Free Guns At Cassino by Leo Kessler

give you all the support I can. I'll call TAC Air Force, but I don't think we'll get much change there for aerial support. This weather's too lousy. But you can rely on the corps artillery. When are you going in, Colonel?'
    `Dawn, sir.'
    `Dawn, eh? OK. It's on your head – and the best of luck, Jack ...’
    ‘ Ah don't see why the folks back in the States always rave about this country,' the skinny PFC from Georgia snorted. 'Jesus Christ on the mountain, there ain't nothing here we don't have better back home!'
    `Yeah, in a pig's eye!' his buddy, a smart high yellow from Chicago snapped from the side of his mouth. 'Go and tell that one to the marines, Washington, they might believe ya.' He lapsed into silence to keep pace with the long line of khaki-clad men climbing up the snow-covered mountain.
    Black Jack Jones, his head bandaged now looked over his shoulder. Is this all that's left of the Regiment, he asked himself in dull surprise, seeing the extent of his losses for the first time. He glanced to his right. The Second was keeping up despite the rough going and the artillery which was coming in low over their heads. They surmounted an embankment and the last shells from the Corps' barrage started to hide the smoke-obscured peak. A machine-gun up ahead chattered suddenly. Here and there soldiers began to flop down behind the cover.
    `Off your duffs!' the big Staff Sergeant, who had insisted he should carry the regimental flag into action, snarled. 'The mother-fugging war ain't over yet. Move it !'
    Some of the young soldiers bent their heads to the glittering snow and pretended that he wasn't there. The Staff Sergeant smashed his boot into the high yellow PFC's side. 'On your-doggon feet, soldier!' he snapped, 'you goddam nigger, you!'
    The line moved forward again, more hurriedly now. The chatter of the machine-guns increased in intensity. The icy clear morning air was full of lead. Men began to fall everywhere.
    The Third hesitated for a moment, the men staring in apparent bewilderment at the men lying on the snow, their blood staining it red, as if they could not understand how this terrible thing could happen to them.
    `Come on, follow me,' Black Jack Jones yelled. 'Keep moving, men!'
    But half the Battalion was down in the snow now, firing at the smoke-shrouded peak. The ones who had kept advancing, faltered and they too were running back to their comrades, sobbing for breath, crashing into the snow beside the others and firing their weapons furiously as if this were sufficient excuse for their withdrawal.
    `Oh, you yella-bellied bunch of niggers!' the Staff Sergeant with the regimental flag cursed. 'Why, yer nothing more than a - ' He never finished the sentence. He swayed crazily suddenly, as a bullet struck him in the back. Blood spurted out of his mouth and he fell forward onto the snow. 'You niggers,' he said faintly, then died.
    The high yellow from Chicago grabbed the flag, now stained with the dead man's blood. He scrambled warily to his feet and looked numbly at Black Jack.
    The Colonel did not seem to see the bullets striking the snow in spurts all around him as he walked along the long line of men lying down, as if he were back on parade in Fort Jay.
    `Come on men,' he kept saying, raising his calm voice only when the chatter of the machine-guns threatened to drown it. `Only another hundred yards and we've got them. For the sake of the old ninety-third.'
    A bullet struck his wrist and he dropped his carbine in the snow. He did not seem to notice, but kept on walking.
    `All you've got to do is to get to your feet and start walking - walking after me. I'll lead you.'
    `For the sake of the old Ninety-Third,' the high yellow soldier yelled and swung the flag.
    ` For the Ninety - Third! ' they bellowed as one, scrambling to their feet.
    `Follow me!' Black Jack Jones cried joyfully, waving his good arm towards the enemy.
    The survivors of the 93rd swept forward and, as the smoke cleared in front of them, they