"You mean as third horseshoer?"
"No, as second."
"Second? What about Wheeler?"
"Wheeler wasn't considered. Wheeler has already asked me for the next D.R.O. opening. He wants out of the stable gang, and Sergeant Bellows has agreed to let him go. I must admit that you're our second choice. We offered second horseshoer to Hampe, but he doesn't want it. He wants to stay on as stable orderly. But I'm going to put Wheeler into the mess as D.R.O. as soon as I can get a replacement for him."
"Do you mean," I said, still not quite believing it, "that if I take the job as second horseshoer, I'll get P.F.C. and fourth class specialist, too? First and fourth?"
Sergeant Brasely grinned. "The grade goes with the job. Can you handle it?"
"Sure. Of course I can handle it. I know I've still got a lot to leam, but I can handle it."
"Then consider yourself a private first class, fourth class specialist. There'll be a Troop Order on the bulletin board tomorrow morning. One more thing. Who do you think, among the new men, would work out as third horseshoer? Somebody that both you and Socky could work with?"
"Micaloni, Tullio Micaloni," I said without hesitating. "I don't know if he'd want it or not, but I can't think of a better man than Micaloni. I've known him ever since I was in the Philippines."
"Okay," Sergeant Brasely said, "we'll talk to him. He's quiet, isn't he? I don't think I've ever heard him say two words."
"He only talks when he has something to say. He spent a couple of years on Fort Drum, you know."
"A1l right, then, Will," Sergeant Bellows said. "You'd better move back to the stable gang tonight, after chow. Socky tells me you guys are a little behind schedule in the shoeing."
"What about the pistol range tomorrow?"
"You've already had your familiarization firing, so you won't have to tire for record, now that you're officially back in the stable gang. Just go on back to work."
"Thanks a lot," I said. "Both of you. I appreciate your confidence in me."
I walked back to the squad-room, just about as happy I as I have ever been in my life. First and fourth! In less than six months I would have my four years in, and I would have another five percent in fogy pay. I could start enclosing a five-dollar bill every month in the letters I wrote I to my grandmother.
As I entered the squad-room, I looked at Quinn for a minute. Quinn was wearing a new green gabardine shirt, and his gold P.F.C. stripes were cross·stitched on both sleeves with yellow thread. I had eight dollars in my pocket, a five and three ones. I rolled a cigarette and handed the makings to Quinn. He rolled a fat one, as I knew he would.
I lit my cigarette and then Quinn's (he never had any matches, either).
"What size shirt do you wear, Quinn?"
"Fifteen-and-a-half, thirty-four sleeves. Why?"
I wore a sixteen neck, and thirty-four sleeves, but I knew that if I moved the top button over a quarter of an inch I would be able to button the collar.
"How much for your gabardine shirt‘?"
"Eight dollars.?
"You've been selling them to Kayo for five."
"That's when I needed the money. Right now I don't need money so bad. Besides, I paid ten for it, and it still ain't paid for yet." `
"I'll give you seven."
"That's fair. I'll take seven."
I gave him the five and two ones, and he took off the shirt. I went down to the latrine and tried on the new shirt in front of the mirror. It was a trifle tight in the chest, but it looked good on me. I turned sideways in the mirror so I could get a better view of the gold stripe on my right arm. The three creases in the back had been sewn in, and there was a faint smell of benzene in the shirt from the cleaners, but it was practically a brand-new shirt.
Well, what the hell, I thought, I had earned the new shirt and the goldstripes. It just went to prove that all a man had to do in the Army was to live right, work hard, and all the good things would eventually come his way. It had certainly worked out that way for me.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
CHARLES WILLEFORD was a highly decorated (Silver Star, Bronze Star, Purple Heart, Luxembourg Croix de Guerre) tank commander with the Third Army in World War II. He has also been a professional horse trainer, boxer, radio announcer and painter. He studied art in Biarritz, France, and in Lima, Peru, and English at the University of Miami. He has published a collection of short stories and fifteen novels, including the best-selling The Burnt-Orange Heresy.
A former Californian, he lives in Miami, Florida, and is the regular reviewer of mystery and suspense fiction for the Miami Herald.
Something About a Soldier - Charles Willeford Page 28
