by Len Levinson
“And you're the biggest one.” Bannon turned to Longtree. “I get your drift. We'll just hold the dummy up and watch the treeline over there. When the Jap shoots at it, we should see something move.”
“I'll make the dummy,” Sam Longtree said.
Longtree took a machete from his field pack and took a few steps into the jungle, where he chopped down some branches. He dragged the branches to the ground beside Bannon's foxhole, then went back to his pack and took out some clothes.
“Hey, Chief,” Frankie said, “this an old Indian trick?”
“Older than you or me.”
“It's probably the one that got Custer.”
“Maybe so.”
Bannon looked at Frankie. “Did Scofield say anything about chow?”
“No.”
“He say anything about anything else?”
“He just said take care of that sniper.”
Homer Gladley crawled close to the foxhole. “I'm hungry, Bannon. Can I open a can of C rations?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“We're not gonna eat until we're ordered to eat.”
Frankie groaned. “Give an asshole a little authority and right away he starts acting like God.”
At the mention of God, Private Billie Jones took out his handy pocket Bible and turned to the appropriate page. “ ’You shall be fed with the manna of heaven, saith the Lord God.’”
Bannon looked at Private Longtree and could see him constructing a scarecrow. He tied branches together to make a cross, put his extra shirt around the cross, and stuffed the shirt with leaves that reminded Bannon of elephant ears.
“Private O'Rourke!” Bannon called out.
“Yo!”
“Get your ass over here!”
Private Jimmy O'Rourke crawled out of the foxhole he shared with Craig Delane and moved in a crouch toward Bannon. O'Rourke was around five ten, with a muscular build and puffy features. He had been a stuntman in Hollywood before the war, and his main ambition in life was to become a movie star. He had a dazzling smile, which he flashed often; it was the product of one of the most famous and rich dentists in Hollywood.
“What you want?” asked O'Rourke, smiling roguishly in a manner that he thought made him resemble Errol Flynn, who was his idol.
“You know how to climb trees, O'Rourke?”
“Sure I know how to climb trees.”
Bannon handed him Sergeant Harrington's binoculars. “Take this and climb one of these trees. We're gonna draw the fire of that sniper with a dummy. You try to spot him when he fires, got it?”
“What if he fires at me?”
“Stay on the side of the tree where he can't see you. Keep yourself concealed. Get going.”
O'Rourke hesitated, because he wasn't used to taking orders from Bannon.
“I said get going.”
“Right.”
O'Rourke took the binoculars and looked around at the trees, trying to figure which one would be his best bet. He selected one and jumped onto it, wishing the Paramount Pictures cameras were pointed at him.
Sam Longtree took a khaki T-shirt out of his pack and stuffed it with leaves. He perched it above the shirt and put his helmet on top of it. “Here's the dummy,” he said.
Bannon took out a Chesterfield, the last one in his first pack. He lit it and watched O'Rourke climb a tree covered with vines and moss. It had wide branches higher up, and they were covered with big leaves. O'Rourke would have pretty good concealment up there.
“Okay, Longtree, you come with me,” Bannon said. “You, too, Gladley, and load up your M 1. The rest of you stay here.”
Bannon cradled his M 1 in his arms and crawled toward the little clearing where Sergeant Harrington had been shot. Gladley followed on his left, and Sam Longtree was a few feet behind him, carrying the dummy in his arms. They made their way through muck and slime, mosquitoes buzzing around them and larger insects conducting dive-bombing operations. Finally they came to the edge of the clearing.
“I think it'd be best if we all went at once,” Bannon said. “That hole Sergeant Harrington is in looks the deepest, so that's the one we'll use. We'll move out on three.”
Bannon counted to three and they dashed out of the jungle. They sped into the clearing and dived into the hole with the dead body of Sergeant Harrington. They landed in the brackish water and mud, shouldering each other for room as a bullet cracked over their heads.
“He saw us,” Bannon said.
“He's one sharp-eyed sum bitch,” Sam Longtree replied.
Gladley looked at Sergeant Harrington and nearly gagged. “Lookit the maggots!”
