by Len Levinson
“I think it's broken,” Blum said.
“I know that,” Frankie replied, “but will it heal straight?”
“I don't know.”
“Well, what're you gonna do about it?”
“I'll bandage it up.”
“But what if it heals crooked?”
“What if it does?”
Frankie jumped to his feet. “What if it does? Are you kidding? I don't wanna walk around with a crooked nose like that fucking Butsko! I don't wanna be an ugly son of a bitch like everybody else. Now, fix my fucking nose right now!”
“I can't fix your nose. I'm not a surgeon.”
“Then send me back.”
“I don't have the authority to send you back. Ask Butsko to send you back.”
“He won't send me back.”
“So whataya want from me?”
Blum painted Frankie's nose with Merthiolate. Frankie looked at Bannon. “Hey, Tex, you're a sergeant. You send me back.”
“I ain't a sergeant anymore,” replied Bannon.
Everybody looked at him.
“What the fuck happened?” Frankie asked.
“Butsko busted your nose and he busted me back to private.”
“What!”
Bannon didn't answer. He took out a cigarette and lit it up.
“That son of a bitch,” Frankie said.
Shilansky ran his tongue over his shattered gums. “And he busted up my mouth too.”
Nutsy Gafooley, the former hobo, nodded. “He's been on the warpath ever since he got back from the hospital.”
“That's because he didn't get no pussy back at the hospital,” Frankie said. “I used to see him there sitting on the lawn, reading field manuals. He's a psycho case. He'd better never get in front of me if there's any shooting going on because I'll put a hole in his fucking head.”
Shilansky snorted. “The bullet'd probably bounce right off. He's got a thick head.”
“Nobody's tougher than a bullet,” Frankie said.
Bannon looked at him. “Knock that shit off. If you shoot Butsko, I'll shoot you.”
“What're you sticking up for him for? He just took away your stripes.”
“He knows what he's doing out here better than any of us.”
Frankie thought for a few moments. “That's true. Ouch!”
“Sorry,” said Blum, who was applying a bandage to Frankie's broken nose.
“Here comes Shaw,” said the Reverend Billie Jones, who had been a jackleg preacher in Georgia before the war.
Shaw was a tall heavyweight tipping the scales at 210 pounds. He'd had forty-six professional fights in civilian life, winning thirty-seven of them, with twenty-eight knockouts. He'd been ranked sixteen by Ring magazine and was trying to get a fight with a top-ten contender when he'd been drafted.
“All right, you guys,” he said, “I'm the new squad leader. There will be no more bullshit or fucking around in this squad. You make trouble for me and you'll wish you were dead. Any questions?”
Nobody said anything.
“Okay, let's saddle up and move out.”
The men hoisted their packs to their backs and formed a column of twos. Bannon was about halfway back and he realized it was nice to be an ordinary dogface soldier again, with no responsibilities and no decisions to make. Let Shaw have the worries. He'd soon find out that being a squad leader was no bed of roses.
The First Squad joined the other squads in the platoon and Butsko marched them to company headquarters, where they were issued hand grenades and bandoliers of ammunition. Then they sat around and smoked cigarettes, waiting for the order to move out.
It came at nine o'clock, and the Twenty-third Infantry Regiment moved into the jungle. They were deployed in a series of long columns, and men with machetes were in front hacking through the thick foliage. Everyone was vigilant, because the Japs were famous for their sudden sneaky ambushes.
The recon platoon was in front of the Second Battalion, and Corporal Gomez, the former pachuco from Los Angeles, was the point man in the recon platoon, thirty yards in front of the others, his narrow eyes darting around, searching for Japs, while his ears listened for Japanese footsteps and the rustle of underbrush.
