by John Hersey
Therefore it was not surprising that on the night when they bought three bottles for three dollars, they began quite early in the evening to tell dirty jokes, then sang some songs, then argued a little, then got restless and decided to go for a walk. Nor was it surprising that the walk was rather noisy. It was really not surprising, either, that when they found that their walk was not taking them anywhere except round and round the same block, they should have decided to go back to their billet. This was not surprising, but it was the thing which got them in trouble.
If they had stayed in their billet and not gone for a walk, they would have been all right. So would they if they had not gone home to their billet so soon, but had walked until their drunkenness dulled their vision and blurred their keenness. But doing what they did got them in trouble.
Here is why:
On the way home, Chuck Schultz said: “Hell of a war.
Polack said: “Smatter, Chuck, you gonna get sick again?”
Chuck said: “Oh, hell no, I feel good. It’s jus’ hell of a war.
Polack said: “Prove it.”
Bill said, for the ninetieth time that night: “Uno due tre quattro cinque.”
Polack said: “Shup, Bill. Prove it’s hell of a war, Chuck.”
Chuck said: “Major.” Polack said: “Major who?”
Chuck said: “You know the fella. Town Hall fella.”
Polack said: “Yeah, I know the one you mean.”
Chuck said: “Joppolo, that’s fellow. Hell of a war.”
Polack said: “What about him? What’s he gotta do with it?”
Bill said: “Cinque cinque cinque Cinque Cinque.”
Chuck said: “He never gets drunk, never, never gets drunk. But he’s good fella.”
Polack said: “Oh, he’s wonderful fella.”
Chuck said: “He’s bes’ goddam fella whole invasion.”
Polack said: “Oh, Gripes, he’s better’n that. He’s perfec’.”
Chuck said: “No, he ain’ perfect. He don’t drink. But he’s good. Oh, he’s good’s hell. These wops, they think he’s Jeez Christ. He’s bes’ goddam thing ever happened to this town.”
Polack said: “What’s ‘at prove? Prove it’s hell of a war. Don’t change a subjec .”
Bill said: “Uno due tre uno due tre.”
Chuck said: “Shut up your goddam counting, Bill. I’ll prove it’s hell of a war. It’s all ‘cause of the Major.”
Polack said: “Goddamit, how’s he prove anything if he don’t drink?”
Chuck said: “Here’s how he proves everything. He’s bes’ goddam thing ever happened to this town, but he’s gonna get his ass kicked. Now is that any kind of a war?”
Polack said: “Who’s gonna kick it? Show me the sonofabitch who’s gonna kick it.”
Chuck said: “General Marvin’s gonna kick it, that’s who.”
Polack said: “Oh, hell, he kicks everybody’s, I don’t see nothin’ special about that.”
Chuck said: “Yeah, but look, Polack, here you got a guy who’s best goddam thing ever happened to this town, I mean he unnerstands these people, and that old fart General Marvin he’s gonna bust him down to Corporal, just like me. Now what the hell kind of a war is that?”
Bill said: “Cinque quattro tre due uno. Backwards. Cinque quattro tre due uno.”
Polack grew suspicious. He said: “How you know? Does the old fart tell you who he’s gonna bust and who he’s not?”
Chuck said: “I seen the paper.” Polack said: “Bustin’ him?”
Chuck said: “No, the paper ‘at’s goin’ to get him busted. Trapani and me, we tried to hide it, but the Cap’n found it. It’s surer’n hell goin’ to get the Major busted when old fart-face sees it.”
Polack said: “Jeez, can you imagine a war like that?”
Chuck said: “Hell of a war.”
Polack said: “Goddamit, Chuck, you proved it to me. Hell of a war.”
Bill said: “I like cinque best. Cinque Cinque Cinque.”
Chuck said: “Rotten dirty stinkin’ unfair lousy war.” Polack said: “Hell of a war, you take and ruin the bes’ goddam man you got.”
Chuck said: “I like that Major, he’s a honest sonofabitch. I don’t want for him to be busted like that.”
Polack said: “I ain’t never seen this Major, but if you say he’s the best goddam Major you ever seen, I’ll take your word for it and I think it’s a unfair sonofabitchin’ war myself for bustin’ him.”
