He felt the treads digging in; they tossed sand to the rear; the bus rolled through a wadi, climbed into the sun that was burning ahead. Something in the rocking motion, the rise and fall, made him feel that he was driving over the bodies of wounded men. He seemed to see across treeless fields, across horizons, across Africa, across Europe, across Asia--into a snowland: there was time to ride through forests, time to ski ...
Shell flames seared his thoughts.
He wanted to swing back, put the Sherman into reverse, turn, rush toward the rear--retreat. He wanted to open a steel door, jump out, run, blunder away from the din, away from the stench of gas and oil.
Landel scribbled something on his knee pad and handed it to Dennison. As Landel yelled on the radio transmitter, Dennison bent over the scrawl and forced his brain to come together and make sense:
Entering Anadi--Armed Corps.
What was Anadi?
Dennison had to jerk his machine away from an abutment of rocks; then it was smooth going: he shot the bus into faster gear: they were rolling at forty: they got to fifty, the heat mounting, billowing.
They were in formation with other tanks in their Corps.
Visibility: a hundred miles.
Blank sand.