In Green Sleep
A Tour of DutyBy JERRY ACKERMANiUniverse, Inc.
Copyright © 2011 Jerry Ackerman
All right reserved.ISBN: 978-1-4620-0244-3 Chapter One
February 1967
Although he had been ordered time and again not to, Specialist 4 Wiley Couch banged the spring-loaded door wide open to Specialist 5 John Bluderin's office and sprinted into it like a man on an urgent mission. He plopped an olive-drab satchel on Bluderin's desk.
Bluderin jerked back from the desk when he heard a shotgun blast, the sound the huge, thick door made when it closed itself. The crackled shot ricocheted all along the corridor and into other offices. It was not the sound anyone wanted to hear in a military building at Hardt Kaserne, especially one that was built like a bunker and once occupied by a battalion of Nazi infantry officers.
"Gotcha," Couch said, belching, patting his beer-belly with one hand and scratching the crotch of his pants with the other. He leaned over, pressing his forearms and elbows on Bluderin's desk. "Hand over the hashish."
The soldier's imposing presence was as exasperating as his diction. His thick head of dark hair—shone to a midnight blue—was always clean but unkempt and usually longer than military regulations allowed. His eyes, which were blacker than his hair, were pierced with pupils the diameter of pencil erasers.
Bluderin believed that Couch was forever under the influence of alcohol and hashish. His constant smile was wide and wet, showing the considerable gap in the center of his upper teeth. Whenever he laughed, and he always laughed at his own quips, such as referring to himself as Smiley Wiley, the lower buttons of his fatigue shirt either tightened severely or busted loose from the pressure of his inflated girth.
Bluderin was accustomed to Couch's careless rhetoric and behavior. His coarseness seemed to be the only way for him to release his pent-up frustration with Bluderin, who (although three years younger than Couch) outranked him and was better looking. Bluderin's six-two, one hundred eighty pound physique—wired with hard, tight muscle—was softened only by his ash blond hair and cerulean eyes. The Führer doubtlessly would have approved of his physical features. However, Bluderin's acceptance of all ethnicities as equals would have landed him in brutal heat with the megalomaniac.
"What can I do for you today?"
Couch opened the satchel and took out a sheet of paper. He looked it over several times, apparently to make sure he had the right item.
"This thing needs to be retyped," he said. "I spilled some beer on it. Can you get Tyler or one of the other grunts to redo it and make around two-hundred copies? But I need you to check it out first, John. Last time I ran a memo the brass gave me all kinds of shit about my spelling and grammar."
Bluderin read the memo and, upon picking up an army pen intended for such purposes, began to make corrections. By the time he had finished, the memo looked stained in rivulets of blood. Even the tips of Bluderin's fingers were marked with miniscule blotches of red ink.
"I don't know how you do it, Wiley. Ten misspellings and a dozen or so grammatical errors in a hundred-word memorandum."
"They didn't teach me much about readin' and writin' down at the farm in Missouri," Couch said. "More or less picked up what I could, and it ain't much."
"Why did you come down from Göppingen? Just to have copies of this notice made?"
"The copier in Göppingen shit the bed again," Couch said, "and, as you saw, the memo is about a change in payday hours and location. I do not want to upset Ma Fella Americans, as President Johnson says, or my fellow GIs, by not keeping them up to speed on the new changes."
From previous discussions with him, Bluderin surmised that Wiley Couch had as much regard for his fellow GIs as LBJ had for Vietnam War protestors. Bluderin suspected that the reason Couch drove down from Göppingen was to spend some time in Schwäbisch Gmünd.
Wiley Couch was not a difficult guy to please. He thought that Schwäbisch Gmünd had everything, meaning great beer at cheap prices, farm girls he could bed down for the price of dinner, and a few regulars at a local Gasthaus with whom he could play cards or otherwise socialize. Like Bluderin, Couch enjoyed the advantage of being fluent in German.
Joining the army and being sent to Germany had been a windfall for Wiley Couch. Poverty-stricken when fresh out of high school, he now always had cash at his disposal and had improved his hygiene considerably. He recently purchased a 1956 Mercedes-Benz 220S black sedan. The gap in his teeth widened whenever he spoke of that possession.
"Like you, my friend, I have it made here, and you're doing better than me. Setting your boss up with a drop-dead gorgeous German broad certainly didn't hurt your standing."
"I must admit," Bluderin said, trying to withhold a smirk, "that the captain has been nice to me since I introduced him to Ingrid Dannette. Sure makes military life easier, and Ingrid is a classic European beauty, don't you think? I wonder, though, how she and McCandley relate to each other. Her English needs to improve, while his German is helpless."
"Come on now, Johnny boy. You're always so goddamn polite and distant. Be real. You know the score. Fucking is a universal language."
"Like music and mathematics, I suppose."