Chuck said: “You know, we ought to do somethin’ for that Major. Polack, we ought to do somethin’ for him.”
Polack said: “You said me a mouthful, Chuck. We surer’n hell ought to.”
Chuck said: “What could we do, Polack? Somethin’ good. He deserves it, by damn, somethin’ good.”
Polack said: “What the hell could we do, Chuck? You’re a goddam Corporal, and Bill and me, we’re just goddam P.F.C.’s. What the hell could we do?”
Chuck said: “Let’s think.”
Polack said: “Okay, pal.... You thinkin’?”
Chuck said: “Yeah, but I ain’t got a damn thing.”
Bill said: “Uno due tre. We ought to give the guy a goin’-away present if he’s all that good.”
Chuck said: “First sensible thing you said all night, Bill. We’ll give him a goddam present.”
Polack said: “What What’ll we give him, Chuck?”
Chuck said: “Jeez, that’s a hell of a tough one. For a goin’-away present, hell, it’s got to be good, if it’s for him.”
Polack said: “It was Bill’s idea. What’ll we give him, Bill?”
Bill said grandly: “Uno due tre quattro cinque.”
Chuck said: “He’s no goddam good, him and his numbers. We got to think of something, Polack, we got to.” Polack said: “Let’s go back and get those bottles. Maybe they’d help us think of something.”
Chuck said: “That’s right, let’s go back to old Four Eyes’ house. Maybe we’ll think of something there. Take a drink, think of something.”
The billet where Chuck and Bill and Polack lived was in the grand town house of a man named Quattrocchi. This man was a merchant whose family had lived in Adano for generations, and for generations had been wealthy. Their house, except possibly for old Cacopardo’s, was the nicest in town. It had been picked as a billet on the first day of the invasion. In the beginning a field hospital had moved in, and afterwards the engineers and M.P.’s had taken over. Signor Quattrocchi had left all of his furniture in the house, merely covered over with canvas slip covers; he had left some of his glassware, in glass-fronted cabinets the doors of which were locked; he had left many of his books on the shelves; he had left the larger of his paintings still hanging. He had not had much time to arrange his affairs, but Major Joppolo had tried to assure him that his house would be well taken care of.
The three drunken boys entered the house and noisily made their way upstairs to the room where they slept. Each took a bottle out from his bedroll and they sat for a time drinking and thinking.
Chuck said: “Take a drink, have a think.”
Polack said: “Get a stink, take a drink.”
Chuck said: “Jeez, that’s hard, to think of somethin’ good enough for that goddam Major.”
Polack said: “I can think of a lot of things, but not a goddam one of ‘em is good enough. The trouble with that goddam Major is he’s too damn good. Now you give me a lousy Major, and I’d have you a present in no time.”
Chuck said: “It’s a hell of a war when you can’t even think of a goin’-away present for a good guy. “
Polack said: “Say! I just thought of somethin’ terrible. Are you sure this Major’s goin’ away?”
Chuck said: “Didn’t I see that slip of paper?”
Polack said: “Tha’s right. Shall we give him a bottle of of lady Fatta’s wine?”
Chuck said: “Hell, Polack, you know that’s not good enough. You know damn well this wine gives you the G.I. trots every time you drin
k it. You wouldn’t want to send the Major out of this town having to go to the latrine every ten minutes, would you?”
Polack said: “Tha’s right. Shall we give him some paregoric an’ bismuth? If he’s got the trots, that’s the bes’ goddam thing there is.”
Chuck said: “Polack, I think you’re drunk. You know he ain’t got the trots till we give him this vino. What the hell’s the matter with you?”
Bill said: “One, two, three, four, five. Why don’t you borrow something from old Four Eyes here to give the Major? You’d find a real nice goin’-away present right here in this house if you just got up off your fat behinds and looked for it.”
Chuck said: “Bill, why don’t you have more ideas? You got the best goddam ideas when you have em. Polack said: “Yeah, good idea, let’s borrow something.”
