Cold rain

Cold rain fell from gray clouds that hung less than one hundred feet above the sodden ground. Two men sat in chairs in the second floor attic room of the old stone farm house. The chairs were behind a table and deep within the room, in shadows never reached by light coming through the large eastern window.

One of the men rested his elbows on the table as he stared through binoculars and through the open window and across the flat field, toward the forest more than eight hundred meters away. The second man sat behind a rifle that rested on its bipod on the table. The rifle had a short telescope.

“I would like to smoke my pipe,” the second man said.

“Margal,” the first man said, not looking up from the binoculars, “you cannot.”

“Of course I can.”

“All right, then. Margal, you may not smoke your pipe.”

“Well, that is a different thing altogether.”

“I would like to smoke a cigarette.”

“Rimon …”

“I would like to have Daviel here, in this room, on this table.” He rapped with the knuckles of his left hand. “Right here.”

“She would not like this house.”

“I do not like this house,” Rimon said. “It is here, at a crossroads, between them and us. Yesterday it was our command post. Tomorrow it could very well be their command post.”

“The lieutenant said it is an important house.”

“The lieutenant … Aha!”

Margal brought the rifle to his shoulder. “What?” He looked through the telescope. Green of the far away trees filled his sight.

“The white blaze on the big oak?”

Margal moved his shoulders slightly to his left. “Yes,” he said. “I have it.”

“Ten degrees left of the mark,” Rimon said. “A man stands between two poplars.”

Margal told his heart to slow its beat as he moved the rifle slightly. “I … Yes.” He turned the focus ring. “Very good, Rimon. He is almost part of the shadows.”

“Almost,” Rimon said. He positioned the enemy soldier between marks within the glasses. “Eight hundred twenty-five meters.”

“Eight twenty-five,” Margal said. He turned the elevation knob until a brown mark rested on the enemy’s forehead.

“There is no wind.”

Margal said nothing. He took a breath and exhaled, then took another breath and let out only some air.

Rimon looked at his friend and then returned his attention to the enemy scout. Or officer about to position soldiers. Or perhaps he was a sergeant. Rimon shrugged. It made no difference.

Margal suddenly raised his head.

“Are you all right?” Rimon asked.

“Yes. I was about to jerk the shot, that is all.”

“Do you want me to take it?”

“No. Thank you, but no.”

Margal again positioned the crosshairs. He breathed as before, holding his breath as he gently squeezed the trigger.

The shot was loud in the confined room. Both men’s ears rang.

Margal worked the bolt, ejecting an empty cartridge, chambering another live round.

“He is down,” Rimon said.

Margal swept the scope right, then left. He saw nothing, not even the movement of bushes. If other enemy were approaching their dead compatriot, their movement did not show. “They are experienced.”

“Or frightened,” Rimon said.

“Do you see anything?”

“No. Say, do you remember that major who ran the range at Camp Fostel?”

“Yes,” Margal said. “He is on brigade staff.”

“I didn’t know that,” Rimon said. He continued watching the forest. “Two years ago, when you and I fired in competition, the major said when we reported in that we could go and have a good time in town, drink wine or beer if we wanted, but stay away from coffee. He said coffee would make a tremble in our hands.”

“I remember,” Margal said. “He was sheep dip.”

“He was,” Rimon agreed. “But he could shoot.”

“That he could. Why did you think of him?”

“Oh, because you and I each had four cups of coffee at breakfast the first morning of competition, yet we had no tremor of any kind.”

“As I said, the major was sheep dip.”

“Yes,” Rimon said. “Also, I thought of him because when we return to the company, I will go to the mess hall and … Movement. Left of the white blaze.”

“Got it,” Margal said.

“More movement,” Rimon announced. “There are many of them.” He slid the binoculars into a carrying case on his belt and picked up his semi-automatic rifle.

Margal said, “Fire all of your magazine and I will fire my remaining four rounds and then we will leave.”

“Yes,” Rimon said. “We …”

Both men ducked as a mortar round exploded at the crossroads, twenty meters from the house.

“Or,” Margal said, “we could leave now.”

“Yes,” Rimon said.