by James Jones
Then he would remember he was not a thirty-year-man any more.
Chapter 46
PREWITT HAD BEEN gone two days when the 1st/Sgt of G Company came back from furlough.
It is an aged proverb in the Regular Army that guys come back from furlough in order to rest up, or otherwise they would have gone right on over the hill. And Milt Warden was no exception. He came in shakily after two days of earnest drunkenness, his prize $120 Brooks Bros, powder-blue tropical suit crumpled and dirty. Acting 1st/Sgt Baldy Dhom met him in the orderly room with the hoary joke that he was four hours late and already marked AWOL on the Morning Report.
Warden did not even bother to laugh. He had been falling-down slobbering drunk for two days, but it was not enough, and he would have preferred more. The two days’ drunk had come out of the admission that his ten-day idyll with his future wife had developed into a profound and absolute bust, and for an admission like that a man needed at least a week of it. Two days was not nearly enough. But then neither was it a pleasant thought to know your Company Administration was being strangled by the sausage fingers of a stupid ox like Baldy Dhom for fourteen days.
He had hardly collapsed himself into his swivel chair, still in his prize $120 Brooks Bros, powder-blue tropical suit, before Baldy was briefing him on the peculiarities of the new Company Commander. Baldy had not wanted the Company Administration any more than Warden had wanted him to have it.
Warden listened in bitter silence. Dynamite had put through the furlough the day before he left for Brigade, just like he promised, so that Warden had not even met 1st/Lt William L. Ross. He had not, in fact, known anything about him except that he was coming. Neither his rank nor his name nor that he was going to be Jewish. Typical, he told himself sourly, typical. The well known Warden luck. No sooner do I get rid of one screwball Jewboy who at least was decent enough to commit suicide than I get another one. Only this time its an officer. Company Commander, no less. And now I’ll have my tempermental Jewish race complexes right with me in my own orderly room, instead of in the rear rank. Jesus Christ.
Then, while he was still trying to digest that one, Baldy informed him of the next new development. Prewitt had been absent for two days.
“What!”
“Thats right,” Baldy said guiltily.
“Why, the son of a bitch wasnt even out of the Stockade yet when I left!”
“I know it. He come out three days after you took off. Acted meek as a lamb. He was ony back nine days, all told.”
“Well, Jesus Christ.”
Warden felt something stronger than the Jewish Problem come over him and displace the contemplation of Lt William L Ross. It was somewhat the same feeling you get watching a line squall moving across the sky and covering the face of the sun on a hot day with a wind-chill sense of rain.
“A hell of a fine mess you made of my orderly room, Baldy. Its pretty goddam bad when a man cant even go on a goddam furlough without having it all fall down on his head.”
“It wasnt my fault,” Baldy said lamely.
“No,” Warden said. Why in the name of Christ wasnt he informed Prewitt was coming out of the Stockade in three days? Did he have to do everything by himself in this outfit? “Well, have you dropped him for rations and picked it up on the Morning Report?”
“Well, no,” Baldy said uncomfortably, “not yet. You see—”
“What!”
“Well, you see—”
“What do you mean, not yet? My god how long do you need? He’s been gone two whole days, aint he?”
“Well now wait a minute,” Baldy said. “I’m tryin to explain. You see, Ross dont know a single soul in the Company by name yet, except for a few noncoms.”
“What the hell has that got to do with this?”
“Well,” Baldy said, “you see Chief Choate turn him in present for duty at Reveille the first morning. I dint know nothing about it till the next day.”
“All right, so what? Jesus Christ, Dhom,” he said painfully, “this is an Infantry Compny, not a goddam YMCA.”
“Well,” Baldy said uncomfortably, but stubbornly, “you was due in the next day. So I figure one day already whats one day more? The harms already done to the Morning Report.”
“Well of all the goddam ways to run an outfit.”
“Well,” Baldy said impassibly, “what the hell? This is your orderly room. I ony ride shotgun on it. And,” he said, “I figure he might even come back in of him own self before you got back.”
