Suicide River

by Len Levinson

  Lieutenant Breckenridge saw the expression of doubt on Private Worthington's face, and figured out what he was thinking.

  “You've got a lot to learn about this war,” Lieutenant Breckenridge said with a chuckle. “There's much more to it than meets the eye.”

  Bannon finished his inspection of the recon platoon foxholes, and was on his way back to the foxhole he shared with Frankie La Barbara. He looked up at the full moon and saw a few wisps of clouds pass by its face. An owl hooted in a tree not far away, and Bannon walked around a thick tangled bush, following the trail back to his foxhole.

  A short squat figure loomed up at him out of the night. Bannon stopped and pulled the strap of his M 1 rifle slung from his shoulder.

  “What're you doing out here, young Corporal?” asked the deep gravelly voice of Colonel Hutchins.

  “Checking my men, sir.”

  Colonel Hutchins stepped forward, bringing a cloud of alcohol fumes with him. Bannon was a six-footer and looked down at Colonel Hutchins, who wore his steel helmet low over his eyes.

  “How are they?” Colonel Hutchins asked.

  “Ready to roll, sir.”

  “Care for a drink, young Corporal?”

  “Don't mind if I do, sir.”

  Colonel Hutchins pulled his canteen out of his case and handed it to Bannon, who unscrewed the top and drank some down.

  “That'll put some lead in your pencil,” Colonel Hutchins said.

  The booze burned Bannon's throat, and he coughed. His face turned red and his eyes watered. “It's got a helluva kick, sir,” Bannon said, handing the canteen back. “Thanks a lot.” Colonel Hutchins sipped some of the fiery liquid and smacked his lips as he inserted the canteen back into its case.

  “Is your platoon ready for the attack?” Colonel Hutchins asked.

  “Yes sir—as ready as they'll ever be.”

  “Do they believe the attack will come?”

  “Some do and some don't.”

  “Do you believe the attack will come?”

  “I don't know whether it's coming or not.”

  Colonel Hutchins made a fist, held it tight, and raised it in front of Bannon's face. Colonel Hutchins bared his teeth and his eyes sparkled as though a fire burned inside his head. “They're getting ready right now,” Colonel Hutchins said in a hoarse whisper, “and they're coming across that river pretty soon. I can smell them and I can feel them in my bones. You'd better get yourself ready, young Corporal. This is no bum steer. Old General Adachi is over there watching his men move toward their jump-offs. I can see him just as clear as I'm seeing you right now.”

  Colonel Hutchins stared into Corporal Bannon's eyes with great intensity, and Bannon felt uncomfortable. He didn't know what to do. “As you were,” Colonel Hutchins said.

  Bannon took a step backwards and saluted. “Yes sir.”

  Colonel Hutchins returned the salute solemnly, then walked past Bannon and continued down the trail. Bannon watched the night swallow him up, then took off his helmet and scratched his head. Returning his helmet to his head, he squared his shoulders and made his way back to his foxhole.

  Less than one thousand yards away, General Adachi watched soldiers from his Seventy-eighth Infantry Regiment march by on the trail that led past his bunker. The soldiers carried their Arisaka rifles slung over their shoulders and their long bayonets in scabbards affixed to their belts. Their packs were nearly empty, for there was little food to give them, and their backs were straight because they knew General Adachi was looking at them.

  General Adachi stood outside his tent, his hands clasped behind his back. Dots of sweat were on his forehead, caused by sharp gnawing pains inside his stomach, but his face was immobile. He couldn't let his soldiers see he was flawed in any way. Aides stood to the left and right of him, also watching the soldiers.

  “The men are ready for this fight,” said General Tatsunari Kimura, General Adachi's executive officer, standing to his right. “They will not fail.”

  General Adachi turned to him. “They will not fail because they can not fail,” he replied. “Everything depends on the outcome of this assault.”

  Officers nearby heard what he said and knew what he meant. If the assault failed, the Eighteenth Army was doomed and all the officers would have to commit hara-kiri, because the responsibility for the failure would be theirs. That was the long and the short of it. Their lives hung in the balance, and the attack was scheduled to begin in only two-and-a-half hours.

