by Len Levinson
“Yes,” replied Bannon.
“Well, whataya know about that. Old bigmouth zigged when he shoulda zagged.” Frankie reached into his pocket and took a stubby little Italian cigar, tearing off the wrapper and putting the end in his mouth. “Well, I guess we ain't got no platoon sergeant and no squad leader either. What next?”
Bannon shrugged.
“I guess we should wait for orders,” Delane said.
“Fuck orders. I make my own orders.” Frankie looked at Sergeant Harrington. “He got any dough on him?”
“I didn't look,” Bannon said.
“He won a coupla big pots in a crap game on the ship last night,” Frankie said. “There was at least two hundred of them Australian pounds in one of those pots, and that's a lot of pussy, in case you don't know it.” Frankie felt for the money in Harrington's pockets.
“Jesus, Frankie,” Delane said, “don't you have any respect for the dead?”
“The dead don't have any respect for me, so why should I have respect for the dead?” Frankie rolled Harrington over and pulled the wallet out of his back pocket. He opened the wallet and it was filled with Australian pounds. “Bingo,” Frankie said, a big smile on his face. “Holy shit.”
Delane scowled. Although he and Frankie both came from New York City, Delane had lived on Park Avenue and Frankie was from Little Italy. They'd inhabited different worlds as civilians, although they'd lived about two miles apart.
“That money belongs to Sergeant Harrington's family,” Delane said.
“Where the fuck's his family?” Frankie stuffed the bills into his pocket. “I don't see his fucking family. Hmm, it looks like he's got a pretty nice watch too.” Frankie looked at it. “It's a Benrus—oh, shit, it's broke.”
Delane shook his head. “Frankie, you've got no morals at all.”
“Fuck morals.” He elbowed Bannon. “How're you doing, buddy?”
“Okay, I reckon.”
Frankie grinned wolfishly. “Just tell me one thing, Bannon. Are you or aren't you sorry that you enlisted in this motherfucker now?”
“It wouldn't have made any difference. If I didn't enlist, they would've drafted me anyway.” ‘
“Texas is supposed to be a big state. If it was me, I woulda hid someplace and they never woulda found me.”
Bannon spat into the mud beside the crater. “This may sound corny, but where I come from, men don't hide from their responsibilities.”
“That sure does sound corny. I got no responsibility to this war. Fuck this war. It's just making rich people richer, that's all.”
“Would you rather fight the Japs in New York City than here?”
“Fuck the Japs and fuck you.”
Frankie was in one of his hyperkinetic moods, bobbing his head around to look in all directions, chewing his gum maniacally, scratching himself, constantly changing positions, sniffing the air like a hunting dog. Bannon looked at him calmly. Frankie was a good man to go out boozing with, and it was good to have him on your side if a brawl started, but Delane had been right when he said that Frankie had no morals.
Bannon heard footsteps to his right. “Somebody's coming,” he said.
“I don't hear nothing,” Frankie replied.
“That's because you got too much New York shit in your ears.”
Frankie grinned, because he loved to hassle with people. It was one of the few things that made him feel alive.
Pfc. Caldwell, the company runner, stuck his head through a bush. “Sergeant Harrington around here?” he asked.
“Yeah,” Frankie said, “he's right here, and he's starting to stink.”
Caldwell, a blond, spidery young man from Bemidji, Minnesota, crept closer to the shell crater and stared wide-eyed at the body of Sergeant Harrington. “Is he dead?”
“What do you think?” Frankie asked sarcastically.
“What happened to him?”
“The same thing that'll happen to you if you don't get your head down.”
Caldwell lay on the ground beside the crater. “Captain Gwynne wants all the platoon sergeants to assemble at his command post right away. Who's the new platoon sergeant here?”
“Search me,” Frankie said.
Delane tried to be helpful. “I think Sergeant Rabinowitz is the next ranking man in the platoon.”
“He's dead,” Caldwell said. “Blown to shit on the beach.”
Delane stared at him. Bannon looked at Frankie. La Barbara's jaw dropped open for a second; then he resumed chewing gum.
“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,” Frankie said. “What next?”
Delane snorted. “Too bad you weren't there to clean out his pockets, Frankie.”
