Mary Benton was a feisty little thing, five feet seven inches tall, and one-hundred-thirty pounds. Despite her size, or lack of it, down at the military police (MP) station, they liked to say that Mary was as mean as a snake and twice as fast. She didn’t dispute that; after all, she was a small woman among large men and,for the most part,the only woman. Mary was actually pleased by the comment, since she took it to mean that she was accepted among the men and the very few women that she worked with as MPs.
Mary took a seat in the front row of the briefing room. The rest of the fifteen members of 1st platoon were filtering in now, and she liked to be right up front. The briefing room wasn’t large, but it was adequate. It was furnished with a bunch of old school desks, the type with a writing area that folded down on the side when not in use. The walls were covered with a plaster stucco material painted white. Everything inside a military building seemed to be painted white, and everything on the outside seemed to be painted some shade of green. The military, especially the army, was in a real rut she decided.
She had no more taken her seat when the patrol supervisor strolled into the room. Sergeant First Class Peterson slammed his stack of folders on the single desk at the front of the room and got everyone’s attention. A second later, Lieutenant Marsh strolled in and Peterson yelled, “Attention!”
Now, anyone with half a brain knew that the lieutenant was going to come in right after the patrol supervisor, and that they should be ready for that eventuality, including Private First Class Johnson, but he was new and, Mary decided, not too smart. Johnson, contrary to everyone else in the room, had already pulled his writing platform up and dropped it into position across his lap. When the lieutenant came in everyone jumped up, but Johnson couldn’t get up, at least not all the way, and he made quite a picture trying to stand up with a school chair clinging to his lap. Not to mention the noise he made dragging the chair with him as he tried to stand.
The lieutenant and the patrol supervisor looked at Johnson and then at each other and just rolled their eyes in mutual disgust.
“As you were,” the lieutenant yelled, as Johnson thankfully stopped struggling and dropped back down to a sitting position, his chair letting out an almost human groan.
No one laughed, but it was a struggle not to and the smirks abounded. At a nod from the lieutenant, Sergeant Peterson commenced to give the briefing. “Okay folks, welcome to the night shift, the specialist is passing out the latest Al Qaeda hit list, and everyone gets a deck of the famous ‘Iraqi Most Wanted’ cards. The intelligence community thinks there may be one or two of them who slipped out at the end of the war through Syria and made it to Europe, so keep your eyes open.” As he spoke, one of the desk clerks moved among the MPs passing out packets to everyone.
The sergeant continued, “Benton.”
“Yes, Sergeant,” Mary answered.
“Tell us about the brawl you had last Saturday.”
“Wasn’t my brawl, Sarge, and it’s all in my report,” she replied, squirming slightly in her chair.
“Yeah, but we want to hear the details, your reports are good, very thorough, but the story loses something when you write it down; we like to hear you tell it first hand. You got a knack for it.”
Mary didn’t like being singled out like this, but she was fairly called and had no choice. She said simply, “It was a Turk.”
“So?”
“Well you’ve heard that old saying, Sarge, meaner than a Turk on a Saturday night. He was Turk, and it was Saturday night.”
The lieutenant tried to hide his smile as the sergeant persisted with a straight face, “Spill it, Benton.”
“Okay, well… we… that is, me and a couple of the Polezei, were making spot checks of the downtown bars. We hit the Tangerine about ten and were just making a nice easy walk through, when all of a sudden this guy at the bar starts yelling and throwing glasses at the bar maid. I guess he took exception to something she said, well anyway, one of the Polezei, German Police for the benefit of PFC Johnson who probably doesn’t know that’s what Polezei stands for.” Hesitating a few seconds with a broad smile, just for effect, she then continued, “So as I was saying, one of the Polezei, Hans Schmidt, he walks up to the guy, grabs him by the left arm, and spins him around. Now this guy’s on crutches, got a full leg cast on his right leg clean up to his hip. He pivots with the crutch under his left arm and, lo and behold, with his right hand he hauls a knife out of that cast. I mean a real down-to-earth knife, not no Cracker-Jack-box pen knife; this knife was fourteen inches long if it was an inch. He starts whipping that baby around right at Hans’ face and old Hans, he starts back peddling, to the tune of four steps a second, but this guy hobbles right after him. You could hear the wind whistling around the blade of that knife every time he made a pass at Hans’ head with that baby. The rest of the patrons are scattering like a grenade just landed in the middle of the place.”