  TWELVE . . .

  Lieutenant Frannie Divers rushed along the jungle path, glancing at her watch. It was a few minutes after twenty-two hundred hours, and she was late for her appointment with Butsko.

  Frannie was all hot and bothered, and it wasn't just because of the tropical heat. She'd been thinking about Butsko ever since she saw him last, of his hairy chest and arms, his big broad shoulders, and the roguish smile on his face.

  The truth of the matter was that Frannie needed a good fuck. Captain Epstein was wonderfully interesting intellectually, and had a nice poetic personality, but he wasn't very thrilling from a sexual point of view, with his soft white flabby body that sometimes reminded her of a beached whale.

  Butsko was another matter. To her eyes and mind he was positively dripping with sex, bulging with muscles, and she just knew he had a big dick. She realized how sexually barren her love affair with Dr. Epstein had been.

  She'd lied to Dr. Epstein, and her conscience bothered her. She'd told him she was going to bed early, and he believed her because he trusted her completely, as she trusted him. She felt terrible about betraying him, but she craved Butsko. She wanted him to screw her all night long and make her come a hundred times.

  Finally she came to the rear of the pharmacy tent, where she was supposed to meet Butsko, but he wasn't there. She looked around and saw only bushes and trees, then glanced at her watch. She was nearly ten minutes late for the meeting. Maybe he'd left when she didn't show up on time. “Damn,” she muttered, glancing to her left and right. What if Captain Epstein walked by and saw her? What if somebody else noticed her there and mentioned it to Captain Epstein. What am I doing? she asked herself. Have I gone insane?

  Butsko lay only a few feet away in the bushes behind her, watching the show. She shuffled from foot to foot, checked her watch numerous times, crossed and uncrossed her arms nervously, and he couldn't help admiring how pretty and strong she was, with her big tits and hefty physical structure. Lieutenant Frannie was no delicate little flower. She was sturdy as many men, but with the soft flowing curves of a beautiful woman.

  “Hiya,” Butsko said, inside the bush.

  She spun around. “Where are you!”

  Butsko stood up. “Right here.”

  “What are you doing hiding in there?”

  “Because I didn't want anybody to see me hanging around. That bitch Agnes Shankar might see me and call the MPs.”

  “Well,” Frannie said, “you shouldn't have made me wait so long.”

  “You didn't wait so long, and you were late anyway.” Butsko walked toward her. “Let's go.”

  “Let's go where?”

  “Come with me, and watch your eyes.” He turned around and bent low, pushing his way through the bushes. She followed him, holding her arms up to protect her eyes.

  “Where are you taking me?” she asked.

  ‘To the El Morocco nightclub,” he replied.

  He trudged through the dense foliage, and she followed him, I ducking low, branches scraping across her uniform and scratching her arms.

  “Do we have to go this way?” she asked.

  “Stop complaining.”

  A few minutes later they came to a small clearing. The moon shone overhead and palm trees leaned all around them. A bird chirped in a tree and the sounds of the medical headquarters were far away.

  Butsko threw out his arms. “It's the El Morocco!” he said.

  She looked around and smiled. “It's very nice.”

  Butsko bowed a
nd angled his arm toward the ground. “Have a seat.”

  “Thank you,” she replied, dropping down to her fanny, crossing her legs.

  Butsko lowered himself to his knees and reached for his canteen. “Let's get drunk,” he said.

  “Drunk?” she replied. “I'm not sure I want to get drunk.”

  Butsko leaned toward her and winked. “Why not? Afraid you'll get crazy and do things you'd never do if you were sober?”

  “Maybe.”

  “You're probably afraid I'd take advantage of you if you was drunk, right?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Well don't worry about it. If I wanted to take advantage of you, it wouldn't matter to me if you was drunk or not.”

