From Here to Eternity

by James Jones

  “Right,” Jimmy hollered, a grin flashing dazzlingly out of the dark face. “Four beer for four queer.” He brought them down. “Compny smokers you outfit tonight, boy. You no fight?”

  “Not me, Jim,” he grinned happily. “I’m scared I’ll git a caulyflower ear.”

  “Boy, you a hot one,” Jimmy laughed, wiping his face with a hand like a deep-smoke-cured ham. “You no kid me, boy. I hear you just take at big Jewboy white hope over, eh?”

  “Is that the story?” he grinned. “Way I heard it, he took me over.” He could feel through the back of his neck several men pausing to look. Somebody whispered something. It must have spread fast. He did not look around.

  “Hah,” Jimmy grinned. “Listen, boy, I see you fight em last year in a Bowl. You good boy. At Jewboy big an he hit hard but he no got the heart. Jewboys never got the heart. You got the heart, eh?”

  “Is that the way it is?” he grinned modestly. “How about my four beers.”

  “Right here, boy. Sure, way it is,” Jimmy said. “Those Jewboy they better learn who to pick on, eh? I fight again next mont downtown myself, kid.”

  The other men were still watching.

  “Where at?” Prew said happily, feeling very esoteric. “The Civic?”

  “Ats it. Six round semi-windup. Win at one, get a main go. Win a main go, take big trip Stateside to fight What you think of him, eh? Quit this goddam job.”

  “Another regular Dado Marino, eh?” Prew grinned.

  Jimmy exploded in laughter and swelled his big chest that almost filled up the bar. “Ats me. Make good flyweight-bantamweight, eh?” he laughed. “No,” he said seriously. “Go Stateside, like grandfather. Last name Kaliponi, you know? Jimmy Kaliponi. Name for grandfather take big trip Stateside in old days. Hawaiian language, no f, no r. Cant say California, say Kaliponi. Got to win fight, go Kaliponi like grandfather, live up to name, see it over there, no mo hila-hila, eh?” he grinned. “I like at Stateside, boy, what I hear about em.”

  “I’ll come down and see you lay him out,” Prew grinned.

  “Good old Civic,” Jimmy said. “Lots of fight. Old Dixie use to fight Civic all a time. Remember old Dixie? My good frien, Dixie. Plenty good boy, eh?”

  Prew felt a big hollow open up suddenly under the happiness and suck it down out of him. He reached for the beers.

  “Yeah,” he said, “plenty good boy.”

  Jimmy was shaking his head, the big laughing face suddenly sad. “Too plenty bad about Dixie go blind like that.” It was the first time he had ever mentioned it to Prew. “You have tough time, boy, tough luck. You good frien like that. Too plenty dam bad, boy.”

  “Yeah, yeah, too bad,” Prew said. “Gimme my beers.”

  “Here you go.” Jimmy shoved them to him. “No pay. On me this time.” The big sad face was just as suddenly laughing again. “I sure glad to see you take at white hope Jewboy over, eh? Godam Jews bad as godam Germans. Just the same. Try to own whole world. But us America no take at stuff, eh? We got the heart. Jewboys and Germans no got the heart”

  “Yeah, yeah,” Prew said, backing out of the press with the beers. “Jewboys and Germans no got the heart,” he said, repeating it in a low voice, as if to himself. Jewboys and Germans, and Wops, and Spiks, and Boston Irishes, and Hunkies, and Guinies, and Niggers, no got the heart. He turned back toward the table feeling a little sick now in the hollowness of his stomach. He didnt fight Bloom because Bloom was a Jew. Why did they always have to make a racial issue of it all the time?

  Behind him he heard Jimmy holler, “Right! Two beer for two queer.” It was Jimmy Kaliponi’s favorite joke. Wait till Jimmy Kaliponi got to go Stateside, if he won his main go, and found that niggers no got the heart either, Stateside. Would that surprise him, Jimmy Kaliponi. Maybe he would even try to explain the difference between niggers and Hawaiians to them, eh? You explain, eh? You tell them, eh? Or maybe he would come back home quick, Jimmy Kaliponi, where only Jewboys and Germans no got the heart.

