Blind Fire by James Rouch

Americans, if it could be called that, was via the TV. Of the mass of imported programmes, just two had made him grind his teeth and reach for the channel tuner. Until now he’d never really believed there actually were people who talked like the characters in Barnaby Jones or Dallas. And now he had two live specimens working with him.
At least, he thought he had two. He couldn’t be sure about Wilson. The gangling carrot-top with galloping acne was just a shade less chatty than Kurt, and he averaged only three grunts a day, on good days.
    ‘I’ve not seen one of these before, how do they handle? I mean, are they difficult, what with vibration an’ all?’
    ‘Not if they’re carefully mounted. This is a bit makeshift, but at this rate of fire it’ll do.’ If Ripper was angling to sit behind the Gatling-type gun, Libby was going to disappoint him. The last thing he wanted was a hick clown tampering with things he didn’t understand. Ripper still hovered, he was chewing his lip and contriving to somehow give the impression that he was hopping up and down while he hunched over the gun’s barrels. He kept giving Libby weird smiles, in which only the bottom half of his face participated, mainly by exposing masses of tiny teeth. There appeared to be enough for several normal mouths. The youngster was painfully thin, and his helmet, perched above sharp bird-like features, looked about three sizes too large, slumping first over one ear, then the other, then down over his eyes.
    ‘Could you knock out a tank with one of these, for real?’ ‘Only if I was firing it inside.’ Oh bugger it, it was a serious question, not too intelligent, but serious. ‘No, I’ll be going for the personnel carriers. Concentrating bursts on one section of their armour, I should be able to put a few rounds into them, and that’s all it takes.’
    ‘You mean these little bitty bullets can stop an-APC?’ Ripper prodded the rounds in the belt like a Pacific Islander being offered his first trade beads. ‘More likely they’ll buzz about inside chopping the crew to pieces, but they’ve got an incendiary filling, so they could ignite fuel, or set off ammo racks.’ 
    ‘Well I’ll be, ain’t that something...’
    Wilson had at last managed to catch the attention of their driver by taking his rifle and pounding it up and down on the man’s helmet. For whatever reason, the engine revs suddenly fell away and the whole truck stopped rattling in time to the straining power unit.
    ‘This is the first time I’ve been in action, same goes for Wilson here, don’t it, Wilson?’ Ripper didn’t wait for a confirmation. ‘See we figured, as the war’s gonna end soon anyway...’
‘Now where the hell did you get that?’ Libby was silenced by a knowing wink from Ripper.
‘Ah know.’ He sank his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. ‘Ah know because my cousin John, he sells fresh dog meat.’
    The relevance of that particular authority was lost on Libby. He tried to think of a polite way to voice the query. ‘What the fuck has that got to do with the end of the war?’ and failed.
    Again the long slow wink. ‘One of his very best customers is Old George.’ If he expected light to suddenly dawn on Libby’s face he suffered a letdown. Ripper elaborated. ‘Old George, Old George who used to be a gardener at the State Governor’s mansion. Like he says, he may not be right at the hub of things no more, but he still gets all the low-down, keeps his fingers on the pulse of the nation as he says. That’s how my cousin John...’
    ‘Who sells the fresh dog meat...’
‘Right, you’re with me now. That’s how he heard from Old George that the Governor had said to one of the maids how the war was gonna end any time. And as he was only half-drunk and getting real horny with her at the time, it must be the truth.’
    ‘Fascinating. I suppose we might as well pack up and go home now.’ It took an effort for Libby not to laugh out loud,