Free Ruins of War by John A. Connell Page A

angry if he failed to maintain order. Mason waved and Kurt waved back.
    As he walked away, pulling his coat tight against the cold, he silently wished them well and vowed to try to do more. He had relieved their hunger for a few days, but the worst of winter was yet to come. How many would survive?
    It was a humbling feeling for Mason to consider that no matter how many lives he could save from the hands of a psychotic killer, it paled in comparison to those facing death at the hands of a cruel winter.

EIGHT
    Q ueen takes rook,” Mason said.
    Another eruption of cheers and groans. Mason could tell by the chants of the GIs surrounding their table that his opponent, a major in the Third Army’s Signal Corps, was downing another shot of whiskey.
    Lose a chess piece, down a shot.
    Mason heard his opponent slam the empty shot glass down on the table then slap the timer.
    “Knight to queen’s knight five” someone said for Mason’s benefit. The actual chessboard was invisible to Mason. He wore a blindfold, though the major did not. But he had a perfectly clear image of the board and the positions of the pieces in his mind, as if he could have reached out and touched them.
    Despite all the grief his grandfather visited upon Mason as a child, he had taught Mason the skill and art of chess—even if it involved cracking Mason’s fingers with a ruler if he made a bad move. And as Mason improved, his grandfather had forced him to play blindfolded. It had served Mason well. He became so good over the years that by the time he reached his senior year in high school he had turned his skills into a small moneymaking enterprise; become a sort of poolshark for chess. He could triple-down the bets by donning a blindfold and challenging his unwitting opponent to one more game.
    Mason figured his exceptional memory, particularly conjuring up images in sharp detail, had come about from being forced, time and again, to track the state of the chessboard in his mind or suffer pain inflicted by his grandfather. Like exercising some normally neglected muscle, the process had developed a part of his brain so that he could bring up certain images in crystal clarity. But normally, unlike with chess, he had limited control over which images stuck; usually they were confined to ones with strong emotional ties. He could instantly recall his grandmother’s face: As if looking at a photograph he could describe the angle of her lips when she smiled or frowned and give an exact count of her wrinkles and blemishes. Or recall his ex-wife in that first week of bliss before their love had turned sour: the contour of her breasts and the intricate folds in her opal irises. But the ability had its downside. He could conjure a precise image of the mangled body of his murdered partner or, like a movie projected on his eyelids, the horrifying weeks he’d spent behind the gates of Buchenwald. Any detective would wish for this skill, but Mason’s never manifested without the accompanying emotional bonds of love or horror.
    The timer ticked down the seconds. . . .
    “Knight to king’s bishop six,” Mason said and slapped the timer.
    The crowd murmured and exchanged bets.
    “Bishop captures knight,” the major said.
    Another roar. Mason felt for a shot glass lined up next to him and downed the whiskey. Mason had already lost eight pieces and consumed an equal number of shots. The major played well, but perhaps not well enough. . . . “Queen captures bishop,” Mason said. “Checkmate.”
    With a final roar from the crowd, Mason removed his blindfold. Money exchanged hands. The pile of dollar bills grew next to Mason, but he hardly noticed. Among the GIs, and just behind the hapless major, stood the brunette reporter, Laura, her blue eyes fixed on him.A flush of warmth coursed through his chest even while he gave her a disapproving glare.
    The crowd broke into small groups, heading for the poker tables or the bar. Mason began to collect his dollars,