  Walking to the table across the carpet of rich grass, he knew he would have to look Bloom up and explain to Bloom he did not fight Bloom because Bloom was a Jew. He would do it tonight, right now, except Bloom would be waiting in the gym to go on for his fight. After the fights, then. Only Bloom would be pooped and in the yelling gym right up until he went to bed, or else out celebrating with some of the punchies, if Bloom won. Tomorrow then. He would do it tomorrow. He would explain it to Bloom.

  He had fought Bloom because he had had to fight somebody, or else bite himself and go mad, the same reason Bloom had fought him, two men who were on edge and ridden raw, and they got in a fight for the amusement of all concerned, except themselves, and fought each other, and that was all, him and Bloom who probably had more in common than any other two men in the Company, except maybe Angelo Maggio, fighting each other, because it was so much easier than trying to find the real enemy to fight, because the real enemy the common enemy was so hard to find since you did not know what it was to look for it and could not see it to get your hands on it, so you fought each other, which was easier, and also made it easier to put up with the real enemy the common enemy, whatever it was, that you could not find, but not because Bloom was a Jew or you a something else.

  He had not thought about Dixie Wells for a long time now. He had almost forgotten Dixie Wells. Who would ever have thought he could have ever forgotten Dixie Wells! He would have to explain to Bloom.

  Then he knew, hollowly, that he could not explain to Bloom. Because Bloom himself would always firmly believe it was because he was a Jew. And nothing he could ever say or do would ever convince Bloom it was not because he was a Jew, and because Prewitt hated Jews. And it was pointless to try to explain to Bloom, tonight, or tomorrow, or the next day, or any other time.

  He looked down at the Chief who was peering up at him out of the forest of bottles and cans like a platoon scout peeking out of the woods, the big mild moonface that was rocklike in unshakeability and that was redblack with layer after layer of tropic burn from every foreign Department of the US Army, laid over the dark Choctaw blood that was there from the beginning, the same face that all over the world where US soldiers congregated to discuss sports was always mentioned with reverent awe, that held alike indifferently the former heavyweight championship of Panama and the current still unbroken Philippine record for the 100 yard dash and that was running down into beerfat now, but still as well known and idolized by Islands sports fans as Lou Gehrig was back in the States, and who was now steadily and efficiently drinking himself into his regular nightly stupor. What would his ecstatic worshippers at the YMCA say if they could see him now?

  He sat down at the table with the beers, looking at the great ponderous frame, so cumbersome in the frail chair but that could be so swift and accurate on the ball diamond or basketball floor or track field or football gridiron. How many times had he watched with the thrill of seeing a Pacific sunset as the big figure leaned lithely into a throw from shortstop to beat the runner at first by a fraction?

  “Chief,” he said urgently. “Chief, whats the story?”

  “Hunh?” Chief Choate grunted blandly. “What story? Story on what?”

  “I dont know,” Prew shrugged. He was embarrassed. He hunted frantically in his mind. “The story on Warden,” he said lamely, as if that were the only thing that could explain it. “Whats the deal with The Warden, Chief? I cant figure him. What makes him like he is, anyway?”

  “Warden?” Chief Choate said. He looked out at the dark street through the white screen of latticework, as if fumbling in his mind clumsily for what the other wanted. “Warden? I dont know. Nothing especial I know of, why?”

  “Oh, I dont know,” Prew said, lamely, beginning already now to curse himself for a fool. “I cant figure him, thats all,” he said. “He was our Staff in A when I was in the Corps, before he got his First. I seen him around a lot then. He can be the meanest man I ever seen, and next minute he stick his neck clear out to get you out of a j
am he helped to get you into.”

  “Yeah?” said Chief Choate awkwardly, “he does, dont he?” He was still staring out. “He’s a hard one to figure, all right, I guess. All I know, he’s the best kicker in the Regmint. I wouldnt be surprised he’s the best one on the Post. You dont see many Firsts like him no more.” Chief Choate grinned bitterly. “They are a vanishing race,” he said.

  Prew nodded eagerly lamely. “Thats what I mean,” he persisted, now that he was into it. “Sometimes I feel like I could understand a lot of things if I could understand The Warden. Sometimes I—If he was a plain out and out son of a bitch like Haskins in E, you could figure him. I know a rotten top like that when I was in Myer; meanest bastard living; liked to hurt people; like to see them squirm. I clerked for him a while and finally quit and transferred out.”

