Victory Road - Mark Bowlin The Texas Gun Club

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and not to expect any more before we go into combat again.” Mayberry was unhappy about the bad news, but there was little that he or his company commander could do about it. Losses at Salerno had been more severe than expected, and there were other units still on the line that were drawing from the repple-depple, as the replacement depot was known. Even though the 36th Infantry Division, the Texas Army, had received notification that it would be back on the line very soon, it was still a lower priority than those American divisions that were currently fighting.

      “What’d we get?” Perkin was certain that the new soldiers would be of limited value—in his short experience as company commander, he was becoming aware that the army was sending the troops that it had, and these were not necessarily the same as those that were needed.

      “Last night? A qualified M-8 driver from Colorado and a reconnaissance scout from Gonzales.”

      Perkin was surprised. “Really? Holy smokes…I’d expected a goat-wrangler and a gynecologist.” He smiled inwardly as he watched Mabes blush. The lieutenant was a very innocent sort, and he had not quite adjusted to Perkin’s off-color sense of humor.

      “Er…yes sir. As for the training, we’ve gotten most of the replacements up to basic standards, but it’ll be a long time before they can match the men they’ve replaced.”

      That, Perkin worried, applied as much to him as any other replacement soldier.

      Chapter Two

      November 8, 1943

      1000 Hours

      Naples, Italy

      The orders were received. The division was to head to assembly areas the next morning to await transport on the long road north. Every mile of that road had been fiercely contested by the German Army, and the Americans and British were relearning a hard lesson about how good the Germans were at defense. Without fail, the Germans blew the bridges over steep mountain ravines and numerous rivers and streams, complicating an advance through a narrow valley that had seen the march of countless armies over the course of countless centuries. While the 36th had been bivouacked near Naples for several weeks of recovery and rehabilitation, the rest of the American VI Corps had continued to push north towards the grand prize of Rome. Those divisions were now exhausted, and the 36th would replace one of them on the line opposite the Germans.

      It would be Perkin’s last day with Gianina until he could get an opportunity to return to Naples. That would be weeks, certainly—maybe months. Maybe never. He could not tell her he was leaving for the front, but she knew it. She saw it in his face the moment she met Perkin at the museum café that morning. He looked tired and dispirited and lost, which he was. For the first time in the young captain’s life, he was not excited about change. He was not restless to leave. He no longer wished to test himself in battle. Perkin wanted to stay with Gianina, and she with him.

      That was not an option. They both knew it, and neither wasted time lamenting their separation or asking questions of “what if.” Perkin would leave and perhaps not come back, and that was simply a fact that both the soldier and the widow of a soldier accepted. They would make the most of the day and pray for Perkin’s safe return to Naples.

      “Wait here. I need to get a key from my office and then I have something special to show you.” Gianina walked away from Perkin, wiping away a silent tear as she did so.

      She was back in a few moments and took Perkin’s hand, leading him to the back of the museum and then down a flight of stairs. They walked down a dimly lit corridor. “We’re taking some art out of hiding—you should be pleased, it’s a vote of confidence in the Allies. It’s not all ours. Some of what we have now belongs to museums in Rome or Florence and has been hidden down here for months; we are just the caretakers.”

      She unlocked a big heavy door and led Perkin into a large room with concrete walls that had nearly a dozen works of art laid out carefully on tables. Some were wrapped and others had been opened since their return from the caves and vaults of Italy. Gianina looked at a long row of light switches and turned on a light over a table at the far side of the room. Two unframed works lay on the table, both wrapped in a heavy cloth but no longer bound. Moving to the larger of the two paintings, Gianina said, “You met me while you and Jim were looking for Caravaggios. We didn’t have any then, but we have some now. This is the one that I wanted you to see.”

      She unfolded the cloth, allowing Perkin to see the painting. It was of a young man standing next to a slightly older woman—based on his clothes and his jaunty feathered hat, Perkin marked the man as a candy-ass or a dandy. The man’s right hand, maybe he was just a boy, was held palm-out by the woman while she gazed intently at his face with a slightly mocking look visible in her lips and eyes. The man’s other hand rested arrogantly on his hip near the pommel of his sword.

      “It’s incredible,” Perkin said with an excited smile. “What’s it called?”

      “It’s one of two works by Caravaggio named The Fortune Teller. This is the first one that he did sometime around 1594 or ’95. I love Caravaggio, don’t you?” She leaned over and kissed his ear, and then asked, “Tell me, what do you see in the painting?”

      Perkin carefully studied the canvas before him. “Well, I ain’t an expert on art, but it strikes me as a little odd. If she’s supposed to be tellin’ his fortune, she ought to be lookin’ at his palm. But she ain’t. Looks more like she’s readin’ his face, and maybe she’s happy about what she sees. Why’s that, d’ya suppose?”

      “She’s watching his face to see if he notices she’s stealing his ring while she tells him how rich and powerful he is to become.”

      Perkin looked down at the boy’s palm and noticed that the fortune teller was carefully sliding a ring off the finger of the dandy. He laughed, “I’ll be damned. I hadn’t noticed that. I wish I had the time to bring Sam here—he mostly likes paintings of horses, but he’d think this one’s a hoot.”

      “Maybe next time.” Gianina put her arms around Perkin’s neck and stretched up to kiss him. After a long, lingering kiss, he moved to wrap her up in his arms. She slipped her arms around Perkin’s waist, and placed her head on his shoulder and relaxed as he held her tight. Nothing was said, and Gianina held back tears as she wished for the embrace to last forever. Two colleagues walking in the corridor past the closed door were having an animated discussion, and the intrusion into their silence broke the spell of the short moment. She stepped back.

      “I have a surprise for you.” She looked up at Perkin. Her eyes had dried up and Perkin recognized that her teasing look had returned.

      “Another one? This is my lucky day.”

      “Well, that remains to be seen. I’m going to tell your fortune. Give me your hand.”

      With a grin, Perkin gave her his hand. Gianina looked carefully at his calloused hand, her fingers tracing the lines on his palm. She frowned at one line, shook her head and traced the line again with her finger and then drew her breath in sharply. Gianina shook her head at Perkin with mock sorrow, but her eyes were alight, “Oh darling, it is very short. The lines on your hand tell me one bad story and the calluses tell me of yet more sorrow. You won’t like it at all. Perhaps the worst news you could get!”

      “What? What is it?”

      “Are you sure you want to hear it? It is terrible.”

      “Bad news can’t wait. Let’s have it.”

      “This short line here says that you…that you will be celibate for a very long time. Starting tomorrow.”

      “Oh. I liked his fortune better.” Perkin nodded at the boy in the painting. “What else did you see in my lines?”

      With a shy grin, Gianina said, “Well these things are never certain, but it looks like the curse of celibacy will lift only when you have returned to Napoli.”

      Perkin

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