“Oh,” Warden said. “You figured he’d just come back.”
“Thats right.”
“Say, what the hells eating you?”
“Nothing, why?”
“Since when is Prewitt such a goddam good friend of yours?”
“He aint.”
“Then why the hell try to cover up for him?”
“I didnt. I just figured he’d probly come back.”
“But he didnt though, did he?”
“Nope,” Baldy admitted. “Not yet.”
“And you’re left holding the sack.”
Baldy shrugged massively and looked at him with the open innocence of a guilty man who knows he is safe just the same.
“Hell, First. I thought you’d be glad I waited for you to handle it.”
“Horse shit!” Warden hollered. “Now I’ll have to pick him up retroactive to the 16th—what month is this? October—retroactive to the 16th of October. How the hell you think thats going to look on the Morning Report?”
“I was ony trying to do you a favor,” Baldy said.
“Do me a favor hell!” Warden bellowed.
“Okay,” Warden said, he ran his fingers tearingly through his hair, “all right. Just tell me one thing. How’d you manage to keep it a secret from the rest of the Compny?”
“What do you mean the rest of the Compny?” Baldy asked blandly.
“Now dont tell me they didn’t even notice he was gone now?”
“I never thought about it,” Baldy said. “But I reckon they did. But you see, like I said, Ross dont know none of them. They dont owe Ross nothing, either. And you know feather-head Culpepper, he never pays no tension to nothing. I mean—”
“I see what you mean,” Warden cut in. “Just one other thing. How did Choate manage to get it past Ike Galovitch? Dont tell me Ike’s in on it too?”
“Well, thats another thing,” Baldy said. “I hant got to that yet. You see, Galovitch aint the platoon guide of the 2nd Platoon any more. Galovitch is been busted.”
“Busted,” Warden said.
Baldy nodded.
“Who busted him?”
“Ross.”
“What for?”
“Inefficiency.”
“Whatd he do?”
“Didnt do nothing.”
“You mean Ross just up and busted him? For nothing? Under a blanket charge of inefficiency?”
“Thats right,” Baldy said.
It was like pulling teeth out of an elephant, if an elephant had teeth. “But he must of done something, Baldy.”
Baldy shrugged. “Ross seen him give close order one day.”
“Well I’m a dirty bastard,” Warden said happily. “All right, who’d he make in his place?”
“Chief Choate.”
“Well now I am a dirty bastard,” Warden said happily.
Baldy seized the opening. “So you can see how I wunt know nothing about it. Who’d ever of thought Choate would turn him in Present? Would you, First?”
“Oh, no,” Warden said. “Oh, no. Of course not.”
“And you know how Champ Wilson is with his platoon. He never pays any mind to whats going on. Especially during training season. You can see how it wasnt my fault.”
“Oh, sure,” Warden said. “All right,” he said, “what else has happened.”
“Thats all, I guess,” Baldy said blandly and got up from his chair. He always looked uncomfortable when he had to sit in a chair. “You care if I take the rest of the morning o
ff?”
“Take the rest of the morning off,” Warden bawled. “What the hell for? What the hell did you do to rate a morning off?”
“Well,” Baldy said immovably, “its practicly noon already. Time I change uniforms and get out to the drillfield they be practicly ready to come in.” He paused in the doorway and looked back at Warden with a closed face. “Oh,” he said, as if just remembering. “Theres one other thing. You see the papers this morning?”
“You know I never read the goddam newspapers, Dhom.”
“Well,” Baldy said, looking at him, “Fatso Judson—you know? the Chief Guard of the Stockade?—he was killed the night before last down to the Log Cabin Bar and Grill. Somebody knife him in the alley.”
“Is that right,” Warden said. “And so what?”
“I thought you knew him,” Baldy said.
“I wouldnt know Fatso Judson from Buster Keaton. If I saw him in the middle of the street.”