  “Yeah?” Chief Choate said with easy interest. “I dint know you ever pushed a pen, Prew.”

  “Not many people do,” Prew said shortly. “I got it kept off my Service Record and Form 20 with the clerk in that outfit, so nobody’d know and draft me back into it ever.” He paused. “I learnt myself typin out a book in the Post Liberry, I guess I was huntin, lookin around for somethin,” he said. Then doggedly he came back. “But you see what I mean. This guy I’m tellin you about was just mean through and through. He couldnt handle men and he hated them because he cou’nt, see? You can figure him. He got his rating ass kissing, and he was always scared there was a browner nose than his around someplace. Easy to figure.”

  “Yeah,” Chief Choate said. He nodded his great head slowly, listening respectfully, trying hard. “I know guys like that when I come here. I know them here.”

  “But that aint the story with The Warden, though,” Prew said. “I dont feel he’s bein mean. I got a kind of funny feelin about him. A kind of—weird feelin, you know?”

  Chief nodded. “Some guys is just bornd unlucky,” he said slowly. “I personally figure Warden is one of them guys.”

  “How do you mean, unlucky?”

  “Well, its hard to explain,” Chief Choate said restlessly.

  Prew waited.

  “You take me,” Chief said, “for instance. I was a kid on the reservation. Bornd and raised there. And I wanted to be a jockstrap. The worst way I wanted to be one. Jim Thorpe was my idol. I use to read everything about him I could find. And I listened to the stories they all told about him. He was a hero to the people. And I thought Jim Thorpe was wonderful, and I wanted to be just like him, see?”

  Prew nodded. These were things he had never heard before, nor anybody else he knew of. Maybe there was something here, maybe here was—something. Important.

  Chief emptied off a can with a long swallow and set it back on the table carefully with sausage fingers among the forest. “Well, they kicked him out of the Olympic Game,” he said slowly. “After he’d won damn near every medal they had. They kicked him out on a technicality. They wouldnt even let him keep his medals. Then I seen him playin them wild Indians in them western movies. You see what I mean?”

  Prew nodded, watching the big calm face look off across the yard.

  “I got bigger,” Chief said, “I wanted to go to college and jockstrap. But I dint even have no highschool. And besides, my old man dint have enough dough to keep the fambly in levis. And I couldnt get no scholarship. How could I get a scholarship?

  “And there was Jim Thorpe, playing Indians in western movies for a livin.” He shrugged his great shoulders and it was like a small earthquake in the forest on the table. “He was probly the greatest jockstrap this country ever had,” he hazarded shyly. “Well, thats just the way it is. Thats the way things go, see? Thats life. Well, could you see me wearin buckskin pants and warpaint and a big old feather bonnet? runnin around yelling with a tommyhawk? Well, neither could I. I’d feel like a goddam ass. The only gadgets like that I ever even seen was all shipped down from a factory in Wisconsin to the Trading Post to sell to tourists. I’d feel like it was a . . . I’d feel ashamed.

  “So I shipped into the army, where jockstrappin would do me some good and live easy. It dont bother me none. You see what I mean?”

  “Yeah,” Prew said, his grin bitter as the edge of a razor.

  “Well, with me, thats okay. I got no complaints.” Chief looked good-humoredly around the smokedrifting talkhumming lawn. The group of recruits in shiny uniforms were singing now that they would drink your goddam Saki and would fuck your black Kanaky but that they would not come back to Wahoo any more, the EM8s version of the Regimental song. Chief grinned, and looked around over the time hallowed, twenty year old Beer Garden.

  “You know where the words Dogface and Dog Soldier come from?” he said suddenly. “They come from the old Cheyenne War Society in the Plains Wars, they called themselves Dog Soldiers. The Cavalry took it from them.”

  “No,” Prew said. “I didn’t know that.”

  “Well,” Chief said, “thats where we got them.” He looked around the place again. “And I bet not ten men ever know where they came from.

  “I like to take things pretty much like they come,” he said. “Thats the way it is, then thats the way I am, see? I do what I can, and what I cant, I dont worry about. I live easy and I figure I got nothin much to bitch about.

  “But Warden’s differnt. They’s something eatin him up inside. Its like he’s got a fire in him that bums him up, and ever now and then it’ll pop up into his eyes. If you ever watched him, you see it. Warden dont belong in the Army.”

