by James Jones
In the corner of the quad at the megaphone, among all the men running back and forth, the guard bugler was blowing The Charge.
“What the fuck are you doing,” Warden bellowed.
The bugler stopped and looked up and shrugged sheepishly. “You got me,” he yelled back. “Colonel’s orders.” He went on blowing.
“Here they come, Pete!” Grenelli hollered. “Here comes one!” His voice went off up into falsetto excitedly.
It was a single, coming in from the northeast on the down leg of the 8. The voice of every gun on the roofs rose to challenge his passage, blending together in one deafening roar like the call of a lynch mob. Down below, the running men melted away and the bugler stopped blowing and ran back under the E Company porch. Warden screwed the cap back on his bottle and ran crouching over to Pete’s chimney and swung around to fire, again with no rest. His burst curved off in tracer smoke lines well behind the swift-sliding ship that was up, over, and then gone. Got to take more lead.
“Wouldnt you know it?” Pete said tragically. “Shot clear behind that one.
“Here, Mike,” he said. “Move back a little and make room for the 1st/Sgt so he can fire off the corner for a rest. You can set the bottle down right here, Milt. Here,” he said, “I’ll take it for you.”
“Have a drink first,” Warden said happily.
“Okay.” Pete wiped his soot-rimmed mouth with the back of his sleeve. There were soot flecks on his teeth when he grinned. “Did you see what they done to our room?”
“I seen what they done to your locker,” Warden said.
From down below came the voice of the bugle blowing The Charge again.
“Listen to that stupid bastard,” Warden said. “Colonel Delbert’s orders.”
“I dint think the Colonel’d be up this early,” Pete said.
“Old Jake must of served his first hitch in the Cavalry,” Warden said.
“Say, listen,” Grenelli said, “listen, Pete. When you going to let me take it a while?”
“Pretty soon,” Pete said, “pretty soon.”
“Throw your empty clips down in the Compny Yard, you guys!” Warden yelled around the roof. “Throw your empty clips down in the Compny Yard. Pass it along, you guys.”
Down along the roof men yelled at each other to throw the empties down into the yard and went right on piling them up beside them.
“God damn it!” Warden roared, and moved out from behind the chimney. He walked down along behind them like a quarterback bolstering up his linemen. “Throw them clips down, goddam you Frank. Throw your clips down, Teddy.”
“Come on, Pete,” Grenelli said behind him. “Let me take it a while now, will you?”
“I got firsts on it,” Mikeovitch said.
“Like hell!” Grenelli said. “Its my gun, aint it?”
“Shut up,” Pete said. “Both of you. You’ll both get your chance. Pretty soon.”
Warden was behind the Chief and Reedy Treadwell on the inside edge when the next ones came in, a double flying in in echelon from the northeast like the single, and he dropped down beside them. Down below the bugler stopped blowing and ran back in under the E Company porch again.
Straight across from Warden on the roof of the Headquarters Building there were only two men up. One of them he recognized as M/Sgt Big John Deterling, the enlisted football coach. Big John had a .30 caliber water-cooled with no tripod, holding it cradled in his left arm and firing it with his right. When he fired a burst, the recoil staggered him all over the roof.
The winking noseguns of the incoming planes cut two foot-wide swathes raising dust across the quad and up the wall and over the D Co roof like a wagon road through a pasture. Warden couldnt fire at them from laughing at Big John Deterling on the Headquarters roof. This time Big John came very near to falling down and spraying the roof. The other man up over there had wisely put the chimney between him and Big John, instead of between him and the planes.
“Look at that son of a bitch,” Warden said, when he could stop laughing.
Down below the loading detail dived out to pick up the clips in the lull, and the bugler ran back to the megaphone.
“I been watching him,” Chief grinned. “The son of a bitch is drunk as a coot. He was down to Mrs Kipfer’s last night when me and Pete was there.”
“I hope his wife dont find out,” Warden said.
“He ought to have a medal,” Chief said still laughing.
“He probly will,” Warden grinned.
As it turned out, later, he did. M/Sgt John L Deterling; the Silver Star; for unexampled heroism in action.