“I thought sure you knew him,” Baldy said.
“Well I dont.”
“Then I guess thats my mistake,” Baldy said.
“It sure is.”
“Then I guess thats everything. I tole you Galovitch was busted, dint I?”
“You told me.”
“Then thats all,” Baldy said. “Do you care if I take the rest of the morning off?” he said. “I got to fix a bad faucet over to the house.”
“Listen Dhom,” Warden said in his official voice, taking a deep breath. He was conscious of the new clerk Rosenberry still sitting quietly at the filing table in the closet. “I dont know what kind of screwy ideas you got in your goddam head, but I know you’re old enough and got enough service to know you cant get by with carrying a goddam man present for duty when he’s over the goddam hill. Even in the goddam Air Corps they cant do that. It always comes out. I’ve had a lot of orderly rooms in my time, and I’ve seen some bad ones. But I never seen an orderly room get so completely 100% fuckedup in such a short goddam time. You may be worth a four stripe rating as a straight duty man. But as an acting first sergeant you stink. You wouldn’t make a good Pfc. You’re miserble. It’ll take me two months to straighten out my goddam orderly room and get it over your two weeks as first sergeant.”
He paused, for breath, and looked up at Baldy who was still standing impassively in the doorway. Warden tried to think up something else to say, something that would make it sound a little bit better, a little more stronger.
“I just want you to know I never seen such a lousy acting top kicker since I been in the goddam Army,” he said in summation. It still sounded thin.
Dhom did not say anything.
“Okay,” Warden said, “go ahead, take off. And you might as well take the rest of the morning off since you wouldn’t do no goddam work anyway.”
“Thanks, First,” Baldy said.
“Go to hell,” Warden said. Angrily he watched the big man go out, the massive shoulders brushing the door jamb on both sides, the huge head almost touching the top of the frame. Baldy Dhom, husband to a fat Filipino lardmama sow of a shrew, father to innumerable runny-nosed half-nigger brats, trainer to one of the worst boxing squads in the history of the Regiment, duty sergeant to one of the miserblest Companies. An old soldier with 18 yrs serv under his belt in his paunch along with 18 yrs beer, and condemned by his nigger family to foreign service for the rest of his natural life. The man who had loyally and sanguinarily led the pack in executing The Treatment that Dynamite had prescribed for Prewitt; and who now, just as loyally, led the attempt to cover up for him when he went over the hill and killed a man because of it. Probly he explained it to himself by some sentimental crap about us old-timers got to stick together, with so many draftees about to take over the Compny. And as he watched him go out, he watched with him, beyond and around him, the whole tacit network of the whole tacit conspiracy, nothing open, nothing said or admitted, just a sudden common movement toward a blindness of not seeing, a sudden tacit ignorance, all over the whole Company, and that you could no more fight than you could fight a solid mountain.
If you wanted to, he told himself. Which you do not. You dont like the Stockade any better than they do. Nobody likes the Stockade—unless they work for it.
Well, he thought, he finally did it. He finally went and did it. Just like you have always known he would do it.
“Rosenberry!” he bellowed.
“Yes, Sir?” Rosenberry said quietly. He was still sitting quietly at the closet table, still quietly filing things.
A quiet boy, Rosenberry, altogether a quiet boy. That was one of the reasons he’d picked him to replace Mazzioli. He had spent the whole last week before his furlough, after Mazzioli had been shifted to Regiment, in picking him.
“Rosenberry, I want you to get the hell over to Regiment and pick up today’s batch of useless memorandums and worthless circulars, while I straighten this goddam mess out, and come back and worthlessly file them.”
“I already have, Sergeant,” Rosenberry said quietly. “I’m filing them now.”
“Then get your ass over to personnel and tell Mazzioli I want Ike Galovitch’s Service Record. I cant stand to look at your goddam face.”
“Yes, Sir,” Rosenberry said quietly.