“Shaddup, twerp.”
Delane looked at Frankie with pure hatred. Delane was of average height and build and didn't consider himself a twerp. On top of that, it was infuriating to have low-class people like Frankie insulting him all the time.
Frankie noticed Delane's anger. “Anytime you feel froggy, go ahead and jump, scumbag.”
“Knock it off, you two,” Bannon said. He looked at Caldwell. “I don't know who's next in command in the platoon. I don't even know where the platoon is.”
“Somebody's gotta come to the meeting. What about you, Bannon?”
“I'm only a private. There's a lot of guys over me. Try Corporal Nowicki.”
Pfc. Caldwell crawled off to find Corporal Nowicki, and Frankie relit the stub of his cigar. “Everything is all fucked up as usual,” he said.
Bannon took out a cigarette and lit it up, noticing that he'd smoked half a pack since dawn, and it was only 0900 hours now. He had two more packs in his field pack, but then what would he do?
Meanwhile the Japanese planes continued to strafe and bomb the jungle. The newly landed GIs kept their heads down and waited for orders. Sometimes the sound of explosions was pierced by shouted orders and the screams of the wounded! Bannon lay back and puffed his cigarette, realizing the truth of one of the lessons he'd learned in training: If you didn't control the sky, you couldn't do much on the ground. But the Japs couldn't stay up there forever. They'd get low on gas sooner or later and have to return to their aircraft carriers.
Delane screamed and jumped two feet in the air. Alarmed, Bannon and Frankie readied their weapons and looked around. Delane landed on his knees and looked at the mud on which he'd been lying. A huge purple centipede was crawling straight toward him.
Frankie wrinkled his nose. “What the fuck is that!”
Bannon's rifle butt streaked through the air and came down on the creature, mashing it into the mud.
“They're supposed to be poisonous,” Bannon said. “If you touch one, you get a rash.”
Frankie looked with apprehension at the jungle around him. “There's supposed to be poisonous snakes out here too.”
“And crocodiles,” Delane added.
“Your mother's a fucking crocodile,” Frankie said.
Delane's adrenaline was still bubbling from his encounter with the centipede, and now he felt a mad urge to kill Frankie La Barbara. He'd always hated La Barbara and considered him utterly loathsome; all he'd have to do was raise his M 1 and pull the trigger.
Bannon placed his hand on Delane's shoulder. “Take it easy,” he said.
Delane stared at Frankie with undisguised hatred. “You're the worst scum I've ever seen in my life.”
“Up your ass with a ten-inch meat hook.”
Delane lunged at Frankie, who counterattacked immediately. Before Bannon could get between them, Frankie blocked Delane's overhand right and delivered an uppercut that sent Delane's head flying backward. Delane slumped into the mud, out cold.
Bannon sighed. “Now look at what you did, Frankie.”
“Fuck him in his ass.”
“We're supposed to be fighting the Japs, not each other.”
“Fuck him and fuck you and fuck everybody.”
Bannon thought he heard something in the jungle straight ahead. There had been a lull in the bombin
g, and it had sounded like a foot stepping on a twig and breaking it.
“Somebody’ s over there,” Bannon said, picking up his rifle.
“It's probably your mother,” Frankie growled, feeling mean and nasty. He hated the Army and the jungle and wished he were back on Mulberry Street in New York, collecting policy slips for the Mob.
Bannon thought it must be Caldwell coming back with new orders, but all the GIs had been warned that the Japs often infiltrated the American lines and you had to be on your guard at all times. He heard the faint rustle of foliage coming from the same direction as the twig.
“I just heard it again,” he said.
“I don't hear nothing.”
“Ssshhhh.”
Bannon raised his M 1 to his shoulder and rested the stock on the edge of the crater. A mosquito buzzed around his nose, and he tried to ignore it. He felt foolish, because almost certainly it was Caldwell or somebody else coming to pay a visit, but the way he figured it, you had to be prepared at all times if you wanted to survive the war.
Frankie sneered. “You really like to play soldier, don't you, Tex?”
“I said keep your fucking voice down.”
“What are you telling me to keep my voice down for? Did you just get promoted to general or something like that?”