Another V of three flashed sliding in from the southeast and Warden turned and ran back to Pete’s chimney as everybody opened up with a joyous roar. Firing with the BAR forearm resting on his hand on the chimney corner, he watched his tracers get lost in the cloud of tracers around the lead plane spraying the nose, spraying the cockpit and on back into the tail assembly. The plane shivered like a man trying to get out from under a cold shower and the pilot jumped in his seat twice like a man tied to a hot stove. They saw him throw up his arms helplessly in a useless try to ward it off, to stop it pouring in on him. There was a prolonged cheer. A hundred yards beyond the quad, with all of them watching now in anticipatory silence, the little Zero began to fall off on one wing and slid down a long hill of air onto one of the goalposts of the 19th Infantry football field. It crashed into flames. A vast happy college-yell cheer went up from the quad and helmets were thrown into the air and backs were slapped as if our side had just made a touchdown against Notre Dame.
Then, as another V of three came in from the northeast, there was a wild scramble for helmets.
“You got him, Pete!” Grenelli yelled, bobbing around on the bucking tripod leg, “you got him!”
“Got him hell,” Pete said without stopping firing. “Nobody’ll ever know who got that guy.”
“Hey, Milt!”
In the lull, Chief Choate was yelling at him from the roof edge.
“Hey, Milt! Somebody’s yellin for you down below.”
“Comin up!” Warden bawled. Behind him as he ran, Grenelli was pleading:
“Come on, Pete. Let me take it for a while now. You got one already.”
“In a minute,” Pete said. “In a minute. I just want to try one more.”
Looking down over the wall, Warden saw Lt Ross standing in the yard looking up angrily, large bags under his eyes, a field cap on his uncombed head, his pants still unbuttoned, and his shoes untied and his belt unbuckled. He started buttoning his pants without looking down.
“What the hell are you doing up there, Sergeant?” he yelled. “Why arent you down here taking care of the Company? We’re going to move out for the beach in less than an hour. Its probably alive with Japs already.”
“It’s all taken care of,” Warden yelled down. “The men are rolling full field packs right now in the squadroom.”
“But we’ve got to get the kitchen and supply ready to move, too, goddam it,” Lt Ross yelled up.
“The kitchen is bein pack,” Warden yelled down. “I gave Stark the orders and he’s doing it now. Should be all ready in fifteen minutes.”
“But the supply—” Lt Ross started to yell up.
“They’re loading clips and belts for us,” Warden yelled down. “All they got to do is carry the water-cooled MGs for the beach out to the trucks and throw in Leva’s old field repair kit and they ready to go.
“And,” he yelled, “they makin coffee and sandwidges in the kitchen. Everything’s all taken care of. Whynt you get a BAR and come on up?”
“There arent any left,” Lt Ross yelled up angrily.
“Then get the hell under cover,” Warden yelled down as he looked up. “Here they come.”
Lt Ross dived under the porch for the supplyroom as another single came blasting in from the southeast and the roaring umbrella of fire rose from the roofs to engulf it. It seemed impossible that he could fly right through it and c
ome out untouched. But he did.
Right behind him, but flying due north along Waianae Avenue and the Hq Building, came another plane; and the umbrella swung that way without even letting go of its triggers.
The plane’s gastank exploded immediately into flames that engulfed the whole cockpit and the plane veered off down on the right wing, still going at top speed. As the belly and left under-wing came up into view, the blue circle with the white star in it showed plainly in the bright sunlight. Then it was gone, off down through some trees that sheared off the wings, and the fuselage, still going at top speed, exploded into some unlucky married officer’s house quarters with everyone watching it.
“That was one of ours!” Reedy Treadwell said in a small still voice. “That was an American plane!”
“Tough,” Warden said, without stopping firing at the new double coming in from the northeast. “The son of a bitch dint have no business there.”
After the Jap double had flashed past, unscathed, Warden turned back and made another circuit up and down the roof, his eyes screwed up into that strained look of having been slapped in the face that he sometimes got, and that made a man not want to look at him.
“Be careful, you guys,” he said. Up the roof. Down the roof. “That last one was one of ours. Try and be careful. Try and get a look at them before you shoot. Them stupid bastards from Wheeler liable to fly right over here. So try and be careful after this.” Up the roof. Down the roof. The same strained squint was in his voice as was in his eyes.