Monkeys chattered high in the trees and birds screeched. Land crabs crawled along the jungle floor, along with wild pigs and crocodiles. The sun rose in the sky and Gomez per-spired profusely, plastering his shirt to his skin. He became thirsty, took a swallow of water from his canteen, and kept going. He felt good being the point man for the platoon. For the first time in his life he was doing something important. Everybody was relying on him, and he didn't want to let anybody down. If he were back with the others, he'd let his mind wander and probably think of pretty Mexican senoritas with golden earrings and wide flowing skirts, but he disciplined his mind and made himself concentrate on the jungle, the sounds and sights, and the telltale movement that would indicate the presence of Japs.
The terrain consisted of thick jungle, scattered hills, and fields of kunai grass. After two hours of tough going, the battalion lost its cohesion as units swung to their left or right, trying to work around obstacles or take advantage of trails that suddenly presented themselves.
The advance became a series of small units moving in a westerly direction through the jungle, staying in touch through walkie-talkies. The sun became hotter and insects of every description buzzed around the men, biting them and raising huge welts on their skin. Shortly before noon Gomez came to a slight rise that indicated the beginning of a hill. He didn't know whether to go up it or around it, so he sat near the trunk of a tree and waited for the others to catch up.
A few minutes later the First Squad appeared through the jungle, and Gomez stood. Shaw, wearing his fatigue shirt unbuttoned to his navel and his sleeves torn off, walked toward Gomez.
“What you stop for?”
“Should we go up this hill or around it?”
Shaw thought for a few moments. “I don't know. We'd better wait for Butsko.”
Shaw told the men to take a break. They collapsed onto the ground, sucking water from their canteens, then lighting cigarettes. All were exhausted and in rotten moods. They were mad at the Japs, mad at the Army, mad at everything. Several minutes later, Butsko arrived with the Second Squad.
“What's the holdup here?”
Shaw told him. Butsko looked up the hill. His recon platoon had become separated from George Company and he didn't feel like calling Captain Orr on the radio to find out what to do. Butsko liked to take charge and make his own decisions. He decided he'd better find out what was on top of the hill.
He told the second squad to take a break, then sat cross-legged on the ground and spread his map out on his lap. He placed his finger on the spot where they'd started in the morning and moved it across the map in the direction they'd traveled. His calculations led him to believe he was at the bottom of Hill 108, which was a solitary hill, not part of a system of hills. He thought he'd better take the platoon up the hill and see if anything was there.
The Third and Fourth squads arrived, and Butsko told them to take a break. Everyone puffed cigarettes and wished they were somewhere else. A few weeks earlier they'd been part of the force that had captured the Gifu Line, which was a Jap defensive position dug into a network of hills, and they'd developed a strong distaste for hills.
Butsko finished his cigarette, crushed it out against his boot, and fieldstripped it, scattering the shreds of tobacco to the ground. He balled up the small piece of cigarette paper, tossed it over his shoulder, and stood up, putting on his steel helmet.
“Okay, let's go!” he said. “First Squad on the point! Everybody else in a column of ducks! If we come under fire, fan out and get down! Move it out!”
The First Squad advanced up the hill in a column of twos, with Gomez far in front on the point, crouching low, holding his rifle in both hands, ready for anything. He raised his feet high in the air and brought them down carefully on the floor of the jungle,
making as little noise as possible, just as they'd taught him in training at Fort Ord, California. The hill became steeper and Gomez bent forward. He pushed branches out of the way with the barrel of his M 1, but some snapped back at him and scratched his face anyway.
Pow!
A rifle was fired in front of him and the bullet slammed into a tree trunk two inches away. Gomez dropped to his stomach, rolled over, and came to a stop behind a tree.
“Japs!” he yelled.
Farther back, the recon platoon was hitting the dirt and spreading out. Butsko looked to his left and right to see if everything was going okay; he found nothing to criticize.
“Advance!” he shouted. “Keep your heads down!”
The recon platoon crawled up the hill and soon came under scattered small-arms fire. The GIs fired back and continued crawling slowly up the hill. Butsko had been through this before at the Gifu Line and knew what was happening. A thin screen of Japanese soldiers were in front of him and they'd retreat to their bunker or whatever they had up at the top of the hill. Sooner or later the GIs would come under machine-gun fire from the bunker and then their real problems would begin.
