Doom River

by Len Levinson

  “Sergeant Mahoney?” said Pfc. DiMeola. He was outside the tent.

  “Whadaya doing out there?”

  “Captain Anderson wants to see you right away.”

  “Oh, fuck!”

  “He’s says it’s important.”

  “Tell him I’m jerking off and I can’t be bothered.”

  “C’mon, Sarge. Stop fucking around.”

  “Tell him I’ll be there in five minutes.”

  “Okay, Sarge.”

  Mahoney rubbed his feet gently and put his wet socks back on again. It was a godawful sensation and made his flesh crawl. He pulled on his combat boots and laced them back up. When he was a civilian, and even when he was in the peacetime Army, he realized, he had never appreciated how wonderful it was just to have dry feet. One thing he could say. The Army had taught him to appreciate the simple things in life. All he wanted when he got out would be a clean little apartment, a decent income, and a good woman like Ginger Reilly to fuck all night long. Surely that wasn’t too much to ask for.

  Mahoney crawled out of the tent back into the pouring rain. The wind was blowing harder and he wrapped his wool scarf more tightly around his neck. The ridge was covered with trenches and pup tents—a little G.I. City. The big-walled CP tent had been erected, and Mahoney walked inside. Sergeant Tweed and Pfc. Drago were there at their desks, fighting the paper war.

  “Go right in, Mahoney,” Tweed said.

  Mahoney pushed the flap aside and entered Captain Anderson’s office. It had a musty smell. Lieutenant Michaels and Lieutenant Garcia were present, along with Master Sergeant Rand and Sergeant First-Class Gundy. Anderson sat behind a desk.

  “Now that Sergeant Mahoney’s here,” the captain began, “I can get down to business. I’ve just received new orders. We’re to move out immediately and capture a little town not far from here.”

  Everyone groaned.

  “I know how you feel,” Anderson said. “I feel the same way myself. But orders are orders. Tell the men to strike their tents and roll them up with their blankets. We’ll dump them on trucks and leave.”

  “What about lunch?” Lieutenant Michaels asked.

  “We’ll have K rations on the march. I expect we’ll have a hot meal in the town after we take it. It shouldn’t be difficult. We understand there’s nobody there.”

  “How do ‘we’ understand that?” Mahoney asked.

  “Intelligence reports.”

  “So, in other words,” Mahoney said, “there might be some stiff resistance.”

  “It’s possible,” Anderson admitted.

  Walking back to the first platoon, Mahoney grumbled and snarled. He hated the Army worse than ever and felt like killing somebody. When he got to DiMeola’s tent, he reached in, grabbed the hapless Pfc by the foot, and dragged him out into the rain.

  DiMeola screamed and threatened mayhem until he saw that it was Mahoney who’d yanked him out.

  “Round up all the squad leaders and have them report to me right away.”

  “What’s up, Sarge?” DiMeola got to his feet.

  Mahoney pointed at the Pfc’s nose. “I’m the one asks the questions—got it?”

  “Hup, Sarge.”

  As DiMeola slouched off to round up the squad leaders, Mahoney looked at his tent. He pulled out his pack, took out another cigar, lit it up. His feet stung as if he’d dipped them in acid.

  “Son-of-a-bitch bastard cuntlapper,” he muttered.

  He kicked the poles of the tent, and it came crashing down. A peal of thunder ripped apart the heavens overhead, and the downpour increased in intensity. I really can’t take much more of this shit, Mahoney thought, as he rolled up the tent. Maybe it’s time I shot myself in the leg.

  DiMeola returned with Cranepool and the other squad leaders.

  “You guys see what I’m doing?” Mahoney said. He was rolling up his wet tent and wet blanket on the mud.

  “We’re moving out?” Sergeant Updike asked in a tone of complete incredulity.

  “You guessed it, buddy. Knock down your tents and roll ’em up. There’s a little town near here that we’ve got to take before the sun goes down. Any questions?”

  “What’s the name of the town?” asked Sergeant Laski of the third squad.

  “How the fuck am I supposed to know? Get going—all of you.”

