter was a malevolent, hulking monster that always intimidated Major Kelly. It hummed like a swarm of bees, singing some monotonous and evil melody that echoed ghostily behind every voice that came and went over its open channel. Perhaps, if he spoke to someone other than General Blade on the set, it would not seem so monstrous. If he could talk to Betty Grable or Veronica Lake or to his mom, it might seem, instead, like a big old shaggy dog of a radio. But there was only General Blade.
        Once they had exchanged call signs, General Blade said, "Blade calling Slade for Kelly." Then he laughed. Finished laughing, he said, "Slade? Blade. This is the Blade and Slade Show, and our first performer today is Major Walter Kelly."
        "I can't take it again," Lieutenant Beame said, bolting for the door. It slammed noisily behind him.
        "General Blade calling, sir," Lieutenant Slade said. He looked quite serious. He never seemed to see anything odd in the General's insane patter.
        Maybe Slade had syph too. Maybe he was already rotten in the center of his brain, crumbling and almost dead.
        Kelly sat down in the single metal chair that decorated the radio room, looked around at the rough board walls, the dust, the spider webs, the board floor. The chair was cold against his bare behind, but it wasn't the sole cause of the shivers that coursed through him. He lifted the table mike and said, "They bombed the bridge again, General."
        "They bombed what?" General Blade asked.
        In a number of ways, Kelly thought, Blade and Slade were similar. The lieutenant was always telling you what you already knew, while Blade was always asking you to repeat what he had already heard. Perhaps Lieutenant Slade was the bastard son of General Blade; perhaps both of them had contracted VD from the same woman: Blade's mistress and Slade's mother.
        "They bombed the bridge, sir," Kelly repeated.
        "How?" Blade asked.
        "With three airplanes and several bombs," Major Kelly said.
        "Three airplanes, Kelly?"
        Kelly said, "They appeared to be airplanes, sir, yes. They had wings and flew. I'm pretty certain they were airplanes,