Frankie La Barbara carried one of the Browning automatic rifles in the platoon and was raking the jungle in front of him from left to right. Every fifth round was a tracer, and he could gauge the trajectory of his bullets by watching where they went.
The platoon had two BARs in each squad, and they put out a tremendous base of fire. The rest of the platoon advanced behind the fire, and every time'a Jap took a potshot at an American, he was answered by a hail of BAR bullets. The Japs retreated up the hill, and the GIs went after them in smooth even waves, covering each other all the way, taking no crazy chances.
Frankie's BAR rested on two metal legs that extended down from the barrel, and the butt had a metal flap that permitted the rear of the weapon to rest securely on his shoulder. It had a handle midway up the barrel, so it could be carried like a suitcase, and it weighed about twice as much as an M 1 rifle.
The bolt slammed forward but didn't fire; the clip was empty. Frankie pulled the clip down and tossed it away, then reached into his cartridge belt and took out a fresh one, tapping it into the chamber.
“La Barbara, move that BAR forward!”
Frankie scanned the jungle in front of him, saw a boulder that would provide good cover, and jumped up, grabbing the BAR by its wooden handle. He ran in a low crouch and a Japanese bullet zanged past bis ear, making him flinch. Dropping lower, he scampered over the last ten yards, threw the BAR to the ground beside the boulder, then dropped onto his belly behind it, flicking up the rear sights and pulling the trigger. The BAR stuttered and danced on its skinny metal legs, and the red tracers made long arcing lines into the jungle ahead.
The recon platoon advanced steadily up the hill, and then, as it was nearing the crest, two Japanese machine guns opened fire on them. The recon platoon stopped cold; now the task was to find out exactly where the machine guns were. There might be one bunker up there or there might be a dozen of them, all mutually supportive like the ones in the Gifu Line.
“First Squad, move it out.!” Butsko hollered. “Squads Two, Three, and Four, give ‘em cover!”
“Let's go!” Shaw said.
The First Squad, which was on the far left flank of the platoon, moved up the hill while the other squads fired everything they had toward the crest and drew most of the Japanese machine-gun fire. The First Squad crawled forward, not bothering to be quiet because the terrific racket around them masked their sounds.
“Let's go, move it!” Shaw shouted. “Bannon, catch up with the others!”
Bannon felt weird to be taking orders from Shaw, because yesterday Shaw had been taking orders from him. Bannon raised himself up on his hands and knees and pushed himself forward. The sound of the machine guns ahead became louder and seemed to be dead ahead. The First Squad made its way up the hill. Bannon was right in the middle, not far from Frankie La Barbara, who looked ridiculous with the big bandage on his nose. Farther down the hill they could hear Butsko shouting. Bannon pushed some branches away from his face and saw smoke and lightning up ahead, blowing against branches and leaves.
“There they are!” Bannon shouted.
The First Squad stopped just in time, because the Japs near the top of the hill spotted them and turned one of the machine guns on them, pinning them down. Bannon pressed his cheek against the moist jungle earth and smelled its stench. He remembered what he saw: the mouth of a cave with gun barrels pointing out of it.
“La Barbara!” yelled Shaw. “O'Rourke! Get those BARs working!”
Frankie raised his head to aim through his sights, and a Japanese machine-gun bullet smacked into the earth only a few inches away. He flinched, tried to raise his head again, and a bullet whistled past his ear. He lowered his head to the ground.
“La Barbara,—Whatsa matter with you?”
“You wanna fire this BAR, you can fire it!”
“I just gave you an order!”
“I just told you to go fuck yourself!”
Bannon couldn't help chuckling. It was nice not having to cope with Frankie La Barbara anymore. Shaw called Butsko over his walkie-talkie and told him that the Jap machine guns had been sighted. Butsko said he was on the way.
A terrific racket erupted down the hill, as the rest of the rescon platoon charged the crest in waves, The Japanese machine gunners aimed their weapons to meet the threat, and Frankie and Jimmy O'Rourke were able to get their BARs going. The rest of the GIs in the First Squad fired their rifles, and soon one of the Jap machine guns swung around to give them a few bursts.
