Tilting the Balance

He said, “General Chill is willing to have his Wehrmacht lads do some of the digging, but feels the rest should fall on the shoulders of what he terms the ‘otherwise useless population. ’ Typical German tact there, what? ”

“I am certain his Soviet colleagues received that in the spirit in which it was intended, ” Embry said.

“No doubt, ” Bagnall said dryly. “They were also particularly pleased with his proposal that Russian soldiers and partisans be those particularly concerned with stopping the Lizards’ tanks once they traverse said ditches. ”

“I can see that they would be. How generous of the distinguished German officer to offer his Soviet allies the opportunity to commit suicide under such distinguished circumstances. ”

“If you stick that tongue any farther into your cheek, you’re liable to bite it off, ” Bagnall said. As long as he’d known Embry, he and the pilot had dueled to see which of them could wield the twin scalpels of irony and understatement more effectively. He feared Embry had just taken the lead on points.

The pilot asked, “And why has General Chill been http://storenonfiction.ru so extraordinarily gracious? ”

“His justification is that the Nazis, with their heavier weapons, would be better used as a reserve to meet any possible Lizard breakthroughs. ”

“Oh, ” Embry said in a slightly different tone.

“Just what I thought, ” Bagnall answered. The rationale made just enough military sense to force one to wonder whether Chill’s plan shouldn’t be carried out as proposed. The flight engineer added, “Germans are bloody good at coming up with plausible reasons for things that are to their advantage. ”

“To their short-term advantage, ” Embry amended. “Setting the Russians up to be massacred will not endear Chill to them. ”

Bagnall snorted. “Somehow I doubt that will cause him to lose any great quantity of sleep. He wants to keep his own forces intact first. ”

“He also wants to hold Pskov, ” Embry said. “He won’t do that without the Russians’ help-nor will they, without his. A lovely muddle, wouldn’t you say? ”

“If you want my opinion, it would be even lovelier if viewed from a distance-say from a London pub-than when we’re caught in the middle of it. ”

“Something to that, ” Embry sighed. “Real springtime leaves… flowers… birds… a pint pot of best bitter… perhaps even Scotch. ”

The pain of longing pierced Bagnall like a stiletto. He feared he’d never see England or its loveliness again. As for Scotch… well, the spirit the Russians brewed from potatoes would warm a man, or send him to sleep if he drank enough of it, but it didn’t taste like anything. He’d also heard that drinking neutral spirits kept you from feeling the effects the next morning. He shook his head. He’d shot that theory right behind the ear more often than he cared to remember.

Embry said, “Speaking of getting stuck in the middle, is there more talk of turning us into infantrymen again? ”

Bagnall didn’t blame him for sounding anxious; their one foray against the Lizard outpost south of Pskov had been plenty to put the flight engineer off the life of a foot soldier forever. The choice, unfortunately, did not rest with him. He said, “They didn’t say anything about that when I was in the Krom. But then, they might not have wanted to, either. ”

“For fear we’d bugger off, you mean? ” Embry said. Bagnall nodded. The pilot went on, “Nothing I’d like better. Only-where would we go? ”

It was a good question. The short answer, unfortunately for both of them, was nowhere, not with the woods full of partisan bands, German patrols, and just plain bandits. Next to some of them, the prospect of facing the Lizards seemed less disastrous. The Lizards wouldn’t do anything worse than killing you. Bagnall said, “You don’t really believe those stories about the cannibals in the forest, do you? ”

“Let’s just say it’s something I’d sooner not find out by experiment. ”

“Too right there. ”

Before Bagnall could go on, someone knocked at the door. The plaintive voice that came through the thick boards was London-accented: “Can you let me in? I’m fair frozen. ”

“Radarman Jones! ” Bagnall threw the door wide. Jerome Jones came in. Bagnall quickly shut the door after him, and waved him over to the samovar. “Drink some of that. It’s fairly good. ”

“Where’s the beautiful Tatiana? ” Ken Embry asked Jones as he poured himself a glass of herb tea. Embry sounded jealous. Bagnall didn’t blame him. Somehow Jones had managed to connect with a Russian sniper who was even more decorative than she was deadly.

“She’s off trying to kill things, I suppose, ” the radarman answered. He sipped the tea, made a face. “Maybe not bad, but it could be better. ”

“Being all alone, then, you deigned to honor us with a visit, eh? ” Bagnall said.

“Oh, bloody hell, ” Jones muttered, then hastily added, “sir. ” His position in Pskov was, to put it mildly, irregular. While Bagnall and Embry were both officers and he very much from the other ranks, he had the specialization in which the Russians-and the Nazis-were interested.

Ken Embry said, “It’s all right, Jones. We know they treat you like a field marshal everywhere else in town. Decent of you to remember your military manners around low cannon-fodder types like ourselves. ”

The radarman winced. Even Bagnall, used to such sarcastic sallies, had trouble being sure how much was intended as wit and how much fired with intent to wound. A spell as an infantryman in an attack that got crushed was enough to jaundice anyone’s outlook.

Giving the pilot the benefit of the doubt, Bagnall said, “Don’t let him faze you, Jones. Our mission was to get you here, and that we’ve done. What came afterwards, the Lanc getting bombed-well, nichevo. ”

“There’s a useful word, eh, sir? ” Jones said, anxious to change the subject. “Can’t be helped, nothing to be done about it-that the Russians pack it all into one word says a lot about them, I think. ”