  “Well, why the hell dont he get out then?” Prew said. “Nobody’s ast him to get in the Army and stay in it. If he dont like it, whynt he get out and get where he does belong.”

  Chief Choate looked at him levelly. “You know where he belongs?”

  Prew dropped his eyes. “Okay,” he said.

  “A man knows where he belongs is lucky, way I see it,” Chief Choate said. “Warden’s a good man, but he just dont belong in the Army. Pete Karelsen’s a good man, too, but he dont belong in the Army neither. I dont neither. Dynamite belongs in the Army.”

  “Okay,” Prew said again, “okay. But why does he want to ride me so much for. If he was mean, and really had it in for me, I could figure it. But somehow I always feel like he dont have nothing against me really.”

  “Maybe he’s trying to teach you somethin,” Chief said.

  “What?” Prew said.

  “What!” Chief said. “I dont know. How would I know what Warden’s tryin to teach you?” he said angrily embarrassedly. His perpetually placid face was still good-natured, but behind his eyes suddenly was the cold flat look of the Reservation Indian toward the white tourists who have come to watch his dances during their two week vacation. “Why the hell dont you ask The Warden, if you want to know so bad? Maybe he’ll tell you.”

  Prew grinned, his starched campaign hat pushed back to show his lank black hair that might have come from some forgotten Cherokee among his own Kentucky ancestors.

  “Snow me,” he grinned. “Snow me some more. Bury me deep.”

  Chief grinned. “I dont know,” he said mollified. “I dont know what he’s trying to teach you. And I dont think anybody’ll ever know, except maybe Warden, and maybe not him. Thats what I think. He’s just a wild son of a bitch. He ain’t got nothing against you personal, he’s the same way with everybody. Old Pete swears onct a week he’s gonna move out on him if he has to sleep in the squadroom even—but he never does.”

  “But if I could only just understand why,” Prew persisted. He was beginning to feel disgusted with it now, foolish with it. He wished now he had kept his stupid mouth shut. For a minute he had thought he was going to learn something, something important. But it all sifted through your fingers like sand and left you holding nothing.

  Chief Choate was looking vaguely out through the lattice toward the dim light of the PX lunchcounter lights across the street. “Warden’s one of them men who cant get killed,” he said with bearlike gentleness. “He was in the 15th when they seen the
ir action in the Settlement in Shanghai. I heard about it down in PI even. He was just . . . He got himself a Purple Heart and a DSC out of it, but you never knew it, did you? Aint many does. He’s just a wild man, thats all, cant find nothin to pin onto. When this next war comes, Warden will be right in there, standin up on the skyline, trying to get himself killed, but nothin will ever touch him. He’ll come right through in spite a hell nor high water, maddern, wildern, craziern ever. Thats just the way he is. Thats all I know. All I know is he’s the best soljer I ever saw.”

  Prew did not contradict him. He sat looking at him, feeling something, trying to feel something else.

  “What do you say we drink some beer?” Chief said. “I like beer.”

  “Thats the best idea yet,” Prew said, and hunched himself down over the beer cans Black Jimmy had insisted on setting him up to. It didnt make sense. He knew he would have to see Bloom tomorrow anyway, even if it wouldnt do any good. Something in what Chief Choate’d said, something unspoken in the garbled mess of the conversation, had made him know it. He had to try to explain it to Bloom. Maybe it wouldnt do any good, but he knew he had to try it.

  The fights got over early. The crowds from the smoker began to swell in through the lattice gates of the Beer Garden before it was even ten o’clock. There had been an unusual number of knockouts. All three of the G Company men had won their bouts, but everybody talked excitedly about Bloom. Bloom had won his main go with a TKO in the first round. Everybody had great hopes of Bloom. He had climbed in the ring with a broken nose, black eye, and unable to talk and scored a knockdown in the first half minute. Doc Dahl, the Regimental surgeon, had not wanted him to go on at all.

  “That boy knows which side his corporalcy is buttered on,” Chief Choate said without enthusiasm.

  “I’m glad he got to go on, though,” Prew said. “And I’m even gladder he won.”

  “He’s a horse,” the Chief said blandly. “A regular horse. Use to be one myself. He could do the same thing over again right now and not even feel it.”