Bannon remembered that it was against a bunker like the one ahead that his good friend Sam Longtree, the Apache Indian, got shot. Longtree had tried to knock out the bunker all by himself and bitten off more than he could chew, but that Indian went insane in combat. All he wanted to do was kill Japs.
The rest of the platoon made their way up the hill, and the Japanese machine guns trained their fire on them again. Bannon wondered what the Japs in the cave were thinking, because surely they knew they were going to be wiped out before long. Why didn't they just surrender? Why did they fight to the death? The Japs were like inhuman creatures to Bannon. They didn't operate on the same wavelength he was on. They were all even crazier than Longtree.
The First Squad pumped lead into the mouth of the cave while the rest of the recon platoon charged up the hill. Finally Butsko got a clear look at the cave. The Japs had piled huge boulders in front of the entrance, and it would take a 155 howitzer to blast through them. He didn't have a 155 howitzer with him, so he'd have to bum them out.
“Gladley!”
“To!”
“Get that flame thrower ready!”
“Yo!”
“Everybody up the hill! Let's go!”
The recon platoon crawled forward squad by squad, covering each other's advance, firing steadily at the mouth of the cave. The First and Fourth squads closed in on the cave's sides, and the two Japanese machine guns swung from the side, frantically trying to stop the American advance.
The First Squad came within throwing range and tossed hand grenades toward the mouth of the cave. The Japs had arranged the boulders in front so that there was only a tiny opening, and the grenades bounced off the boulders and rolled down the hill, exploding ferociously.
“Stop the grenades!” Butsko yelled. “Move in on the flanks!”
The recon platoon split in half and approached the mouth of the cave from the sides. The Japanese machine gunners fired wildly, but the GIs had moved themselves out of range.
“Charge!”
The GIs jumped up and rushed the mouth of the cave from the sides. A Jap head and torso appeared in the opening; he was trying to get out with his rifle so he could get a clear shot at the GIs, but Hotshot Stevenson, the platoon sharpshooter, lined him up in his sights and pulled his trigger. The M 1 fired and the Jap caught a bullet in the center of his b
rain.
The other Japs in the cave pulled their dead comrade in as the recon platoon crowded around the sides of the opening. Butsko yanked a grenade from his lapel, pulled the pin, let the lever fly off, counted to two, and lobbed the grenade through the opening.
Screams issued from inside the cave, and seconds later the grenade detonated with a mighty roar. Smoke and flames shot out of the opening and the ground heaved beneath the GI's feet.
“Gladley!” shouted Butsko.
Gladley stepped toward the front of the cave and aimed the nozzle of his flamethrower toward the opening. He switched on the lever and fire shot out of the nozzle, sounding like a hurricane. The flames poured into the cave and Gladley held the nozzle steady. Terrible screaming could be heard from within, along with the crackling and spattering of human flesh as it roasted in the fire. A head covered with flames poked through the opening, and Butsko aimed his rifle at it, pulling the trigger.
Blam!
The head shattered into a dozen burning bits. The GIs dodged out of the way so that none of the fire would fall on them. Gladley maintained a steady stream of fire into the cave, and smoke poured out, smelling like a barbecue.
“That's enough,” Butsko said.
Gladley turned off the lever and the column of flame shrank back to the nozzle.
“Gafooley!” said Butsko. “Get me a piece of wood to pry away those rocks with!”
“Hup, Sarge!”
“The rest of you keep your fucking eyes open.”
Nutsy ran off into the jungle to get a piece of wood, and the GIs looked around at the jungle to make sure no Japs were sneaking up on them. Smoke billowed out of the hole and rose up toward the treetops. Everything became silent again, and soon the insects were chirping and birds called out to each other.
Nutsy returned with a thick branch from a tree. Butsko took it and wedged it between the boulders, heaving hard, separating them wide enough so he could get through.
“Bannon, Jones, Shilansky, come with me!”
