As to how he might react, good God, sir, the man is normally very patient and calculating, but, on rare occasions, has appeared to act irrationally. What will he do? I have no idea."

"Guess," Marshall said firmly.

Burke took a deep breath and thought, what the hell. "He's a bully and if confronted could easily back down and wait for an opportunity to try again. I rather think that would make everyone happy." Marshall did not respond, but seemed to nod almost imperceptibly. "If he doesn't back down, he could use his massive army to swat our force like flies."

"Which, Colonel?" Marshall insisted. "I want your opinion."

Burke tried not to stammer. "He operates from a position of strength. He cannot afford to show weakness. I think he'll use force to expel us from Berlin. God help those poor soldiers."

Marshall rose and did not appear to notice it when a thoroughly stunned Burke remained seated. "Colonel, thank you for your help. You will be driven back to your apartment. Be in my office at eight in the morning."

"BERLIN," WHOOPED PFC Tommy Crawford, a gangly kid from Georgia. "We goin' to Berlin!"

Sitting on the ground, Sergeant Jack Logan could only shake his head in wonderment. Where the hell did some of the kids think they were going? To the circus? Crawford was a scarcely literate nineteen-year-old from some squalid little place south of Atlanta and, until a few months ago, had never been more then ten miles from his home. Now he had been to New York, London, Paris, and maybe was on his way to Berlin on his government-paid world tour. Logan still didn't think Crawford realized all these cities were in Europe. Maybe he didn't realize what Europe was?

"Sergeant?"

"Yeah, Lieutenant?" To Logan, Singer looked shaken and pale.

"Tell me about combat."

Logan looked at the line of tanks forming to head out, and the trucks that would carry the infantry. The Sherman tanks looked strong and dangerous, but the cloth-sided trucks appeared horribly vulnerable. Even the Shermans' strength was somewhat illusory. The stubby little 75mm guns they carried just weren't strong enough to knock out the newest and biggest kraut tanks, and their thin armor and high silhouettes made them easy victims.

"What do you mean, sir?"

"You've been in combat, haven't you? What's it like? How do you react?"

Logan patted the ground. "Have a seat, sir." When Singer made himself comfortable, he continued. "Lieutenant, the first time I was in so-called combat it was a few months ago and a mortar shell landed a couple of hundred yards away, and we all fell flat and hugged the ground for as long as we could. We'd still be lying there if someone hadn't told us it was safe to get up. Y'know, I have no idea where the shell came from or if it was even German and not one of our own.

"The second time, there was a report of a sniper in a grove in front of us and the entire platoon fired twenty or thirty rounds each into the trees. I don't know if we hit the sniper, if there ever was one, but we scared the hell out of a bunch of trees and it felt damn good to be firing back."

"You mean you've never seen a German in all this time?" Singer was incredulous.

"Sure I have. Dead ones and prisoners. But have I ever had the privilege of confronting one who was coming at me with bayonet fixed or aiming up a shot at me? No. Maybe I did see a few of them. Sometimes you see motion in the night where there isn't supposed to be any, or you see shapes running like hell in the distance, but you can't be certain

whether they are krauts or civilians or, in the case of nighttime, just a case of the jitters."

"You're not a big help, Sergeant.