  A chill passed over her. She felt a little afraid, but also turned on somewhat by what he'd said. She thought about how she was all alone in the jungle with a big hairy man, with no one to save her, and that turned her on even more. Butsko took off his helmet, revealing his thick straight black hair. He needed a shave and shower, and Frannie could smell him. That, too, turned her on.

  He held out the canteen to her. “Ladies first,” he said.

  “That's okay,” she replied. “You can go first.”

  He unscrewed the top of the canteen, raised it to his lips, and threw his head back. She watched his Adam's apple bob up and down as he drank the white lightning. His shirt was unbuttoned nearly to his waist and he'd torn the sleeves off for air-conditioning. She looked at his big barrel chest, and then glanced down to his muscular thighs straining against his pants. He was so different from Captain Epstein that she thought they could belong to a different species of human being.

  He lowered the canteen and said, “Aaaahhhhh!” Wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, he held the canteen out to her. “Goddamn this is good stuff. Here—have some.”

  She held the canteen in both her hands and raised it to her mouth. Tilting it upwards, she took a swallow. Butsko could see her nipples against the material of her fatigue shirt, and felt raunchy. He wanted to grab her, throw her down to the ground, and wrestle with her, but didn't want to make any fast moves too quickly, because women were skittish until you got to know them well, and then they threw you down and wrestled with you. He was glad he was with her and not Lieutenant Betty Crawford, whom he'd stood up. He hadn't met her when he was supposed to, and she probably was wondering what happened to him. She could wonder all she wanted to. He wanted to roll around on the ground with Frannie Divers, and he'd deal with Betty Crawford and all her baloney some other time.

  “It's awfully strong,” Frannie said. “Where did you say you got it?”

  “A cook makes it.”

  “It tastes almost like the real thing. The jungle juice I've drunk up till now tasted like rotten garbage juice.”

  “This ain't jungle juice,” Butsko said. “This is real Kentucky white lightning made from a special recipe. Pass it over when you're finished with it.”

  “I'm not finished with it.”

  She raised the canteen and drank more, while he watched greedily and hoped she'd get drunk enough to tear off her clothes and go crazy. He was anxious to hug that strong supple body against him and press his mouth to hers. He couldn't wait to stick his dick into that soft sweet spot between her legs.

  She drank more and passed the canteen to him. He swallowed some down and handed it back to her. The canteen went back and forth a few times, and Frannie felt woozy. She hadn't drunk alcoholic beverages for over a month, and the white lightning was 150 proof. She thought about Captain Epstein all alone in his tent, probably reading a book before going to bed, and felt guilty.

  “I really shouldn't be here with you,” she said, holding out the canteen to Butsko.

  “Why not?”

  “Because I've got a boyfriend.”

  “So what.”

  “I feel guilty being here with you.”

  Butsko placed the canteen on the ground in front of him and sighed, “Here we go again.”

  “What are you talking about?” she asked.

  “All you women've got the same line of bullshit.”

  “What line of bullshit?”

  “You're always feeling guilty about something. You're always worried that you're gonna do something you shouldn't.” He looked into her big brown eyes. “I could understand it if we were back in the States and were was no war on, and you were married to somebody, but you're not married to anybody and there is a war on, and we might get killed tonight or tomorrow or who knows when. The war is a nightmare, and if people have a chance to have a little fun, they should take it. Why not?”

  “I don't know,” she said. “It would be terrible if my boy-friend found out.”

  “He's not gonna find out.”

  “What if he does?”

  “If he loves you so much, why doesn't he marry you?”

  His question surprised her. Marriage to Dr. Epstein had never occurred to her. “I don't know,” she said. “We've never talked about marriage.”

  “If he doesn't love you enough to marry you, and you don't love him enough to even talk about it, what the hell are you worrying about?”

  She wrinkled her nose and looked up at the moon floating across the sky. “I never thought of it that way.”

  “What way did you think about it?”

  “I thought Dr. Epstein and I were having a very serious love affair.”

  “How serious could it be if marriage never came up?”

  She thought for a few moments. “I don't know.”

  Butsko reached for the canteen again. “Some people make mountains out of molehills. They screw around with each other and try to convince themselves they're in love.”