Delane opened his eyes and moaned. Bannon stared in the direction of the sounds he'd heard. Then more bombs fell, drowning out any possibility of hearing footsteps. Old gnarled trees fell to the ground, and huge clouds of smoke rose in the air.
Then the wide green leaves burst apart in front of Bannon and he saw a Japanese soldier waving a long sword in the air!
"Maline, you die!” the Japanese soldier cried.
He charged out of the jungle, followed by two more Japanese soldiers. They were only fifteen yards away. Bannon couldn't believe they were there. He'd been training to fight them for eight months, but now, when confronted by them, he was too astonished to move.
"Holy shit!” screamed Frankie La Barbara, his cigar dropping out of his mouth.
The initial shock wore off in a second and Bannon had his rifle ready. He trained his sights on the lead Japanese soldier and squeezed the trigger.
"Banzai!” shrieked the Jap.
Ka-pow, replied Bannon's rifle, and the Jap tripped over his feet, falling to the ground. The second Jap carried a long rifle with a bayonet and charged with it pointed at Bannon's face.
Bannon came up out of the hole. He didn't have time to fix his bayonet, and all he could do was fire his M 1 wildly from his waist. The M 1 bucked in his hand, but the Jap kept coming.
"Yaaahhhh!” screamed the Jap, plunging his rifle and bayonet toward Bannon's chest.
Bannon stood his ground and parried the Jap bayonet to the side, then kneed the Jap in the balls. The Jap bellowed in pain and fell backward. Bannon bashed the Jap in the face with his rifle butt and then noticed the third Jap soldier coming at him from the side. He heard a loud crack and turned in time to see the third Jap go down. Frankie La Barbara had swung his heavy BAR like a baseball bat and split open the Jap's head.
The Jap whom Bannon had kneed was lying on the ground, moaning, his jaw broken and his balls somewhere up in his stomach.
Frankie La Barbara stood over him, holding his BAR with both fists around its barrel and bringing its massive buttstock down on the Jap's face. “I ain't no fucking Marine,” he growled. The Jap's skull cracked open, blood and brains splattering everywhere.
Bannon felt sick. “Jesus Christ, Frankie. What you do that for?”
“What was I supposed to do, jerk him off?”
“We could've taken him prisoner. Maybe Intelligence could have got something out of him.”
“Fuck G-2. I think that other one had a sword, didn't he?”
Frankie ran toward the Jap whom Bannon had shot and lifted the long curved samurai sword from his hand. “Hey, looka here!” Frankie waved the sword in the air, making it whistle and gleam. Then he positioned himself over the dead Jap, raised the sword with both hands, and brought it down swiftly, chopping off the Jap's head. “Wow!” Frankie shouted. “What a fucking sword! Just what I need!” He tried to figure out how to carry it with him always.
Bannon had seen cattle butchered, but he'd never seen a man butchered. He'd always known Frankie La Barbara was a little nuts, but never this nuts. Yet, Frankie had saved his life. Maybe the best kind of person to have at your side in a war was a maniac like Frankie La Barbara.
Frankie untied the dead Jap's scabbard and fastened it to his own waist. Craig Delane staggered out of the shell crater, blinking in astonishment. “My word,” he said, looking at the dead Japs, “where'd they come from?”
Bannon's eyes fell on the holster attached to the belt of the Jap at his feet. He bent down, unsnapped the holster, and pulled out a shiny Nambu pistol. Turning it over in his hand, he saw that it was beautifully machined. He had no idea how to load and use it but jammed it into his belt anyway.
Bannon heard footsteps and raised his rifle. Lieutenant Scofield, his carbine held at the ready, burst into the tiny clearing. Behind him were several men from the platoon.
Lieutenant Scofield was a twenty-one-year-old product of OCS who was unsure of himself and compensated with arrogance and chickenshit. “Did somebody fire a shot over here?” he asked. Then he noticed the dead Japs. “Oh.” He stepped forward and turned green at the gruesome sight. “What happened?” he asked, his voice weaker than usual.