  DiMeola rolled up his half of the tent and tied it with straps. Then he put up the aerial of his walkie-talkie and listened for news. Underneath a tree he looked mournfully at the sky, the walkie-talkie pressed to his ear.

  Still puffing his cigar, Mahoney was so mad he could spit. A light mist was rising from the wet forest floor and everything appeared gloomy. Why do I fight so hard to stay alive? he asked himself. Why don’t I just let them shoot me and get it over with?

  After a while the platoon returned. Mahoney said nothing, so they just hung around. Cranepool tried to strike up a conversation but Mahoney was gruff and Cranepool, disappointed, walked away. The sporadic firing of machine guns and rifles could be heard in the distance.

  I really ought to shoot myself in the leg, Mahoney thought. This is getting to be too much for me. I’ve been doing this shit for too long. They ought to let the old veterans like me go home after two years at the front.

  “Sarge,” said DiMeola, “the captain wants us to go to the CP. He says there’s gonna be chow.”

  “Chow?” Mahoney said, “All right, everybody—let’s have a column of ducks over here.”

  Mahoney marched them toward the CP. The big tent had been torn down but the cooks had placed their aluminum containers on the ground and one of the other platoons was passing through the chow line.

  As Lieutenant Garcia approached, Mahoney threw him a salute. Garcia had straight black hair and a coffee complexion underneath his helmet.

  “Take your men through the chow line, Sergeant.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  As his platoon took out their mess kits and cups, Mahoney led them through the line. The cooks put hamburgers and the same hash-brown potatoes they’d had for breakfast into the mess kits. They gave Mahoney some bread and filled his cup with warm coffee. At the end of the line, Mahoney spotted the mess sergeant, old “Shoeface” McGhee, sitting in the back of a deuce and a half truck. McGhee waved to him and indicated that Mahoney should join him. His spirits lifted by the sight of McGhee, Mahoney walked to the truck.

  “You fat fuck,” Mahoney said good-naturedly, “you always wind up where it’s warm and dry.”

  McGhee chortled. “If you were smart enough to be a cook you could be doing the same. Come on up here, you fucking scumbag, and tell me what it’s like to be a soldier.”

  Mahoney passed up his mess kit and climbed into the truck. In back of the truck were whole crates of food. Mahoney started to dig in.

  “You look like a drowned rat,” McGhee observed.

  “Fuck you,” Mahoney replied, stuffing food into his mouth. “Goddamn, this is good. No wonder you’re so fat, McGhee. You been eating your own chow all the time.”

  “Why the hell not?” McGhee asked with a laugh, puffing a cigarette. “Captain Anderson tells me the company is moving out to take a town near here.”

  “That’s about the size of it, buddy.”

  “Are there many people in the town?”

  “How in the hell should I know.”

  McGhee cleared his throat. “Well, you know, if there are a lot of people there should be some cunt.”

  A light bulb went on in Mahoney’s head. “Hey, man, that’s right!”

  “Of course it’s right. You’re liable to get laid in that town, Mahoney.”

  “If I can, I’ll give her a couple of shoves for you, buddy boy.”

  McGhee blew a smoke ring into the air. “If you had extra cigarettes and candy and shit, that would probably make it easier for you.”

  “It probably would,” Mahoney agreed, shoveling hamburger into his mouth, “but where am I gonna get extra cigarettes and candy?”

&nbs
p; “From me,” McGhee said.

  “You got cigarettes and candy?”

  “Don’t I?”

  “Gimme some!”

  McGhee widened his eyes. “Give you some? What do I look like to you, a fucking charity? I ain’t no charity. I got the goods but I ain’t giving them away. They’re gonna cost you, but you can afford it. I heard you got more money than God.”

  “But I send all my money home to my mama, McGhee!”

  “All of it?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What you do that for?”

  “Because I’m saving up for something, and I figured I wouldn’t need anything until payday.”

  “Guess you figured wrong, shithead.”

  Mahoney put the last morsel of food into his mouth and wiped off his lips with the back of his hand. If he could get laid tonight, it would be worth a long march through the rain. And McGhee was right, it would be much easier if he had some candy and cigarettes to throw around. Girls always went for the guy who made a big splash.