  Is that what I'm doing? Frannie asked herself. Am I just trying to convince myself that I'm in love with Dr. Epstein? “Hand me that canteen, will you?” she said to Butsko.

  Butsko passed it to her and she drank some down, questioning what had been going on for the past month between her and Captain Epstein. Then she looked at Butsko and raised her bushy eyebrows.

  “What am I doing here with you?” she asked.

  “You just want to fuck me,” he replied, taking the canteen out of her hands.

  He raised it to his lips and drank some down, while she looked at him, mildly shocked by what he just said. She wasn't too shocked because she'd been raised in a household of brothers who cursed all the time. Butsko screwed the top back onto the canteen and placed it to his side.

  “Guess what I'm going to do now?” he asked.

  “What?”

  “I'm going to grab you,” he said, “so get ready.”

  She didn't know how to get ready, but he leaned forward and was all over her anyway. He took her in his arms, pushed her to the ground, and rolled on top of her, feeling her strong firm body underneath him, her breasts pressing against his chest, and then he touched his lips to hers, gently at first, but he hadn't had a woman for a long time and his passions got the better of him. She opened her mouth and he thrust his tongue inside, tasting her saliva tinged with white lightning. They squirmed against each other and Frannie decided to stop worrying and let go. Butsko was so powerful, so different from Dr. Epstein, just what she needed.

  He rolled off her and unbuttoned the front of her fatigue shirt. She wore a khaki GI brassiere underneath it, and he reached around to unsnap the hooks. The brassiere came apart and he pulled it away, revealing her size-forty breasts.

  “My God,” Butsko muttered, burying his face in those fabulous breasts, licking them, sucking her nipples, grunting and breathing hard, while she hugged his head tightly against her and writhed, grinding her teeth together, looking up at the moon.

  Bannon raised his head and peered over the top of his foxhole. Ahead through openings between trees he could see the Driniumor River churning and rushing toward the sea. Only darkness and the fuzzy outlines of the jungle could be seen on the other side.

  “Anything going on?” Frankie asked.

  “I can'
t see anything.”

  “I bet the Japs don't attack tonight. I think this alert is just another way to harass the troops.”

  Bannon dropped back into the foxhole. “You wanna bet?”

  “I'll bet you twenty dollars,” Frankie said.

  “It's a deal.”

  They shook hands solemnly in the darkness of the foxhole.

  “What makes you so sure the Japs're gonna attack?” Frankie asked.

  “Colonel Hutchins told me they're gonna attack.”

  “How does he know?”

  “He can tell.”

  “How can he tell?”

  “He's an old soldier and I guess he's got a special instinct about these things.”

  Frankie laughed. “He's an old drunk—that's what he is. What's so special about that?”

  “I believe him,” Bannon said.

  “You're just a fucking cowboy,” Frankie replied. “What do you know? You just lost twenty dollars.”

  “We'll see,” Bannon said.

  “You're a fucking asshole and that's all you'll ever be no matter how many stripes you got on your shoulder,” Frankie told him.

  “We'll see.”

  Lieutenant Betty Crawford wondered what happened to Butsko. She'd waited for an hour at the place she was supposed to meet him, and he never showed. She couldn't believe he'd stand her up, not after all they'd been through together. She thought something must have happened to him, and now entered his tent to see if he'd fallen asleep in his sack.

  It was dark inside the tent, and many of the cots were empty. Some of the men snored, and a few read newspapers and magazines by the light of kerosene lamps. She walked down the rows of cots and finally came to the one Butsko slept on, but it was empty.

  “Anybody know where Sergeant Butsko is?” she asked in a whisper.

  “I saw him going into Captain Epstein's office an hour ago,” somebody replied on the other side of the tent.

  Betty wondered why Butsko had gone to see Captain Epstein. It must have been something important if he'd broken the date he'd made with her. She decided to go to Captain Epstein's office and see if Butsko still was there. Turning, she headed toward the tent flap. She was worried that perhaps Butsko had become ill suddenly with blood poisoning or some other serious medical problem.