Chuck said: “Bill, you don’t even know how good your ideas are when you have ‘em. Look: this Major, he’s Italian himself, speaks it like a goddam native. He sure is gonna appreciate something Italian from old Four Eyes’ house. Boy, Bill, I don’ know why you aren’ a goddam millionaire with the ideas you got.
Bill said: “Uno and tre is quattro. Due and tre is cinque. Jeez, I can even add.”
Chuck said: “Let’s go an’ find something ‘fore we pass out.”
The three boys got up. They were pretty drunk now. They staggered out of their room and along a long corridor until they came to a drawing room.
Polack said: “Lookit that room, like a goddam Gran’ Central Station. There’s a lot of Eyetalian junk in there.” Chuck said: “Let’s have look.”
Polack said: “Why’n we give ‘m a chair?”
Chuck said: “Good idea. Take the goddam shroud off’n a chair, give ‘im a chair.”
Chuck and Polack skated across the floor to a chair. They bent over it to take the slip cover off. Their fumbling hands could not find where to loosen the cover. “Lif’ it up,” Chuck suggested. “Look at it from unnerneath.”
So they lifted the chair above their heads. Polack reeled. Chuck lost his grip. The chair crashed to the floor, and a leg broke off. Bill picked the leg up.
Chuck said: “Too damn much trouble, lousy chair. Hell with a chair.”
Polack spotted a terra cotta bust standing on a marble pillar-like stand in one comer. “Who’s ‘at?”
Bill said, as if positive: “Garibaldi.”
Polack said: “Le’s give’m a Garibally.” And he went over to the corner, lifted the bust off the pillar, started uncertainly back toward the others, lost his balance, and dropped the bust. It broke into hundreds of pieces.
Polack looked over the mantel at a painting of a fat nude. She was lovely in his wine-washed eyes, and he said: “Give’m a woman. A Major needs a woman.”
So the three worked together to get the painting down. They balanced themselves on chairs and grunted and all lifted on the bottom edge of the painting. They managed to lift it off its hook, but they could not keep it balanced. The picture fell, and its canvas hit the back of a chair, and the fat woman was ripped from flank to flank.
Polack said: “Hell with Gran’ Central Station. Le’s go in ‘nother room.”
They went into a dining room. In one corner there was a big glass-faced cabinet containing Venetian glass= ware on shelves. “Give ‘im somethin’ to drink out of,” Chuck said.
He tried the door of the cabinet, but it was locked. “Bill,” he said, “open this goddam thing up. Don’t just stan’ there with that goddam club. Open up.”
Polack said: “Case of ‘mergency, break glass an’ pull lever.”
Bill stepped up and poised the chair leg. “Uno, due, tre,” he said, and on three he let go. The glass front shivered to the floor. The three boys staggered forward to chose a gift. First they dropped a bowl. Then they dropped a glass swan. Then they dropped a big goblet. Then they knocked the whole cabinet over and broke everything.
The three men went from room to room this way, leaving a trail of ruin behind them. Their disappointment grew as they saw their chances dwindling of getting anything good enough (or durable enough) for the Major.
Finally Chuck said: “Hell of a war, when you can’t even find a present in of Four Eyes’ house.”
Polack said: “Hell of a lousy goddam unfair war.” Bill said: “Le’s go to bed.”
So they went to bed. Polack heard Chuck crying in his bedroll, and he said: “Smatter, Chuck, feel sick?” Chuck sobbed: “Hell of a war.”
Polack said: “Yeah, hell of a war, Chuck, go to sleep.”
Chapter 16
WHEN Major Joppolo arrived at his office next morning, two visitors were waiting for him. One was Quattrocchi, owner of the house where Chuck, Bill and Polack were billeted. But Quattrocchi had to wait, because the other was Lord Runcin, one of the Amgot higher-ups. The Allied Military Government was, and still is, a joint British-American affair, and as in the higher echelons of the military command, American and British officers were sandwiched in with each other. Lord Runcin was near the top.