Before Bannon could open his mouth, Frankie was talking a mile a minute, gesticulating with his wonderful new samurai sword. “Well, you see, Lieutenant, it was like this: We was in that ditch over there, minding our own business, when all of a sudden these gooks came at us. . . . “
Scofield got the picture and interrupted him. “Who chopped off that one's head?”
“I did,” Frankie said proudly, showing the blood on the samurai sword. “This fucking thing is really sharp, sir.”
“Was he alive at the time?”
“I dunno, sir. I didn't think of talcing his pulse or nothing like that.”
“We should try to take prisoners whenever possible. Keep that in mind in the future.”
“Yes, sir.”
Scofield looked at Bannon. “I understand Sergeant Harrington is dead.”
Bannon pointed to the hole in the ground. “He's over there.”
Scofield walked to the body of Sergeant Harrington, aware that every eye was on him. He squared his shoulders and puffed out his chest, trying to show some of the command presence that is the trademark of great officers.
“He was a good man,” Scofield said solemnly, although he'd always thought Harrington was a stupid ass. “I'm going to miss him.”
Frankie muttered under his breath, “I think I'm gonna cry.”
“You say something, La Barbara?”
“No, sir—I just got something caught in my throat.”
Lieutenant Scofield turned to Bannon. “You're the temporary squad leader here until further notice. Gather your men together and deploy them throughout this area. Link up with the first squad on your left and the weapons platoon on your right. Stay put until further orders. Any questions?”
“No, sir.”
“Carry on.”
Lieutenant Scofield turned to walk away, when suddenly they heard the scream of a diving airplane above them.
"Hit it!”
They all dived into the mud as the Zero opened fire with its machine guns, sending a hail of lead into the jungle. A Japanese artillery shell smacked into the ground nearby, blowing mud and trees into the air. Bannon lay flat, next to the Jap soldier he'd kneed in the balls, and wondered when the bombardment would come to an end. He also wondered why he'd been selected as the new acting squad leader and didn't know whether to be happy about it or not. On one hand it would be good to have some control over what was going on, but on the other hand it wouldn't be easy to keep guys like Frankie La Barbara and Homer Gladley in line.
&nb
sp; Well, he thought, if I could handle a bunch of crazy cowboys back on the ranch, I guess I can handle a bunch of soldiers here, right?
He tried to convince himself, but deep in his heart he wasn't so sure. Meanwhile the squadron of Zeros passed by and that section of the jungle became quiet again.
“Let's go, men,” Lieutenant Scofield said.
He rose and led his men out of the little clearing. “I'll send the Graves Registration people back for Sergeant Harrington,” he called back over his shoulder to Bannon.
“Yes, sir,” Bannon said.
Lieutenant Scofield disappeared into the jungle, leaving behind the men from the second squad, who all looked at their new squad leader, Pfc. Charlie Bannon.
“Am I gonna have to salute you now?” Frankie La Barbara asked sarcastically.
Bannon realized immediately that if he was going to lead the squad effectively, he'd have to earn the respect of the men, and the best way to do that would be to kick the shit out of Frankie La Barbara, but he wasn't altogether sure that he could. There was only one way to find out.
“Frankie,” Bannon said, “go find out where the Weapons Platoon is so we can link up with them.”
“Why me?”
“Because you're the one I'm telling to go.”
“Who the fuck are you?”
“You know who I am. Get going.”
Frankie was annoyed, and this quickly passed to belligerance. “Fuck you. I ain't going out there alone. There might be more Japs out there.”
“Take Shilansky with you.”
“Fuck you—you take Shilansky with you.”
“Frankie, I just gave you an order.”
Frankie scowled. “Fuck you and fuck your orders. Who're you? You're just another asshole like the rest of us out here.”
Bannon hooked his thumbs in his cartridge belt and looked Frankie in the eye. “I'm gonna tell you just one more time, buddy. Take Shilansky and find out where the Weapons Platoon is.”
“What if I don't go?” Frankie asked, spacing his feet apart with his toes pointing outward. “What're you gonna do, go cry to Shithead Scofield that I disobeyed an order?”
The Japanese planes were flying back to their aircraft carrier, and Bannon figured this was as good a time as any to show everybody who was boss in the squad. “This is between you and me, Frankie. If you don't get going right now, I'm going to kick your ass.”