PFC Joseph Tyler walked into the office, taking the memo from Bluderin and listening carefully to his instructions. Bluderin could not help but notice how diminutive Tyler looked when he passed Couch on the way out. At five-six, the PFC was a full head shorter than Wiley, and the circumference of Tyler's chest was less than a third of Couch's. The PFC's clean-shaven skull made the two contrasting images look even more emphatically like a portrayal of David and Goliath.
After Tyler left, Couch grabbed his satchel and pulled out a flask of Jägermeister. Guzzling a large swig of the liquor, he offered some to Bluderin, who waved him off.
"Put that away." Bluderin said in a loud whisper. "You never know when the brass is going to make an appearance. In fact, McCandley could be here any minute. He needs to approve some documents before he lets me go on a three-day pass. Do you have to drink something with such a strong, licorice aroma? I hope the captain doesn't smell it. As it is, he'll probably reprimand me for letting the door slam shut. That's bad enough. Alcohol could make him renege on my pass and have you demoted."
Bluderin was anxious for Couch to leave so he could finish his work for McCandley and go to his apartment. Although no unmarried GIs were allowed to have a private residence, Bluderin had gotten approval from McCandley to have a "temporary private place, given the cramped barrack space, provided he can be contacted at any time." The fact was that Bluderin was going to be assigned, from time-to-time, to temporary duty (or TDY) covert missions, supposedly from orders out of the 8th Military Intelligence Unit in Ulm. A private apartment could be a necessary accommodation to fulfill some assignments. McCandley knew all about that, of course, but for the record he had to come up with some other "reason" for allowing Bluderin to have an apartment. So the TDY business was tucked into something vague—with not a word said to anyone—and with a pledge of secrecy.
Arranged by intelligence agents, Bluderin's private residence was located two blocks away from Gustav Erdmann's Gasthaus. Erdmann was designated to be a key communications point for TDY assignments.
For Wiley Couch, the Gasthaus, as an overall concept, was his main attraction in Germany, and Schwäbisch Gmünd had plenty of them. There were approximately a hundred and thirty in town. Couch's mission was to visit every one before he completed his tour of duty. The Gasthaus number was significant, since the population of the town was around forty thousand, not including U.S. military personnel and their dependents.
"Around one Gasthaus per one-hundred adult citizens," Couch had estimated, "and when you knock off the non-drinkers, it probably comes down to a Gasthaus for every fifty folks."
Bluderin realized that, as fluent as Couch was in German, he had a naïve appreciation for what the Gasthaus and similar public inns or taverns meant to the country's social demeanor. Gustav Erdmann had explained to him that, since the vast majority of German citizens had relatively small homes, especially in comparison to those in the U.S., the Gasthaus served as an extension of their homes, where people could socialize. Even those who never drank alcoholic beverages had a Gasthaus they frequented.
PFC Tyler returned with the copies. Bluderin checked the master copy one more time and handed the stack of copies to Couch.
"Thanks for recommending me for promotion to Specialist 4," Tyler said to Bluderin. "I appreciate it, and I sure could use the money."
"No problem," Bluderin said. "You earned it."
Joe Tyler was a quiet, devout Mormon from Jordan, Utah, married with a one-year-old daughter and another baby on the way. Bluderin admired Tyler's humility, his "clean living" style, and his straight-dealing sincerity. Joe had married early—at seventeen—and told Bluderin that his wife was the only woman he knew, in the Biblical sense, and the only one he would ever know in that manner. Bluderin once shared the ideal that Tyler was living, but it no longer suited him. A former Roman Catholic turned agnostic, Bluderin no longer held onto any ideals.
Couch almost knocked Tyler to the floor, mumbling so sooory as he placed the copies in his satchel and shook hands with Bluderin. Tyler quickly scooted out of the office upon avoiding the near collision.
"Thanks for the favor, man. If you want, stop by Josef's Gasthaus later today, and I'll buy you a drink. I'll be there, either playing cards or squeezing Helga's titties."
"Maybe, we'll see," Bluderin said, waiting for Couch to leave. Josef's Gasthaus is one place I will avoid tonight, Bluderin thought as Couch left. At least he made sure to close the door gently this time.
He finished typing the corrections to several small documents, then looked out the window before clearing his desk. The sun had melted the frozen enamel off a colossal oak, and an ever-so-slight hint of green filtered the air, as if it had come in from the horizon on a breeze. A gray castle, set on the crest of a grayish blue hill in the background, jabbed at the sky like a fist of thorns. Having an interest in art, Bluderin thought the scene looked like something Pieter Breugel the Elder could have painted.
Captain William McCandley stepped into the office. "I know you're anxious to begin your three-day pass, Specialist Bluderin, so let me look at the English version of the court martial proceedings with the supporting documentation and you'll be free to go."