“Sergeant Warden!” Lt Ross roared up from down below. “God damn it! Sergeant Warden!”
He ran back to the roof edge. “What now?”
“I want you down here, god damn it!” Lt Ross yelled up. He had his belt buckled and his shoes tied now and was smoothing back his hair with his fingers under his cap. “I want you to help me get this orderly room ready to move out! You have no business up there! Come down!”
“Goddam it, I’m busy!” Warden yelled. “Get Rosenberry. Theres a goddam war on, Lieutenant.”
“I’ve just come from Col Delbert,” Lt Ross yelled up. “And he has given orders we’re to move out as soon as this aerial attack is over.”
“G Compny’s ready to move now,” Warden yelled down. “And I’m busy. Tell that goddam Henderson to send up some clips and belts.”
Lt Ross ran back under the porch and then ran back out again. This time he had a helmet on.
“I told him,” he yelled up.
“And tell Stark to send us up some coffee.”
“God damn it!” Lt Ross raged up at him. “What is this? a Company picnic? Come down here, Sergeant! I want you! Thats an order! Come down here immediately! You hear me? thats an order! All Company Commanders have orders from Col Delbert personally to get ready to move out within the hour!”
“Whats that?” Warden yelled. “I cant hear you.”
“I said, we’re moving out within the hour.”
“What?” Warden yelled. “What? Look out,” he yelled; “here they come again!”
Lt Ross dove for the supplyroom and the two ammo carriers ducked their heads back down through the hatch.
Warden ran crouching back to Pete’s chimney and rested his BAR on the corner and fired a burst at the V of three that flashed past.
“Get that goddam ammo up here!” he roared at them in the hatchway.
“Milt!” Chief Choate yelled. “Milt Warden! They want you downstairs.”
“You cant find me,” Warden yelled. “I’ve gone someplace else.”
Chief nodded and relayed it down over the edge. “I cant find him, Lootenant. He’s gone off someplace else.” He listened dutifully down over the edge and then turned back to Warden. “Lt Ross says tell you we’re moving out within the hour,” he yelled.
“You cant find me,” Warden yelled.
“Here they come!” Grenelli yelled from the tripod.
They did not move out within the hour. It was almost another hour before the attack was all over. And they did not move out until early afternoon three and a half hours after the attack was over. G Company was ready, but it was the only company in the Regiment that was.
Warden stayed up on the roof, by one subterfuge or another, until the attack was over. Lt Ross, it turned out, stayed down in the supplyroom and helped load ammunition. The Regimental fire umbrella claimed one more positive, and two possibles that might have been hit by the 27th and already going down when they passed over the quad. Stark himself, personally, with two of the KPs, brought them up coffee once, and then still later brought up coffee and sandwiches. In gratitude for which, Pete Karelsen let him take over the MG for a while.
After it was all over, and the dead silence which no sound seemed able to penetrate reigned, they all smoked a last cigaret up on the roof and then, dirty-faced, red-eyed, tired happy and let-down, they trooped down reluctantly into the new pandemonium that was just beginning below and went to roll their full field packs. Nobody had even been scratched. But they could not seem to get outside of the ear-ringing dead silence. Even the pandemonium of moving out could not penetrate it.
Warden, instead of rolling his pack, went straight to the orderly room. In the three and a half hours before they finally left he was in the orderly room all the time, getting it packed up. Lt Ross, whose Company was the only one that was ready ahead of time, had already forgotten to be angry and came in and helped him. So did Rosenberry. Warden had plenty of time and to spare, to pack the orderly room. But he did not have any time left to roll his full field pack or change into a field uniform. Or, if he did, he forgot it.
The result of this was that he had to sleep in the popcorn vender’s wagon at Hanauma Bay without blankets for five days before he could get back up to Schofield to get his stuff, and he would have welcomed even a woolen OD field-uniform shirt. He did not see how the hell he could have possibly have forgotten that.