Bannon turned to Sergeant Harrington and saw a worm crawling into his nose. Another was crawling out of his ear. A dozen were in his open mouth.
“I can't stand this!” Gladley said hysterically. “I gotta get out of here!”
Bannon grabbed him by the front of his shirt. “You'll stay right in the fuck where you are!”
Gladley was afraid of Bannon, although Bannon was much smaller than he. Bannon had a mad gleam in his eye and a ferocious energy that never failed to intimidate Gladley.
Sam Longtree fastidiously arranged the dummy's clothes as if it were going on parade. Then he raised it up so that the helmet cleared the top of the hole, held it in that position for a few seconds, then yanked it down.
“This is like fishing,” Sam Longtree said. “We got to fool the sum bitch. If he thinks we're trying to draw his fire, he won't shoot.”
Longtree raised the dummy up again, a little higher this time. Then he brought it down quickly. He raised it the third time, higher than before, and suddenly there was a crack as a Jap bullet struck the helmet and sent it flying through the air.
“Wow!” said Gladley. “That Jap's a dead shot!”
Longtree placed his own helmet on the dummy and raised it again, twisting and moving it from side to side frantically.
“What're you doing?” Bannon asked.
“If a man gets hit, there's usually a big commotion, isn't there?” Longtree asked, bouncing the dummy around. “Everybody tries to help the man, right?”
Crack!
A bullet zipped through the shirt on the dummy. Longtree pulled it down. “That's all for this place,” he said. “We should move now and try someplace else.”
“Move!” said Gladley. “Are you crazy! If we move, he'll shoot us!”
“Not right now,” Longtree said. “He gots more to look at than this little bit of jungle. We might have a little break.” He reached into his pocket for his pack of cigarettes.
Bannon took out his fresh pack of Chesterfields and opened it up. He wondered if O'Rourke had seen where the Jap was shooting from.
“I wish I had something to eat,” Gladley said. He was a mountain of a man, with round shoulders and a head as big as a basketball.
“You should start smoking,” Bannon said, holding out his pack of cigarettes. “It kills hunger.”
“But it's bad for you. It cuts your wind.”
Bannon put the cigarettes back into his pocket. It was true, cigarettes did cut his wind, but he felt that if he didn't smoke them, he'd go insane. And besides, there were more dangerous things to contend with than cigarettes.
“Do you think we'll get some hot chow for lunch?” Gladley asked hopefully.
“No.”
Gladley frowned and scratched his belly, trying not to look at the corpse of Sergeant Harrington. Longtree sat cross-legged a in the mud, his head bent low, as if meditating deeply about something. Bannon looked at him and blew smoke out of the corner of his mouth. Back in Texas, Bannon hadn't thought much of Indians, but now he was beginning to realize that Private Sam Longtree was one of the best men in his squad.
Lieutenant General Hamkichi Hyakutake, the commander of all Japanese forces on Guadalcanal, sat behind his desk deep in the jungle. He was a stout man of fifty-four, with a thin black mustache and a perpetual expression of hauteur on his face. He was eatin
g rice and raw fish, using chopsticks, and occasionally sipped a bowl of green tea. While chewing, he studied a captured map of American positions on Guadalcanal, but the map was out of date, although he didn't know it.
His tent flap was pushed to the side, and his secretary, Corporal Nobutaka, entered, saluting stiffly. “Colonel Tsuji is here to see you, sir.”
“Send him right in.”
“Yes, sir.”
Nobutaka spun around and left the tent. A few moments later a tall ascetic-looking officer entered, bowing low. He was forty years old, wore a Fu Manchu mustache, and had been nicknamed “God of Operations” for his fine staff work under General Yamashita in the battle for Malaya.
“Come in, Tsuji,” General Hyakutake said genially. “Have a seat. Tell me what you have found out.”
Tsuji marched toward the desk and sat erectly on a chair. An ultranationalist, he had been involved in countless plots against the civilian government before the war. Now at last General Tojo was head of the government, and there was no further need to plot.
“Shall I wait until you're finished eating, sir?”