“And while you’re there, get the Service Record of every other man who’s changed status while I been gone.”
“Do you want Prewitt’s Service Record, too, Sergeant?” Rosenberry asked quietly.
“No-goddam-it-I-dont-want-Prewitt’s-Service-Record-too-Sergeant,” Warden bawled. “If I want Prewitt’s-Service-Record-too-Sergeant, I’d of told you, you stupid son of a bitch. Remember? you’re a soljer now, Rosenberry; not a goddam civilian.”
“Yes, Sir,” Rosenberry said quietly.
“A draftee maybe,” Warden temporized craftily.
“Yes, Sir,” Rosenberry said quietly.
“—But nevertheless still a soljer,” Warden roared triumphantly. “Just a plain goddam stinking mucky out-at-the-ass soljer. Who’s suppose to do what he’s told, when he’s told, without askin goddam civilian foolish questions. Get me?” he roared.
“Yes, Sir,” Rosenberry said quietly.
“All right then, move it. And dont call me Sir; only officers is called Sir. I’ll get Prewitt’s Service Record later on. When I need it. And when I’m goddamned good and ready.”
“Yes, Sir,” Rosenberry said quietly.
“I got to get the rest of this crap straightened out first, before I can even use Prewitt’s Service Record,” he explained in a somewhere near almost normal voice.
“Yes, Sir,” Rosenberry said quietly, already on his way out the door.
Warden watched him cross the quad, still moving quietly. You didnt fool him a goddam bit either. He was a quiet boy all right. A Jewish secret, quietly contained, and open to members only. Maybe not even open to members, he amended. He probly dont miss much, but you wont have to worry about him talking too much.
If only, he exploded suddenly, the goddamned ass wouldnt look at a man like he thought he was the Prophet Isaiah returned to earth from someplace. Rosenberry looked at him like he thought he was a frigging four-star General.
You couldnt blame him for that. That was the goddam draftee influence, that and the Officer’s Extension Course. Rosenberry must have heard about the Officer’s Extension Course. He must have. The whole Compny had heard about it. Only, with Rosenberry, instead of needling him about it to relieve their own baffled surprised disappointment, like the rest of the Company, Rosenberry kept it inside that quietly contained Jewish secret along with everything else he heard saw or felt.
Hell, he thought, maybe he even admires you for it. He’s a draftee, aint he?
He would never find out, though, not from that sealed vacuum of quietly contained Jewish secret. It was a secret he would like to unravel someday, just for the exercise, just to see what was inside.
You never will though, he told himself, not as long as he knows you’re going to be an officer. He
leaned back in his chair and lit a vile-tasting hangover cigaret, wondering suddenly what Prewitt had thought. When Prewitt found out Milt Warden was going to become an officer.
As he came out of it and his eyes refocused themselves, he found himself staring at the Morning Report Book that Dhom had fouled up for him. Pass the buck, pass the buck, he told himself angrily. Let somebody else do it.
Well, Warden, what are you going to do? You got to do something.
That Dhom, if he’d only learned himself to speak good grammar he would probly be a Major today, he had all the other qualifications. The no good stupid son of a bitch, he raged furiously as he locked the Book up in his private desk drawer, theres nothing stupider than a stupid German.
He ought to be able to give him ten days or two weeks. Unless something special or unusual came up, like maneuvers. Annual maneuvers would be coming due pretty soon now. But even five days would be that much extra protection, on the records, later on, when he did come back. Because there was not any doubt in his mind that he would come back. Thirty-year-men went over the hill, sure. Often. Thirty-year-men did not desert.
Not because they didnt want to, he thought, because they couldnt.
Where the hell was a thirty-year-man going to desert to?
It was possible they might send somebody around from the Provost Marshal’s office, but he doubted it. Fatso Judson was not worth that much to the Army, or to the Stockade. Fatso Judsons were dime a dozen in any outfit. There was at least one of them in every company, and usually there were more. The Commandant of the Stockade—