  “Listen, McGhee,” Mahoney pleaded, “I’ll pay you back on payday.”

  “Fuck you,” McGhee replied. “You might be dead before payday.”

  Mahoney groaned. “What a terrible thing to say!”

  “Money talks and bullshit walks.”

  “Maybe we can work out a deal,” Mahoney said.

  “What kind of a deal?”

  Mahoney held up his wrist. “How about this watch?”

  “I got watches up the ass.”

  Mahoney unstrapped it. “But you ain’t got one like this.”

  “I got a bagful better than that.”

  “But it’s pure gold!”

  “Watches like that are a dime a dozen. Put it back on your wrist and save your breath.”

  Mahoney put the watch back on and tried to think of what he could trade to McGhee in exchange for some cigarettes and candy. He remembered the pistol he had taken from the German officer.

  “Hey!” he said, slipping his pack off his shoulders. “Have I got something for you!”

  “Mahoney,” wheezed McGhee, “you’re so full of shit you’re starting to stink.”

  Mahoney opened his pack and took out the pistol. “Looka here.”

  McGhee’s eyes widened. “Is that one of them German guns?”

  “You bet your fucking ass it is. Take a look at it.”

  McGhee took it from Mahoney’s hand and looked it over. McGhee fell in love with it immediately. German pistols were highly prized among rear-echelon soldiers. They liked to mail them home and say they’d captured them.

  Mahoney could tell from the glitter in McGhee’s eyes that he loved the pistol, although McGhee was trying to play it cool in an effort to downgrade the pistol’s value.

  “Not a bad little piece,” McGhee mused. “What do you want for it?”

  “Fifty dollars.”

  “Fifty dollars? Are you crazy?”

  “You know you’re going to get a hundred for it once you get back to the big consolidated mess where you and your buddies fuck up food.”

  “Forty,” said McGhee disdainfully.

  “Fifty.”

  “Forty.”

  “Tell you what,” Mahoney said, “give me twenty-five now, and twenty-five next time you see me. I’m liable to get killed in the assault on the village tonight, and then you won’t have to pay me the other twenty-five. Get the picture.”

  McGhee grinned and held out his big hand. “It’s a deal.”

  Mahoney shook McGhee’s hand. McGhee unbuttoned his shirt and dropped the pistol inside. “All I can spare right now are five packs of Camels and ten Hershey bars.”

  “Stolen out of C Rations, right?”

  “None of your business where it came from. Did I ask you where that gun came from?”

  “You know where it came from.”

  “And you know where the goods came from, so why talk about it?”

  “How much is that stuff gonna cost me?” Mahoney asked.

  “Ten bucks.”

  “Ten bucks!”

  “You heard me.”

  Mahoney pointed his finger at McGhee. “You fat fuck—you’re a crook!”

  McGhee was nonplussed. “Take it or leave it.”

  Mahoney sighed. “I’ll take it.”

  “That means all I have to do is give you fifteen bucks.”

  “And the other twenty-five when you see me again.”

  “Right.”

  McGhee reached into his pocket and took out a huge roll of bills. Boy, is this guy raking it in, Mahoney thought. No wonder the food is so bad. He’s spending most of his time in the black market.

  “Here you go,” McGhee said, handing over the money.

  “Thanks.”

  “Here’s the goods.” McGhee grunted as he got up and moved forward in the truck. He opened the box and took out the cigarettes and Hershey bars.

  Mahoney took the cigarettes and candy and put them in his pack.

  “It’s been a pleasure doing business with you,” McGhee said, lighting up another cigarette.

  Chapter Eleven

  Charlie Company slogged down the other side of the ridge and entered the swamp. They were heading to their left, and Mahoney wondered who was going to plug the big gap in the line. He had already figured out why they were moving. Once he’d heard General Patton address the troops, and Patton had said that it didn’t make any sense to capture something that doesn’t permit you to go anywhere. That ridge didn’t have a road net behind it, but presumably the village would. If they took the village they’d be able to send tanks and the red-ball express all the way through to the Siegfried Line. That must be the reason for the quick move.