“Hans’ partner, Fritz, sees the knife come out and moves in behind this Turk. Fritz makes a grab for that spring loaded rubber baton those Polezei carry in a pocket on their right leg, you know the one I mean, the one that they swing once, but it hits you four times before it stops. Well, anyway, he must have missed and got the wrong pocket ‘cause he comes up with his spare machine pistol clip; you’ve seen ‘em, twelve inches long, and they hold a hundred rounds of nine millimeters. Well, instead of puttin’ it back and getting the baton out, he just hauls off, and lays that sucker up alongside that Turk’s head. Dropped him colder than a cucumber, but it broke the magazine, and nine millimeter rounds scattered all over the place. Took us near an hour to find them all.”
“Anyway, then this guy’s old lady comes flying across the room, screaming like a banshee, and jumps right on Fritz’s back, gets him around the neck, and proceeds to put the choke on him. Fritz is turning blue, Hans is still back peddling, not wanting anything to do with a woman the likes of this one, so me, being a woman too, I figured to even the odds. I grabbed my military police club and tapped her on the head, just to get her attention. That gives Fritz the chance to toss her over his head, and she winds up on top of her hubby, who is just as cold as he was when he hit the floor. There’s blood and nine-millimeter rounds all over the place, people making for the exit like somebody yelled fire. I cuff the old lady, and Fritz cuffs the cucumber. The meat wagon comes and hauls them off. That’s about it, Sarge.”
Both Sergeant Peterson and the lieutenant were trying hard now to suppress smiles; Mary could really tell a story. Finally, he said to Mary, “You left out the fourteen stitches the guy’s wife got from your tap on her head.”
“Fourteen was it? No kidding? Well, she was choking Fritz; I mean he was code blue, I had to back him up. He would have done the same for me. Somebody make a complaint against me, Sarge?”
“No, as a matter of fact, Hans and Fritz requested you again tonight. They liked your style, but the next time you go to get somebody’s attention, do it a little lighter, will you? Back in the States, we’d be getting sued over that.”
Mary knew that to be the truth, but over here in Germany, there usually wasn’t a problem; it was pretty much a police state and, when the Polezei said jump, most people couldn’t wait to jump out of the way. “Okay, Sarge, sure. It was just a reflex, as blue as old Fritz was, I wasn’t sure I’d get a second lick at her, so I made the first one count.”
Sergeant Peterson let that pass, but he wasn’t done with her just yet and continued, “Sergeant Benton, that’s the fifth fight you’ve been in, in as many weeks. You’ve seen more action in the last six months than half the MPs in Germany all rolled into one.”
“Can’t help it, Sarge, things just happen to me. I always seem to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
“Yeah, sure. Oh, and by the way, Corporal Williams is getting out of the hospital tomorrow, they say he’ll only have a slight limp the rest of his life.”
“Who?”
“Corporal Williams, you remember him. He’s the marine whose leg you broke in two places a couple of months ago.”
“Aw, Sarge, you know that wasn’t me. That was Fritz again; he kicked my squad car door shut on that poor sap’s leg. I was just standing in front of my car, taking down some information for my report, and I heard a scream. I turned around and seen this guy thrashing around in the back of my squad car, like a chicken with its head cut off, and his leg hanging out the bottom of the door. Fritz was standing there with Hans chuckling, and when I asked the interpreter what had happened, he said that the guy tried to escape, and Fritz kicked the door shut on him. According to the interpreter, Fritz didn’t realize the guy’s leg was hanging out the door at the time he kicked it, or so he said. I was hot; you know it took me near twenty-four hours straight to get that report done.”
“Yeah, Benton, but it wasn’t real clear in your report just how that marine got his leg out the door in the first place. You had him handcuffed, with his hands behind his back, a seat belt on him, and the rear doors of squad cars only open from the outside. Funny how he got that door open and stuck his leg out like he did, huh?”
Mary lowered her voice a little, winked at the sergeant, and replied, “Just between us girls, Sarge, I think Fritz opened that door for him, and when he stuck his leg out, Fritz kicked the door shut just to be mean. That marine was a mean sucker anyway, Sarge, he beat his wife half to death, and it took three of us thirty minutes of wrestling around on his kitchen floor just to get the cuffs on him. I guess Fritz figured he needed a little payback, but honest, I had no part in it.”
