Ghost Story

by tallsunshine12

It was Halloween, and it was time for a ghost story or two around the campfire. It was a 'feel good' night where the only worrisome pests were the flies. Supper had been cans of mystery meat stew heated up in an old combat helmet. The men of the Rat Patrol sipped their coffee—or in one case tea—and watched the snapping flames, gently lulled into a half-comatose state.

"Have I ever told you the story about a desert ghost named Hans Dietrich?" asked Hitch, glancing around the campfire at each of the other men in turn.

Troy felt a shiver go up his spine. "Hans Dietrich! No, I don't believe you have."

"Oh, then you're in for a treat!" Hitch jumped, feet first, into his story. "A curse had settled upon the desert after the death of Hauptmann Dietrich, one where his ghost roamed the sands looking for the men who had killed him …"

"Which means us, right, Hitch?" asked Moffitt, sipping his tea.

"Yeah, now I'm just getting started, so listen up."

"How long is it?" asked Tully. "I want to check my jeep again."

"Can't you leave that jeep alone long enough to hear Hitch's story?" said Troy, teasing both of them.

Hitch was showing impatience. "It's a good story, if you want to hear it."

"'course we do, lad. Prattle on," said Moffitt.

"Well, the Rats had a mission to blow up a convoy—"

"When did they not?" asked Moffitt, immediately shushing himself with a finger to his lips.

"To blow up a convoy."

"He's stuck in a groove," said Tully, "like a broken record."

"Would you all listen!"

"Go ahead, Hitch. We don't have much else to do until you know who shows up. If he does." Troy seemed skeptical.

"Well, this ghost roamed the desert looking for the Rat Patrol and finally came across the jeeps just as they were about to take off after the supply trucks."

"What were they carrying?" asked Moffitt. "The trucks, I mean, not the jeeps."

Tully pitched in. "Dancing girls?"

"Does it really matter what they were carrying?" asked Hitch, beyond steaming now, his face purply-red in the fire's glow.

"It does to those girls. Deserts cause dry skin."

"Go ahead, Hitch," Troy repeated, his teeth glowing in the same light. "Let the man finish, you two."

"Well, there was a chill in the air—"

"There always is—on the desert at night, I mean." Moffitt never knew when to quit.

"I'm cold now," said Tully, extending his hands to the fire.

"Maybe we should turn in," said Troy, yawning and stretching.

"Not before you hear my story."

"It really is late," said Moffitt, likewise yawning after watching Troy do it. "He won't show up tonight. I guess something's keeping him."

"Like one of those dancing girls." Tully, again.

Hitch was beyond boiling now. "Alright, the ghost appeared right in front of the jeeps and threw up his hand. He chanted something in Arabic. Then our jeep, Troy's and mine, went flying up in the air and landed upside-down in some rocks."

"Ooh, that hurts," said Moffitt.

"Not your jeep, Doc. Ours."

"Still, that'd be a pain to get a jeep out of some rocks," Tully threw in.

"I'm really feeling knackered after that big supper," said Moffitt, stretching, his long arms knocking Hitch's cap off where they sat cata-cornered to each other at the fire.

Hitch retrieved his hat out of the fire. "You did that on purpose, Doc!"

"Who, me, hit little ol' you?" That was Troy this time, mocking Hitch.

"What was that!" cried Tully, his heart suddenly leaping into his throat. "I thought he heard a 'yowl.'"

Troy, the great pacifier, said, "One of those wild dogs, Tully. Calm down. They won't come near the fire."

A pack of wild dogs had been roaming this area lately. Driving up to the camp, the four men had seen them about a half-mile off the road. A more ragged, snarling, snapping bunch couldn't be imagined.

"The Desert Ghost—" Hitch began again, for the umpteenth time it seemed.

"Don't you mean the Desert Fox?" asked Tully, lighting up a cigarette. He so wanted to quit smoking.

"No, not him. The ghost of Dietrich." When all had quieted down for a split second, Hitch continued. "The Desert Ghost turned to the other jeep and stretched out his hand. A ray shot out of it and that jeep—yours, Tully and Moffitt—exploded into a million pieces."

"What about us?" asked Tully.

Moffitt couldn't help laughing. "Yeah, did we explode into a million pieces, too?"

Hitch went on. "All was silent, except for the groans of the dying men, while the ghost surveyed the scene with bright lights in his eyes. Suddenly he laughed, and laughed, splitting the desert air into … a million pieces."

"I wouldn't want to pick them all up," said Tully, taking a last drag of his cigarette and crushing it in an old can. "Do you know any other?"

"I'm not finished with this one yet, Tully." Tully gave a "Oh, pardon me" shrug of his shoulders. "The convoy came up to the jeeps and discovered the bodies of the four men of the Rat Patrol. The ghost's voice boomed across the desert. Speaking to the commander of the convoy, it said, 'Now, you may go in peace.'"

"Or a million of 'em," quipped Troy. "Pieces, that is. I'm turning in. This story is too much excitement for me. Wake me for the fishin' tomorrow." He snuggled down in his sleeping bag. "Someone turn out that Coleman?!"

Moffitt reached over and turned off the Coleman lamp. He too thought it was time to hit the 'sack.' As Tully banked the fire and Hitch got ready to douse it with the pot of coffee, the campers heard an ominous sound, like jackbooted feet tramping through the woods close by. Troy started up.

"Can it be?" he asked. "He did make it!"

"Yes, and I heard my name invoked as some kind of ghost," said the deep tones of the ghost himself, Hans Dietrich, no long Hauptmann. Just plain Hans Dietrich. He had climbed up to the camp from the road below, where Tully's 1954 Willys Jeep and Troy's Buick Wildcat of the same year were parked.

"We thought you got held up at the oil fields," said Moffitt, handing Dietrich a cup of joe that Hitch had poured.

"I managed to get a flight into Grand Junction, then a rent-a-car, and here I am! Ready for some s'mores!"

"Glad you could make it. Troy says the fishing's better here than anywhere on the planet. He doesn't know the Tweed. The salmon there would take your arm off."

With that salubrious thought, the five men, now no longer desert rivals, or desert anything here in Western Colorado at Troy's favorite fishin' hole, shared one or two more cups of coffee (and tea) and a couple more stories with him.

"How d'you like my story, captain?" asked Hitch. "You won!"

For an answer, Dietrich fit the story with a proper ending. "And the ghost evaporated into the night, leaving the scene of his greatest triumph."

Tully was just returning from his jeep with an extra sleeping bag for their guest (not ghost). Overhearing Hitch, he handed it to Dietrich and said, "Yeah, you actually won."

"For once," growled Troy, snuggling down in his sleeping bag.

"What a shock!" mumbled Moffitt, zipping his against the nighttime cold.

Somewhere, aloft, an owl hooted, but whether he too was making fun of Dietrich for his braggadocio, no one gave it a passing thought. It was, quite literally, sack-time.

The war, which had always been so close when these five men were together, was now terribly far away. More than just years, more than just distance, old animosities were forgotten, new bonds forged. Forged in coffee, in tea, not blood—

Troy and Dietrich had even buried the hatchet, and not in each other's back.

And oh, by the way, the fishing was just great the next morning!

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Thanks for reading!