  The swamp was more like a bog, with little water but a lot of muck. Mahoney sank into it up to his knees, and he knew his feet were going to be worse tonight. He also knew that more men from his platoon would have to be sent back to the rear with advanced cases of trench foot. The problem was that they never sent anybody up from the rear as replacements, but maybe some would arrive after they took the town.

  The first platoon led Charlie Company as usual, and Mahoney had two scouts fifty yards ahead of the first platoon. They were Pfc. Hawkins and Pfc. Butsko from McKeesport, Pennsylvania. Butsko was a big, tough guy, a former steelworker, and Mahoney had noticed him shortly after taking over the platoon. Butsko always appeared angry and vicious, which was the proper attitude for a good combat soldier. He also had the necessary size, because in hand-to-hand combat, sheer physical strength was almost everything. Mahoney thought Butsko would make a good corporal and squad leader. He’d move Butsko up as soon as one of the other squad leaders got knocked off.

  On the other side of the swamp they came to the road. Captain Anderson formed the company on it, and made the men spread out so that one artillery shell wouldn’t wipe all of them out. They made their way through hilly forest country, and then came to a stretch of farmland. At three o’clock in the afternoon, Butsko gesticulated wildly with his hand, indicating that the village was dead ahead. Mahoney took the walkie-talkie from DiMeola and called Captain Anderson to tell him.

  “Take a squad of men,” Anderson said, “and see if there are any Germans in the village. We’ll wait here on the road for you.”

  Mahoney decided to take Cranepool’s squad, because he figured it was the best squad in the platoon. He formed them into two columns, one on each side of the road, and marched them toward the village. He and DiMeola took positions in the middle of the two columns.

  The rain continued to fall. Mahoney felt warm and loosened the scarf around his neck. He squinted his eyes and peered through the rain, looking for the village. Slowly it came into view, its bombed-out buildings emerging ethereally through the rain and fog.

  “Keep your eyes open,” Mahoney cautioned. “There may be a ton of Germans in there.”

  The road angled down into the village. Smoke curled from ruined buildings and random figures could be seen amidst the debris. Mahoney
figured that the town had once contained German soldiers before the American Air Corps bombed the shit out of it.

  As the soldiers drew closer to the village, they crouched and held their rifles tightly. They were ready to hit the muck and start fighting at the sound of the first shot or explosion. But nothing happened. As they entered the village, their eyes searched the rubble and windows of caved-in buildings for signs of German soldiers. It was a small village and in a matter of minutes they reached the little square at its center. Opposite the square was a church half-demolished by bombing.

  An old man with a white mustache watched the Americans with great curiosity. He wore a black raincoat and a wide-brimmed hat. Mahoney walked up to him and said in French: “Are there any Germans in this town?”

  The man shook his head. “Some Germans passed through last night, but now they are gone.”

  Mahoney looked around at the buildings edging the square. He saw a few people walking around in the wreckage, but they weren’t wearing German helmets or hats. Some were women. Mahoney held out his hand for the walkie-talkie, and called Captain Anderson.

  “It doesn’t look as though there are any Krauts here,” Mahoney said. “I think it’s safe to move up the rest of the company, sir.”

  “We’ll be right there.”

  Mahoney handed the walkie-talkie back to DiMeola and looked around at the town. It had consisted of only forty or fifty houses, and he figured most of the people who lived there worked in the fields nearby. It was probably a little, out-of-the-way place that no one except its inhabitants had cared about until a few days ago when the bombs started to fall. Mahoney hoped nothing would happen in the town while he was there.

  “Take a break till the captain gets here,” Mahoney said.

  The men lounged around the square, lighting up cigarettes. They wondered what the women would look like up close. Several little boys in raincoats shyly approached the soldiers, talking in French to each other. Most of the soldiers didn’t know what they were saying, but Mahoney spoke French fluently and knew they were admiring the various weapons the soldiers were carrying.

  “Chocolate?” one boy said to Cranepool.

  Cranepool grinned, reaching into the pocket of his field jacket. “Here,” he said.