One by one, each company’s consignment of trucks lined up before its barracks in a double file and settled down to wait. One by one, the platoons of troops filed out into their company yards and sat down on their packs holding their rifles and looked at the waiting trucks. The Regiment moved as a unit.
No two companies were going to the same place. And when they got there each company would be a separate unit on its own. But one company, that was ready, did not leave out by itself for its beach positions ahead of the other companies, that were not ready. The Regiment moved as a unit.
Everywhere trucks. Everywhere troops sitting on their packs. The quad filled up with trucks until even the Colonel’s jeep could not worm through between them. The yards filled up with troops until even the Colonel’s adjutants and messengers could not work through them. There was much swearing and sweaty disgust. The Regiment moved as a unit.
And in the G Co orderly room, Warden chortled to himself smugly, as he worked.
Once, when Lt Ross had gone to the supply room, Maylon Stark stuck his head in at the door. “The kitchen truck’s loaded and ready to roll.”
“Right,” Warden said, without looking up.
“I want you to know I think you done a hell of a swell job,” Stark said reluctantly strangledly. “It’ll be two hours, anyway, before any other kitchen in this outfit is ready; and some of them probably have to stay behind to get loaded and come down later.”
“You done a good job yourself,” Warden said, still not looking up.
“It wasnt me,” Stark said. “It was you. And I just want you to know I think you done a hell of a job.”
“Okay,” Warden said, “thanks,” and went on working without looking up.
He rode down in the jeep at the head of the Company’s convoy with Lt Ross, Weary Russell driving. There was terrific traffic. The roads were alive with trucks and taxis as far as the eye could see, bumper to bumper. The trucks were taking them down, to beach positions; the taxis were taking them up, to Schofield, where their outfits would already be gone. Recons and jeeps slithered in and out among the long
lines of trucks, but the big two-and-a-halfs could only lumber on, a few feet at a time, stopping when the truck in front stopped in back of the truck in front of him, waiting to move on until the truck in front of them moved on a little in back of the truck in front of him.
The trucks had been stripped of their tarps and one man with his BAR or machinegun mounted over the cab rode standing on the truckbed wall. Helmeted heads were poked above the naked ribs watching the sky like visitors inspecting the dinosaur’s skeleton in the Smithsonian Institute.
In the jeep, riding up and down haranguing on the road shoulder alongside the Company’s column, Warden saw them all, a lot of times. Their faces were changed and they did not look the same any more. It was somewhat the same look as Stark had had in the messhall, only the drunkenness was evaporating out of it leaving only the hard set of the dry plaster. Out here on the highway, lost among hundreds of other outfits, the idea was not only clearer but bigger, much bigger, than back at your home barracks in your own quad. Chief Choate, riding with a BAR up, looked down at him from above his truck cab and Warden looked back.
They had all left everything behind, civilian clothes, garrison shoes and uniforms, campaign hat collections, insignia collections, photograph albums, private papers. To hell with all that. This was war. We wont need that. They brought nothing but the skeletal field living equipment, and the only man who packed in anything comfortable to bring with him was Pete Karelsen. Pete had been in France.
Gradually, foot by foot, the trucks moved on down toward Honolulu and whatever waited on the beaches. Up till now it had been a day off, it had been fun.
Pearl Harbor, when they passed it, was a shambles. Wheeler Field had been bad, but Pearl Harbor numbed the brain. Pearl Harbor made a queasiness in the testicles. Wheeler Field was set back quite a ways from the road, but parts of Pearl Harbor were right on the highway. Up till then it had been a big lark, a picnic; they had fired from the roofs and been fired at from the planes and the cooks had served them coffee and sandwiches and the supply detail had brought them up ammo and they had got two or three planes and only one man in the whole Regiment had been hit (with a .50 caliber in the fleshy part of his calf, didnt even hit a bone, he walked up to the dispensary by himself), and he was getting himself a big Purple Heart. Almost everybody had a bottle and they all had been half-drunk anyway when it started and it had all been a sort of super-range-season with live targets to shoot at. The most exciting kind: Men. But now the bottles were fast wearing off and there was no immediate prospect of getting any more and there were no live targets to shoot at. Now they were thinking. Why, it might be months—even years—before they could get hold of a bottle again! This was a big war.
