“Really?” I had an idea. I took a fountain pen from my breast pocket and placed it on my shoulder. “Show me. Shoot the cap off this pen.”
“All right.” He aimed the rifle at the pen and blew the cap off as if it were nothing.
I took the hand grenade out of my bag and pulled the pin.
“What are you doing?!”
“Running away!” I turned my back on him and fled.
“Shit!” I heard the bearded Gabati cursing behind me. “Bloody thing doesn’t work! The bugger’s tricked me!”
As I’d expected, the rifle had jammed after the first shot.
I turned and hurled the grenade. Then I continued to run for dear life through the wood. My feet hardly touched the ground.
There was a dull explosion, and the bearded Gabati’s voice could be heard no more. As I continued to run, I couldn’t help feeling sorry for him. He wasn’t all that bad. He probably had a wife and children, too. If only he’d accepted my offer of the lunch box, he would still be alive.
As I emerged from the wood, I could see no sign of friend or foe. Abandoned vehicles and trucks, empty ammunition boxes and other remnants were scattered all over the plain as far as the eye could see. I assumed that both sides had withdrawn from the front line to have their lunch. It was a lunchtime ceasefire.
I made my way back to the foot of the hill I’d raced down that morning. There, men from the catering corps were dishing out lunch, and soldiers were grouped together around large soup pots. I’d blown up my lunch box with the hand grenade, so I had no option but to join them, however disgusting the food might be. I joined a queue of soldiers lining up for their rations.
As luck would have it, the soldier in front of me was the little man I’d met on the train.
“Hey! So you survived?” he said by way of a greeting.
“Yeah, just. I was about to be shot by a Gabati just now.” I explained the whole story to the little man.
“I had a similar experience myself, once,” he replied. “It was just after I’d signed up. I was queuing up for my lunch, just like we are now. But when I looked around me, I didn’t recognize any of the other blokes. I thought I’d gone back to my own lot, but they were actually the enemy. I was going to eat lunch with the Gabatis! When I realized that, I could hardly stand upright. I actually wet myself. Oh dear. Why did I have to tell you that?”
“What happened, anyway?”
“Well, I knew the game would be up if I ran for it. So I collected my ration as normal, then I gulped it down as fast as I could and slipped away quietly.”
After eating a tasteless lunch, we had to listen to instructions from our officers. Army officers and company presidents have that much in common – they keep wanting to make speeches.
An officer sporting a colonel’s stripes stood on a low mound and started spouting forth. “As you all know, there’s going to be some serious fighting in this area tomorrow,” he said. “But as soon as that was announced, a lot of you wanted to claim your paid leave tomorrow. Shame on you!” His face turned a shade of beetroot. “What do you think war is all about?! Have you never given a thought for your country? Bloody home-loving rabble!”
I felt rather deflated. He was no better than some ogre of an office superior, shouting at his staff for refusing to work overtime. My respect for army officers plummeted.
“No one will be allowed paid leave tomorrow. You’ll all be charging the enemy. And I hope you all die in the process. Hahahahaha!” In his raging fury, the Colonel started to look slightly deranged.
The afternoon’s fighting was about to start. I sought out the officer who was now my superior and gave him a piece of my mind.
“Platoon Leader! Why did you evacuate like that without telling me? I was surrounded by the enemy and almost got killed!”
“Oh. Awfully sorry. No need to be so angry!” He smiled and patted me on the shoulder. “To make up for it, you can work here this afternoon if you like. It’s safe. Look. There’s already a pile of faulty rifles waiting for you.”
“I’ve lost my tools.”
“I’ll order some more from HQ.”
“And you’re sure this won’t be the front line next?”
“We won’t retreat any more than this. I shouldn’t think.”
I worked all afternoon with the new tools, but only managed to repair six rifles. It looked as if I’d be commuting to the front for some time yet. The war itself had been going on for more than four months now, with no sign of ending. Both sides had refused offers of support from the superpowers, while the United Nations, faced with appeals from both sides, couldn’t decide which stance to adopt. There were more pressing matters for it to be concerned with, anyway. Safe to say that such minor conflicts between neighbouring mini-states, like family feuds, were simply ignored. Whatever the case, this conflict looked likely to continue for several months to come.
It was nearly time to go home, so I started putting my tools away. The Platoon Leader appeared again, smiling as usual. “You were late this morning, weren’t you,” he said. “So I’m going to invoke the penalty clause.”
I looked at him in dismay. “P-penalty clause?”
“You’ll be on sentry duty tonight.”
“What?! You can’t make me do that!” I rammed the screwdriver into the ground. “That’s a combatant’s job!”
He made a hand gesture as if to placate me. “Calm down. Sentry duty’s easy. All you have to do is carry on working here, then go over to check the ammo that’s hidden behind that rock once every hour. There’s not much fighting round here at night. The enemy won’t try to steal the ammo, either.”
“How do you know that?!”
“Because the Gabatis all have vitamin A deficiency. They’re all night-blind.” He nodded. “You’ll be relieved at two in the morning. You can sleep at General Staff Headquarters after that. And don’t forget – you’ll get paid time and a half for night work.”
“I’d rather go home. My wife will be worried.”
“I’ll explain it to her on the telephone. And anyway, look how few rifles you’ve repaired!” Gradually, his tone had changed to that of someone mollifying a child. He wasn’t at all like army officers in the old war films. His behaviour was quite odd, in fact, considering we were supposed to be superior and subordinate.
I decided to test him out. “And what if I refuse your order?”
“Refuse? Would you?” He kept his smile, but lowered his voice in a menacing way. “Look, I know all about you. Your company ordered you to come under our command. So you should look on me as one of your company’s directors. Do you want me to send them a performance assessment?”
“I understand,” I replied with a sigh. “I’ll stand guard.”
“Ha! No need to stand. Just sit down and get on with your work.” Suddenly his relaxed, light-hearted tone had returned. He gave me a patronizing smile. “I’ll make sure you get your dinner,” he said, then started humming to himself as he walked away.
I got up and had a stretch. The sound of gunfire was far off now, and there were few soldiers to be seen. An evening breeze wafted over the area. The slope of the hill was soon awash with the glow of sunset. Soldiers passed me in twos and threes on their way home, chatting cheerfully. Their faces bore expressions of relief that the day’s work was over. In their minds, they were already back home.
I squatted down again, and got back to work repairing the rifles. I was getting used to it now, and could carry on working even in the gathering gloom. After finishing the next rifle, I carried it with me to check the ammunition that was hidden behind a rock some three hundred yards away. The ammunition had been carefully placed in six different piles, with several boxes to each pile. Everything was in order.
Far to the east, over in the paddy field area, fighting between the night troops was already starting up. I could hear the sound of shelling, gunfire, screams, and the rest. Just as in the daytime, it seemed to be a war of minor skirmishes between combat units, a kind of guerrilla warfare in and around the forests. Exploding shells lit up the darkening sky, silhouetting the slopes of hills in the distance.
At last the sun sank below the horizon. I stopped working and stretched myself out on the side of the hill. The moon appeared in the night sky, casting light over the whole area. A breeze blew over from the direction of the