Peterson replied deadpan, “Benton, you ought to write a book; you get into the weirdest situations I’ve ever heard of, and you always come out smelling like a rose.” Turning now to the rest of the MPs he finished, “Okay girls, let’s hit the streets, and try not to follow Sergeant Benton’s example.”
Mary took a seat in the front row of the briefing room. The rest of the fifteen members of 1st platoon were filtering in now, and she liked to be right up front. The briefing room wasn’t large, but it was adequate. It was furnished with a bunch of old school desks, the type with a writing area that folded down on the side when not in use. The walls were covered with a plaster stucco material painted white. Everything inside a military building seemed to be painted white, and everything on the outside seemed to be painted some shade of green. The military, especially the army, was in a real rut she decided.
She had no more taken her seat when the patrol supervisor strolled into the room. Sergeant First Class Peterson slammed his stack of folders on the single desk at the front of the room and got everyone’s attention. A second later, Lieutenant Marsh strolled in and Peterson yelled, “Attention!”
Now, anyone with half a brain knew that the lieutenant was going to come in right after the patrol supervisor, and that they should be ready for that eventuality, including Private First Class Johnson, but he was new and, Mary decided, not too smart. Johnson, contrary to everyone else in the room, had already pulled his writing platform up and dropped it into position across his lap. When the lieutenant came in everyone jumped up, but Johnson couldn’t get up, at least not all the way, and he made quite a picture trying to stand up with a school chair clinging to his lap. Not to mention the noise he made dragging the chair with him as he tried to stand.
The lieutenant and the patrol supervisor looked at Johnson and then at each other and just rolled their eyes in mutual disgust.
“As you were,” the lieutenant yelled, as Johnson thankfully stopped struggling and dropped back down to a sitting position, his chair letting out an almost human groan.
No one laughed, but it was a struggle not to and the smirks abounded. At a nod from the lieutenant, Sergeant Peterson commenced to give the briefing. “Okay folks, welcome to the night shift, the specialist is passing out the latest Al Qaeda hit list, and everyone gets a deck of the famous ‘Iraqi Most Wanted’ cards. The intelligence community thinks there may be one or two of them who slipped out at the end of the war through Syria and made it to Europe, so keep your eyes open.” As he spoke, one of the desk clerks moved among the MPs passing out packets to everyone.
The sergeant continued, “Benton.”
“Yes, Sergeant,” Mary answered.
“Tell us about the brawl you had last Saturday.”
“Wasn’t my brawl, Sarge, and it’s all in my report,” she replied, squirming slightly in her chair.
“Yeah, but we want to hear the details, your reports are good, very thorough, but the story loses something when you write it down; we like to hear you tell it first hand. You got a knack for it.”
Mary didn’t like being singled out like this, but she was fairly called and had no choice. She said simply, “It was a Turk.”
“So?”
“Well you’ve heard that old saying, Sarge, meaner than a Turk on a Saturday night. He was Turk, and it was Saturday night.”
The lieutenant tried to hide his smile as the sergeant persisted with a straight face, “Spill it, Benton.”
“Okay, well… we… that is, me and a couple of the Polezei, were making spot checks of the downtown bars. We hit the Tangerine about ten and were just making a nice easy walk through, when all of a sudden this guy at the bar starts yelling and throwing glasses at the bar maid. I guess he took exception to something she said, well anyway, one of the Polezei, German Police for the benefit of PFC Johnson who probably doesn’t know that’s what Polezei stands for.” Hesitating a few seconds with a broad smile, just for effect, she then continued, “So as I was saying, one of the Polezei, Hans Schmidt, he walks up to the guy, grabs him by the left arm, and spins him around. Now this guy’s on crutches, got a full leg cast on his right leg clean up to his hip. He pivots with the crutch under his left arm and, lo and behold, with his right hand he hauls a knife out of that cast. I mean a real down-to-earth knife, not no Cracker-Jack-box pen knife; this knife was fourteen inches long if it was an inch. He starts whipping that baby around right at Hans’ face and old Hans, he starts back peddling, to the tune of four steps a second, but this guy hobbles right after him. You could hear the wind whistling around the blade of that knife every time he made a pass at Hans’ head with that baby. The rest of the patrons are scattering like a grenade just landed in the middle of the place.”