“No, no, of course not, Tsuji. Relax. Give me your report.”
Colonel Tsuji did not relax. He opened his leather briefcase and took out a sheaf of papers, thumbing through for the information he wanted. Then he cleared his throat. “The Americans have landed approximately one thousand men,” he said, “plus approximately ten tanks and a small amount of artillery. The Imperial Air Force bombed and strafed them extensively, but it is not known at this time the extent of their casualties.”
“I see,” said General Hyakutake. “Very interesting. Hmmmm.” He wrote the figures on a piece of paper, not realizing that the Americans had landed three thousand men and much more equipment. One of the main problems of the Japanese on Guadalcanal was that they continually underestimated the number of American troops facing them.
“I recommend an attack on these new replacements immediately, sir. They're probably green and won't be able to stand up to us.”
“You're quite right, Tsuji, but first we have to find out where they are. Send out patrols to determine their location. I imagine we shall attack them at night. Westerners, being very haughty, effeminate, and cowardly, intensely dislike fighting in the rain or mist or in the dark, as you well know. They cannot conceive night to be a proper time for battle, though I'm sure they consider it excellent for dancing and seducing their hideous women. In those weaknesses lie our greatest opportunities.”
“Yes, sir.” Tsuji wrote in his little notebook. “We'll probably have a good idea where they are by sundown, so perhaps we can attack them tonight, before they get acclimated to this island.”
General Hyakutake picked up a lump of raw fish with his chopsticks. “Tonight will be good, because we already have planned a surprise for them. Admiral Yamamoto is sending us two battleships to shell the airfield and the American positions surrounding them.”
"Two battleships, sir? That's a great deal of artillery for such a small area. Should be rather devastating.”
“Should be.” General Hyakutake placed the piece of fish in his mouth. “The shelling will kill many of them and destroy the airfield. The ones it won't kill will be badly disoriented. Then we attack.” General Hyakutake smiled as he chewed the fish.
“Excellent thinking, sir,” said Tsuji, who deep down thought Hyakutake an idiot. He figured he could have thrown the Americans off Guadalcanal long ago if he'd been in command.
“Do you have anything important to add to your report, Tsuji?”
“No, sir.”
“Then you may return to your quarters for lunch.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Tsuji rose, bowed, saluted, did an about-face, and marched out of the tent. He put on his soft cap and marched through the jungle, passing tents and groups of soldiers cleaning equipment. A camouflage net was spread over the area so that American planes couldn't spot them from the air. Sentries were posted in the jungle to guard against American raids. Many of the soldiers were emaciated, because the Japanese were having more difficulty landing supplies on Guadalcanal than the Americans.
He approached his tent from the side and was surprised to see the guard in front of it leaning on his rifle and staring distractedly into the jungle. Tsuji walked silently toward the guard, and when he drew close, reared back his fist and punched him with all his strength in the mouth.
The blow was so powerful that the guard lost consciousness for a moment and dropped to the ground. Enraged, Tsuji stomped on his face.
“You idiot!” he screamed. “How dare you loaf and dawdle in front of my tent!”
“A thousand apologies, sir!” the man whined, trying to crawl away from Tsuji's boot. “Ten thousand apologies!”
Colonel Tsuji kicked him on the temple and knocked him out cold. Then he smashed his heel down on the soldier's nose, splintering bone and cartilage. It was common for Japanese officers and NCOs to treat soldiers that way, and they meted out even worse punishment to enemy soldiers who were unfortunate enough to get captured.
“Sergeant of the guard!” Tsuji screamed.
A sturdy little sergeant came charging through the jungle, bringing himself to an abrupt halt in front of Tsuji and throwing a smart salute. “Sergeant Kaburagi reporting, sir!”
Tsuji pointed to the soldier bleeding and unconscious on the ground. “This scum was daydreaming in front of my tent! Send me another soldier who knows how to stand guard properly!”
“Yes, sir!”
Tsuji turned and entered his tent. The soldier on the ground moaned softly, and Sergeant Kaburagi kicked him again in the face. That ended the moaning. Sergeant Kaburagi ordered two nearby soldiers to drag the derelict away and a third one to guard Colonel Tsuji's tent.