"Yes, sir. I made the final revisions."
McCandley scrutinized the English version of the proceedings with an utmost sense of detail. He had a legal background and used it extensively on base, so he was making sure that Bluderin made no legal misinterpretation in his report. A man of nefarious detail, the captain was as fussy in his appearance as he was in his review of documents. His fatigues were impeccably pressed, and his eyeglasses were always crystal clear. He shaved twice a day, had his brownish gray hair trimmed every five or six days, and smelled of English Leather.
"The documents look fine, John. Bring them over to Tyler for filing before you leave. It will take a week before the German counsel comes back with any comments."
"Yes, sir, and as you requested, the staff has plenty to do in my absence."
"Speaking of the staff, I heard that they refer to me by a sobriquet. You better warn them, if I as so much as hear the term Candy Ass around here I'll have every one of them busted down to buck private."
"I have never heard the derogatory term you referred to," Bluderin said, knowing damned well that if he acknowleged having heard it McCandley would press him for names.
McCandley took off his glasses and squinted at Bluderin, who interpreted the gesture to mean that the captain did not believe him. McCandley's ego was larger than his intellect, but the man was no fool.
"I understand your situation. Just tell them what I said. On another matter, I have a personal request I'd like to ask of you. Ingrid has a niece whom she would like you to meet, unless you have a girlfriend we don't know about?"
"There is no girlfriend, sir. I'll be pleased to meet Ingrid's niece."
"Good. I'll let Ingrid know when I take her to dinner tonight. She'll be delighted. We both think you need to socialize more, to bring you out of your shell."
McCandley loved to wield his influence, to coax soldiers into doing things he felt they should do to improve themselves.
Bluderin was annoyed that Ingrid was trying to set him up with her niece. He imagined that she mistakenly thought she was doing him a favor in return for his introducing her to McCandley. However, he did not want anyone intruding on his preference to be left alone. Outside of his friendship with Howard James, an army cook who was a gifted artrist, he did not want to know anyone else in the army—or anyone with connections to it—on a more personal basis. It wasn't that he felt he was better than everyone else. There were numerous soldiers whose talents exceeded his and whom he respected. He just wanted to be free of the army's influence whenever possible. He certainly did not want to be coerced into a personal relationship being promoted by his military superior and instigated by his girlfriend.
McCandley picked up a book from Bluderin's desk. His light gray eyes looked at Bluderin with what seemed to be a quizzical expression. His forehead wrinkled and he scratched his eyebrows on the rim of his glasses as he studied the cover of the book.
"Where did you get it?" he asked, his voice bearing an inquisitive, almost suspicious, tone.
"From the library in town," Bluderin said. "Ingrid checked it out for me. It's a book about the history of Hardt Kaserne. I've been impressed with the massive, stone structures since I arrived here. Everything is so solid. I swear the complex could withstand an intense bombing and remain essentially intact."
"When was it built?" McCandley asked.
"The Kaserne was constructed in 1937 and originally named the Adolf Hitler Kaserne. During the war the Kaserne was used as billets for German Officers Corps cadets."
McCandley raised his well groomed eyebrows in surprise. "What else have you learned?"
"I found out that the Kaserne also housed French POWs during the war. When the war ended, the complex became a clearing house for refugees, DPs from all over Europe. Later, it was taken over by the U. N. Refugees Relief Administration and renamed Hardt Kaserne. I'm sure you know the rest of its history, that American troops began to occupy Hardt in 1951, populating it with a series of Field Artillery Battalions ever since."
"I'm glad to see you taking an interest in military history," McCandley said. "I wish other soldiers would do similar things, instead of getting drunk whenever they're off duty and behaving irresponsibly. You should write an article, a summary, about the base's history and publish it in the weekly newsletter distributed on base."
"Yes, sir. I'll draft it when I'm on pass and type it when I return."
Bluderin was amazed how McCandley could turn anything—even a simple reading of local history—into a job.
"Great. Maybe the article will help raise the morale around here."
Wishful thinking on your part, Bluderin thought. Nothing could boost the morale at Hardt Kaserne. The presence of the Fascist architectural military complex, filled with a swarm of soldiers in olive-drab, army fatigues, stood in stark contrast to the more gentile—or gentrified—architectural masterpieces of the town surrounding Hardt and Bismarck, the latter being an American-occupied military complex situated at the foot of the hill below Hardt. During World War II, the Germans had constructed a tunnel from Hardt Kaserne to Bismarck Barracks. Under U.S. Army control, no one was allowed access to that passage out of the base other than selected officers and intelligence-related personnel. Hitler had instituted a similar policy regarding the tunnel when he was in power.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from In Green Sleepby JERRY ACKERMAN Copyright © 2011 by Jerry Ackerman. Excerpted by permission of iUniverse, Inc.. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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