“Hans’ partner, Fritz, sees the knife come out and moves in behind this Turk. Fritz makes a grab for that spring loaded rubber baton those Polezei carry in a pocket on their right leg, you know the one I mean, the one that they swing once, but it hits you four times before it stops. Well, anyway, he must have missed and got the wrong pocket ‘cause he comes up with his spare machine pistol clip; you’ve seen ‘em, twelve inches long, and they hold a hundred rounds of nine millimeters. Well, instead of puttin’ it back and getting the baton out, he just hauls off, and lays that sucker up alongside that Turk’s head. Dropped him colder than a cucumber, but it broke the magazine, and nine millimeter rounds scattered all over the place. Took us near an hour to find them all.”
“Anyway, then this guy’s old lady comes flying across the room, screaming like a banshee, and jumps right on Fritz’s back, gets him around the neck, and proceeds to put the choke on him. Fritz is turning blue, Hans is still back peddling, not wanting anything to do with a woman the likes of this one, so me, being a woman too, I figured to even the odds. I grabbed my military police club and tapped her on the head, just to get her attention. That gives Fritz the chance to toss her over his head, and she winds up on top of her hubby, who is just as cold as he was when he hit the floor. There’s blood and nine-millimeter rounds all over the place, people making for the exit like somebody yelled fire. I cuff the old lady, and Fritz cuffs the cucumber. The meat wagon comes and hauls them off. That’s about it, Sarge.”
Both Sergeant Peterson and the lieutenant were trying hard now to suppress smiles; Mary could really tell a story. Finally, he said to Mary, “You left out the fourteen stitches the guy’s wife got from your tap on her head.”
“Fourteen was it? No kidding? Well, she was choking Fritz; I mean he was code blue, I had to back him up. He would have done the same for me. Somebody make a complaint against me, Sarge?”
“No, as a matter of fact, Hans and Fritz requested you again tonight. They liked your style, but the next time you go to get somebody’s attention, do it a little lighter, will you? Back in the States, we’d be getting sued over that.”
Mary knew that to be the truth, but over here in Germany, there usually wasn’t a problem; it was pretty much a police state and, when the Polezei said jump, most people couldn’t wait to jump out of the way. “Okay, Sarge, sure. It was just a reflex, as blue as old Fritz was, I wasn’t sure I’d get a second lick at her, so I made the first one count.”
Sergeant Peterson let that pass, but he wasn’t done with her just yet and continued, “Sergeant Benton, that’s the fifth fight you’ve been in, in as many weeks. You’ve seen more action in the last six months than half the MPs in Germany all rolled into one.”
“Can’t help it, Sarge, things just happen to me. I always seem to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
“Yeah, sure. Oh, and by the way, Corporal Williams is getting out of the hospital tomorrow, they say he’ll only have a slight limp the rest of his life.”
“Who?”
“Corporal Williams, you remember him. He’s the marine whose leg you broke in two places a couple of months ago.”
“Aw, Sarge, you know that wasn’t me. That was Fritz again; he kicked my squad car door shut on that poor sap’s leg. I was just standing in front of my car, taking down some information for my report, and I heard a scream. I turned around and seen this guy thrashing around in the back of my squad car, like a chicken with its head cut off, and his leg hanging out the bottom of the door. Fritz was standing there with Hans chuckling, and when I asked the interpreter what had happened, he said that the guy tried to escape, and Fritz kicked the door shut on him. According to the interpreter, Fritz didn’t realize the guy’s leg was hanging out the door at the time he kicked it, or so he said. I was hot; you know it took me near twenty-four hours straight to get that report done.”
“Yeah, Benton, but it wasn’t real clear in your report just how that marine got his leg out the door in the first place. You had him handcuffed, with his hands behind his back, a seat belt on him, and the rear doors of squad cars only open from the outside. Funny how he got that door open and stuck his leg out like he did, huh?”
Mary lowered her voice a little, winked at the sergeant, and replied, “Just between us girls, Sarge, I think Fritz opened that door for him, and when he stuck his leg out, Fritz kicked the door shut just to be mean. That marine was a mean sucker anyway, Sarge, he beat his wife half to death, and it took three of us thirty minutes of wrestling around on his kitchen floor just to get the cuffs on him. I guess Fritz figured he needed a little payback, but honest, I had no part in it.”
Peterson replied deadpan, “Benton, you ought to write a book; you get into the weirdest situations I’ve ever heard of, and you always come out smelling like a rose.” Turning now to the rest of the MPs he finished, “Okay girls, let’s hit the streets, and try not to follow Sergeant Benton’s example.”