Inside the tent Tsuji took off his hat and threw it on his desk. His shirt and pants were soaked with sweat, so he took them off and sat only in his jockstrap on the tatami mat spread on the ground. This was in a comer of the tent, and in front of him, on an empty crate of ammunition, was a color photograph of the Emperor, who wore a brimmed military hat with a cockade. Tsuji lit a stick of incense and stuck it into the ground in front of the photograph, then bowed low to his Emperor, whom he considered half-man and half-god.
Tsuji thought of himself as a religious man, and everything he did, he did for his Emperor. He maneuvered his legs into the lotus position, folded his hands on his lap, and meditated on the face of his Emperor. The foolish Americans had only an elected president to lead them, but they, the Japanese, had a god. How could the Japanese lose if they had an incarnated god on their side? That would be impossible.
He regulated his breathing as he gazed at the face of his Emperor, and gradually drifted off into a trance.
THREE . . .
Bannon decided they'd return to the rest of the squad one at a time, and he designated himself first to go. He crouched in the foxhole with Gladley and Sam Longtree, adjusting his helmet and cartridge belt, and then bounded out suddenly, running four steps and diving headfirst into the densest part of the jungle.
Crack!
The sniper saw him and had taken a wild shot, but Bannon was moving fast and the bullet crashed harmlessly into the trunk of a tree. Bannon landed in a puddle of water, which stank horribly. Little bugs flitted around on the surface, and Bannon jumped up. He dashed to drier ground and tried to rub a leaf off the back of his hand, but found out on closer inspection that it was a leech. Bannon stared at it in morbid fascination. His part of Texas had no leeches, and he didn't know what to do with it. Then he remembered a training lecture on forms of life in the jungle, in which a captain from headquarters had said the best way to get rid of a leech was to touch a lighted cigarette to it.
"Halt!” yelled Private Billie Jones. "Who goes there!”
"Bannon!”
Bannon entered the dank jungle area where his squad was lying around in foxholes. Craig Delane was smoking a cigarette. Bannon grabbed it out of his m
outh and touched the burning end to the leech, and the leech rolled off his hand. Bannon handed the cigarette back to Delane, who stared, horrified, at the leech twisting and rolling on the ground.
Bannon looked for Private O'Rourke to ask if he'd seen the position of the Jap sniper, and O'Rourke had a big shit-eating grin on his face that answered Bannon's question.
“You remember where he is?” Bannon asked.
“I sure do.” O'Rourke pointed. “Thataway.”
“Good work.”
Homer Gladley came crashing through the jungle clumsily and looked around. “Chowtime yet?” he asked.
Nobody said anything. Bannon looked at his watch. It was twelve-thirty, and he figured he ought to let the men have some C rations. He felt strange making these kinds of decisions. Usually somebody else made them and he just did as he was told.
“I think we'd better chow down now,” he said, “and then we'll go after that sniper.”
“If he stays where he is,” Frankie La Barbara said.
Homer Gladley tore into his pack and came out with a little cardboard box of C rations. He ripped the cover off and withdrew a little khaki can, reading the label.
“What kind you got?” O'Rourke asked.
“Sausage patties.”
“I wouldn't feed them to my fucking dog.”
“If anybody don't want theirs, they can just give ‘em to me,” Homer said, taking his can opener out of his pocket and sticking the point into the top of the can.
Suddenly, almost spectrally, Sam Longtree appeared in their midst .Unlike Homer Gladley, Longtree moved silently through the jungle; they didn't even hear him coming.
“It's chowtime, Chief,” Bannon said. “Make it quick because we've got work to do.”
Longtree sat beside his pack and opened it up. Bannon did the same, feeling more respect for the Indian. Bannon had hardly noticed him before, because Longtree had been quiet and low-key. In fact Bannon had had the impression that the Indian was a little-retarded, but now, on the battleground of Guadalcanal, Bannon realized that Longtree was better suited to the situation than the rest of them. When it came time to appoint an assistant squad leader, Longtree would probably be it.