Lord Runcin was a man of about fifty. He had wavy blonde hair and bright eyes which seldom looked straight at whoever he was talking with. He took snuff. Aside from the fact that he had a purely colonial point of view toward the Italians, he was considered to be a pretty good man for Amgot. Not the least of his attributes was his energy. On this particular morning, it was only five minutes past eight, and yet Lord Runcin had been on the road since six thirty, had taken breakfast on American rations in a wheat field, and had been waiting patiently for his Amgot representative in Adano for fifteen minutes. He was making a round of interviews, to try to pick up the best examples of Amgot work from each of the occupied towns.
Major Joppolo showed him into his office. “Wizard quarters,” His Lordship said. Lord Runcin affected the slang of his subordinates, but he always seemed to use American slang when talking to his British men, and vice versa, so that many of them understood very little of what he said.
This was the first time Major Joppolo had ever had a t?te â t?te with a real honest to goodness Lordship. He was surprised to find him wearing shorts and an open collar and no hat at all. His Lordship’s deferential manner, as he sat on the other side of the Major’s desk asking questions, made Major Joppolo, who had once been a clerk in the Sanitation Department of New York City, feel quite important.
By way of making conversation, His Lordship pointed a thumb in Quattrocchi’s direction and said: “Your Italian friend is in quite a flap.”
The former Sanitation clerk said: “What was that, Lord? I didn’t get that.”
“Never mind,” said His Lordship. “Well, what kind of a job have you been doing here, Joppolo?”
The former Sanitation clerk said: “Well, Lord, I’ve been doing all right.”
“Doing all right, eh?” His Lordship smiled and made a note of the expression in his notebook, for future use. “What are the best things you’ve done?”
Well, there was the subsidy. The Italians used to pay every family with a son in the Army eight lira a day for the head of the family and three lira for each dependent. Because these people really depended on the subsidy, Major Joppolo had started paing it again at the old rate. He now called it Public!’ Assistance, because he thought that sounded more democratic. He paid it out of fines and income from goods that he was selling, and he had a committee consisting of the Mayor, the Chief of the Carabinieri and a local citizen to determine whether each family needed or deserved Public Assistance. On the first day the town had paid out seventyfour thousand lira.
“Bully,” said His Lordship. “What else?”
Well, to show how the town was financing itself, there was the muslin. A Liberty Ship had come into Adano harbor, and had discharged a cargo of war materials - bulldozers, bridge girders, tents, and some ammunition. Down in the bottom of one hold the unloaders found six bales of white muslin. The skipper of the ship said he had to unload it. The Quartermaster on the beach would not take it. There were no papers for th
e muslin, no consignment. The muslin had U.S. Treasury markings on it, so it was obviously Lend-Lease, and it was obviously lost. Major Joppolo heard about it, and seeing the rags on the people of his town, he said he could use it. He called his Civil Supply director and told him about the muslin, and the director gave permission to sell it at a fair price. Major Joppolo put two rolls up for sale, and held the other four in reserve. There was such a shortage of cloth in the town that the two rolls were gone in that many hours.
“Good work, Joppolo,” His Lordship said. “What else?”
There was the refugee problem. On the day of the invasion, there were only six or seven thousand people in the town; the others had all run to the hills. Within a few days there were thirty-two or -three thousand. The town got badly crowded, and one reason was that there were a lot of refugees from the town of Vicinamare. These people had come down to Adano because the Allies had been bombing Vicinamare pretty hard before the invasion. Now that the battle had gone beyond Vicinamare, they wanted to go home, but there was no transportation. One day the Major saw a German bus driving down the street. An American soldier was driving it. Major Joppolo said to himself: “I could use that bus.” He asked around and found out it belonged to the Engineers. So he called the Motor Officer and said: “I’d like to use that bus of yours one day a week.” The Motor Officer said it would be okay with him if the Major had proper permission. So Major Joppolo called the Adano base commander, who said it would be all right. And a few days later one busload of cheering, laughing people had started home. Now Colonel Sartorius, head of Amgot for the Province of Vicinamare, heard about the bus a few days later, and he got sore, and told Major Joppolo not to do that any more. “Sometimes,” Major Joppolo said, “I think Colonel Sartorius is an awful dope.”
Lord Runcin said: “Do you mean you think he takes harmful drugs?” And his Lordship dipped into his snuffbox.
Major Joppolo said: “Oh no, Lord, I just mean he’s stupid.”
