Читать книгу Allied Zombies for Peace - Craig Nybo - Страница 10

Chapter 3

Khaki clad World War I veterans stood like tombstones at the head of the parade route. Their gray and white hair flicked in the November breeze. Their brown, woolen coats gave the impression of a barren field of men. They wore either steel, sweeping helmets or wide-brimmed campaign style hats, accented with golden citation chords. Some donned canvas gators around their calves. Others had tucked their breeches into polished leather boots. Many of the men held unloaded, vintage weapons—the standard issue American military Winchester model 1917 bolt action rifle, the Colt .45 automatic, snapped neatly into leather side-arm holsters.

The Right Patterson Air force Base museum had recently refurbished an antique 1918 Mark VIII tank—a gigantic, tracked vehicle complete with its two original 6-pounder Hotchkiss .57 millimeter canons, mounted on two bulky sponsons on either side of its bulk. The museum proprietor had also acquired five additional Browning M1917 machine guns and mounted them in their original fashion on the front and sides of the mammoth. Though the tracked behemoth could only move at a scraping five miles an hour, it was a tremendous curiosity to military history buffs and laymen alike.

“Weren’t these only used by the 67th infantry?” Chester Harker—most people knew him as Flash—said. He and Henry Pearlman looked at the tank, both men in wonder.

“Those boys were son’s of bitches,” Henry said.

“Saved our asses at Cambrai.”

Henry drew a crisp breath and let it out. A cloud of cold condensation plumed from his almost bloodless, seventy-two year old lips. ”I miss my boys.” Henry’s charcoal eyes panned across the meager gathering of Great War vets. He remembered when better than a hundred would march the parades. He remembered convention halls full of his brothers-in-arms, singing the old anthems and reciting the old saws. “You see Manwell?”

“Cigarettes killed him.”

“Damn.”

Flash looked over the whole ragged bunch of Great War Marchers. Some smoked, some spat, some scowled. “They’re looking smart though, every last one of them.” Flash tipped his hat to a rakish angle and grinned.

“Not like the new breed.” Henry looked down the parade route at a throng of Viet Nam Vet marchers. Most of them hadn’t breached their thirties. Some had shone up in dress uniforms, respectful, honorable; but too many of them had grown their hair long like those damn hippies and wore their fatigues open and loose. “I’ll tell you, Flash, we’ve seen the last of the red-blooded, hard-working Americans. Every generation’s going to get more and more spoiled until this whole damn country spins right down into the crapper.”

“Why are you marching today; I thought you were done with all this.”

“That grandson of mine, he thinks he’s a big Hollywood director. Says he wants to make a documentary film about my being a war hero.”

“You are a war hero?” Flash smiled.

“I’m not the one who saved a squad of S.O.B’s from a Gerry gun crew by stripping to his skivvies and running a 50-yard strip show just to keep their attention while we took ‘em out with potato mashers.”

Flash’s grin grew bigger, an act that would have been impossible for anyone but him. “Oh yea, that was me. I guess I’m the war hero.” Flash pointed at the Silver Star pinned to his tunic.

“At least we’ll give my grandson a good show. Make sure you flash those pearly whites when you see him clacketty-clacking along with that new-fangled camera of his, I swear, you have the teeth of God.”

Both men chuckled, but their good humor gave way and their faces went slack, tired, old. They stood like a pair of skeletons, waiting for the pistol to fire and for the parade to begin. Although they didn’t know it, they waited for their last battle.